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Sometimes I believe, Hacker News should have more of this kind of "self hacking" articles. It may seem more like reddit, but it is surely not. I normally hate

by fsniper 14y ago

Sometimes I believe, Hacker News should have more of this kind of "self hacking" articles. It may seem more like reddit, but it is surely not. I normally hate self respect, self development books. I feel they are mostly bullshit. HN main page is a great filter for bullshit so I really like these more. And thinking about change, I also had the introvert/extrovert change for myself. But this was not just me, my friends helped me a lot. If they were not telling me that I was not a problem, but my attitude is a problem. I would never have enough self confidence and would not ever change. Sometimes I get more introvert, but I know, this is just because I want to be. And whenever I want, I can change.

gliese1337 14y ago
I've also gone through the same process of being a strong introvert and learning to be more sociable. And I thought that was a really excellent application of the idea of the growth mindset for the article to point out. But I've gotta take issue with the idea that learning to be sociable is the same as learning to be an extrovert. It's just learning good social skills and learning to enjoy using them despite being an introvert. I'm pretty well convinced that introversion vs. extroversion is just a part of everyone's neural anatomy, as much as being right-handed or left-handed is. That is somewhat plastic, but it takes fantastic levels of effort to fundamentally change. In/extroversion is a matter of how you think and what drains or recharges your mental energy, not how good you are at interacting in social groups; those things happen to be correlated, but there are some really awkward extroverts as well as really sociable introverts.
- fsniper 14y ago
  I believe you have pinpointed the issue here. I learned to be more sociable and I'm still introvert. Making the distinction is important. Thank you. But while having transitions, sometimes I really became extrovert. Mostly I like to hold my issues to myself. But sometimes - with the help of booze - letting go of my thoughts is easier.
crusso 14y ago
But this was not just me, my friends helped me a lot. The problem is that our neurons are wired to lead us to behave in a certain way. People with addictions and serious dysfunction are often trapped by their own programming and can't just "reason their way out of it". Friends serve as a "leap of faith" mechanism that help you to change the way you think. If you think you'll reason yourself into making different decisions than your current programming, you'll often be stuck making the same decisions as always. For the really big changes, you need to unplug your current decision-making software long enough to do things you wouldn't normally do. This is why 12-step programs always have some element of god/spirituality. When people open themselves up to "a higher power", they allow a sort of human meta-programming to rewrite their connections. This leap of faith reason is also why group therapy works so well. You can suspend your normal programming if the steps to get you to where the person next to you in the circle is are small ones.

by fsniper 14y ago

gliese1337 14y ago

I've also gone through the same process of being a strong introvert and learning to be more sociable. And I thought that was a really excellent application of the idea of the growth mindset for the article to point out. But I've gotta take issue with the idea that learning to be sociable is the same as learning to be an extrovert. It's just learning good social skills and learning to enjoy using them despite being an introvert. I'm pretty well convinced that introversion vs. extroversion is just a part of everyone's neural anatomy, as much as being right-handed or left-handed is. That is somewhat plastic, but it takes fantastic levels of effort to fundamentally change. In/extroversion is a matter of how you think and what drains or recharges your mental energy, not how good you are at interacting in social groups; those things happen to be correlated, but there are some really awkward extroverts as well as really sociable introverts.

fsniper 14y ago
I believe you have pinpointed the issue here. I learned to be more sociable and I'm still introvert. Making the distinction is important. Thank you. But while having transitions, sometimes I really became extrovert. Mostly I like to hold my issues to myself. But sometimes - with the help of booze - letting go of my thoughts is easier.

crusso 14y ago

But this was not just me, my friends helped me a lot. The problem is that our neurons are wired to lead us to behave in a certain way. People with addictions and serious dysfunction are often trapped by their own programming and can't just "reason their way out of it". Friends serve as a "leap of faith" mechanism that help you to change the way you think. If you think you'll reason yourself into making different decisions than your current programming, you'll often be stuck making the same decisions as always. For the really big changes, you need to unplug your current decision-making software long enough to do things you wouldn't normally do. This is why 12-step programs always have some element of god/spirituality. When people open themselves up to "a higher power", they allow a sort of human meta-programming to rewrite their connections. This leap of faith reason is also why group therapy works so well. You can suspend your normal programming if the steps to get you to where the person next to you in the circle is are small ones.