thejdizzler
1d ago
I'm so sorry to hear this!
thejdizzler
1d ago
At least at Hopkins (where I am), it's woke all the way down.
thejdizzler
4d ago
- 40 minute walk, 15 minute drive with usual traffic
- 40 minute walk, 20 minute bus ride
- 30 minute drive. Fruit, berries.
- 20 min walk 5 minute drive
- Looks like 22 minute drive
- 40 minute drive or 15 minute train from station that is about ~20 minutes away from where I live.
thejdizzler
6d ago
It's also quite difficult to use TheMotte in a way that encourages low effort. My best performing posts are ones I spend time on, which is usually a form of deep work. There really isn't enough content on here to doomscroll, and reading comments is actually usually pretty high energy.
thejdizzler
6d ago
Great observations. I wish there were tools that could do this. Cold Turkey sort of approximately gets close to this, but it's very very crude and requires a lot of upfront effort/willpower.
thejdizzler
6d ago
Yea I agree with this sentiment. There are all these studies (mainly to do with reading) that gamification actually backfires. If you give a kid money or some other external reward for reading that actually is a pretty surefire way to avoid that kid developing a real love for reading. And so too with any other hobby you might be able to think of.
thejdizzler
6d ago
Good observation. I also agree that the hustle-culture memes aren't reflective of how people's efforts can actually be allocated. A common failure mode I see in myself is over-scheduling things in my down-time and not doing any of them and gaming/scrolling instead. I really should be resting during that time.
thejdizzler
6d ago
Maybe better suited to a Wellness Wednesday post, but I think there's a significant culture war angle here too.
To what extent is the current competency crisis in government, academia, etc. caused by an inability to spend time by oneself and actually put in the work? I've lamented in the past the decline in the social landscape, at least in the United States, but among the social environments that I have been finding recently in Baltimore, there seems to be almost a pathological fear of spending time alone in order to put in the work to actually improve at the thing that we're supposed to be doing together. For example, I've recently been going to a Spanish Happy Hour group at a brewery Thursday evenings after work. There are usually at least a few native speakers there, but aside from them, most people are at a quite elementary stage with the language, and aren't doing anything outside of the happy hour to improve. For some people this makes sense: they're mainly there to socialize not to learn, but for others, like the guy who organizes the group (Alex), the lack of progress is baffling to me. Alex started the group to improve his Spanish so he could communicate better with his girlfriend's family. And yet he seems unable to find the time to practice outside of happy hour (with reading/TV/shows/flashcards). I see the same thing with my new roommate, who is absolutely in love with the country and culture of Spain, and goes to happy hour with me, but won't put in the solitary effort to actually improve at the language. I see the same thing with running: people only going to run clubs to socialize and then expecting to run fast when they don't put in outside mileage on their own time, and even within the philosophy book club that I run where people seem unable to do the 30 pages of reading we discuss every other week.
I see this with myself as well, especially in my PhD. I know what I need to do to be successful: read the papers and do the experiments I have planned, but instead I find myself goofing off with labmates, texting/calling friends while I do busywork, or on this forum posting. Phones may have isolated in some ways, but at the same time, the current media environment seems to have created a constant yearning for companionship that I don't think is conducive to actually growing in competence and skill in areas outside of socialization.
thejdizzler
6d ago
Looks like Russians have just stormed into the center of both Pokrovsk and Kupyansk. Maybe the Ukrainian collapse has actually begun?
I seem to have lost the ability to focus on a book for more than 30 minutes in the last month, which is concerning. Maybe this is just an ebb in the tidal process that is my relationship with reading, but this time it feels different. It's not so much a lack of time, but feeling like I should be doing something else (working, running, or texting mainly). Sometimes this feeling is valid, but mainly reading is for time when I don't have the energy to do these things (run, work, or be social).
What can I do about this? Or do I just need to chill?
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