How is it that we make so many decisions every day? On the show in the past we've talked about heuristics and we've talked about bias and we've also talked about how our brains are kind of lazy. Over time they learn to kind of compress information and we have to force them, kind of kick them into gear manually sometimes. Sometimes that's a simple thing like taking a new route to work, but other times it seems a little bit more difficult. We're going to talk about something that kind of encompasses all of this information in today's episode, and I'm really excited about this topic because what we're going to talk about today will truly kind of apply to everyone, first of all, but it'll apply to everything that you ever do in your career. And I'm not overstating this. I'm not exaggerating it. It is actually truly all-encompassing. That's the topic that we're talking about today is all-encompassing. My name is Jonathan Cottrell. You're listening to Developer Tea. My goal on the show is to help driven developers, hopefully you are a driven developer, to help driven developers connect to their career purpose so they can turn around and do good work, do better work, actually produce quality things, or actually do quality research, build positive relationships with their coworkers or with the people that use the products that they create. Right. Whoever they're servicing. So that's really the goal is to kind of better the environment that developers are cultivating. And we do that by connecting you to your career purpose. But going beyond that, really kind of helping you understand the pathway to better thinking, the pathway to continuous improvement, to lifelong learning. And so we want to uncover as much of that as we can on this show. So today's episode... I'm really excited about it because even though it's a very simple topic on the face of it, it really does encompass all of these things that we've talked about so many times on this show. Before we jump in, I do want to talk about something I wish that everyone would try at least once in their lives. It's a very simple thing. It's loose leaf tea. We are not actually a tea show. I assume that a lot of you do get a cup of tea every once in a while when you listen to the show. And there's not a better... way to do tea than to do it with loose leaf tea. And you can get premium tea right now from Mad Monk Tea for 15% off if you use the code developer tea. How many times can we say the word tea in one episode? But truly, this is such a good product. They have all of the stuff that you need, by the way, to brew loose leaf tea right there in their store. And it's all affordable. Of course, they have a tea of the month club. Go and check that out. Head over to MadMonkTea.com. And remember the code developer tea at checkout for that 15% off. Thank you to Mad Monk Tea for partnering with developer tea. So we're talking today about this thing that kind of all encompassing concept that it covers bias. It covers the lazy brain. It covers differing perceptions. This concept is the mental model. Mental models. This is such a huge topic. It's so important to understand this, at least from an outside perspective, understand what it means to have a mental model. A mental model is a way of thinking in a limited field. That's the way I'm going to describe it on today's episode. I encourage you to go and do some research on your own once we've gone past this episode, because there's no way we're going to cover everything in today's episode. But mental models, they really kind of became super popular in the... business world because of Charlie Munger. If you haven't heard of Charlie Munger, then you're probably not alone, even though he is amongst one of the most successful businessmen in our time. So Charlie Munger is actually the partner of Warren Buffett. And back in 1994, Charlie Munger spoke to the USC Business School. And he basically laid out this idea that you need multiple mental models to be successful. And it seems like it's going to be hard, he says, but ultimately, a very small number of these mental models carry most of the weight. He also says that you need mental models from multiple fields, not just whatever your particular field of study is. So how can we identify these multiple models? And how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? So how can we find ways of expanding our own set of mental models? See you soon! and discuss useful mental models that I'm finding in my own career and share them with you. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you again to WooCommerce for sponsoring today's episode. Remember, WooCommerce is such an incredibly easy thing to get up and rolling with, and they're offering you a 20% discount for using the code DEVELOPERT. That's two words, DEVELOPERT at checkout. And remember, that code ends in March 2018. The end of March, that code is going to expire. So make sure you head over to WooCommerce.com slash DEVELOPERT today. Thank you again for listening. If you're enjoying these episodes, and if you don't want to miss out on future episodes, make sure you subscribe. There will be future episodes, and they come very quickly. So it's easy to get behind, and then ultimately, you're probably going to miss something that you would have actually connected with, enjoyed, and potentially benefited from. So go ahead and subscribe on whatever podcasting app you use. Thank you so much for listening. And until next time, enjoy your tea. See you soon.