It’s scary that it’s hard to not know which is which. That’s why I dont want to just try out new medicines to see which helps with anxiety or not.
I dont think people are as scared of medicine as I am. Like, they see medicine for mental health as something that could help, do nothing, or make things worse. It’s never really talked about if it’s dangerous.
Self-help book I read today:
A section in ch. 7 called, “But Isn’t a Little Bit of Anxiety Helpful?” talked about causation and logic how just cuz y happened after x it doesn’t mean x caused y to happen. Like, when a batter does their ritual foot tapping before batting to get a good hit.
I don’t know much about causation and logic but it looks interesting to study.
The author brought up causation and logic to show that people attribute their success to their anxiety and how that might not be the case. He asked the reader to explore the causal relationsihp between anxiety and good performance. He asked does it make always make them perform well? and Has the reader ever accomplished things when they weren’t anxious?
Huh I don’t know I like anxiety sometimes to do stuff that doesn’t actually seem that bad(e.g. talking in front of the class.), but I do notice sometimes how worrying about things when doing tasks gets in the way of doing them normally.
Self-help book I read today:
Chapter 8 is called, “A Brief Word on Mindfulness,” and the first few paragraphs said that mindfulness helps a person break out of habits, meditation is a part of mindfulness, and that a person doesn’t have to practice meditation to practice mindfulness.
I remember when I first found out about mindfulness and meditation. I became aware of things I didn’t know happen in my mind and I felt smarter cuz of that. Like you don’t have to stay in same cycle and make the same mistakes.
Self-help book I read today:
The last few paragraphs of ch. 9 said that are three types of behavioral tendencies. Just like the fight/flight/freeze response, the three tendencies are approach/avoid/go with the flow. The author listed what a person does with each tendency.
With the approach tendency, the person is more optimistic and interacts with positive things more(e.g. positve thinking, bright side of things). With avoiding tendency, the person seems less optimistic and interacts with negative things more cuz they want prepare for the bad side of things to happen. With go-with-the-flow tendency, the person is more easy going, follows the crowd more, and doesn’t take things too seriously.
I had a few thoughts about this like first it sounds like an astrology reading. The other thought thought is I asked myself what is the author trying to say? I think it’s that the reader should be aware if they’re doing these tendencies and it’s resulting in anxiety. Like maybe the old way to doing things isn’t as good as they thought. Maybe they’re approaching things that are stressful the wrong way.
Self-help book I read today:
The first few paragraphs of Chapter 10 part 2 talked about how we form habits and that we form them to focus on other stuff that needs our attention.
The next few paragraphs talk about how hard habits are to break and that thinking out of them doesn’t work out for us. The author suggests using reward based learning to have the brain want someting else. Something else more rewarding.
In the next few paragraphs, the author talks about being aware of the reward value of old habits. That way you have a chance to change them.
The next paragraphs brought up an example of somebody smoking and them trying to be more aware of the habit. It was a lady and when she was aware of her smoking she noticed the bad smell and taste of the cigarette.
In a few paragraphs after, the author brought up an example of somebody grabbing a bag of chips after arriving from a long day of work and later on the person doesn’t even notice that they’re halfway through the bag. The author calls this the “set and forget” of forming habits.
I notice I do that too sometimes. I see it with food I thought I wanted to eat the food for the taste, but I end forgetting about the taste and finishing the whole thing. It makes me think if I’m eating the food for something else.
Lately, I’ve been having a hard time sleeping consistently, and I notice that I become overly aware of the things I do. So much that when I do notice them the habit changes and I sleep less hours. The author talked about something like that how when we become aware of our behaviors it can change the heirarchy of how rewarding it feels compared to other behaviors. I notice that since I have a lot of free time I do that a lot and it can change my sleep cycle.
In the another paragraph, the author talks more about the guy eating the chips example. The author says that he’ll do the zombie-like behavior of picking up chips and eating them while he watches tv. Until he becomes aware of that behavior, the value of him doing that is not going to be updated, it’s not going to be changed.
This isn’t just an issue of habit. Food companies do scientific research to figure out how to cause this, e.g. by figuring out human satiety mechanisms (how our body knows that we’ve eaten enough) and trying to bypass/break/trick them (e.g. with soft food that requires less chewing). (I have seen this kind of information from several sources. I have not extensively fact checked and researched it.)
Yeah, I didnt think about that. It’s not just on the person that has the habit.
Yeah, I think something like potato crisps are really easy to chew that after eating a lot of them it’s hard to feel full.
Self-help book I read today:
Around the middle of chapter 10, the author says that by becoming aware of the experience of the bad habit can the person find reasons for changing it. One of the examples brought up was the person becoming aware of the smell and taste of smoking and them not liking it.
A few more paragraphs later, the author says that by becoming aware of the experience, the person can see how useful the habit is at the moment. If it’s not then the person will be less excited about it and move it down the hierarchy of useful habits.
Around the end of chapter ten, the author says to try to not change habit by becoming intellectual about it. Like, try to think away from doing the habit. He brought up an example of a person telling themselves to not do a habit but 5 mins later they end up doing it. He says trying to think through the habits and stopping them can become a habit loop in itself. Also that the heavy lifting part of changing a habit should be left to a certain part of the brain called the “orbitofrontal cortex”. That’s the region of the brain I think that handles the reward value of habits.
Self-help book I read today:
If you are struggling at this point, don’t worry. First and second gears aren’t
even focused on changing behavior yet. We’ll come to that in Part 3. But for
now let’s think about a little train.
One of my favorite childhood stories was The Little Engine That Could.
In the book, there was a little blue train engine that started out her days
as a switch engine, but when she’s tasked with pulling a load of children’s
Christmas presents over a hill, she doesn’t think she can make it up the hill.
The little engine is fighting great odds: she’s got lots of devilish
confidence-squashing thoughts in her head keeping her down. To combat
them, she comes up with a mantra that’s got a nice beat to it: “I-think-I-can.
I-think-I-can. I-think-I-can. I-think-I-can.”
The little engine hooks herself to the train of Christmas toys, and with
trusty mantra in hand and head, starts up the mountain. “I-think-I-can. Ithink-I-can.” She beats back her demons, crests the hill, and descends to a
hero’s welcome of screaming toy-deprived kids who are now crying with
joy. As she rolls down the hill, she changes her mantra to “I-thought-Icould. I-thought-I-could. I-thought-I-could.”
So, what was the little engine’s secret sauce? Engine oil? Elbow grease?
Actually, there’s something else besides effort that’s happening in this
story. The little train is at first focused on the future (I think I can), and then
on reliving the past (I thought I could). But what really gets her up the hill
is not getting caught up in either. Instead, she’s focusing on the present
moment.
This is what you can take from this:
Don’t trust your thoughts (especially the shoulds). Thoughts are just
mental words and images that come and go and should be viewed with a
healthy skepticism. This doesn’t mean that thinking is bad. Remember,
planning, problem-solving, and being creative are part of what makes us
uniquely human and helps us in life. Thinking trips us up when we get
caught up in worry or self-judgmental habit loops (that is to say, shoulding
—I should do this, I shouldn’t do that). Those types of thoughts, especially
the ones that have strong opinions, are the ones to be on the lookout for, as
they just make us feel bad about ourselves.
There’s a section in ch. 14 called Who Needs A Pep Talk?, where the author stated that even your worse thoughts about yourself can be viewed with skepticism. When having a lot of thoughts about your ability to do the task, you can be skeptical about those thoughts cuz maybe they could be wrong.
I find that interesting cuz just as much as bad thoughts about my performance could be right, they could also be wrong in certain ways. Usually I take the bad feeling thoughts for what they mean and think they have a deeper truer meaning about my ability, but I see that they could also have lots of wrong to them. Like why do I have to feel bad about myself when I think about a truth that hurts?
Self-help book I read today:
I hope you’ve developed your own evidence base for first and second
gears at this point. If you have, you can probably relate to this journal entry
from someone in our Eat Right Now program:
One evening I reacted to an emotional scenario by diving into a
treat. I fed the fire in an effort to quickly feel better. The
momentary soothing sweetness became overridden by a body
sense of a chocolate “gut bomb” and slumping in defeat and
disenchantment.
If you are recognizing disenchantment pretty clearly in your own
experience (not just understanding the concepts, but feeling them in your
body), congratulations, you are ready for third gear.
Third Gear
Returning to the OFC, we know that for a behavior to be reinforced and
sustained, its reward value likely must be greater than that of the behavior it
is replacing. Think of the OFC like someone addicted to Tinder or some
dating app. They are always swiping and swiping, looking for that bigger,
better offer (BBO). When it comes to choosing behaviors, our OFC is
always on the lookout for that BBO.
In fact, the OFC sets up a reward hierarchy so that you can make
decisions efficiently without having to exert too much mental energy. This
is especially true when you are making choices. Your OFC assigns each of
your previously performed behaviors a value, and when given a choice—
let’s say between two behaviors—it can then choose the more valuable one.
This helps you make choice decisions quickly and easily without having to
think too much about them.
For example, I have performed many, many chocolate-eating behaviors,
to the point where my OFC has a pretty detailed chocolate reward hierarchy
set up. My hierarchy goes like this: I like 70 percent dark chocolate much
more than 40 percent milk chocolate. When presented with the two, I don’t
have to think about it; I will always eat the 70 percent. Don’t get me wrong,
I’m not a monogamous 70 percent guy. I’ll always try something new if it
meets that 70 percent threshold (higher percentage, sea salt, a little cayenne,
maybe some almonds), but rarely will I slum it into the 60s.
To break old habits and make new ones stick, you need to set up the
necessary conditions.
First, you need to make sure that reward value of the old habit is
updated. That’s why you’ve been practicing second gear so much.
Second, you need to find that BBO.
For example, becoming clearly aware that smoking doesn’t taste good
reduces the reward value of smoking cigarettes (second gear), but people
don’t stand idly by on their smoke breaks doing nothing if they aren’t
smoking. Idleness quickly gives way to boredom and restlessness, which
themselves don’t feel particularly pleasant. In many paradigms for addiction
treatment, the solution calls for a substitute behavior. Eating candy can
occupy the time and satisfy a craving (to some degree), yet feeds the
habitual process: triggered by a craving, one learns to eat candy instead of
smoking, which sets up its own reward-based learning loop—and is the
usual suspect for the average fifteen-pound weight gain that comes with
quitting.
Third, for lasting habit change, you must find a special type of BBO, not
just any old BBO.
You need to find a reward that is more rewarding and doesn’t feed the
habit loop through mere substitution of a different behavior.
Mindfulness might fit the bill. This is really important, so I’m going to
repeat it: mindfulness might actually give you more satisfying rewards, as in
a substitute that has bigger, better rewards but without the baggage of
feeding the craving (more on that later).
Let’s continue using stress as an example. What if instead of smoking or
eating cupcakes you substituted a mindful curiosity as a new behavior? Two
unique differences emerge here: (1) there is a shift from externally based
behaviors (eating, smoking, etc.) to internally based ones (curiosity); and
more important, (2) the reward value is materially different. You can also
substitute a mindful curiosity for internally based habitual behaviors such as
worrying, because curiosity feels better than anxiety.
I want to try to practice the first and second gear that the author suggests doing.
Is there something anxiety related that’s bothering me right now? Yeah, posting on Critical Fallibilism. I have a lot of ideas on what to post but I worry about how it’s going to pan out so I just don’t do anything in the end.
Let’s do gear 1 by creating habit loops:
Trigger: Wanting to post a topic in the forum
Behavior: Thinking it’s too much of a hassle to post
Reward: I don’t have to worry about posting and me messing up badly
Trigger: Wanting to post a topic in the forum
Behavior: I don’t know how to word my post and have somebody care about it.
Reward: Hold off on posting so I don’t have to deal with wording the post badly
Trigger: Wanting to post a topic on the forum
Behavior: Idea sounded good on paper but writing it down sounds stupid
Reward: Don’t have to worry about sounding stupid
Trigger: Wanting to post a topic on the forum
Behavior: Worry about me not posting my marvel rivals video before doing other stuff
Reward: Hold off on posting and not worry about being held accountable.
Trigger: Wanting to post something on the forum
Behavior: Scared my words won’t come out the way I wanted initially
Reward: Don’t have to think about not being heard and not expressing myself correctly
I think second gear is becoming aware of stuff from your habits so here they are:
I’m becoming aware of a pattern that when I want to take on a task, it’s hard for me to decide for the task. I end up just dropping it altogether.
I notice that the initial thought to post sounds great, but as time goes on it sounds more and more disagreeable.
FWIW, your posts in recent months have been fine. You’re doing well! Offhand, I don’t recall you ever posting something toxic, and being mistaken sometimes is totally fine and expected. Your post quality, clarity and interestingness has been fine.
FWIW, I forgot about that and don’t really care one way or the other (please take that positively, not negatively!). In general, people who aren’t your good friends or family or coworkers/bosses/teachers probably aren’t paying very close attention to you and usually don’t care much (positively or negatively) about what you do. It’s hard to get attention and you don’t need to have anxiety about what people think about most things because you usually don’t have their attention. There are exceptions like if you walk around in public in really unfashionable clothing a lot of people will probably notice (and briefly judge you and care, but most or maybe all of them will quickly forget about it if it’s a big city. in a small town more people might remember it when you do something that stands out).
That sounds good. I’m so glad!
That makes sense. Btw, Im almost done with the video. Im gonna post it here when im done.
I’ve come to accept this more:
And I will often post those immediate thoughts if I couldn’t think of something better, even if I think they weren’t very good. I think it’s good because then I can get criticism and actually get some good ideas instead of only having the bad ideas. I had to shift my mindset to care more about making progress and less about sounding smart.
That sounds good to me even though it can be hard. There are some things that come to mind that count as immediate thoughts like posting answers to a math problem or posting answers to a grammar problem on the forum.
Yeah, similarly, irl sometimes I see it’s better to voice what you think to someone instead of staying quiet.
One time I wanted to call animal control because the neighbor’s outdoor cats would make my sibling’s dogs bark and wake me up. When I told my brother I would do it, he said that don’t do it cuz that’s kinda mean and the neighbors take care of them. That made me think, “Yeah, that’s kind of rude to just do that behind their back and not communicate about it. I don’t want to do that.” The critique/criticism helped improve my ideas in that scenario.