Conceptual Change

"Problems cannot be solved by the level of awareness that created them." This quotation is typically attributed to Albert Einstein. Wikiquote has no attribution for it.
A similar thought, also attributed to Einstein is
"Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different result."
Wikiquote attributes this to Rita Mae Brown, from Sudden Death, Bantam Books, New York, 1983, p. 68.

I've been struggling with changing my patterns of thinking. I was working on a project recently and kept running up against blocks that I have run up against time and time again. My challenge has been to rethink my response to the blocks and to re-imagine the very nature of my work. If I don't change how I respond, I'll end up with similar results to those I've had in the past.

This is the coach's challenge: how does a coach get a performer to perform more effectively? The answer: get them to do things differently. For me, what I typically work with is trying to envision the project in different ways, and to see the different spaces in the project that can be effectively approached with useful tools.

This is, I suppose, partly a left-over of what I learned in my Ph.D. program, which had been set up by Horst Rittel, a design theorist--that is to say, a philosopher who studied the process of design. Rittel argued that there were basically no simple, easily defined steps in design processes, and that there were no grand schemes to follow to guide the designer to his/her goal. Instead the designer had to work towards an uncertain goal, one that shifted as the designer came to see new aspects of the problem, and the best one can do in terms of applying methodologies, or specific techniques, was to find places where those techniques could be used to forward the project without assuming that they would lead to an answer.

Because I don't think that we can prescribe methodologies very well, and less so, the larger the task, I tend to try to look for ways to re-envision the task at hand so that it can be seen as a series of smaller related tasks.

At the same time, because there is no over-arching methodological framework to guide the designer/writer, it is important for the writer to seek an overarching vision of the project's goals, to provide the framework to guide efforts.

I had a writer once tell me: "I'm stuck, but I only have six months to finish my project, so I don't have time to learn to work any differently." But I think that kind of thinking eliminates the chance that I can really help: I can't force someone to work with a whip. I can't even entice them to work with kindness and positive support. What I can do is help the writer see the project differently; I can help a writer see positive opportunities to develop his or her interests and abilities.

Having said these things, I now have to go back to the paper I'm writing, lest I let the momentum slack (thus falling into one of the traps that I fall into). And I want to jump into the revision (the third complete rewrite of the 8 pages since Wednesday) before I start to think how hard it is to revise.

Counting

What Counts?
I'm thinking, in this case, particularly about what to count as "work accomplished", but it's a very interesting general question as well, because deciding "what counts" is a crucial decision.

Consider, for example, the United States Constitution in one of its darker moments:
Article 1, Section 2, paragraph 3: "Representatives...shall be apportioned among the several States...according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free persons,...and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other persons."
Indians not taxed counted not at all in determining representation of the new federal government. "Other persons" counted 60% in determining numbers of representatives, but of course those other persons didn't get 60% of a vote, being slaves.

It's nice and dandy to think of numbers as objective. It's one of the lovely myths of science. But what we choose to count is determined by how we see the world. What gets counted depends on our subjective decisions concerning what to count. This is true whether we are a physical scientist looking data sets and trying to decide whether some data can be considered outliers, or whether we are social scientist trying to decide whether certain data are coded as one thing or as another, or whether we are a politician trying to decide who to count as eligible with respect to some policy. It is inevitable that a value-laden subjective determination is made considering what counts.

While I mention this as a general principle that all academics ought to be aware of, my real concern here is in thinking about writers and how writers can sabotage themselves. I had a writer lament to me the other day "I didn't get much done; I only wrote abut 2000 words." When I wrote back "That's great 2000 words is a considerable piece of work and if you keep up a pace like that you'll finish in no time," I got a response "Actually I only wrote about 1000 words."

Well, we all have to figure out what to count. It's easy to count the words that we have written: lots of word-processing software will do it for us. It's not so easy to count if we start saying "well, these words do count, but those don't." But the determination is ours: we have to make the subjective decision of what counts before we can start enumerating.

But I wasn't so much concerned with counting words, as I was with counting effort and counting progress. The effort we put in, and the progress we make are not perfectly measured in the number of words we write. I think that writers with writer's block and related problems often suffer from not being willing or able to count what they did as actual work or actual progress.

It's important to learn to celebrate the fruits of our efforts, and even more important to learn to count the fruits as actual fruits. If we spend a day of hard work, thinking through difficult problems and then say to ourselves "I got nothing done because I didn't write enough words," we are counting our effort as worthless. And what kind of emotional state does such a method of counting lead to? It leads to depression, one can easily imagine.

Dr. David Burns, M.D., author of the mass-market book on CBT titled Feeling Good, argues that there are "ten cognitive distortions that form the basis of all your depressions" (p.32). Number four on his list of cognitive distortions is "Disqualifying the Positive: You reject positive experiences by insisting they 'don't count' for some reason or other" (p.42). While I have reservations about any mass-market book on psychology, and don't know that I would accept Burns' contention that all depression stems from his ten cognitive distortions, I do believe that if we engage in his cognitive distortions we are creating a strong negative emotional state. If we reject our efforts as not counting, then each day that we make an effort, and each day we discount the effort of the day, we add to our negative feelings about ourselves and about our project.

It seems, therefore, important to be able to celebrate the effort, and to celebrate the actual progress that we do make, even if it isn't as much as we would have hoped. And in that celebration we definitely don't want to focus on the idea that it wasn't as much as we hoped.

In the long-term practice of writing it is crucial to be able to have days where the productivity seems low, and not berate ourselves for those days. Writing, like many practices, is uneven--some days go well, some go badly; sometimes we make a lot of progress in an easy, measurable sense. Sometimes we make progress by having some sort of epiphany--even sometimes when that epiphany leads us to want to throw away some old writing that we had previously intended to use. Writing is about creating a working whole: a complete, coherent written work. Some of the progress necessary in that endeavor will involve re-arranging ideas we had earlier in the process before we knew what we have learned during the process.

Finally, I want to note that yes, sometimes we get nothing done. Some days we don't try. Some days we may sit down and write nothing, or write a load of tripe that doesn't contribute to the project. It's okay to admit that you had an unproductive day. But it seems to me superior to try to focus--everyday--on the positive accomplishments, and to remember to count them and celebrate them. That whole load of tripe?: well at least you learned that that wasn't what your dissertation needed. Deciding what to count is a practice in itself; it's nice when we can get the practice to support us.

A Matter of Choice

While reading The Now Habit: A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play, by Neil Fiore, I find the following recommendation:

"Replace 'I have to' with 'I choose to'."

This is an idea that I ascribe to, and a notion that has appeared in my blog in the past. It's always interesting to find another expression of an idea that you harbor yourself. I can't necessarily trace my source of the idea: have I read it elsewhere before? I probably have, but don't know where. Maybe something by Anthony Robbins. The premise is very much a cognitive-behavioral one: by changing the stories we tell ourselves, we change our emotional reality.

It's all about the practice, to me. CBT is often seen as being behaviorist in the extreme form, where it may be believed that behavior is the psychological totality. But it seems to me that even if we ascribe to psychodynamic theories, there is a place for behaviorist principles.

If we want to remember someone's phone number and we have nothing to write it down, what do we do? We repeat it to ourselves. If we want to remember a poem, what do we do? We repeat it? If we want to master and remember a musical piece? We practice; we repeat. The behavior reinforces the pattern.

And so, it seems to me that we can benefit from practicing the stories that we tell ourselves. We can benefit from telling ourselves "I choose to," rather than "I have to." It reminds us that we have a choice in the matter--that we have a choice with what we do with our lives. Especially when it comes to things like working on our dissertation. Some things we have to do: we have to eat; we have to drink water; we have to breathe. But do we "have to" write a dissertation? Certainly the imperative to do the dissertation is not of the same character as the imperative to breathe.

So try to remember to choose the things that will serve you.

No use crying over spilled milk

I lost my glasses yesterday. It was an inconvenience, but I got a new pair. It had been too long since I had a new, so it was no great loss. But it was a good opportunity to reflect on patterns of thought.

The last time I got new glasses, I worried about everything. I went to different stores. I dithered and vacillated about frames and costs. It took me an entire day to make a decision and who knows--perhaps I saved some money.

Yesterday I just went to the store that said they could give me glasses the same day. I probably spent more money, but I didn't fret. I enjoyed the day. I didn't fret about making the right decision and I didn't fret over the mistake that had put me in the position of needing new glasses right away. And that gave me the emotional energy to work and to focus on things much more productive than worrying about my glasses.

Some things are beyond our control. Once the milk has spilled, there's no putting it back into the bottle.

The question, then, is what we do once the milk has spilled. Or once the glasses have been lost. Or the draft rejected.

Working yourself into a tizzy over the bad outcome doesn't help. One might argue that we don't have control over our emotions. And there is no question that in the moment emotions can be overwhelming. But in the long run we can control our emotions. We all do--it is necessary to our socialization. And there are theories--like cognitive behavioral therapy--that argue that in the long run we can even change the emotional patterns that we may not be able to control in the moment.

I have been reading Dale Carnegie's "How to Start Worrying and Start Living." I know that it's basically no more than a pop-psychology self-help book--except, perhaps, that it doesn't really even use psychology--or at least not any psychological theory. But, as far as I can tell, the basic message of the book is that worrying is a matter of where you are focused, and if you train yourself to focus your attention on things that you can change, then you won't have time to worry about things (and vice versa--the more you stop paying attention to worry or regret, the more you can focus on taking action).

Choices

What choices do we get to make and how are we going to make them?

We want to understand our goals, and the context in which we work (that is to say those things that we cannot or will not try to change), but our options are what deserve the great focus. What kinds of outcomes follow from our choices? It is in the focus on the choices that we are most empowered because we are focusing on our actions.

I'm thinking about this right now because I'm anxious. And I'm worrying about things that are beyond my control. I'm not thinking about what I can do; instead I'm thinking about what I can't do, or at least what I believe that I can't do. And that doesn't really feel very good.

This post, then, is an exercise on focusing on things that I can do. Writing, for me, offers an opportunity to work on directing my attention. It's not a meditative sort of thing, but it does force my focus on to the present, and on to what I can do.

If Cognitive-Behavioral psychology is correct in presuming that negative emotional states are strongly related to the stories we're telling ourselves, then an exercise like focusing your attention to write about something positive will help us change the stories that are giving us trouble.

For me, fear is a big problem, fear of other people. But to let that rule me? I have choices of how to act, and as I pursue my choices, I want to choose those that are the most able to help me face my fear. And one of those choices is to keep in mind that any possible course of action has negative potential outcomes, many of which have little or nothing to do with me. So I know that I could choose to focus on negative outcomes for any and all potential courses of action. Or I can try to choose the course of action that will help me move towards my own goals, even in the face of the fear-inducing negative outcome.

I haven't figured out how to choose to turn off the emotional switch. I think that's possible, too. But for now, I know that in the long run, I feel best when I choose a course of action and resign myself to the possibility that it has something bad in store for me, because I see that there is also a possibility that it has something good in store for me.

The Placebo Effect

How is it that a placebo effect exists?
In writing about What the Bleep Do We Know?, I got an e-mailed comment about the part of that movie that talks about the effect of the mind on water--there are a series of pictures of water molecules showing how each had been affected by being labeled in different ways (presumably through the action of the mind). What if we had a bottle of "confident" water? or "peaceful" water? What would happen if we drank that water?

Now I don't know how to evaluate the accuracy of the science of the shaping of the water molecules, but I do feel pretty darn confident that the placebo effect exists, and, though I haven't actually studied the placebo effect, that there is plenty of research out there to support the notion of the placebo effect.

How is it that it operates? One possible explanation that we might imagine would be to link the water molecules of What the Bleep with the placebo notion: in the process of taking the placebo, our believing mind alters the molecules in some way. Another possible explanation (and the one I imagine most people would favor over the What the Bleep explanation) would be that our mind acts directly on our body--by believing that changes will occur, we may create those chances purely through the power of the mind. To explain the placebo effect--an observable phenomenon--somehow requires physiological change through action of the mind, whether that causal path is direct or indirect. I have come up with two possible explanations, but I daresay more could be imagined--both variations on the two basic themes I laid out, or development of some other theme (e.g., supernatural entities?).

If the placebo effect exists, is it possible that it can be consciously exerted--for example by repeating "I am confident", one grows in confidence? That would seem to be the rankest version of pop psychology and using affirmations. But does the logic of the placebo suggest that possibility?
We might argue that the placebo effect can only be unconsciously activated, but that requires a Freudian view of the mind, and one wonders whether we really want to believe that there is some entity called the "unconscious" or whether Freud's theory, which characterizes the unconscious as a sort of independent agent, relies on human conceptualization and thus creates a division that is not accurate with respect to the placebo effect. (I daresay someone has studied whether the placebo effect is only unconscious or not; I haven't researched that.)

If we acknowledge that there is a possibility (not a certainty) that we can consciously invoke the placebo principle through such behaviors as repeated affirmations, at what level does the possibility become great enough to try such actions? And though I dismiss affirmations as pop psychology, there is no doubt that there are therapeutic with significant empirical research to support them that suggest that we can improve our moods through behavioral modifications (like affirmations).

For me, especially at those moments when things seem the most difficult, the level of possibility doesn't have to be very high. It seems to be worth the chance, because the cost of changing my behaviors to promote is so low. The effort doesn't contradict other efforts to change my situation, and costs nothing but a little effort.

Following this logic, then, it seems that to the extent that we can imagine a possibility, and we can imagine the steps to get there, we can then use our minds to help us move there by focusing on that goal ("I am confident!").

This post is a little of a hodge podge, because I was also thinking about the role of imagination in work as academics or philosophers: when faced with an observed phenomenon, we can use our imagination to generate different hypotheses about the causal factors of interest (as I did with the placebo effect).

We can also use our imagination to hypothesize connections of significance: if there is such a thing as the placebo effect: how can that be significant to the individual? What can be done with the placebo effect? Maybe you could institute a whole program based on it (which might be a health pogrom, not a health program)? Or maybe you would want to limit attempts to apply the placebo effect as treatment to only some cases (say ones with low risk, or ones that are not treatable by other means).

Our imaginations are keys to a whole realm of possibilities in academic work. Judicious use of imagination, along with careful qualification (e.g., the conscious placebo effect is possible, not certain) can lead to fruitful lines of discussion.

Preparing for Feedback (2): Worst cases

We don't really want to dwell on the worst cases, but we do want to recognize that we can develop a practice that helps us deal with stories that we tell ourselves that make us feel bad--like worst case scenarios.

But that is a place for intervention. As described by David Burns (in the book Feeling Good-forgive, please, my use of pop psychology for a reference), there is a form of therapy that puts a great deal of focus on our ways of thinking. Burns refers to the work of Aaron Beck, and his theory known as "Cognitive therapy", which is also commonly called Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (or CBT). Burns writes: "Beck's thesis was simple: (1) when you are depressed or anxious, you are thinking in an illogical, negative manner, and you inadvertently act in a self-defeating way."

As described by Burns, a great deal of the practice of this therapy is about keeping a journal, writing down negative thoughts and thought patterns, and analyzing them for logical errors such as exaggeration of the gravity of situations.

I think that if an academic were to write down their worst fear about submitting a work to another, and then were to examine that statement and look for logical errors or errors in reasoning, they could probably find them. And if the logical errors are not there, there is probably some associated claim which is filled with logical errors. (Incidentally, my use of "their" as a singular, gender-neutral pronoun in the first sentence of this paragraph is intentional. I understand that there is some debate over whether this is "proper" English; this is my choice as to how to use English. I have no fear of being misunderstood. To those who are offended by my grammatical choice, I will say only that I respect your position without agreeing.)

You might imagine "What if I'm told I'll be kicked out?" But if you examine that, you can see how unlikely it is. There is, of course, some population for whom this risk is real, and that population then, ought to look for other aspects of his/her thinking that are creating distress.
You might imagine "I'll be told I'll never finish or my work is no good." But how likely is your reader to do that? And if you have good reason to believe it is likely, doesn't that indicate as much about the reader as it does about your work?
You might fear "I'll have a lot more work to do." This is a realistic fear, but I would wager that one doesn't get depressed just thinking "I have a lot more work to do", one gets depressed when one starts thinking "I'm overwhelmed with all the work" or "I'll never get all the work done on time." But such thought patterns are exactly the kind of thing that CBT, as described by Burns (who calls it "Cognitive Therapy", as I noted earlier), is meant to handle. Using ideas like "being overwhelmed" or "never finishing" are the sorts of cognitive patterns that Burns focuses on defusing with the practices of CBT.

So if the prospect of getting feedback is stressing you out, write down the fears, and then try to write down some alternative outcomes that are better, and are also equally likely or more likely.