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Jan. 8, 2009 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
01:11:58
1250 The Draining Maze - A Listener Conversation

A listener talks about creative blocks in music writing, and losing motivation for his second university degree.

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Hello? Oh, that's better.
Okay. Good. Good, good.
So, what can I do for you?
Well, I'm not sure exactly where to start because it's been quite a few things.
Mainly I've been finding it difficult to make any progress with anything really at the moment.
Sorry, I'm just...
No problem, take your time.
Yeah. Well, it's...
Well, there's a...
Sorry, I'm really...
It's a bit difficult to...
Is it that you feel nervous or are you feeling strongly or is your mind blanking?
I just want to make sure I understand where you're starting from.
Yeah, my mind's just blanking a little now.
I am feeling a bit nervous.
Sure. Well, remember, this doesn't go anywhere.
This is just a conversation between you and I. Obviously, no details, if you don't mind.
And if you don't want to share it, we don't share it.
So don't worry. It's just you and me talking at the moment.
So don't feel like we're in an amphitheater or something.
Yeah, yeah, of course.
Well, it's...
I suppose a lot of it is...
Well, my position at the moment is that I was doing...
I was studying, well I still am, so I was studying mathematics at university and a couple of months ago I just suddenly wasn't able to get up for it or do the work and so I haven't got anywhere with that and I'm thinking of dropping it and maybe doing something else for a while Sorry to interrupt.
Did you post about this? I seem to remember.
Yeah, I have posted about it.
Okay, yeah, because I think I remember this topic, which is good, because it means that I've got some history, I suppose.
So you first posted about it a couple of months ago, if I remember rightly.
Yeah, I was just finding it difficult to Yeah, no problem.
So, has it changed at all substantially in the time since you posted and now?
Has it gotten better or worse or is it about the same?
As far as that goes, I'm a bit clearer now about things.
Before, I just thought it was down to some sort of laziness sort of thing.
I don't think that's the case now.
I think it might have something to do with my family stuff or something because...
What actually happened after that is that my parents kept phoning up repeatedly and trying to put pressure on me to get up for the stuff and go to lectures and try as hard as I can to get the work done and things.
And I found that a bit...
I didn't like it at all.
I found it They're starting getting quite a bit angry at me, and I think it's making it worse for me.
Right, right. No, I mean, I certainly understand that if you feel unmotivated, then having pressure put on you tends to deflate that.
Whatever remaining motivation, often it tends to deflate that even further, or is that not what you experienced?
Again, I don't want to put words in your mouth.
Yeah, that's what I found.
Okay. I'm sorry, go ahead.
Well, over Christmas, I was at home over Christmas, and I've talked to them about that, and they have apologized about it, because they've now said that they were being too harsh.
I mean, they've realized that it was making it worse rather than better.
That's good. I mean, that seems very positive.
I mean, we've all been in a situation where we want to affect the outcome of something.
It can be even as something as, not to trivialize it, but something as silly as watching a sports team.
You know, we tense up in our chair.
We want the goal to go in.
You know, whatever it is, right?
And sometimes we can, of course, overreact or react in a non-optimal way to put pressure on someone who's already feeling unmotivated.
So, you know, this is a...
To me, this is an entirely forgivable thing.
But again, I just wanted to put that...
It's a good thing that they're, in my opinion, that they're saying all of that.
But anyway, go on.
So you were talking about the conversations you were having at Christmas?
Yes, but they also...
Well, when I talked to my mother about it, she also made quite a lot of excuses for why she did it and saying it.
It was because I wasn't giving her the correct information.
I wasn't actually saying that I couldn't get up for it.
I was unmotivated or I didn't want to or I wasn't enjoying it enough and that sort of thing.
So I felt that somehow I was shifting a bit of the blame onto me.
Right. And that is, I mean...
Again, I think I understand what you mean, because those magic three words that are so tragically absent from some relationships, you know, tell me more, right?
Everyone thinks the magic words are I love you, and that's the conclusion.
But of course, when you say I'm unmotivated, I think it's the most useful thing for anyone to say.
Is, okay, well, tell me more.
Tell me more. As opposed to, well, it doesn't matter if you're unmotivated.
We won the Battle of Britain, so get out of bed.
Again, I'm just...
It's not the right generation, but you've just got to buckle down.
The stuff that sometimes we get, right?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's all a bit...
I don't know. I'm finding it quite difficult to work out what...
I think they were just saying sorry to...
because they wanted me to forgive them.
They wanted me to...
because afterwards I felt I was feeling a bit distant from them.
Right. Well, of course, the challenge is a little bit, and it's more my fault than yours, but the challenge is we're sort of starting at the end, if that makes any sense.
So do you mind if I do my annoying 50 questions about your history and all that kind of stuff?
Is that okay?
Yeah. I don't remember that you went into a lot of that on the board, so I'd just like to sort of, and if you did, sorry, if I can't remember, I'd just like to refresh myself on that.
No, I don't think I have talked a lot about it, or talked anything about it, really.
Okay, so if you could, I guess, do that, right?
A little bit about your history and what it was like growing up and so on.
Can you ask me some questions?
I find it easier to...
Sure, okay.
Are you an only child?
No, I've got two brothers.
I'm the middle one.
middle child, okay and would you say how would you describe your relationship with your parents from sort of early days I guess earliest days you can recall onwards I find it quite difficult to remember I've got I tend to be quite fairly...
I tend to be fairly close to...
To my parents, but I do remember quite...
I do remember a few things which weren't very pleasant.
I remember a long time ago I was teased a bit by my dad and my older brother, and I think when I was being...
I always found it particularly No, I always find it very painful when I was being told off.
If I did something wrong, I was never physically punished, but I tended to get...
Do you remember feeling really awful when I was being told off?
Because then when I sort of...
I think it...
It wasn't just continued afterwards in my head.
I think I understand what you mean, but of course it's important to be sure.
Can you think of an example, it doesn't matter if it's trivial or not, but of an example where this occurred?
I'm finding it really difficult to think of an example at all.
Okay, well, I'll keep asking questions and I'm sure we'll stumble across a nugget or a geyser.
When you were a child and you were being corrected in whatever manner was occurring, did you feel that you sort of understood the rules, the roles, the boundaries, and so on?
And again, understanding them as kids doesn't mean that we always obey them, but did you have a feeling that you knew what the parameters and the rules were?
Sometimes, but not always.
There were a few times where it was quite unexpected.
Right, okay. And when you were being...
And I'm trying to, again, I'm always hesitant to try and...
I always never want to put words in people's mouth, right?
But as you say, words are a little tough coming, so I'm going to put out a few tentacles and see if they strike anything useful.
And I'll just talk about my experience, and this is not to layer it on yours.
And again, this is all internet opinion time, right?
So this doesn't mean anything.
This is just my theory or my ideas or my experience.
But one of the things that I strongly remember about growing up in England was that I felt that when I did something wrong, I felt corrected very heavily on the moral side.
If this makes any sense.
Sorry, go ahead. Yes, actually, it does make sense.
I told it it was mostly wrong.
I'll give you an example.
This is just my experience.
Maybe yours was completely different.
I'm sure it was. I remember when I was in boarding school, there was a rule which was Don't climb this little fence between the boarding school and the sanatorium, which was where the sick children were sent.
And we were playing football, and the ball went over the fence.
And it was, I think, after classes or so.
There were no teachers around.
And we had known from experience you weren't allowed to go around the street to us.
So basically our football game was over for the day, and we'd just started.
And it was not a big fence, right?
I was, I think, six or seven years old.
So I climbed the fence, I got the ball, and I came back.
And I knew that I was breaking the rules, but the rules didn't really make any sense to me at the time.
And anyway, I was caught, and I was caned.
And the caning wasn't so bad, but what I found...
And again, this is just my experience, right?
But what I found to be a little bit soul-crushing was...
The lecture. And the lecture for me was literally like, even though I was six or seven years old, they said, younger children might emulate you and fall to their deaths.
You know, like it was so much, you know, it's like a climate fence, right?
I mean, I'm not leading children to their deaths.
Do you know what I mean? Like it was, it was, and this lecture went on and on about all of the dire consequences and Your mother works hard for your uniform, and if it rips, she has to pay for it, and the children that you're leading to possibly impale themselves, and, you know, respect for law, respect for order, civilized society, like, I fucking climbed a fence, you know?
Like, it was just, it was big relative to...
The thing that I had done, right?
Like I wasn't selling crack to babies.
That's sort of what I was, you know, I wasn't able to articulate it at that age.
But it felt very big to me, the lecture versus the actual transgression.
It's like, if you're going to lecture me about leading children to their deaths, what do you say to people who are actually leading their children to their death, right?
You know what I mean? Like, it was so big.
And again, that's just my experience.
I certainly don't want to layer that on yours, but that was where I sort of sensed that things might be for you, and you can tell me if this makes any sense or not.
Yeah, I don't think it was ever that extreme, I think.
Good! Yeah, it wasn't.
But I think I did, well, if I was being told off, it generally went on for quite a lot of time and you couldn't escape it.
Well, I suppose that's the way.
The way it always works is that you can't run away from these things.
What I remember is that even after it's finished, I remember it just...
I was a little upset and I remember that the things she said were sort of going on in my head for quite a long time afterwards.
And do you remember the things that she said that were going on?
Well, I think it...
I think it was...
I think I was told to sell selfish quite a bit.
I'm sorry, I don't know why I'm finding it so difficult to remember.
Well, there's three possibilities, right?
One is that it didn't happen, which I don't believe.
The second is that you simply can't remember.
And the third is you can remember, but you feel inhibited about talking about it.
Yeah, it's likely to be.
I don't know, I think I tend to get inhibited quite easily.
You tend to get? Inhibited quite easily, yes.
Well, you're British.
That's on the passport, right?
Okay, and can you think of instances where the word selfish was applied?
Well, I think that was tend to be...
Well, I think it's applied to a lot of things.
You know, if I did Sorry, I really can't think of a single thing at the moment.
That's totally fine. I can remember some of the emotions I went through, but not the actual things.
Okay, well, I mean, obviously the emotions to me would be the things that are more important than the events, right?
So why don't you talk about the feelings that occur during these times of transgressions and corrections and the aftermath?
Well, I think I actually...
I sort of...
I think I believed it quite a lot.
I actually felt, really.
I felt that I was being selfish and bad and that sort of thing.
And the feeling that resulted from that?
Again, I don't want to prompt you, right?
But I just know that this is a tough thing to articulate.
Yeah, I'm just trying to figure out how to explain it.
Well, I don't think you need to explain it, because that's the challenge you're facing, right?
I mean, you don't need to, you don't do whatever you want, but I think it would be most useful to tell me what you felt during and after these corrections.
Actually, I think I did feel a bit...
I felt I was being...
I felt it was a bit unfair.
I don't know, I can remember feeling rather a bit cheated, like it was.
But I think... Sorry.
No, no, it's no problem at all.
It's totally fine with me.
I mean, I'm just having a nice stroll in my study, so I'm getting my exercise in.
You're perfectly happy and perfectly happy to take your time.
And I'm also perfectly willing to ask questions with all due sensitivity to the fact that, you know, I don't want to lead you.
So we can wait for you to be able to summon the words, or I can just be annoying and keep asking questions.
It's totally up to you. I think I'd rather you keep asking questions.
Okay, sure, sure, okay.
Now, I will first of all give an opinion, and it is, of course, as usual, just the opinion of some guy on the internet.
I don't think it's particularly good to call children selfish.
I don't think that's very good parenting at all.
I'm not saying it's abusive or anything, I just don't think that's good parenting.
Right, because it is not, it's kind of an insult, right?
Like, we never say that someone is selfish, unless you're a complete Ayn Rand fanatic, if that means anything to you.
We never say that someone is selfish as a compliment, right?
Yeah. And so, I don't think that it's good to apply negative labels to a child's personality any more than it is to apply negative labels to...
An adult's personality, you can say about their choices or whatever, right?
I mean, assuming they haven't done egregious nastiness or whatever.
But I don't think it's good to apply pejorative labels to a child's personality.
And again, tell me if that's not correct.
But when someone says, you're selfish, they are applying a negative label to you.
It's like saying to a kid, you're a liar, rather than you told a lie, right?
Yeah, I think that's what it generally was.
If I did something wrong, it was made into my personality rather than just saying what I did.
Right, and this is all egregious violations of UPB. I don't know if that means anything to you or whether you know the theory.
Yeah, that makes sense.
Sorry, did you want to sort of say why or I can mention it?
It's totally up to you. Well, it's because of...
In saying that, they are going against what they're...
If it applied the same logic to them, then they would be selfish or they would be...
Well, yeah. I mean, selfish as a descriptor is saying you are acting without or with a negative regard to the feelings of others, right?
Yeah. And yet...
By applying this label to you, they are acting, I would say, without enough regard to your feelings, right?
Does that make sense?
Yes, that makes sense. I mean, you didn't like being called selfish, and so it's not a good thing to apply that label to a child.
It is selfish to call someone selfish, in my opinion.
Yeah. I mean, parent to child.
To call your child selfish. The other thing too, of course, is that the question then arises, as it always does in these kinds of situations, which is, you know, oh dear mama, if I really was selfish, then I wouldn't care if I was called selfish, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So it's... Like if someone says to me, Steph, you have no empathy...
Then I would only care about that if I had empathy.
It's a self-contradictory statement, a self-detonating statement, right?
Yeah, I see. Like if you really were selfish, didn't care about the feelings of others, you wouldn't feel bad for being called selfish.
It wouldn't work, right?
When someone says you're selfish, that only works because you're not, right?
Because you do care about the feelings of others, right?
Yeah. And that's another reason why it doesn't sort of fit.
Now, non-UPP compliant, of course, doesn't mean evil, right?
And we're talking about some delicacies of language here.
So again, I'm not trying to drive you off the cliff.
Oh, it's abusive. I'm just saying that to me, or in my opinion, this is not just or fair.
And I don't think it's kind to apply these labels to a child.
And it doesn't mean like, you know, and what you're talking about is a repetitive thing.
It's not like we say something and then we go, oh, sorry, you know, I didn't mean that or we come back and apologize.
But this seemed to be pretty consistent if I understand what you're saying.
Yeah, it was fairly consistent.
I don't think it's all that bad compared with...
The thing is, when I compare my childhood to other people's on FDR, I tend to find that mine still seems to come out favourably compared to most people's.
And I'm sure that's true, but of course the reality is that when you were a kid growing up, you didn't know about other people's childhoods on FDR or anywhere else, right?
You only had your own childhood to reference.
So I think it's important to be true to what you experienced as a child.
I know that there is a temptation to say, well, there are starving kids in India, blah, blah, blah, right?
But that doesn't actually help your direct childhood experience where that reference was not available to you, right?
Yeah, yeah, of course.
Sorry, go ahead. Yeah, it wasn't entirely negative either.
Sorry, what wasn't entirely negative?
Well, my childhood experience, I suppose.
Yes, and just because we're focusing on these problems doesn't mean that I'm trying to paint the whole thing with a black brush.
If you go to the doctor and you say my elbow hurts, and he focuses on your elbow, that makes sense.
We don't focus on the things that are working, so we're going to focus on the things that may have had some influence into your lassitude or problems with your university education.
Yeah. Now, another thing that occurs, in my opinion, or in my experience, when we label a child And particularly when we label a child or when we apply negative statements to a child in totality, in personality rather than in specific action with reference to whatever, right?
Rules or better ways of doing things.
Then what happens is it becomes hard for the child to internalize cause and effect, to internalize choice.
Because if you say to a child, you know, lying is not good and here's why, and you can, you know, it's a 360 review.
You can also, you know, if I'm a parent and I don't tell the truth, you can call me on it.
And so when we sort of go through that, then what happens is children internalize, at least this is the theory, right?
I hope to have it work out in practice.
But children internalize not the punishments but the rules, right?
And not the rules like, this is what you do, you know, just because I say so.
But they internalize the rules like, this is good behavior and here's why.
And we also, I think, want to say to the child...
Lying is bad for you because it's a tough thing to sustain.
It gets very complicated and then you're afraid of being caught out and it's almost always better to, you know, just fess up and, you know, whatever.
And of course, you know, it's easier to do that in a situation where there's not, you know, bad punishment or whatever, right?
So it's around basically appealing to the child's self-interest and desire for happiness and, you know, sort of greed for joy and so on, right?
So that the child can...
Internalize rules that will benefit him or her rather than bad consequences result from this action, from these people.
Because what that does is it turns children, and I'm using absolute statements here with all the caveats, right?
But it turns children into navigators of punishment and reward rather than internalizers of beneficial rules for living.
Yeah, I think that's appropriate because I think I remember more.
I'm sorry? Oh, did we just lose you?
Hello? Oh, I've lost your audio.
Are you back? Are you there?
Can you hear? Hello, testing one, two, three.
Hello, can you hear me now?
Yes, that's fine, that's fine.
We get these sometimes from Skype, no problem.
Okay, that wasn't me then.
So, yeah, sorry, I was just talking about how children can become navigators of punishments and rewards of the good or bad opinion of other people rather than internalizers of rules for their own benefit.
Yeah, I can still hear you.
Okay, good, good. You can just tell me what your response was to that.
I'm sure we can pick it up again. Yeah, that does make sense to me because I remember trying to navigate, yeah, as you said.
Also, my parents weren't always consistent and And when they got angry.
Sure, and to...
I'm so sorry, please.
How rude of me. Please, sorry, say that again.
I'll shut up, I promise. It sort of had a lot to do with their mood at the time.
Right. So if they were in a bad mood, they got angry with everyone, pretty much.
Right. And in the absence of rules, that's inevitable, right?
Like, in the absence of...
In the absence of, you know, clear objective rules, which of course your parents aren't philosophers, right?
I mean, they're not going to sit and invent those things, right?
They're going to do a lot of, like a lot of parents do, seat of the pants kind of stuff and so on.
But in the absence of rules, we are left with moods, right?
I mean, that's sort of inevitable, if that makes sense.
But the problem is that the moods become the rules, right?
But the moods keep changing, therefore the rules are not objective, therefore...
And then what happens is...
Because the punishments and the rewards become harder to predict, children tend to spend even more time focusing on the social or emotional cues that are around them, right?
If that makes sense. Yeah.
Yeah, that does, yeah. Okay.
Now, I'm perfectly happy if you want to talk about anything else to do with your childhood, but I'd like to hit a massive catapult fast-forward and talk about university, but that's entirely dependent upon whether there's anything that you wanted to add about the stuff we're talking about here.
No, that's... That's fine, I think.
Okay. So what happens in life, and this is obvious, and obviously you're a very intelligent fellow, so I apologize for the obviousness of it.
But what happens in life is external cues as to what we should do, the right or wrong thing to do, so to speak.
External cues diminish over time.
So if you're six and your parents get mad or whatever, that's a very big deal and that has a very big effect on you and it gives you kind of something to navigate.
And what you're navigating might be a bit of a maze, but at least you can navigate it because the cues are strong, right?
Approval, disapproval, and so on, right?
Yeah. Now, as you grow up into your teen years, what happens is Those social cues that come from your family, which may result from...
I think in your situation it results from having more punishment than rules.
Because if a child internalizes a rule, they don't need the social cues nearly as much, right?
So if the child understands, say, lying is bad for you and it's confusing and it makes you unhappy and it's stressful and blah blah blah, Then that's internalized, right?
The child may still need external feedback and guidance and so on, right?
They may even need negative consequences, right?
As long as they're understood within the context of, you know, the reasonable rule, right?
But the child has internalized that rule and the child will then use that rule for, you know, hopefully the rest of his or her life, right?
But it doesn't diminish because it's internalized, if that makes any sense.
Yeah, yeah.
Now, on the other hand, though, if you are reading social cues, rather than – and again, I'm using absolutes, and I'm not saying it's either one or the other, but we're just using these two poles.
If you read social cues, and that's your navigation as to good, bad, right, wrong, appropriate, inappropriate, whatever, those social cues diminish over time.
That's why it's effective in the short run, so to speak, because it will bring compliance.
But unfortunately – It leaves the child pretty deficient in terms of life skills for adulthood, right?
Because in adulthood, people don't care that much, right?
I mean, your professors don't care if you show up for class.
I mean, they do, but not the degree to which your parents did when you were seven or whatever, right?
Your friends don't care if you graduate or not.
And again, I'm using an extreme way of putting it, but again, not compared to your parents getting involved with your behavior when you were younger, right?
Yeah. I mean, your potential employer doesn't care if you apply for the job or not because he doesn't even know if you don't, right?
Your landlord doesn't care whether you're having a good or bad day.
Neither does the visa company or the...
Right? So the problem is that if we are, in a sense, propped up No, that's a bad metaphor.
If we spend quite a bit of time as children navigating the maze of good and bad feedback from people around us, what happens is that maze, those maze walls, drain away into the ground as we get older.
And we actually have to make decisions for ourselves, but without reference to the maze, we kind of don't know what to do.
Because we haven't internalized, we don't have a compass, right?
We just navigate a maze that keeps changing and that's our occupation.
But we don't have a compass and we don't have a map with which we can plot our own lives because what we've been doing is responding to positive and negative social cues around us rather than developing our own inner compass and cartography.
Yeah. Now that's a speech which may be pure nonsense but I just wanted to know whether that makes any sense to you.
Yeah, that does make sense.
It seems to fit. It's a good theory.
Okay. Now, is there something you wanted to add to that?
Because I wanted to put just a tad more icing on the cake.
No, I don't think so.
I've got... I forgot to mention it before, but I was home-educated for quite a bit of time, throughout the secondary school age.
I think that might have been just...
Sorry, can you just do a cross-pond translation?
What is post-secondary and colony terms?
Oh yeah, sorry. You know, for an age is...
12 to 11, 16, you know.
And then you went back for the last year or two of...
Yeah, I don't know how relevant that is, but it probably means I've had a lot more contact with my parents.
Okay, okay, now that's good.
Now, was it your mother, does it remember rightly, that she was doing the home education?
Yeah. Well, yeah, mostly.
My father helped with a few things.
Right. And your mother, when she would teach you stuff, how would she deal with the challenges of right answer, wrong answer, did your homework, didn't do your homework, and that kind of stuff?
How is that a challenge of involvement and engagement dealt with?
Um, it was a...
Well, there weren't any personal criticisms for getting stuff wrong or doing stuff badly most of the time.
I'm sorry, could you just repeat that last statement?
Yeah, no, I can't. Sorry.
No, there wasn't any personal criticisms if I did the work badly, I don't think.
But I suppose there were...
Yeah, mostly it was okay mostly.
Just trying to...
Okay, and that's fine.
And what was your motivation like when you were studying at home?
And we're not picking on studying at home.
I just want to make sure I understand this phase because it's a little different from the usual.
Yeah, yeah. It was...
Sometimes I was...
We used to be motivated, but a lot of the time I wasn't particularly...
I don't know, I'm trying...
Yeah, I think I felt more...
I suppose it does add a bit of a personal element to it, you know, who you feel you should be getting on for.
So working half of the reasons because you do gain respect from your parents, I suppose, rather than...
Yeah, so I don't...
Yeah, it was a...
Sorry, I'm... No, that's totally fine.
That's totally fine. Would you say...
Yeah, would you say that if you would think about your mother's teaching styles and motivations when she was teaching you at home, and we'll just talk about your mom.
I know your dad was in there, too, and we can talk about that, too, if that's useful.
Would you say that her goal was to...
Give you knowledge or to give you a joy of learning or was it some mixture?
Because those two things are quite different in many ways, right?
One is kind of passive, like she's pouring knowledge into you like water into a bucket.
And the other is, again, more around the internal motivation and desire for learning.
I think it's mostly giving to give knowledge, but I think it's a bit of both.
I'm... And the reason I'm asking these questions, and I'm trying not to be leading, and obviously your experience trumps any nonsense theories that I have, but what I'm trying to do is figure out why you feel absent from your own education in university.
Because what I get a sense of when you talk about, and I remember this from your post on the board, and tell me again if I've completely got my head out of my armpit, but what I get a sense is that you feel very dissociated or separate from your own education.
Yeah. Right?
So it's almost not like you want a maths degree and you want to be an engineer or an astronaut or a maths teacher or whatever it is that would go from after that.
I don't get the sense that it's you, your desire, that...
Because if it was your desire, you would be doing it like a hobby, right?
Yeah, yeah, I find it so.
So there's some...
Well, my interest in the subject was greater before, you know, I had...
Well, yeah, yeah, yeah, it sort of...
Yeah, it sort of changes it when you're studying it.
Well, it can. It doesn't have to, right?
I mean, I studied history and philosophy at the grad school level and...
It was fantastic.
Yeah, I had teachers who were, you know, I thought not particularly optimal.
In fact, almost all of them.
But the point was that I got to do amazing work.
I got a little desk in the library.
I, you know, I could stay up all night reading philosophy and feel that I was actually achieving something, which in hindsight, I guess I was.
But because I have this lifelong love of philosophy and rationality and to a smaller degree science and economics and all that kind of stuff.
And so that's my pleasure.
That's my desire. Even when I was working full time, before I did FDR, I'd listen to audio books on philosophy and psychology and economics and politics and blah, blah, blah.
In my car when I was commuting.
And so that was sort of a strong desire that I had to pursue that knowledge.
And even in the face of not great teaching at the university level, the fire still burned within me too.
And of course I had no productive goals with this whatsoever, right?
It was just that was knowledge for the joy of learning and studying.
But that's not what you're experiencing, right?
In fact, it seems almost quite the opposite of what you're experiencing, right?
Yeah, yeah. It was a bit of that.
It was okay right at the beginning, but then it's quickly all sort of the passion for it disappeared quite quickly.
Okay, and was this a passion that you had as a teenager as well?
Yeah, it's always been an interest of mine.
Actually, before doing a maths degree, I was doing a music degree before that, which was, I suppose music was more of my passion, generally for Excellent.
If you just make sure to hold off the really important information until we're about a half hour into the call, that would be excellent.
Oh, sorry. I'm just kidding. Sorry.
That's fine. Okay, so maybe that's something that's worth looking at.
Perhaps you could tell me a little more about music and what swapped you out of it and what changed and so on.
Well, I stopped doing...
Well, I suppose I got to the stage and then...
I suppose it's really a creative block which stopped me being able to continue the music degree.
The area of music I was most interested in is composition.
And I found it just impossible to write anything, even just engrave a sheet of paper.
I found that impossible.
Right. Sorry, there was not a creative block in that you had some ease and facility with composition before, and then did it suddenly stop or did it slowly stop?
And how long did it stop for before you hit the eject button?
It was quite a gradual stopping, actually.
I think I've always had a...
I've never found the creative process to be that free, absolutely.
I've always found that I can only do it some days and not other days.
I think it gradually got worse until I had quite an emotional reaction to writing.
Oh yeah, no, I can totally understand that.
I mean, creative blocks are just sheer agony.
I mean, I'd rather be constipated with a bowling ball, so I really do understand that.
And how long did this creative block last?
Um... It's been a couple of years, really.
Right. And, sorry, has it been a couple of years that you've been trying to but failing, or have you been unable to?
Failing is probably the wrong word.
Recently, I just haven't been trying.
Right, right. Okay, so I'm like, my bother, right?
Yeah. Before I was trying a bit, but then, you know, I didn't have much, I suppose I don't have much reason to try one.
As soon as I write something down, I feel a lot worse, so that puts you off trying.
So, okay, so it's not that you can't put anything down, or at least what you just said there was that you can put something down, but then you feel worse afterwards?
Yeah, but I usually didn't even get to the stage of putting something down, just thinking about the ideas.
And why do you feel worse afterwards?
And what is the feeling?
And I don't want to lead you again, but is it...
No, go ahead, go ahead. If you've got the words, I won't ask my annoying questions.
Well, I think I felt that...
I felt...
I was being completely overly critical of myself, so I sort of took...
You know, if I write something down and then...
Even though it's still work in progress, or it's not even work in progress, it's just an idea, then I felt that it was really...
I get sort of emotional...
I reject it emotionally, and I feel bad about...
You feel like it's trapped, is that right?
Yeah, yeah. Again, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but having gone through...
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I wasn't being a bit...
So you write it down and it's like, you know, this is what, do re mi?
This is like derivative garbage.
What is it that, what is the language that occurs for you when you look and what is the feeling?
I mean, is it disgust?
Is it hatred? Is it indifference?
Is it boredom? I mean, it's got to be something negative, right?
Because otherwise you wouldn't... I think it's sort of disgust.
I don't just feel that what I've written is rubbish.
I feel that I'm rubbish because of that.
Aha. All right.
Did you hear what you were just saying there?
Yeah. Yeah, that's similar to the...
To what I was being told of, you know, it's not just I've done something bad, it's that I am bad, yeah.
Okay, go on.
Because I know you're like, I'm reciting back this rote argument.
Well, I guess it's similar too, right?
But tell me what... Because the action is not the person, right?
Yeah. But so if you do something that's not creative, it doesn't mean you're not creative.
It just means you did something that wasn't creative, right?
And of course the problem is that if you leap, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, right?
So if I say, if I'm writing music and I say, this is crap, right?
Then I don't continue to write music and therefore I don't gain the additional skills to make it better, right?
If I run around the block and I'm tired and I say, well, I'm so out of shape, I'll never win a marathon or I'll never even run a marathon or I'll never even run twice around the block, then I stop running and it becomes true, right?
Yeah, and of course, if you're only writing a tiny bit down, then the chance of it being good is really low anyway, because anyone who's creative, it's only about the 1% which is good. it's only about the 1% which is good.
Right, and even to get to that 1%, you have to put in thousands of hours of churning out crap, right?
I mean, even Mozart's considered the stone genius of the musical world because he was writing some crap stuff at the age of 5.
It wasn't until his mid-twenties that he began to produce his really stellar work, right?
Thousands and thousands of hours.
And this is true of rock bands, it's true of writers, it's true of sports people.
They have to, and you might want to read this book, in fact, it strongly suggests you do, called Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, where he makes the argument.
He says he was in a music school and they did some statistical analysis and they found that, like they put the pianists into three categories, right?
There was the top tier who could be concert pianists, there was the second tier Who could be pianists, you know, in an orchestra or whatever, jazz pianists.
And then there was the third tier of people who were pretty much going to end up being music teachers, right?
And what they found was that these tiers of ability were entirely differentiated or almost exclusive.
Actually, no, it was exclusively differentiated by the number of hours of practice.
In other words, if you did 10,000 hours, you were concert pianist.
Like... No kidding.
No one did 10,000 hours and wasn't that good, right?
Now, if you only did 4,000 hours, you were like music teacher guy, and there was no one who did 4,000 hours who was in a higher tier, and I think it was 8,000 hours with the middle groups, right?
Yeah. So it's not ability, right?
They did the same thing with chess masters, right?
10,000 hours gets you to grandmaster, and there's no one who did grandmaster who didn't do 10,000 hours And there was no one who did 10,000 hours who wasn't a grandmaster, right?
Except one, I think Bobby Fischer was 500 hours short.
That's what Stone Genius can get you, is a 5% reduction in the amount of work you have to do, right?
So there is just a certain amount of just teeth-gritting repetition that occurs in the mastery of anything, right?
So if you say, well, it's crap and you don't do the practice that's going to make it be less crap to eventually good, to eventually great, if you just power through that, then it becomes true, right, if that makes sense.
Yeah, yeah.
Sorry, this is all stuff you know, so I just sort of wanted to… No, no, I didn't realise quite how much that was.
In case I thought there was more to have natural ability.
Sorry, he used to be annoying again, but he does an analysis of the Beatles.
And the Beatles, when they went to Hamburg, spent a year playing eight hours a day.
Seven days a week, right?
Because they were in a bar, then they would play from like I don't know, like 6 p.m.
to 2 a.m.
or whatever it was. And like with almost no breaks, right?
And that, I can't remember, a year, year and a half or something like that.
And that added up to this magical 10,000 hours, right?
There just seems to be around this 10,000 hours that you begin to have breakthroughs.
And I certainly can say that my own writing, such as it is, both in the creative and the fiction and the non-fiction spheres, was...
You know, crap for a long time and then became a little less crap.
And then, you know, when I was in my second year of theatre school, I began to write some good stuff, right?
But this was after thousands of hours of practice, right?
And it's the same is true with philosophy, that I only became even reasonable, to the degree which I am reasonably original, that only occurred in my mid to late 30s after 20 years of studying philosophy.
So... You know, there's just a certain amount of grim, grit-your-teeth repetition that is necessary to become really good at anything like language or music or anything.
So this is sort of what I want.
Again, I just wanted to sort of emphasize that, that this seems to be a pretty universal phenomenon from sports to music to anything.
So the avoidance is you don't avoid it because you're not good.
You're not good because you don't avoid it.
And this is assuming that you're not good.
I'm not saying you are or aren't, but we're just working with your opinion, right?
Yeah, well, I don't actually know how good I am anymore.
Well, unfortunately, you have an opinion about how good you are, right?
Yeah, but that's not a conscious opinion.
It's more of an emotional opinion.
Right, so the interesting thing...
Let me just put out two poles of perspective here, two opposites of perspective.
Right? And see if this makes sense.
I'm not going to talk about your childhood because I just want to talk about the blocks that are occurring for you right now.
We can certainly talk about your childhood if you want, but let's just look at what's going on right now.
Because this is the logjam that needs to be detonated, right?
So on the one hand, you're taking things entirely too personally, and on the other hand, you're not taking them personally enough.
How's that for a Gordian not for you?
Okay, I'm done. Bye. Okay, go on.
Okay, so for instance, when you take things too personally, it's because you are identifying your personality with what you sketch on a piece of paper.
Right? This composition is crap, therefore I'm crap.
That's too personal, right?
Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes sense, yeah.
On the other hand, you feel, as we talked about earlier, distanced and alienated from your studies.
In other words, you don't own mathematics within you.
It's become like a sentence, like a death march, right?
And this is not uncommon, right?
When we have a distortion in our personality, it's both extremes which get affected, right?
Like, if we take things too personally here, we will take them less personally here, or somewhere else, right?
And we have these two poles of music and math, and it's good that you stayed in the M's, you know, for rhyme schemes.
But you have this thing with music where you're crap if what you put down you believe is crap, which is too personal, and on the other one you feel dissociated and alienated from the goal or the desire for mathematics, which means that you don't feel that it's personal for you, if that makes sense.
Yeah, yeah. So just switch those and we're good to go.
Just kidding. See the wires?
There's a blue wire and a red wire in the back of your head.
Now, obviously there's no magical and simple solution to this, right?
Except to say the following.
And hopefully this will, I don't know, motivate or make some sense and let me know if it does or doesn't.
Which is that... There are no social cues for you anymore.
There is no approval or disapproval.
There's no good or bad that is outside yourself that you can navigate by.
The walls of the maze have melted away, and you stand in a plane of your own creation now.
And although you seem to have imbibed, and it seems to me to make perfect sense, you have imbibed the habit of looking around yourself for social cues for approval and disapproval, You have catapulted past the time where that is going to have any utility for you whatsoever, and now it is only going to have disutility.
It's going to be negatively useful, right?
Actively unuseful, is sort of what I'm saying.
And you don't have to do mathematics.
You don't have to do music.
You don't have to see your parents.
You don't have to not see your parents.
You don't have to keep your friends. You don't have to drop your friends.
The cues, the maze has drained away, and you stand in a desert of possibility.
Where you can go in any direction that you want.
But now, what you need to do, in my opinion, is try to refocus your sensitivity, your antennae, to that which is useful or productive or approved of or good or, you know, well, mathematics is practical and whatever, right?
You need to go away from those cues and start to look at what it is that you want to do with your life, if you could do anything with your life.
And of course, you're young and brilliant, so you can do anything that you want with your life.
But you need to do two things, in my opinion.
One thing is you need to start to figure out the genesis of this focus on external cues, how it came about within you, and you can do that.
Obviously, with the help of a therapist, since you're in school, to me, would be ideal and essential.
Maybe it has something to do with your parents.
Maybe it's a peer group. Maybe it's teachers.
Maybe it's something else completely.
I mean, I don't know, right?
I mean, there's some evidence around parents, but, you know, this is something to work on with a therapist and with journaling and so on.
That's the first thing. Now, that's the cues that you have absorbed or imbibed from outside your environment.
And those are the least dangerous cues that you're responding to.
Because the most dangerous cues that you're responding to at the moment are your internal cues, right?
Yeah. So tell me what that means to you.
Because I want to make sure we're on the same page, right?
Okay. Oh, you're regretting saying yes now, aren't you?
Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know this was going to be on the test.
I'll pay attention now.
Well, what I mean is that you have these internal cues like this is good, this is bad, right?
Yeah. This is crap music, this is whatever, right?
Those are not helpful, right?
Yeah. Now, saying they're not helpful doesn't help you, right?
And you can look for podcasts on self-criticism.
There's some really great listeners who dove in to some pretty ferocious self-criticisms, right?
Confronting the inner critic, right?
Which is very important. Inner critics are good, right?
This is called a conscience, but we want them to be counselors, not dictators, right?
Which is true for any part of the personality, right?
So it's good to have an inner critic, because we don't want to be like no-conscience people, right?
But it's not good to have an inner dictator, because then you end up just Feeling like a slave in your own skin, right?
Like, I can't do this because I'm not creative, and then if I try to be creative, I get mad at myself, and I feel that I'm crapping, right?
That's not freedom, right?
That's just saying, I don't feel comfortable without strong external cues, so I'm going to manufacture internal cues, and then I'm going to organize my life based on the avoidance or pursuit of self-approval or self-rejection, right?
It's internalizing something that happened earlier because that's all you know how to do.
And again, I'm using extreme terms, right?
But this is just for emphasis, right?
Is that self-generated, desire-based, happiness-based, goal-based, hobby-based behavior doesn't seem to be a strong component within you.
And we know that because...
Of some aspects of your history, of the self-attacks that you launch into with regards to music, and also because you don't feel that you own the degree that you're on.
It has become something that is imposed, right?
Rather than something that you have internally generated and wish to pursue of your own volition.
And when we do that, it doesn't mean that it becomes magically easy, right?
There is always still challenges to overcome and so on, but the internal drive remains constant, right?
Hmm. Yeah.
And so I think that if you did not have internal cues, these internal cues sort of mean this inner dictator of like, this is crap, this is great, or whatever, I think that would be very anxiety-producing or provoking for you.
Like, if you didn't have to have anything that you needed to do, which is really the truth in life, and we don't even have to get out of bed, we don't have to eat, we don't have to do anything, right?
Yeah, this is what I've been finding when I've been trying to sort of, because I have been thinking, telling myself that I don't actually have to do anything in these situations, and I end up sometimes just doing nothing and all, you know, lying in bed and only getting out in the evening to eat and, you know, quite extreme stuff.
Right, okay, and obviously, and to me, again, people say, oh my god, well that's no good then, right?
I'm not one of those people.
I mean, to me, lying in bed all day, perfectly fine.
Perfectly fine, right?
To me. People say, oh my god, but he's going to blow his exam.
It's like, well, so what? Right?
So what? I mean, you don't want to get a degree in something that you dislike, because what a waste of time that would be, right?
Yeah, but I'm not going any other direction, though.
Well, that I don't agree with, right?
I mean, to me, it's fine.
Like, you know, lie in bed or whatever, right?
But I think that, obviously, that is not a path that's going to lead you to happiness in the long run, right?
I mean, you know, bed rest is fine when you've lost a limb or whatever, right?
But clearly this is not going to lead you to long-term happiness, right?
Now, it's important that you feel this lassitude and allow yourself to experience it.
I think it's essential to talk about it with a therapist.
But I guess the essential question is why mathematics?
I mean, you said you enjoyed it when you were younger, but what was the goal?
goal?
What was the purpose?
How was the mathematics degree going to add to your happiness in life in the long term?
Well, I thought it would be a good idea since I couldn't do that.
I thought if I did a degree which wasn't music, then that might help me get out of the block and...
Sorry, what does that mean?
Well, I thought the creative block I had might have been caused by studying it, so if I was studying a different degree, then I thought that would help the block, and then I would end up with a A good mathematics degree is a very respectable degree, so I could now open up all sorts of possibilities.
Like what? Well, as far as careers, I suppose.
Well, sure, but like what? I don't know.
I don't think I really thought that far ahead.
So there's a bit of a problem here, right?
Yeah. Because you also have a contradictory thing, right?
So you're saying, okay, well, I'll do mathematics to help my music, but maybe it'll lead me to accountancy.
Yeah, but I didn't see anything wrong with that since lots of musicians, lots of, you know, some of the greatest musicians are not musicians by profession.
Well, sure, but I bet you they actually write music, right?
Yeah. Because that's the problem, right?
Hmm. Yeah.
So this is sort of like a weigh station or a recharging station, which also may lead you to a destination that you're not really that sure about, right?
Because it's not like you said, well, my next favorite thing is to be an accountant, right?
So mathematics will lead me to CPA, to whatever, right?
No, yeah, I didn't really...
I don't have much desire to go into those sorts of jobs.
Right, stockbroker or whatever it is, I don't know, engineer, whatever it is.
They sound very dull to me.
Right, right.
So does it make a little more sense why your motivation is flagging a little?
Yes, that does make sense.
It's not part of a bigger picture, right?
Yeah, yeah. It's like you can tread water for so long and your legs get tired, right?
It's like, well, shouldn't we swim somewhere, right?
Yeah, I think I was more out of worrying about doing nothing, I suppose.
I wanted to be doing something.
Right. It's not always the best solution, right?
Yeah, yeah. Because action for the sake of action, without it being part of a larger picture, will often lead us to greater self-doubt and inaction, which is, I think, what you're facing at the moment, right?
Yeah. Okay, okay.
But now the problem is I'm finding it difficult to do things which I think will lead somewhere.
Like, I want to start getting some therapy and I'm feeling very...
Well, I should have been doing this ages ago and sorting it out.
Oh man, so now you're also criticising yourself for not doing therapy earlier, right?
Oh man, that's good.
It's good, you've got quite the critic.
Yeah. So is it that, you know, now I should be doing therapy, but you're not doing it because you should have been doing it before, which causes you to do it even later?
Is that the logic behind this approach?
No, I don't think there's any logic.
Oh, there's logic. There's logic, right?
And the logic is that you are consistently put in situations where you're not enthusiastic, right?
This is the pattern, right?
Yeah. Right, you're not enthusiastic about therapy because you should have been doing it earlier.
You're not enthusiastic about...
Maths because you don't know where it's going to go and where it does seem to go, you don't even want to go, right?
And you're not enthusiastic about music because it leads to a creative block and self attack and so on, right?
So the problem is, I think, fundamentally around enthusiasm.
Is that fair to say?
Yeah, that is fair to say.
And you will never ever get enthusiasm, in my opinion, you will never ever get enthusiasm if you are either pursuing or avoiding pain or pleasure.
Whether it's your internal critic or external positive and negative validation, those are the opposite of being enthusiastic about something.
Enthusiasm is an authentic self-generated state of your own joy and happiness, right?
And that's perfectly sustainable.
And it doesn't mean you do the same thing.
I used to be really enthusiastic about computers and programming and business, and now I'm more enthusiastic about...
I don't know, philosophy and media attacks or whatever, right?
But it does mean that you will be in a state where those transitions will be navigatable and you'll be in that dance with your own unconscious where you sort of give a little give and take, right?
Because, you know, if you don't ask yourself and are curious about what it is that you want, then you won't ever get that answer.
You'll end up imposing these rules on yourself, which will forever drain, in my opinion, your capacity for enthusiasm, right?
And you'll end up feeling like you're constantly propping up a tent, a big tent where the poles keep breaking, right?
And that's your life, right?
Yeah. Right. Yeah,
will help you to peel away from the fear of punishment and the desire for reward and more towards spontaneous generation of authentic personal goals.
Yeah, yeah.
And what do you think now?
I don't have that much more to add at the moment, and I know we've been talking for a while, so I just wanted to know what you felt about the conversation, useful, not useful, helpful, not helpful, anything I could have done better or differently?
Hmm. No, it's definitely been useful.
I just needed...
I needed things to be a bit more...
to clear things up, because that...
Has that been achieved to some degree?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it has.
Before I was thinking, I just wasn't understanding why I wasn't getting anywhere.
Right, right, right.
And will you call a therapist?
Now's the perfect time, because you get it cheap in school, right?
Yeah, yeah, it should be.
I'm not...
I'm probably going to be I don't know.
I think I'd be dropping the university, though, for the time being.
Because I don't think it's getting me anywhere, and I don't think there's any good use of staying in.
And obviously, that's a personal decision.
I would talk about it with a therapist first, even if it's just a couple of sessions.
Oh, okay. Yeah. Because, you know, you made big decisions without that process, which have proven suboptimal.
And so making another decision in the absence of that process, to me, would be courting the same problem.
And I don't know, because, I mean, there's no way for anyone else to know if that's the right or wrong decision.
But I definitely would make sure that you're not doing it as another way of avoiding the punishment of a lack of ambition or a lack of desire for it, if that makes sense.
Yeah. So do you think I should also hold off making any decisions about what to do with my...
Oh, absolutely, yeah.
I mean, nobody should make any decisions about family, positive, negative, or otherwise, without talking, in my opinion, without talking to therapists extensively on the issues, right?
So, yes, absolutely.
I mean, I would not go off in a new direction until I got some clarity with these issues, right?
Because they're a challenge for you, right?
I mean... It's not like, you know, my parents sold me into Muslim slavery and, you know, like, it's not like there's not any clear, obvious things that are striking, so to speak, that say, ah, this is why, right?
And sometimes there are, and in this case, there are subtle trends which may or may not be, you know, who knows, right?
So given the subtlety of the issues...
Which is not to say that there's not suffering there to whatever degree there is, but given the subtlety of the issues or if the issues aren't subtle, your challenge in getting to the feelings or the history, I would say, because you said, well, I said, well, can you give me examples of these kinds of parental criticisms?
And you a couple of times couldn't remember them, right?
I would say that until you can access that kind of stuff, for better or for worse, I would say that it's important to not make decisions because I don't think you're rooted in a clear understanding of what happened to you in the past and what influence it may have had in where you are.
Yeah, thanks.
That makes me feel a bit relieved because I was concerned you were trying to push me to make decisions.
No, I hope that I, I mean, I try always not to say to people, I hope I haven't told you what to do.
I mean, I hope, because it's pointless.
No, no, absolutely not.
I mean, without reference, without a deeper and more thorough understanding of your history, both external and internal, no, absolutely not.
I would not make decisions right now in the absence of getting greater understanding about these issues.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, thanks.
Good, good. Well, I'm glad we got that clear, that's for sure.
So, you will, again.
This is the only thing I am telling you to do, which is to make the call with the therapist, so I'm sorry to be annoying about it.
There's one exception, right? The UPP guy with his one exception.
But I think that is an essential thing to do, to make sure that, you know, get a map, get a compass, and that way you know wherever you're going next is going to be something sustainable.
Yeah. I've been a bit, as far as therapy, I've been a bit confused about different types.
Does it matter what type?
I think, you know, I mean, rational cognitive emotional therapy, I mean, is the one that I'm the most familiar with, but...
The more important than the school is the person, right?
I mean, if you feel that you have a good connection and can speak openly and honestly, if you get a good feeling about the person, you feel relaxed and you can trust them, then, you know, unless they're completely barking mad, I would say that that's more important than any particular school.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'll make some...
I'll make some calls today, I think, yeah.
Good for you. Well, listen, I won't blather on and interfere with that much more essential process, but I will send you a copy of this.
Obviously, there's lots of people who are facing the same challenges that you're facing, so I hope that you would think about releasing it, but have a listen to it first and let me know what you think.
Yeah, thanks. Yeah, I've got nothing against releasing it.
Okay, well, great job. Great job.
I'll send you a link to the cast anyway.
Yeah, thank you. And do let us know how it goes, if you don't mind, just if you can stick it on the board, that would be great.
Yeah, I will. All right, thanks, man.
All the best. All right, thanks.
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