Some Canadian researchers have gained insight into the nature of self control, and I find their conclusions fascinating. In a nutshell what they have found is that as humans, our capacity for self control is limited and shallow.

These researchers concocted an experiment where they made the subjects watch animal snuff movies, and one group was told to control their expressions and emotions, and another group was not directed in any way. Afterwards they were given a rapid colour matching test that requires a controlled response. What these researchers found is that the group that were told to suppress their emotions did poorly on the test, compared to those who simply watched the movie.

Apparently though, self control is like a muscle, and we can be trained to get more of it. Just like running a marathon might make it hard for you to walk right after it, it will have a positive effect on your overall endurance.

The interesting thing about this study implies about consumerism and addiction. In the case of consumerism, it suggests that marketers should work harder to test the limits of self control, and put people in a state of "self-control fatigue", as such people will be more prone to impulse buys. This then means that we can expect even more tests of our self control to happen as marketers use this to their advantage. The question then becomes: will we become stronger from a constant overload of self-control tests, or weaker? Sure a runner who runs every day will become stronger. But how about a runner who is forced to run all day, every day?

In the case of addiction this has all kinds of interesting implications. It means that one can work on the general case of self control through simple, measurable exercises, and then use that to apply to the task of overcoming ones object of weakness. This seems like a much stronger, and much more sustainable policy of dealing with addition, rather then through some kind of zero-tolerance style.

Finally, if self control is workable like a muscle, it means that if you work on it daily, you can increase your leel of self control. This of course, takes self control! It's a win-win proposition. Maybe in the future, I'll bblog about tools I have found that help one in such a venture.

(Source: The Futurist)

Merlin Mann over on 43 folders has this great post on what can be called the Tale of two selves. The meat of this entry is that the unified self that we believe is responsible for our actions is an illusion. The self that might set goals like "I wont to work hard, be productive and buy a house." may be over-ridden by another self that is faced with the prospect of hard partying and instant gratification. We wander through life assuming that the 'I' is a stable rock that we can cling to, when there seems to be similar selves but with different motivations at different times. The same I that says "I am on a diet!" is not the same I that is buying the ice cream.

But this separation of selves is much more subtle then a distinct dumb-ass-instant-grat-self and the monocle-wearing-disciplined-self. Not only are the selves that we wear when at home, work, or the club are all different selves, but the selves that we present to our bosses and our team members are different. The same me that comes home from work is not really the same me that kisses my daughter "goodnight". So what happens when one self wants something, but the other does not? Which self wins? Which self should win? Which self is the real me? Which me should make the decisions?

Perhaps most illustrative of this whole concept of multiple selves, and more importantly, multiple selves in conflict is illustrated with a self-battle every day at around 5:30. I know I should be heading home, cause that is the optimal time to catch the train, go see my wife and daughter, but... just. One. More. Frag. (won't hurt). The me that is in the immersive game of Quake 3 wants to show these jerkbags what-for, but the other me wants to go home and see my family. On to of that, there is a background me that is avoiding going home, cause that means I'll have to deal with my other job sooner.


This is very deeply connected to the "50K feet", and "runway" views of your life that David Allen talks about. For those that don't know, the "Runway" is whats going on (and what needs to be done) right now. Then there are the views of your life, getting higher and higher. 10K feet being your current projects, 20K feet being the projects for this year, all the way up to 50K feet, which is your life's goal, your raison d'etre. The thing is, that you have to have a clear line between the runway and 50K feet. If your nose is pointed at the British Isles, but you want to go to Japan, then you're going to have to make an in-air turn, and that is going to be painful.

Now the first urge is to say "Well okay, lets turn this plane west, and be done with it.", which is to say, buckle down and get to reaching your goals. But if your nose is pointed East, but your goals are pointed West, which is out of sync? Do you need a course correction at a higher level or a lower level? In reality, two goals aren't quite so mutually exclusive. That being said, if my 50K feet goals are in sync with the selves-that-I-am-in-my-daily-life, then it is much easier to achieve them. But if you really feel that your life's work is to save the world, and you are cranking widgets from 9-5, then you have a problem. Maybe you need to reset your 50K view, and choose a different direction for your life, maybe you need to work toward quitting your job and figure out how to save the world instead, or perhaps you need to re-evaluate how the widget cranking is helping you to save the world.

I think that the crux of getting your selves to work together as a unified country, instead of a civil war is to start by extending lines down from the 50K view. To meet your goal of changing the world, you need to eventually boil that down to action steps and this process of boiling down your life's work means starting at your top, with things like retirement goals and the goals you have for the next 50 years, and working your way down the ladder to 20, 10, and 5 years, until you get down to where the rubber meets the road (or runway in this extended analogy). As you start this boiling down task, you might see goals that work their way upward. In fact, ideally, you will have a situation where some of your more immediate goals can start to fall in sync with the loftier goals as a person.

So when magicians are talking about their true-will, this is where they are going with it. To understand ones desires, from the base desires like,"ugh! want to have crazy-sex shoot big imaginary virtual guns at people and eat cookie dough ice cream!" all the way up to the lofty "I must save the world—no one else is." is to get at the heart of ones "true will".

Check out a few recent "the show"'s where Ze Frank talks about creativity trhough new perspectives and learning. Did you know he was a Neuroscientist?

The subject, seen as a whole, is of a man (representing me) lying on a barren plain before a wheatfield, with his head split open. The point of view is from the top of his head. The subject is then roughly divided into the left hand side of the picture, [with] the thoughts made in his head represented as a maze; and the right hand side, the view of the rest of his body. The hands and feet are seen through the eyes, nose and mouth, tapering off into the distance and the outside world.

THE MAZE [left-hand side of painting] An exitless one, it occupies and divides the inside of the cranium into groups of thoughts, the passageways being calculated to do the grouping. The white rat curled up in the central cavity represents my Spirit (I suppose). He is curled up with frustration from having run the passages so long without hope of escaping out of this maze of unhappy thoughts. They [the groups of thoughts] proceed as follows:-

Group I [top and top right]
Home upbringing: a) I, as a small boy, rejected by my school mates; b) my fear of school bullies and the ridicule of the school girls; c) my fear of being rejected by my father and losing the companionship, food, shelter and warmth of a home; d) my father's philosophy, the survival of the craftiest, pointed out by the plight of the foolish fish.

Group II [top left]
Political: a) my one time attachment to Ukrainian nationalism, which is a cry of anguish at the Ukraine being raped by Russia; b) my subsequent association with members of the Peace Movement, a Communist front organisation; c) the end result of over-zealous political leaning, WAR (my physical fear of it).

Group III [middle left]
Sexual: a) the merry-go-round string of rag dolls and wallflowers represent my lack of feeling and direction for dancing; b) the bull, dragging along his impediment and galloping towards the cow in heat, represents my fear of the animal side of sex in me.

Group IV [bottom left]
My social relations: choice between a) the hospital, with its ordeal of the panel (I in the test tube), interpreted in turn in two ways:
1) [below] as a benevolent conspiracy, or 2) [above] as a malevolent persecution: or b) the outside world - I continuing to be the outcast, skirting the smooth level highway of life in the ditch behind the hedge, sensitive to being seen in the light.

Group V [middle and bottom right]
Life and death: a) [middle right] Museum of Hopelessness being life and b) [below] the conveyor belt bearing the victim (me) inexorably to be crushed by the roller Death, I being one third there by the clock; c) [bottom right] the last picture is of me trying to convince myself that I am really mortal, using second hand information (the drawing) rather than examining the skeleton or coffin.

OUTSIDE WORLD [right-hand side of painting] Grasshoppers and drought (sun before the clouds) represent the mercilessness of Nature, which bankrupted my father, a farmer, and brought out of him the cornered beast. The thorny, stony ground is a kind of T.S. Eliot Wasteland - spiritual and cultural barrenness: the pile of excrement with flies on it represents my view of the world and the people that live on it. The loosened red ribbon [linking the 2 halves of the skull] bound together the head of a T.S. Eliot Hollow Man, and was untied by psychotherapy (Dr Cormier), but since the outside world is still unappealing, the rat remains inert. Before the head was opened, burrs (bitter experiences) choked the throat and pricked the sensitive underside of the tongue, and when it was opened the sawdust and shavings (tasteless education) spilled out from on top the tongue: mixed with the sawdust are symbols of (to me) equally tasteless Art, painting, literature and music. The burrs also represent, in the eye socket, the successive evaluations of my character by any friend during the process of acquaintance, all repellent but hopeful till the last, when the heart is discovered to be a grub. On the tongue and in the throat, the Kurelek family (big burrs produce little burrs), representing my father as the hard domineering blue burr opening up the mushy yellow burr, my mother, to release a common lot of burrs, my brothers and sisters, and one unique orange one - myself. The last burr, spearing culture, is I at the university. The inverted one is I as a child, trapped painfully between two aspects of my father, the one I hated and the one I worshipped.

-- Kurelek's Interpretation of "The Maze"

Here are a batch of links to some closeups of the overall picture:
Top of the Sull | Kicked Out | Beaten Up |
Crows Attacking the Lizard |
Conveyer Belt | Spikes | Test Tube |
Coffin and Death