If “what you are” is the only/most effective way to change “what you do” (eg unconscious signalling) then the advice of the original article to focus on “what you do” is poor advice, even if it is technically correct that only what you do matters.
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
— Aristotle
It goes both ways. And it’s meaningless to speak of changing “what you are” if you do not, as a result, do anything different.
I don’t think the Cracked article, or I, ever said that the only way to change your actions is by changing some mysterious essence of your being. That’s actually a rather silly notion, when it’s stated explicitly, because it’s self-defeating unless you ignore the observable evidence. That is, we can see that changing your actions by choosing to change your actions IS possible; people do it all the time. The conclusion, then, is that by choosing to change your actions, you have thereby changed this ineffable essence of “what you are”, which then proceeds to affect what you do. If that’s how it works, then worrying about whether you’re changing what you are or only changing what you do is pointless; the two cannot be decoupled.
And that’s the point of the article, as I understand it. “What you are” may be a useful notion in your own internal narrative — it’s “how the algorithm feels from the inside” (the algorithm in this case being your decisions to do what you do). But outside of your head, it’s meaningless. Out in the world, there is no “what you are” beyond what you do.
As was pointed out elsewhere in these comments, there are situations where changing “what you are”—for example, increasing your confidence levels—is more effective then trying to change your actions directly.
Let’s say that you don’t do something that you want to do, because you’re not confident enough.
What is the difference between doing that thing, and improving your confidence which causes you to do that thing? What does it even mean to distinguish between those two cases?
And if improving your confidence doesn’t cause you to do the thing in question, then what’s the point?
Edit: On a reread, I might interpret you as saying that one might try (but fail) to change one’s actions “directly”, or one might attack the root cause, and having done so, succeed at changing one’s actions thereby. If that’s what you mean, then you’re right.
However the advice to “change what you do” should not, I think, be interpreted as saying “ignore the root causes of your inaction”; that is not a charitable reading. The author of the Cracked article isn’t railing against people who want to do a thing, but can’t (due to e.g. lack of confidence); rather, his targets are people who just don’t think that they need to be doing anything, because “what they are” is somehow sufficient.
If there is no other method, then advising people to ignore changing what they are in favor of what they do is bad advice.
I am having trouble parsing your comment. Could you elaborate? “no other method” of what?
Also, who is advising people to ignore changing what they are...? And why is advising people to change what they do bad advice?
Please do clarify, as at this point I am not sure whether, and on what, we are disagreeing.
If “what you are” is the only/most effective way to change “what you do” (eg unconscious signalling) then the advice of the original article to focus on “what you do” is poor advice, even if it is technically correct that only what you do matters.
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” — Aristotle
It goes both ways. And it’s meaningless to speak of changing “what you are” if you do not, as a result, do anything different.
I don’t think the Cracked article, or I, ever said that the only way to change your actions is by changing some mysterious essence of your being. That’s actually a rather silly notion, when it’s stated explicitly, because it’s self-defeating unless you ignore the observable evidence. That is, we can see that changing your actions by choosing to change your actions IS possible; people do it all the time. The conclusion, then, is that by choosing to change your actions, you have thereby changed this ineffable essence of “what you are”, which then proceeds to affect what you do. If that’s how it works, then worrying about whether you’re changing what you are or only changing what you do is pointless; the two cannot be decoupled.
And that’s the point of the article, as I understand it. “What you are” may be a useful notion in your own internal narrative — it’s “how the algorithm feels from the inside” (the algorithm in this case being your decisions to do what you do). But outside of your head, it’s meaningless. Out in the world, there is no “what you are” beyond what you do.
As was pointed out elsewhere in these comments, there are situations where changing “what you are”—for example, increasing your confidence levels—is more effective then trying to change your actions directly.
Let’s say that you don’t do something that you want to do, because you’re not confident enough.
What is the difference between doing that thing, and improving your confidence which causes you to do that thing? What does it even mean to distinguish between those two cases?
And if improving your confidence doesn’t cause you to do the thing in question, then what’s the point?
Edit: On a reread, I might interpret you as saying that one might try (but fail) to change one’s actions “directly”, or one might attack the root cause, and having done so, succeed at changing one’s actions thereby. If that’s what you mean, then you’re right.
However the advice to “change what you do” should not, I think, be interpreted as saying “ignore the root causes of your inaction”; that is not a charitable reading. The author of the Cracked article isn’t railing against people who want to do a thing, but can’t (due to e.g. lack of confidence); rather, his targets are people who just don’t think that they need to be doing anything, because “what they are” is somehow sufficient.
Oh, I didn’t realize that. You’re right, that is a much more charitable reading.