Being the Type

Cognitive Systems

by Robert Atwater, March 9, 2025
AI Generated Art

Understanding Your Mind: A Framework for Growth

Too often, self-improvement advice misses the mark because it ignores how our cognitive processes really work. By clarifying the core mental functions that drive our behaviors and decisions, we can develop more effective strategies for personal growth. In this article, we introduce four main cognitive processes that shape your subjective reality—and explain how your natural preferences, influenced by feelings of pleasure and pain, determine your habits and choices.

This framework builds on ideas from modern psychology (see, for example, Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow and research on effort discounting in decision-making, such as Kool et al. (2010). While Carl Jung suggested that we tend to prioritize certain cognitive processes—which he linked to his ideas on introversion and extraversion—I view those as early, rough sketches. In my framework, what you often label as introversion or extroversion is really about the comfort (or discomfort) you experience when gathering information versus organizing it.

Information Gathering

1. Sensory Processing

Every thought, decision, and belief begins with how you take in the world. This process is not just passive reception—it’s an active construction of your subjective reality. Your sensory inputs and initial perceptions lay the groundwork for everything that follows.

2. Conceptualization

Once information is observed, your mind works to comprehend and create new realizations. Conceptualization involves connecting ideas, comprehending complex issues, and solving problems—those “aha” moments that transform raw sensory data into meaningful insights.

Information Frameworking

3. Integrating

After insights are formed, your mind must organize and structure them to make sense of the world. Cognitive Integration involves determining what fits into your logical, consistent understanding of existence. It operates through two strategies:

• Embedding: Integrating new information into your worldview without alteration, creating stability and continuity.
• Optimizing: Refining and adjusting existing frameworks to better align with your priorities and experiences, thus increasing harmony in your internal narrative.

4. Biasing

Both before and after your mind has framed information, you might assign a value to that information—determining what is good or bad, and what is better or worse. This emotionally charged valuation process is essential for decision-making and further adjusts your frameworks. It operates through two complementary strategies:

• Enterprising: Prioritizing outcomes and achievements by assigning elevated values based on the probability of producing desired results.
• Advocating: Prioritizing processes and intentions by assigning elevated values based on the virtues demonstrated in the persuit of success.

The likelihood of using each of these strategies is also influenced by biases—the more comfortable you feel using a particular strategy (or the more you fear its absence), the more likely you are to default to it.

A Brief CPU Analogy

Cognitive science often describes the brain as a type of biological computer. In this analogy, these four cognitive processes function much like a CPU's core operations. Information Gathering acts as the input processing stage, Information Organizing structures and sorts the data, and Biasing determines which processes take priority by assigning value. An image at the bottom of this article will visually represent these cognitive functions alongside System 1 and System 2, setting the stage for our next deep dive into that area.

Why This Framework Can Transform Your Personal Growth

• Clarity in Decision-Making: Recognizing how you gather, conceptualize, frame, and assign value enables you to better identify and adjust limiting habits and biases.
• Enhanced Learning: Tailor your learning strategies to work with your natural information processing rather than against it.
• Balanced Growth: Addressing both the pleasures and pains associated with different mental functions helps you optimize your behavior in a sustainable way.
• Resilience and Adaptability: By understanding that your preferences are shaped by comfort and fear, you can consciously choose to step out of your comfort zone when necessary for growth.

We acknowledge that this framework is a temporary oversimplification of the complex interplay of cognitive processes. Future articles will offer deeper nuance and clarity to refine these ideas further.

This article is just the beginning. Future posts will delve deeper into each of these topics, offering actionable strategies based on the latest research in cognitive science and psychology. By building clear, digestible “data chunks” of information, you’ll be equipped with the insights needed to optimize your thinking—and, ultimately, your life.