Showing posts with label decisions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label decisions. Show all posts

Monday 29 July 2013

Things I Want to Say to My Girls

Sometimes, I wonder if we don’t all have an innate form of ‘locked in’ syndrome… of experiencing life from the inside of our heads that feels normal to us, and we never think of sharing with other people…

Twice, recently, I’ve experienced moments of ‘oh, doesn’t everyone do/know that?’

The first was in doing some research about neurology and psychology and the effects and power of mindfulness meditation (weird direction, I’ll grant you, but you just never know what kinds of wonders you’ll find when you look…)

insulaInsula: it’s a part of your (and my) brain that is active in perceiving the body’s internal experience, and is highly attuned to empathy. It is said that people with highly-developed (that is, in neuroplasticity speak, often-used) insula are not only highly empathic with others, but highly self-aware: they can feel what’s going on in their own bodies, including their shifting moods and tension or relaxation and one of the markers for high level insula function is being aware of their on heart beating.

Cue the double-take..

Ask around a bit.

Isn’t that ordinary? Don’t you always feel your heart beating?

That was surprise number one.

The second one I stumbled upon while re-reading Dan Baker’s lovely (I highly recommend it) What Happy People Know. He refers obliquely to one of the sources of happiness in life being about choice, specifically being aware of our personal choices regarding not only our lives, but also what we’re good at and value. It reads:

Why am I so sure that’s who I am? Because that’s exactly whom I chose to be. I put tremendous effort into making these choices. I eliminated many other possibilities and poured my heart into the ones that fit me best.

Which got me thinking about the multiple talents and abilities I am aware of having (that old self-awareness thingy again) and have no intention or interest in using or developing further, or, perhaps more relevant to the title of this piece as you’ll see in a moment I hope, earning money from… For example, whenever the option to sell things (home party kinds of things) comes up, which is virtually every time I attend one and someone notices that I’m good at retaining all kinds of information and chatting up the benefits, etc… Yes, I know, but I still also know that I’m not willing to do what I know it takes to be successful in that business and I have no interest in participating in it –no, really, not even for the potential for vast amounts of money. I get it, I’m weird.

But what I just realized I’m not sure I ever told my girls –because it’s one of those ‘doesn’t everyone know this?’ – is

you don’t have to do what you’re good at just because you’re good at it

You are good at so many things, you can pick the one(s) that you want to use, not only the ones other people notice or that other people value, and certainly not all of them if you don’t wanna…

Just sayin’ … ‘cause you may not have noticed…

 

Friday 26 April 2013

Addiction and Choice

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Recommended reading: Addiction, a disorder of choice, by Gene M. Heyman

When we subject children to anti-drug propaganda* we may be taking for granted a few propositions that have not been established outside the ‘my pappy tol’ me so’ and ‘some dude in a pub said’ frames.

As Heyman’s thesis valiantly proves, addiction is absolutely a voluntary choice and is absolutely not a disease.

I’ll summarize the argument for the second claim first, because it’s so universally accepted today. If alcoholism, smoking, heavy drug use and oxycodone abuse were diseases, it would not be possible to ‘quit.’ Not with a change of attitude, not with rehab and not with meetings –all of which can and do end addiction in real life. More than 80% of heavy, chronic drug users quit on their own, by choice, most of them before they’re 30 (they also typically start at 18.) If the disease model made sense, then MS and diabetes could be ‘quit’ with the help of rehab or meetings, which is a ridiculous suggestion.

On to the voluntary choice aspect. Because a lot of the research on the subject tends to be done by economists, rather than mothers of 14-year-old boys, they often take it as read that people do not voluntarily choose self-destructive options. Anyone who has ever seen Jackass or its many imitators can snort at that idea. Clearly, people do, rather more often than most parents are comfortable, make choices that are not in the best interest of anyone, including themselves.

What’s going on?

It turns out that one other things economists get wrong is the frame in which the decisions are being made. Economists look at ‘market baskets’ –like a collection of possible spending choices for someone’s discretionary income, and see that overall people tend to make reasonably sensible choices: the ‘best interest’ model. Yet people have rationally pointed out that there are a great many people who are bankrupt –or being evicted for non-payment of rent, with big screen tvs and smartphones—that rather argues against the theory. The frame economists use, in Heyman’s terminology, is a global framework for decision making, and it does tend away from self-destructive and toward best interest. In drug use, this means that when someone frames the ‘will I use cocaine now?’ question in terms of ‘is this the best use of the next $150 and 4 hours of my time, considering my life goals?’ the answer is very, very different from a ‘local’ viewpoint.

The local view is ‘will I suffer through the craving now?’ In short-term decision-making, people will very often make self-destructive and even openly suicidal choices. In my post about lacking resources (Anti-Resourceful), I described one such devastating decision from my hometown. It is not irrational, from a ‘this moment’s pleasure’ standpoint, to use drugs instead of living through withdrawal.

So, to drug education

What do we tell the children, and what ‘works’ for avoiding hard core drug addiction?

As much as we don’t really believe it will work (hence the propaganda*) the answer is: The Truth.

The truth includes the fact that drugs use money, energy, resources and time in a way that does not get anyone closer to their personal goals in life. It’s uncommon knowledge, but you only get to spend this dollar, this bit of energy and this minute once.

The truth includes the fact that most people who experiment with drugs have their own very good reasons for not becoming habitual users, and it’s probably worth forty minutes of your life to figure out what yours are.

The truth includes the fact that there are many potentially-devastating side effects from most potent drugs, and in spite of the fact that the odds of ending up with any or all of them are really pretty small, without the drug use the odds are much nearer to zero.

The truth includes the fact that drug use has some real attractions that are genuinely hard to beat with anything else in the world, but none of those eradicate any of the other truths, including the fact that quitting is filled with suffering, often for a good long time.

The truth includes the fact that the majority of successful people look down on both the effects and the users of mood-altering substances particularly when the use can no longer be easily contained to non-productive hours, or when the urge to use spills out into criminal and anti-social behaviour. All people need the respect and goodwill of their friends and neighbours and while you’ll certainly be popular with your dealer/supplier and your buddy users, you will also certainly be restricting your social circle dramatically.

Do we have to get into dire threats and fictional statistics? I don’t think so. In fact, it would be ever so much better if we didn’t.

___

* Propaganda defined: amplified, simplified and vilified info-tainment designed to coerce underlings into believing whatever overlings have determined to be ‘best’ for them, regardless of any accuracy of statements…

Sunday 23 November 2008

Excellent use of the materials at hand? Are you resourceful?

https://www.flickr.com/photos/erix/7166737552/in/photolist-bVipoy-e6Xgf6-7CXxaM-BSBgVi-6pypBR-rYGoGh-6pCXbS-bVnkZe-re1eCQ-9zrPjw-bVqv5g-aRn4Z8-nwwCGu-ciabm1-BXzXwS-e5FCJb-fxKLqV-5uCQMp-RN6FRG-JnCPPX-GFaLU1-QBNLD6-csBhnE-35FWLx-dMVUFx-apPTqp-8P9Umk-6XYKHq-ibD8ZT-dfcvx-g7f4FM-6cPxJT-6um3SM-fpAmK1-a4Jbep-5fmqJG-6xjoWF-mp476Y-5iYUFJ-aLw2Ui-4LAgby-9TH7uz-91Qauq-gbAiLX-51ZBxq-h4bm8K-5qUFXc-eYeVtW-nDyjwf-8NXwbM
Excellent use of the materials at hand.

That's what I think of when I hear 'resourceful.' 


Then there is the opposite of resourceful. I can't decide if it's impatience, selfishness, expediency or some kind of sense of being indestructible, or even that it just doesn't matter, really.


That the consequences, whatever they may be, are deemed not important enough (or is it likely enough) to sway the decision.

Unbelievable decisions have become something of a theme around here these days. The tragedy that started me thinking about this was a 32-year-old who fell off the 15th floor of my daughter's building and died from the impact with a balcony rail and a concrete planter and the ground. Her distraught co-workers and friends insist 'it wasn't stupid it was just poor judgement' ... which is a synonym, I thought, but whatever...

Now I think: if there was anything I wanted my kids to take with them into adulthood, it was a sense that there is more than one way to accomplish anything, and it's usually a good idea to think of more than one before acting on a plan. The aforementioned woman had locked her keys in her apartment and instead of any of these choices:

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/allandonque/4423383088/in/photolist-7JSZFE-cNCqW3-5oE6xH-9N3uje-5FbPcw-6KzKDp-5ugsnR-37DF7m-72hCy7-7xWyyv-88Lq1i-4813tb-eEUSMo-mQJgyM-arpyFV-9pUjcd-6ZH4sh-9C8hEw-7h4HLP-jun5hY-72cR52-cSuJYQ-mcaaqp-oXtEb8-d3X13q-8YWyST-6h2g8K-dBCE5b-qFjNsW-8SqKDw-9TfRmX-pcWXYb-6s8b-8JRnat-37uTZj-fjJCgF-jvMHXU-4CKcga-QErvr4-6TH6g-ry2fJ9-5XqCrY-5rW57Y-GoUXP-69R6nh-beozf6-a67apt-dN3sPi-sjMdA-95FUSV
  • get the other set from her new husband, at work 6 blocks away
  • call a locksmith and pay $50 to be let into her home
  • call the manager and have him use the passkey (no cost)
  • wait somewhere else until her husband arrives home from work (several hours)
  • try breaking in herself
  • find some strong guys to break the door down
  • get the keys from her husband, get another set cut and return his keys to him
Which seem to me to mostly be pretty sensible ideas... Instead, she decided to climb down to her 14th floor apartment from the apartment directly above, without a safety line. I've done a small, informal survey: no one, of any age, who I've ever talked to about this has ever thought it was a smart idea.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/mllerustad/524063712/in/photolist-NiXTf-6TrAN1-897Nzu-mejWV-8GDWEq-9dGpQm-p6TBnK-ruvgy-oe1meL-dAVd5G-siJyT-a9Hvm2-61mYAZ-awPrnE-oe1xES-eJkuYY-7D4QUZ-6D8vEw-gfiEcP-cA6RGJ-7dAYDn-4AZY61-8kSVNA-o4q9cA-SsctXh-chrwkC-oe1h1q-6TrECo-6Trxjj-6DX6JQ-9vg9-6jPMdj-gfiGZS-6TryfC-r4DXzd-6TryYb-9Qh6iX-nWzJXo-8sL21d-pa1bVY-oe1uUS-9dZj3-qVe7T-9GzTL4-7mo8ar-6GQoP-4oELoV-7oF7Jq-4CYMyi-5DXNoB
My daughter lived on the 17th floor, and I wouldn't have leaned over that railing to catch any falling object (I'd make a stab for one of my kids, but otherwise, not even for a cat.) I'm not wigged out by the height, I think it's fun to look over the edge and see all the little stuff below, but I wouldn't throw my weight against the railing for anything.

The apartments in this building have 10' ceilings, and there is no 13th floor (or, rather, the 14th is the 13th floor) so when she landed on the ground level with the 2nd floor, she fell more than 120 feet. 


A review of her plan: instead of hesitating or being talked out of this idiotic plan by the wise, elderly woman who tried, this not-young woman decided it was so important that she make her apartment perfect for her new husband that she would not be swayed from what appears to be the first solution that occurred to her, full of confidence that she would absolutely succeed because, as she told the neighbour, 'I climb mountains.'

https://www.flickr.com/photos/15585764@N05/4946242292/in/photolist-8x5Mvw-dpBjvD-6XQUTe-8BTqDZ-5xXrH-QZsbuo-6f7aSM-88R3ST-ogaTMU-HLd6GX-5F6kYi-fx1cwg-8fqQAr-fx1cnD-fx1cDg-kaAnAp-dSGcU5-fxftJj-6PSNxf-4ZsW98-7eP3LL-o56Ksi-CzJHfk-4fdkcc-dpBjag-dpBpBy-dpBjnX-4Si5pE-dDA6k-dpBsN1-dpBqA5-dpBptY-dpBgqT-dpBpJE-dpBghi-dpBhX6-akq9we-9qtFZP-5tJk5y-dpBqtf-dpBq6L-dpBfVv-4LAzLf-qwJsTR-bNniaD-6fbcuj-6HXFr6-dpBifX-dpBiQt-dpBspjOne of the unfortunate realities of life is that sometimes the single dumbest thing we ever decide to do is also the single last thing we ever do. 
If you can't be a good example, at least you can be a horrible warning.
This story, and all the folks who one way or another make it into the Darwin Award nomination list, points to a sense of 'I couldn't (or didn't) think of anything else to do in the situation.' This lack of creativity just astounds me.

So, kids, resourcefulness may some day save your life, without you ever really noticing.