Links 2023-07-29
A few items on inner reflection and the related
I originally started by saying this was a collection of advice links. But advice is overrated, undesired by those who need it, and unneeded by those who desire it. Regardless, these seemed helpful to me and interesting in their own right.
Dynomight gives us a Taxonomy of Procrastination—specifically his own procrastination. To summarize we can start with his claim:
…if you want to do a thing and
you like doing it; and
you’re sure it will work; and
you’re sure it will be awesome; and
you’ll get the benefits quickly;
then it will be easy. So if you’re procrastinating, look for the bottleneck.
After this, he considers standard solutions before exploring why procrastination exists as a feature rather than a bug.
Morgan Housel has great thoughts on Paying Attention. Including the idea of a wide funnel and tight filter, he mentions:
When reading an article, book, or report, ask, “Will I still care about this in a year?”
Five years? Ten?
Most of the time you’ll realize you won’t care about whatever you’re reading in a week. It’s newsy – maybe it’s interesting, but it has an expiration date.
There are two types of knowledge: Expiring and permanent. . . .
Asking how long you’ll care about the information you read pushes you to focus on permanent things and care little about temporary things – a great mindset for long-term thinking.
Michael Huemer argues against The Vice of Crappy Moralism. When and why should you not moralize? He elaborates on four points:
a. We don’t know what we’re talking about.
b. How about minding our own goddamn business?
c. Piling on
d. The joy of superiority
He does allow for selective situations with a need for moralism. Specifically:
a. When it’s your business
b. Politicians
c. Theoretically interesting cases
Gurwinder brings us 40 Mind-Expanding Concepts. Notice how these reflect back on the three links above. Specifically in order here are three to consider:
13. Revenge Bedtime Procrastination:
You don’t want the night to end and the dreaded morning to begin, so you procrastinate going to bed, as if by doing so you can prevent tomorrow ever coming. But tomorrow *will* come, and if you don’t sleep well, it’ll hit you all the harder.
17. The Never-Ending Now:
We're always chasing the latest info, but this tends to be junk whose main selling point is novelty, not quality. Instead of new info, seek that which has stood the test of time: classic literature, proven theorems, replicated studies.
We're better at solving other people's problems than our own, because detachment yields objectivity. But Kross et al. (2014) found viewing oneself in the 3rd person yields the same detachment, so when trying to help yourself, imagine you're helping a friend.
Enjoy!