# Summary
A mental representation is a mental structure that corresponds to an object, an idea, a collection of information, or anything else, concrete or abstract, that the brain is thinking about.
Everyone on the earth has formed lots of mental representations and has been using it in daily life. Experts in any field differentiate themselves from naives with highly complex and sophisticated representations of various situations.
Mental representations are multiple patterns rather than pieces. The larger and more the patterns an expert has born in mind, the quicker and more correct he is able to assimilate information in the field.
People have turned patterns into long-term memory and thus the neural circuitry in their brain has been changed to produce highly specialized mental representations.
If you want to increase the quality and quantity of mental representations in any field, you should spend more time and energy than others.
While the mental representations give masters a view of the forest that novices lack, they also allow masters to zero in on the trees when necessary.
#字词篇
“Chess masters have been playing blindfolded for more than a thousand years, mostly as a way of showing off, although sometimes as a way of handicapping themselves when playing less-skilled opponents”
1. show off: if you say that someone is showing off, you are criticizing them for trying to impress people by showing in a very obvious way that they can do or what they own. 炫耀
[例句] He had been showing off for her at the poker table. (牌桌上他一直在她面前表现自己)
[造句] If you want to impress yourself as quick as possible in the public, you can show off yourself regardless of possible others' critics. This is one quick-fix in some books to teach people to get rid of shyness.
2. handicap:to make something more difficult to do 阻碍
[例句] Rescue efforts have been handicapped by rough seas and hurricane-force winds. (救援工作受到了大浪和飓风的阻碍)
[近义词] disadvantage, disfavor
[造句] Handicapped by unexpected obstacles, you have to handle it face to face and believe your ability to overcome them.
“he would write the position he was studying down on a piece of paper and puzzle over it during school hours”
puzzle over: to think for a long time about something because you cannot understand or solve it.
[例句] The class puzzled over a poem by Shakespeare.
[造句] If you see him pulling his hair, you will think that he is puzzling over the math problems.
“Indeed, one could define a mental representation as a conceptual structure designed to sidestep the usual restrictions that short-term memory places on mental processing.”
sidestep: to avoid talking about a subject, especially by starting to talk about something else. （尤指透过开始讨论别的事情）回避（某个话题）
[例句] The speaker sidestepped the question by saying that it would take him too long to answer. 演讲者借口说回答要很长时间而回避了这个问题。
[造句] No matter how many times you sidestep the issue, it remains there unless you handle it.
#熟读深思
“Either way, reading this book and thinking about the topics I’m discussing will help you create new mental representations, which will in turn make it easier for you to read and learn more about this subject in the future.”
学习英语以来，我最怕的阅读理解文章就是科技文和经济文，完全陌生的领域，读懂了每一个词却没有理解整句话到底在说些什么，每次都是连蒙带猜的糊弄过去。近来在准备考试，终归不想再这么糊弄过去。所以铁了心的看经济学人的文章，专挑经济类的看。从一开始的4个小时一篇（读完不知所云）到现在的三个小时一篇（记得文章大概），终于开始入门了。今天阅读看到上面这一段话的后半部分说，当我们在脑海中建立了新的mental representations，将来在遇到类似主题的文章时，学习和理解都会更加容易起来。如此我也就理解了我的变化根源了。
Peak这一类说理论证的文体也是我比较抵触的（之前只喜欢小说，嘿嘿），第一次读Option B的时候，真的相当痛苦，大家都读明白了，我却脑中一片浆糊。第二本 The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People渐渐能理出思路，一直到现在这一本，我终于摸到一点点读此类文体的门道。也因此，心里不再害怕未知。感兴趣而又不曾接触过，就开始读起来，钻进去再冒出来，多思考，不至于成为大家，但是自己的脑子总算是延伸了。
