What is ‘Mind Hacking’ AKA metacognition?

AKA What the hell?

7 min readDec 12, 2018

In our tech-heavy world, hackers get a bad rap. But, according to Sir John Hargrave, we’re all hackers — mind hackers.

In his book Mind Hacking (print, eBook, audiobook), Hargrave brilliantly details how we can improve our cognitive control and focus our mind, which are linked to success in school, work, and life.

Mind Hacking, he says, isn’t just about thinking; it’s about meta-thinking — thinking about our thinking (a term known as metacognition). By doing so, we can “hack back into our minds and rewrite the code,” based on what we want to achieve in school, work, relationships, life.

Here are my top takeaways from this book:

1. Upgrade yourself from a user to a super-user.

In a study, subjects were trained to (a) focus on a specific target, (b) notice when their minds had wondered, and then © return their attention back to the target. With practice, they were able to sustain attention and ignore distraction for progressively longer periods of time (the crux of Deep Work), actually rewiring their neural circuitry to be more efficient and productive.

As mind hackers, we want to log out of what Hargrave calls “user mode” (autopilot, essentially) and log back in as a “super-user,” so we can rewire our brains to be more efficient and productive.

Getting logged out of the system is not the problem, he says. The problem is when we don’t notice that we’ve been logged out of the system. With time and training, you can stay in “super-user mode” for longer periods of time, which will produce better results in all aspects of your life.

2. Think of attention like money.

When you focus your attention on attention itself, it’s like putting money in a bank account with compounding interest. If it takes money to make money, it also takes attention to make attention.

In the Attention Economy — a term coined by Thomas H. Davenport and J. C. Beck in their book The Attention Economy: Understanding the New Currency of Business — attention is the most scarce (and therefore valuable) commodity, which makes time our most valuable resource. The better we use it, the more valuable it is.

2. Fragmentation of attention (multitasking) makes us weaker.

Stanford University sociologist Clifford Nass, a pioneer of multitasking research, explains it like this:

“People who multitask all the time can’t filter out irrelevancy. They can’t manage a working memory. They’re chronically distracted. They’re even terrible at multitasking. When we asked them to multitask, they’re even worse at it, so they’re pretty much mental wrecks.”

3. Bookend habits with cues and rewards.

Citing Charles Duhigg’s book The Power of Habit, Hargrave talks about the importance of using the cue-and-reward system to create positive habits. His tips for cementing habits include:

Choose a consistent time (e.g. first thing in the morning).
Choose a consistent place (i.e. somewhere you won’t be disturbed).
Choose a consistent reminder (e.g. a digital reminder).
Choose a consistent reward (e.g. a shower, breakfast, music).

4. Use the ‘5 Whys’ to eliminate negative thought loops.

The “5 Whys” is a technique commonly used in business problem-solving, that was developed by Sakichi Toyoda (who founded Toyota Industries Company, the company from which Toyota Motor Corporation developed).

Hargrave recommends using this technique — asking “why” five or so times to identify the root of a problem — to debug negative thought loops (things we tell ourselves over and over again, which control just about everything we do).

“Your loops create your thoughts. Your thoughts create your actions. Your actions create your life. Therefore, the quality of our loops determines the quality of our lives.”

Hargrave gives the example of Charlie, a 25-year-old programmer who usually gets fired from or quits a job:

Why can’t you hold a job, Charlie? — I can’t get along with my bosses.
Why — Sometimes I’m insubordinate.
Why — Now that I think about it, it’s more like I don’t want to be forced to do something I don’t believe in.
Why — Because I had to do that a lot growing up. I hate that my father was so dominating.
Why — Because it makes me feel like I can’t be trusted to make my own decisions (the root of Charlie’s problem).

5. Track your mind-hacking progress in a measurable, scientific way.

As an adult, Benjamin Franklin started a moral perfection project — a set of 13 virtues he wished to develop in himself. To ensure these virtues became habits, Franklin used a diary to make a simple grid, with columns representing each day of the week, and rows measuring each of the 13 virtues.

Each day, Franklin reviewed his progress across the 13 virtues, marking with a black spot any day in which he didn’t live up to his ideal self. Each week, Franklin also had a target virtue (i.e. a thought loop) that he would strive to habituate for the entire week.

If you’re struggling to get started with positive thought loops, Hargrave recommends writing down the following fill-in-the-blanks 15 times each day:

I will feel __________.
I will do __________.
I will have __________.
I will give __________.
I will be/become __________.

6. Until it’s on paper, it’s vapor.

The obvious-yet-often-underutilized practice of writing down our ideas, thoughts, and resolutions is a game-changer. Writing is a gateway behind the world of mind and the world of matter. It’s how thoughts become things, how an idea gets from our heads into our hands.

In 2008, a study funded by the National Institute of Health recruited nearly 1,700 people to help them lose weight — by keeping a food diary (a written or digital list of everything they ate).

The results were astounding: The more food records people kept, the more weight they lost. Knowing their food choices would be recorded, rather than eaten and forgotten, was a powerful motivator to make better choices. Furthermore, participants began noticing patterns in their diet, which could only be understood and appreciated after they wrote it down.

7. Operate like an addict.

Addiction is widely considered to be a lifelong disease. Hence why treatment professionals promote neuroplasticity, the brain’s ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections, instead of a lifelong cure. When addicts rewire their brain connections to make better decisions, they can more effectively achieve and maintain sobriety.

To achieve neuroplasticity, professionals recommend writing down your next day’s schedule — Vertical Planning — including both work and rest, from as soon as you awake until bedtime. The purpose is to turn a negative loop (using a substance, feeling bad, and using the substance again) into a virtuous cycle (making progress, feeling good, and making more progress).

8. Optimistic people’s field of perception is literally greater.

When you write out your positive thought loops daily (revisit number 5), you’re more likely to notice the people and situations that can help you achieve your positive thought loops, as they present themselves. You’ll also set your expectations accordingly, and you’ll begin viewing situations in a different light.

For example, if you’re repeatedly writing out the positive thought loop of getting skinnier, and someone invites you to an exercise class, you’ll see it as an opportunity, not just another activity on your to-do list.

Also, when you commit to investing time and energy in the small task of writing out your positive thought loops each day, you’re more likely to commit yourself to investing time and energy into the larger tasks that will bring your thought loops to life.

9. A constant reminder of anything will help you achieve, well, anything.

Want to break a bad habit, or start a new one? Create a reminder. Want to achieve something? Create a reminder. Want to be better at something? Create a reminder.

The more reminders you create, the more they’ll stick in your mind, and the more likely you are to follow through with whatever the reminder represents. After all, the word remind literally means “bringing it back to mind.”

You are responsible for creating reminders for yourself, Hargrave says, but he recommends putting them in the following places for optimal success:

Hanging on your computer monitor, nightstand, or dresser
Making a computer background, screensaver, or smartphone background
Breakfast area
Daily alarm
Bathroom (“across from the toilet is ideal”)

10. Small pushes, when timed correctly, can have big effects.

A term borrowed from physics, resonance is the practice of using minimal effort to create maximum force.

When you shift your focus from getting things done, to getting the right things done, Hargrave says, you’ll move closer to this equilibrium. These “right things” are known as keystone habits, or single habits that lead to several good habits, resulting in a chain effect that produces a plethora of positive outcomes.

If your keystone habit is to meditate for 10 minutes per day, for example, you’ll become less stressed. By becoming less stressed, you’ll strengthen your immune system. By strengthening your immune system, you’ll get sick less often. By getting sick less often, you’ll be more productive. By being more productive, you’ll feel more accomplished. By feeling more accomplished, you’ll be even more productive, and the chain continues.

There’s more where that came from at Hack My Time.