Overthinking and how to nobble it
Dec. 19th, 2010 10:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
andygatesAn interesting study has been going the rounds (Ars has the clearest writeup) and its got me thinking. Not about M&Ms -- well, mmm, now you mention it -- not about M&Ms but about thinking and doing, and why I'm so very good at adhockery and starting projects and so very bad at follow-through and finishing things.
I'm very, very good at task visualisation. I know exactly how the finished bathroom will look: I've gone over all the details of every job but I just can't find the gumption to make it physical. I know exactly what that training session will be like but, meh, maybe I'll just surf for a bit (million-tab baby, baby: if I could I'd twinscreen each eye separately). And yeah, I know exactly what healthy food I'll do tonight but meh, I've already thunk that, let's have dirty pizza instead. I've turned into Grampa from the Lost Boys: read the TV guide, don't need the TV.
Let's assume for a moment that this article provides a working hypothesis: if I think about things less, I'll do more. I may even fall into fewer gumption traps (the most obvious ones are Lane Rage and For Want Of A Bolt) as my planned-stuff is less rigid, so less derailed by unplanned stuff.
How in the seven hells does that actually turn into a thing to do? All I can think to do is make a bunch of to-do lists and spin the bottle, but that's a project and I'll get bored of it after I've worked out the list parameters and upgraded the bottle for some custom dice or maybe made an app for it.
You lot are different think-meats in different heads; barring the solipsistic horror of the entire Universe being my imaginings, you must think in different ways. Do you hypervisualise and then get bored? If you don't... what do you do? Are you always surprised when things work out as expected, because "as expected" is a null set? How do you do anything without the mental map beforehand?
I'm very, very good at task visualisation. I know exactly how the finished bathroom will look: I've gone over all the details of every job but I just can't find the gumption to make it physical. I know exactly what that training session will be like but, meh, maybe I'll just surf for a bit (million-tab baby, baby: if I could I'd twinscreen each eye separately). And yeah, I know exactly what healthy food I'll do tonight but meh, I've already thunk that, let's have dirty pizza instead. I've turned into Grampa from the Lost Boys: read the TV guide, don't need the TV.
Let's assume for a moment that this article provides a working hypothesis: if I think about things less, I'll do more. I may even fall into fewer gumption traps (the most obvious ones are Lane Rage and For Want Of A Bolt) as my planned-stuff is less rigid, so less derailed by unplanned stuff.
How in the seven hells does that actually turn into a thing to do? All I can think to do is make a bunch of to-do lists and spin the bottle, but that's a project and I'll get bored of it after I've worked out the list parameters and upgraded the bottle for some custom dice or maybe made an app for it.
You lot are different think-meats in different heads; barring the solipsistic horror of the entire Universe being my imaginings, you must think in different ways. Do you hypervisualise and then get bored? If you don't... what do you do? Are you always surprised when things work out as expected, because "as expected" is a null set? How do you do anything without the mental map beforehand?
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no subject
Date: 2010-12-28 01:04 am (UTC)Once you've got the survival thing out of the way, old Maslows pyramid cuts in, and since you're not likely to catch religion it doesn't leave much basic drives left.
So that's what the mortgage thing is about, not the money, but putting the "survival" back on the table, it's about not eating 2 minute noodles for the rest of your life while living out of a cardboard box. A similar thing can be done by getting an expensive SigOther.
Inside the box, IMO, is the prioritisor-er. (and it's wot breaks if one does the guru reject the material world bit) - hence the Maslow-link between prioritisor-er and spiritualism/religion.
Ssince you don't have want big money/silly toys/expensive girlfriend/wank car; you're now standing at the edge of today's narrow Western cultural identity. Beyond this there are dragons (which is one reason normal types don't want to know there is even an edge (hence their blinkers)
no subject
Date: 2010-12-28 11:06 am (UTC)What you're saying is that peril makes a man of me. Well, shit, why didn't you just send me off to war? How's your take on the Hemingway question?
It's a Dirk Gently leap to connect the two, really.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-28 08:51 pm (UTC)If it was an answer that fit into your normal calculations, then you could visualise the problem and thus see it's answer as you can the order tasks. Consider it in the manner of the Plato's Allegory of the Cave.
If you could recognise the process from your PoV you could see the answer.
Much of what plagues the infamous "GenX" symptoms... and I'm not slapping a label on you; you've known me longer than that. It's a bunch of signs and manifestations which have some common causes. ...which if looked at objectively have some common mental and psychological causes.
To quote a friend. If you lift a very heavy weight (eg in weight lifting) you must be focussed in the moment. Can one acheive the same thing by mentally visualising the same process?
What are the simulaities/differences?
In the modern information world, what room is there for "reality"? What value is there beyond what individuals arbitarily assign? And through what processes do they use to assign these things?
After all, many folks would think running or weightwork or pennyfarthings are not worth focussing on. What is it that makes these things worth the effort to start with?
It does also become difficult as you are very intelligent and know it, yet in it's own way this can be blinkers that are closing you into your own linear world, as you measure and judge. BTW the process is age dependent :) and well documented. Just not in modernly scientific acceptable ways (I first came across it numerology, although it is hinted at in the full Myers Briggs reports, where the focus priorities change due to experience and age)
no subject
Date: 2010-12-28 11:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-01-04 05:57 pm (UTC)It's relevancy is that it's the same black box. (or wetware box, in this case). Analysing of black box is done by in-out signal comparison.
To put it another way (i.e. another ray trace passing through): Have you worked out who your audience is yet? (for each case mentioned). (re:prioritise-or) c.f. maslow pyramid (ie it's not death avoidance/adrenal addiction (safe); it's not food (sated); it's adaquate shelter (protected) ....)
Oh here's another little bit random, little bit connected, little bit other article to check out: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/12/13/101213fa_fact_lehrer?currentPage=all
My curiousity; Why do all these experts assume they work in an isolated closed system? that is to say isolated to their interests/data stream