Group Rationality Diary, December 1-15

therufs

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for December 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.

Immediate past diary: November 16-30

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for December 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.

Immediate past diary: November 16-30

Always get up before the alarm

How do you manage a habit of this? How do you manage to do it intentionally at all? It seems to me that the entire purpose of a morning alarm clock is to counteract the fact that we pretty much can't control when we wake up.

I loathe alarms, but I still need one for working days, or I would be two hours late every day.

If you can't wake up in time without an alarm, you're probably sleeping too little. I need the alarm about 1/10 of the time, so it's still useful to have it set.

If you want to hate alarms less, use one that starts gradually. You'll learn to wake up even to the slightest of sounds.

6Emile13y

Unless I'm really tired, I'm usually vaguely semi-awake between 7 and 7:30 (where my Alarm rings), at which point instead of going back to sleep I now decide to get up and do stuff. The going to bed before midnight helps make sure I don't get too tired.

7TheOtherDave13y

I used to need an alarm every day to wake up; I no longer bother to set one at all unless I need to wake up at an unusual hour to catch a plane or something. I managed it by spending about six months going to sleep whenever I was tired and sleeping until I woke up. (This was triggered by major physiological trauma I was recovering from.) At first that meant I was sleeping 14+ hours a day. (Typically in two shifts, so that I had a few hours of wakefulness in the morning and a few hours in the evening.) By the time I recovered enough that my body only wanted 8 hours or so, my habit was to go to sleep around 10pm and wake up around 6am. I managed this because my recovery was my #1 priority... more important than socializing or staying up late doing other things. When I started living a more balanced life, I started staying up later, and found my balance-point was going to sleep around midnight and waking up around 8am. That's still where I am. When I indulge myself and stay up late, I still wake up around 8, though I sometimes choose to nap for another hour or two and come to work late. (Admittedly, when I've gotten enough sleep I sometimes choose to not-nap for an hour or two and come to work late anyway.)