51–60 of 60 posts
The body has a homeostatic balance physically and psychologically. Pushing yourself out that balance (the comfort zone) induces and adaptation (growth). When you push yourself into the edge, as he defines it, you enter the hormetic zone, the area of the dose response where there is benefit (be it from physical or psychological stressors or medicines). Going too far causes unbeneficial and possibly irreparable damage.
Edges are cool. That's where the action is. But sometimes, we shouldn't have action. As I have gotten older, I have learned that "It Depends" is really a mantra for life. I know of some folks that are dealing with mental health challenges. They are all dirt poor, on SSI/Medicaid, and terrified of losing these. As a result, they don't try to get jobs, or advance themselves, socially. They don't take risks. Their thera…
> know of some folks that are dealing with mental health challenges. They are all dirt poor, on SSI/Medicaid, and terrified of losing these. That's why we need UBI, SSI ends up being an indirect UBI anyway but at least with a real UBI system people wouldn't be afraid to try to work during the time periods they were feeling better.
I have seen people in this situation. Sometimes you don't even need to be poor, just in a bad situation where you need help and are getting it. But deeply incentivized (captured might be the right word) by artificial risk structures to avoid any attempts to get out.
The concept he discusses of “the edge” is very similar to “edge of chaos” from physics, but has been studied extensively in complexity sciences, specifically complex adaptive systems. The theory proposes that all complex adaptive systems (CAS) naturally adapt to a state at the “edge of chaos” which is a transition zone between order(stability) and disorder. The theory proposes this is the zone where maximal learning/…
all systems that have accumulated complexity did it in an effort to create resiliency to survive/reproduce/continue to exist, which is innately a method of accumulate self-supervised 'learning', when left to dwell to its own emergent methods. this applies to all systems, from biospheres to food-chains to cells to human evolution. resiliency is needed for systems to be less fragile against chaotic perturbations, as th…
Which is what makes math so interesting. The constant stream of finding predictable islands in the unpredictable, and then unpredictable islands (hard problems) in the predictable (seemingly simple easily defined systems).
Math is chaos.
I suppose as we get smarter, and our understanding of the world gets more sophisticated, our survival/growth progress becomes more and more a math exercise.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Edges are cool. But they do have a dark side, often forgotten when talked about in public. I have once been on the edge of chaos for too long and eventually when it flipped over it took years to recover. Possibly even decades. Or possibly a lifetime.
Agreed. Crunch times at work, 10+ hour days for years left me burnt out even after being out of that for 5 years. Too much edge of your comfort zone can ruin your life!
I don't think it's necessarily a "happy medium", but wisdom to know what kind of pain it is, and what the cost/benefit is of the situation. If you're lifting weights, the "burn" you feel after doing 20 reps of a light weight might be way higher in intensity than a little twinge in your shoulder; but the "burn" might be something you push through, while the twinge is something you just stop your workout for that day -…
I like the nuance you're bringing to this. When originally writing the article, I considered using a gym/weightlifting analogy, as it felt extremely relevant. I agree that the cost/benefit part can really be important. I might lean a bit more into my edge if I'm talking with someone I really care about, even if the cost/risk to me might be a little higher. I'm also much less likely to lean into my edge if I feel the…
Re not talking to a potential powder keg, if you're interested the opinion of one ancient guy a lot of people look to for advice:
“Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces." -Jesus
Edges are cool. That's where the action is. But sometimes, we shouldn't have action. As I have gotten older, I have learned that "It Depends" is really a mantra for life. I know of some folks that are dealing with mental health challenges. They are all dirt poor, on SSI/Medicaid, and terrified of losing these. As a result, they don't try to get jobs, or advance themselves, socially. They don't take risks. Their thera…
I am one of those people. I tried. It was a bad idea.
I am neurodivergent with mental health issues and started working again in 2022 as a developer after having been on disability for about 15 years. A friend of mine has given me a referral to a place he worked, and I had a mid-level development position at a startup that involved a lot of teaching bootcamp grads how to do stuff - that part of my work especially was a great fit. Then the economy tightened up and I got laid off - and there was just no work to be found.
I had worked exactly 11 days past the trial work grace period (thanks, former employer), so I'm in a weird situation where I'm able to draw benefits for a couple of years but I'll have to reapply for disability in a few months. Had I worked 11 days less, I'd still have benefits like nothing had ever happened - and had I worked into December of that year I'd have nothing at all.
The part no one tells you about any of this is that you are going to be reliant on referrals for work for the rest of your life because the gap in your work history makes you absolutely toxic to any sort of HR department permanently. And if the job market dries up like it has, where you're just another mid-level dev in a sea of thousands, that gap in your work history is going to render you absolutely unemployable. I have no idea what that gap in my work history has to do with my skill as a software engineer (aside from the fact that I have had lots of time to practice), but it makes me radioactive.
My life is currently hinging on whether or not my reapplication goes through. If it doesn't... I really don't know what I'm going to do. Getting a job in my field is clearly not an option anymore, and there isn't much other work I'm really all that able to do.
All I can do to get through my days is to try very hard not to think about that. It's grim and it sucks and I really don't anticipate this ending well for me, but I'm trying to stay hopeful.
Edges are cool. That's where the action is. But sometimes, we shouldn't have action. As I have gotten older, I have learned that "It Depends" is really a mantra for life. I know of some folks that are dealing with mental health challenges. They are all dirt poor, on SSI/Medicaid, and terrified of losing these. As a result, they don't try to get jobs, or advance themselves, socially. They don't take risks. Their thera…
> I know of some folks that are dealing with mental health challenges. They are all dirt poor, on SSI/Medicaid, and terrified of losing these. > > As a result, they don't try to get jobs, or advance themselves, socially. They don't take risks. Their therapists tend to encourage this stance. > > I can't, with sincerity, say that they are all wrong, but I'll bet some of them are. If they pushed themselves, they could p…
Sadly, it is not an unusual story (for me). I have heard similar bureaucratic Catch-22 stories for years.
Basically, no one wants to acknowledge that people with mental health issues even exist (unless it's a family member, then "That's different...").
They get totally shafted. Criminals tend to get treated better.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Edges are cool. But they do have a dark side, often forgotten when talked about in public. I have once been on the edge of chaos for too long and eventually when it flipped over it took years to recover. Possibly even decades. Or possibly a lifetime.
Agreed. Crunch times at work, 10+ hour days for years left me burnt out even after being out of that for 5 years. Too much edge of your comfort zone can ruin your life!
>Too much edge of your comfort zone can ruin your life!
its the easy tasks, procrastinating into a wave, that accumulate exponentially the quickest.
Edges are cool. That's where the action is. But sometimes, we shouldn't have action. As I have gotten older, I have learned that "It Depends" is really a mantra for life. I know of some folks that are dealing with mental health challenges. They are all dirt poor, on SSI/Medicaid, and terrified of losing these. As a result, they don't try to get jobs, or advance themselves, socially. They don't take risks. Their thera…
What would such a winner "win" though, if as soon as you get to do anything you want that means you lose?
Edges are cool. That's where the action is. But sometimes, we shouldn't have action. As I have gotten older, I have learned that "It Depends" is really a mantra for life. I know of some folks that are dealing with mental health challenges. They are all dirt poor, on SSI/Medicaid, and terrified of losing these. As a result, they don't try to get jobs, or advance themselves, socially. They don't take risks. Their thera…
> There's a saying: "Winners do what they need to do. Losers do what they want to do." What would such a winner "win" though, if as soon as you get to do anything you want that means you lose?
Second, it’s interesting that the takeaway from the saying is that we can never do what we want.