That’s sometimes a very frustrating thing to read- the “get rid of environmental triggers” thing. Speaking solely for myself here, my triggers are either really, really difficult to do anything about (financial difficulties) or a bad idea to try and get rid of (my academics). Sometimes you’re just stuck at a point in your life where you can’t fix your triggers.
I think there must be more we can do than get rid of triggers, or add more meaningful things. Maybe not as effective, but mental illness is a complex thing. Complex things have weak points. Sometimes I wonder of we’re ignoring the trees and just seeing the forest here. Mental self-help advice is so… formulaic.
Hi, I’m Alexandra. I’m turning 18 tomorrow, and I’m slowly coming to the conclusion that I have GOT to be more rigorous in my self-improvement if I’m going to manage to reach my ambitions.
I’m not quite a new member- I’ve lurked a lot, and even made a post a while back that got a decent number of comments and karma.
I discovered Less Wrong through HPMOR. It was the first time I’d read a story with genuinely intelligent characters, and the things in it resonated a lot with me. This was a couple of years ago. I’ve spent a lot of time here and on the various other sites the rationalist community likes.
I’m mostly posting this now because I’d like to get more involved. I recently read an article that said the best way to increase competency at a subject is to join a community revolving around the subject. I live in OKC, where I’ve never even HEARD of another student of rationality. The closest I’ve gotten is introducing my boyfriend to HPMOR.
I’m a biology student at a community college near my living space. I’m very good at biology, english, philosophy, etc. I’m really, REALLY bad at chemistry/physics and math. I’ve done some basic research into what makes a person suck at mathematical things, but it’s been frustratingly low on insights. Most of the time, it’s resulted in “you need to practice! you need to learn mathematical thinking!” which is objectively true, but practically, a little more detail in what to do about it would be nice. Practice hasn’t really seemed to help too much beyond working problems. Give me an equation and variables and I can do the math. But I can’t EXPLAIN anything, or apply it to non-obvious problems involving it. This is seriously getting in the way of both my biology studies and my study of rationality. I took general chemistry 1 twice to get a low B. I’m in the first two weeks of general chemistry 2 and it takes ages to get what seems like basic concepts. When I discovered I magically had a B in College Algebra, I suspected the professor curved the grade without telling us. I withdrew from precalc after three weeks because I realized I couldn’t cope.
I’m hoping to get into contact with some of the more mathematically inclined people here who are willing to help. I considered emailing a few of the higher-profile contributors to the community, but frankly, they’re intimidating and the idea is very scary to my inner caveman worrying about being kicked out of the tribe.
I have some pretty lofty goals for my future research- I want to go into genetically modified organisms, and try to improve nutrition and caloric intake in parts of the world where that sort of thing is difficult to get. Reducing scarcity in our society seems like a good start to a general boost in the “goodness” of the world. But there is absolutely no way I can succeed at this if I can’t get a good handle on math and chemistry. My skill at the lower levels of biology is only going to carry me so far.
I’ve probably rambled enough, so thanks if you took the time to read. If, for some strange reason, you feel a pull towards helping a struggling student get a grasp on abstract thinking, I urge you to give into the temptation because oh god I need the help.