Surviving Loneliness

Internet advice on creating new habits

snezhinka — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 02:58:32 +0000

Be consistent - Do it every day and at the same time of the day. Both daily repetition and cues like time of day, place and circumstances are critical in making a habit stick.
Start Simple – Start with a small change and build on success later on.
Remind Yourself – Place reminders and encouragements, especially the areas where you notice the habit meets most resistance.
Form a Trigger – Create a ritual you use right before executing your habit.
Realize Hidden Needs - The old (bad) habit you are giving up was fulfilling some need. Don’t ignore it, but adequately fulfill it with a new habit.
Encourage Yourself – Don’t give up even if you fall off the wagon every once in a while. Fight negative thoughts, by interrupting them with positive ones: “I’m no good at this, but, if I am working on getting better.”
Remove Temptation - Restructure your environment so it won’t tempt you.
Associate With Role Models - Spend more time with people who model the habits you want to mirror.
Run it as an Experiment - Withhold judgment until after a month has past and use it as an experiment in behavior. Experiments can’t fail, they just have different results so it will give you a different perspective on changing your habit.
Swish - Visualize yourself performing the bad habit. Next visualize yourself pushing aside the bad habit and performing an alternative. Finally, end that sequence with an image of yourself in a highly positive state. Do it until you start automatically go through the pattern before executing the old habit.
Write it Down – Writing down the resolution makes your ideas more clear and focuses you on your end result. Note both the positive benefit of the new habit and the negative consequence of staying with the old habit. Remember: you are doing this for yourself, no one else.

Dealing with panic and desperation

snezhinka — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 03:11:32 +0000

I have to write a brief summary of a very extensive subject. I know enough to write it but I’m having trouble wrapping my mind around it. Plus I am periodically overcome by desperation of how impossible the task seems. I panic. I feel fear. So here is what I am using to fight it:

Assume some basic knowledge and start from there. Getting started, writing that first sentence just right feels both paramount and impossible. I have to remind myself that first sentence will be rewritten many times. It is not that important. It might become the middle of the final piece or get cut completely. The only thing that’s important is to get started somewhere. So brush away doubts of how much I have to define first-hand. Just start somewhere close to my main goal. That’s good enough.
There are many good ways to present knowledge. Stop looking for the perfect, the right way. It doesn’t exist. Start somewhere and prepare to deal with a mess for awhile. Eventually it will transform into something that feels harmonious. Recall your first paper: it was a mess but once it had some form you got a good feedback and eventually things fell into place.
Circle around your whole piece. Don’t expect to write things down sequentially. Instead outline your piece with brief statements for each subsection. See if the story flows or sections need to be rearranged. Maybe there will be need for new sections that you didn’t envision before. Getting the bird’s view of your entire piece is important. First, it helps to wrap your mind around it. Second, it looks less overwhelming and mysterious. Third, you can show your progress to your advisors at any step of the way. And get a valuable feedback.
Keep your eyes on the goal. With extensive subjects like this it is important to remember the main goal of the summary. You are only addressing a certain aspect of the problem. So don’t try to squeeze in sections just to demonstrate your knowledge. New questions will undoubtedly arise, so keep only those that are relevant. All the rest: note them somewhere and move on.
Encourage yourself every step of the way. No matter how minuscule your progress is, acknowledge it to yourself. Focus on what is better, not on what is good or perfect. Tiny victories ensure the overall success.
Don’t do the work to just cross it off your list. It has to be valuable to your overall progress. Think of how it will help you tomorrow to make one more step forward. Will you be able to improve on this later on? Will you know what to do next? Does it have enough detail? Is it unique or a simple copy of something that already exists? Does it address your goal (in however yet feeble manner)?

Survival starts with me

snezhinka — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 22:00:13 +0000

I should not count on outside help. Survival had to start with me. In my experience, a cast-away’s worst mistake is to hope too much and do too little. Survival starts by paying attention to what is close at hand and immediate. To look out with idle hope is tantamount to dreaming one’s life away. — “Life of Pi”

I can be alone and not lonely. Surviving loneliness has nothing to do with finding someone else. It has everything to do with enjoying life as it comes, deriving happiness from many sources.