Belly Button Lint

Feeling Lint-y?

Tag: problem solving

  • Theme:

    Trust default is a winning strategy

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    1–2 minutes

    Through evolutionary nature humans have a trust default: we tend to trust rather than be skeptical. This has proven beneficial (even logical) for many reasons.

    Consider game theory where “cooperation first” is the best tactic, but also we can double down into trusting others up front rather than forcing people to earn trust.

    This means for a very small percentage of betrayals you will attract many more of the right kind of people to you: people who will care and support you because you gave strong trust first.

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    doubling down on rationality

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    1–2 minutes

    We often appeal to rationality, yet seldom take it far enough.
    We partially problem solve, applying enough effort to get past the current predicament.Taking rationality further it begins to dissolve its own support, leading from solutions to existential dilemmas.

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    Be Less Wrong

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    1–2 minutes

    Even when you are right, you aren’t. We always need more information or consideration.
    Tomorrow, science or philosophy will have a better answer, a novel approach to crack this thorny impasse. Or tomorrow, we will know how we should have responded in that confrontation. But today, we must move forward knowing every step we take is wrong.

    We attempt to make good decisions, but when information fails we are left making choices with instincts shaped by circumstances, or we crowdsource our ethics, or we choose an incomplete data set and make a leap.

    They are all wrong, but some processes of choice have a predictive capacity allowing them to foresee conflict and avoid confusion for better outcomes.
    The goal is not to be correct but to establish a framework of checks and balances to be less wrong.

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    Morality is an Evolutionary Tactic

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    1–2 minutes

    Evolution plays a numbers game in which survival is based on vast losses.

    Applied to politics, one strategy is population growth equating to value proliferation, another is infection for utilization, and a third is hivemind colonization.

    Survival requires confrontation (genocide), adaptation (symbiosis), or resources applied to stagnation (equilibrium).
    Nature is agnostic to your moral conceits but as tactics for consensus amplification, they are tremendous survival protocols.

  • Theme:

    brute force solution

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    1–2 minutes

    Whether opening a pickle jar, debugging software, or growing your business, brute force is often the go-to move.
    You can apply more force, more hours, more power, more dollars, or more bullshit.
    This phase of problem-solving is when you are familiarizing yourself through practical experience — literally "feeling it out" — which grows into instinct and eventually begets elegant solutions.

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    The hidden third party

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    1–2 minutes

    We see things dualistically: us v them.
    Our interests (goals) are disrupted (blocked) by another, creating a conflict. This friction creates an invisible but powerful third object: the problem.
    We can choose to fight each other and empower "the problem" or ally against the problem by collaborating.

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    Picking up your toys and leaving

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    1–2 minutes

    In my family, we were taught that when people will not listen or change with you, you should take your better, wiser self away and play your own game your way. That’ll show em.
    While this preserves your integrity, leaving becomes limiting. How do you learn to charm, disarm or dominate if your go-to move is running away?

    Leaving isn’t a wrong move, but it is a crowbar, and it’s impossible to build a house with only demolition tools.

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    The wolves outside the door

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    1–2 minutes

    What if there is no wolf outside your door?
    What if the only wolves are inside with you?

    What if all of your external paranoia need not exist and no one outside actually cares one whit about your meager fiefdom?

    What if all of your problems and pain are caused by your own wolves tearing you apart from the inside?

    Tend to your own wolves, tend to your own wounds before looking outside of you for the cause of your problems.

  • Theme:

    Pissy problem solver

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    1–2 minutes

    I am always pissy until I solve a problem.
    This means I am perpetually annoyed because life is nothing but problems (challenges) I seek to exterminate. A healthier approach is to cohabitate with problems; accept instead of conquer.

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    Unhooking the problem solver solves problems

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    1–2 minutes

    The helpful problem solver in your head connects ideas, plans for the future, and draws conclusions from the past. Because it won’t shut up, we think the chatterbox is who we are, but that is our "small self."
    If you can ask yourself: "what is here now when there is no problem to solve?" you can relieve the problem solving and tune into greater awareness.