2 ms·

Read stories. Start with short stories and blog posts. Also audiobooks are great for when you are walking around. Take walks where you talk to yourself or a fri

Read stories. Start with short stories and blog posts. Also audiobooks are great for when you are walking around. Take walks where you talk to yourself or a friend about those stories and thereby think about them more clearly via the same mechanism that makes rubber-duck debugging a good way to solve technical problems. This YouTube series is a good start to how to think about stories: https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8dPuuaLjXtOeEc9ME62zTfqc0h6Pe8vb https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8dPuuaLjXtOeEc9ME62zTf... Actually, John Green's works in general aren't bad for what you are after, but don't restrict yourself to one author. Accept that not only are all these things maddeningly complex, but that you will never be comfortable with their ambiguity. Also, go out into the world. Learn to be a good listener so those who are tired, scared, lonely, or otherwise vulnerable will come to you for comfort.

qznc 12y ago
I think you give too much credit to stories. I fully agree with listening to people. You need to respect them first, though. Every human being tries to live a good life. The filthy beggar on the street, the greedy wall street trader, the corrupt cop, the geeky programmer. I listed stereotypes. If you get to know people, you learn how they are not stereotypes. It does not matter if you travel around the world or around the block. You can meet very different people everywhere. Usually people love to talk about themselves. Just ask questions. More concrete? Find something you dislike (folk music, Pokemon, PHP, Justin Bieber, conservatives, art museums, baseball, soap operas), then find out why other people love it. Learn about biases, fallacies, psychology, persuasion. We meatbags are so broken, confused, and warped.
- afarrell 12y ago
  My post definitely does. Too often we pattern-match against stories we already know and don't examine where reality deviates. But I don't know how to counteract that besides other countervailing or attached stories.

qznc 12y ago

I think you give too much credit to stories. I fully agree with listening to people. You need to respect them first, though. Every human being tries to live a good life. The filthy beggar on the street, the greedy wall street trader, the corrupt cop, the geeky programmer. I listed stereotypes. If you get to know people, you learn how they are not stereotypes. It does not matter if you travel around the world or around the block. You can meet very different people everywhere. Usually people love to talk about themselves. Just ask questions. More concrete? Find something you dislike (folk music, Pokemon, PHP, Justin Bieber, conservatives, art museums, baseball, soap operas), then find out why other people love it. Learn about biases, fallacies, psychology, persuasion. We meatbags are so broken, confused, and warped.

afarrell 12y ago
My post definitely does. Too often we pattern-match against stories we already know and don't examine where reality deviates. But I don't know how to counteract that besides other countervailing or attached stories.