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therufs comments on Group Rationality Diary, November 16-30 - Less Wrong
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After having heard much about how great a gratitude journal is for one's life, I overcame my sense of impending hokeyness long enough to set up a Google form to journal in and an IFTTT recipe to remind me to do it.
In the interest of full disclosure, it comes to my attention that I did little if any work to figure out where the impression of hokeyness came from and whether it ought to be believed. :/
Well, I feel like a gratitude journal is almost an exemplar of hokeyness. But that doesn't mean it's bad or ineffective.
If that bothers you, frame it as an exercise in mindfulness and positively-oriented reflection.
Technically, gratitude journal is an example of selection bias. (A hypothetical impartial observer should make notes about everything, indiscriminately.)
But that's okay, because the purpose of the gratitude journal is not to make impartial observations, but to change yourself. To focus your attention on processes that have proved successful in the past, on resources your have, etc.
This hits on the particular question I failed to ask in this case, which was something like "Is there some particular bias I'd be exploiting for fun/profit/improvement?"
Which, of course, begs the question of whether it is rational to exploit biases instead of trying to mitigate them.
I think there is not much hope to remove biases from System 1, so we might as well use them for our benefit. With System 2, let's try to be as unbiased as possible.
More metaphorically, use your thoughts for (unbiased) thinking, but use your emotions for (productive) action. Don't try to use your emotions for thinking, they are not made for that purpose.
System 1 and System 2 aren't separate, defined systems though. They bleed into each other. It's useful language for talking about thinking, but massively oversimplifies the matter.