Searching for Success
What I’ve learned so far from operating networks ... part 3 of … who knows 🤷🏻♂️
Carrying on from What I’ve learned so far from operating networks ... part 2 of … who knows 🤷🏻♂️
System 1 and System 2
What is this ’system 1’ and ’system 2’ anyways?
System 1 and system 2 have been referred to by many things, and system numerology isn’t the best nor the first name for them. Some texts refer to them as monkey brain and machine brain (The Chimp Paradox).
The best way to view ‘the system’ (as proposed by Keith Stanovich and Richard West), is system 1 is your reactive part of your brain, and system 2 is called into action when there is no known or available response in system 1.
Over time you and your environment train your system 1 to react to give situations and stimuli. Whereas system 2 is more like your long term memory and stores key facts and information … etc. The two things to remember are;
System 1 is effectively ‘in charge’. There’s no decision or reaction that doesn’t initially engage system 1 first (aka ‘the chimp’).
Our systems/brain is lazy, therefore if system 2 needs to be engaged, it will work with system 1 to see if there is a ‘good enough’ response, even if that response doesn’t completely fit what is actually needed (aka ‘the computer’).
As per the old cliche, wherever possible ‘think twice and cut once’ (aka ‘the human/ you’).
“System 1 operates automatically and quickly, with little or no effort and no sense of voluntary control.
System 2 allocates attention to the effortful mental activities that demand it, including complex computations. The operations of System 2 are often associated with the subjective experience of agency, choice, and concentration.”
Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow
Negative Positivity
Over recent years we humans have focused on positivity being ‘the cure’ for various problems and issues, whether it be our lives both at home or in business. However, more recently this has started to spillover into what I call, negative positivity. And by that I mean, positivity at all costs … which ironically comes with quite a toll to be paid.
The human race isn’t designed to be happy all of the time, and coping with this thing we call life, is hard enough in these modern times with 24×7 media, news coverage and operating cycles, so to be positive 24×7 is not natural.
We need to be able to flow unabated between happy, sad, angry, elated, stoic … etc., without fear of retribution from our fellow human beings. Which is compounded by the endless stream of digital content on social media, ‘showing’ everyone being happy and successful ALL of the time.
Just remember, what others show you isn’t always the truth and be conscious of what your chimp is interpreting for you (just remember to put it through your own ‘computer’/ filter).
Media
Social media and the wider media and advertisements, are just that, media. And whether you like it or not, whilst there is a lot of respectable outlets and sources, it is peppered with additional information and sources which want to hold a false mirror to you for their own gain.
The biggest underpin of the social element of that is companies that want to sell you the idea that, whatever idea they can impart to you or mental thread they can pull on, that they and only they, have the answer. And a lot of the time this is done with either stereotyping or negative re-enforcement.
The second is individuals selling their story of how perfect or amazing their life and/ or achievements are. There’s several articles every year about how filters and photo editing on social media portray the subjects as ‘perfect’ or ‘beyond human’, and then the ‘scandals’ as a celebrity is caught out faking their beautiful life to the masses.
My personal opinion regarding social media content, that with the exception of genuine people (usually family and friends) and fact checked news outlets, the wider influencers and media that they generate (videos promoting the ‘latest’ skin care or cure for loneliness) is all fake and ultimately as per YoYo’s in the ‘00’s its all temporary. They prey on people’s insecurities and fear of missing out (FOMO) to create peer pressure (either externally or self inflicted) … it’s one big algorithm and it’s stacked against … you!
And in typical human fashion of keeping up appearances or FOMO, we can push ourselves into situations which can have long term negative consequences.
What you have however, is what you’ve achieved and accomplished for your lifetime. No-one can take that away from you, and if someone is using any of this (or the lack of it) to be rude to you, that’s there problem, not yours. What you can do, (is kind of what I’m doing now) is share your experiences, learnings, failures … etc., so that others can learn from them to improve themselves in a positive way and rebuild their resilience that the modern world has slowly stripped them of.
I’ll explain later how FOMO for me nearly put me in the hospital.
‘Coping’ Mechanisms → Tool Kits
‘Coping’ is a cliched term, so I’d like to move the conversation to ‘Tool Kits’. Without repeating several of the suggestions that appear throughout this article, the one that should be advocated here the most is awareness. Once you’re aware you can act, and remember what worked one time or for a specific scenario might not work for the current one; hence needing a tool kit in order to be more flexible as life changes and evolves.
The place I started was getting comfortable in my own skin, or at least as comfortable as you can. It’s easier said than done, and depending on the situation I’m in, I can quickly find myself regressing if I’m not care. I’m still working my way along this journey, and so far it’s at least yielded the results in the ‘Searching for Success’ series.
