AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: How I used Stephen Covey's Principle-Centered Living to change my life DATE: 7:48 PM ----- BODY: My current self-help practice is a spin on "principle-centered living" as suggested in Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. In that book, Covey suggests that the way to be effective—which he makes a point of distinguishing from being happy and being successful—is to center yourself on your principles. He starts the book by showing the pitfalls of having false centers:

If you are Spouse Centered: You are highly vulnerable to the moods and feelings of your spouse.

If you are Family Centered: Your feelings of self-worth are based on the family reputation.

If you are Money Centered: Your personal worth is determined by your net worth.

On the other hand, if you're "Principle Centered" then "Your source of security provides you with an immovable, unchanging, unfailing core enabling you to see change as an exciting adventure and opportunity to make significant contributions."

This sounds very seductive, and when I read that ten years ago, I felt deeply moved. However, I didn't know where to begin forming a list of principles. Stephen Covey also doesn't list any of his principles in his book.

I did some searching and found that Covey has a site where people can post their progress working through his practices:

Here's an example from one user:

Family (Wife and Kids) = I do not react to their weaknesses and I use proactivity to make them successful slowly.

Career = I work with plan and plan my work use courage to achieve my goals to full fill my materialistic needs.

That doesn't really make sense to me. They remind me of principles I started hashing out when I read Covey's book ten years ago. i.e. They all felt half-baked, leaving me with a temporary self-help high.

However, a year ago, I resurrected principle-centered thinking in a way that worked for me and has changed my life. My strategy has been to come up with a sentence that encapsulates a timeless rule.

What I did was develop a 6th sense for whether something is "meaningful." I was able to read potential principles, and I could feel this umpf in my chest that told me "this is meaningful." You can try this yourself too. Think of the last 10 movies you've seen, and one by one, ask yourself, "is this meaningful?" If you feel a deep-seated "yeah" inside of you, then that movie's meaningful to you.

You can use this meaningfulness test in any other domain. Is your job meaningful? Is your current relationship meaningful? Is the book or TV show you're into meaningful?

Now, if you use this meaningfulness test to create a sentence that every time you read it, you feel moved by it, then you have yourself a bona fide principle.

Here are three really powerful ones that I came up with for myself:

All social interaction should be preceded by empathy. (As discussed here.)
Happiness has less to do with where you are at than with what you do about it.
Your rambling, passive, stream-of-consciousness thoughts are not what you really think.

Ever since I committed each of those principles to writing, they've changed me in reliable ways. Each one represents thoughts that I've always believed in somewhere in the back of my mind, but never combined into a strong position. That first principle, on socializing, made me immediately, and permanently more effective at socializing. That second one about happiness, made me permanently more optimistic about life. And that third one made me permanently less beholden by the chatter in my head.

Over the past year, I created a list of 390+ principles on all sorts of topics, including success, passion, relationships, and communications. I hope to eventually produce a book compiling these.

The way to come up with a principle is to think of a problem in your life that you feel you've solved half-way. What can you say about it that is meaningful? What could you say to yourself that would unify you and give you a full and confident response?

Labels: principle, principle-thinking

----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Bartolomeu DATE:4/1/09 7:25 AM Hi,my name is Bartolomeu and i'm from Brazil, Very good job and i believe that. I really like SCovey and your theory.

Best regards ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: What do you do when your heart, mind, intuition, and gut disagree? DATE: 4:07 PM ----- BODY: When you make a decision, what's the thought in your head as you're making it? Do you make decisions from your heart, mind, intuition, or gut?

What happens when all your major sources of imperative disagree? What if you ask God, and he tells you to defy your gut? Sartre would say something like, "it doesn't matter, at some point, we just invent choice."

My friend Rusty has a funny response: "Well, you can cross-out intuition, because that's pretty much your gut. And we eat when we're heart-broken, so gut beats heart. And we can't think when we're hungry. So, I'd say gut. Go with your gut!"

Imagine how powerful changing the source of your decisions could be. What if instead of always "going with the flow," you decided to be someone who "goes with his gut" or "follows God." Everything you do would change.

Labels: decisions

----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Susannah DATE:3/26/09 5:56 PM Well, I reckon that if it comes down to it, gut instinct, intuition, and answers from 'God' would usually be the same one and should be taken over rational thought anytime. Just an opinion of course :-) ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Queen Elizabeth DATE:4/3/09 12:05 AM I like how you buddy Rusty turned your question into a form of rock-paper-scissors! ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Philosophistry DATE:4/3/09 12:07 AM haha, that's a good way of putting it. Yes, yes he did. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: I'm not a loner, but I'm not really its opposite. DATE: 3:50 PM ----- BODY: I'm not a loner, but I'm not really its opposite. On 43 Things, one common wish is, "figure out where all the people like me are hiding." I can relate to that really well. And I wrestle frequently with my identity as an strong individualist and my identity among others.

I spend a lot of time alone. I'm a freelance developer, and so I spend most of my day on the computer. But I do like socializing. I like it a lot. And I've always struggled with the question about fitting in. Every so often, when my coffers rise a little, I go on a shopping spree thinking, "Okay, now! Now is the time when I'll start fitting in." And I pick some target group, and I work on blending in. This excitement doesn't last very long, and so my wardrobe is this collection of various experiments or stabs at different groups.

Today, two ideas hit me at the same time that I think may bring this issue to a close. One is a simple re-phrasing:
An argument for "fitting in" is that yes, it's true: birds of a feather do flock together.
But then a knee-jerk response in me came up:

But what if I don't want to flock with anybody?
And I think that spoke to me even stronger. I love socializing, but I hate groups. I feel that groups dumb me down, and I feel that only through partnerships or on my own, do I really get what's good for me.

What would be a good word for that? I'm not a loner, but not a group-ist. "Individualist" is a kind of trite word, and who isn't an individualist anyways? I kind of wish I knew German, because I heard that it's easier to construct new words just by tacking on atomic ideas to each other. Maybe if I read the Loner's Manifesto I'd get some new perspective.

Labels: socializing

----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

rampantheart DATE:4/2/09 9:08 PM I can relate to your character. I suppose the word would be "Non conformist". It can't be an individualist, as you had pointed out. Any extrovert may be an individualist. ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

lisa DATE:4/3/09 8:31 AM What your explaining is the coolest way to be!! ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Philosophistry DATE:4/3/09 11:35 AM Thanks! Other people on Twitter were telling me that they were exactly the same way. They were only into "dyads" or one-on-one pairings. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Introducing Self-Programming, my approach to self-help DATE: 2:06 PM ----- BODY: I've been asked to give an "elevator pitch" as to what exactly I have to offer. I've determined it's this:

Self-Programming is a method of self-help that looks at all practices, from New Age, to Science, to Religion, and distills whatever will bring about meaningful, lasting, life-change.

I believe in meditation, but I don't need words like prana or nirvana.
I believe in prayer, but I wouldn't claim to be religious.
I believe in medication, but I won't promote Prozac or Zoloft.
I believe in self-help books, but not the ones like Tony Robbins'.
I believe in therapy, but I believe you ultimately have to help yourself.

It's called Self-Programming, because all of those fields are important only inasmuch as they function within our lives. I'm a programmer by trade, and I believe that we can translate any method to its meaningful, core functionality.

Labels: meta-self-programming

----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Anish Chattergee DATE:3/26/09 4:02 PM What are the benefit of self-programming? In other words, what is the "product of the product"? ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Philosophistry DATE:3/26/09 4:19 PM the product of the product is meaningful, lasting life change. ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

The Terrill...ific! Trainer DATE:3/27/09 11:03 AM Good post! If we don't focus on our own programming we can fall prey to someone else's programming that may not be in our self interest. Most people I think are in a trance most of the time and being programmed to what the the programmer wants. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: When your friends have unrealistic dreams DATE: 7:05 PM ----- BODY: This just popped up on Ask.MetaFilter: How do you tell a friend that their dreams aren't realistic?

I know it's not GROOVY to be a PARTY POOPER and tell someone not to pursue their dreams. I usually tell people to do so and to work hard at it and I really mean it. But in THIS CASE, for a certain friend, I just can't get myself to do it! ...

This is what I responded back with:

I can very much relate to this feeling. I've been on both sides.

First, keep this principle in mind: If you have dreams and passions and don't pursue them, you will always regret it. So, knowing that, it's better for your friend to fail—and fail hard—pursuing his dreams, rather than have the kind of regret that pops up later in mid-life crises.

Second, try to give charitable criticism. Instead of telling your friend your perspective, try to walk with him through the process of thinking. Don't ask him questions that are leading, like, "So, did you make a plan yet? hmmm?" Instead try to think of questions that you would ask if you were his fan. "So what are you up to next?" You know, actually be curious.

Be open to a 50-50 chance that he could reveal something about where he's going that you just didn't have any idea about.

That's what it means to be charitable. And charitable friends are ones everybody should have. And through the process of talking it out and having a soundboard, there's theoretically a 50% chance he'll see the error of his ways anyway, and reform. But more often than not, if done right, you'll maybe help him refine his goals a little and your opinion of him will change a lot.

Labels: communication, criticism, passion

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: The Best of the Best Advice Books DATE: 12:36 PM ----- BODY: I just finished two projects:

I counted every amazon.com link in every single question and answer page (12,000+ pages) from the human relations and work & money categories of Ask.MetaFilter. This spans more than five years worth of advice.

Personally, I trust these lists to be the best books on their topics. That's because I believe in the power of hive minds, and I believe that MetaFilter is one of the best hive minds out there. I don't know why MetaFilter is so good. Perhaps it's because it costs $5 to join the community, or that it has a slight bias for librarians. All I know is that some book recommendations on there have changed my life.

And now I have a lot more reading to do.

Labels: books

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: The Meaning of Forgiveness DATE: 2:44 AM ----- BODY: I find a lot of inspiration in strange places. For example, I just learned a valuable lesson about forgiving from the film Indecent Proposal.

This movie came out in 1993 and earned $266 million worldwide. Besides having an interesting cast—Demi Moore, Woody Harrelson, and Robert Redford (the billionaire making the offer)—it has an intriguing premise: What would you do if someone offered a million dollars for one night with your wife? (That the film won 3 Razzies, including Worst Picture, is beside the point).

Woody Harrelson and Demi Moore make the deal, but after much strife between them, Woody comes to an important understanding. Watch:

For re-iteration, here's the takeaway quote: "The things that people in love do to each other they will always remember. And if they stay together, it’s not because they forget, but because they forgive."

This is profound to me. And I've translated it into this principle:
Forgiving and forgetting are not the same thing.
Think of the wrongs that people have done to you in the past. Could/can you still be close to them, knowing you will never forget what they did? If the answer is yes, then you've forgiven them. I think sometimes, in our neverending quest for perfection, we wish to be free from bad memories or any imperfect thoughts. But that seems like a recipe for loneliness and anxiety.

Labels: forgiving, principle

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: How do I break the habits that keep me from finding Mr./Ms. Right? DATE: 2:59 AM ----- BODY: Some very good advice from grumblebee:

It's NORMAL to have 4 or 5 relationships not work out. It's also normal -- but often wrongheaded -- to look for some sort of deeply-meaningful pattern in the botched relationships. Of course you're going to look for a pattern. You feel powerless, and when people feel powerless, they look for patterns so that the universe doesn't feel so random. So that it feels manageable. "If I understand it, I can do something about it."

Here's the REAL pattern: for MOST people, their first 4 or 5 relationships don't last. A introvert will think, "It's because I'm too introverted." An extrovert will think, "It's because I'm too outgoing." An overweight person will think, "It's because I'm too fat." An honest person will think, "It's because I'm too guileless." And their friends (and sisters) will think these things, too, because they are also looking for patterns.

...

Continue reading rest of the comment, it's good. I've fallen into this trap before.

This goes back to a principle of mine:

Don't make a global change when a local change will do.

Labels: principle, relationships

----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

megan DATE:4/2/09 1:40 AM I like that principle, especially from a programmer's perspective, and not from a "think globally, act locally" perspective (which I imagine is where most people's minds might go). I bet there are a lot of things that I've learned from database development that I never thought to apply to my "real life." ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Philosophistry DATE:4/2/09 1:57 AM Databases... I'm sure you could mine a lot of universal ideas from that field.

Come to think of it, sometimes programmer-speak becomes so second-nature to me that I had forgotten that the "local change vs. global change" expression comes very much from my computer science background. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Short post on the meaning of vacation and recreation DATE: 2:43 PM ----- BODY: The roots of the words recreation and vacation are all too often obscured when we're engaged in either.

Recreation is about re-creating ourselves. And vacation is about vacating our minds.

Play is a very important part of self-development. When we're smiling and laughing with friends, it's as sign that something positive is happening within us.

Vacation is ultimately about achieving a zen-like detachment from our busy-ness, so that you can see your life for what it really is.

In Spanish class, I enjoyed learning that the word for "having a good time" is divertir. This is apparently related to the word "diversion." You're having a good time when you divert yourself from your current rivers. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Security is no contentment DATE: 11:16 AM ----- BODY: Oddly enough, I've met a lot of people lately who've decided to quit their jobs on their own! Initially, this seems counter-intuitive, but I think people are starting to think, "Well, if I could lose my job any day now, why did I work so hard to obtain and maintain this position in the first place?"

This led me to this thought:

Security is no contentment.

I think we often cling to financial security as a way of buying ourselves contentment. Sometimes we think, "okay, if I can just get to this financial position, or this solid job, then I can relax and be happy." This economy has shown us that the security we were looking for was kind of shallow.

I left a salaried job in January of 2008 in order to focus on freelance game design. Right now, I don't live paycheck to paycheck, but I do live somewhat gig to gig. Sometimes I get a little shiver thinking about it, but more often it feels like a thrill, like I'm really challenging myself. And that is what buys me contentment. Being out of my comfort zone.

I'm reminded of a quote by Warren Buffett:

Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked.

While unemployment in the United States is now at 8%, the other 92% are wondering when they'll be next. This climate is showing who was really devoted to their job, and who was just floating on an artificial market boost.

I highly recommend the following book, even for anybody who is not looking for a job. It has, and continues to have, changed my life:

----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

SarahQB DATE:3/17/09 7:25 PM You will appreciate this: http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1884779_1884782_1884749,00.html ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

SarahQB DATE:3/17/09 7:26 PM link was cut off. search for Time magazine 10 Ideas Changing The World. #1. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: What is Intentional Living? DATE: 2:39 AM ----- BODY: In my never-ending quest to figure out "where are all the people like me hiding?" I discovered an interesting label: Intentional Living. The most obvious forms are people like vegans and Quakers, but I think a lot of people have an intentional living philosophy and don't fit into any other obvious category. I discovered this quote that could be the beginning of a manifesto for Intentional Living:

I want to think about living and what is important in life, to clarify my thinking--and also my life. Mostly we tend--I do too--to live on automatic pilot, following through the views of ourselves and the aims we acquired early, with only minor adjustments. No doubt there is some benefit--a gain in ambition or efficiency--in somewhat unthinkingly pursuing early aims in their relatively unmodified form, but there is a loss, too, when we are directed through life by the not fully mature picture of the world we formed in adolescence or young adulthood.

This quote is in the introduction to The Examined Life, by Robert Nozick, one of the most important philosophers of the 20th Century. When I read that I just thought to myself, "Yes!"

Labels: intentional living, philosophy

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Follow interesting people, not interesting topics DATE: 4:16 PM ----- BODY: Got an interesting bit of advice from John "Halcyon" Styn at this panel "How to Rawk SXSW:"

My mom told me an important piece of advice when I was starting out at college. Find out who the interesting professors are and take all of their classes.

I think that can apply to the rest of life too. Wish I got that advice when I started college.

Labels: followinterests

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Ten 10-min. Relaxation Videos DATE: 12:29 PM ----- BODY: I put together a playlist of Ten 10-min. or longer relaxation videos from YouTube. Turn on, tune in, drop out.

Labels: relaxation

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: How do you stop the endless chatter in your mind? DATE: 5:16 PM ----- BODY: My ideas on how to quiet the mind revolve around this principle:

The mind is an echo chamber.

Any thought you have repeats itself at varying decibel levels. If you're paying attention to your thinking, then your recognition of that thought becomes another thought. If you try to stop your thinking, then that command will carry with it the target thought, further amplifying the echo. For example, George Lakoff in Don't Think of an Elephant, suggests that Nixon shouldn't have said, "I'm not a crook" because it immediately puts the idea of "crook" in people's heads.

This all makes quieting your mind difficult. You can try willful thought-stopping, but you will notice your brain get sore, and in some cases, often the target thought will become stronger. In White Bears and Other Unwanted Thoughts, Daniel Wegner discusses a study showing that the target thought to suppress almost always gets stronger after an active attempt to suppress it. It's like trying to yell "quiet!" in a library.

I have a method that addresses this. It's called a "net reduction in repetitive thoughts." What you do is alternate between these two methods:

Active thought-suppression
Letting yourself have the thought

If you push too much on the first method, you'll just amplify the thought. If you focus too much on the second method you're obsessing. Both methods do cause at least a momentary increase in the thought, but if played right, as a pair, they eventually lead to a net loss of the thought. For example, if you let your mind flow freely and express all the negative thoughts of the day, it will be like airing out the pressure. Or, if you have a mind that's running out of control, and you tell yourself briefly, "I don't like these thoughts," that may put a kink in the thought-train and discourage negativity. Either way, you want to ultimately end up with less repetitive thoughts, or a "net" reduction.

Controlling your thoughts is essential to happiness. Wegner further shows studies correlating depression and a weakened ability to control negative ideation.

So remember this: Sometimes you need to let your mind run out of steam on its own. Other times you need to intervene and gently say halt. Move appropriately between the two, and you'll have a quieter mind.

Labels: ocd, principle, relaxation

----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

donah DATE:3/13/09 11:58 AM I love the way that you have explained not engaging with the thoughts. I would have never considered putting it that way. I will use this example with my patients. It will be very helpful.thanks so much for sharing. ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Philosophistry DATE:3/13/09 12:02 PM Thanks for the encouragement! ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Nat Couropmitree DATE:3/13/09 6:36 PM I get what you're saying with the balance of the 2 methods and yet trying to end chatter in my head, seems to add to the chatter.

One of the ways I have found helpful to decrease chatter is to take time to write it down. I write down what I'm feeling and thinking without judgment. It helps clear my mind. Then I get even clearer by breaking down my thoughts/feelings into what I don't want, what I do want and how I want to feel instead.

I wrote an article about this process which I call "The Chatter Stopper."

http://www.prosperitylighthouse.com/blog/5-steps-to-getting-beyond-procrastination-and-overwhelm/ ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: 6 Seconds To Relax DATE: 8:21 PM ----- BODY: I love this tip from Zen Habits: 6 Seconds to Relax. Any time you need to relax, just do a two-second inhale, and a four-second exhale. Examples:

B: If you’re a Blogger, take a breath each time you click “save” when writing an article for your blog.
R: If you make Reservations for an airline, take a breath each time you book a flight going east.
E: If you’re an Engineer, take a breath each time you use your calculator.
A: If you’re an Accountant, take a breath each time you see a number ending in 6.
T: If you’re a Teacher, take a breath each time the school bell rings.
H: If you’re a Highway tollbooth operator, take a breath each time a white car comes through your lane.
E: If you’re an Editor, take a breath each time you correct a comma.

Breathing is so crucial to mindfulness techniques. For most people, their natural breath in shallow and weak. Imagine if it was 20-40% deeper every time, what kind of global impact that would have on your well-being?

Further Reading:

Labels: relaxation

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: The Highest Success DATE: 12:51 PM ----- BODY: I think a lot about success, passion, and fulfillment at work. Here's a principle that ties all three together:

The most successful people have joy-enhanced output.

Everybody at the top of their game, from Warren Buffet on down to Jon Stewart, they all love what they do, and their love is what their makes their output so good.

I'm reading Warren Buffet's biography, and you see at an early age, he always loved numbers and collecting things. That, and he loved adhering to principles, like "Keep an Inner Scorecard." It seems that the reason why he's so successful is that he loves digging through financials personally, and he loves fighting all the powers that seek to push him away from a disciplined response.

Is it possible to succeed without loving your work? Absolutely. This is what happens to valedictorians, for example:

... few of the valedictorians seem destined for intellectual eminence or for creative work outside of familiar career paths. Dedicated to the well-rounded ideal to be a valedictorian, after all, you must excel in classes that don't interest you or are poorly taught; the valedictorians had used their strong work ethic to pursue multiple academic and extracurricular interests. None was obsessed with a single talent area to which he or she subordinated school and social involvement. This marks a difference, Arnold said, "from what we know about many eminent achievers, who tend to evince an early passion for a particular field." For these people, Arnold writes, "a powerful early interest evolves into lifelong, intensive, even obsessive involvement in the talent area." She goes on, "Exceptional adult achievers often recall formal schooling as a disliked distraction." Valedictorians, by contrast, conformed to the expectations of school and carefully chose careers that were likely to be socially and financially secure: "As a rule, valedictorians relegated their early interests to hobbies, second majors, or regretted dead ends. The serious athletes among the valedictorians never pursued sports occupations. Most of the high school musicians hung up their instruments during college.

(from An Interesting Statistic about Valedictorians)

Think of your favorite album or movie. Can you imagine the musician or director loathing it while making it? The most cherished products and successes you will almost always find, come from people who enjoyed doing it.

Could you imagine A-Rod hating baseball and being so good? Could you imagine Steve Jobs hating his job?

Labels: passion, principle, success

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: A Stillness Movement DATE: 1:04 AM ----- BODY: Maybe what we need is a Stillness Movement. The goal of this, as opposed to mindfulness, is to simply do nothing. Don't meditate, don't use your computer, don't try to clear your mind, don't talk to anybody, don't do any work, just be. You'll probably be sitting, maybe lying down. But really, just try to hang out in your own self.

There is some precedent to this, I think. At least according to an episode of Six Feet Under I saw, the Quakers have something similar:

Unprogrammed worship is the more traditional style of worship among Friends [Quakers] and remains the norm in Britain, Ireland, continental Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and parts of the United States. During an unprogrammed meeting for worship, Friends gather together in "expectant waiting" for divine leadings. Sometimes a meeting is entirely silent, sometimes quite a few people speak. Meeting for Worship generally lasts about an hour.

When they feel they are led by the spirit a participant will rise and share a message (give "vocal ministry") with those gathered. Typically, messages, testimonies, ministry, or other speech are not prepared as a "speech". Speakers are expected to discern the source of their inspiration — whether divine or self. After someone has spoken, it is expected that more than a few moments will pass in silence before further Ministry; there should be no spirit of debate.

Unprogrammed worship is generally deemed to start as soon as the first participant is seated, the others entering the room in silence. The Meeting for Worship ends when one person (usually predetermined) shakes the hand of another person present. All the members of the assembly then shake hands with their neighbours, after which one member usually rises and extends greetings and makes announcements.

wikipedia entry on Quakers

I certainly want to try a Quaker service. They sound very radical in a way that doesn't fit the stereotypical look of radicalism.

Labels: relaxation

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: When meditation fails, focus on net relaxation DATE: 7:02 PM ----- BODY: I've been on three meditation kicks in my life. Somehow I read an article or a book, and I'll get all excited about it for a week, by the second week it becomes challenging, and by the third or fourth week it stops completely.

Initially, when you haven't meditated in a while, your body will just be so receptive to it. It's like getting a massage the first time. Your body responds with, "where have you been all my life?"

But by the law of diminishing returns, you eventually get a little desensitized to it. In Mindfulness in Plain English, there are segments devoted to handling these moments. However, I kind of don't like the suggestions because they involve increasing your involvement with meditation.

Meditation, for me at least, starts to become a chore or another achievement arc. I start to find that I'm less relaxed than when I started.

I talked to some of my friends about meditation, and they have their own techniques. One friend says he practices what he calls "peacing out." This could be just sitting still on a bench in a park. Or it could be closing his eyes and reclining for a while.

Another friend of mine says she takes "mindful showers," where she tries to feel all the warm droplets making contact with her skin.

What I want to propose is simply this:

Do whatever it takes to achieve a net increase of relaxation.

Meditation is a good first step, but if that doesn't work out, do whatever else has worked. Read a book if that's your thing. Play video games. Turn off the computer. Just whatever it is, leave yourself more relaxed than when you started the task.

You could even ask the same about your job. How can I go through my day such that when I leave I'm more relaxed than when I started?

Labels: relaxation

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Relaxation IS a Panacea DATE: 3:22 PM ----- BODY: I think the seductive appeal of self-help, religion, therapy, etc. is to find the Holy Grail: a panacea for life. A panacea is defined as A remedy for all diseases, evils, or difficulties; a cure-all.

Oftentimes I get excited by a new life-change idea, and 99 times out of 100 I have to remind myself, "Phil, such-and-such system is not a panacea!"

But I think relaxation is. Because 99% of the problems in your life can be aided with more relaxation.

Relaxation's opposite in anxiety, which is a fight-or-flight response. When you're in fight-or-flight, you're mind is focused. When you're focused, you're willfully blind to everything else. This then, becomes a good way to miss the real problems and solutions.

Often when I query my intuition or God about what I should be doing, the response is 9 times out of 10, "relax." If I follow the imperative and calm down, I'll find myself led automatically to a better way.

I think this is largely why Buddhist practices like meditation have endured for so many millennia. Because they work!

Check out this book. It has a 5-Star rating from Amazon. Frequently cited as the best introduction to meditation:

Labels: relaxation

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: If It's a Good Idea Don't Do It DATE: 2:30 PM ----- BODY: I like Jonathan Mead's suggestion that "good ideas" can threaten your passions. This is a problem I encounter frequently. It's arguably my biggest problem.

Being a computer programmer, opportunities come along to join this-or-that start-up and to forgo wages for stock options. Sometimes, even, the start-ups will be in a field that I think is really interesting, like video game design. And that becomes really tough because the project just seems like a "good idea." "Common sense" seems to drive me to want to take the projects. Guilt takes over as I think about how, "people would kill to have this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity."

But riffing on the same point as Mead's, I often end up doing things that I think are really smart choices, but end up not enjoying them. Afterward, I feel satisfied that I accomplished something, but regretful that I didn't spend my time doing something that made my heart sing.

Even in mundane areas, I encounter this trap. I often jump at the opportunity to watch an "interesting" movie with a cool premise and great actors, only to be disappointed in its lack of watchability.

It's the journey, not the destination, that matters.

Labels: asceticism, passion

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Don't Build Your Happiness On a Tower of Babble DATE: 8:52 AM ----- BODY: This principle is important for anybody who follows the path of life-change, whether through therapy, self-help lit, religion, or otherwise:

Don't build your happiness on a tower of babble.

Don't abuse words, jargon, or babble to bolster yourself. Most self-help lit, for example, wraps you in complicated jargon. This is a folly even of one the best-selling and most effective self-help books: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. This is an actual quote from Steven Covey's book:

In an interdependent situation, every P problem is a PC opportunity—a chance to build the Emotional Bank Accounts that significantly affect interdependent production.

(via Slate's Choose Your Guru feature).

Some gurus are aware of this problem. In another great self-help book, What Color Is Your Parachute?, Nelson Bolles notes that a symptom of when we're lying on our backs like weaklings is when we're falling in love with words. He says that when we find ourselves talking on and on, that's a sure sign that we are seeking confidence in the wrong places.

He then encourages everybody to go out and do stuff! Experiment, challenge your rules, and get out of your comfort zone. He says that he tells people this because it reliably unblocks them.

Do you know someone who spouts mantras? Anybody who keeps saying something to the point that it sounds nonsensical, or like babble, you start to wonder if they're unsure of what they're saying.

It relates to this other principle:

If you have to repeat it to make it so, then maybe it isn't.

I like reading the subtext of what politicians say. If they keep talking about "honesty, good government, honesty, good government," you have to wonder if they're just trying to re-assure themselves that they are indeed good.

Or take the case of Bill Bennett, who sold millions of books about virtue, including the best-seller The Book of Virtues: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories. While he goes around the country haranguing the nation to lead better lives, it was later revealed that he was addicted to gambling. To the vocally virtuous, you have to wonder if they're not just trying to wash away their guilt in public.

Most of these inspirational self-help books are written with the same process that I write these posts. When I'm inspired by my epiphanies, writing them out helps me elaborate and codify the thoughts. The process feels great. It's the pleasure of re-enforcement and echo. My inspiration is when an idea goes into a feedback loop through self-expression. That's how zealots form. They get excited, go around repeating their mantras, see other people turned on, which only further encourages their enthusiasm.

While this site and my passion is all about the power of rhetoric, I have to be on guard for its pitfalls.

Further Reading:

Labels: principle, rhetoric

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: What to do when you can't find something DATE: 1:54 AM ----- BODY: When you've been looking for something and can't find it, ask yourself the question:

Where else haven't I looked?

Twice today, I thought I had lost something in my apartment. I looked around, and re-looked in all the same places. I got stuck, and then I remembered that question.

Likewise, I was so frustrated with my career-search problem, telling myself, "Well, I've read all the good books on the topic, I've introspected on this issue for years, I've asked everybody for advice, and nothing seems to work." I then asked myself, "Okay, where else haven't I looked?" I then realized I hadn't looked to religion. I then picked up a copy of The Purpose Driven Life and it immediately gave me a whole host of ideas and moved me forward. If you're an atheist, look to religion. If you're devout, look at science. If you're an introvert, ask someone, anyone. If you're an extrovert, turn off your phone, shut off your MySpace, and meditate on it.

Even if the answers aren't in that other place, the very process of dipping into untapped wells will stir your creative juices.

Labels: creativity

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Self-discipline is write in front of you DATE: 12:33 AM ----- BODY: If you want to steer yourself in any direction, the most powerful tool is the pen. It's based on this principle:

Writing is a commitment

There's a reason for the expression, "commit it to writing."

I have a friend that manages a team of programmers, and whenever he really wants to have things done he says, "put it in writing." Any task, "write it down, send me an email." Anything he wants done, "I make a list."

Create a document on your desktop. Call it "scratch-paper.txt." Then start typing things you want in your life. What you will find is that magically, in a style similar to The Secret, things will naturally fall into place.

Thinking or saying your goals is so ephemeral. Writing them down makes them stick. The page never forgets what is written on it.

The act may seem symbolic, but I find that what I write down invisibly controls me. Even if I don't refer back to my writing, it's hovering somewhere beyond the edge of my consciousness. Sometimes, the only way for me to stop is to actually delete the text or throw the paper away. That's how powerful it is.

Likewise, there's a dark side to the power of writing. Make sure what you write is meaningful. If you write down all sorts of random promises, you may find yourself being torn in different directions.

Labels: principle

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Relax right now DATE: 12:26 AM ----- BODY: This is an interesting use-case for YouTube. I never thought to search for "relaxation video."

Pop on your headphones, turn on the volume, and tune out:

Labels: relaxation

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: DTFMA DATE: 1:28 PM ----- BODY: On Ask.MetaFilter, the best advice site on the Internet, a common refrain is a simple reply: "DTFMA." It stands for "Ditch the F-ing Man Already."

DTFMA sounds simple, but sometimes you can go for years and never hear that.

Sometimes the best advice is simple and incisive. It reminds me of a similar refrain: "He's Just Not That Into You."

The Sopranos has a funny conceit: a criminal seeks therapy to feel better while committing crimes. This plays out for two seasons, but in the middle of Season 3, there is a sudden breath of "real talk:"

I wish all advice were this poignant. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Maybe nothing is wrong with you DATE: 10:19 AM ----- BODY: Here's a deceptively simple principle with deep implications:

Don't make a global change when a local change will suffice.

The seduction of life-change, whether in the form of self-help books, therapy, etc., is that they cater to the impulse "to fix what's wrong with me."

Martin Seligman, in Learned Optimism, shows that optimism is highly correlated with happiness. And then, he explains optimism as the following attitude:

problems are local instead of pervasive
problems are temporary instead of permanent

Maybe you just need to move out. Maybe you just need to switch majors. Maybe you need an anti-histamine for those allergies.

The last time you hit a snag, what did you try to fix? How large of an area did you try to fix?

The temptation is there to make some kind of complete life transformation. I believe that this is related to an ascetic impulse that is simply human nature.

Note, this post willfully contradicts my post on systemic flaws.

Further Reading:

Labels: optimism, principle

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Transitioning from an ENFP to an ENFJ DATE: 4:00 PM ----- BODY: According to Myer-Briggs, 75% of the time the tests show I'm an ENFP, or Idealist-Champion. The other 25% it usually shows ENFJ, The Giver.

ENFP = Extraverted iNtuitive Feeling Perceiving.

Perhaps my systemic flaw is the lack of J, or "Judging," in my life.

I feel like some people spend their whole lives battling a systemic flaw, spending decades in therapy or jumping from one pop-psych self-help book to the next. Being in constant self-struggle is not the way to live. I don't want to be 85 and tell my grandkids, "Well, it's the struggle that's meaningful in life!" B.S. I want to stop struggling and start living!

Occasionally, while in the throes of a deep, introspective episode, a thought will hit me: "Phil, you've been grinding away at this problem for years!" This is a really depressive thought, to think of all the wasted time just thinking. But the hopeful and "meta" side of me asks the question, "What kind of person carries this kind of problem their whole life? How do I not be that person?" I start to think of what could be my systemic flaws.

I feel like everybody I talk to at least has heard of things like ENFP, INFJ, etc. Many people know their own label. You would think someone so against B.S. in psych wouldn't mention these personality tests. But the trick is to not take them too seriously, and to take many of them, so that you can paint an impression of your psychological profile. I believe in psychological profiles. I believe that if you have a P at the end of your profile, you have more in common with other "Perceivers" than those with a J at the end. Stereotypes may be false, but traits do come in groups.

So in my case, I'm more of a P than a J. A perceiver rather than a judger. And that matches ordinary behavior in me. After watching a movie, for example, I usually don't pass judgment afterward, but rather express my feelings. I say, "That put me to sleep" or "That really engaged me." Rather than, "Well, that was stupid" or "What a wonderful film."

But I wonder if the lack of J could be a systemic flaw, because here's the way I drive through life: I just keep going, keep going, keep going until I start to get depressed, and then introspect about why I'm depressed, eventually figure out what's bothering me, and then change course. So I'm constantly veering off until the red flags come up, and then I re-balance. The problem with this pattern is that there's no prediction and prevention. And I spend a lot of my life in the mud, introspecting and re-orienting. It would be nicer to sail steady. That's where judgment comes in handy. When you're just focused on perception, you'll only make decisions based on what's affecting your senses right now. Judging goes one degree behind perception and says, "this is not good" which in a way says, "if I were to engage this, I'd probably not be pleased." Being a Perceiver is more about trial-and-error and auto-correction until you find a routine that satisfies you for a while. And then you veer off again.

But how do you get better at judging? How can you change your psychological profile? Do you just get practice making judgments on things? Do you tell yourself every 5 minutes, "okay, judge!" ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

SarahQB DATE:3/6/09 4:41 PM What a great, honest, introspective post. (yes, I'm a J)

I think the struggle comes more from being moderate in one or more area. If you're close to the line, it's easier to see both perspectives. This is a great attribute, but can also be tormenting when you're trying to make decisions. I know it has been for me.

Actually, I shouldn't use the word moderate--it sounds so bland. You could be equally passionate and forceful about two sides of the coin, but that would still leave you on the line.

I hover on several lines. I want that to be a strength, but it does provide a source of great frustration.

-Sarah, INTJ ----- COMMENT: AUTHOR:

Philosophistry DATE:3/6/09 4:50 PM Glad you like the post. Interesting thoughts. The more I write here, the more people I find who are thinking about these issues.

I wonder if perhaps being moderate is what helps in becoming a judge. When you're calm, even-handed, and feeling the weight of everything, then you can make a judgment.

While as the Perciever is just always chasing wherever they see brightness. Helps for passion, probably doesn't help for having a cool hand. ----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: What Excel taught me about value-based living DATE: 3:21 PM ----- BODY: I spent 4 hours yesterday in a state of dysphoria, unsure what was wrong with me. By all apparent measures, everything was going well in my life. But I found a principle today that unblocked me and made me much happier. The principle ultimately springs from my experience in this story:

Four years ago I had an Excel spreadsheet with a list of anything on my mind. I put down things like, "Getting a new computer," "Free time," "Family," "Finding a new career." And then I put a number between 0 and 10 to the right. 0 being not important, 5 being somewhat important, and 10 being very important. I then updated the list every week, and watched to see how my numbers changed. I also tried to see if any of them were reliably greater than 7.

When I first created this spreadsheet, my life became magically easier. Decisions came easy, I was calmer, and everything was put into perspective.

For the first month, "Going to Japan" got 8s or higher, and so I cashed my small 401(k) and took off. When I was in Japan, "Staying in Japan" remained high on the list, and so I stayed for an extra month, sharing a room with a German and eating ramen everyday. Eventually my tourist visa ran out, and "Going home" floated to the top of my list. I finally went home.

As I'm writing this and reflecting, those 3 months were probably one of the best stretches of my life. So why did I stop?

When I came back, I got sick of my Excel spreadsheet. While I had felt more balanced, I also felt irritated by the confines of it. I finally put a stake in the coffin with this entry:

Living in Proportion To This List = 3, not really important.

And it stayed that way for weeks. Finally I ditched the spreadsheet.

But there has been a lingering sense in me for years afterward, "what was so magical about that spreadsheet?"

Now, I think I understand the mechanic behind it. That spreadsheet provided a rough view of my values.

So what, though? I've always known about "values." Everybody always says, "well, so-and-so has good values."

But a principle struck me today that I think captures why it's so important:

If you live according to your values,
then at least one major happiness metric will always be fulfilled.

So this morning, I queried myself, "In what way am I not living according to my values?" A few major areas popped to my mind where I was slacking, and I immediately set my mind to re-adjust.

Labels: principle

----- -------- AUTHOR: Philosophistry TITLE: Make an endorsement for What Color is Your Parachute DATE: 9:31 AM ----- BODY: Cite the safe-guarding skills one. ----- --------