Categories
Uncategorized

Only say yes

Thread from @visakanv:

with each passing year I increasingly realize that, not only should I focus on what I want to see more of, I should also let go of trying to help other people stop focusing on what they say they don’t want to see more of. brings us to Nietzsche’s “I wish only to be a yes-sayer”

https://mobile.twitter.com/visakanv/status/1500482262672232449?cxt=HHwWgsDSpeCq5NIpAAAA

the core “engine” of this is even more radical than I thought, even after I thought I already understood it. and it radicalizes me more and more with experience

https://mobile.twitter.com/visakanv/status/1500482453567578113

“i want to stop X” must be reframed into “I want to do Y”, this seems to dramatically improve the odds of success, it feels like an order of magnitude or more

https://mobile.twitter.com/visakanv/status/1500482755947560960

How do I get there? How do I get to the point where all I do is say “Yes” or “I want to do Y”?

Assertion: with filters. Lots of “No” answers to X.

Which is not as hard as it sounds. The Y crowds out the X. Saying “Yes” to Y (this is the hard part) makes saying “No” to X easier.

Synthesized:

  • Only say yes to Y. It helps if I say no to X, too. But that’s just a question of how long the transformation takes, from X to Y.
  • This means I know that I want Y and I don’t want X. I have a goal. This is the necessary pre-condition. The goal can be a tentative hypothesis (“Let’s see what happens if I have more Y and less X”) but an Aim is necessary.
  • More Y means less time for X.
  • More Y brings me even more Y. Birds of a feather, etc. (It will probably bring me unexpected K, and P, and W. These are the second order effects of aiming at Y).
  • X becomes a trivial part of my life. Eliminate it in favor of all Y, all the time. Or one of the second order effects that became visible while focusing on Y.