Psychological Mindedness Part 1

Posted on April 08, 2017 by Josephine Heiss, One of Thousands of Life Coaches on Noomii.

The concept of psychological mindedness has been written about and described both anecdotally and empirically over the last century. I was recently reminded of this idea and thought how an understanding of this concept goes hand in hand with coaching and with being a good coaching candidate in that being interested in the inner workings of our minds and how our thinking greatly impacts our lives helps clients to be successful in the coaching process.

According to an article in the International Journal of Psychoanalysis, written by Stephen Appelbaum. When evaluating the idea of psychological mindedness Appelbaum asked the question, "Is there one ability or a congeries of related abilities…[that leads to psychological mindedness?] This idea from Appelbaum got me thinking? Could people strive to attain a state of psychological mindedness or was it an inherited trait or set of biological requirements that a person either had or didn’t have? And if we were inclined to develop our psychological mindedness what abilities should we focus on? Lastly, if a majority of people across the board lack psychological mindedness and were therefore unable to examine the contents of their own mind; how could they learn to see past their own mind’s defenses and begin to heal and grow?

To start let’s break down Appelbaum’s definition of the concept into two parts. The first part states that psychological mindedness includes, “a person’s ability to see relationships among thoughts, feelings and actions…” This implies that a person must, at a minimum, have the ability to pay sustained attention to incoming information and have access to stored long term memories which requires complex reasoning and problem solving skills. This is a cognitive ability that thankfully many of us access every day. The second part of Appelbaum’s definition continues, “with the goal of learning the meaning and cause of the [witnessed] experiences and behaviors” [that they recognize.] This last part implies that the person intends to use what they learned by observing themselves in their relationships to better understand themselves and others more genuinely. This intention setting is the essence of a successful coaching experience.

The next article I reviewed is from the Journal of Clinical Psychology from June 2005. Here the authors, cite the following, “Farber offered a comprehensive definition of Psychological Mindedness that involves awareness of psychological processes in self and other…” the article goes on to explain, “the high minded or psychologically minded person understands that [their observed] psychological constructs have substance…” or in other words that their thoughts have weight and that context matters, including our opinions of others that comes up in the examination of our thoughts.

This second definition is helpful because it shifts the focus from our cognitive ability that was addressed in Appelbaum’s definition to our willingness to see our own shortcomings in regards to our interactions with others and to strive to change. Once we gain awareness of our thoughts we can use tools like coaching and meditation to dis-identify with them and we can hold that same space for others as well. Then we can begin to set and apply our intention to our patterned ways of thinking and learn how and where we get hooked and be open to transformation.

The knowledge that we are all in the same boat psychologically, for the most part, in that we are all slaves to our hardwired thinking processes, brings to mind the quote attributed to both Plato and Ian McLaren “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

From this research on the operational definitions of this concept, I have developed my own ideas about what it means to be psychologically minded. I feel that it is closely related to being introspective. It means having the willingness to pause and to see yourself as an object in your own awareness in order to observe your mental and emotional health and to extend that same understanding to others without judgement. This exercise of stepping back and pausing takes practice. And it is one that I suggest when I first start to work with a new client. Meditation is the best tool with which to explore our inner workings and build the muscle of self reflection. When we are able to see ourselves more clearly we step out of the cycle of endless stories that our minds spins from our thoughts about what is happening to us and we stop clinging to external sources to fuel our emotional energy. We are more present and we can respond to life instead of reacting unskillful to it.

In my next article I will discuss steps for developing a more psychologically leaning mind!
until then I welcome your feedback and thoughts. Be well.