How Your Mind Really Works (Blog)

[Savage]

Maybe I'll post a pic when I get it fully set up. The room is 11'x12' (I think) and has three doors: one goes to the hallway, one to a private bathroom, and one to an outdoor courtyard with some trees and plants. There's a short palm tree right outside the door but no trees in the office, although there are a few plants in the room.

The office has a large sliding-door closet with built-in shelving and some drawers. I use a glass, metal, and wood L-shaped desk (from The Sharper Image Stockton collection), and there's a matching bookcase as well. Other than that, I have a 4-drawer Hon filing cabinet but not much else.

I'm setting up this office differently than I did my last one. Since the closet here has such great built-in storage, I'm putting virtually all of my books and supplies in there. I want to keep the room itself more spartan and open. I'm thinking about getting a big wall-mounted LCD TV to use as my primary PC monitor. I tested the idea for a few hours with a 42" LCD TV and really liked it -- I wrote my last blog entry that way. Right now I'm still using a 19" LCD monitor.

Incidentally, the built-in ceiling fan with light can only accept the smaller bulb sizes (3 bulbs x 40W max each), so I'm still working on the lighting issue.

[Sunnybayes]

Steve... hi five!

standing off of each other's shoulders.

[Keith]

A possible solution that you didn't mention is mirrors - they brighten a place up some and make it look larger.

[Bruce Achterberg]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

[...] I'm setting up this office differently than I did my last one. Since the closet here has such great built-in storage, I'm putting virtually all of my books and supplies in there. I want to keep the room itself more spartan and open.

Is that so you can have a bottomless pit put in so when people read your articles and say, "This is madness!", you can say, "This... is... PAVLINA!" while kicking them into the pit, exposing your extremely ripped midsetction as you raise your arms in victory?

[impaul99]

Just a question. What if our minds work nothing like this? What if we're just building a box around our understanding, and by believing in this box we create it using the rules of Subjective Reality.

For example, what if I proposed that our minds work differently. Let's take Steve's lighting issue as an example. Supposedly the "problem" is created, which is that he's moved into a house with bad lighting and he has to use his mind to "solve the problem". However, if we throw SR into the picture, why is there bad lighting in this place in the first place? Why didn't Steve just create a house that already came with good lighting? According to SR, he creates everything so he obviously created bad lighting too.

So, why would he do such a thing? Well, because maybe he needed to write an article for his blog and needed an example for a problem to illustrate, so he "created" bad lighting in his house. But the bad lighting was there when he moved in, which was before he started writing the article. Not necessarily. According to SR, the house could have had good lighting, then Steve needed a "problem" to solve, so now the house has bad lighting and his memories of the past (which doesn't really exist) change to match his new reality so now he think that the house always had bad lighting.

Therefore, the solution to the problem is not about finding a way to get bigger lightbulbs into a 40Watts maximum power rating socket. The solution to the problem is to figure out WHY your mind created the problem in the first place and eliminate the need for you to want to create that problem. Once you do that, and you no longer need the problem to exist, it will "disappear" out of your life.

Anyway, just some crazy thoughts I thought about while reading the article.

[Savage]

I'm pretty sure I created this problem to learn how many Steves it would take to change a light bulb.

Subjectively speaking I wanted to do something a bit more creative with my office this time, so the lighting problem is an opportunity in disguise -- it nudges me to do something more interesting with the lights because the most obvious solution is a dead end.

[impaul99]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

I'm pretty sure I created this problem to learn how many Steves it would take to change a light bulb.

Subjectively speaking I wanted to do something a bit more creative with my office this time, so the lighting problem is an opportunity in disguise -- it nudges me to do something more interesting with the lights because the most obvious solution is a dead end.

Yup. The problem I created for myself having to build my own fence that spans about 1,000 feet was an opportunity in disguise as well. 1,000 feet is about 90-100 fence posts. At approx. 2.2 bags of cement per post, that's approx 220 bags of cement. At 55lbs per bag, that's 12,100 lbs of cement I had to haul, lift several times, mix and pour in the last month or so. In that time I have built my lifting strength up big time. I can now lift those bags quite easily, whereas when I started I remember the 55lbs bag seemed so heavy.

I basically created an opportunity to force myself to work out

[Max Power]

Originally Posted by impaul99

Just a question. What if our minds work nothing like this? What if we're just building a box around our understanding, and by believing in this box we create it using the rules of Subjective Reality.

I'm not sure this article is helpful on a SR level. Within the SR model, mind/body is not identity, but output like everything else created. Strictly speaking from the SR POV, there is no mind.

If you believe you have a mind somewhere inside your body, then the article has value, but from SR POV it's unecessary to consider how the mind works, because it's a created thing, it's output, it doesn't do any work.

If you were discussing how consiousness may work, that's different, but the mind is largely redundant. Where and what is you mind? Is it in your brain, is it the thing you use to think? No it's just a label for cognitive thought (another creation) Still Steve is very good at improving the state of consciousness, so it's all good

Max

[Mark Lapierre]

Originally Posted by Max Power

I'm not sure this article is helpful on a SR level. Within the SR model, mind/body is not identity, but output like everything else created. Strictly speaking from the SR POV, there is no mind.

And yet regardless of SR or OR POV, do your observations of how your thoughts occur, and how your perceptions and thoughts are associated, and how your ideas of what you perceive, do they match with the model Steve outlines here, i.e., a highly associative, hierarchical arrangement of interlinked conceptualisations.

And if not, what do you observe?

[Max Power]

Originally Posted by Mark Lapierre

a highly associative, hierarchical arrangement of interlinked conceptualisations.

Me no likey smart versions of me pretending to be intelligent

You have SO MANY SPECIAL BIG WORDS I WISH I KNEW WHAT THEY MEANT

Does using big words make you feel special??? I love it when we fight

And if not, what do you observe?

Hmmmm Let me see....I observe myself creating everything including the most boring parts of me, the stupid me, the denial me and the guru me....which part of me are you Mark? I would have to say you are the boring part trying to feel special

Dumb are we, but smart enough to be God

Max

[Hari.c]

Excellent article Steve.
Thanks for the wonderful stuff.

[jeroenvm]

Originally Posted by Max Power

You have SO MANY SPECIAL BIG WORDS I WISH I KNEW WHAT THEY MEANT

[...]

Hmmmm Let me see....I observe myself creating everything including the most boring parts of me, the stupid me, the denial me and the guru me....which part of me are you Mark? [...]

At first I was irritated by your post. All caps tends to do that to me . Then I thought: hmm iritation, you must have struck a chord with my subconsciousness.

Let me first voice my irritation: you dont want to know what Marks special big words mean. You have an aversion for them. You don't believe that it is worth the trouble to find out what they mean (and you might be right, at least from your point of view).

Lets see if I can answer your identity question from my point of view: Mark represents logic and explanation. That is the crutch of my conscious mind. It keeps my beliefs inside well-known boundaries. You represent bravado. Just make an unsubstantiated claim. Don't try to hide the disability to back it up. Ignore sensible arguments against the claim. And look, you get away with it. It might have been unsubstantiated, but not powerless. Hence your alias .

I've been listening to Steve's podcasts and I can see a spiral growing here. And it hasn't even comleted its first round. Is this leading anywhere (that is, is it an upward spiral)? Or is this a private game (on a public forum) that you two have played out many times before. That would probably have the effect that the points of view of either of you are now neatly carved in stone...

Please enlighten me. Also, feel free to flame me for interference .

Jeroen

[Mark Lapierre]

Originally Posted by Max Power

Does using big words make you feel special???

Hahaha no I use big words because they say, in a concise form, what I mean.

Perhaps I'm the part of you simultaneously trying to teach the rest of you to expand your vocabulary, and to realise and accept your limitations, and grow to overcome them, without resorting to insults.

Incidentally they're almost the same words that Steve used.

Your entire life’s worth of knowledge is stored in your mind as associatively linked, hierarchically organized, invariant representations.

{edit: Hahaha I think you'll like today's word of the day Max. Abstruse}

[Max Power]

Originally Posted by Mark Lapierre

Hahaha no I use big words because they say, in a concise form, what I mean.

Perhaps I'm the part of you simultaneously trying to teach the rest of you to expand your vocabulary, and to realise and accept your limitations, and grow to overcome them, without resorting to insults.

Incidentally they're almost the same words that Steve used.



{edit: Hahaha I think you'll like today's word of the day Max. Abstruse}

Sometimes parts of me drive me crazy, so full of knowledge and big words bashing me over the head with knowing making me insulant Text based interaction is difficult some times to get a point across without coming off inferior, but suffice to say, me likey you long time After all we're all in this together right

Max

[Jenny]

Oh, too much information my head is spinning! Great article Steve.

A couple of things I’m having some trouble understanding though. I can understand how my perceptions become internal representations, get matched to other like representations and stored with similar representations. Where I get confused as I read this is with the definition of invariant representations. If invariant means unchanging (and perhaps I am just being too literal in my reading of this) I don’t understand later in the article when Steve writes “You’ll experience some of your biggest a-ha breakthroughs when your mind finally classifies an old memory into a new invariant representation”.

If one of the core concepts is that a particular representation is unchanging this doesn’t make sense to me, although it does make sense if I am just reading this wrong and what is really being said is that a new, and perhaps stronger, invariant representation has been created which directly impacts the existing one and the end result is a new matching of representations leading to new understandings.

Or is this exactly what Mark was getting at by noting that beliefs are opinions about reality not necessarily the representations themselves??

Originally Posted by Mark Lapierre

But beliefs are opinions about reality, in other words opinions about those representations. They would be retained as invariant representations, but that doesn't mean all invariant representations are beliefs.

If so, is this a clue as to how knowledge would be stored as “hierarchically organized” invariant representations? By this I mean if knowledge is always being gathered some of it consciously and some of it subconsciously how does the mind determine just where to store it hierarchically? Would perceptions be stored at a lower level than beliefs for example or would hierarchy be determined by the number of associated representations already existing?

Originally Posted by theknightwhosaysni-NI

It makes sense to me that beliefs are stored as invariant representations, but that not all invariant representations are belief, as you say.
I understand the concept of invariant representation is slightly different than belief, as it is more about understanding and learning, looking for sense in the patterns we experience in life. I still have to think about it though.

Or am I just simply mixed up?

[Max Power]

Originally Posted by jeroenvm

I've been listening to Steve's podcasts and I can see a spiral growing here. And it hasn't even comleted its first round. Is this leading anywhere (that is, is it an upward spiral)? Or is this a private game (on a public forum) that you two have played out many times before. That would probably have the effect that the points of view of either of you are now neatly carved in stone...

Please enlighten me. Also, feel free to flame me for interference .

Jeroen

What's really scary, is that there are parts of me I do not like

Max

[jeroenvm]

Originally Posted by Jenny

Where I get confused as I read this is with the definition of invariant representations. If invariant means unchanging (and perhaps I am just being too literal in my reading of this) I don’t understand later in the article when Steve writes “You’ll experience some of your biggest a-ha breakthroughs when your mind finally classifies an old memory into a new invariant representation”.

The way I understood it, is that invariant representations are representations of invariants (that is, concepts that appear to be invariant), not so much representations that are invariant. At the other hand invariant represesentations don't change much after they get formed. New ones appear and may put the old ones in disuse. The old ones are still there, however. Possibly for ever. Possbily until they are relevant again. Change (growth) is achieved by forming new invariant representations and use them.

Jeroen

[jeroenvm]

Originally Posted by Max Power

What's really scary, is that there are parts of me I do not like

Max

You don't have to like me. I am just me.

I am on the Mark and there is Max Power. The task at hand is to find a way to persuade Power to stop rejecting everything and put his force behind a really big change . (Hey, don't tell me that there are some invariant representations here, arrrgh, they're everywhere.)

Tell me, what is it about my post that you don't like?

Jeroen

[Max Power]

Originally Posted by jeroenvm

The task at hand is to find a way to persuade Power to stop rejecting everything and put his force behind a really big change

I can't answer you as I have no idea what you are saying "find a way to persuade Power to stop rejecting everything" what does that even mean?
put his force behind a really big change Huh?

If it means I don't agree with everything and everybody on this forum, that's hardly surprising is it, how boring would it be if we all agreed? Do we all believe in SR? Jesus Christ? LoA? No, let's make a deal, let's agree to disagree, you believe whatever you want and I'll do the same, okay.

Max

[jeroenvm]

Originally Posted by jeroenvm

[...] invariant representations are representations of invariants (that is, concepts that appear to be invariant)[...]

Sorry, that was ill conceived. Concepts live in the mind, so invariant representations are not representations of concepts. They are concepts. They are representations of aspects of reality (subjective or objective, whichever you like best) that do not appear to change from your point of view.

I once saw how a balloon artist works. He squeezes a ballon in the shape of an hourglass and then gives it a twist. This creates two compartments. Often one of those compartments is much smaller than the other. In my view, every point of view is a compartment of a single conscious omniverse that observes itself. This makes it hard for me sometimes to decide which labels belong to which compartments.

Just like with maps it is hard to grasp the stuff that is being described or represented. As Korzybski stated: the map is not the country. I would like to add: study the map, but don't forget to travel through the country.

[jeroenvm]

Originally Posted by Max Power

I can't answer you as I have no idea what you are saying "find a way to persuade Power to stop rejecting everything" what does that even mean?

Unless you think that I am a part of you, it has probably more to do with me than with you. I stated in my first reply that there was something in your reply to Mark that struck a chord with me. I am sorry that my attempts to clarify only seem to muddle the waters.

For the last ten years I've been working on an ambitious project and I have been doing that largely on my own. I would like to attract other people into my life who add more enthousiasm, creativity and joy to the project. So far, however, I have been locked in a downward spiral: the common reaction to my ideas is either "too weird" or "brilliant, but inconsistent with my beliefs or goal".

The reason why I persist to continue this thread is that it helps me confront and clarify this pattern. I believe that confrontation and clarification of this pattern will help me to destroy and replace it. Then I will be able to join forces with other people effortlessly.

I am sorry if some of my remarks appeared to be directed personally at you or your beliefs. That was not my intention at all. Thanks for your help so far!

Jeroen

[Max Power]

Originally Posted by jeroenvm

Unless you think that I am a part of you, it has probably more to do with me than with you. I stated in my first reply that there was something in your reply to Mark that struck a chord with me. I am sorry that my attempts to clarify only seem to muddle the waters.

For the last ten years I've been working on an ambitious project and I have been doing that largely on my own. I would like to attract other people into my life who add more enthousiasm, creativity and joy to the project. So far, however, I have been locked in a downward spiral: the common reaction to my ideas is either "too weird" or "brilliant, but inconsistent with my beliefs or goal".

The reason why I persist to continue this thread is that it helps me confront and clarify this pattern. I believe that confrontation and clarification of this pattern will help me to destroy and replace it. Then I will be able to join forces with other people effortlessly.

I am sorry if some of my remarks appeared to be directed personally at you or your beliefs. That was not my intention at all. Thanks for your help so far!

Jeroen

No worries It's all good This is a PD forum and we're all human just trying to figure out what the *bleep* is going on, it's easy to get the wrong end of the stick

Good luck with your project

[jeroenvm]

Originally Posted by Max Power

No worries It's all good [...]

Good luck with your project

She'll be right. Thanks mate.

Jeroen

[Jenny]

Originally Posted by jeroenvm

Concepts live in the mind, so invariant representations are not representations of concepts. They are concepts. They are representations of aspects of reality (subjective or objective, whichever you like best) that do not appear to change from your point of view.

Thanks for trying Jeroenvm, this has just confused me more. I think it is the wacky and fairly unclear division between what is happening in the brain versus what is happening in the mind that gets me stuck... I should go back and read Steve's post again and maybe things will make more sense.

Originally Posted by jeroenvm

Just like with maps it is hard to grasp the stuff that is being described or represented. As Korzybski stated: the map is not the country. I would like to add: study the map, but don't forget to travel through the country.

Nice reminder!

[Mark Lapierre]

Lets see if this analogy helps, Jenny. Think of Invariant Representations (IRs for short) as puzzles. Each IR is made up of many puzzle pieces, all tied together with pieces of string going from piece to piece, and together they depict something we've encountered, either through our senses or our thoughts. When you think of something, you trace along those pieces of string until the entire puzzle is put together. If it's the very first time you're encountering this thing, the puzzle pieces and threads will be new (but inevitably linked to something).

If it's not the first time, you're just tracing the existing strings and putting the puzzle together. Those pieces of string get thickened each time you recall the puzzle they're part of, forming a a more easily recognised, and therefore clearer picture.

Tracing those threads to either form, or recall a puzzle set, is what goes on in the mind. The puzzle pieces and threads themselves are the brain.

The puzzle is never complete; one set of pieces may connect to another set, or form part of a bigger set, each depicting things which are related in some way. It could just be a very weak relation, like a connection of only a few small, thin threads.

Those "a-ha" moments that Steve mentioned are like establishing a strong connection between two (or more) previously unrelated puzzle sets. This creates a picture which, while you can see it includes the previous two, now looks completely different. Physically there are still distinct puzzles, (the original IRs haven't changed) but they now *also* combine to form a new one.

Kinda like doing a real puzzle. You have one section which looks vaguely foresty, and another section which could be clouds, or ocean, and another bit which looks like white cloth. At some point you see the separate sections a little differently and suddenly realise that there's a cabin in the forest, and the white cloth is the top of a mountain, and that's not ocean but a lake, and the left over grey/brown/green pieces are the base of the mountain, and it all comes together to form the scene of a beautiful lake/forest/mountainside retreat.

(and even better, you beat your Grandma's old record of 44 minutes!)

[jeroenvm]

Originally Posted by Jenny

Thanks for trying Jeroenvm, this has just confused me more. I think it is the wacky and fairly unclear division between what is happening in the brain versus what is happening in the mind that gets me stuck... I should go back and read Steve's post again and maybe things will make more sense.

Originally Posted by Mark Lapierre

Tracing those threads to either form, or recall a puzzle set, is what goes on in the mind. The puzzle pieces and threads themselves are the brain.

I completely agree with Mark, but... I feel that his explanation sheds more light on the brain part than on the mind part of consciousness. This may be (at least in part) caused by a bias in the way the question was put. Especially the phrase "what is happening in the mind" implies the assumption that something happens in the mind. It is my personal conviction that stuff only 'happens' in the brain. These happenings are observed by the mind. If you like the verb "to happen", I believe that 'choice' can be defined as "whatever the mind happens to observe". Why choice? Because there appears to be a certain amount of freedom in how the brain responds to its environment.

Basically this is the old mind/body problem. If the mind controls the body, and the mind is 'spiritual' or 'metaphysical' rather than physical, then any influence that the mind has on the body will violate physical 'laws'. Either that or the law must be extended, which only moves the boundary between the physical and the nonphysical and doesn't solve anything. Of course, when the so called physical 'laws' don't uniquely determine the path of a physical stucture like the brain, there is a certain freedom for a nonphysical entity like the mind to trace a path just by choosing what to observe.

To use another game metaphor: the mind is like a game of memory: at every turn it looks at a two cards. if they are the same it gains a point, otherwise it gains knowledge, there is always a gain . To make this really similar to what the mind does, there should be no actions involved, only attention. So imagine that all cards are lying open, the pictures clearly visible to the 'player'. The player focuses her attention on two cards. If they are the same she is happy, otherwise she knows where those two pictures are. The only way to keep this game interesting is with zenlike mental dicipline!

This is still all about 'maps'. Only you can understand your own mind. Please share... what do you think?

Jeroen

[JKuehl]

So how would you link this to learning for university exams?

Right now, i have to go through 4 courses for my final exam which concludes my bachelor degree.

Here´s my opinion on it:

While doing the exercises i´m planting some invariant presentations of an algorithm to solve them. If theres a step i can´t solve - thats where the learning must occur.

By using Mindmaps for all the factual data i need to learm i´m creating a invariant visual presentation of all those facts - helping me in remembering more of the whole mindmap, if i know some details ( so to say a "shape" of an invariant presentation ). Similar to your example with "this is a person" "this is a woman" "this woman is at least 6" tall" "this woman has blond hair" i know "this is a mindmap" and "this is a mindmap of databases" "this mindmap is about entity-relationship-diagrams" and "this is about the symbols used for it".

The problem i have, is to form representations for the "hard facts" where i can´t that easily form invariants in a visual or auditorial style.

So an example would be all the advantages databases got over file-based datahandling.

The Mindmap helps me pack those into a branch of that map, but there are no images for representing them. For such things, also time and effort would be too high to remember an image for each word. An example where this concept works very well is representing numbers with images ( three - tree, five - hive, ... ) because its limited to 10 images and you´ll use numbers every day.

[jeroenvm]

Hi J,

Originally Posted by JKuehl

So how would you link this to learning for university exams?

Right now, i have to go through 4 courses for my final exam which concludes my bachelor degree.

I found it helpful to distinguish between 'learning' and 'studying'. Steve describes 'learning' as changing one's invariant representations. In my view (though I have to admit that I am much influenced by Hofstadters new book "I am a strange loop" lately) those invariant representations define me in a way. And I am not willing to have some external demand like an exam drive changes to my own selfhood. So I might study for an exam, but I never learn for an exam. I do decide to learn about subjects that interest me for their own sake.

I also discovered that it is much, much easier to study for exams that cover subjects that I have learned about already. If a subject is still unfamiliar when I start to study, then I have to study and learn at the same time. On top of that, I feel forced to learn, which creates a lot of resistance.

Mark Lapiere mentioned a book about Holistic Learning in one of the earlier posts. That book resonated very well with my experience that study is easy if you allow yourself to learn from everything and by every means possible.

Originally Posted by JKuehl

The Mindmap helps me pack [hard facts] into a branch of [a] map, but there are no images for representing them. For such things, also time and effort would be too high to remember an image for each word. An example where this concept works very well is representing numbers with images ( three - tree, five - hive, ... ) because its limited to 10 images and you´ll use numbers every day.

There are lots and lots of ways to form invariant representations. When I was eleven years old I was a year behind other kids on the subject of basic arithmetic. Then I was introduced to algebra. As a part of my homework I had to simplify a complex algebraic expression. With the help of my father and after at least ten minutes of intense concentration and hard work, we managed to simplify it to something astounding: zero. That simple experience is still at the core of my invariant representations that deal with complexity, rules, time, meaning and a lot of other stuff.

It feels great to be enthousiastic about a (new) tool. Watch out for the "if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail" trap, however. Your potential is so much greater than that. To quote Korzybski (again): "the map is not the country". Experience reality. Learning, eventually even wisdom, will be the result.

Jeroen