Get Uncomfortable
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newsletter.smarter.blog
You could make yourself uncomfortable by donning a mail gauntlet and punching yourself in the face every thirty seconds until you die. So what? What good does that do for anybody, yourself included?
It's this intensely epicurian take on stoicism. It's like, the purpose of becoming hard, tough, and a badass is to sit there enjoying that you are a hard, tough, stoic badass.
What are you going to DO with that? Answer that question and I'll tell you what you are. If you have no answer, you just told ME what you are.
Am I going to lose any sleep over that? Nah. What good would it do for me to be angry over some fool's self-absorption? If I have nothing better to do than fret over that, it's an indictment of me and I ought to attend to that lack in myself.
Be uncomfortable if it serves a purpose. If, like Seneca, the purpose is 'not to get too out of touch with regular people', that's fine, if that matters to you. I play drums and lift weights. I don't like the weights, but when I sit down to play drums (or carry firewood etc) I'm not helpless thanks to the discomfort. Purpose transforms all this. Purpose is nice. It's the point of the exercise, not just sitting there contemplating your badassery.
I didn’t start with a particular purpose but I knew I wanted something a little different. Now when I go to the gym and it’s a day I’m just not into it, I drag myself in there anyways.
I’m not really arguing against the point you’re trying to make. But your example is illogical.
If A then B doesn't mean if B then A.
Thanks for catching it!
I mean, yeah, kind of. The purpose of things like this, imo, is general durability. It falls into the same category for me as lifting, or cardio, or even non-specific math. It may have no immediate purpose or intent, but it has a positive impact on everything else you _do_ have a specific purpose for.
In the same way that it's never a benefit to be weaker, or out of breath, or slower at math, it's never a benefit to be less mentally durable than you otherwise could be.
While being somewhat strong is good I argue there are no general qualities past your 'beginner gains'. When you hit that wall you'll need to optimize, which is the same as saying you will become worse in other areas to progress. Efficiency is opposite to robustness.
My paternal grandfather was a military man. He was as hard and stoic etc etc as they come. He was not an emotionally available person and died estranged from the whole family for no reason. There are tradeoffs to becoming too good at something, so we better have a good reason for going that distance.
You just implied that social creatures have the exciting option to value socializing with other social creatures.
My head says you're in sales. But my heart says you're a waterbear who hitched a ride to Earth on a meteorite.
If you respond to this, humor me and do it in the voice of the waterbear.
I read it thinking of the hustle culture people who associate cold showers and other performative discomfort to success, and wondered how they would read it.
I seek discomfort when there is a significant payoff, some unique experience that's worth the pain. Risk eating something completely different, taking the slow route somewhere, talking to strangers, taking the road less travelled.
Fortune favours the bold. It's ambivalent about people who take cold showers.
"cold showers" is a counter-example of this, it is "performative discomfort" as you say without a learning. Not all discomfort is productive in itself. Discomfort is a side effect that has other causes.
But discomfort is an effect of this learning, even a marker: in the words of David Bowie, "If you feel safe in the area that you're working in, you're not working in the right area. Go a little bit out of your depth. And when you don't feel that your feet are quite touching the bottom, you're just about in the right place to do something exciting."
> Deliberate cold exposure causes a significant release of epinephrine (aka adrenaline) and norepinephrine (aka noradrenaline) in the brain and body. These neurochemicals make us feel alert and can make us feel agitated and as if we need to move or vocalize during the cold exposure. Cold causes their levels to stay elevated for some time and their ongoing effect after the exposure is to increase your level of energy and focus, which can be applied to other mental and/or physical activities.
https://hubermanlab.com/the-science-and-use-of-cold-exposure...
example of systems that get better, from the book if my memory is not failing me:
- biological muscles, each time you stress it more than its current capacity micro-tears makethem heal better than before.
- the aircraft industry, each airplane crash make the next airplane less likely to crash.
so if you have an antifragile system you're better off seeking some of these stressors at the right doses (don't go crashing planes in real life, do it in a simulation please)
this is the only thing I remember from reading the book when it came out, if I forgot somethings feel free to mention them.
We have quite a bit of ability to control things. All my friends who are into fitness enough to cite a PR seem to have constant random aches and pains.
People who just walk and eat healthy but never push themselves have much less.
There are some scientific benefits to ice baths, and I do take cold showers(Anything to defend against the viruses here!), but you won't see me "Playing through the pain" or quitting a job to hike for 3 months.
I do think absolutely everyone should read Taleb though. Both for the few useful ideas not commonly found elsewhere, and because you'll see antifragile thinking everywhere and have a better understanding of other people.
My brain's autocomplete is completely failing here, what is PR? It keeps going to pull request, peer review, and public relations.
Not to get philosophical, but Stoicism (and many philosophies) go over this. Man's Search for Meaning is an example of the importance of how one reacts in the face of things beyond their control.
So something like a cold shower leads to next uncomfortable thing being easier and so on. The inertia part is why I workout first thing in the morning, and why I feel like Jiu-Jitsu has done more for my well being than anything else I've ever done. They are relatively safe, controlled ways be uncomfortable daily which spills into every other area.
Now, does this automatically mean success? Of course not, but I'm sure we can all think of at least one thing that's uncomfortable that we should be doing to make our life better. If a cold shower helps someone do that thing, then good.
I don't sleep on the floor at home to make camping easier. That would be silly.
Cold showers are not "performative discomfort" - no one has to know about it if you don't tell them. They're about forcing your body into an almost painful situation, overriding the animal instinct to always seek warmth, shelter, comfort. It is about practicing an exertion of your willpower; your will as a thinking human to endure something uncomfortable with no immediate gain - this is about proving to yourself that _you_ are in control of your body, not the other way around. The same can be said for willing yourself to stop at one drink, or one doughnut, or whatever vice you enjoy. Daily cold showers provide a constant reminder that you are the ultimate arbiter of your mood. They are a form of self flagellation that promotes cross-functional discipline.
In addition to all that, there is the anti-inflammatory response cold showers bring that can aid in recovery after exercise, cardiovascular benefits and so on.
If you have some other form of physical self discipline that helps you more tangibly - great! For me, cold showers integrate very well into my daily routine and I find that days that start with a cold shower are far more productive than those without. It only takes a minute.
Yes, the anti-inflammatory response is great. But usually, an ice-pack does a better job because it is targeted. Only very few moments in life bring inflammation for your entire body. We really should stop pretending there is value in suffering for suffering's sake.
By all means, do the things that make you happy. Just realize that they are "you" things, not universal truths.
I'll take a cold shower occasionally, usually for specific reasons (just came inside from hot, dusty work and want to cool down). It's no more uncomfortable than jumping into a cold creek to swim as a kid, it kind of amazes me that people do it thinking there's a philosophical aspect to it.
I would almost argue that maybe if you think that's uncomfortable in some significant way that you live a very comfortable life.
Cold showers are just arbitrarily unpleasant, like sleeping on the floor or not salting your pasta water. You should save your resilience for pain that bears fruit.
In the poem the point is that the two roads forked in the woods and the poet chose one arbitrarily. After having walked it and experienced the journey, in looking back he tells himself he took the ‘road less traveled’ - though in truth he has no idea. It’s about our tendency to look at the arbitrary choices and random luck we’ve had in our life, but to look back on that and form a narrative that our choices, our random path, was somehow more noble or novel or interesting than the paths we didn’t choose - or that other people have walked.
Essentially, the moral of ‘the road less traveled’ is to stop thinking that you’re special just because you only drink Sumatran coffee imported by this little place that roasts all their own beans. Or because you go to a Korean spa that has a cold immersion tank.
You’re just wandering in the forest with the rest of us.
there is enough unique experience in just doing things that interest me, and that i care about. but it being a unique experience is not the goal. it being worthwhile is.
Just wanted to mention on the subject of being uncomfortable:
I've slept on the floor for decades, initially just to avoid wasting space on a bed in my bedroom while still living at home. But this increasingly became apparent as preventative of waking up with back pains which I'd experience whenever deviating from the floor at friends' homes or hotels, so I just kept doing it. It's not cozy or comforting, it's just dull but I'm so used to it that it's fine.
Eventually it became clear that by sleeping on the floor I had unintentionally made getting up easier. It's not a comfort trap like the soft cozy beds I used to sleep on. This effect became very apparent when I started doing pushups every morning. When I'm already on the floor from where I slept, it's a very short (dis)comfort delta from where I was to where I want to be when what I want is doing pushups on the floor. I'm already on the hard floor; just put away the blankets and pillow and bust out a set then get on with the day. There's no substantial comfort debt to dig myself out of first...
Since experiencing this I've started becoming more conscious of limiting comforts and making them more intentionally used when necessary. It pays in dividends to be a bit tougher across the board. Maximizing comfort continuously is tantamount to coddling yourself constantly, that's what we do to spoil babies.
Because of how poor I grew up, I slept on the floor for most of my life until I went to college and started doing it again after college. Of course sleeping with someone else means sleeping in beds again, but I can generally sleep on a floor just fine. Most people will end up complaining about aches and pains when they do.
I don't have any evidence for or against it, but I personally generally feel better when sleeping on the floor.
So less dense areas of the body are being pressed upward while the rest tries to sink lower, putting all sorts of awkward deformations and strain into the spine, depending on orientation.
For me there's an ideal amount of deformation and that's on the order of a thick rug or yoga mat, just to distribute the load slightly at points of contact (and some thermal insulation). Japanese tatami mats are pretty good since they're basically just slightly compliant breathable floor panels which helps with heat/humidity issues.
As long as my mid section and extremities that don't generally get any propping up on a flat floor can remain unelevated vs. the sinking rest I don't seem to ever have any back problems. One thing that's surprised me is how little thickness is required for it to become an issue. Even sleeping on a birth in my buddy's sailboat without removing the ~2-3" foam cushion can cause me back aches come morning. Remove the cushion and sleep on the underlying bare wood instead? Zero problems, reproduced numerous times over the years.
I hear you re: sleeping with someone else. It's been a sticking point in my past relationships. But for me especially the older I get, I definitely value my physical health, fitness, and lack of chronic pain far more than having a partner to share a bedroom with. It's an easier path to choose without want for children...
I've slept in many terrible places, and I'll take leaving my warm bed on a cold morning over them any day.
Goggins on the other side grew up more like Epictetus. Where the philosophy drove them to sagehood/being kings of their own categories.
This blog falls a bit short on what pain and suffering can do to a person. The whole stoicism movement is more akin to the myth of Sisyphus. Like Camus’s book:
The struggle itself ... is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.
I'm not sure if "spending 1 minute in an ice bath" really drove it home. "I've given up takeaway during the week" or "I've stopped using my aircon" would be more...impactful? As it is, it comes across as comparing a cold bath to what undeveloped countries live in, which feels very naive.
First intentional discomfort encourages you to pay attention to what your body is saying, and trains your willpower. It's easy to fall into a default state of being where impulses come up from your subconscious and you act on them without thinking. Doing uncomfortable things trains you to listen to your body tell you to not do something, and trains you to have the willpower to do it anyway.
Second, discomfort helps you appreciate comfort. Hot cocoa in front of the fireplace is nice, but after a day of snowshoeing it's incredible. The fist meal you have after completing the Appalachian trail, whatever it is, will be the best meal of your life.
Third, there is increasing evidence that certain types of physical discomfort improve health and longevity. Aerobic exercise is obvious and well supported. There is growing evidence that exposure to very hot and very cold temperatures improves longevity. There is also evidence that fasting helps as well. Keep in mind that "does X make you live longer" is a difficult question to answer in a scientifically rigorous manner. I'm on mobile or I'd link to some studies.
This makes a stronger point than the whole article.
However, the reward for the discomfort wasn't just cocoa. Snowshoeing is hopefully also enjoyable. My point in a comment up there was that you should probably save discomfort for things that have some kind of payoff. Hiking is an excellent example of that.
What I meant to talk about is as follows: we have engineered away all sorts of discomfort from our lives and I think that's bad. So (1) be aware of this, (2) seek some discomfort, and (3) if you run into discomfort, take it in a positive way (this I didn't convey in the article).
But yeah I don't mean to say chop of your limbs! Not sure how people are reaching that conclusion.
Thanks HN!
That being said, I feel like the article fails to drive anything meaningful. Thats not to say stoicism is pointless. There are many people in the discussion here that bring up great points about stoicism.
As for myself, I don't know much more than the pop culture basics of stoicism so I can really give any further guidance.
Did I miss the point of the article? It seems like it skipped why someone is looking to get tough. Without that, I'm skeptical that sitting in an ice tub etc is really effective at making someone tough outside of that very specific scenario.
This post sounds like a teenager who's just read Dune and thinks "Sardaukar tough but Fremen tougher".
Imagine not being able to finish a netflix movie in 1 sitting.
They manage it because they have to.
I'm way more stubborn post diagnosis because I promise you (whoever you are) are way less scary than the fact that I might wake up and never walk again.
In my life this manifests through a willingness to speak up for those lower on the totem pole, to call people out on being manipulative assholes, and a willingness to take bolder decisions because I've been through worse, so come at me, bro.
Freedom, like wealth and efficiency, can easily become its own end instead of the end to a healthy, fulfilling life.
Really? My experience is pretty much opposite.
In "developing" nation I can afford pretty much anything. House heating, hot water, plenty of good food, car with plenty of gas...
My parents in "developed nation" are freezing their asses for some stupid politics. Switching on hot water only briefly for quick showers. Supermarkets only have processed junk food. They can not afford car. Politicians are telling 70 year old woman to use bike in snow storm instead...