relevancy testing, overcome time shifts relevancys testing prompts, recovering plasticity and flexibility, throat working chakara, some of those.
Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
251–260 of 280 posts
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#252I think you should hesitate - to think of yourself as a slow thinker, that is. What you’ve actually described is performance anxiety, and that’s really very treatable.
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#253[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#254I learned to slow my thinking with cannabinoids.
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#255As a slow thinker, I think many are missing a really important point, which I was hoping would come up. Sigh.
Preparedness is not the solution for many unique and many times life changing situations, where we do not have time to think, but have to make decision very quickly. And I have always failed at that, and created misunderstandings, pain.
And having ADHD, slow processing brain, and some hearing loss, I have not seen any solution that would help me.
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#256Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Don't speak. Great advice. Nothing shows confidence more than asking a question and then waiting for answer. Let the awkward silence sit. And when you do speak, keep answers short and to the point. It also conveys confidence. Anytime I see/hear someone rambling in email/on meeting, I know they are not confident in what they are saying.
>Anytime I see/hear someone rambling in email/on meeting, I know they are not confident in what they are saying. Well then you are dismissing people unfairly. You won't hear a peep out of me if I don't know the answer. On the other hand, if I have mountains of data that proves my point, or if the problem is nuanced, you'll hear all of it. I'm working on getting better at distilling that data into short, actionable po…
> On the other hand, if I have mountains of data that proves my point, or if the problem is nuanced, you'll hear all of it.
I wouldn't consider this rambling. There are many people who just talk to fill space. Their point was made in the first 10 seconds and then they just keep going. IMO, that's very different than going over all the data or explaining a nuance.
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#257Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have no background in pedagogy, but I've never understood the point of timed, high pressure tests, especially for children. You really just want to know the child has mastered the material such that they can solve the problems correctly--why is it necessary for them to do them in under 30 seconds, or whatever the bar is? If one kid gets the test done in 20 minutes and the other one takes 2 hours, but they both get…
There actually is a reason. It is to make sure that kids have mastery of fundamental skills that they will need in the future. If it takes you a long to subtract, for example, it will take you an impractically long to do long division, and eventually you will take so long with more complex concepts that you won't be able to learn effectively. Additionally, you also want a fair number of problems in any given test to…
Subtraction is not necessary for division.
This is a specific example, and the general point is that there a multiple ways of doing things. If a child can avoid 1 step and skip straight to the result more efficiently, that is a valid way of solving a problem.
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#258Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just this morning I listened to a radio interview with pianist Igor Levit. It was excruciating. He had to think for seconds before every third word in a sentence, creating awkward pauses, and when he had finally finished an answer, he had only transmitted trivial content. I am sure that if they had sent him the questions a few days earlier, he could have prepared much more interesting and eloquent answers. I felt ver…
Politicians do mock interviews all the time to prepare. Everyone else expecting to be interviewed should as well. If you put some effort into it you can think up 98% of the questions you might be asked - the only question is what order they will ask and how much detail they want. So you practice someone asking those questions and you responding - sometimes they will ask clarifying questions, sometimes not, but again…
You've got it exactly right, and the same technique works well for giving presentations.
Run through your slides in front of your rubber duck, as if they're the audience.
You want to program your brain to work like a soundboard - for topic X, say "Y". I find it helps me greatly to have these prebaked responses ready to go, and I get to choose when I'm talking whether I adlib entirely or just repeat the same script i trained.
Often even during the talk there would be times I'd feel out of it, distracted, or something else. Then you just do rote script until your brain recovers and you can be fully "on" again.
Finally, people LOVE hearing stories. So the more stories you can work into your answers or your presentation, people will stay engaged. This is a common thread from watching many very competent presenters at cons
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#259I’m fairly quick but the first thing out of my mouth is rarely correct.
I’ve learned to tone that down by not responding immediately with an answer. My immediate response is almost always a set of considerations, and then I walk through my internal thought process with whoever I’m answering.
This does a few things, it respects the other person who you are talking to, as they have likely thought about it too and for longer, so might have some deeper insight. Secondly it prevents you from saying one thing out of nowhere and backtracking, preventing confusion/frustration where you contradict yourself. People have a lot more confidence in the person who is very clear and has fewer instances of jumping from one solution to a different one.
I would say change nothing but do learn to express your inner monologue clearly. I often do that by making notes as one would in debate (on paper or mentally).
Re: Ask HN: Slow thinkers, how do you compensate for your lack of quick-wittedness?
#260This is something that's easy to have an opinion on so you're going to get buried. I'll do my best to make a high-signal comment here, but it will be drowned by all the other replies, which also likely touch on these points. First, "slow-thinking" is really just a different way of expressing your thinking and you should begin by leaning into it rather than leaning away. Take time, allow yourself to pause to collect y…
> First, "slow-thinking" is really just a different way of expressing your thinking and you should begin by leaning into it rather than leaning away. Take time, allow yourself to pause to collect your thoughts. People often interpret quietness (not filler) as intelligence and maturity (because usually it is). Alternatively not answering is also valid. From experience, it doesn't work, especially in a group setting. P…
Can you give an example of this? Even if you say something indicating that you need a moment, they will just ignore you?