The experimental mindset

Takeaways from a Neuroscientist's talk

I loved this idea of tiny experiments. It’s about running an experiment to understand whether you enjoy doing something or not. It is a way of thinking scientifically about our preferences and not giving up on ourselves while building a habit. I have always believed that social media is addictive and I can't even remember the number of times I have tried to change my habits around using linkedIn and instagram but I feel like I’ve finally found a narrative to comfortably leverage it to learn publicly rather than being swayed by the dopamine hits of engagement.

So I have decided to write for the next 30 week days, learnings that I'll share from content I come across, something I have learned in grad school or maybe projects I have worked on. I have tried building a habit of writing before but I kept giving up somehow or the other. This time it feels like I have a clear timeframe to stick to, so let's see.

#Day 1:

I watched this video by a neuroscientist on thinking about uncertainities. I have been a risk taker all my life and I think I am okay with not knowing. But everyone else around me is mostly risk averse, they influenced me to believe that it is not okay for me to not have everything figured out. I have to do something and get something for the sake of it. I tried half-heartedly, didn't succeed and it crushed my soul. It has been super hard. I just realised that it doesn't have to be this way. I can advocate for myself and I can push back and ask them for sometime to experiment and understand my preferences.

This video explains this way of building an experimental mindset in a very interesting way through the concept of liminal spaces, which are basically in between spaces. So whenever we are transitioning from one state to another like in my case, post graduation life. It is a time of uncertainity and it gives anxiety, because we are wired for safety and knowing what next. The good news is we can "choose" to see liminal spaces as duration of experimentation and figure out what we want to do instead of giving in to the pressure. We have the agency to change our perspective and not get influenced.

Moreover, when we aren't confident, we tend to take advise seriously, rather than critically ruminating over it. For example, the current phase has significantly affected how I feel about myself and lowered my confidence, I was also in close touch with the risk averse people, which is what made it harder to distance myself from this influence. So, we need to get the much needed space for our own sanity.

In the beginning of the talk she also talks about this idea of finding purpose, it can really be very misleading, I have been a victim of it. Believing that there is something out there that I am meant to do and it should magically come to me. Moreover, people who have found their purpose give vague advice as if one day they got up and had this epiphany that helped them know what they want to do for their rest of the life. It is quite not true. There are very few people doing the same set of things all their lives. Most of us keep experimenting and failing until they find something that they find comfortable working towards. Therefore, the author, Anne, suggests conducting tiny experiments, with a clear goal and duration. (taken from number of trials in research field) Duration is important so that we don't end up feeling like we have to indefinitely keep doing this. Once we have consistently worked towards this we can analyse the data and find out if we like doing this or not. Instead of working with our whims, moods and fantacies, this is a practical and data backed way of finding what we might like doing. So in short, finding our purpose is about experimenting with a lot of things and then analysing the data and figuring our what we enjoy doing. It is also a way of training our instincts/gut to discern our likes and dislikes. In an era of machine learning and model training, we forgot that’s how even we function.

Lastly, the video also discusses how lot of people give up on their hobbies thinking they always have to be consistent with it, but we can stop and start whenever we want. I have never started working towards a hobby because

a. I was always fearful of experimenting in public and fear of feeling embarrased if I don't stick to my promise.

b. I was aware that I haven’t had a good relationship with consistency but I also had a flawed idea of consistency, for me, it was doing it every single day without fail.

Sad, how we believe in such constructs and don't question our definitions. This prevents us from experimenting and learning about ourseleves and we are too ready to beat ourselves down and stop trying to learn to build a new hobby.

Takeaway: Building a discipline for experimental mindset. Trying out a new hobby with a clear timeframe in mind and then analysing the data to decide if I want to stick to it or not.

Here’s the talk I am talking about: