I'm not sure this applies to your particular situation, but a general solution for proceduralizing behaviors that was discussed at minicamp (and which I'd actually done before) is: Trigger yourself on a particular physical sensation, by visualizing it and thinking very hard about the thing you want yourself to remember. So an example would be if you want to make sure you do the things on your to-do list as soon as you get home, spend a few minutes trying to visualize with as much detail as you can what the front door of your house looks like, and recall what it feels like to be stepping through it, and think about "To do list time!" at the same time. (Or if you have access to your front door at the time you're trying to do this, actually stepping through your front door repeatedly while thinking about this might help too.)

And if there's some way to automate it, then of course that's ideal, though you said you don't know when the next conference will happen so that's more difficult.

Or another kind of automation: maybe you could save the bio you wrote in a Word document, and write a reminder in it to add the edits you want... or just do them now, and save the bio for future use. Then all you have to remember is that you wrote your bio already. Which is another problem, but conceivably a smaller one: I don't know about your hindbrain, but upon being told it had to write a bio, mine would probably be grasping at ways to avoid doing work, and having it done already is an easy out.

For a problem like this, remembering for something rare in the indefinite future, the important thing is to remember at that time that you know something. At that point, if you've put it in a reasonable place, you can find it. It seems to me that the key problem is the jump from "have to write a bio" to "how to write a bio," that is, making sure you pause and think about what you know or have written down somewhere. Some people claim success with Anki here, but it doesn't make sense to me.

What most people do with bios is that they reuse them, or at least look at the old one whenever needing a new one. As Maia says, if you write an improved bio now, you can find it next time, when you look for the most recent version. But that doesn't necessarily help remember why it was an improvement. If you have a standard place for bios, you can store lots of variants (lengths, types of conferences, resume, etc), along with instructions on what distinguishes them. But I think what most people do is search their email for the last one they submitted. If you can't learn to look in a more organized place, you could send yourself an email with all the bios and the instructions, so that it comes up when you search email.

In response to this post: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2013/02/which-biases-matter-most-lets-prioritise-the-worst.html

Robert Wiblin got the following data (treated by a dear friend of mine):

89 Confirmation bias

54 Bandwagon effect

50 Fundamental attribution error

44 Status quo bias

39 Availability heuristic

38 Neglect of probability

37 Bias blind spot

36 Planning fallacy

36 Ingroup bias

35 Hyperbolic discounting

29 Hindsight bias

29 Halo effect

28 Zero-risk bias

28 Illusion of control

28 Clustering illusion

26 Omission bias

25 Outcome bias

25 Neglect of prior base rates effect

25 Just-world phenomenon

25 Anchoring

24 System justification

24 Kruger effect

23 Projection bias

23 Mere exposure effect

23 Loss aversion

22 Overconfidence effect

19 Optimism bias

19 Actor-observer bias

18 Self-serving bias

17 Texas sharpshooter fallacy

17 Recency effect

17 Outgroup homogeneity bias

17 Gambler's fallacy

17 Extreme aversion

16 Irrational escalation

15 Illusory correlation

15 Congruence bias

14 Self-fulfilling prophecy

13 Wobegon effect

13 Selective perception

13 Impact bias

13 Choice-supportive bias

13 Attentional bias

12 Observer-expectancy effect

12 False consensus effect

12 Endowment effect

11 Rosy retrospection

11 Information bias

11 Conjunction fallacy

11 Anthropic bias

10 Focusing effect

10 Déformation professionnelle

08 Positive outcome bias

08 Ludic fallacy

08 Egocentric bias

07 Pseudocertainty effect

07 Primacy effect

07 Illusion of transparency

06 Trait ascription bias

06 Hostile media effect

06 Ambiguity effect

04 Unit bias

04 Post-purchase rationalization

04 Notational bias

04 Effect)

04 Contrast effect

03 Subadditivity effect

03 Restorff effect

02 Illusion of asymmetric insight

01 Reminiscence bump

How do you correct your mistakes?

For example, I recently found out I did something wrong at a conference. In my bio, in areas of expertise I should have written what I can teach about, and in areas of interest what I want to be taught about. This seems to maximize value for me. How do I keep that mistake from happening in the future? I don't know when the next conference will happen. Do I write it on anki and memorize that as a failure mode?

More generally, when you recognize a failure mode in yourself how do you constrain your future self so that it doesn't repeat this failure mode? How do you proceduralize and install the solution?

WRT S.M.A.R.T. goals, Nick Winter says in the motivation hacker:

When you do pick your goals, forget the advice about SMART goals. Use Piers Steel’s slightly improved CSI Approach. Your goals should be Challenging (if they’re not exciting, they won’t provide Value); Specific (abstract goals can leave you vulnerable to Impulsiveness, since it’s not clear what you need to do); Immediate (avoid long-Delayed goals in favor of ones you can start now and finish soon), and Approach-oriented. (As opposed to avoidance goals, where you try not to do something, you should instead reframe it positively as an attempt to do something—it just feels better.)

Nick Winter knows about habit formation

Sorry if this is a noob question, but what is "the textbook" in this case?

Found out intimate relationships are a part of my life in which I feel I could do better. Found out it is overlooked in x-rationality groups. Bought The textbook on it. Am learning it.

Gosh. New item added to my list of "Not everyone does that."

...I have difficulty imagining what it would be to be like someone who isn't the little voice in their own head, though. Seriously, who's posting that comment?

Hijacking this thread to ask if anybody else experiences this - when I watch a movie told from the perspective of a single character or with a strong narrator, my internal monologue/narrative will be in that character's/narrator's tone of voice and expression for the next hour or two. Anybody else?