Royane Real
Are You a Left Brained Thinker or a Right Brained Thinker?
By Royane Real
Have you ever heard someone say, “I’m a left-brained thinker” or “I’m a right-brained thinker” ? If you have heard these terms, you have probably wondered what they meant.
When a person calls himself a left brained thinker, what he is trying to say that he is very logical and linear in his thinking, but not very emotional or creative. When a person calls himself a right brained thinker, he is trying to say that he is emotional and creative, but not very logical or linear.
Why do we use this particular set of terms to describe how different people think? It’s because of the way the brain is constructed.
Even if you’re not a brain surgeon, you probably have a basic idea of what the brain looks like. We’ve all seen many pictures of the brain, our most important organ. Pictures of the brain show a rounded object with a very convoluted surface, split into two parts, looking more or less like a giant walnut.
Scientists call the two basic sides of the brain the right hemisphere, and the left hemisphere. That word hemisphere means “half of a sphere”.
For a long time, we have known that the right and the left brain control slightly different functions, because of knowledge gained in studying the way that people are affected after experiencing a head trauma.
Now, we can study more scientifically what roles the two hemispheres of the brain play.
It turns out that there is a lot of overlap in what the two halves of the brain do, but there is also some degree of specialization involved.
In general, the left half of the brain gets more involved in processes that need a lot of logical thinking, and the right half of the brain gets more involved with processes that need creative and emotional thinking.
Which type do you think you are? Most of us are able to be both logical and creative, but usually we are much better at one type of thinking compared to the other.
Which kind of thinking is best? The answer is that both types of thinking approaches are important. When a person is too logical, or too illogical, problems can arise. A person who can only think logically will have just as many problems as a person who never tries to think logically.
No matter which kind of thinking you’re already good at, why not practice a bit of the opposite? Both hemispheres of your brain have their own talents and their own kinds of knowledge. If you only use one kind of thinking all the time, you may lose out on some valuable insights that you could gain by expanding your mind.
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