# Adopt a debugger’s mindset to solve your recurring life problems

I've noticed a similarity between people's recurring life problems and coding:

When programming, if the output of some code I wrote isn’t what I was expecting, the fault doesn’t lie with the computer, it’s with how I coded it. It doesn’t matter how many times I execute the same code because it’ll always produce the same output. If I execute “2+2”, it doesn't matter if I'm expecting "5", because the code will always spit out “4”.

In real life, does anyone actually execute the same behavior over and over and expect different results? As it turns out, *all the time*. 

I’ve written about four common examples of this:   
1 - Procrastination  
2 - Rumination  
3 - Social Anxiety   
4 - Simping 

First I'll describe what the debugger mindset is, and then I'll apply it to each of these four.

**The Debugger Mindset**
========================

Many people don’t make headway with their recurring life problems. They just keep doing the same habits. Or if they *do* make attempts to solve their problems, it’s typically done for a brief period of time, and if they don’t get results quickly, they throw up their hands in defeat and go back to their old ways.

Instead of that, why not **write down** all your beliefs about the problem? In doing so, sometimes you'll notice a glaring mistake in your code (ie: your behavior) that’s causing you to obtain the same result over and over. For recurring life problems that aren't getting solved, the only way to succeed is by trying something new.

Or if you're unsure exactly what you believe, I'd recommend just writing down everything you *do* with respect to the problem. That'll reveal what you believe about it.

For each of the aforementioned four problems, I’m going to apply the three steps of the **debugger’s mindset**, which are:

*A. List out your beliefs about the problem.*[^og5uqwo6z9g]  
*B. Determine if there are alternative ways to act.*  
*C. Actually try something new and measure the results.*

**Recurring Problems, and Solutions**
=====================================

**1 - Procrastination**
-----------------------

*A. List out your beliefs about the problem*:

1.  This task I don’t want to do is big, confusing, and overwhelming.
2.  I ought to get the whole thing done, in one go, to just get it over with.
3.  Ehhh, I’m too overwhelmed to do all that. To cope with the stress, I’ll procrastinate and do something else.
4.  Repeat steps 1-3 until the impending deadline is so stressful that doing anything else seems reckless in comparison. Then hurriedly do the task under immense pressure.
5.  Finally, learn nothing from this and repeat steps 1-4 for the rest of my school/working life.

*B. Determine if there are alternative ways to act.*

That the task feels initially unapproachable in Step 1 is totally fine. But Step 2 creates classic "black and white thinking" (ie: that something can *only* be one thing or another). In this case: I have to either do the entire task in one go, or not do it all. Why is there no middle ground?

From [this Dr. K video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBifDZwPiI4) a year ago, he explained that the middle ground is exactly what breaks us free from the cycle of procrastination. I *could* try to do a big, scary task all in one go, but that’s a bad way to frame it. Instead, why not ask the following question: “Can you work on it for five minutes?”

Five minutes is not enough time to get anything of substance done. Therefore, it’s the perfect amount of time to entice beginning a task. With just five minutes, I only have enough time to do these:

*   Read over the instructions
*   Make some light notes 
*   Do a quick outline 
*   Write a to-do list of the task’s subcomponents

After those five minutes, I walk away and do something else. Afterwards, the intimidating barrier of “*STARTING THE TASK*” has crumbled. Even better, in my time away from the task, my subconscious begins working on it and makes it easier to return to the task later.

Once I accepted this new belief and practiced it a few times[^awz4gibzgm8], it became an automatic mental habit for me. Nowadays, once I do five minutes of work, I usually end up just working on the task for longer or until it’s complete because it’s not so big or scary anymore.

*C. Actually try something new and measure the results.*

1.  This task I don’t want to do is big, confusing, and overwhelming.
2.  But can I work on it for just five minutes? Yeah, definitely.
3.  The task is no longer as scary once I’ve started.
4.  I then complete the task.  
    

**2 - Rumination**
------------------

Last month I overheard a conversation between two young women in front of me at a coffee shop. One was complaining, “I just don’t get it, I took Rebecca out bowling, I made her dinner, she has said flirty things to me—so when is she going to ask me out? Doesn’t she *know* I have a crush on her?”

Her friend reassured her, “the time will come if it’s meant to be.”

I assumed that would be the end of the conversation, but surprisingly, it dragged on for over an hour. The smitten woman kept reviewing variations of the previously mentioned details and saying to herself, “I just don’t get it. It doesn’t make sense. Why hasn’t she asked me out yet?”

*A. List out your beliefs about the problem*:

1.  She’s upset that she didn’t get asked out.
2.  Because it’s upsetting, she’s analyzing the event over and over to determine if she missed anything important that happened. 
3.  But since it’s in the past, she can’t actually change anything and get a happy ending or resolution. This upsets her further…
4.  Repeat steps 1-3 for however long she wants to mentally beat herself up for.

*B. Determine if there are alternative ways to act.*

I’ve previously written a whole guide on [how to stop ruminating](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jbYKSHm9cgFnwbFJo/rumination-is-a-habit-and-you-can-break-it). It doesn’t matter how many times you review the past, the past doesn’t change. So to break out of this recursive loop of bad logic, I’ve suggested doing the following.

*C. Actually try something new and measure the results.*

1.  This event didn’t go my way and this upsets me.
2.  I analyze the event in as much depth as possible by journaling about it.
3.  After that, anytime I catch my mind drifting back to the event and having thoughts like, “what if I had said this?”, I say to that thought, “thanks for showing up, but I’m ruminating. I've already journaled about this.”
4.  My brain recognizes that I’m not going to endlessly engage with a past that I can’t change, so it gives up and goes to think about other things.  
    

**3 - Social Anxiety**
----------------------

*A. List out your beliefs about the problem*:

1.  In new social settings, I’m terrified of rejection, disapproval, upsetting someone, etc.
2.  To ensure I don’t mess up, I will exercise extreme caution and be hypervigilant of people’s reactions to me.
3.  Because I'm constantly monitoring for threats and being cautious, I never accidentally/carelessly piss anyone off. Therefore my behaviors work and save me from ever feeling bad.
4.  Repeat steps 1-3 for every social encounter and watch how my social anxiety never gets better.

*B. Determine if there are alternative ways to act.*

The [socially anxious person’s top priority](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/wFC44bs2CZJDnF5gy/social-anxiety-isn-t-about-being-liked) isn’t to make friends, but instead to not make enemies or upset people. They’re engaging in safety behaviors. Toddlers do the same thing: “*a monster under my bed is scary, hugging my blankie makes me feel better, so I’ll just take my blankie everywhere I go so the monster can’t get me.*” When you’re 3 years old, this is fine. But if you go to college still clutching your safety blankie, you’ll get strange looks.

Step 1 for the beliefs surrounding adult social anxiety is fine—it’s okay to be scared of new people or experiences. But step 2 is the equivalent of the safety blankie—the extreme caution and hypervigilant monitoring actually reinforce the feeling of anxiety. How? Because performing them implies that there are very serious consequences if you mess up. But there aren't. Socially, people make mistakes all the time and they learn from them.

When the child matures, lets go of the blankie, and finds that monsters don’t kill him, he learns that it wasn’t necessary.

Similarly, when the socially anxious adult recognizes that the feeling of anxiety is not life-ending and in fact a normal part of growing up, and that making a risky joke doesn’t cause people to hate them forever, that adult rewrites their code as follows.

*C. Actually try something new and measure the results.*

1.  In new social settings, I’m terrified of rejection, disapproval, upsetting someone, etc.
2.  And…that’s okay. Instead of monitoring everyone’s reaction to me constantly, I’ll just say the thing that’s making me feel a little anxious.
3.  Maybe what I say is great and people think I'm entertaining! Or I may end up saying something that people don’t like, but then I’ll be able to learn from this experience. This is part of growing up.
4.  Without constantly monitoring others, my anxiety (which was trying to protect me, yet stopping me from fully expressing myself) doesn’t have much utility anymore. The feeling of anxiety then decreases over time.

It takes practice, but eventually you feel confident to tackle any social activity. And when anxiety does arise, it feels like a mere annoyance rather than an all-encompassing fear that controls you.  

**4 - Simping**
---------------

This is an insult (used as both a noun and a verb) that comes from the word “simpering”. Someone who is being a simp wants the person of their affection to like them, and is willing to do anything for them (even at the cost of their dignity). 

In the context of dating, a classic example is the nerd who wants to date the cheerleader, so he does her homework hoping that she’ll realize that he’s actually super smart and kind and generous. She realizes he’s useful, so she strings him along to get favors out of him. Meanwhile, he believes if he keeps doing nice things for her, then she’ll *finally* agree to go out with him. Her love is surely *just* around the corner…

*A. List out your beliefs about the problem*:

1.  I really like this person and I want them to like me.
2.  Therefore, I’ll do anything for this person in order to charm them.
3.  If I just keep doing nice things for them, they’ll surely come to their senses and realize that I’m a worthy person to date!
4.  1.  Occasionally they compliment me, so there must be potential! I’ll just do even *more* homework for them, or spend money on them!
5.  Repeat steps 1-3 (which can go on for a long time).

*B. Determine if there are alternative ways to act.*

Step 1 is somewhat reasonable. But step 2 destroys any semblance of a mutual relationship, and instead props up a transactional relationship where someone does favors and gets stringed along by the other person.

I’ve never been turned on by someone who is needy and willing to do anything for me. That’s weird behavior. To break out of this loop is simple, but you may not get the results you’re hoping for.

*C. Actually try something new and measure the results.*

1.  I really like this person and I want them to like me.
2.  Maybe I’ll do *one* nice thing for this person, or ask them to hangout with me *once*.
3.  If they make excuses or say “no”, then this person probably doesn’t like me. By walking away, I show them that I’m not overly invested in them. Perhaps this will make them more curious about me.
4.  1.  Or they'll forget I exist. And since there’s not mutual affection, I move on. There are other fish in the sea. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

* * *

I'll leave some more examples of recurring life problems in this footnote[^buxiyju54bc] to explore/solve on your own (if you want to practice the debugger’s mindset).

**Amusing Anecdote & Commentary**
=================================

Last week at a coffee shop I met a psychologist in his mid-fifties. I told him about my debugging idea. Then I asked him, “For your patients with recurring problems, how come they don’t just write down their beliefs, analyze them, determine if they’re unintentionally causing their problem in some way, and ultimately try something new to change their behavior?”

He looked at me funny, and then chuckled to himself. He replied, “You’re assuming people want to solve their problems. Half my patients are bored housewives that just want someone to listen to them. It’s not my job to tell them how to fix their problems, and if they don’t want to put in the work and change their behavior, then that’s their problem. Because as soon as I *tell* them what I think they should do, they become defensive and stop listening. That’s human nature. What you’re doing with the debugging of your beliefs—that’s rare. If everyone had the ability to do that, then I’d be out of a job.”

Critical thinking is hard. It’s energetically taxing. Nobody forces you to do it after you’re out of school. In the book *The Neurogenesis Diet and Lifestyle*, author Dr. Brant Cortright notes that:

> Cognitive testing shows there is a drop-off in mental abilities at two key points in life:
> 
> *   After leaving school
> *   After retiring from work
> 
> But note: **not everyone experiences such a decline.** Those people who continue to be mentally engaged *do not* see a cognitive decline at these times.[^y8g3p8g609]

They say you should never expect people to change, that you should accept them for who they are. No, I call bullshit. That belief is a symptom of low expectations. But that's where most people live comfortably—in the valley of low expectations. After school is finished, there's no longer artificial pressure pushing people into becoming diamonds, and they aimlessly follow the path of least resistance as their souls, like grains of sand, drift into the desert of lost dreams.

Rather than tinker with the algorithm that governs their behavior, and subject themselves to some temporary discomfort and failure, people default to repeating the same mistakes over and over. Freud likes to say that *we repeat rather than remember*. It’s for this reason that a domestic violence victim keeps returning to her abuser rather than running away—better to face the violence she has come to expect, rather than subject herself to the terrifying reality that if she went somewhere else then things could get worse.

In life, when we just stay the course and don’t try anything new, then we guarantee that nothing will ever get better. But when we tinker with the formulas of our behavior (and attempt to debug them), we won’t always improve, but at least there’s a chance that things will get better.

As Eliezer Yudkowsky has put it: "Not every change is an improvement, but every improvement is necessarily a change."

[^og5uqwo6z9g]: If you’re not the introspective type, you could ask a friend to do a code review (ie: have them evaluate your behavior and ask for ways to improve). Once a week I meet with my manager at work to review any outstanding coding problems I have. After trying variations of the same thing over and over, it’s nice to get an outside perspective. 

[^awz4gibzgm8]: There's a sticky note on my work laptop that says "Can you work on it for five minutes?" to remind myself of this trick. 

[^buxiyju54bc]: Getting angry every time you talk with one of your parents. Or your romantic partner. Or a particular friend.Problems with your roommate’s cleanliness or noise levels.Feeling stagnant with the job you have.Being out of shape with a poor diet and exercise routine. 

[^y8g3p8g609]: I've seen the decline—friends who were previously sharp and ambitious have slid into the all-too-easy consumerist brain-rot available. In a way, it's rounded their sharp edges and made them more palatable for a general audience. But if you ask me, I preferred the acerbic taste of their prickly fanaticism.