Is Introspection Useful?

Look within.

I have this intuitive sense that it's useful to think about our thinking, a.k.a to engage in introspection or metacognition.  For me, this intuition has swollen to become even more, a bit of an obsession.  Practical introspection could be considered the founding principle of this blog.  But is my intuitive sense correct?  Is introspection useful?  Or, is it a narcissistic drain on our cognitive resources? 

At the core of my personal philosophy toward introspection is an inherent skepticism.  Essentially, I propose that the goal of introspection is to adopt a stance of skepticism toward our own thinking with the objective of tuning our decision making to improve our mental lives and get better at life.

Skepticism truly is at the heart of this process.  I propose that improvement requires a continuous process of asking "Is this bullshit?" even (or especially) about our own thoughts.  By calling bullshit on our own habitual modes of thinking, we can reach a new understanding about the cognitive traps we might be falling into on a daily basis that cause us stress or hold us back from our goals.  We can then slowly work to discard these destructive patterns of thought with healthier ones.

As I've mentioned, this just makes sense to me.  But I could imagine a scenario where this might get out of hand.  The term "analysis paralysis" comes to mind.  One could introspect his life away, questioning each layer of decision making until he is frozen in inaction.

Of course, nothing in life is inherently good or bad, it's all how something is applied.  Exercise is a great example.  If done responsibly, exercise is beneficial.  You can get healthier and more physically fit. However if one were to exercise to the point of excess, injury or illness may result.  Introspection must be the same way.  There must be a self-analyzing sweet spot.  But what is that balance?

Ironically, my excessive introspection has led me to believe that the sweet spot is far on the side of less thinking.  As I have skeptically analyzed my thoughts as they have floated by over the years, I have come to realize that most of them can be binned as useless "worrying".  I have come to loathe thinking that does not perform a useful service to me and I have found that most thinking is useless thinking.

This line of thinking has led my to another principle.  I propose that thinking is useless unless it results in a decision and, typically, an action.  In other words, thinking is just energy-sapping wheel-spinning unless it actually cause you to do something in the real world that has consequences. Furthermore, by taking action we are essentially performing a mini-experiment about how our actions impact reality.  We can then learn from our actions and plan our next actions based on evidence.  This mode of thinking-while-acting is very close to my personal interpretation of flow and is the default state that I try to achieve.  

Here's how it's playing out right now in my dome...

Me: Well, Homunculus, is introspection useful?  

Homunculus: I think the answer is yes if the objective is to squash negative thinking that impairs our ability to make shit happen.  In other words, I propose that we should be skeptical that all of our thinking is useful and be ruthless in turning those thoughts off that get in our way.

Me: How do I know if it's negative thinking and not a rational weighing of risks?  I shouldn't always charge head first into a situation.  That's risky!

Homunculus: It's hard to know for sure what will happen but start taking some actions in the direction that seems the best and see what happens.  You'll learn more by experimenting in this way then by worrying about abstractions.

Me: But I'm worried about this, that, and the other thing...  What if they happen?

Homunculus: Again, it's all theoretical.  Take some small actions in the direction that looks most promising (test the waters, if you must) and learn/think with some new information at hand.

Me: Homunculus, you're the man.

Homunculus: No, you're the man.  Stay happy!

Don't Don't Break the Chain... Make the Chain!

Make the chain!
(source: Wikipedia)

One of the worst productivity tips I've ever heard came from Jerry Seinfeld.  Here's the "tip": never skip a day of work.  Specifically, as a comedian-writer Seinfeld's goal was to write as much as possible.  To this end, he marked a calendar with a big red "X" for every day he worked.  After a few days of this, a chain of X's would form.  Then came the productivity goal: "Don't break the chain."

I've tried this trick for some activities and I've found it to be a terrible piece of advice.  Here's why: I always failed.  Eventually, I broke the chain.  Eventually, life reared up and made it impossible to stick with a habit.  Something always comes up: illness, events, deadlines, fatigue.  And guess what?  Failing sucks!

The problem with "Don't Break the Chain" is that it is an avoidance goal: it frames a goal or habit as something not to do.  The problem with this is that doesn't describe the behavior that one should be doing and leaves too much room for failure, as I've described.

Instead, I propose the following counter to Seinfeld's tip: "Make a chain."  Track every time you do something.  Make a check mark. Stick a sticker.  Put a coin in a jar. Whatever.  Just give yourself credit for every time you do it right and keep track of how many times you did it.  In this case, it doesn't matter if you skip a day.  Pick up the next day, or the next.  Or the next week.  Small failures don't matter if your goal is to make a huge chain; just pick up where you left off.

This has worked great for me while I've taken up running.  At first, I got all bummed out when I missed a day of my running plan: I broke the chain.  But then I reframed the goal as "make the chain" and now I can never fail.  If I miss a day, I just pick up where I left off.  Each workout I complete, I cross it off.  I see a permanent record of my progress that cannot be taken away.

Stay happy :)

My Stress Portfolio

What's your stress tolerance? (Credit: Mike Richey)

I'm no investor.  Far from it.  I've bought maybe 10 stocks in my lifetime and I recall the best performer losing half it's value.  I'm also no sucker, so I learned from my mistakes and quickly outsourced my meager investment portfolio to the professionals and haven't looked back.

Now, when I talk about "investment professionals", I should clarify.  I really don't trust the stock-picking ability of anyone since the financial markets are complicated and I doubt that anyone can predict how anything that complicated will behave.  Fortunately, I'm not alone in this opinion and a subset of the investment community relies on the principle of diversification of risk as a bedrock strategy for coping with the uncertainty of the markets.  Through diversification, an investor can rely on historical information about the best performing investment types without putting all her eggs in a single proverbial basket.

Now let's shift gears to stress.  Life activities and events are like investments.  We are investing our time and attention in activities that may bring us happiness, pleasure, grief, or stress.  The payouts or losses may be on the timescales of days, to weeks, to years.  As an investor of our time and attention, we must weigh the probabilities of gains with the risks of losses: driving hard at work could bring promotions at the cost of personal relationships, for example.

I propose the concept of a Stress Portfolio as a strategy to balance our activities to allow both personal growth while managing the risks that come with stress, like poor health or burnout.  My Stress Portfolio is a introspective sense of the balance of five components of my reaction to daily life: distress, eustress, flow, relaxation, and boredom.  I think of each of these as representing a decreasing level of stress one might experience.  As events happen in life both within or outside my control, I can reevaluate the distribution of my stress portfolio and "rebalance" my intensity to compensate.

What is the right distribution of stress?  I think the answer to that question will vary by the individual. For example, some people are more resilient than others and may benefit from a greater allocation of activities in the distress or eustress categories.  This is an interesting area for research as proper allocation of stress will determine the degree of success an individual can achieve.  To much stress and a person may crumble and give up.  Too little stress and a person is not challenged and may not rise to their full potential.

As a general rule, I think most of our time should be spent in a state of relaxation or flow with a decent amount of time in a state of eustress (exciting or exhilarating situations). I also don't advocate total avoidance of stressful situations or boredom (the extremes).  These act as high and low intensity activities that can permit personal growth and recovery, respectively.

Until more research is done to determine the right allocation, all we can do is look within and ask ourselves what our portfolio should look like.  Just like an investor must evaluate her risk tolerance, an individual must evaluate her stress tolerance to find the right allocation and maximize performance over time.

Stay happy!

Useful Data

But is the information useful, monkey? Is it?!
(source)

In a recent attempt to "cheat" with science while creating a March Madness bracket, I rediscovered the online data-geek candy store FiveThirtyEighty.com, brain child of renowned statistician Nate Silver.  In another incredible display of sexy stats, Silver and Company have assembled a robust statistical model of the NCAA men's basketball tournament, adding evidence to the thesis that the geeks shall inherit the earth.

While the information on FiveThiryEight is beautifully presented and likely as accurate as one will get, I began to wonder: is this useful? More broadly, what makes information useful?

I don't want to get too hung up on what "useful" means, but for my purposes I'd like to define useful as enabling better performance: greater accuracy, greater speed, or higher success rates in some activity.  What feature of data would make it useful?

Here's my opinion: for information to be useful, it must be actionable.  In other words, for information to enable better performance or higher success rates it must inform what actions should, or should not be performed to improve accuracy.

A great example of this type of information for me has been heart rate data during exercise.  When I run according to my heart rate training plan, I know that I'm working too hard on my easy day when my heart rate goes above some threshold.  This is actionable information.  My heart rate is too high so I change my behavior and slow down.

For the FiveThirtyEighty March Madness predictions, the information is sort of actionable.  The FiveThirtyEight bracket is structured as probabilities of a team winning at each stage of the tournament.  This information is useful if I'm betting on a game (i.e. which team is likely to win) but isn't useful if I'm trying to make a bracket (i.e. which teams are most likely to be in each slot of the bracket).

The lesson here is that the structure of the information should match the decision to be made.  In the example of my hear rate data, my current heart rate is only useful in the context of a threshold.  I must know how my current data point relates to some useful scale.  Only then can I take action to bring my individual measure back into range.

However, generating actionable data is incredibly complicated because it requires a solid understanding of the mechanisms that explain a phenomenon.  In the case of heart rate training, heart rate is a well-established proxy for intensity and systematically modulating intensity is important to balance improvements in fitness against risk for injury.   Creating actionable data is also complicated by the need to understand how it will be used (i.e. betting on a game vs. making a bracket).  For these reasons, generating data without a solid theory to back up action is no better than rock collecting.

A related piece on FiveThirtyEight highlights an interview with White House Chief Data Scientist, Dr. D.J. Patel.   A topic of discussion that caught my attention was that of "Data Products" which Dr. Patel explains as "How do you use data to do something really beneficial?"  The true obstacle to creating powerful data products (the dream of Big Data) isn't access to data or data processing tools as these are now as ubiquitous  as the internet and the personal computer, respectively.  Instead, the obstacle to data products, or "useful data" as I'm calling it, is creating a solid theory about the mechanism driving a phenomenon.  Without this understanding, data remains noise.

For these reasons, while I am as enamored by sexy data as much as the next dork, I am reminded about the need for good scientific theories that allow us to interpret and structure sexy data in a way that makes it useful.  That is the real challenge for data scientists in the age of big data.

The Axiom of Awesomeness

Everything is a skill.

Is intelligence something we are born with? Or, can we become more intelligent with hard work?  The answer is certainly a bit of both but a critical variable is our personal opinion on the matter: if you don't think you can get smarter, you won't.

In classroom settings, if students think intelligence is malleable, they are more motivated, exert greater effort, and outperform students who think intelligence is fixed trait (I'm not compensated for that link, BTW).

Unfortunately, I think the broad implications of these observations are not always appreciated.  Often, the message is that a growth mindset - an attitude that self-improvement is possible - is critical for performance by kids and in school.  However, a growth mindset is really about performance by anyone doing anything.  The real take-home message from studies like these is that a general growth mindset is a critical first step before we can become better at life.

To counter this poor messaging, I propose the following Axiom of Awesomeness.  The Axiom outlines a philosophy of growth that we must accept before we can improve.  I'll enumerate the axiom first and then will expand on each tenet.

The Axiom of Awesomeness

1. Everything we do is a skill.  
2. Every skill can be improved by deliberate practice.
3. Skill improvement through deliberate practice takes time and effort.
4. Every moment is an opportunity to practice a life skill.

OK, so that's the Axiom. Hopefully I will be able to convince you that the axiom is on-target and that it's an important cognitive framework to support becoming a rockstar.

1. Everything we do is a skill.  

While most research studying a growth mindset were focused on school performance, school performance is only one part of life.  As I've discussed before, being good at life goes way beyond an SAT score.  However, everything else we do can be considered as much a skill as test taking.  For example, staying focused on a task is a skill.  Controlling our emotions during stress is a skill.  Managing relationships is a skill.  Speaking is a skill.  Writing is a skill (one I'm struggling with right now).   Skills aren't only limited to those things we traditionally might consider skills, like playing the guitar, drawing, or taking tests.

2. Every skill can be improved by deliberate practice.

No one is born playing the guitar or knowing math or being a great public speaker or being a leader.  Even the masters in fields like these spent countless hours focused on getting better: they practiced (for an in depth analysis of this, check out Mastery by Robert Greene).  Dedicated, focused practice is essential for improvement and success.  For more on the focused part of this tenet, see this article by Cal Newport.

However, let's keep in mind the first tenet of the Axiom: everything we do is a skill.  For example, let's say I'm bad at following through on projects (something most people struggle with, I'm sure).  Well, following-through-on-projects is a skill.  That's the first tenet of the Axiom.  The second tenet of the axiom is that practice improves skills.  Thus, I need to come up with some way to practice this skill.  In my example of "following through on projects", I might select one, small project as a "fail at no cost" test-case which will allow me to work on my issue without getting discouraged.  Once I succeed at the test-case, I can set my sights on something more challenging.

3. Skill improvement through practice takes time and effort.

Ahh, but here is the tricky part: getting better takes real work!  Sorry, I know we all want someone to tell us the secret to being amazing (like this book claims).  But that's not reality and we all know it.  Improvement takes focused effort over long periods of time.  Until one has practiced something for decades one can't assume it's an impossible task.  My homunculus likes to say to me: "Stop whining like a little baby, put your big boy pants on, and get to work".

4. Every moment is an opportunity to practice a life skill.

The good news is that getting smarter, more intelligent, or better at life can happen at any moment.  We don't need to concoct some arbitrary self-improvement program that goes on our calendar.  Every moment of living is a practice opportunity.  Why?  Because life isn't easy and we aren't perfect which is a guarantee that we will always screw something up.  With the Axiom of Awesomeness in mind, these challenges morph from "this sucks and I suck" to chances to get better at life.

Here is a perfect example: preparing for a presentation.  Making and giving a presentation is an opportunity to resist the urge to procrastinate (a skill), focus on a single task (a skill), manage our anxiety (a skill), communicate to a group (a skill), and bounce back if it doesn't go well (a skill).  Every step of preparing for this presentation is a practice opportunity.  My favorites in the list are: managing our anxiety and bouncing back if it doesn't go well.  These are skills that most often trip us up because they are so hard to define and aren't viewed as skills at all.  Frequently, these skills are chalked up to "that's just the way I am."  Wrong.  We must remember the first tenet: everything is a skill.  Next time can be better but we have to keep practicing.

In Summary

Perhaps this is obvious, but a belief that improvement is possible will determine if we improve.  However, a growth mindset is only part of the equation.  As I argue with the above Axiom, a growth mindset must be supplemented by three additional elements: 1) a broad definition of skill to include anything humans do, 2) a willingness to put focused effort into improvement, and 3) an attitude that life's challenges are opportunities to get better at living.  In combination, these four assumptions will not only permit improvement but will also be motivating during periods of difficulty when our resolve is tested.

Stay happy!

Meta-metacognition: The cure for the analysis-paralysis issue

In Eric-Wubbo Lameijer's nice article Metacognition: the third way of thinking, there is a nice discussion of the potential power that can come from thinking about our thinking.  By approaching our thinking habits with the attitude of the expert - in other words, deliberately seeking better strategies for tackling our problems - we can become better thinkers, even expert thinkers.  In most cases, thinking better is good for business.

But Eric points out a possible pitfall with metacognition: too much metacognition and we fall victim to paralysis by meta-analysis.  I've discussed the importance of translating thoughts to action before, but still the question "how do we achieve the balance between thinking and doing?"  I actually can't believe I'm saying it, but with more metacognition, thank you very much!  The "default state" for many is to be a planner and a thinker, but we should remain dedicated to thinking well and thinking in a way that promotes performance.  To that end, I am downright meta-metacognitive, and am always on the look out for excessive metacognition.   When I think I'm thinking too much, I take action to stop thinking and make shit happen.

But what does that entail?  How can we think our way out of thinking? My opinion: we can't.  Instead, the thinking will continue, but we can consciously start to act by doing things with our bodies like typing, cleaning, dialing, walking, etc,  Eventually, these actions will lead to a shift in mind-set from the analysis mode, to a flow mode where the details of the task are sufficiently engaging to prevent metacognition.

The one time when I find this most important is when trying to sleep - if I'm not careful and I hit the hay in an analytic mode, Mr. Sandman will never arrive.  However, reading before bed gets my mind out of the meta and into flow... Greetings Winkin', Blinkin' and Nod!

The Mental Reboot Script

Time to reboot.

There's no way around it - the grind has been grinding you down.  You're tired, you're stressed, your motivation is low.  Sometimes life can be really tough and, lately, life has been really tough.

But bad times ebb and flow, come and go.  Sometimes things are tough, other times things are great.  Perhaps the tough times seem to happen more than the good times, but it's hard to know for sure.  When you're stressed it's difficult to keep perspective.

Situations can change though, and situations change faster if you make an effort to move forward, to make progress.  Who cares if you only make a little change today for the better?  At least it's a step in the right direction.  One small change to make life better is all you need to feel some hope.  Who knows?  Maybe this is the beginning of a period of incredible success.  Until you get started, you'll never know.

So get focused.  Don't let all the nagging stressors creep into your mind all at once.  You can only do one thing at a time.  Just pick something to do that would make a difference in your life and start working on it.  Pick something small, manageable and doable and just get it done.  No more worrying about picking the perfect thing to do, just trust your instincts and make progress.  Block out all other intruding worries and attack that one thing that will make you feel the most accomplished.

Oh, and please? Give yourself a break when you're done?  In order to make real, lasting progress you're going to want to stick to your goals.  Most things that need to be done take some time to happen, so let's not burn out.  After a full day of focused effort, you deserve to relax, rest and recover.  Your brain is an organ and a day of hard work is like a mental workout: you need some recovery time to be ready for the next day.

And while we're on the topic, don't lose sight of all the good stuff you have going on.  There are things that bring you joy even if they are little, simple things like McDonald's breakfast sandwiches.  Look around and remind yourself about a few things that make life fun and enjoyable.

Feeling better?  Good.  But, don't beat yourself up about getting down in the dumps from time to time.  It happens to everyone.  The important thing is to keep an eye on those nasty thoughts and be sure to reboot when things get out of hand.

Pessimism now, optimism later

Optimism and pessimism aren't
exclusive: it's all about timing.

My homunculus admitted to me that I've been confusing him.

On the one hand, I've been saying that optimism is critical for performance: if we get all pessimistic, we give up prematurely and don't invest the time to achieve our goals.

On the other hand, it's also critical to acknowledge our failures.  If we don't embrace our weak points and bury our head in the sand, we won't get any better at life.

Vexing isn't it?  The optimism thing was particularly hard for the rational part of my brain to embrace: I didn't like the idea of externalizing too many of the bad things that happened to me.  That felt like I was avoiding responsibility for my actions.  Also, as a total control freak, it didn't sit well to think that I couldn't influence most things in my life for the better.

But, luckily, I had a real a-ha moment.  Accepting our failures and being optimistic are not mutually exclusive.  Instead, it's all about timing.

Specifically, it is a fact that no one is perfect.  Life isn't perfect.  Actually, sometimes life can really suck.  Furthermore, none of us and none of our lives will ever be perfect. Debby-downer.

However, this doesn't mean that we can't get better and that our lives can't get better.  Just because we have aspects of our lives that are imperfect doesn't mean that, with time, we can't improve.

This is the way to reconcile our weak points with the need to remain optimistic.  Right now, in the present, we should be realistic about where we stand and acknowledge what sucks.  At the same time, we can remember that the bad doesn't have to last forever.  In the future, things can get better.  Combining these two attitudes - pessimism for now, optimism for later - is the formula for lasting, long-term progress.

Brain In A Jar

Don't forget: you have a body.

"Embodiment" is a concept in cognitive science that doesn't get enough attention.  In very simple terms, embodiment means you have a body.

Uh, ok.  Yes, most of us can agree that we have a body but the true insight of embodiment is that how we think, actually the very fact that we think at all, cannot be separated from the fact that we have a body.  For a primer, check out this "brief guide to embodied cognition" from Sam McNerney.

Here's the way I think about it: if we had some sort of technology that would allow me to take out my brain and put it in a jar, you know what would happen? Nothing.  I might think about stuff, but eventually I would stop thinking about anything new and I would probably go crazy from sensory deprivation. In addition, without a body all my thoughts would be meaningless: if a brain thinks in a jar and no one is there to listen to it... You get the idea.

The Happy Homunculus attempts to be a practical blog, dedicated to applying psychology to performance.  Luckily, all this talk about embodiment has practical implications.  Basically: you have a body and, if you want to perform at your best, you better not forget it.

I can think of two major extensions of embodiment that relate to performance:

First, all our thinking matters for shit if we don't get out in the real world and do something. We can feel like garbage or feel great.  Be happy, or be sad.  But, what really matters, in the real world, is what we do with our body (hands to do, mouth to speak, eyes to look, ears to hear) to make something happen.

Second, everything that happens to your body, happens to your brain.  Let me put it this way: your brain is an organ connected with all the other organ systems of your body.  If you treat your body like it is an expendable brain-carrying-case, your brain will suffer.  Your thinking will suffer.  And, your performance will suffer.  I'm sure many of the academics that I interact with would love to avoid this fact, but if your body is unhealthy, your brain is unhealthy. Period.

In summary, we have bodies.  Our brains can not be separated from our bodies.  Our thinking can not be separated from our bodies.  Let's get our bodies out into the real world and make shit happen.  And, let's take care of our bodies so we can keep making shit happen.

Readin', Writin', and... Self Control?

A wrathful Khan, yes.
But, not the Khan I'm writing about. 

One of the most exciting things that has happened to education in recent memory is the founding of the Khan Academy.

If you don't know the story, Sal Khan is a highly educated, non-educator who was once a hedge fund analyst.  However, his life took an unexpected turn when the video-based math tutorials he made for his nieces became increasingly popular on YouTube.  This unexpected response inspired him to create an online "academy" where anyone can learn any topic for free.

The idea (and execution) of the Khan Academy is awesome.  Check out this TED talk to get a sense of the applications and implications of this type of learning system.  Watching this gave me goose-bumps of the "I've glimpsed the future" variety.  But, I also had one criticism; not of Khan Academy per se, but that most educational strategies fail to acknowledge the essential cognitive skills that kids need to succeed both in the Khan Academy and in the regular academies around the world.

At Khan Academy, kids can progressively watch videos on topics of increasing complexity and can also take quizzes to measure understanding.  However, even with an incredible resource like Khan Academy, kids must possess a few cognitive skills to fully benefit.  For example, without focus or diligence, kids will not return to the site again and again to reap the full benefit. Without resilience, kids may quit after a period of failure before the inevitable breakthrough can be made.

While merging education with technology is a fantastic thing, and is sure to improve education for millions, we must not ignore the fact that essential, metacognitive skills must be in place for our children, and us, to reach full potential.  How technology can be brought to bear on this challenge remains a major hurdle.  Until then, teachers in the trenches and parents at home are the only people who can ensure our kids develop these essential characteristics.

S.M.A.R.T. Goals Are Dumb

Dream small.

If you've ever been exposed to any goal-setting advice of any kind, you've probably heard of S.M.A.R.T. goals, an acronym which stands for Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely.  I'd like to add one more adjective: overwhelming.

Who has the time and energy to craft a series of SMART goals and then track progress in great detail? I'm a nerd, but there are only so many excel spreadsheets I can create before I feel ashamed.

Also, what happens if you think you've created a SMART goal, but realize it's not "attainable" or too "timely"?  I know what happens to me: I feel like monkey poo.

SMART goals are also dumb because when they are too "big picture", they cause anxiety.  For example, when I think about some Big Goal, even when it may fit into the SMART paradigm, I get overwhelmed. I get discouraged. I get pessimistic.

What's the solution?  Actually, I think it's a combination of Big, but Vague, goals and small SMART micro-goals that are designed to bring us one step closer to that Big Vague Goal.  This concept of micro-goals is shown to be effective in everything from making tough changes, to procrastination, to extreme physical challenges like training for the Navy Seals.

Why does this work?  Because you can design the micro-goals to be so stupid easy, you are guaranteed to succeed. So, we shouldn't make some huge-ass SMART goal that seems impossible (even if it's not). Instead, we do something so tiny that it seems ridiculously easy (run for 5 minutes).  Then, we do it and feel awesome.  This creates a positive-feedback loop: set more tiny goals, kick ass, repeat.  As long as these tiny, micro-goals are pointed in the general direction of the Big Vague Goal, we're basically guaranteed to come close to our Big Vague Goal over time.

To be fair SMART isn't all bad, setting specific, measureable, attainable, realistic, and timely goals is essentially what I suggest we do: easy goals are all of those things.  But I would add one more essential criteria: small. The smallness takes the overwhelming scale out of the equation. So, SMARTS goal-setting is the way to go for me, but that's an awkward acronym and it's easier to just say SMART goals are dumb.

Self Help Snake Oil

Beware self-improvement snake-oil.

In The New Atlantis, Algis Valiunas waxes poetic about the self-help industry:

A vast apparatus of uplift and solicitude services Americans’ longings for success and happiness. Self-help, positive thinking, actualization, motivation, empowerment: the industry of worldly wisdom whirs on like a perpetual-motion dynamo, powered by the consumers’ insatiable compulsion to have it all and to feel good about themselves, and by the purveyors’ confidence that they, at any rate, can indeed have it all, by turning out swill by the boatload and feeding the cravings of the perennially feckless.

With this beautiful passage, Mr. Valiunas reveals a misgiving I've harbored since first starting to explore the science of self-awareness.  Specifically, is all self-improvement advice a bunch of mumbo-jumbo?

On the one hand, I've stumbled onto a ton of science that indicates that certain metacognitive skills are critical for performance: self-control, grit, creativity, optimism.  In these cases, there is at least a smidge of research suggesting that if you possess these characteristics, life is better. +1.

On the other hand, anyone can spew any advice about anything.  And, there are plenty of people who are, including me. Much of the advice hasn't been put to the test. -1.

So, what are we to do?  What is the snake-oil and what is the medicine?  The scientist in me would argue that we should study the various theories.  Whatever methods hold up to rigorous testing can be adopted and the rest discarded.  However, the pragmatist in me realizes that there aren't enough scientists to test every opinion on self-improvement.

So, what are we to do, as individuals?  Here's where I fall on the matter: I'm an empiricist.  I read some scientific tidbit, or digest some philosophic treatise and then I try it on for size.  How then do I feel?  How then do I perform?  I keep my eyes open for feedback on my performance and monitor my emotions.  What works, for me, works for me.    If I like the way things are moving, I'll keep doing what I'm doing.  If it ain't broke don't fix it.

At the heart of this approach, and at the heart of all science, is skepticism.  Is it real?  Is there proof?  Can I see it for myself?  The same can be said for self-help information.  Is it based on science?  Good science?  And, does it work for me?  We can all be scientists with our own minds.  And should.

Comfortable with the Uncomfortable

Uncomfortable? Yes.  Smart? No.

When I'm bad at something, I feel like 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag.  In other words, making mistakes makes me really uncomfortable.

Unfortunately for my feelings though, becoming comfortable with the uncomfortable may be the single most important thing I can do to become a better person.  Researchers and educators are beginning to appreciate that embracing failure and learning from our mistakes is a critical skill if we want to be our best.  And that appreciation is beginning to catch on in the popular press.

For example, when the New York Times Magazine published "What if the Secret to Success is Failure?", the piece quickly became one of the most emailed articles.  But it didn't stop there.  A month later, Kathleen Parker of the Washington Post reminded us "How we succeed by failing" and Jonah Lehrer pointed out that mistakes explain "Why [...] Some People Learn Faster".

Soon bloggers picked up the scent: Zen Habits suggested we face our failings (and in public) and LifeHacker showed geeks like me "How to Identify and Learn from Your Mistakes".  The punchline: coming face-to-face with our failings is essential to improve on them.  By putting our heads in the sand, we may feel better in the short term, but in the long term nothing changes.  If we're lucky, the ostrich strategy will allow us to feel all warm and fuzzy about ourselves.  If we're unlucky, our failings will come up and bite us.

Intellectually, I think we all appreciate that we need to work on our weak points to get better.  But all this great advice misses a critical reality: it sucks to suck.  Being bad at things is emotionally painful.

So what do we do?  My vote: train our brain to like the pain.  Not all uncomfortable things are bad, and we have the ability to re-label feelings consciously so that our feelings of pain become badges of honor.  So, instead of reacting to discomfort with "this sucks", we can tag on an addendum: "this sucks but look how tough I am".

Put simply: discomfort is proof we're willing to become better.  Being willing to withstand some pain shows that we're ready to change.  From now on, every time I make a mistake and feel like an idiot, I'm going to embrace the feeling: if I weren't pushing myself then I wouldn't be making mistakes.

Embrace the Suck

Shit happens.

Having just been to the funeral of a loved-one, I am reminded of a cruel fact of life: shit happens.  Bad shit happens all the time and, often, there is nothing we can do about it.

Actually, that's not quite right.  We can always do one thing when shit happens: react to it.  When bad shit goes down, the one thing we have control over is how we react to the bad stuff.  In fact, that is the thesis of Viktor Frankl's classic Man's Search for Meaning: how we react to adversity defines us.

But, of course, this fact brings up a philosophical and practical question: how should we react when bad things happen? Is there a "best" cognitive strategy for coping with bad shit?

The answer to that question is important for many reasons.  From a performance perspective, how we react (internally and externally) to hardship will impact our ability to "get the job done", whatever that might be. For example, if we let our suffering bubble up as anger, we might alienate our boss or an important client.  Internally, if our suffering distracts us, our quality of work may suffer too.

From a health perspective, how we react to difficulty will influence our well-being.  For example, an extremely negative emotional reaction may trigger a stress response.  Unchecked, such a response turns chronic, and brings with it all the documented health nastiness that we hear about.

So, what should we do, metacognitively speaking, when the shit hits the fan?  One method, which is somewhat intuitive, might be to try to ignore the bad stuff: put it out of your mind.  However, this approach may be counterproductive.

An alternative strategy is to actually face suffering head-on.  In fact, this strategy has been adopted by three very different schools-of-thought that each know a lot about dealing with hardship, and is the approach I like most for dealing with my own shit.

The first example comes from the military and is the source of this post's title.  The military phrase "Embrace the Suck" is a crude way of saying "Face the Music".  The lives of military personnel rival almost any endeavor in a nefarious combination of physical and mental hardship: physical exertion, discomfort, sleep deprivation, isolation, fear, injury.  In other words, war sucks.

But, how do top war-fighters react to the suckiness?  Try to ignore it?  No, instead this common phrase is a reminder to not sugar coat a bad situation but, rather, to look suffering in the eye and embrace it as a part of life and as a part of getting the job done. In fact, it appears that some soldiers actually come to revel in suffering as part of the challenge. For example, this guy.

The second take on this cognitive strategy is from a very different source: Buddhism.  Interestingly, Buddhism, which is a philosophy that strives to maximize joy, identifies suffering a fact of life: it's unavoidable.  Moreover, Buddhist teachings actually suggest that we "touch our suffering" and mindfully explore both the cause and feeling of suffering.  The Buddhist practitioner is often encouraged to "smile at suffering", acknowledging suffering as part of life and recognizing suffering as a complex experience that makes happy moments better by contrast. For more on the details of the Buddhist philosophy, you can check out Thich Nhat Hanh's The Heart of the Buddha's Teachings (FYI: this is a philosophy book, not a book about science).

Finally, in performance psychology, the "mindfulness, acceptance, commitment" approach, which I've discussed before, and is described in detail by Frank Gardner in The Psychology of Enhancing Human Performance, offers a scientific perspective on the "embrace the suck" philosophy.  Proponents of this school-of-thought suggest that top athletes recognize pain and suffering (mindful), accept it as part of athletics (embrace it/accept it), and finally move on and get the job done (commitment) in the face of adversity.  The mindful awareness and acceptance of suffering, though, are the essential first steps. The best athletes embrace the suck.

Why might this approach work? The opposite strategy - ignoring bad things - may be counterproductive because it nearly guarantees that bad shit is going to catch us off guard. Then, all the negative emotion can rush forward uncontrolled, like some homunculus back-hand to our amygdala.

Alternatively, embracing pain and bringing it into awareness may act as a pressure release, while also giving us time to craft strategies for coping. In addition, consciously evaluating emotionally charged thoughts and feelings seems to make emotions and sensations less visceral and more intellectual, further reducing their power over us.

The examples I've provided may seem extreme: soldiers, athletes, monks.  However, we all have our own shit to deal with and it never hurts to be a tougher person or to become better at coping with bad shit. Anecdotal and observational evidence suggests that an "embrace the suck" mentally is a decent metacognitive strategy for enhancing our toughness.

Is working hard a talent?

Working hard, or hardly working?

Being the best: is it hard-work or talent...  The topic seems to make internet-blogger-types get all giddy with excitement.  O!  The back and forth; the opinions and convictions.  So dramatic, who is right?

Of course, after all that, some wise-ass chimes-in and states the obvious: "everyone is right!"  Buzz-kill; but, true.

Aha! But I have a new, totally fantastic way of thinking about the issue that is certain to make the "Hard Work is King" crowd cringe.  I raise this question: what if the ability to work hard is a talent?

The problem is that all the talking heads out there look at working-hard as something independent of our brains; like hard work isn't a behavior that happens because our brains/minds make it happen.  Whoa, are we saying that our souls have to get involved now and whip up a frothy batch of free-will so that we can work hard and become a bad-ass?  We aren't becoming dualists here are we?

The ability to work hard is just that, an ability.  Working hard takes a ton of cognitive awesomeness, much of which is influenced by both genetics and our environment.  Let's enumerate some of the metacognitive ninja-skillz necessary to work hard, shall we?

First, we must exert significant impulse control, because we can't be distracted by extraneous information and influences.  Second, we must have the ability to recognize errors as they happen and generate creative solutions.  Third, we must demonstrate resilience and optimism so we can overcome our failures and keep working.  Fourth, we must know when and how to seek out the advice and feedback of others so that we don't fall into repeated patterns of behavior.  Fifth, we must have some motivation to work hard, otherwise, working hard is just dumb.

I'm worried about my genes.

Wow, when I spell it all out like that, the simple dichotomy of hard-work vs. talent breaks down.  Instead, hard-work becomes an ability all it's own that is not easily dissociated from a number of underlying cognitive capacities.  Isn't this fun?  Now we can start to ask more specific questions: is impulse control learned or innate?  Is optimism learned or innate?  Yes, the answer to questions like these will be "both", but at least then we can start to tease out strategies for working with what we have.

Maybe one day the debate will end.  Mr. Science will send me a nice letter indicating that I don't have "that gene" and I should give up science and become a monkey-trainer because, by way of some Gattica-like sorting process, that's what I'm programmed to do.  Until then, I can't change my genes, so worrying about "talent" is a waste of my time.  Instead, I'm going to work as hard as I can to improve my ability to work hard, because that's all I can do.

Meta-Feedback

I'm lookin' at the monkey in the mirror.

My boss has been on a feedback-seeking, awesomeness rampage.  In the last two weeks, I estimate that he has come to me, or other members of our little group, and asked a ton of questions of the "how am I doing" or the "what could we do better" variety.

Perhaps he's stumbled on to this blog, but I can't be tickled given that I've been a bit obsessed lately with the idea of seeking out feedback (see here and here).

In fact, tickled doesn't even really do my reaction justice.  A better word might be "grateful".  Another one might be "flattered", of the "it's nice to know he really gives a shit"-variety.  I mean, I already knew my boss cared, but it was still nice to get some hard behavioral data as evidence of his interest in the opinions of the group.

This series of interactions made me realize something: asking other people how they feel about our performance earns respect.  It indicates empathy, it indicates a desire to improve which, in turn, bodes well for future performance, it indicates a respect for the opinions of others.  All really, really good cognitive qualities.

So, what did I do in the face of all this ass-kicking, feedback seeking behavior on the part of my boss?  I went all Meta up in here and gave the guy some meta-feedback.  Specifically, I said something like: "You want some feedback?  How about this: I think it's awesome how much you've been seeking out feedback from us.  It makes us feel valued and it makes me confident the group is moving in the right direction."  We then high-fived.  I'm joking about the high-five.

Lesson for today? My vote is that if someone has the guts to come to us and ask for feedback, we should show how awesome that is by giving some meta-feedback in return.  It's sure to keep the feedback seeking behavior going strong.

Good hands and the Goldilocks zone

Stay focused.

As an amateur molecular biologist, I often wrestle with lapses of concentration.  This can be linked, I speculate, to the simultaneous terror and boredom that molecular work entails.

Picture this: six, clear tubes, labelled in a simple code that belies the complexity of the underlying experiment.  I add liquid, typically clear with no discernible color, hue or other distinguishing features that might signal that this is anything more than water.

I set a timer.  Ten minutes of incubation at room temperature.  I place the tubes in a centrifuge and spin, 15,000 cycles per minute.  I wait fifteen minutes more, remove some clear liquid and add more, but a different kind.  I repeat each step six times, one for each tube.

In between actions, I change the tip of my pipetman - the device that allows microliter control over the liquid added to the evolving biochemical reaction.  Change tip, add liquid, next tube. Repeat.

During these day-long exercises in repetition, I've experienced some failures.  These mistakes fall into one of two broad categories: external or internal.  In the external class, I become distracted by something happening outside my head.  A conversation between colleagues or a conversation I've started.  When these conversations reach some mystical level of distraction, I will realize in a moment of panic that I've skipped a critical step.  Or, I've lost track of the tubes.  Or, I've lost count.  Failure.

Feedback Friend

You know what stinks?  Getting feedback.  You know what stinks more?  Working hard to get feedback.  While we know that feedback is good for our development and performance, it still stings to hear about how we could do better.  So, why make it worse by having to struggle to get valuable criticism?  Instead, let's use the buddy-system!

Tell Me About Myself

I just realized that seeking feedback is a very selfish thing.  As I've discussed before, the act of talking can be thought of as an act of charity: you are giving away your hard-earned experience for use by others.  In contrast, the act of listening is an exercise in selfishness: you are more likely to gain new information and expertise.  After simple listening, asking questions is even more selfish!  By asking questions, you can steer a conversation in a direction that is interesting or useful to you.  Today, we're going to take selfishness to a whole new level.

Week of Sleep

Week of Sleep? Check!

The Week of Sleep worked for me.  I'm being totally serious.  I followed my own good advice and was blown away by the results.  Setting up a relaxing, circadian-cycle-friendly nighttime ritual (and sticking to it) has wired my brain to sleep on command.  Now, when my old-person bed time rolls around, I start to get all blinky-eyed and fuzzy-headed instantaneously.  How about you?

Did you miss the Week of Sleep?  Do you want to take your sleep routine to the next level?  Here's the summary:

Week of Sleep

Day 1: Bed Time - Set the clock.
Day 2: Dim - Let there be dark.
Day 3: Bedtime Snack - The way to sleep is through the stomach.
Day 4: Low Flow - Do something.
Day 5: Passive - Do nothing.
Day 6: Bright - Re-Set the clock.

I don't know if you noticed this (I didn't and I wrote all the posts), but the bedtime routine we've developed seems like something that would work for putting a toddler to bed.  And, now that I think about it, that's a pretty smart way to approach our own sleep habits.  I mean, if this approach works for the creatures with the least amount of self-control (i.e. little kids), then it should work for our inner children too.  Or, should I say, our inner monkeys!

Next week, the Daily Mind Games are going to be paused while your humble author heads to an awesome, geeky conference.  While I'm away, I'd love to get some feedback about future Weeks of Metacognition.  What kinds of topics would you like to see?  I've been thinking about Weeks of: Feedback, Creativity, Interaction, Toughness, or Open-Mindedness.  If you have any preference, please let me know in the comments.  Also, if you have any ideas of your own, I'd love to hear them.  I would love some feedback from my readers about topics of interest.  So, please!  Where we should go from here?

Until then, here's some fun/interesting stuff that's come my way over the last week, enjoy!

Homunky's Hot Hits:

To start, here's a retelling of an allegory/experiment about learned anxiety that I've encountered before.  Does anyone know the source of this?  Is it a real experiment?

Next, we've talked about Flow a lot here at The Happy Homunculus, but here is a great Intro to Flow if you'd like a fresh point of view on the topic.  And, of course, if you haven't read the original, you should do it.  Click the link and buy the book to support Homunky!

As someone interested in improving my performance and, as part of that, my pain tolerance, here is a great summary linking meditation, mindfulness, and improved pain tolerance.  This seems to be totally in line with the Mindfulness, Acceptance, and Commitment model for peak human performance: avoiding negative emotions and sensations is the sign of a beginner, while accepting the negative consequences of a task allows full engagement and eventual mastery.

Finally, on a more serious note, HelpForDepression.com is running a fundraiser in support of the non-profit To Write Love On Her Arms, a group dedicated to improving the lives of people struggling with depression and other mental health challenges.  They would appreciate any form of support. Thanks!