Vox

Leitura de 25 min

Your Capacity for Growth Is Dependent on This Factor - Cognitive Load Theory

Summary

This episode delves into Cognitive Load Theory, a psychological framework explaining how the amount of mental effort required for a task impacts learning and performance. The host establishes that a significant portion of knowledge work, especially software engineering, is fundamentally about learning—whether it’s new technologies, problem domains, or team dynamics. The core tenet is that there is an optimal level of cognitive load that maximizes learning efficiency; both overloading and underloading our cognitive capacity are detrimental.

The discussion emphasizes that cognitive load is non-discriminatory; it aggregates from all sources, including work tasks, personal stressors, fatigue, and environmental distractions. This means external factors consume the same finite cognitive resources needed for professional work, leaving less ‘headroom’ for optimal performance. While overload is the more common issue, underload—often from insufficient challenge—can also lead to disengagement and low performance.

A critical insight for managers is that cognitive load is not static; it varies daily for each individual based on life circumstances, energy levels, and interest. Effective management involves opening conversations with team members about their cognitive load to collaboratively find the right level of engagement. The host shares a practical approach of asking reports about their energy and positivity levels as a starting point for this dialogue.

The episode also explores how skills develop: through repeated practice near the point of ‘task saturation,’ the cognitive load required for a specific skill decreases as it becomes internalized or automated (e.g., developing muscle memory). This frees up cognitive capacity to take on new challenges or parallel skills, which is the pathway for career growth. The host concludes by connecting cognitive load management to empathy, encouraging listeners to understand how varying loads affect their own and others’ capacity to learn and perform.

Topic Timeline

  • 00:00:11 — Introduction to Cognitive Load and Its Importance — The host introduces the episode’s focus on cognitive load, framing it as a concept that can change how developers structure their day, manage sprints, and assign work. He posits that a huge part of knowledge work, especially software engineering, is fundamentally about learning—gathering information and creating connections in the brain. This sets the stage for discussing how cognitive load directly impacts our capacity to learn and succeed.
  • 00:03:07 — Core Tenet of Cognitive Load Theory — The host explains the core principle of Cognitive Load Theory: there is an optimal load that maximizes learning ability. Operating outside this optimal range—either overloaded or underloaded—is detrimental to the rate of learning. He visualizes this as a ‘corridor’ or range where performance is best, suggesting there’s likely an exponential falloff in learning ability once cognitive load passes a certain threshold.
  • 00:05:49 — Cognitive Load is Non-Discriminatory — A key insight is presented: cognitive load does not discriminate based on the source of the load. Stress from work, personal life, a messy desk, or hunger all consume the same finite cognitive resources. This means non-work factors reduce the available ‘headroom’ for optimal work performance. The host notes that while overload is the more common problem, underload from insufficient challenge can also cause disengagement.
  • 00:08:06 — Cognitive Load is Not Static - Advice for Managers — The host emphasizes that cognitive load varies day-to-day for every individual. For managers, the job is not to ignore this variability but to recognize it and open a conversation with reports about their cognitive load. The goal is to work collaboratively to find the right level of engagement. A practical tip shared is asking team members about their energy and positivity levels to start this dialogue and diagnose whether dips are from overload or underload.
  • 00:10:47 — Types of Cognitive Load and Engagement — The discussion touches on different categories of load within Cognitive Load Theory, such as intrinsic load (the difficulty inherent to the subject). Engagement is also highlighted as a factor; sometimes performance is low not due to load level, but because the work is the wrong subject for the person’s interests, leading to selective disengagement. This underscores the need for managers to consider both the amount and the type of work assigned.
  • 00:13:34 — Self-Awareness and Managing Your Own Load — The host encourages listeners to develop self-awareness to recognize their own signals of being overloaded or underloaded. By tuning into feelings and behaviors associated with different load levels, individuals can make better daily decisions about whether to take on more, scale back, or have conversations with their manager. This self-management is key to optimizing personal working capacity.
  • 00:14:33 — Practical Example: Why Multitasking Fails — A simple writing exercise is proposed to demonstrate cognitive load in action. Writing your name and address sequentially is compared to interleaving letters from each task. The interleaved version takes drastically longer due to increased cognitive load from switching contexts and holding more information in working memory. This illustrates the fundamental reason multitasking is inefficient and can lead to overload.
  • 00:16:05 — Task Saturation and Skill Development — Using the example of flight training, the host describes ‘task saturation’—pushing to the edge of cognitive capacity. Repeated practice near this point leads to skill development not by increasing total cognitive capacity, but by reducing the cognitive load required for that specific skill through internalization and muscle memory. This process frees up cognitive resources to learn new things in parallel.
  • 00:19:44 — Growth as Reducing Cognitive Load per Skill — Growth within this framework is defined as reducing the cognitive load needed to perform a skill, thereby freeing capacity. For developers, this means initially higher load for new skills, making it risky to adopt too many at once. Over time, internalized skills allow for taking on new, different cognitive loads or more parallel work. The host concludes by linking personal life management to career success, as cognitive load aggregates from all life domains.

Episode Info

  • Podcast: Developer Tea
  • Author: Jonathan Cutrell
  • Category: Technology Business Careers Society & Culture
  • Published: 2025-07-23T07:00:00Z
  • Duration: 00:23:49

References

Podcast Info

Transcript

[00:00:00] Hey everyone, and welcome to today’s episode of Developer Tea.

[00:00:11] In today’s episode, we’re going to be talking about this concept of cognitive load.

[00:00:18] My goal on the show is to help driven developers like you find clarity, perspective, and purpose

[00:00:23] in their careers, and clarity in particular in today’s episode is what we’re going to

[00:00:30] focus on.

[00:00:31] This concept is one that can change the way you think about structuring your day.

[00:00:39] It can change the way you think about, if you lead reports, for example, how you structure

[00:00:46] their time, how you structure a sprint, what kind of work.

[00:00:53] You assign how well a person is expected to focus in a given circumstance, and there’s

[00:01:02] some very simple ways to experience what we’re talking about in today’s episode, to actually

[00:01:10] feel it while you’re listening to the episode.

[00:01:14] I’m going to try to do some of those proofs or examples.

[00:01:23] During this episode, the first kind of assumption that we make before we get into this episode,

[00:01:30] and hopefully you can follow me here, the first assumption that we’re going to make

[00:01:34] is that software engineering, and not just software engineering, but our careers as professional

[00:01:47] adults throughout our lives are charged.

[00:01:53] I’m going to try to do some of those proofs or examples, and hopefully you can follow me here,

[00:01:56] that a huge portion of the work we do is fundamentally learning.

[00:02:03] Learning about a problem, learning a new technology, learning how to work with another person,

[00:02:09] learning about the product that we’re building, right?

[00:02:14] This is all gathering information in our environment, whether that is explicitly defined information

[00:02:21] or if it’s something that we have to do in our daily lives.

[00:02:23] This is all gathering information in our environment, whether that is explicitly defined

[00:02:23] and reasoning about it, learning about it, creating the connections in our brain, right?

[00:02:32] If anybody disagrees with this, I’d love to hear your theory on why this isn’t the case.

[00:02:39] But fundamentally, a huge part of what we do as engineers, and really, it doesn’t matter

[00:02:47] if you’re an engineer or not, if you’re working in any kind of knowledge work, if you’re working

[00:02:51] in any kind of startup, for example.

[00:02:53] A huge part of what you’re doing is learning, all right?

[00:02:57] So we’re going to kind of take it for granted in order to take the next leap in this discussion.

[00:03:07] The concept of cognitive learning theory, right?

[00:03:12] Cognitive learning theory, the kind of core tenet of cognitive learning theory is that there is some optimal load

[00:03:23] under which our learning environment excels.

[00:03:30] Another way to put that is there’s some amount of information load, some amount of processing load

[00:03:39] that optimizes our learning ability.

[00:03:45] It optimizes how much information can we learn in a given unit of time.

[00:03:53] Overloading or underloading, right?

[00:03:57] Overloading our cognitive capacity or underloading our cognitive capacity is detrimental to this rate,

[00:04:06] to this cognitive learning rate.

[00:04:10] Okay, so you can kind of think about this as a corridor.

[00:04:17] And likely, you know, there’s some range where, you know, there’s some range where there’s some kind of

[00:04:23] you can’t get perfect cognitive load necessarily, but there is some optimal amount.

[00:04:35] And as long as you’re close to that optimal amount, you’re probably going to get most of the benefits of this phenomenon, right?

[00:04:42] I’m not really sure what the falloff looks like.

[00:04:44] I haven’t really dug into the studies that have been done to that degree.

[00:04:49] I suspect that there is some kind of exponential falloff.

[00:04:52] And once you go past a certain cognitive load, your learning ability tanks pretty quickly.

[00:04:58] That would be my guess.

[00:05:00] It doesn’t really matter too much for what we’re actually trying to target here, right?

[00:05:06] Which is to recognize that cognitive load, right?

[00:05:09] So we have a direct relationship between our capacity to learn, which we’ve already mentioned is essentially our capacity to succeed, right?

[00:05:20] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:21] Right?

[00:05:22] Right?

[00:05:22] Right?

[00:05:22] Right?

[00:05:22] Right?

[00:05:23] Right?

[00:05:23] Right?

[00:05:24] Right?

[00:05:24] Right?

[00:05:24] Right?

[00:05:24] Our capacity to succeed is directly related to how much we are able to handle versus how much we’re trying to handle.

[00:05:35] What is the input versus our current load?

[00:05:43] Alright, so now here’s the critical insight I want you to take away here, okay?

[00:05:49] Our cognitive load does…

[00:05:52] not discriminate on any kind of categorical basis all right another way to put this is

[00:06:01] our cognitive load does not care where the load is coming from cognitive load does not discriminate

[00:06:12] on if it’s work information that we’re processing if it’s uh you know trying to order lunch

[00:06:22] because we haven’t eaten we missed our lunch break if it’s tired if it’s anticipation

[00:06:30] if it’s a messy desk all of these external factors that have absolutely nothing to do

[00:06:39] with our work take up some of our cognitive load capacity that leaves less headroom

[00:06:47] right it leaves less available space

[00:06:51] right

[00:06:52] to perform optimally okay the vast majority of problems by the way uh in in this

[00:07:01] uh i guess category are going to be overload problems the underload problems do exist

[00:07:07] all right so and and they do still happen you may have a manager for example who in order to not

[00:07:15] overload you they end up not giving you a lot of challenge which means that your cognitive load

[00:07:20] is low

[00:07:22] and it’s low enough that you disengage right so there is some uh benefit like um

[00:07:31] some study benefit to loading more if you are in this if you’re in a disengaged position

[00:07:39] in particular if you’re in some kind of like low energy board kind of disengagement

[00:07:45] right so having a higher challenge having more cognitive load in that situation is likely to be a disadvantage to you

[00:07:52] potentially going to help you

[00:07:54] the vast majority of people who are listening to this right now what you’re dealing with

[00:07:58] is likely

[00:07:59] talking

[00:08:01] excess cognitive load but if you’re a manager i want you to listen to this part especially okay

[00:08:06] pay attention to this part

[00:08:08] cognitive load is not a static value

[00:08:13] even for the same person from one day to the next

[00:08:17] right what does that mean it means that

[00:08:20] a given person on your team is going to need a full acknowledgement for taking an office hours list of the site the insurance procedures to terminate a job until they drive it does this even if you’re in a position where you haven’t been part of this work today it means people know what the insurance is about for the meds are not going to pay animal insurance so that are eventually may likely to get discharged after theatkrs young sometimes for

[00:08:22] going to do what humans do. They’re going to have a variety of experiences from one day to the next,

[00:08:29] from one month to the next, from one year to the next. There will be things that tax their

[00:08:37] cognitive ability. And your job as a manager is not to ignore that. It’s not to push them past

[00:08:46] their limit. It’s not to try to compress that out, but it’s to recognize that. Recognize

[00:08:55] and to open the conversation with your reports. This is my very opinionated take,

[00:09:01] okay? And I believe that it’s backed pretty well by available research.

[00:09:09] Your job is to open the conversation about this cognitive load with your reports so that you can

[00:09:16] work with them.

[00:09:16] Work with them on engaging at the right level.

[00:09:21] You having a clear idea of what good engagement looks like.

[00:09:28] You having an open conversation about what aspects of their life are taxing their cognitive load from week to week.

[00:09:39] One of the simple ways that I do this with my reports, for example, is I try to ask them,

[00:09:44] what is your energy level and what is your positivity level?

[00:09:48] Lower energy is either, this is the interesting thing, it can either be over or under.

[00:09:57] Overtaxed or underloaded.

[00:10:00] So we have to kind of dig out why, but we start with that evaluation.

[00:10:06] If you’re high energy, we’ve probably got the load just about right.

[00:10:12] Most of the time, we’re going to hear,

[00:10:14] we’re going to hear people say, I’m dipping on energy because I’m a little bit tired because I’ve been running really hard.

[00:10:21] That’s usually the reason why we see a dip in energy.

[00:10:25] Sometimes it’s because they’re bored with what they’re looking at.

[00:10:29] And some of this, there’s some kind of, there’s different types of load.

[00:10:33] If you go look at cognitive load theory, there’s a lot more to it than just a single bucket of cognitive load.

[00:10:42] It adds up to that.

[00:10:44] Essentially, but there’s different categories of load.

[00:10:47] There’s things like intrinsic load.

[00:10:49] Intrinsic load is what is the level of cognitive energy required because of the subject itself, right?

[00:10:58] You can imagine that intrinsic load then is going to be directly related to somebody’s experience.

[00:11:06] If somebody doesn’t have any experience with, let’s say, scaling a database,

[00:11:10] the intrinsic load doesn’t,

[00:11:14] it doesn’t necessarily change from one person to the next,

[00:11:16] but how they relate to that intrinsic load is going to change, right?

[00:11:21] So there’s different types of load.

[00:11:24] Sometimes, sometimes, and again, this is a manager,

[00:11:29] something to pay close attention to as a manager.

[00:11:32] Sometimes the load that you experience because of a particular subject is low

[00:11:41] because you’re not interested in it.

[00:11:44] And so,

[00:11:44] so the cognitive processing slows down not because you’re overloaded and not because you’re underloaded,

[00:11:54] but because you’re selectively underloading.

[00:11:57] You’re choosing not to.

[00:11:59] Sometimes this happens unconsciously.

[00:12:01] You’re kind of bored by that.

[00:12:03] You’re bored by that particular topic.

[00:12:04] So this is another reason why you end up with low performance from somebody who you’re giving them a good challenge.

[00:12:13] They’re,

[00:12:14] they’re like in terms of the load level.

[00:12:17] This might be the appropriate load level,

[00:12:19] but it’s the wrong subject.

[00:12:21] It’s the wrong kind of work for that person.

[00:12:22] So they’re not going to engage at the cognitive load level that would encourage like an optimal output,

[00:12:31] right?

[00:12:32] So the critical takeaway here,

[00:12:35] the most critical takeaway you can have is cognitive load is not static.

[00:12:41] It’s going to change day to day.

[00:12:42] Reducing your cognitive load that is not producing value gives you higher overhead.

[00:12:49] But it comes with an important caveat that if you are providing yourself more overhead availability,

[00:12:57] then you risk underloading,

[00:13:00] right?

[00:13:01] You risk getting to a place where the challenge is actually insufficient for you and you end up in that kind of low performance zone because you’re underloaded.

[00:13:09] You’re disengaged,

[00:13:11] right?

[00:13:11] So,

[00:13:12] the art here is because humans have varying degrees of cognitive load.

[00:13:19] The art is trying to figure out what is that balance,

[00:13:24] right?

[00:13:25] It’s also interesting to kind of evaluate yourself and what are your behaviors when you’re underloaded versus overloaded?

[00:13:34] When can you recognize that you’re overloaded?

[00:13:37] What are the signals?

[00:13:38] What are the feelings that you have?

[00:13:40] This requires a lot of,

[00:13:42] kind of,

[00:13:42] awareness and being able to focus on the moment and focus on the feelings that you have as a result of a given cognitive load level,

[00:13:53] for example,

[00:13:54] right?

[00:13:56] Being able to be in tune with that can help you choose,

[00:14:00] should I adopt more into my load path today?

[00:14:05] Like,

[00:14:05] should I have more on my plate today?

[00:14:07] Or should I scale down?

[00:14:09] Or do I need to talk to my manager about,

[00:14:12] you know,

[00:14:12] the reason why I’m so upset today?

[00:14:13] Because I don’t have what it takes to get this done.

[00:14:14] Right.

[00:14:14] So,

[00:14:15] I’m glad that you’ve learned this.

[00:14:15] I know that you’re not,

[00:14:16] I know that you’re not more than all of us out there out there.

[00:14:16] And I’m glad you’re not the only one that’s learning this.

[00:14:17] But I also want to add in,

[00:14:17] and I also want to add in,

[00:14:18] just to kind of give you an idea of what’s going on and this is a,

[00:14:19] this is something of an out of control or a trauma,

[00:14:20] but this is definitely something that you need to be aware of,

[00:14:21] because you’re going to optimize your own,

[00:14:21] uh,

[00:14:22] kind of working capacity by doing this.

[00:14:22] Right?

[00:14:22] A very simple example,

[00:14:23] we’re going to end with this very simple example.

[00:14:24] Uh,

[00:14:24] by doing this, right? A very simple example, we’re going to end with this very simple example.

[00:14:33] And we’ve done this before. There’s a couple of different examples. One of them

[00:14:37] that I like to do is also a good example of why multitasking doesn’t work very well,

[00:14:43] right? But it’s a cognitive load is the kind of fundamental reason why it doesn’t work very well.

[00:14:47] So we can do that one quickly. If you get out a piece of paper and you try to write down,

[00:14:55] first, I want you to like set a little timer or something next to you,

[00:14:59] start it and then write your first and your last name and then your address, right? Your mailing

[00:15:06] address. If you don’t have a mailing address, you can write down your email address, right? Or your

[00:15:11] phone number. So write those things sequentially.

[00:15:16] Now,

[00:15:16] uh, I want you to do the same thing, but instead of writing sequentially,

[00:15:23] I want you to write one letter from each thing, right? And time it. You’re going to notice,

[00:15:29] I mean, by a long shot, uh, the second version of that is going to take drastically longer,

[00:15:35] right? Some of this is switching costs, some moving your pin, more space, right?

[00:15:41] Even if you were to eliminate the switching cost, you’re still going to have a higher cognitive load

[00:15:46] because you’re having a lot of time to do that. So if you’re going to do that, you’re going to

[00:15:46] have to switch through those different pieces. You’re having to try to hold more in your head

[00:15:51] and it’s going to reduce your capacity. There is a point at which you will become overloaded.

[00:16:00] It’s actually a principle. Uh, when I was going through flight training, for example,

[00:16:05] this is a principle that, uh, CFIs learn. A CFI is taught to put their students at the point of

[00:16:16] task.

[00:16:16] Saturation task saturation is essentially cognitive load at the very edge of their capacity,

[00:16:25] right? So what does, what does this look like? It looks like, uh, once you hit this point,

[00:16:31] your CFI can recognize it very quickly because people tend to act the same. They start to freeze

[00:16:38] up. This happens, uh, to almost every flight student that ever gets training, right? And the

[00:16:46] fun part is, uh, when you’re at the point where you’re at the point where you’re at the point where

[00:16:46] fundamental reason is because that task saturation creates this overload. And again,

[00:16:51] that performance tanks off of, off of the, uh, off of the right side of that graph. If you were

[00:16:57] to visualize this as a graph, your performance is going to tank if you’re overloaded. So the

[00:17:04] interesting thing about this training is that over time, if you experience that task saturation

[00:17:12] overload, but you continue to bring yourself

[00:17:16] up close to that point, your skill, and this is, this is a really interesting kind of dynamic,

[00:17:23] your learning and your skill and your practice make it such that your cognitive load lowers.

[00:17:34] It’s not that you are becoming more capable of higher cognitive load. If that was the case,

[00:17:40] then you would see that, you know, you would see that ability across multiple other areas,

[00:17:46] as well, right? So your ability to handle more cognitive load is not necessarily improving.

[00:17:54] Unfortunately, that would be great, right? Instead, what’s happening is in order to operate,

[00:17:59] in order to perform those particular skills, the necessary cognitive load to do those skills,

[00:18:07] to actually perform that, to, you know, fly that particular maneuver, that cognitive load goes down,

[00:18:13] right? Because you’ve seen, you’ve seen, you’ve seen, you’ve seen, you’ve seen, you’ve seen, you’ve seen,

[00:18:16] you’ve started to develop muscle memory, or you’ve started to develop a little bit more

[00:18:19] internalization of that skill, rather than having to think about how to do it. You’re kind of just

[00:18:25] remembering or going through the motions. There’s less cognitive load in order to accomplish the

[00:18:31] same outcome, right? This happens with everyone in almost every skill category. This happens to us

[00:18:39] as software engineers. Over time, we learn about our tools. We learn about the languages that we use.

[00:18:45] We learn about our environment. We learn about team dynamics. There’s lower cognitive load in order to have the same outcome, right?

[00:18:55] We push ourselves to the point of task saturation over and over and over, and we begin to develop skills.

[00:19:03] And those skills really internalize and allow us to accomplish more with lower cognitive load.

[00:19:12] We accomplish, you know, the same amount, let’s say,

[00:19:15] with less cognitive load. So as we continue to grow, growth in this, like, I guess, in this

[00:19:24] theory or in this, you know, paradigm, growth is, is essentially measured by how much cognitive

[00:19:32] load does it take in order to perform a particular skill? I think that’s a very narrow definition,

[00:19:38] but it’s a powerful definition, right? Because what this really looks like in our careers

[00:19:44] is it looks like we’re going to be able to accomplish more with less cognitive load.

[00:19:45] It’s like being able to take on new, different cognitive load or more or both, right?

[00:19:53] This is, this tends to be the, the pathways for growth. Either you’re, you’re able to

[00:19:59] produce more of the same thing up to a certain point, up to a certain, threshold, or you’re

[00:20:08] able to take on a new, a different type of cognitive load in parallel. So you have one

[00:20:15] skill, and you’re doing that. And, and you’re able to then start to build up the cognitive load.

[00:20:15] And you’re able to start to build up the new artificial learning or all the other skills you have in parallel.

[00:20:15] So you have one skill and you’re doing that. Now, what kind of skill is that, right?

[00:20:15] developing a second skill or a third skill, you’re able to perform the same skills in parallel with

[00:20:22] a new one that requires higher cognitive load because now you’re adopting that skill into your

[00:20:28] repertoire. So if you’re a newer developer, that load is going to be higher earlier. So trying to

[00:20:38] adopt seven skills all at once is going to likely be an overload, right? So this theory really

[00:20:45] does help you understand, one, how do we develop these skills over time? What does it actually

[00:20:53] mean to have a skill? It means being able to do the thing more internally without having to

[00:20:59] think about it a lot, right? That’s really what it means to have the skill. And secondly, that our

[00:21:07] day-to-day management of our energy, we shouldn’t be expecting ourselves to do the same exact output

[00:21:14] all the time.

[00:21:15] We’re going to have some distribution, probably something like a normal distribution of output

[00:21:22] over time dependent on our cognitive load, which doesn’t care about what category we’re talking

[00:21:29] about, right? This is one of the reasons why managing your personal life is such a critical

[00:21:35] part of success in your career, right? And vice versa. Managing your career is such an important

[00:21:43] part of your success.

[00:21:45] Your personal life. Because this ability to handle things, right, the ability to be able to learn,

[00:21:56] once again, this fundamental skill, being able to learn, is moderated by the cognitive load that

[00:22:04] we experience in a given frame.

[00:22:08] Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode of Developer Tea. I hope this was enlightening or at least is engaging the

[00:22:15] parts of your brain. If you’ve ever experienced, you know, imposter syndrome, for example, this is a great theory to understand why your learning or your ability to grasp a concept may be drastically different than another person’s, even if that person has very similar skill sets to you, right? This cognitive load theory can really kind of crystallize what it means to be able to learn something new, what it means to be able to work effectively, right? And I hope that this has been helpful. Thank you so much for listening. I’ll see you next time. Bye.

[00:22:45] So, I hope you’ll take this and you’ll at least think about how this plays out or how you are interacting with your own cognitive load, how much cognitive load you’re expecting your team to be able to handle in a given period of time. And hopefully this also encourages you to have empathy with other people who are going through things that may be increasing their cognitive, their ability to do something really difficult, right?

[00:23:14] Maybe mindless.

[00:23:15] Maybe moderated by the fact that they have something really difficult going on in their lives. So, my encouragement here is for you to build your empathy, build your understanding for other humans, understand that, you know, our brains are not just machines and that our cognitive load is actually affecting us in a universal way, not in these categorical ways. Thank you so much for listening. And until next time, enjoy your tea.

[00:23:45] Thank you.

Visão de gráfico