Left Brain, Right Brain, Hypnosis, Emotional Tiredness ...

.
I have noticed that the way I think changes when I'm in a tiring event. This is noticeable whether it's a long day or two days, but it becomes hugely significant for longer events (4, 5 or more days). I also know that emotional draining can occur when we have to make a long series of difficult decisions whether, in the end, one feels good about the performance or outcomes. Decision-making is emotional work and it leaves us feeling slow, dull and weighed-down. A long series of tasks requiring emotional decision-making can drain us without necessarily making us physically much weaker. We will still feel the need to consume massive calories and to sleep. One chess grandmaster was asked his hobby and he said "sleeping". Sleeping helps to reset the emotional nervous system to do its work properly and that's crucial for decision-making.

Given all that, it makes sense to understand how to do the mental work with less decision-making draining effort and in some way to maintain a steady consistent way of thinking with high efficiency and effectiveness over days of heavy mental work involving (potentially) lots of decisions (as happens in a chess tournament with long games over many days).

I have noticed many times when a potential move would pop into my mind almost instantly when viewing a new chess position. I'm sure diagnostic physicians also have such intuitions when they're seeing a steady steam of new patients. Probably many business leaders or stock traders or sports coaches who have a steady flow of decisions to make have the same experience. "Get in the *flow* and intuit what to do" -- that's been a common suggestion for everyone to do better. But, often intuition fails us and in a game like chess or with anything which has lasting and serious consequences you want more from your choices if you have time to consider options and ramifications.

So, a typical approach suggested for chess (and perhaps other things) is to intuit something and then to rationally, logically & consciously analyze it before committing to it. In chess the second part is sometimes called the Blumenfeld Rule or the Blunder-Check. One reviews the intuited candidate action by whatever angles you understand are important to see if the candidate stands up to scrutiny. One problem with that is that our conscious efforts are very slow and very very tiring and we're still not very good at it. Another is that we can talk ourselves out of a candidate action which in fact is alright. Having the Left and Right Brain arguing against each other doesn't always help.

What do you do when your intuition becomes hard to recognize and many moves/actions seem equally good or when all seem bad?

Without intuition how do we, how can we, approach a situation or problem to find the next thing to do or the solution?

If hypnosis is truly a way to 'speak directly to the subconscious', and many believe that it is, then it means the Left Brain and the Right Brain operate separately and may become tired separately (remembering the whole body is involved in thinking and decision-making). If intuition is slow or indecisive or somehow ineffective when it becomes tired, then perhaps that is the time we really have to lean on other means to think clearly. People under stress, like policemen or commercial airplane pilots or soldiers or firefighters or ER doctors need sleep and a good diet, but they also need good thinking techniques and regular procedures.

The subconscious is powerful, though we're not always directly conscious of what it's effecting. I've seen it in action and realized that my conscious efforts were simply not that powerful. That's why I think hypnosis or other ways of leading the subconscious to behave a certain way is indeed powerful and a great lesson to us all. Don't be sold by the P.R. department known as the conscious mind with its story-telling. A lot of it is justification made of cobwebs and isn't to be trusted.

I think this also has ramifications for education. We feed information to children and hope they can remember it. We show them methods for doing things and hope they practice it and remember how to do it. But, when it comes to new things or creative things or especially difficult and stressful things I wonder if they have any education or ways of arriving at good thinking techniques. It's sometimes thought to be too personal and not something one should be taught. But, learning thinking techniques is like learning mathematics or scientific experiment protocols or engineering practices and these are all important for people to achieve greater things than intuition alone can provide.

I'm curious what stories people from various fields would tell about how they think under duress and during long events. What works and what is just 'old wives tales'?