From politics to our mental lives, everything today seems disorganized. People talk past each other during disagreements. Conversation rarely pursues a single thread, and instead jumps from one disconnected idea to another. Our thoughts follow a similar pattern: we dart from one task to another, and sometimes we can’t remember what we were doing just five minutes ago.
This sense of clutter is no doubt aggravated by over-connectivity, nonstop notifications, and addictions to doom-scrolling. But our own thinking habits-whether skillful or scrambled-shape our lives, too. If put to proper use, our minds can still help us achieve clarity, order, wisdom, and even happiness. So how can we can begin to reclaim our minds’ innate powers?
In his November 2021 book, Think Better: Unlocking the Power of Reason, Notre Dame’s William K. Warren Professor of Theology Ulrich Lehner provides a down-to-earth and lively guide on how to make use of our minds’ built-in resources-and how doing so can help us thrive. Watch this Public Discourse webinar discussion of the book with Professor Lehner, moderated by managing editor Elayne Allen.