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Maybe you’re not trying

usefulfictions.substack.com

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Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#181

Post by pizzafeelsright »

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…

Two things are at play:

The problem with your problem is you have a desired outcome. And the other is you are not required to do the heavy lifting.

One method is to find a way to bless "future me". Future me will thank current me sometime in the future and while current me won't enjoy future me's rewards directly, he will think kindly, instead of with contempt.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#182

Post by lubujackson »

An interesting side-note about this post: the use of "agentic" in the context of human behavior. It is an interesting shift in how we view ourselves. This happened with the advent of computers, viewing everything we do in the context of information processing and retrieval; with the advent of social media, viewing our social interactions as signals with pass/fail results.

It is reductive, but also a new perspective from which to see ourselves.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#183

Post by txrx0000 »

h33t-l4x0r wrote: post #172
txrx0000 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never refuted your hypothesis, I just pointed out the fact that the universe being deterministic has nothing to do with whether it's worth it for you to believe that you can achieve things and therefore try. Nor did I say that whether you believe it depends on something you can control. Assuming determinism, it's always worth it to believe that you can achieve things and try, even if it's as a result of me saying t…

It sounds like you're saying that a being with no free will should strive to overcome that somehow, and you can't understand how ridiculous that is.

No, that's not what I'm saying. And I never said that you're a being with no free will. In fact, you have free will. It's just that your idea of free will refers to a deterministic process if we're in a deterministic universe.

It's not possible to know what a non-deterministic process is in a deterministic universe. If you have faith that the universe is deterministic, then your definition of "non-deterministic" is equivalent to "deterministic" because you've never observed anything other than deterministic processes.

The only reason we're even able to talk about this in a meaningful way is because we both know your assumption is just an assumption rather than the truth, and we abstractly distinguished some phenomena as different from others, and say that one group defines determinism, while the other group defines non-determinism.

But since you're assuming that the universe is deterministic, then according to you, free will means the capacity for deterministic decision-making, which you have. The process of decision-making still happens in your brain, it's just a deterministic process.

I've merely pointed out that accomplishing something is a state of reality that can only come after trying to do that thing. If you don't try, you won't accomplish. And if you don't believe you should try, you won't try. So if you don't believe you should try, you won't accomplish. All of these statements are true in a deterministic universe.

If you don't believe you should try, then there can only be one outcome: you won't accomplish. If you believe you should try, then there can also only be one outcome (according to your assumption), but you don't know what it will be. The universe may have predestined you to accomplish something, but it can only begin with you believing you can do it. Why not start believing you can do it? Believing is a necessary precondition to accomplishment, even if that belief is predetermined. Just do it.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#184

Post by sindoc »

Good points. Thanks for sharing. The main point I glean from this read is: don’t let productivity at work mask other aspects of your life.

There are irreducible dimensions of life where one shouldn’t accumulate debt, otherwise they come bite you when you’re vulnerable or they could make you vulnerable, which will end up affecting your productivity at work to say the least.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#186

Post by accrual »

mosesbp wrote: post #84
accrual wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminded me of Einstein: > We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them

Since I assume you would be interested to know, this quote seems almost certainly misattributed to Einstein and seems to have been made up by Ram Dass [1]. Though I would be happy to be proved wrong if you have a source [1] https://hsm.stackexchange.com/questions/7751/did-einstein-sa...

Interesting! Yeah, there appears to be a lot of discussion on the topic. My source indicating Einstein was no better. However, happy to attribute it to Ram Dass and/or Einstein, both were brilliant.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#187

Post by captainkrtek »

y-curious wrote: post #77
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…

People in the ADHD community are outspoken about a tangential concept: cleaning. Cleaning your friends place is a fun, novel, non-emotional activity. Cleaning your own space is a mental slog, boring and often painful due to having to rid yourself of mementos. In that case, my theory is that you get to shed your learned helplessness about how things look. I suspect it’s similar with giving advice.

It’s true.

My girlfriend and I both have ADHD and are medicated. I will run laps around her tidying up her place, but struggle at my own place.. its so hard to understand

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#188

Post by BeFlatXIII »

nicbou wrote: post #112
BeFlatXIII wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Each attempt teaches you something, so to make good art, you have to make a lot of bad art first. Paper is cheap and making bad art is fun once you move past perfectionism. For the same reason, if it weren't for digital cameras, I never would have taken enough pictures to become competent enough to enjoy photography. I am also all ears about anyone chiming in with an effective way to deal with shopping problems. So…

Writing that comment got me to try Zalando, instead of slowly mapping out and visiting every store in my city. Maybe I wasn’t trying correctly. My friend also taught me to slowly gather an inspiration folder with things I like. I have one for clothing, home decor and art. It made my job much easier. I have filled a shopping cart with clothes I have seen on others in the last few months. It wasn’t that hard. I was jus…

What is Zalando, besides an island in Denmark?

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#189

Post by BeFlatXIII »

dpark wrote: post #132
BeFlatXIII wrote: post #91

> But the feeling of effort doesn’t mean that you’re Actually Trying. That's why I go out of my way to dunk on people who treat “try things” and “hard work” as useful advice. What you work hard on matters. If they wanted respect, they ought to have had the honesty to admit they do not have specific advice for you (or lack the time to help).

But “try things” and “hard work” are excellent advice. Someone who’s working really hard to solve a problem one way when it’s not working is not in fact “trying things”. Someone who’s trying many things but putting no effort into it is not “working hard”. People willing to both try things and work hard are much more likely to discover a good solution.

Yes, they're both necessary, but they're not useful to someone who is stuck. They're both vague blow-off statements. If someone isn't working hard, suggest they spend more time on the issue; if they're stuck suggesting somewhere in the process to try something else.

Re: Maybe you’re not trying

#190

Post by alsetmusic »

Yoric wrote: post #153
nicbou wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is for me too, but in the end, practice made it so much easier. It took years and some guidance from a therapist, but it worked. “I want to meet more people” was one of those problems that took me year to properly work on. I think that the core problem was similar: I was willing to make an effort, but did not have a clear idea of how to do it.

Well, happy it worked for you. For me, I've taught myself to socialize, but it takes lots of masking to do so, which means lots of energy, and failures are pretty hard on me.

One thing that helped me a lot was practicing in low-stakes situations. I started chatting up Uber drivers pretty consistently and learned a lot about just letting go in the moment. I was using rideshare for all my travel at the time, before the pan made me realize how vulnerable I was without a car. I don't get that practice anymore because taking Uber is much less frequent and I let the habit ossify.
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