This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://curi.us/2559-problem-solving-while-reading
Hmm the automated RSS-to-forum-post Discourse plugin left out the list of links at the very end of the post when you expand it. 
This is a known issue. I added some embed selectors but it didn’t fix it. I don’t know why. The solution is: you should click the link and read stuff on the original site. The embeds will sometimes have glitches.
6th paragraph from the article:
You can never be perfect. It’s also important to sometimes change your habits after they’re formed. Sometimes you’ll learn something new and realize a habit or subconscious automatization should be changed.
Dang, i didn’t realize it would be a thing to change previous habits. I don’t think I track it enough.
When I play Marvel Rivals, I noticed I revisited learning to aim in that instead of using older intuition(i think one is relative terms for length(e.g. a little bit or a lot)), I tried using ordinal scales(e.g. a scale of 1-3, 1 being the least movement of crosshair/analog stick and 3 being the fastest I could move the crosshair) to help me aim.
Is that an example of realizing a habit should be changed? I feel like it’s helped more with aim than just eyeing stuff out. Only problem I think tho is that it’s not all fully automatic. I don’t think I integrated it with my old intuition well. Like, I think I probably use more automatic terms for moving the analog stick by saying a little or a lot or medium amount.
Option 3 of doing text analysis stuff as described in the article:
Make trees, outlines or other notes covering everything so you get an understanding of the book that way rather than from direct reading. E.g. do paragraph trees for every paragraph and then make section trees that put the paragraphs together, and then do trees that put the sections together, and keep doing higher level trees until you cover the whole book.
I like this idea. It’s like making your own book but an understanding of it.
I’m thinking you can do 1 and 2 at the same time? Like, I don’t think someone usually is already good at making the trees and outlines so it’ll be practice anyways and improving those skills. I do want to understand the book im going to read, but just a little is ok, like some important parts. I want some parts to practice at least.
Isn’t it kind of interesting that improving skills for self help stuff is just like improving skills for reading? I think getting good at those skills is more important than just doing the overall goal of the self help stuff. I think I may be wrong.
Option 4 of the article:
Read a section at a time then go back and do the analysis and practice after finishing the section but before reading the next section, rather than stopping in the middle of a section. That’ll let you read and understand a whole chunk at once (to your current standards). Analyzing/practicing/etc. in between sections shouldn’t be very disruptive.
This option sounds nice too, but I don’t think im in a rush to understand the self books im going to read, so it’ll be ok. Maybe it would be good to change the pace or just try option 4 later to see what works
If you’re procrastinating on doing any analysis, it’s because you don’t actually want to do it. In that case you need to do problem solving about that.
Idk why I would be conflicted if it happened so that’s sounds important to consider
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I should have written that part of you doesn’t want to do it. Maybe part of you does, but there’s still a conflict to try to figure out there.
One reason people don’t like self-help books and similar material is because it says they can and should be different, but when they try to change it doesn’t work very well. The book is often missing some important information (it’s not very personalized in addition to being imperfect), and they may feel bad if they can’t make it work.
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Why did you write it like: if you’re procrastinating, it’s because you don’t actually want to do it(“it” is I think any analysis)?
Is there an error in your original writing?
I was thinking that you wrote it like that because the person is being decisive about analyzing. Maybe? Like, if they keep going along with their procrastination, they’re actually not going to do it. They already decided not to.
Does the next paragraph in your reply talk about why people are conflicted about doing analysis for self help books? Is that why it’s under the part where you said you should have written stuff differently? Is the paragraph connected to you saying you should’ve written your stuff differently?
Here’s the paragraph im talking about:
I didn’t check the context but I thought that statement (“you don’t actually want to do it”) could be misunderstood, so I wanted to clarify. Someone could interpret it as meaning they should just give up and do something else, which isn’t what I meant. There’s just a problem to be addressed.
Oh ok, I thought when someone says I should have done x instead of y, it meant that there was an error. I didn’t think that things needed to be clarified since others may misunderstand. I was looking for errors cuz idk i thot it’s important to look for them whenever. I thought it would be good to see if one made an error. It would show one needs to work on a skill more. Or maybe there’s a misconception? Idk.
Yeah, that seems to be the point u were trying to make. That’s the important thing to take note