Group Rationality Diary, September 1-15

therufs

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for September 1-15.

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 cata for starting the Group Rationality Diary posts, and to commenters for participating!

Next diary: September 16-30

Immediate past diary: August 16-31

Rationality Diaries archive

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for September 1-15.

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 cata for starting the Group Rationality Diary posts, and to commenters for participating!

Next diary: September 16-30

Immediate past diary: August 16-31

Rationality Diaries archive

Are you serious? What exactly is the positive emotion of berating yourself? If you really mean it, I guess you simply have no idea about what a positive emotion feels like.

I worded that poorly. The idea I was trying to convey was that you can either work to strengthen a certain trait, or work to remove whatever is preventing you from having that trait. I'm going to retract that idea, since the more I think about it, the less sense it makes.

Also, chocolate cakes don't exist; there is simply the absence of non-chocolate non-cakes. And it feels really good, trust me.

Happiness doesn't exist; there is simply the absence of unhappiness. Darkness doesn't exist; there is simply the absence of light. That is the idea I was getting at. Looking back, you're right, it's all just word games. Playing with definitions. So I will just agree with your statement that unhappiness is stronger than happiness, and affirm that my goal is to eliminate unhappiness, then go from there.

That feels to me like instead of turning off the radio, you turn on the TV even louder. And then you don't hear the radio. (But you also don't hear the birds. But that's okay, because they don't really exist; they are just the absence of the radio.)

To clarify: Radio = negative emotions tv = random noise to drown out rest of mind. *bird = positive emotions

You mention turning off the radio, and you suggest doing so by isolating the root sources of emotions and dealing with them by understanding that they are wrong or useless. This is excellent advice, and is the core concept of how CB therapy works. Your mistake is thinking that once you understand a thought is useless or wrong, it will go away. It won't, at least not for me. When I am afraid, when I am apathetic, when all choices feel equally meaningless and bereft of happiness, I overpower the radio with the TV. Without a listener, the radio turns itself off. My meditation session is finished, so I turn off the TV as well. In the resulting silence, I hear the bird song. That is the purpose of the TV.

Thank you for your comment. I just read an article claiming there was no such thing as happiness, and I guess I got a little carried away and didn't think things through.

Happiness doesn't exist; there is simply the absence of unhappiness. (...) Looking back, you're right, it's all just word games. Playing with definitions.

This might be just another definition among many, but I think it is worth to look at the details. Emotions happen when some chemicals are released into our blood system.

So I could translate "happiness is simply the absence of unhappiness" as: there are chemicals people release when they are unhappy, but there are no specific chemicals for happiness; the feeling of happiness is the feeling of ... (read more)