February 2009

3 Simple Things I Love About…

by Vlad Dolezal on February 28, 2009

Originally, I was going to call this post “3 Simple Things I Love About The UK”. And it was simply going to be an anti-rant about this great country I just moved to last October.

But as I was thinking about it, I realized this post can be more useful than that! The concept can be expanded beyond what I personally love about one particular country. It can be about what you love about every area of your life!

So first I’m going to present the original 3 simple things I love about the UK. And then I’ll write a bit more about how you can create a similar list to feel happier and get rid of boredom!

Let’s get started…

1. The bus drivers

Back where I come from originally, the bus drivers are some of the meanest and nastiest people you can think of. If you’re running to catch a bus, they will probably wait until you’re about 2 metres from the door, and then slam it closed in your face and drive off.

In the UK, the bus drivers are some of the nicest people around! They’re always cheerful and enthusiastic, always ready to help you out if you need directions or anything!

And you know why? Because every time we ordinary citizens get on a bus we greet the driver, and every time we get off we thank them for the journey.

It’s amazing how such little things can improve someone’s life. It remind me of a story from Dale Carnegie’s book How to Win Friends and Influence People. In there, Dale shares a story about a company that had lots of trouble with their cleaner. He did a very poor job, and the employees mocked him for it, and even specifically made the floors dirty just to show what a poor job he was doing.

Then a new manager came on board, and he decided to radically solve the problem. He got the whole office together, and in front of everybody, *he thanked the cleaner for the great job he was doing*! Everybody was astonished! But you know what? The next day, the cleaner did a better job of cleaning up the floor! And the manager went and personally thanked him for the improvement. And he continued to do so every time he saw an improvement.

Before long, the office was pristinely clean, and all the employees really started to appreciate the cleaner. It didn’t take any threats or promises of rewards. The cleaner simply needed to know that he’s valued and appreciated, and the manager knew how to provide that.

2. Non-smoking bars and clubs

In the UK, you can’t smoke in public indoor places (or something along those lines). And this includes bars and clubs.

As a non-smoker, I really love this! I can go out for a fun night out with friends, and come back smelling more or less just as clean as I went! (As opposed to completely reeking of cigarette smoke after just half an hour in any bar where smoking is allowed.)

3. The people’s accents

I don’t know why, but I find the British people’s accents totally awesome :D

From the Cockney (London) accent, to Scottish accents, to Irish accents (though Ireland isn’t technically part of the UK), they’re just a pleasure to my ear!

And here in the North of England, although the people might not have the most awesome British accents, they make up for it by using some totally funky phrases. How many times a day do YOU get called “luv”? :D

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5 Simple Things I Love About…

But you know, this post isn’t really about me, or about the UK. It’s about the simple principle of looking around you at all the awesome things in your life.

You can treat this as a game! The next time you’re waiting in a checkout line, or stuck in traffic, simply ask yourself, “What 3 simple things do I love about…?”, and substitute any part of your life.

For example, you could ask yourself what you love about…

  • your job (or school)
  • your relationships
  • the room you’re in right now

…and anything else you can think of!

It’s a simple way to blast some happiness into your life every day, plus it gets rid of some boredom for you!

Hey, in fact, do it right now! Pick an area of your life, and ask what three simple things you love about it. If you want, you can even share the love in the comments :) . There’s always room for more gratitude.

(By the way, 14 months after I started this blog, I finally added a picture of myself! You can see it at the About page.)

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5 Common Myths About Learning

by Vlad Dolezal on February 25, 2009

learning mythsLearning is just one of those subjects, like religion or politics – everybody has an opinion, even though most people know very little about it.

Do YOU believe some of these common myths about learning?

1. You need innate talent to be great at something

Lots of people claim you need to be BORN a genius. That Mozart was always destined to be a great musician, or that grandmaster chess players have some special brain wirings or genes that make them great at chess.

In the mid-to-late 1900′s, there was one man who thought this was utter crap. Laszlo Polgar. He decided to prove that geniuses were made, not born. And he was going to do that by teaching his children to be chess champion from very young age. He found a wife who was going to support this experiment, and together they had three daughters.

From very young age, he began training his daughters to be a chess champions. He quit his job and made training his daughters his only occupation. They were homeschooled so they could spend forty to fifty hours a week practicing chess instead of wasting their time doing more mundane schoolwork. He had several grandmasters tutoring them on a daily basis.

Two of the daughters, Susan and Judit became the world’s top 2 female chess players. Susan was actually winning chess tournaments for under-11′s when she was just 4 years old.

You don’t need any inborn talent to become great at something. You just need the motivation and practice.

2. When you’re not learning as fast as you want, it’s because you’re not putting in enough time

This myth is held especially dearly by people who have tried putting in a lot of time into learning something, without much success.

For example, someone might try learning French by spending half an hour a day reading textbooks and doing exercises. They don’t learn much, so they try putting in twice as much time – an hour every day. And yet they still don’t learn significantly faster! Their conclusion? They’re not putting in enough time! (you gotta love the logic behind that :) )

We humans love being right. In fact, the need to be right (at least inside our own minds) often makes us less successful and less happy! The people who tried putting in more time and didn’t succeed believe that more time is the answer to learning. So instead of considering they might be wrong, and try learning through a different method – they decide they’re still not putting in enough time! But they can’t be bothered to put in even MORE time… and so they miss out on the wonderful experience of learning a foreign language!

3. To become great at something, you need to put in 10 hours a day

This is related to the point above. Lots of people think that to become really good at something, you need to spend every waking hour thinking about it and doing it.

Now, don’t get me wrong – obsession sure helps. If you spend ten hours a day practicing a single skill (like the Polgar sisters did), you WILL likely become really good!

But, as many top pianists will confirm, you don’t need 10 hours a day of piano practice to become a master pianist. In fact, 1 hour a day is quite enough, if you use the right learning methods! (Source: Fundamentals of Piano Practice)

Before you starts firing off angry e-mails saying “But of COURSE you need 10 hours a day of practice to become great! I heard it from so-and-so…”, pause to think for a moment. Guess who will tell you that you need 10 hours of practice a day to become a master pianist?

That’s right – the people who never made it past being mediocre! Now, call me skeptical if you want… but I think that if you want to learn what it takes to become GREAT at something, it makes sense to ask people who are themselves GREAT at that skill, not people who are mediocre!

4. You’re not smart enough to learn quickly

This is a belief that a lot of people hold. It might seem like it comes directly from a low self-esteem or a bad self-image. Interestingly enough, it usually doesn’t. Instead, it comes from another psychological phenomenon.

We humans like to attribute our successes to things we control (“Oh yeah, of course I succeeded. I’m really smart!”). And we tend to attribute our failures to things we DON’T control (“The sun was in my eyes.” or “I just had a bad day.” or “I’m just naturally bad at x.”)

So when we’re struggling with learning something, the immediate reflex is to say “Ah, I’m just not smart enough” or “I’m just not a public speaker. I was born without the public speaking gene!” (which are things we DON’T control), rather than saying “I’m not using the right approach to learning this.” (which is something we DO control).

5. You can’t significantly alter how fast you learn something

I used to believe this one. Big time.

I used to think that we are all born with a certain IQ, and that this is all that determines your learning rate. Boy, was I ever wrong!

In fact, using the right learning methods is EVERYTHING! You can literally speed up your learning tenfold by using the right methods. I experienced this myself when learning to play the piano. I was struggling, learning really slowly, and ready to give up… and then I came across the free e-book Fundamentals of Piano Practice. Let’s just say I was BLOWN away by the results! :)

Since that day, I have researched just about everything there is to know about human learning. And it only confirmed my initial experiences. Most people are using such sub-optimal learning methods it’s almost ridiculous. Thankfully, you can easily change your learning methods, once you know what the right ones are!

I’ll share all my knowledge about learning with you on another day. But for now, you can at least check out my article about The one secret behind learning ANY skill quickly.

—

Have you ever believed any of the above myths? Do you know any other common learning myths that others should know about?

Or maybe you think I’m completely full of horse crap and I should be hung up by the G’khazar*?

In any case, feel free to leave a comment! :)

(image courtesy of Cayusa)

*Town Hall

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How I Conquered My Computer Addiction

by Vlad Dolezal on February 21, 2009

It’s official now! I have conquered my computer addiction!

Back in the old days, (that is, about three weeks ago), I would often come home tired in the evening. I would turn on my computer, check my e-mails, and then browse reddit or something for half an hour to wind down.

That would be the plan anyway. I would usually keep browsing… and browsing… until I would finally rip myself free at 2 am, then crash into bed and wake up bleary-eyed and drowsy in the morning. Then I would sleep through some of my lectures (Okay, that was generally a good use of my time. Now I read books during those same lectures instead.)

The point is, I would often almost automatically turn on the computer and then waste a lot of time pointlessly browsing websites (lolcats, slashdot, reddit, the daily wtf, some webcomics,…). Now, I’m not saying those websites are bad… but my excessive usage sure was.

I knew I had to handle the addiction… but I couldn’t think of how to apply my usual methods. I couldn’t go on a thirty-day trial of not using computers, because there are some essential things I need a computer for (e-mail and blogging). Sheer willpower didn’t get me anywhere either. I would simply slip back when I was tired.

And then I had a flash of inspiration! There was ONE principle I COULD apply easily!

The principle was… Activation energy! It basically means that every action you take is like a boulder rolling down a hill. It takes some initial effort to roll the boulder over small humps at the edge of the hill, but once you get it rolling, it’s effortless to keep going. This is a great principle if you want to create some positive habits, but it’s also very evil when bad habits are concerned. All it took for me was to idly turn on the computer, and the boulder got rolling. And it didn’t stop until it reached the bottom of the mountain, at 2 am, when I finally decided enough is enough and went to sleep.

So how exactly did I apply this principle?

I decided that I had to give myself EXPRESS WRITTEN PERMISSION before doing anything on my computer. (And I had to sign it.) The only two exceptions to that rule were e-mail and blogging (not reading blogs though).

It sounds simple. That’s because it is. But it worked amazingly well for me!

For example, about two weeks ago, I was lying in bed in the early evening. I felt bored, and kind of vaguely bad. So without even thinking, I got up and reached for the computer on switch. Then I paused to think. If I turned on the computer, I would get maybe 5 minutes’ worth of entertainment by checking my e-mails. I lied down back on my bed.

I considered giving myself permission to waste some time. It would be really easy. Just grab a piece of paper, scribble down “permission to browse reddit”, sign it, and off I would be! But when I considered that logically, I knew it wouldn’t make me feel any better. In fact, I knew it would make me feel worse.

I contemplated all my options, but I couldn’t think of a single thing to do on the computer that would make me feel better. In fact, I got up and reached for the on switch two more times as I laid there, but I always got back down again. I wouldn’t turn on the computer before I had given myself the written permission to do something there, and my logical brain simply wouldn’t let me give myself the written permission, because it knew it would only make me feel bad.

Long story short, after about 20 minutes of lying there and having this mental battle with myself, I decided to go for a walk in the park. The walk made me feel better, afterwards I read a book for an hour or two and then went to sleep. Happy end :)

Requiring the permission interrupted my pattern. Normally I would mindlessly turn on the computer and waste time. Instead, requiring written permission broke my state… and I could make a logical decision! A great example of how breaking your state can stop unhelpful patterns of behavior.

Things I did along with the “written permission” rule

The written permission requirement was just one part of my elaborate plan to conquer my computer addiction. I had been struggling with mild computer addiction for years, so I knew I had to be well prepared.

Firstly, I considered: What was the positive intention behind my computer usage habits?

I realized the intention was to keep me from getting bored.

So firstly I made sure I had a life :) . Because if I had hours and hours of free time every day, I would just slip back and spend that time at the computer.

Next I made sure I could get all the benefits of mindless computer browsing. One of those was to wind down after a long tiring day.

So I bought some Terry Pratchett books. These would substitute for idle web browsing.

And so, armed with only a handful of Terry Prachett books and a piece of paper saying I need a written permission to do anything on my computer apart from e-mail and blogging, I conquered my computer addiction. Psychology rocks!

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Site update:

I have moved my blog to http://vladdolezal.com/blog/ (Don’t worry, you don’t need to do anything to keep reading my blog. Chances are, you wouldn’t even notice for some time if I didn’t tell you.)

I called my blog “An Amazing Mind” since the day I launched it over a year ago… but I finally decided it’s time to say bye-bye to the old name. I’ve been considering this for ages, but the last straw the broke the proverbial camel’s back happened a few days ago. I was considering doodling my e-mail on a whiteboard at the uni… and I realized I would feel comfortable doodling down vlad@leedsmathgeeks.com but not vlad@anamazingmind.com, even though this is my main blog.

I realized I have felt the domain name is a bit awkward ever since the beginning – it’s time to finally let go. I will slowly change the blog name and branding over the next week or two.

The good news is…  I found out how to redirect all traffic and everything from the old address to the new! So you can keep reading as if nothing had happened, and all the old links will automatically redirect to the new address! Just don’t be surprised when you visit my blog from now on and you see vladdolezal.com instead of anamazingmind.com .

Update: Commenting was broken for a couple of hours. It should work fine now.

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Breaking Your State

by Vlad Dolezal on February 18, 2009

Have you ever decided to wake up early, but when the alarm clock rang, you just sleepily peered at it, mumbled “never mind”, and went straight back to sleep?

(cue black and white video of a person doing just that)

Have you EVER decided to do something for a limited amount of time (like idly browsing the web for only half an hour), but when the time was up, you muttered “just 5 more minutes…” and kept on going… and going… and going…?

(cue a black and white shot of a person who’s fallen asleep on their computer keyboard. A small pool of spit is forming under their mouth)

Now what if I could tell you that there’s actually a very simple solution to dealing with that? That you can let your logical mind make the decision in that moment, instead of letting your body carry on automatically?

(cue bright colors and loud exciting music!)

And NOW, for a LIMITED time ONLY, for the LOW LOW PRICE of $199… ahem *cough* *cough*. I mean…

There IS a simple solution! It’s called “breaking your state”, and I’ll share it with you right now!

Breaking somebody else’s state

I was recently listening to some Tony Robbins self-improvement materials. One of the principles he talks about a lot is breaking state.

For example, a client would come to Tony, and they would immediately start sobbing “Gosh, Tony, I don’t know what to do anymore, I…” and Tony would shout “WHOA there! Wait! We haven’t started yet!”

The client would blink in shock and immediately stop crying. Then Tony would go “Okay, now tell me about your problem.”
“Uh, okay. So, in my job…” and the client’s eyes would start to swell with tears again.
“Wait!” Tony would say. “What side of your front door is the doorknob on?”
“What!?”
“This question is of supreme importance, trust me. On your house, what side of the front door is the doorknob on?”
“Uh… on the right side.”
“I see. Okay, NOW tell me about your problem.”
“Alright…”

And the client would proceed to tell Tony about the problem calmly and logically. What Tony did was to interrupt the client’s state every time the client started crying about the situation. Pretty soon, they wouldn’t be able to go back to that behavior, because it kept getting interrupted. It’s like taking a vinyl record and repeatedly scratching across it. After you scratch it enough times, it will start skipping and you will have broken the pattern! It will never play the same way again.

Now that was a rather mild example of what Tony would do. He also talks about throwing some water on his clients (in good humor), or having them squeeze their nose and go “Yip yip yip!” – All of that in order to break their old pattern of behavior and get them into a more resourceful state.

But you can also use the principle of breaking state on yourself!

Breaking your own state

In fact, I did this back when I was waking up early in the morning. I knew that I couldn’t trust my sleepy self to make the decision to stay out of bed. So I simply decided that when my alarm clock rang, I would get up and go to the bathroom and brush my teeth. Only THEN would I decide if I wanted to stay up.

I didn’t know it at the time, but that would break my sleepy state. I could then decide with a clear head whether staying up was really worth it. (It usually was.)

Remember when I talked about activation energy? That starting action is like rolling a boulder from the top of a hill. It takes some effort to get over the initial hump, but after that the boulder will keep rolling by itself.

In fact, the boulder of action will tend to keep rolling even if you try to stop it! It’s got inertia! You need to pretty radically break your state to STOP doing something! That is, unless you want to wait until the boulder gets all the way to the bottom of the mountain and stops. That would be like waking up at 11, and going “Ah, FINALLY I don’t feel like staying in bed anymore!”

How to break your state

Breaking your state is pretty simple. All you need to do is do something radically different*. And by “do”, I mean move your body!

So if you’re lying in bed reading a book, and a friend calls you and says “Hey, wanna go out tonight?”, your first thought would be “Nah, don’t feel like it.” But that’s only because you’re lying in bed, in a deep book-reading state.

So what to do? Tell your friend “Give me a second”. Then jump out of bed! Move with energy! Squeeze your nose, hop in one spot and go “Yip yip yip!” That should break your state pretty radically :) . (Bonus points if somebody else can see you.) Only THEN consider going out that night, and maybe realize it’s actually a pretty good idea!

So every time you need to break your state, just do something silly and outrageous :) . That’s the quickest way to break your state.

You can also break your state to interrupt a pattern of behavior that isn’t helping you. Like Tony’s client who would start crying every time they thought about their problems. That’s a completely useless pattern of behavior! And we all have less than useful patterns of behavior in our lives, where all we need are a few well-timed pattern interrupts.

In fact, in my next blog post, I will share how I managed to conquer my computer addiction! I didn’t realize it at first, but it involved breaking my state! (among other things)

Until then,
Vlad

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Men’s Holidays and Women’s Holidays

by Vlad Dolezal on February 14, 2009

Happy Valentine’s Day everyone! Luv y’all verrr much!

And since it’s Valentine’s Day, I was just thinking about something. Did you know there are men’s holidays and women’s holidays?

No, really! And it’s not just the obvious stuff like Mothers’ Day and such.

Some time ago I read a very interesting survey on what were men’s and women’s favorite “special occasions”. There were some days that both men and women rated highly – like birthdays and Christmas.

But there were also a few intriguing differences. Women rated anniversaries and Valentine’s Day very highly, while those usually appeared somewhere near the bottom of most men’s lists. Meanwhile, men really liked the 4th of July and the Superbowl. (Okay, I read the survey a long time ago. I’m not too sure about the Superbowl.)

Why is that? Well… our brains are wired differently at the deepest, reptilian, level. Some holidays simply appeal deeply to the male instincts, while others appeal deeply to the female instincts!

Take Valentine’s Day for example. It’s a celebration of commited relationships, and a man spending his resources on a woman. Those are things that make women feel more feminine.

Meanwhile, the things that make men feel more masculine are:

  • freedom
  • territory
  • winning in competition with other men

And Valentine’s Day isn’t much about those. In fact, it’s kinda about REDUCING men’s freedom by having them commit to a women. No wonder we guys don’t like Valentine’s Day.

Just this Friday, I was talking to a few friends who were planning to do stuff with their girlfriends for Valentine’s Day. They were just NOT into it at all – they felt that Valentine’s Day was just a nuisance. We men all feel that way on a deep instinctual level.

For you women out there who can’t understand how Valentine’s Day feels for us guys – it feels a bit like picking Christmas presents for someone you’re not that excited about seeing anyway, and having no idea what present to buy. In other words, a bit frustrating and annoying, and kinda pointless. But we do the Valentine’s day stuff anyway because we know you girls love it, and we love you :)

Looking at what makes us guys feel more masculine, you can see why for example 4th of July is so popular with guys (I’m European, so I’ve never actually experienced the 4th of July celebrations, but I hear it involves fireworks and food and it’s a celebration of some big military victory.). It’s about freedom and  territory and winning in competition over other men! It’s exactly the stuff that makes us feel more masculine!

Oh yeah, speaking of Valentine’s day being a women’s holiday…

Last weekend, a bunch of us were celebrating a friend’s birthday. We were doing an Otley run, which is a tradition here in Leeds – we all dressed up costumes of a certain theme (our theme was sci-fi) and went from pub to pub all the way from Otley to Leeds.

I got talking to one of the girls, and at one point she half-jokingly told me she was “very single” and that she was hoping to find a man of her dreams that night. But the thing is… she was only half joking. I could sense a slight tinge of desperation in her.

She also told me she had been single for 9 months. I thought for a bit that maybe she was getting a bit desperate being single for that long… but that didn’t seem right. Surely being single isn’t such a big deal? And then I realized! It wasn’t being single that was the big deal. It was being single on Valentine’s Day! With just a week left, she WAS getting a bit desperate to find a relationship, even a short-term one!

Now, I’m not 100% confident about my analysis there – in fact I’d like a female opinion (This is your chance, girls!). Is it true that being single is normally not a big deal, but it IS a kind of a big deal on Valentine’s Day? And if yes, what does it feel like to be a single woman on Valentine’s Day? A bit like being alone on Christmas Day? Or can you think of a different analogy to help us guys understand?

Thanks for your input! Of course, guys, if you have anything to add about your favorite men’s holidays, feel free to leave a comment too!

Okay, that’s all about the topic of men’s vs. women’s holidays :) . But since I’m in a storytelling mood, I might as well tell you another story from my life associated with Valentine’s Day…

My experiences with Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day holds a dear place in my heart. Why? Because it was on Valentine’s Day that I first grew the balls to ask a girl out!

Every time I think back over that day, it brings a huge grin to my face. Because at the time, I was a COMPLETE and UTTER wussbag. Just wait and see :) . But thinking about it, it also makes me realize how incredibly far I’ve come since then. And that brings an even bigger smile to my face. So without further ado…

It was a beautiful winter day, a few years ago. I was still a high school student back then.

There was this girl in my year whom I fancied. I had known her a bit for… um let’s see… I think it was about two years by then. I had never really talked to her much (yeah, I know, great start for a potential relationship :p). But when the Valentine’s Day was about to come, I decided to act!

So for Valentine’s day, I bought her a bouquet of flowers! That’s right… not a single red rose like a cool romantic dude – a whole bouquet of flowers! Super-wussbag move number 1 :D

So I gave it to her like:
“Err… Ummm… Hi… Errr…. here.”
“Oh, is this for me? Thank You!” *hug*
“Errr, yeah. Haha. Errr… ok… I’ll see you around.”

Yeah, I know, Don Juan himself would be proud :p. Super-wussbag delivery – that’s number 2!

Later on, during lunch break, I decided to actually, you know… ask her out! That’s what I gave her the flowers for, after all! So I walked up to her again.

“Hi… err… um… I was… errr… wonderingifyou’dilketogooutwithmesometime?”
“What?”
“I was… errr… wondering if you would… umm…. like… errr… like to go out with me sometime?”
“Okay.”
“How about today after school?”
“Oh, I can’t, I’ve got extra French.”
“Oh, sure, right, no problem. How about after extra French? I can wait.”
“Okay! After extra French.”

Yay! What a great way to convey “I have no life and I will completely rearrange my schedule to suit whatever you please.”! Super-wussbag move number 3!

After that I said bye and walked about 10 metres over to a bunch of my guy friends. I told them I just asked her out and she said yes. This led to a mutter of approval and some high-fives. In plain view of her. Super-wussbag move number 4!

Okay, long story short, we did go out for a milk-shake, I was acting nervous and stilted the whole time, we talked about boring stuff, and she’s been avoiding me like the plague ever since :p

Every time I think back over that day, I realize just how stereotypically nerdy and socially inept I used to be back then :D . And it just makes me laugh.

I also like it because it was roughly a month or two after I first got into personal growth. So every Valentine’s Day, I think back and say to myself: “It’s been only x years that I’ve been into personal growth, and look how FAR I’ve come! Wow!” And then I feel really good about myself.

And that’s really all for today :) . Share the love!

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Invisible vs. Not Real

by Vlad Dolezal on February 12, 2009

Yeey, I’m going to go all woo-woo and fluffy on you! I’m going to talk about INVISIBLE stuff!

(No ghosts though. Don’t get your hopes.)

(I’m not sure why I said “fluffy” either)

Okay, back to the point. Let me ask you a question. Do you believe electricity is real?

(if you answered no, feel free to stop reading.)

Electricity is real, but you can’t see it. If you’re thinking of a spark… think again. The spark is actually super-heated air momentarily transforming into plasma as high voltage passes through it. An ordinary spark you can make by shuffling your feet on a carpet has tens of thousands of volts – enough to turn air into plasma. (That’s also why a spark stings. The plasma burns a tiny patch of your skin.)

Okay, where am I going with all this? (apart from showing off my knowledge of physics :p) My point is – I’ve recently been noticing psychological energy in the world.

No, no, wait, I haven’t gone completely over the edge and into the twilight zone. Yet.

By psychological energy, I mean things like:

  • anger
  • shame
  • unhappiness

When two or more humans are communicating, there’s always transfer of emotional energy. Whether they’re aware of it or not.

When a person comes into the room all smiling and excited, and starts high-fiving their friends, they’re unwittingly sending out positive energy to everybody in the room.

When somebody comes in down and depressed and starts making passive-aggressive comments, they’re instead sending out NEGATIVE psychological energy to everybody around them.

What I’m getting at – some people are often sending out negative energy without even realizing it! And when you point out that their passive-aggressive comments are annoying, or hurtful, or something, they claim they were “just talking”, or “just saying this to my friend” (loud enough for everybody to hear). Well, even though they might not consciously realize it, they were sending out negative energy to everybody around them.

And if they claim you’re talking nonsense about “psychological energy” and such, you’re seeing a great example of the misperception that just because something is invisible, it’s not real! (Not that I ever go around saying “Dude, you’re TOTALLY sending out negative energy! Stop it now!” – that wouldn’t really help.)

The meaning of the message is on the RECIPIENT’S side

But what if the message is ambiguous? What if I make a fun and playful comment to you, but you interpret it as an insult?

Things like that happen to me sometimes. It might not always be perceived insults, but miscommunications happen. In those cases, I usually use my gut feeling for what’s the right action. Sometimes the other person is at fault and they’re losing out by misinterpreting my messages, so I just don’t spend my energy on them anymore. But sometimes I apologize if my communication is misperceived, because I know I unwittingly invaded someone’s personal boundary.

As an analogy, imagine I was sending out TV signal, and you had a TV signal receiver, but they were tuned differently. So I would send out some interesting program, but all you would get would be static. Then you might get annoyed I’m sending you all this stupid static.

Hmm, in fact, as I’m writing this, the analogy just gave me a new insight!

When I’m sending out my signal to the general public, and someone tunes in and misinterpret the signal as static, that’s purely their fault! Like when I decide to run around in the park barefoot in the rain, and somebody feels victimized “because I’m showing off how young and healthy I am” or whatever. We humans are sending out signals all the time – it’s not my fault someone tunes in and misinterprets them.

But if I was sending out my signal to a particular person, and they interpreted it as annoying static, that would be MY fault for not calibrating my sending apparatus properly! In that case it would make sense to apologize for sending out annoying static to them.

So we have invisible but real stuff, and when you send it out, it travels in a state of uncertainty, until somebody receives it and interprets it. Yay! I think I’ve just discovered quantum psychology!

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And now for something completely different:

I recently started a math-themed blog with a couple of friends from my university course. I can now finally get all my fun, random and interesting math ideas out into the world! You can see the blog at http://leedsmathgeeks.com/ (Make sure you read the post about Throwing cats out of airplanes. (Yes it’s about math)(No, it’s not cruel to the cats at all. You’ll see.))

I have also started putting together everything I know about learning new skills into a paid e-book. It’s going to include all of the best material from my Learning Mastery series of blog posts, as well as a lot of completely new concepts you have never heard me mention before! But be patient, because it’s still at least several weeks away.

I have a couple of other cool things lined up for this blog, but I’m not going to reveal those just yet :)

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The Effortless Habit Change

by Vlad Dolezal on February 8, 2009

Something really interesting happened to me recently.

I turned vegetarian.

That’s not so interesting by itself. What IS interesting is HOW that happened – completely effortlessly! Turning vegetarian took me about as much willpower as it takes you to brush off a speck of dust that landed on your shoulder.

It was completely different from other major habit changes I did in the past. When I tried waking up early, or jogging every morning, or meditating for 10 minutes a day, it took me gargantuan effort and all kinds of hacks to keep those habits. I fiddled around with pain and pleasure associations (though I didn’t know it at the time), I set myself reminders, I tried conditioning my body for automatic responses and much more.

And yet turning vegetarian was completely effortless for me. Why? I don’t really know. But I’m going to throw out some ideas here, and maybe I’ll make you think of times in the past when YOU effortlessly changed a habit. And together we can figure out what exactly makes some habit changes effortless, while others are as hard as hell!

So why was the switch effortless?

1. I never liked meat that much anyway

Even as a small kid, I only saw meat as a nuisance I had to get through to enjoy the tasty side dish. That hasn’t changed much over the years. I had got to the point where I didn’t mind meat, and some of it was actually quite nice (like chicken). But mostly I liked meat only because of all the herbs and spices we tend to throw on it. And we can simply throw those on any other dish we choose.

2. I was REPLACING a habit

I haven’t actually created a new habit. I simply substituted vegetarian meals for meat-filled meals. That’s quite different from, say, getting up an hour earlier in the morning and going jogging.

3. I switched gradually

Instead of deciding one day “There, I’m not going to eat any meat for the next thirty days!”, I simply started replacing meals gradually. Instead of making myself ham and cheese sandwiches, I made myself cheese sandwiches. Instead of buying beef cornish pasties, I started buying vegetable cornish pasties. And so on. I only replaced non-vegetarian meals when I thought of a convenient alternative. In fact, the only thing I really had to give up were some take-aways (which doesn’t bother me that much). I now realize how amazingly much meat there is in your usual take-aways!

Well, those are the basic reasons I can think of. Have you ever made a big habit change completely effortlessly? If yes, please share your experiences in the comments!

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The Map is Not The Territory… And That’s Great News!

by Vlad Dolezal on February 4, 2009

The map is not the territory. You might have heard this saying before.

It means your model of reality is different from the physical reality. The whole of reality is too much to grasp… and so your mind creates a simplified model to help you cope. Your model of reality will always be incomplete.

And that’s a good thing! In fact, a simplified model is sometimes better than a more detailed one…

More detailed doesn’t mean better

Look at the two images above. They are both showing the same thing – how to get from London to Oxford. The one on the left is clearly much more detailed and accurate. And yet if you wanted to get from London to Oxford, the image on the right will probably do a better job. It shows you exactly what you need and doesn’t waste your time with unnecessary detail.

And the same thing happens in life. If you want to achieve something (like get in shape), your model of how you want to get there needs the right amount of detail. If you don’t know enough about the topic, that would be like staring at a map with huge blank spots.

But a lot of people get stuck up on the details too much. They worry about the small obstacles, and unlikely possibilities. They look at all the trees and ditches, and they miss the highways. Or sometimes they get caught up in the search for better and better maps. They read more books about the topic, watch more instructional videos, and listen to talks, constantly improving their map, making it more detailed and accurate. And they completely forget that the biggest part of getting somewhere is actually setting off!

Choose a map with the right amount of detail

Ever heard of intention manifestation? That’s when you simply focus on what you want, and you start to notice possibilities around you that you never saw before.

That would be like setting off with a map that has almost no details, and then asking the locals for directions. Interestingly enough, this works really well in life! (Though sometimes in really weird ways.) In the map analogy, one local person might say “Oh yeah, my friend Bob is just going in that direction with his horse cart, why don’t you join him.”, and so you join Bob, you ride with him along the side of the river and notice a ferry boat with an old man that you wouldn’t find on any map, which saves you journeying to the next bridge, and once he ferries you across there’s a train leaving in just the direction you need.

The point is… focus on what you want, and don’t get too stuck up on means to achieve it. If you want a million dollars, focus on that. Say “I wish a million dollars into my life within three years”, don’t say “I wish a million dollars into my life within three years, and I’m going to get it by doing this particular 9-5 job, and if that’s not enough I’ll take up night shifts in this particular call center…”

Yet a lot of people do exactly that. They think of what they want. Then they think about the means to achieve it that they know of at that particular time. So they draw the exact step-by-step journey on their map of reality, and then they set off along that path, completely ignoring alternate possibilities that show up along the way.

Don’t be that kind of person. Chart your journey, then set off… but stay open to alternate possibilities. Because your map is only a map… and the reality will often provide you with a better map along the way.

(Images courtesy of Google Maps)

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