The main thing I personally got from this post: I feel my habits as much more real and significant choices to make, and I predict this will change how I think about habits in the long term. I used to think of habits using the framework of TDT (‘if I eat the snack when I especially feel like it, then I’m the agent who will eat a snack every time I especially feel like it, and will eat a lot of snacks’) but the notion that these are the parts of you that determine my long term trajcetory way more than any individual project I work on, is new and visceral.
(Thing I liked: I internally predicted that the section title “The World is Literally on Fire” would be an exaggeration and it wasn’t and I was surprised.)
There were a few other things I like. In general, I probably won’t personally Feature posts of this sort (things that feel like “looking back, reminiscing, drawing conclusions about what is truly important”) if someone writes a post like this every other week or so, but if you just do a retrospective once every e.g. five years, I’m more inclined to think your search algorithm has output the real nuggets of value in the data that is your history. So thanks for this meandering post of things you’ve noticed, I really liked the habits things and will ponder more about the noticing confusion, burnout and gratitude. The stuff here feels really useful, and I appreciate knowing some of the main things in this private data store. For these reasons, I’ve Featured it.
Yeah, the habits thing is the one I’m by far most confident in. I do think the noticing confusion/burnout/gratitude things are important but they feature so strongly mostly by accident of anecdotes that all happened in the space of a week and felt connected.
I’m not 100% sure I grok the difference you intend between the TDT habits and Habits-As-Described here—is the main difference that you not only obtain the benefit of the TDT habit, but also the benefits of change-to-personality that change additional types of choices you’ll make?
I am compelled to express my disappointment that this comment was not posted more prominently.
Habit formation is important and underrated, and I see a lot of triumphant claims from a lot of people but I don’t actually see a lot of results that persuade me to change my habituation procedure. I myself have some successful years-old habits and I got them by a different process than what you’ve described. In particular, I skip twice all the time and it doesn’t kill my longterm momentum.
And I hope you’ll forgive the harshness if I harken back to point #4 of this comment.
Yeah seems fair. I’ve thought about writing it into the essay and been uncertain how to do so. It’s been 6-7 years and I’ve had on my list to write a new version of this post, and distill out my new life lessons now that I’ve had twice-as-long a time horizon.
(Note: The habits listed in this essay had lasted years, at the time I wrote the essay. I think they failed most concretely during the pandemic, and then subsequently moving to different houses)
The main thing I personally got from this post: I feel my habits as much more real and significant choices to make, and I predict this will change how I think about habits in the long term. I used to think of habits using the framework of TDT (‘if I eat the snack when I especially feel like it, then I’m the agent who will eat a snack every time I especially feel like it, and will eat a lot of snacks’) but the notion that these are the parts of you that determine my long term trajcetory way more than any individual project I work on, is new and visceral.
(Thing I liked: I internally predicted that the section title “The World is Literally on Fire” would be an exaggeration and it wasn’t and I was surprised.)
There were a few other things I like. In general, I probably won’t personally Feature posts of this sort (things that feel like “looking back, reminiscing, drawing conclusions about what is truly important”) if someone writes a post like this every other week or so, but if you just do a retrospective once every e.g. five years, I’m more inclined to think your search algorithm has output the real nuggets of value in the data that is your history. So thanks for this meandering post of things you’ve noticed, I really liked the habits things and will ponder more about the noticing confusion, burnout and gratitude. The stuff here feels really useful, and I appreciate knowing some of the main things in this private data store. For these reasons, I’ve Featured it.
Yeah, the habits thing is the one I’m by far most confident in. I do think the noticing confusion/burnout/gratitude things are important but they feature so strongly mostly by accident of anecdotes that all happened in the space of a week and felt connected.
I’m not 100% sure I grok the difference you intend between the TDT habits and Habits-As-Described here—is the main difference that you not only obtain the benefit of the TDT habit, but also the benefits of change-to-personality that change additional types of choices you’ll make?
It’s the future, and many of my habits have regressed and I have skipped more than twice. :(
I am compelled to express my disappointment that this comment was not posted more prominently.
Habit formation is important and underrated, and I see a lot of triumphant claims from a lot of people but I don’t actually see a lot of results that persuade me to change my habituation procedure. I myself have some successful years-old habits and I got them by a different process than what you’ve described. In particular, I skip twice all the time and it doesn’t kill my longterm momentum.
And I hope you’ll forgive the harshness if I harken back to point #4 of this comment.
Yeah seems fair. I’ve thought about writing it into the essay and been uncertain how to do so. It’s been 6-7 years and I’ve had on my list to write a new version of this post, and distill out my new life lessons now that I’ve had twice-as-long a time horizon.
(Note: The habits listed in this essay had lasted years, at the time I wrote the essay. I think they failed most concretely during the pandemic, and then subsequently moving to different houses)