Active vs. Passive Learning

Elaborate. Monkey.
(source)

Thinking about our thinking is an important step to maximizing our potential for learning.  Metacognition during learning allows us to evaluate our own learning to determine if it is being effective.  Am I really learning the material?  Do I really understand the material?  Thinking about our own comprehension is an important part of any learning process.

I recently read an article by Kathrin Stanger-Hall, a biology professor at UGA who has an interest in evaluating the effectiveness of teaching strategies.  This article points out the difference between active and passive learning strategies.  For example, passive learning may be limited to the following mindless study habits:

• Reading the material
• Going to class
• Making index cards
• Highlighting
• Looking up information
• Reviewing notes

On the surface, these behaviors seem like learning.  However, while these activities may be parts of a successful learning process, they do not include an active awareness where the student is working to connect the information within a larger context or to evaluate self-understanding of the material.

Active approaches to learning would augment these activities with the following sort of thinking:

• Asking "How does it work?"
• Drawing the process or system
• Writing study questions to evaluate self-understanding
• Reorganizing information into new categories
• Comparing and contrasting information

This type of approach to learning leverages the concept of elaboration that we've discussed before:  somewhat non-intuitively, our brains seem to encode information better with more details and comparisons, rather than less.

As we learn, metacognition should be simmering in the background.  Are we learning?  How can we connect this with other information we understand?  How could we distill the essential elements?  This self-awareness is essential for learning to remain productive and efficient.

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!

Is Meditation Self-Help Bullshit?

Are you wasting your time,
meditating monkey?

A recent article by Virginia Heffernan in the New York Time Magazine is excoriating the gradual westernization of mindfulness meditation, demonizing this trend as somehow running counter to the essence of this ancient practice.  I think at the heart of this article is a desire to protect people from self-help snake oil but there is a palpable vibe in the article of an anti-self-help bias that is unfortunate.

As I've discussed before, our attitudes about change influence our ability to change.  So, while I agree with Ms. Heffernan that self-help advice should be evaluated critically, binning the entire self-help movement as bullshit isn't helping anyone either.

In this context, I can't help but reevaluate the purpose of mindfulness meditation (and mindfulness, in general).  Is mindfulness mediation useful? 

As someone who has practiced mindfulness meditation as an attempt to manage stress, I have concluded that meditation is simply a concerted effort to implement a reappraisal of bad thoughts.  Specifically, it has been suggested that rumination, or the endless replay of negative thinking, may contribute to depression.  Cognitive reappraisal is a well-known approach for dealing with a number of negative or disruptive thoughts and meditation is just a practiced form of this.  In the mindfulness meditation style I have tried, namely Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction popularized by Jon Kabat-Zinn, one reappraises negative thoughts as "thoughts", taking a meta-level view of them and partitioning them as something distinct from our experiencing mind.

Personally, this makes sense to me.  Just as I wouldn't accept the self-help advice of some rando, I am not going to trust that my automatic catastrophizing about the world is based on fact.  During mindfulness meditation, I am taking a skeptical stance toward my own worries and recognizing them for what they are: worries, not reality.  Ultimately, the proof is in the pudding when it comes to the value of mindfulness meditation.  If it helps someone cope with the challenges of life, then great.  We should all be active participants in our own mental health, experimenting with approaches until we get results.

In this way, stress management is like exercise.  Is one form of exercise better than another?  Is meditation better than a book club?  The answer is: it depends.  It depends on who is doing it, whether they enjoy it and whether they stick with it.  If the answer to these questions is "yes", then the long term outcome is likely to be positive.

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!

The Three Brain Virtues

Benjamin Franklin: A balding ape.

As I mentioned last time, I've been reading the incredibly engaging and inspiring biography of Benjamin Franklin by Walter Isaacson - "Benjamin Franklin: An American Life".  In the context of this blog's founding concept of self-improvement via self-awareness, I took note of Franklin's famous "virtues" and related tracking system that he devised to improve in each area.  Of course, I am hardly the first person to be drawn to Franklin's virtues: there is an entire website dedicated to virtue tracking for the sake of Pete!

Despite the worn ground around the thirteen virtues of Franklin, as a self-satisfied brain philosopher, I can't help but take a crack at my own set or cognitive/neuro-science inspired set of virtues.  Before doing so, however, here are Franklin's virtues, as reported by the Wikipedia article describing Franklin's life:

1. "Temperance. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation."
2. "Silence. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation."
3. "Order. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time."
4. "Resolution. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve."
5. "Frugality. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing."
6. "Industry. Lose no time; be always employ'd in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions."
7. "Sincerity. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly."
8. "Justice. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty."
9. "Moderation. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve."
10. "Cleanliness. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, cloaths, or habitation."
11. "Tranquility. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable."
12. "Chastity. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation."
13. "Humility. Imitate Jesus and Socrates."

Upon review of these virtues, I can't help but notice that successful practice of each relies on a central capacity for impulse control.  I've pontificated on this concept to nausea and beyond, but the fact remains that implementing the virtues requires the ability to have an impulse to do something but also having the cognitive self-control necessary to quash that impulse and redirect attention to a more "virtuous" activity.

So, I draft my own virtues with an eye toward the "fundamental" cognitive characteristics that would support any other set of virtues, Franklin's or otherwise.  I like to think that these are somehow the foundation for doing anything based on a plan rather than based on a whim:

1. Self-awareness - the ability to think about your own thoughts, to analyze those thoughts, and to compare how you are thinking to the way you would rather be thinking.

2. Focus - the ability to attend to something of choice and hold attention despite distractions.  The ability to maintain a line of thought.

3. Resilience - the ability to try again even when you fail.  The ability to get back on the horse.

And...  That's it!  Wait, what?  How can that be it?  When I think about virtues, they have to be very personal and specific things.  We all put value on different ways of living.  However, to actually stick to any set of resolved virtues takes a short list of cognitive skills, and I think that list is simply: metacognition, focus, and resilience.

Why?  Because a virtue is like walking on a tightrope.  First, you need to know if you're even on the tightrope or on the ground.  You need to also know if you're on the right tightrope, or if you even want to walk any tight rope.  This set of decisions require metacognitive self-awareness: we need to recognize our own thinking and behaviors and be able to compare these to some alternative.

Second, you need to stay focused while on the tightrope.  Eyes on the rope, careful foot placement, move, stay centered, etc.  If you're mind is frequently wandering to topics like monkey poop, then you'll be falling off the rope a lot.  The same goes for a virtue: we need to focus on the task of being virtuous without letting distraction or temptation creep in.

Lastly, you need to get back on the rope!  Tightrope walking is hard, as is sticking to any goal of personal change.  You will fail.  Again.  And again.  We all do.  If you're committed to being a good tightrope walker, you're going to have to get used to the idea of falling and getting back on the rope.

I'm convinced.  If you're not, let me know in the comments or with an email.  I look forward to convincing you that these are the "simple" characteristics we all need to do anything we need to do, virtuous or otherwise.  I'm definitely right on this one....  

A Guide to a Happy Life

Eat some fruit every day.

Note: This is the first-ever guest post on The Happy Homunculus.  It comes to us from an anonymous philosopher who figured it all out and never told anyone.... Until now!

No one can make you happy (or unhappy for that matter).  That choice is totally up to you.   All some of us can do is point the way, and hope that you take a look.  Learning about yourself and living life well is a process that we ALL go through.  It’s about making mistakes…lots of them…every day.  The only way to learn is through our mistakes.  Did I mention that WE ALL MAKE MISTAKES?

Here’s the important piece-try not to make the same mistakes over and over again.  It’s hard, I know.  The first step toward that end is to THINK very highly of yourself.  You’ve probably noticed that the word think is in big letters.  That’s because it’s important.  Thinking rather than just feeling.  It’s a huge concept.  Not one that most people can wrap their minds around.  But it’s worth THINKING about. (Sorry, I just love caps)  Try not to act on feelings…most feelings mean very little, no matter how passionately you feel them.  Rather, act only after thinking those feelings through, and deciding whether it would be in your best interest to do something about them.  Most feelings just need to be acknowledged and then let go of.   Too much?

Speaking of feelings, it’s worth noting that we all carry around some emotional baggage from our childhood.  Those are feelings we were never allowed to feel or express at the time or never quite understood or were traumatized by.  The bad news is that those feelings can become repressed, hidden just under the surface.  They come out as anger or some equally disconnected painful emotion at the wrong time and usually targeted at the wrong person. Often times they are self- destructive.  Many people live their lives completely disconnected from themselves or their true feelings.  VERY UNHEALTHY for all of us!  The good news is through therapy or self introspection we can remember those less than happy times, relive those feelings and connect them to the appropriate person, place or thing, living or dead.   Once you confront those emotions and deal with them by connecting them to their original origin, then you can let them go and begin to heal.   Just remember, ALL FEELINGS HAVE TO BE RECOGNIZED AND EITHER LET GO OR DEALT WITH.  NEVER IGNORED!     Now you are free to begin to lead a much healthier, happier life and deal with emotions as they happen, without going through the much more complicated process of storing them for later, inappropriate use against an innocent bank teller, co-worker or poor hapless spouse.  It’s NEVER too late to treat your child within really, really well, especially if you weren’t treated well when you actually were a child.  Take responsibility for the care and feeding of that child and move on whistling a happy tune.

Your life has purpose and meaning.  If you were not born, those whose lives you’ve interacted with would not be the same.  We are all inter-connected.  We all share the same purpose.  It’s OK that you have no idea what that purpose is-that’s part of the process.  I can tell two very general reasons we are here (on earth) Ready?

LOVE  and  KNOWLEDGE.  There you have it.  Let’s keep it simple.

Love yourself first and when you’re in a really good place, then help others along.

The more you learn about yourself and others and life and, well, everything, the more advanced you become. The more you grow.  The further along in the PROCESS you go.  Easy!

Be positive rather than negative.  You cannot be both.  They are opposites and cannot exist in the same place at the same time.  Choose to be positive.  Trust me on this.

The more positive energy you put out there, the more will come back to you.  It’s a good thing.  The same is true with negativity.

Believe in yourself.  You are all you have.  Recognize all your successes and build on them.  They weren’t accidents.  Give yourself all the credit you deserve.  If you don’t, you’ll be constantly filled with fear and self-doubt and always starting from scratch.

Don’t confuse STUFF with success.  Clothes don’t make the man…or woman.  Success comes from the inside out, not the other way around.  If you feel empty inside, you will NEVER have enough clothes, drugs, cool friends, cars, shoes, beer, wine, money(you get the idea) to make you feel the way you want to feel.  NEVER EVER!! 

Fill that void with self-love.  Positive actions… A strong work ethic… Trust the PROCESS.

Keep doing the right things the best way you can, not perfectly, but the best you can and you will be successful.  I promise.

Here’s another important piece – if you do all this good, positive stuff and put yourself first and think before you act on feelings alone…if you do all this, you may still FEEL like crap.  It’s ok.  You can’t make a change after so many years and expect it to feel right.  If you stop smoking after 20 years, you will feel miserable for a while.  But keep with it and you will start to feel better.  It’s a process.  It takes time.   Oh yeah, don’t smoke.

Develop a support system.  Talk to people you can trust.  Don’t keep secrets.  They’re destructive.  Know who you can trust and let them help you through tough times.  Remember, we are all connected, and we’ve all gone through the same or much worse situations than you.  (Sorry, you don’t win the prize for terrible life stories)

DO SOMETHING GOOD FOR YOURSELF EVERY DAY. (Again, note the big letters)

It can be as simple as getting some ice cream or walking in the park.  It’s not what you do but why you’re doing it.  You’re doing it because you’re worth it. (put those last words in big letters in your mind)  You can create a positive mood with not much effort, as I have stated in my opening sentence!

(Admit it…I’m good!)

If you don’t know what to do, just do something positive.  As long as you move in a positive direction, you will find your way.  Believe in yourself.  Did I already say that?  It’s worth repeating.

Eat some fruit every day.

We all have stuff to deal with.  Know what is yours to handle and what is everyone else’s.  You are not responsible for anyone but you.  Not your mother or father or friends. Just deal with YOUR STUFF.  Let them deal with theirs.

Big finish…Treat yourself  well.  Believe in your abilities.  Be Positive.  Live life from the inside out.  Life is about one decision after the other.  Again and again… over and over.  If you don’t like a decision you’ve made – make another one!  Try to make better and better decisions for yourself.  You have a lifetime to practice.  Remember you are special.  Never forget that.

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.

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.

Moore's Law for the mind

The smartest apes think about
thinking... And wear armor.

If you've read even a handful of posts here at the Happy Homunculus, you'll know that a major buzzword is "metacognition".  I love saying it, thinking about it (meta-metacognition?) and writing about it.  After all this metacognition geekiness, I feel I am overdue in explaining my obsession with this whole thinking-about-thinking business.

To get right to the point, I think metacognitive skills are the most important cognitive skills we possess. Furthermore, if we want to provide ourselves, our children, our grandchildren, and society with the best tools to survive in a complex, changing world, I am of the opinion that metacognitive training should serve as a foundation on which all instruction is built.

Why? In order to explain, I propose the following thought experiment:  

Let's say I want to become a better runner.  Right now, I am a terrible runner.  I sort of bounce up and down like a large, flightless bird.  It's a sad thing to see and is a horribly uncomfortable experience for me.

However, I also don't run very often.  The skill of running is not one that I've invested a lot of time and energy into mastering.  So, just like anything, if I start running more frequently, I'll improve.  I'll get fitter, my form will probably improve, my pain tolerance will increase etc.

The sigmoid: Awesomeness as a function of time

In fact, once I start running more regularly, I should see my running ability improve dramatically.  I'm so shitty at running that, during this beginner phase, even thinking about running will probably make me a better runner.  

Unfortunately, and as most of us are aware, that honeymoon phase doesn't last forever.  Soon, the improvement gains stop coming so easily.  Soon, I will begin to experience the dreaded "sigmoid" phase of the learning curve. In other words, I'll keep getting more awesome, but the gains in awesomeness will come less and less frequently. 

Now, this is assuming that my training plan doesn't change.  All I'm doing is running more often than not-at-all, say every day for 20 minutes. That's it.  Well, what if I start mixing it up and begin to experiment with my weak points.  Do I need to get faster?  I may run some sprints to see how fast I am.  How's my endurance?  I may go for some longer runs to see if I have the ability to sustain a pace for longer.  By experimenting, through trial and error, I may realize that I've plateaued because I am not focusing on speed.  Switching focus to that weak point may result in faster improvement than if I had continued doing the same thing I had been doing.

This the deliberate practice approach to improving running: I can start thinking about the process and I'll get better, faster.

Metacognition is the same concept applied to how we think and learn.  So, the first cognitive level might be: study.  But  if, after studying again and again I realize I am not at a level I'd like to be, then I must move to the second cognitive level: meta-study.  In other words, I must start thinking about how I think during the process of studying.  How often do I study? Where do I study?  What does studying consist of: reading, looking at pictures, highlighting endless passages?  How might I become more efficient at studying?

Moore's Law is the oft-cited phenomenon that the power per unit size and/or cost of our computers has grown and continues to grow exponentially.  Now, I purposefully mentioned Moore's Law in the title to be provocative and I don't actually believe that one could actually experience exponential growth in intelligence simply by thinking more about thinking.  

However, I do believe that a little deliberate analysis of how we think is a strategy that will undoubtedly lead to better thinking, and performance, than simply rote repetition ever will.  In this way, metacognition is pretty much the only strategy that will allow for constant improvement  in performance.  Moore's Law for the mind is something I made up so you would read this, but metacognition can still make us smarter, faster.

The beauty of a metacognitive approach is that it can apply to any type of thinking or behavior.  Where should I focus to raise my performance to the next level?  Perhaps I give up too soon because I have a pessimistic attitude towards change. I should probably focus on reducing negative self-talk. Or maybe I know what I need to do to get better but don't invest the time to improve.  I might want to think about combating procrastination.  The possibilities really are endless, but improvement will happen after some focused metacognition.

Unfortunately, I get the impression that most people don't think of thinking as a skill that can even be improved.  Instead, many people focus on the externally-motivated skills that are essential for day-to-day existence.  That is a totally reasonable approach in the short-term, but by going meta we can bust through any plateaus that may be dogging us and maximize our effectiveness in the long-term.  

For that reason, the most essential metacognitive skill is to first think that improving how we think is even possible.

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.

Keep your mouth shut

It's on.

My sympathetic nervous system switches gears and revs.  Chest goes tight, constricts like a squeezed fist.  My neck flushes with heat, and blood.  My nerves tingle and prickle.

My hands go numb. My face goes numb. Like feet falling asleep, but in reverse: normal, through pins and needles, to lead balloons, rather than the other way around.

My jaw: it grinds and contorts and pulses.  Perhaps my inner Jeckyl and Hyde are discussing the merits of an outburst:  one part fighting back the rush to speak.  Don't say a word.  Keep your mouth shut.  The other part doesn't want to negotiate.

I'm angry.

Criticism frequently comes from a place of anger.  Often, when we do get some feedback, it is because the person on the other end has become frustrated.  They've been able to deal with our idiosyncrasies, but only for so long.  Then, things reach a point when that person just can't take it any more, and their opinion bubbles up and out as anger.

Our inner monkey starts to throw poo.  It meets anger head-on, anger for anger.  Yelling for yelling.  But, of course, a vicious feedback loop ensues, because if anger begets anger, then getting angry is the opposite of the right reaction.  The situation elevates.  Boom.

It's perfectly normal.

So, in the spirit of seeking feedback from every one around us, I propose the following thought experiment. The goal for this Mind Game is to practice receiving criticism gracefully by first observing the sensations of anger that accompany being criticized.  When we find ourselves reacting to angry criticism with anger, the goal is to keep our mouth shut.

Keep your mouth shut

Task: Watch for feelings of an angry reaction following criticism.  Do not speak until the initial physical sensations subside.

Info: What does it feel like to be angry?  This thought experiment encourages us to become more self-aware with regard to the mental and physical process of becoming angry in the face of aggressive criticism.  After we become more in tune with the sensations of anger, we will be more likely to control an impulsive outburst.  In the few moments it takes to pause and consider the situation, we are very likely to develop a more thoughtful and effective response.

Goal: Don't react until you've processed the opinion of the other person.  Determine if their criticisms have merit.  Thank the person who criticized you.

Coaches, coaches everywhere

One coach.

Everyone dreams about achieving great things.  In reality, very few people ever become world-class at anything.  What a bummer.

Obviously, most of us get stuck at mediocre because we give up.  Let's be honest, practicing is hard work and takes time; it's so much easier to pack it in and watch T.V.  I've been there.

However, many people - including myself - are willing to do the work.  For example, I'm committed to being a great scientist, it's my full-time job.  I crave improvement because my entire career rests on my ability to improve.  In fact, success may require that I am the very best in my field.  Because of this, I eschew the plateau. I must improve as fast as possible, for as long as possible.

On the one hand, I could always work harder, log more hours, and be more focused.  Yes, all of that contributes to my development.  But what really gives me pause is the possibility of a metacognitive blind-spot.  What if I'm not even aware of my weaknesses?  I'd be meta-clueless: clueless about being clueless. Egads.

In this purely hypothetical situation (*wink), my problem is that I don't know how to get better; I'm out of ideas for how to improve.  As Atul Gawande argues in his recent New Yorker piece, that's when I might benefit most from a coach: someone with expertise and a fresh perspective who can "tweak" my performance and allow me to break through a sticking point.

Many coaches.

A coach is particularly valuable because the feedback is often novel; ideas we might not have generated on our own.  Our coach's fresh perspective generates new ways of thinking about the "problem" of improving.

Unfortunately for most of us, and as Gawande points out, getting a coach is not a possibility.  Either we can't afford one, it would be a cultural faux pas, or a dedicated coach may not even exist (although, in my case, I was surprised to find an example of scientist-coaches).  So, what are we to do?  How might the rest of us improve if we have reached a plateau?  If we knew the best strategy for getting better, we'd execute.  The value of a coach, that fresh set of eyes, is not something we can provide for ourselves.

At its essence, coaching is feedback.  A coach examines our performance and provides feedback about how we might improve.  To that end, I propose a distributed model of coaching.  Instead of resting our hopes and dreams on a single, capital-C Coach to lead us to the promised land, why not think of each interaction as a mini-opportunity for coaching?  All our peers, mentors, subordinates, and colleagues can provide fresh perspective on our performance, no coach needed.  Often, to get this valuable perspective all we have to do is ask.

In practice, this process of seeking feedback from all types of people is easier-said than done.  In future posts, I will explore some of the challenges, and strategies, of effective feedback-seeking behavior.  I'd love your feedback, dear reader, so please post your thoughts in the comments!

Missing gorillas. What?

What gorilla?

Back in my younger days, as an impressionable undergraduate, I was exposed to a now-famous experiment in attention.  Sitting in a lecture hall at Yale University, my Introduction to Cognitive Science professor, Brian Scholl, played the class this video.  Watch the video, do the task, then read on.

The task was simple.  Watch the ball, count the passes.  Don't be distracted by the players in the black uniforms, watch the players in the white uniforms. And, like most of my fellow over-achievers at Yale, I wanted to do this right.  So, I got really focused and did the task.

The task ended, and the results were summarized.  Thankfully, I thought, I did it right - I counted the correct number of passes for the white team.  Hooray!  However, the video soon prompted: "But, did you see the gorilla?" An audible murmur vibrated from the audience: a group equivalent of "WTF"?  Soon, the murmur was followed by gasps and giggles as the video was replayed in slow motion.  There, walking right through the scene, was some dude in a gorilla suit.  Almost everybody in the audience had missed him.

Oh, that gorilla.

In the video, the task was clearly defined: count the passes for the white team.  And, for that task, I did very well - a perfect score.  However, in life, our tasks are usually less well-defined.  In life, picking up new information, being observant and open-minded, is just as valuable as extreme focus.  This relates back to my recent thesis regarding attention: for some tasks, we need to be very focused; but for others, we need to be open-minded.  In other words, if we reframe the task of the video above to "be observant", then I failed miserably.

What does this mean at a practical level?  My interpretation is that we must consciously select a level of intensity for our focus depending on the task.  In addition, since life's challenges are often so poorly defined, we must be sure to get into an open-minded state from time-to-time.  Otherwise, we might miss a gorilla.

Fruit Ninja and flavors of focus

Slice that bananna!

Recently, my wife and I have been obsessed with the game Fruit Ninja.  And, having been simultaneously obsessed with the idea of focus and obtaining metacognitive control over my intensity of focus, I couldn't help but start to analyze Fruit Ninja as a tool for fine-tuning my already ninja-like ability to focus.  Let me explain. (Also, I'm not getting paid to write this, I just like Fruit Ninja).

For those of you who don't know, Fruit Ninja is a game that originally became popular on the iphone and has since expanded to the Android platform, the iPad and (I think) to an online game.

The game is simple, grasshopper.  But not easy.  The goal is to slice up fruit by swiping your finger across the screen of your touchscreen device.  That's the easy part.  The hard part is that, in addition to fruit, there are bombs that fly into the scene and occlude your target fruit.  Hitting the bombs earns a point penalty in some versions of the game, and in other versions of the game can lead to instant failure. Check out some video footage.

What does this silly game have to do with flavors of focus?  Well, cynical adult, the game offers three "modes" of play: classic, arcade, and zen.  Ooooh, zen!

Just one more game, please?

Each mode places different cognitive demands on the player.  In classic, the number of fruit slowly increases over time and if you miss three fruit in total, your game ends.  In addition, hitting a bomb results in instant failure.  For these reasons, classic mode require intense focus and precision.

Flexibility of focus: what and how much?

Multitasking?

Attention deficit: another modern malady of excess.  Too much food, and we became larger.  A surfeit of sitting, and we grew softer.  Now, with the information revolution, we wrestle with an excess of ideas, and we grow distracted.

Recently, science has begun to unearth the pitfalls of poor focus.  In one study, researchers at Stanford examined the cognitive consequences of multitasking and found that the chronically distracted lost the ability to control attention.  Cognitive performance suffered as a result.  Gross.

But regulating our attention is more interesting, and complicated, than focusing on one task at a time.  Yes, we must choose where to place our attention. However, we must also decide how much to focus.

A recent article in the Journal of Neuroscience, emphasizes the importance of intensity of attention as it relates to cognitive performance.  In this fascinating study, the authors rely on recordings from a group of neurons in the monkey brain that correlate with attention: the more neurons firing in this brain region, the more focused the monkey.  Intriguingly, the authors found that as the focus of the monkeys increased, so did performance on a visual discrimination task... To a point.  Surprisingly, when the monkeys were most focused, they often performed poorly when the task demanded recognition of large changes.  In these cases, focused monkeys were very good at detecting minute changes, yet large visual changes resulted in more errors for dialed-in monkeys.  Did the monkeys miss the forest for the trees?

Week of Feedback

Give your monkey-brain a pat on the virtual back: some positive feedback for a job-well-done!  The Week of Feedback is over here at The Happy Homunculus, and we've done some good work getting (and receiving) feedback.  Getting feedback about our performance is a straight shot to awesomeness, so let's searching for criticism.  It's the fastest way to be amazing!

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!