I’ve been on Mount Stupid a lot, maybe enough to be past Mount Stupid’s Mount Stupid. I’ve had a lot of interests that I’ve developed over the (relatively short) 22 years and I’ve been caught standing atop Mount Stupid (by others and by myself) enough that I often feel it in the pit of my stomach - a sort of combination of embarrassment and guilt—when I start shouting from there. Especially if no one corrects me and I realize my mistake. The worst is the feeling I get when I’ve established some authority in someone’s eyes and give them wrong information.
The best cure I’ve found for getting stuck atop Mount Stupid is to start learning a subject that’s been the long interest of an honest friend (someone who’s default mode of communication—at least among good friends—is significantly closer to Crocker’s rules than to ordinary conversation). That seems to have really been the most helpful thing for me. If you take up a subject, you get past Mount Stupid a lot quicker when there’s someone to push you tumbling off the top (or at least point out your vast ignorance). It also builds up a reflex for noticing your ignorance—you start to know what it feels like to have a shallow understanding of something and you start to recognize when you’re speaking out of your depth. You’ll have been conditioned by having been called out in the past. Of course, you’re still going to shout from high atop Mount Stupid a lot, but you’ll realize what you’re doing much more easily.
Caveat: I might still be atop Mount Stupid’s Mount Stupid, don’t forget that.
I’ve been on Mount Stupid a lot, maybe enough to be past Mount Stupid’s Mount Stupid. I’ve had a lot of interests that I’ve developed over the (relatively short) 22 years and I’ve been caught standing atop Mount Stupid (by others and by myself) enough that I often feel it in the pit of my stomach - a sort of combination of embarrassment and guilt—when I start shouting from there. Especially if no one corrects me and I realize my mistake. The worst is the feeling I get when I’ve established some authority in someone’s eyes and give them wrong information.
The best cure I’ve found for getting stuck atop Mount Stupid is to start learning a subject that’s been the long interest of an honest friend (someone who’s default mode of communication—at least among good friends—is significantly closer to Crocker’s rules than to ordinary conversation). That seems to have really been the most helpful thing for me. If you take up a subject, you get past Mount Stupid a lot quicker when there’s someone to push you tumbling off the top (or at least point out your vast ignorance). It also builds up a reflex for noticing your ignorance—you start to know what it feels like to have a shallow understanding of something and you start to recognize when you’re speaking out of your depth. You’ll have been conditioned by having been called out in the past. Of course, you’re still going to shout from high atop Mount Stupid a lot, but you’ll realize what you’re doing much more easily.
Caveat: I might still be atop Mount Stupid’s Mount Stupid, don’t forget that.