Group rationality diary, 6/4/12

cata

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for the week of June 4th. It's a place to record and chat about it if you have done, or are actively doing, things like:

Established a useful new habit
Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief
Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations
Optimized some part of a common routine or cached behavior
Consciously changed your emotions or affect with respect to something
Consciously pursued new valuable information about something that could make a big difference in your life
Learned something new about your beliefs, behavior, or life that surprised you
Tried doing any of the above and failed

Or anything else interesting which you want to share, so that other people can think about it, and perhaps be inspired to take action themselves. Try to include enough details so that everyone can use each other's experiences to learn about what tends to work out, and what doesn't tend to work out.

Thanks to everyone who contributes!

(Previously: 5/14/12, 5/21/12, 5/28/12)

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for the week of June 4th. It's a place to record and chat about it if you have done, or are actively doing, things like:

Established a useful new habit
Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief
Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations
Optimized some part of a common routine or cached behavior
Consciously changed your emotions or affect with respect to something
Consciously pursued new valuable information about something that could make a big difference in your life
Learned something new about your beliefs, behavior, or life that surprised you
Tried doing any of the above and failed

Thanks to everyone who contributes!

(Previously: 5/14/12, 5/21/12, 5/28/12)

Newest idea for bedtime enforcement- I started a spreadsheet where I can record what time I took melotonin, went to sleep, woke up, etc. If nothing else, I figure I might at least get some good data.

When I moved, one of the Random Objects I stumbled across were the goggles I had to wear for about two days, post-LASIK. I hate driving in bright sunlight, and sunglasses are never good enough. I remembered that these goggles were amazing at blocking sunlight (since they were for protecting sensitive, just-surgeried eyes) and decided to use them as my driving sunglasses, despite the fact that they look somewhat unusual, and leave little goggle marks on my cheeks. On a somewhat related note, I still wear the bracelet I got from Rejection Therapy almost everyday, as a reminder to do things like this.

I attempted using a strict Pomodoro (blocked websites), and tried a variety of time settings. I disliked it, and found the enforced time settings to be unnatural to my workflow. I left the app on my browser though, since I can see using it as a pre-commitment device, if I end up recognizing that I am getting overly distracted by facebook or whatnot. Just click the little tomato, and it will force me to get off time-distracting sites for a while.

I've been specifically noticing emotional states, and their effect on me in the middle of experiencing them quite a lot lately. I had already started doing that before mini-camp though, so I don't know if the increase in it is due to natural progression of the skill, or due to the Emotional Awareness class. As an aside, I think that is the next class we will run at our local meetup.

I remembered that these goggles were amazing at blocking sunlight (since they were for protecting sensitive, just-surgeried eyes) and decided to use them as my driving sunglasses

IIRC in Europe it's illegal to drive with sunglasses stronger than [some amount].