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Maybe you’re not trying

usefulfictions.substack.com

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Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#121

Post by TylerE »

atoav wrote: post #26
Etheryte wrote: post #6

This is an idea that philosophers have played with in countless varieties, perhaps the one closest to the author's wording is Jean-Paul Sartre's concept of bad faith. Faced with anxiety, guilt or overwhelming weight of responsibility, it's often easier to subconsciously sidestep the problem and pretend you don't have a choice, even if you do. This is not even a conscious decision, it's hard to be aware of our own qui…

Paradoxically some things with human bodies work like that: Back pain? One of the best ways of usually getting rid of it is using your back more and building muscle. I once worked with a guy who was a grandmaster at finding rational explainations of why they needed to do the thing that clearly was bad for them. He was overweight, but every time he ate both extremely unhealthy and much next to us he would explain how…

[flagged]

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#122

Post by tayo42 »

xivzgrev wrote: post #78

she's a little hard on herself. She claimed the ideas her husband came up with were not particularly inventive and the same she'd come up with had she been helping a friend Yet, when she told her friends, they did NOT suggest such actions. They too felt like there was nothing that could be done. Rather I'd posit that the actions the husband did seemed obvious to the author in hindsight, and that not everyone would ea…

Kind of agree, as I was reading it I basically thought that sucks idk what you could do. Let alone get in touch with the fbi. In my mind they're an organization that will get in touch with you, but you don't really call in. Til I guess

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#123

Post by mwcz »

yousif_123123 wrote: post #58

I've always noticed that when I'm giving advice to someone or trying to help out, it always feels their problem is easier than whatever problem I have. As someone with some anxiety around things like calling some company to get something done or asking a random stranger for some help in a store, I would gladly do it if it was to help someone else (family member or friend). But when it's for me I find it harder. I won…

I'm sure there's a proper name for what you described, but I call it Rip van Winkle syndrome. He helps everyone in the town with their needs, while allowing his own property to fall to ruin.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#124

Post by aspenmayer »

analog8374 wrote: post #75

Comprehensive agency is best achieved via meditation (specifically, "choiceless awareness"). In my experience. It's basically a physical approach to applying agency rather than a rational one. Agency becomes a paint sprayer and you spray it everywhere. Your agency expands in all directions. It's pretty great.

I’ve been watching a lot of interviews with David Lynch lately (RIP), and apparently he was a longtime practitioner of meditation, and he even wrote a book about it. Your words, especially the “paint sprayer for agency” resonated with me and reminded me of the way he would describe expanding consciousness through meditation.

I appreciate your insight.

Here’s an interview where he describes a bit about his meditation practice. The entire video is worth a watch, but for the sake of brevity, I have linked directly to the timestamp referenced.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=FPb-eTI5jZE&t=597s

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catching_the_Big_Fish

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#125

Post by paganel »

ekjhgkejhgk wrote: post #29

> I learned his real name and used it to track down an old friend of his to ask for help Does anybody else find this strange? There's this person whose name you don't even know, but somehow you know who his old friends are? This is not a situation I'm familiar with.

There's probably more to the story than the author is willing to let us know, but that wouldn't have made for a nice Silicon Valley "you can do it if you really want it for real!"-success story.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#126

Post by perlgeek »

CoffeeTails wrote: post #70
yousif_123123 wrote: post #58

I've always noticed that when I'm giving advice to someone or trying to help out, it always feels their problem is easier than whatever problem I have. As someone with some anxiety around things like calling some company to get something done or asking a random stranger for some help in a store, I would gladly do it if it was to help someone else (family member or friend). But when it's for me I find it harder. I won…

This is something I've noticed as well. I've talked about this with my psychiatrist and she calls this brave, reassured version of ourself the "me-mentor" (jag-mentor in Swedish). Similar to our inner child, this is a core part of our who we are. The idea, if I understood correctly, is to build this me-mentor more and let it help us feel more safe. Let it support our insecure parts/personas. (I hope my English isn't…

Somewhat related, a psychologist I talked to in the 2000s said she really liked the Patronus concept in the Harry Potter books. You imagine an entity that's fueled by your positive memories and emotions, and that protects you from certain anxieties and other stressors.

Things like that seem to be used in at least some schools of psychology.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#127

Post by righthand »

This stood out to me because I have been involved in a small claims court case over a small amount of money (less than $2k). No one will give me advice other than "take them to small claims", because the take is too small for them to take interest and often small claims issues are really stupid disagreements between two parties where one party is not taking responsibility for some finances.

Depending on where you live, small claims can have many routes (this is good), the default is to have your case heard by a judge while you are unrepresented by a lawyer (most likely). However due to the large amount of cases and the fact that your case has very low value, the courts may push you to other routes. One route is mediation, I have been to two-forced mediation sessions and each time the opposing side states at the top they have no intent of make a deal. The second mediation the lawyer was still hostile from the start and threatened to have me pay their legal fees. This rattled me and made me reconsider my actual case. I needed clarification. I found a lawyer referral service provided by the state with a 30 minute consultation, that was affordable ($35) and even though I wasn't looking for representation it offered me a chance to have someone give me advice on the latest updates. A lawyer helped me out but not before immediately rejecting me after seeing the small amount and the small claims case information. I had to reach out again and explain that I didn't really need their representation but to weigh the threat of legal fee retaliation (though honestly what judge would allow that to happen?).

I ultimately think if we had better civics education people wouldn't feel so helpless. This entire small claims process has revealed how difficult it can be to find legal advice and how often that uphill battle can be once you're up against an opponent. It is always easier to walk away than make arguments legally you don't really know or have to get assistance. We need to start teaching civics in schools at a young age or people will feel more and more trapped by the technology they use and less empowered by the rights they have.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#128

Post by pessimizer »

leobg wrote: post #33
bsenftner wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds to me like this "bad faith" mechanism has been weaponized, and is literally how the public is controlled in the United States, maintained in a state of apathy towards the violation of everything the nation claims as a core value.

That word is having a moment, it seems. https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=weaponized

It's a word people use now to attack things that are supposed to be core values, like free speech. The way I use it is the way it ought to be used, the way you use it is "weaponized."

https://www.google.com/search?q=weaponized+free+speech

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#129

Post by hiAndrewQuinn »

yousif_123123 wrote: post #58

I've always noticed that when I'm giving advice to someone or trying to help out, it always feels their problem is easier than whatever problem I have. As someone with some anxiety around things like calling some company to get something done or asking a random stranger for some help in a store, I would gladly do it if it was to help someone else (family member or friend). But when it's for me I find it harder. I won…

The opposite conclusion is that you are more risk-taking when it comes to dictating the actions of others, because neither their gains nor their losses directly accrue to you. But human beings feel loss aversion more keenly than they desire gain, so this biases the advice you would give others (but not yourself) riskier in general.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#130

Post by txrx0000 »

txrx0000 wrote: post #108
yetihehe wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's not my position at all. I would like to understand your position more. Most people believe that they have choice. They could for example do more work or lie on a couch. You mean they have no choice and whichever decision they took is not from their will, but only from their circumstances? I agree that a lot of the weights in such decision is a result of previous happenstances, but "no agency" model suggests…

I believe OP's original implied position was "the universe is deterministic, so why even try", but I was able to convince them that trying is worth it regardless. In fact, the universe being deterministic would mean that it's always worth it to believe that you can accomplish something (if you want to increase the probability of accomplishing that thing). > You mean they have no choice and whichever decision they too…

Wait, no, there's no "increasing the probability" if you really had faith in determinism. That was my lack of faith leaking through while trying to emulate the thought process of a person that has faith in determinism.

Instead it's more like, "if you're reading this already, your brain state is destined to change this way." Whatever I say is just a necessary process to get you to that brain state. Be glad that you're there now because you're no longer doomed to an undesirable future, or at least you can't tell anymore even if you are.

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