# You don't get to have cool flaws

*This post seems particularly relevant to LW, which to me has a "save the world" culture and is filled with the "misunderstood burden-carrier" trope types. **However:** it has been justly describes as* advice; *please take with a grain of salt.*

**tl;dr:** Solve the flaws you find in yourself and *don't get attached to them*. 

I’ve been noticing something recently: while doing casual things among laughing friends, on bright Summer days when I reciprocally smile at life, I revel in some sort of inner somberness which feels “cool” to me. It feels like secretly being Batman or Frodo Baggins; carrying a heavy wound and burden on the inside and being a dark vigilante who fights crime by night dressed up as a flying mammal. I figure it’s what Oppenheimer felt like sometimes; pretending to be present in small talk while thinking about Very Serious Things.[^3nh6h79d2n7]

Oppenheimer Mode turns on when I’m thinking of misaligned AI and what I could do about it. It turns on when I look at fellow humans and think that they are [something to protect](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/SGR4GxFK7KmW7ckCB/something-to-protect). It turns on when I start narrating my own life and watch it from the outside like it’s a book or movie.

“Has poor mental health” is a flaw. It is an obstacle in between me and my goals. Here are a few other common obstacles: “is overly analytical”; “is overly romantic”; “has only casual relationships”; “is lazy”; “is easily distracted”; “is bad at math”; “is ignorant of social conventions”; "never sleeps enough"; “is too cynical”; “is too naive”; “makes bad arguments”; “is bad with money”; “has addiction X”. There are many more; think them up for me, please. You’re probably full of them. In particular: which flaws do you particularly [*identify with*](http://www.paulgraham.com/identity.html)*?*

You’re not allowed to identify as these flaws. You aren’t allowed to revel in them and feel proud of them.[^cmfxehz6p5] *I’m* not allowed to be proud of being gloomy: being gloomy doesn’t *help me* and so I won’t revel in it. What matters is my goals, not how I look getting there. No one has ever become Great without internalizing that lesson.

I like the idea of the Flawed but Great Human; that’s why I liked *Oppenheimer*. But I won’t, as I might have before, start “acting like Oppenheimer” at random moments by looking aloof, distant, and acting like I had 220,000 deaths on my hands. I’m not going to look at interesting figures of the past I’d like to emulate in some ways (*some* ways!) and end up checking the “flaws” checkbox off before the “qualities” checkbox.[^vnsnhvqlad]

The flaws checkbox is *already checked*. No matter what you do, you will still be a foolish monkey who will commit innumerable and unique errors across its lifetime. You *don’t* get to pick and choose what those errors are. The crucial lesson is that those Flawed but Great figures *solved the flaws they knew about*. They did not fall for the “keep a flaw because it looks cool” failure mode and thus eliminated a sufficient amount of flaws for them to make history.[^jvsadnc0jy8]

If you really want to emulate the greats make sure to detect your flaws and then promptly destroy them. This isn’t “kill your darlings”; your flaws shouldn’t have been your darlings in the first place.

[^3nh6h79d2n7]: I am listening to the soundtrack of the movie as I write this. 

[^cmfxehz6p5]: Kaj_Sotala mentioned that "flaws" could become part of your identity; that if looking cool along the way is what you want, then your flaws are your goals and are no longer obstacles. Let me rephrase this then: what you would yourself identify as a flaw is probably not something you want attached to your identity. If you keep it nonetheless after thinking about the pros and cons of keeping it attached, I wouldn't call it a flaw anymore. So if the cocaine is what keeps you running, whatever man, the hedons might be worth the cost.  

[^vnsnhvqlad]: As Screwtape points out, flaws are also tempting because they're vastly easier to emulate than qualities. 

[^jvsadnc0jy8]: Also the flaws they ended up keeping didn’t seem “cool” to them.