Group rationality diary, 5/21/12

cata

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for the week of May 21st. 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 (and explanation)

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for the week of May 21st. 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!

I really tried hard at being friendly and positive, and may have gotten a job out of doing so! (I will know in a week.)

I failed to start teaching myself Italian. I meant to start Sunday, but end up reading junk instead. I also planned on painting, and never got around to doing that, either. I'm mainly posting that here to make me do it when I wake up tomorrow. It's not the actual doing of the work that I dread, it's figuring out where to start.

Update: I did get around to drawing (about 1/6th done a rather large painting), and was reminded that I probably ought to just work on painting people instead of giant time-sinking scenes.

I still have not gotten around to Italian. I discovered that my CDs and lesson book have vanished sometime in the last 9 months of disuse (any free sites out there with good programs?) and I need to find it before I can actually do anything.

6Grognor14y

Your comment reminds me of how the only way I managed to motivate myself into getting a job was to become homeless