Cognitive Scaffold

Preparing your thinking workspace

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MENTAL MODEL · M1630

Yak Shaving

Yak Shaving
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Version 1.0.0 · Updated 2026-07-30

CORE DEFINITION

To achieve goal A, you must first do B; to do B, you must first do C... and eventually you find yourself shaving a yak, which seems unrelated to goal A but is a necessary step in the logical chain.

SCAFFOLDING EFFECT

psychology

Reduce cognitive load

Dependency chain management. When you find yourself mired in trivialities (shaving), stop and check: do I really need this dependency, or have I gone overboard? Sometimes you need to cut the dependency chain (hack), not solve it.

anchor

Anchor fast decisions

Presumably a metaphorical expression: investing excessive effort in a large, stubborn, or irrelevant object with little return. The mechanism is directing resources to areas with extremely low marginal returns.

MINIMUM ACTION

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Practice this model in one real situation:

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Source support: Explicit

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    en.wikipedia.orghttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yak_shavingZH · Explicit
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