41–50 of 91 posts
I want to make a case against having a "growth mindset". And against fighting procrastination. And any other self improvement stuff. - all these things happen at a much lower level than conscious thought. We have approaches to achieving based on genetics, early upbringing, life experiences, etc. No amount of wanting things to be different will make it so. - there are no recipes. There is just doing stuff, some will s…
I want to make a case against having a "growth mindset". And against fighting procrastination. And any other self improvement stuff. - all these things happen at a much lower level than conscious thought. We have approaches to achieving based on genetics, early upbringing, life experiences, etc. No amount of wanting things to be different will make it so. - there are no recipes. There is just doing stuff, some will s…
I'm actually a huge supporter of self-improvement as a whole and growth mindsets but I think it can be quite dangerous indeed. Many people use them as a way to avoid facing problems they have or distracting themselves from issues that they can't solve through any amount of learning or working. It's important to realize that achieving success in your career, learning five languages or building a cool invention aren't…
so, what do you recommend?
Figure out what makes you happy. When you're 100 years old, what will you have done, learned, or experienced that will make it worthwhile? As if it were one big experience that you unknowingly opted into. It can be many things, but usually there are a few really important things in there. It may take some real consideration - think about it for a while.
Thats your vision. And once you have your vision, growth may be necessary to achieve that vision. The existence of a vision will point you in the right direction of growth.
With that approach you may find that certain interests you have now fade away when you take such a broad perspective. It also forces you to take an inherently personal perspective on life. After all, it's what you want to make of it that is important, not what somebody else (religious leader, life coach, buddha, tech guru) says.
I want to make a case against having a "growth mindset". And against fighting procrastination. And any other self improvement stuff. - all these things happen at a much lower level than conscious thought. We have approaches to achieving based on genetics, early upbringing, life experiences, etc. No amount of wanting things to be different will make it so. - there are no recipes. There is just doing stuff, some will s…
What do I do if I'm not successful then? I've dealt with suicidal ideation before, but everyone then just told me that it was a problem of mindset. If I'm not capable of becoming successful then...what's the point?
There's plenty of point in merely enjoying the moment. There is little one can do or say to combat the inherent meaninglessness of being, as every argument can be thwarted by a simple "we're all going to die anyways so what's the point?" I don't think there can even logically be a point to life.
That's not to say that goals such as bettering society, bettering one's self, or enjoying the moment aren't worthwhile. Nor does it imply that we should sink into abject hedonism and shoot heroin all day. It merely means that none of these things should be expected to subvert meaninglessness. In this sense, it's actually quite liberating. You can do anything you please, without the burden of wondering whether or not it will fill the perceived void in your soul. That void is an illusion, one which is unfortunately brought about often by depression, BPD, GAD, etc.
After lots of therapy I learned I had internalized a negative voice from an abusive relationship early in my development, which fucked up my sense of self-worth and my perception of life. It made me incessantly focused on "being the best", and if I couldn't achieve anything "great" then I had no choice but to hate myself.
If you're having suicidal thoughts, then it's time to seek professional help. I was at that point too. My doctor and I decided our best bet was to try 10mg of Lexapro for a couple months, and I've never felt better. Depression is a pernicious beast. It seeps in slowly subsuming all rational cognitive faculties, to the point where I was not merely sad, I was obstinately despondent, and refused to listen to reason. It emanated from a "feeling" of meaninglessness which I could never eliminate with mere rational thought. I guess my "chemicals" were just fucked up, and I needed a little help from the Lexapro.
So, what do you do if you're not successful? Anything else you want. The world is your oyster. Failure ultimately means as little as success. If you don't succeed at something you enjoy, then simply keep doing it, keep enjoying it, maybe you haven't struck gold yet but the journey is worth embarking on once you realize that contentment doesn't lie at the end of the journey, but within it's entirety. If you feel it's too late to start, there's still plenty of beauty left in life. Sometimes I find the following Kurt Vonnegut quote useful:
> "What is the purpose of life? To be the eyes, the ears, and consciousness of the creator of the universe, you fool!"
Now, I'm fairly young, I expect my opinions are biased by the fact that I personally feel like I still have a lot of time left to embark on journeys. I can understand if the perspective changes as you age, and feel as if you missed out or squandered your best years. Hopefully someone older can step in and share their thoughts.
I also hope I don't sound like I'm proselytizing. Just wanted to share my experience if it helps anyone.
I think a lot of us have some idea of what "practice" means, but very few of us do it. Instead, we "play to win". Because it feels like practice but it really isn't.
For example, a lot of folks want to get better at basketball, so they play pickup games. Which is great. But isn't enough to get really good. You're trying to win at that game. So you won't do the necessary things to learn new skills. And the necessary things is to look like an idiot while you try a new move, a fadeaway, dribbling with your weak hand, etc.
I think that applies to most of life. We sort of think we're trying to get better, but really we're in all these games to win.
So to get better at this, I think it's necessary to just shift to more things that look like real practice with no intent on outcome. Give yourself chores like: I'm going to write an article every week for 6 months in different styles that match authors I look up to. (Maybe you publish these, maybe you don't.)
There's no winning in that statement (except the part about showing up every day). Many of us are going to resist and try to turn the exercise into: I'm going to try and grow my blog subscribers by X over 6 months. No, that's a game about winning. Get back to just practice.
When we understand what practice really feels like, the growth mindset comes more naturally: Ah yes, I'm used to sucking at something but I show up and practice and see how I get better.
Another exercise: practice being terrible in public. Give yourself quotas show off how bad you are at the beginning. Like publish yourself learning something something. Twitch stream learning to code. Publish those first awful videos you edit. Every. Day.
Are X and Y reasonable? Are they things you even want to do? Or things that you feel like you have to do because of some hacker-start-up-culture-HN-bullshit? Why even care when someone challenges you?
Everybody’s different and some people (like me) aren’t capable of a lot. Once I accepted that, life became a lot easier. I read, watch TV, exercise, do decently at work, but am I really doing anything? Not really. But I’m OK with that.
At one point I had a big realization that perfectionism was keeping me from ever going outside my comfort zone. This meant that for decades I had only really been growing in areas where I was naturally gifted and experienced (logic, math and similar) but failed to grow much in areas where I wasn't (e.g. emotional intelligence and interpersonal skills) because that way I never really had to fear failure, or challenge…
Practice being terrible. I think a lot of us have some idea of what "practice" means, but very few of us do it. Instead, we "play to win". Because it feels like practice but it really isn't. For example, a lot of folks want to get better at basketball, so they play pickup games. Which is great. But isn't enough to get really good. You're trying to win at that game. So you won't do the necessary things to learn new sk…
A best ever at something doing the most simple drills for an hour.
I have in my head I suck at basketball but Curry takes more practice shots in that video than I have in my life.
At one point I had a big realization that perfectionism was keeping me from ever going outside my comfort zone. This meant that for decades I had only really been growing in areas where I was naturally gifted and experienced (logic, math and similar) but failed to grow much in areas where I wasn't (e.g. emotional intelligence and interpersonal skills) because that way I never really had to fear failure, or challenge…
There's an old saying that whatever is worth doing is worth doing badly. So true. When I was in Germany, they have a saying that you start with "something to hate". Already knowing that what you're about to do is going to be crap makes it easy to get going. Then you set about fixing your crappy beginning. It gets you unstuck.
If you like it you’ll have time and motivation to pick up the details later.
(To a non growth mindset a worry like using the wrong racquet for a sport is paralyzing.)