Rapid Improvement (Blog)

[Savage]

Use this thread to discuss the following entry from Steve Pavlina's blog:

Rapid Improvement

[dwixi]

Loved this article.. I can reel something like this happening to me soon.

[Elfwing]

Very true for me. I've even done it before and not known what it was - usually during the holidays. Very, very fun to do, though.

[Plato]

Man, I totally went overboard this week with the letting things slide... Been going crazy getting my social skills better and busting anxiety. But I've let my health go to pieces. For some reason I've found myself drinking copious amounts of energy drinks and not eating much food. Combine that with some peak experiences and high stress, and now I'm out of action. Hands won't stop shaking. Totally drained. Don't know if this is flu or just my body being really upset with me.

[Savage]

Good health is something that you shouldn't let slide overall. Simple daily practices like eating a healthy diet, exercise, and sunlight will support whatever else you do. These practices are time positive, meaning that you get more back than you give -- more energy, more alertness, needing less sleep, less illness, etc.

Of course getting these practices installed is the sort of thing that can be assisted by an all-out focused effort for a few weeks.

[Plato]

Yeah, lesson learned, big time. Packed lunches and water = victory in this case!

[hithere]

So what could people do about the government-mandated job we have 5 days a week until age 18?

It would be nice if we could arrange school this way. Three weeks of American history, three weeks of Algebra IV....

If I could make that happen, life would be swell. In fact, I'll discuss that prospect with some of my teachers this week. You know, because I don't know what it's like for them, teaching the exact same thing seven times and feeling like no matter how many times they teach it, there's still another batch of thirty kids who still don't understand yet....

[Fullcrum]

This is true in my experience. I think this explains why most productivity systems do not work for me overall - I exist "episodically". This explains a lot. Thanks.

[restless]

Thank you very much, Steve. That's a potentially life-changing article.

I remember some of the best times of my life were when I concentrated single-mindedly on something.

However, I think there are activities where this can't be applied:

• Health: As Steve said above, this should be a priority. Daily habits can help!
• Getting proficient at a musical instrument or at sports: You need consistent practice to improve further. Practicing 1 hour per day will yield much better results than doing 8 blocked hours per week. Your mind needs time to absorb the training.
• Lucid dreaming: You can only practice this at night, or when napping.
• Bodybuilding

Question to everyone: How do you deal with such activities in a stress-free way?

You could integrate them into your daily habits. That way, you ensure that you don't let them slide. E.g: Get up, 30 minutes of exercise, 30 minutes of practicing the drums. After you are finished with these activities, you can use your remaining free time to dive into a single subject.
Well - is there a better approach?

[Lupe]

Originally Posted by hithere

So what could people do about the government-mandated job we have 5 days a week until age 18?

It would be nice if we could arrange school this way. Three weeks of American history, three weeks of Algebra IV....

If I could make that happen, life would be swell. In fact, I'll discuss that prospect with some of my teachers this week. You know, because I don't know what it's like for them, teaching the exact same thing seven times and feeling like no matter how many times they teach it, there's still another batch of thirty kids who still don't understand yet....

That's right! If Steve could write a persuasive article for whoever controls the education industry to use this method (one topic at time for maximum performance), it can save millions of hours from being used up in inefficient system. Same thing with lectures. Get rid of lectures, and make self-didactic method easier by...

1. making organized info of all topics on the Net
2. making a test so that people can earn their proof of knowledge.

similar to this:

W3Schools will happily teach you online for free at your own pace. They have free online tutorials for essentially any web coding environment, and other sites offer the same thing for programming languages like C, Python, and so on. W3Schools makes its money only if you want to get certification for what you've learned. Once you've learned something, you can pay them about $60 and take their exam, consisting of 60 multiple-choice questions in 60 minutes. Ten Quick Ways to Make Money

...Resulting in professors and teachers losing their jobs but it's good for the advancement of humanity.

[Neutral]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

I’ll have a different primary focus for 2009. Most likely it will have to do with social dynamics and relationships. This is an area that’s been fascinating me lately.

I intend to focus on this, I hope you will. And this post reminded me the importance of focusing on this one thing.

Like in programming, or any problem solving activity in general, often the hardest part is getting into hacking or "debugging" mode. That mentality requires long blocks of time. Without the time, you never get to load the whole problem into your head. And you're eaten by a thousand bugs.

And Steve, what do you mean by working on social dynamics and relationships? Low-level social dynamics, like PUA stuff, or high-level stuff like understanding evolutionary psychology and exploring polyamory?

[hithere]

That would be fantastic, but teachers add so much life to the learning process... I was thinking more in terms of the CTY summer program: Teach one class, eight hours a day with breaks for the sake of meals, sleep, and just plain breaks. Three weeks of immersion. Final exam. Repeat and try not to rinse.

That might solve the problem of cramming for eight tests in two days for the procrastinators, too.

[RRR]

Thank you Steve.

I was thinking about this model of productivity earlier this week. It has been the only way in my life that I've ever accomplished anything. I find something I desire or find interesting; eg. losing 70 lbs, studying psychadelics, social dynamics; and I just go black and white and focused entirely on the subject.

It is not uncommon for me to study a subject for a week straight only stopping to sleep and eat. When I first took up exercising I went from eating a junk food diet and not exercising to eating a plain consistant diet (spagetti, chicken, salad), and exercising until exertion (sprinting/basketball under cover of darkness) for an entire summer. I lost 70 lbs in 3-4 months.

I've done the same with water fasting. I became interested, I absorbed a ton of knowledge, and I did a 13 day fast.

I find I get very distracted and my interest wanes when I don't follow this method of action. School was always bothersome, little chunks of boring spread throughout the day. Eventually I hope to raise children outside of that medium.

I find that when I try to integrate other people into my current routine I lose the results I was achieving. For example: When I was losing weight one summer I had my schedule set. But when I tried to integrate a friend we made a move to a gym, I had to try and balance their schedule, overall I lost my edge.

Do you find its important to allow yourself the freedom of staying in hermit mode? I get pretty riled up when people try to interrupt me mid-way through a crash session.

[lifetimelearner]

Originally Posted by Fullcrum

This is true in my experience. I think this explains why most productivity systems do not work for me overall - I exist "episodically". This explains a lot. Thanks.

true for me to thanks

[Matt Willard]

This seems interesting to me because I often wonder if I'm not working fast enough to achieve my goals. In that case, I think it's more of a amount of time spent per day working on a goal, because I usually spend 3-5 hours straight taking on goal-related projects. Also my focus definitely needs work, and if that's fixed, it could help increase the amount of time I spend. Hmmm...I do have several books I checked out that are unrelated to my goal...I can improve in that area, at least.

[Monique7nuns]

Originally Posted by restless

Question to everyone: How do you deal with such activities in a stress-free way?

You could integrate them into your daily habits. That way, you ensure that you don't let them slide. E.g: Get up, 30 minutes of exercise, 30 minutes of practicing the drums. After you are finished with these activities, you can use your remaining free time to dive into a single subject.
Well - is there a better approach?

Make stress management one of your focus'. Meditation, breath awareness, mild cardio or another form of exercise, listening to music, laughing.. do whatever relieves stress. I've been working on this the past few weeks. On top of doing qi gong every morning I began 20 minutes of guided meditation each day - I think it helps to do it at the same time to develop a routine and habit with it. The following week I added "50 breaths" (just counting out 50 breaths after qi gong).

The better approach being just to break each thing down into smaller pieces until you "get it". For instance, with the guided meditation I can tell after doing it as much as I have that it isn't as effective as I'd like it to be so before I add some other stress managment activity this week, I'm going to focus on how to make meditiation more effective. The better approach is to keep evolving until whatever you want to master is working for you.

Ok.. so now that I've said that comes the question of how many deep focus' does a person do at once effectively? For me there is
1. stress management - qi gong is effective I've been doing it for months and ready to graduate.. maybe to a little longer routine.. Meditation isn't as effective - re evaluate and try something new, 50 breaths sorta effective.. but I'm going to go back to Meditation as a focus first.
2. health improvement via food.. I've been trying to cut down sweet snacks gradually, but it's not working.. Probably because I don't have a back up plan of other things to eat instead.. ALSO more effectively I'm letting my body get used good fat like coconut oil, 1/2 tsp at a time.. I'm graduating that each week very well, so I'll keep increasing the amount.

It's just a matter of calibration which is what Steve mentioned in the article.. and using the effectiveness of each new habit your developing as a guide as to whether or not your ready to step it up.

[Rapid]

Steve said,

"I’ve gotten so comfortable doing radio and podcast interviews that I feel like it would be easy to progress to TV. If Oprah called, it wouldn’t seem like such a big deal at this point."

So why hasn't Oprah called? Steve, are you looking to go beyond on-line and radio marketing? I (and maybe others here) would be happy to drop Oprah a line. Let me(us) know.

[Savage]

Originally Posted by Neutral

And Steve, what do you mean by working on social dynamics and relationships? Low-level social dynamics, like PUA stuff, or high-level stuff like understanding evolutionary psychology and exploring polyamory?

In a nutshell it means being able to consciously construct the social terrain of my life -- i.e. figuring out the types of people I want to have in my life, finding good people to fill those roles, making ew connections, and building and maintaining those relationships.

In the PUA community, strategy and tactics used to build a guy's social skills, courage, and self-esteem, so he can approach people and make connections. That part is easy for me. I can make new friends quickly whenever I want. Lots of new connections come to me as a result of my work, so I always have a strong inflow of new people coming into my life. My energy is such that people open me all the time. I sometimes joke with Erin after I chat with someone in public, "I easily could have number-closed her if I wanted to."

I have a totally different problem to solve than most people in the PUA community. My problem is targeting. I need to be more selective in consciously targeting and screening people to build close relationships with. Obviously I can't just keep adding more and more friends to my life -- I can't keep up with the ones I have right now. I guess the PUA community would refer to this as qualifying.

Obviously I can't just qualify people on looks.

Perhaps the most important screening factor right now is for me to find people who really own their power -- i.e. self-motivated types who really push themselves to grow. I have lots of friends who are well-aligned with truth and love, but not enough who are strongly aligned with power. I need more friends who have a strong courage alignment too.

The funny thing is that people who are active in the PUA community would probably be some of the best people for me to connect with because they're all pretty growth-oriented. They actively work on their courage. I'd mainly need to screen for the ones who are aligned with truth (i.e. those who wouldn't use deceptive tactics, lying, etc).

[Monique7nuns]

I didn't think it was possible to choose your friends.. or your family. I've been under the assumption deep relationships/connections happen naturally or intuitively because either you or they have something to learn from the other.

[Jake Birkett]

lol @ Ultima, what a classic series. Don't know if you ever got round to playing VII but it's a classic too! It was very picky about it's memory requirements though and eventually I got a new computer that wouldn't run it, which was a bummer because I'd nearly finished it. However, years later I got a program called DOSBox which emulated a DOS-based PC and was able to complete the game, hurrah!

[Rose of Cairo]

Originally Posted by Fullcrum

This is true in my experience. I think this explains why most productivity systems do not work for me overall - I exist "episodically". This explains a lot. Thanks.

Same here Existing episodically is my natural tendency. I love to focus only on one area or project at a time, neglecting everything else around, and then switching to something else. That's also why I hate jobs, university and all those things where you need regularity!

[impaul99]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

In a nutshell it means being able to consciously construct the social terrain of my life -- i.e. figuring out the types of people I want to have in my life, finding good people to fill those roles, making ew connections, and building and maintaining those relationships.

In the PUA community, strategy and tactics used to build a guy's social skills, courage, and self-esteem, so he can approach people and make connections. That part is easy for me. I can make new friends quickly whenever I want. Lots of new connections come to me as a result of my work, so I always have a strong inflow of new people coming into my life. My energy is such that people open me all the time. I sometimes joke with Erin after I chat with someone in public, "I easily could have number-closed her if I wanted to."

I have a totally different problem to solve than most people in the PUA community. My problem is targeting. I need to be more selective in consciously targeting and screening people to build close relationships with. Obviously I can't just keep adding more and more friends to my life -- I can't keep up with the ones I have right now. I guess the PUA community would refer to this as qualifying.

Obviously I can't just qualify people on looks.

Perhaps the most important screening factor right now is for me to find people who really own their power -- i.e. self-motivated types who really push themselves to grow. I have lots of friends who are well-aligned with truth and love, but not enough who are strongly aligned with power. I need more friends who have a strong courage alignment too.

The funny thing is that people who are active in the PUA community would probably be some of the best people for me to connect with because they're all pretty growth-oriented. They actively work on their courage. I'd mainly need to screen for the ones who are aligned with truth (i.e. those who wouldn't use deceptive tactics, lying, etc).

Hmmm...very interesting. I'd definitely like to hear more about how this goes for you Steve. I'm kind of at the opposite end of this spectrum right now. Meaning, I'm currently removing myself from the presence of the "wrong" people for my conscious growth, much the same way you're looking to place yourself in the presence of the "right" people for you.

So far, I've been noticing a MAJOR difference in my state of mind just being alone, compared to when I was constantly in the presence of people at lower levels of consciousness. They are not bad people, but when you're around people who are constantly doubting everything and fearing everything and talking about the news, and the recession, and the latest shooting or stabbing and the price of gasoline, it can be pretty draining.

Just removing myself from such environment and being alone and having the time to read some of my books and such which calibrate much higher at the levels of love and a joy and stuff has been transformational.

I guess you're now at the next point where you selectively add even more people into your environment. Very cool.

[impaul99]

Originally Posted by Rose of Cairo

Same here Existing episodically is my natural tendency. I love to focus only on one area or project at a time, neglecting everything else around, and then switching to something else. That's also why I hate jobs, university and all those things where you need regularity!

I'm the same way. When I find something that interests me I like to dive in full force until I learn what I wanted to learn and then move onto something else.

[Erock]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

Perhaps the most important screening factor right now is for me to find people who really own their power -- i.e. self-motivated types who really push themselves to grow. I have lots of friends who are well-aligned with truth and love, but not enough who are strongly aligned with power. I need more friends who have a strong courage alignment too.

The funny thing is that people who are active in the PUA community would probably be some of the best people for me to connect with because they're all pretty growth-oriented. They actively work on their courage. I'd mainly need to screen for the ones who are aligned with truth (i.e. those who wouldn't use deceptive tactics, lying, etc).

I'm sorry but I'm going to have to disagree with you on this one Steve. I think people in the PUA community are actually mostly people who lack courage, yet are aware of what is possible if they had it. Lately I've been moving into some social circles in which the guys are all very naturally good with women and would never have any need for the pua community. However, they are constantly pushing their limits in other areas (a couple of them are trying to become professional athletes, another is really into business and investments, and one of them is really into stand up comedy).

Picking up women pretty much comes down to courage, so the fact that one would need to enter the community shows that they lack courage. I'm not insulting these guys in any way, in fact I am one of them myself and I still get a lot of anxiety when it comes to women, but I'm just saying that if your looking for men who have really embraced their power, you're looking in the wrong place.

Erock

[Dive Bomb]

I enjoyed the article and will put it to use. While other people ask you more in depth questions, I have a trivial one. What college station did you do the interview for (the one mentioned in this blog post) and is it available online?

[BChris]

Is this possible in college?

Im studying computer science an i like to be programming or learning new stuff about this topic but when you have literature, history and this kind of classes together, balance is the only way!

[supertom]

steve have you ever spent more than 10hrs straight on anything recent ?? Interested to learn about any of your experiences.

[pharmboy]

Originally Posted by supertom

steve have you ever spent more than 10hrs straight on anything recent ?? Interested to learn about any of your experiences.

Probably writing. Steve has been cranking out some high-quality lengthy articles
these days. Great ideas! I naturally work this way, also. I just need to refine it. Steve defined it for me, so now I can begin focusing on it.

This article tells me to be either hot or cold, not lukewarm, in what I want to accomplish. The 4 hour work week guy (Ferris?) seems to have mastered this skill... learning languages, martial arts, etc, in a short amount of time.

[Sukotto]

Today's article rings a bit Zennish to my ears.

When you sit, just sit.
When you work, just work
When you play Ultima... just play Ultima.

[Logan]

Steve interesting what mentioned the PUA community a few times recently.

Guys in the community are guys who face their fears. Then they grow from there. In the beginning they think that they need tricks, technics and lines to get girls. But then they realize it's about themselves. The community teaches guys to be confident and to go for what they want.

If you're interested in honest PUA stuff I would suggest you check out Stephane Hemons (ideaGasms - The Leading Edge In Dating, Sex, And Relationship Consciousness. | ideaGasms) and Tyler Durdens (Real Social Dynamics Blog) stuff. And of course mine.