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  • The Organized Mind

  • Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload
  • Written by: Daniel J. Levitin
  • Narrated by: Luke Daniels
  • Length: 16 hrs and 19 mins
  • 4.1 out of 5 stars (48 ratings)

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The Organized Mind

Written by: Daniel J. Levitin
Narrated by: Luke Daniels
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Publisher's Summary

New York Times best-selling author and neuroscientist Daniel J. Levitin shifts his keen insights from your brain on music to your brain in a sea of details.

The information age is drowning us with an unprecedented deluge of data. At the same time, we're expected to make more - and faster - decisions about our lives than ever before. No wonder, then, that the average American reports frequently losing car keys or reading glasses, missing appointments, and feeling worn out by the effort required just to keep up.

But somehow some people become quite accomplished at managing information flow. In The Organized Mind, Daniel J. Levitin, PhD, uses the latest brain science to demonstrate how those people excel - and how listeners can use their methods to regain a sense of mastery over the way they organize their homes, workplaces, and time.

With lively, entertaining chapters on everything from the kitchen junk drawer to health care to executive office workflow, Levitin reveals how new research into the cognitive neuroscience of attention and memory can be applied to the challenges of our daily lives. This Is Your Brain on Music showed how to better play and appreciate music through an understanding of how the brain works. The Organized Mind shows how to navigate the churning flood of information in the 21st century with the same neuroscientific perspective.

©2014 Daniel J. Levitan (P)2014 Penguin Audio

What listeners love about The Organized Mind

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text book

cut to the point! hard to take out the good nuggets of information when it's so boring

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    3 out of 5 stars

half the book is gold, half is written in Yapanese

its worth listening to for the value in the first half of the book. the author then goes on to yap about nonsense for the remainder of the book. i would rate the first half a 4-5 stars, while the latter half a 1-2 stars. the book should have stopped halfway through.

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informative

It's an informative book, sometimes dry and too wordy. some of the examples come across as rather sexist. ie, why is it the woman who falls into the tracks an needs rescuing by a man.

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  • Oliver Nielsen
  • 2014-09-16

Finally a book about productivity that delivers!

This is one crazy interesting book! It's long yes. And some reviewers find it way too long.

Me? I find it amazingly well-written, well-edited and deep. Daniel explores various concepts and elegantly connects them in a brilliant fashion.

This is one of those book I hope will never end. Each minute is packed full of info. No fluff in this book.

Beware though: the book does talk a lot about the various regions of the human brain, their interconnectedness and role in various situations related to procrastination, productivity, organisation, etc. So if you'd rather like a lighter read, this book probably isn't for you.

But if you like books with more substance, ones that challenge you, and have perhaps read and enjoyed Your Brain at Work: this book will be a surprisingly good listen for you.

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81 people found this helpful

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  • Scott Wozniak
  • 2015-06-08

Ironically Disorganized Book

The opening chapter got me very excited. And then I steadily grew more and more frustrated. This is a well-written book, but instead of staying focused on the mind or organization or similar topics, it frequently sidetracks into rants on topics as diverse as alternative science, education methods, generational differences, and prostate cancer. Each piece was okay, but the scattered topics and occasional bias (for example, he's clearly not a digital native) left me very disappointed.

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31 people found this helpful

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  • Renato Delatorre
  • 2014-12-17

Excellent reas for any professional

Where does The Organized Mind rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

This is an excellent book to understand how the mind works. The things we are taught to believe about how to learn or how memory works is so wrong. This Levitin does an excellent job at debunking some of those misconceptions. But the real value is in helping you organize your thoughts and your daily life.

Any additional comments?

Two criticisms I would make, and this happens in audio books all the time; reading the text without pause from the chapter heading on through, and speaking our URLs. Reading without pause makes it sound like the chapter heading is part of the chapter text and is confusing. Spelling out a URL, especially a long one is ridiculous. I am hearing an audio book, what value is it to read that to me? Just put that in the book page where the reviews are.

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28 people found this helpful

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  • Max Osterhaus
  • 2016-10-18

A few good takeaways, a mess of ancillary

There are some good practical tips in here about organizing thought, to-do lists, information, and physical environment, but I was distinctly bothered by the many chapters that did not seem to belong in this book at all and were shallow repeats of topics in many other pop-science books.

Do we really need another chapter on probability theory and our failures in understanding it? Or about information theory?

The sections about memory were deep and interesting, those about social relationships, business, and ethics, regrettably shallow.

maybe read chap 1 and 3...maybe read something else.

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  • David Hoos
  • 2019-04-01

Pretentious and pedantic - Not helpful at all

Coming to this book, I thought I was going to get something that explained how one could organize their mind better in an age of information overload. Ironically, the book itself was information overload. It's like being handed a book on combustion engines when you ask how to turn a car on. I got the feeling like this guy is a self-important academic who likes the sound of his own voice and thinks that word count equals intelligence.

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12 people found this helpful

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  • Al
  • 2016-11-18

An Amazing Insight to Our Mind and How to Look at the World Around Us

This was one of the most enjoyable books I have listened to in a long time.

To start with I learned more about the human brain and how it works in this book than anyone that I have ever listen or read before. More importantly, the way the author presents the parts of the brain and how they function makes them far more comprehensible than others that I have tried to read. I found myself retaining and actually using the information in my every day life when I was thinking about something I would reflect and think "oh this is happening so I must be using this portion of my brain." The result of that increased understanding

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  • Amazon Customer
  • 2014-10-21

blah blah Blah

What disappointed you about The Organized Mind?

Endless examples of worthless tips. Like How to Organize your sock drawer.

What was most disappointing about Daniel J. Levitin’s story?

Lacks original or inspiring thought.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Luke Daniels?

Narration is fine.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

I feel dumber after listening.

Any additional comments?

Please remove from my library.

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10 people found this helpful

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  • Kimberly
  • 2015-05-18

Overkill

The title should have been "the statistical mind", "whole lota theories" or "how to beat a dead horse for 10 chapters".
The narrator was awesome, but the content was 10 chapters of overkill. If you must read the first two chapters and stop.

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8 people found this helpful

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  • T. Plunk
  • 2015-04-11

A great book on how you mind & how to be organized

What did you love best about The Organized Mind?

The book explains how you mind tricks you and what you need to do to be organized. With this information I've been able to more effectively use organizational systems I was already familiar with and adapt them to my own traits.

What other book might you compare The Organized Mind to and why?

The closest book I've read was "Your Deceptive Mind: A Scientific Guide to Critical Thinking Skills", but this focuses more on the effect of some of the same issues with thinking on science.

Which scene was your favorite?

When the author talks about how highly organized people organize their mail.

What insight do you think you’ll apply from The Organized Mind?

I have been able to organize my email more effectively using the principles in this book.

Any additional comments?

I would recommend anyone who's job revolves around email to read this book and most others.

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  • Brady Reed
  • 2015-01-31

An intelligence journey

Simply put, I just feel smarter after listening to this book. The range is vast and most topics I found interesting to fascinating.

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7 people found this helpful