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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   1553 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for March 6, 2024

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

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  • Choose environments that you’re more comfortable in that naturally highlight your good qualities. Maybe something like a book club
  • Prepare and bring something thoughtful to share with people. In book club it could just be some interesting knowledge related to the chapter. At a house party it could be a homemade snack. The thing that you share should be something you put thought and effort to, not just something expensive.
  • This last point is very controversial, and you need to proceed with extreme caution. In party situations you can explore the use of psychoactive substances that do some combination of: (1) reduce your anxiety (2) increase confidence (3) make socializing more interesting/fun (4) don’t make you noticeably impaired.

  • The problem lies in I may not always get the choice. We're going to a house party or bar if my girlfriend wants to go (not that she's unreasonable in wanting to go there!). This is what makes me want to fix this issue.

  • I like the sharing idea. Maybe an activity or game could also work.

  • I have a history of being slightly reliant on substances to help ease social anxiety, so I will be avoiding this one. I think it can definitely work for some people.

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


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