"What Impact Do Focus on Dividends and a Narrow-Minded Attitude Have on Us?"

This article is Lu Canwei's 75th original piece.

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In the previous article "How 996 Changed Our Lives," we mentioned why I can be more efficient in completing tasks with deadlines before the deadline.

Scientists designed a virtual game similar to Angry Birds, where players must play at least 20 rounds. At the start of each round, players receive some blueberries, and after shooting them, they score points based on the trajectory, meaning the more shots taken, the more points can be earned.

The scientists provided one group of participants with 6 blueberries per round and another group with 3. The results showed that players with more resources shot more casually, while those with fewer resources made wiser judgments when shooting.

This phenomenon is referred to by scientists as the "focus dividend." We often accomplish what we believe to be impossible under conditions of resource scarcity, such as finishing a daily update before the deadline.

Additionally, scientists found that firefighters have the second-highest probability of dying in vehicle accidents, second only to heart disease. About 25% of deaths are due to car accidents, with 79% of those being because they were not wearing seatbelts.

Firefighters should have a greater awareness of safety than the average person, and they generally remind their families to wear seatbelts. So why do they fail to do so themselves? Is it a double standard?

Not quite. When they receive an alarm, they must quickly change clothes, rush to the fire scene, and formulate firefighting strategies on the way. They need to study the building structure, entry and exit routes, and the number of fire hydrants, all within a very short time frame. Their ability to do this is thanks to the focus dividend.

However, the consequence of this dividend is that excessive focus can lead to neglecting seemingly trivial tasks like buckling a seatbelt. Scientists refer to this situation as "tunneling," indicating that when we focus on one thing, we tend to overlook others.

This is also why the poor get poorer. When the poor fall into tunneling, they face unpaid bills and focus on solving that immediate problem, neglecting longer-term considerations, such as the risks of borrowing. After all, future issues can always be resolved somehow.

So we comfort ourselves with the saying, "The boat will reach the bridge when it gets there."

The impact of tunneling goes far beyond this; it profoundly affects how we make decisions. Deadlines can lead to short-sightedness. When we focus on immediate benefits, we tend to amplify our own gains in collaboration with others, considering how to maximize our own profits while minimizing other benefits, such as the potential for future win-win scenarios through altruism.

When we begin to focus on a particular matter and enter a state of tunneling, it can lead to inhibitory effects.

I believe everyone has experienced this, such as when I focus too much on someone's flaws and overlook their strengths. This can lead to increasing dislike for them, extending to their words and actions, and even their name becoming off-putting.

Focusing on an important matter can make it harder to think about other things we care about. Psychologists refer to this phenomenon as "goal inhibition."

We often see people making seemingly irrational decisions because they are trapped in a tunneling mindset, unable to make reasonable assessments of costs and benefits. The negative impacts of these mental burdens are not included in their evaluation criteria.

A clear example is insurance. Because I am currently financially strapped, I might say I can't afford it, only to find that not buying insurance ultimately leads to an inability to cover health-related risks. Sometimes we try to do several things at once to save time, which is a benefit brought by the focus dividend in tunneling.

However, the things outside the "tunnel" are often overlooked. For instance, while I am writing this article, I am already late for a meeting with a friend. But the benefit of the focus dividend is that I spent only half the usual time writing this daily update.

The book "Scarcity" had a significant impact on me, and I highly recommend everyone read it.

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