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morgan_blackledge's reviews
664 reviews
Clean: Overcoming Addiction and Ending America's Greatest Tragedy by David Sheff
4.0
Brave. Factual. Crucial reading for anyone who is curious about, or in some way effected by addiction. This is the book on substance dependence that needed to get written. Its going to do a lot of people, a lot of good!
Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
4.0
Fragile refers to things that break when exposed to shock. Robustness refers to things that are resistant to shock. Antifragile refers to systems that become stronger as a consequence of exposure to shock. Living systems (including people) are Antifragile.
In the mental health field we talk about resilience a lot. But it's not always clear weather resilience means being 1: Robust i.e. resistant to shock and therefore less sensitive, or 2: Antifragile i.e. optimized to learn and grow from life's inevitable stresses. The second would view willingness to experience intensity as prerequisite to personal growth. I see the need for both, but I vote for stepping to the Antifragile when ever possible.
Antifragile is a "game changer" (please excuse the tiered phrase) for me, particularly for introducing me to the term: iatrogenic - loosely defined as harm caused via medical treatments, but more broadly applied to harm caused by any sort of intervention. The authors point in elaborating on the term is that living things (including people) often benefit from exposure to appropriate stressors. Interfering with said stressors (via medical or other types of intervention) however well intended, can be harmful in the long term.
I could smooch Talb for digging up these ol chestnuts: Mollification, Mithridatism and Hormesis. Mollification means intervening with the intent to calm, sooth or pacify a symptom e.g. palliative medicine and pain management. Mithridatism is the practice of protecting oneself against a stressor by gradually administering non-lethal amounts e.g. exposure therapy for trauma and phobia. Hormesis is the practice of impelling a generally favorable biological response via exposure to stressors e.g. any kind of athletic training, weight lifting, running etc. Currently psychotherapy tends to promote the agenda of Mollification. In my ideal world, psychotherapy and psychological training promotes the agenda of Mithridatism and ideally Hormesis.
The author is "refreshingly irreverent" (please excuse the tiered phrase) towards fancy, overly complex explanations and practices, and particularly skeptical (even hostile) regarding the too often unchallenged status and claims of academia. You have to love that even (no especially) if your an ivory tower resident.
Taleb pits "tinkerers" (inventors and entrepreneurs) e.g. Steve Jobs against "thinkers" (philosophers and economists - so fashionable to bash lately) e.g. Paul Krugman, and asserts that tinkerers drive innovation while thinkers hitchhike and claim the credit. A neat observation, but similar to the equally brilliant and bombastic Matt Ridley, Taleb goes too far when dismissing the contributions of scholars and researchers to the greater good.
Taleb posits "Fat Tony" as the archetypical Brooklynite, smash mouth, nobel savage, anti-philosopher who makes money by the bushel while the "Harvard Fragilistas" sit on their tweed asses and blah, blah, blah. The observation has merit, but much of reality simply doesn't conform to this caricature.
For instance characters like Robert Oppenheimer, Richard Feynman and John von Neumann. Can you honestly call these guys effete intellectuals? They were all great humanists, theorists and hard drinking, bare knuckled men of action. They dreamed up and built the A-bomb and the "thinking machines" that facilitated it's creation, and then wrestled with the monster ethical and political issues that emerged as a result of its use. Let's see Fat Tony do that!
As someone who has spent the better part of 30 years doing blue collar jobs, ones that entail mopping floors, swinging hammers and lifting lots of heavy things on and off of big ass trucks, I'm here to tell ya, despite what Dr Taleb says, sometimes those Fat Tony types are actually idiots. As someone who is also a college professor and community mental health clinician, some academics are not petty leaches. A few of them do good things and are actually kinda generous and smart.
It takes all kinds of people to innovate. Some people push the ball forward from the arm chair e.g. Einstein. Some people push the ball forward from the wheel chair e.g. Stephin Hawking. Some people push the ball forward from someone else's sofa e.g. Paul Erdos, and sadly some great thinkers are "regular guys" who never get their due, but that doesn't mean that our celebrated intellectuals are all a pack of frauds.
Additionally, Taleb lets his libertarian intuitions get the better of him when he try's to reframe the accomplishments of Denmark and Sweden as not in fact examples of effective centralized government, but rather cleverly disguised confederations of small, independent micro municipalities. Oh really? Now who's being all fancy pants?
Call it what you want, but Denmark and Sweden have some of the highest tax rates and most top down interventionist social policies of anywhere, and still manage to squeak out a decent little standard of living for their citizens (Ooops, I mean the highest standard of living on the planet). Not the most innovative countries granted. But not exactly the gulag either.
And as far as education failing to pay out in terms of higher income and opportunity. Would Dr Taleb like to explain his theory to the some of the first generation Mexican Americans that are students at the university I teach at? I'd be willing to venture that finishing college will equate to enhanced "optionality" for at least a few of those individuals. Maybe a few others.
Don't get me wrong. I love the book. It's brilliant and it fully lives up to the hype. But as Dr Taleb says, Antifragile things love criticism, so here's a little love and criticism for him and Fat Tony.
In the mental health field we talk about resilience a lot. But it's not always clear weather resilience means being 1: Robust i.e. resistant to shock and therefore less sensitive, or 2: Antifragile i.e. optimized to learn and grow from life's inevitable stresses. The second would view willingness to experience intensity as prerequisite to personal growth. I see the need for both, but I vote for stepping to the Antifragile when ever possible.
Antifragile is a "game changer" (please excuse the tiered phrase) for me, particularly for introducing me to the term: iatrogenic - loosely defined as harm caused via medical treatments, but more broadly applied to harm caused by any sort of intervention. The authors point in elaborating on the term is that living things (including people) often benefit from exposure to appropriate stressors. Interfering with said stressors (via medical or other types of intervention) however well intended, can be harmful in the long term.
I could smooch Talb for digging up these ol chestnuts: Mollification, Mithridatism and Hormesis. Mollification means intervening with the intent to calm, sooth or pacify a symptom e.g. palliative medicine and pain management. Mithridatism is the practice of protecting oneself against a stressor by gradually administering non-lethal amounts e.g. exposure therapy for trauma and phobia. Hormesis is the practice of impelling a generally favorable biological response via exposure to stressors e.g. any kind of athletic training, weight lifting, running etc. Currently psychotherapy tends to promote the agenda of Mollification. In my ideal world, psychotherapy and psychological training promotes the agenda of Mithridatism and ideally Hormesis.
The author is "refreshingly irreverent" (please excuse the tiered phrase) towards fancy, overly complex explanations and practices, and particularly skeptical (even hostile) regarding the too often unchallenged status and claims of academia. You have to love that even (no especially) if your an ivory tower resident.
Taleb pits "tinkerers" (inventors and entrepreneurs) e.g. Steve Jobs against "thinkers" (philosophers and economists - so fashionable to bash lately) e.g. Paul Krugman, and asserts that tinkerers drive innovation while thinkers hitchhike and claim the credit. A neat observation, but similar to the equally brilliant and bombastic Matt Ridley, Taleb goes too far when dismissing the contributions of scholars and researchers to the greater good.
Taleb posits "Fat Tony" as the archetypical Brooklynite, smash mouth, nobel savage, anti-philosopher who makes money by the bushel while the "Harvard Fragilistas" sit on their tweed asses and blah, blah, blah. The observation has merit, but much of reality simply doesn't conform to this caricature.
For instance characters like Robert Oppenheimer, Richard Feynman and John von Neumann. Can you honestly call these guys effete intellectuals? They were all great humanists, theorists and hard drinking, bare knuckled men of action. They dreamed up and built the A-bomb and the "thinking machines" that facilitated it's creation, and then wrestled with the monster ethical and political issues that emerged as a result of its use. Let's see Fat Tony do that!
As someone who has spent the better part of 30 years doing blue collar jobs, ones that entail mopping floors, swinging hammers and lifting lots of heavy things on and off of big ass trucks, I'm here to tell ya, despite what Dr Taleb says, sometimes those Fat Tony types are actually idiots. As someone who is also a college professor and community mental health clinician, some academics are not petty leaches. A few of them do good things and are actually kinda generous and smart.
It takes all kinds of people to innovate. Some people push the ball forward from the arm chair e.g. Einstein. Some people push the ball forward from the wheel chair e.g. Stephin Hawking. Some people push the ball forward from someone else's sofa e.g. Paul Erdos, and sadly some great thinkers are "regular guys" who never get their due, but that doesn't mean that our celebrated intellectuals are all a pack of frauds.
Additionally, Taleb lets his libertarian intuitions get the better of him when he try's to reframe the accomplishments of Denmark and Sweden as not in fact examples of effective centralized government, but rather cleverly disguised confederations of small, independent micro municipalities. Oh really? Now who's being all fancy pants?
Call it what you want, but Denmark and Sweden have some of the highest tax rates and most top down interventionist social policies of anywhere, and still manage to squeak out a decent little standard of living for their citizens (Ooops, I mean the highest standard of living on the planet). Not the most innovative countries granted. But not exactly the gulag either.
And as far as education failing to pay out in terms of higher income and opportunity. Would Dr Taleb like to explain his theory to the some of the first generation Mexican Americans that are students at the university I teach at? I'd be willing to venture that finishing college will equate to enhanced "optionality" for at least a few of those individuals. Maybe a few others.
Don't get me wrong. I love the book. It's brilliant and it fully lives up to the hype. But as Dr Taleb says, Antifragile things love criticism, so here's a little love and criticism for him and Fat Tony.
The Middle Passage: From Misery to Meaning in Midlife by James Hollis
4.0
I love James Hollis. And I liked this book. But I have to say, I liked his more recent book on the same subject (Finding Meaning in the Second Half of Life: How to Finally, Really Grow Up) even more. May as well go ahead and spoil yourself rotten and read em both!
The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society by Frans de Waal
3.0
This book is really hard to rate. I liked this book and I love DeWaal so I feel like a dick for only giving it 3 stars, but there were so many cringeable moments that I can't in good conscious give it the 4 star ratting I would like. My big complaint is DeWaal relies so heavily on observational methods, which is very interesting and useful, but then dismisses critics (who regard observational findings as inconclusive) as big reductionistic meanies who are too un creative or tin hearted to understand that animals have empathy and are intelligent. I think almost everyone (with some notable exceptions e.g. Skinner and Ted Negent) intuitively understands that animals are intelligent and empathetic. The reason biologists and social scientists want systematic, experimentally derived evidence is because they want to understand the exact mechanisms of said phenomena (for various excellent reasons). Furthermore, DeWaal exercises every opportunity to present experimental evidence that support his claims. Beyond that, the book is discursive and disorganized, making it nearly useless as a reference for later use. The book is essentially preaching to a choir (of which I am a member). Entertaining and confirming of some good feelings, but low on hard use value.
The Secret Life of Pronouns: What Our Words Say About Us by James W. Pennebaker
4.0
J.W Pennebaker's early research indicates that people who write about their traumatic experiences (i.e. journaling) tend to recover from psychological and co-occurring physiological symptoms faster and better than those who do not.
An important factor in Pennebaker's study was that participants were asked to write about their traumatic experiences, every day, for fifteen minutes, over the course of four days. Participants who wrote the same (or similar) story each time didn't get the beneficial effect. Participants who changed the way they told their story did.
According to Pennebaker's more recent computer assisted statistical analysis of word category usage in writing and speech samples, an individuals particular style of use of function words -in both writing and speech- is an important indicator (even predictor) of their psychological state, and social status.
FUNCTION WORDS ARE:
-Pronouns (such as I, you, they)
-Articles (a, an, the)
-Prepositions (to, of, for)
-Auxiliary verbs (is, am, have)
As a clinician, I am excited by Pennebaker's work. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy has prescribed journaling for decades. The literature has clearly demonstrated that journaling has therapeutic value, but has failed to describe how (exactly) journaling works. This research sheds light on the former, hopefully leading to more effective and targeted future interventions.
Additionally, Pennebaker's work may shed light on the active components of talk therapies such as Motivational Interviewing. Perhaps facilitating change talk has an even greater efficacy than previously understood.
A note of warning, this book is really hard to stay with at first, i.e. I kept drifting off and having to re-read large sections for the first few chapters. The going gets smoother though, so I strongly suggest pushing through. The bulk of the book reads nicely, and is full of really juicy and original stuff. Notice most (if not all) of the extremely negative reviews were from people that did not finish the book (an automatic disqualifier for any review).
I realize this is an incredibly dry review. This is no coincidence. The book is incredibly dry too. But that's not always a bad thing. Think white wine, or towels. If you endeavor to read this thing, don't expect a slack jawed page turner. But if you think you might be interested in exploring the intersection of statistics, linguistics and psychology, I highly recommend this book.
An important factor in Pennebaker's study was that participants were asked to write about their traumatic experiences, every day, for fifteen minutes, over the course of four days. Participants who wrote the same (or similar) story each time didn't get the beneficial effect. Participants who changed the way they told their story did.
According to Pennebaker's more recent computer assisted statistical analysis of word category usage in writing and speech samples, an individuals particular style of use of function words -in both writing and speech- is an important indicator (even predictor) of their psychological state, and social status.
FUNCTION WORDS ARE:
-Pronouns (such as I, you, they)
-Articles (a, an, the)
-Prepositions (to, of, for)
-Auxiliary verbs (is, am, have)
As a clinician, I am excited by Pennebaker's work. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy has prescribed journaling for decades. The literature has clearly demonstrated that journaling has therapeutic value, but has failed to describe how (exactly) journaling works. This research sheds light on the former, hopefully leading to more effective and targeted future interventions.
Additionally, Pennebaker's work may shed light on the active components of talk therapies such as Motivational Interviewing. Perhaps facilitating change talk has an even greater efficacy than previously understood.
A note of warning, this book is really hard to stay with at first, i.e. I kept drifting off and having to re-read large sections for the first few chapters. The going gets smoother though, so I strongly suggest pushing through. The bulk of the book reads nicely, and is full of really juicy and original stuff. Notice most (if not all) of the extremely negative reviews were from people that did not finish the book (an automatic disqualifier for any review).
I realize this is an incredibly dry review. This is no coincidence. The book is incredibly dry too. But that's not always a bad thing. Think white wine, or towels. If you endeavor to read this thing, don't expect a slack jawed page turner. But if you think you might be interested in exploring the intersection of statistics, linguistics and psychology, I highly recommend this book.
The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It by Kelly McGonigal
4.0
Lately, it has become very fashionable (particularly for neuro-sceensters) to bash the the outdated notion of free will. And for good reason. That shit is a fairy tale. It just plain doesn't exist. At least the hokey ol' folk psychology notion of "uncaused" behavior a.k.a. contra-causal free will. a.k.a. classical dualistic free will i.e. the belief that there is a component (call it a soul or what ever) to human behavior that is something more than the unavoidable consequences of the genetic and environmental history of the individual and the possible stochastic laws of nature..............
Every event (including human behavior) has a natural cause (of some sort or another), and there's no such thing as ghosts, so please get over it, it's 2013 for fux sake.
That being said, it is pretty clear that people make choices, and the choices they make, make a difference. It's gonna take people smarter than myself to sort out all of the apparent contradictions and tangles inherent in this particular philosophical puzzle. So I'm not even going to try. And frankly, neither did the author of The Willpower Instinct (Kelly McGonigal), and I for one, think that's a very good thing.
McGonigle does a decent job of revitalizing this decidedly uncool and very unfashionable topic, due in part to the fact that she kept that shit simple! Simple language, simple ideas, simple simple simple. I loved that about this book.
Many people erroneously think that the answer to their problems will come from learning some complex theory or idea, and once they have the magical information, than their life will "fall in to place" with little to no effort.
In my experience, the opposite is true. The information needed to understand most of life's challenges is typically quite simple and readily available. But the actual solutions are usually difficult and typically take some real effort.
Willpower is one of those things. If you lack willpower, the explanation is not complex, McGonigal explains the issue quite easily, in very simple language. But actually changing that situation for yourself will require effort i.e. practice. Willpower is like any other psychological skill. It's like a muscle, it gets stronger with practice. It's not hard to understand, you just have to actually do it.
McGonigle didnt exactly get creative with the format though (for better or worse). It's a standard formula for popular psychology books to (a) identify a problem that nearly everyone suffers from, (b) Identify all the ways that commonsense notions about the issue are wrong, (c) summarize the what the "new" science of ______ says about the subject, (d) bombard you with a litany of interventions and exercises, followed by (e) case study examples of dubious authenticity, and (f) copious research findings. Again, McGonigle doesn't even try to do it differently. She pretty much just did one of those. And it works pretty good. Cha Chunk - one pretty decent pop psych book, made to order, nothin fancy.
WHERE THIS BOOK SHINES!
McGonigle does do a particularly good job of describing how negative self evaluation can be deleterious to our willpower. According to McGonigle, self criticism and self castigation is counterproductive to adaptive behavioral change. Many people think they need to be "hard on themselves" in order to "keep them selves in line". But negative self talk (and the feelings and beliefs that accompany it) can actually keep people trapped in cycles of maladaptive, out of control behavior. For example: people who over eat to manage negative feelings may harshly self castigate, leading to enhanced negative feelings, which trigger more of the unwanted impulsive over eating behavior -and so on -and so on -and so on...
I am currently working as a clinician in a addiction recovery program. Our clients come to us FULL of shame and self criticism. It's normal, it's natural, but it doesn't help them change the behavior. If shame worked for that, they wouldn't be addicts. Shame actually makes the problem worse because it makes them feel worse (see above) and it diverts attention from the real problem, making arriving at a reasonable solution pretty dang hard.
One component of this phenomena is the Ironic Rebound Effect:
This refers to when attempts at cognitive control/suppression backfire and result in increased incidents of the undesired cognitive content e.g. feelings, mental images, self talk etc. For example: after individuals attempt to disregard doubts about themselves, their self esteem actually declines and their anxiety rises (Borton, Markovitz, & Dieterich, 2005). Likewise, when individuals feel compelled to condemn some activity, such as a risky act, they are actually more likely to undertake that activity in the future (Maio & Olson, 1998).
According to McGonigle, the intervention for ironic rebound effects is, simply put, to "give up". Let go of the agenda of cognitive control. Surf The Urge! In other words, allow yourself to have the problematic feelings or thoughts (or what ever), with equanimity, i.e. without resistance or self judgment, and (most importantly) without reflexively acting on them. From this platform of self acceptance, the individual can begin to gain insight into the actual triggers and mechanisms of the behavior, and make the needed adjustments necessary to retrain the maladaptive behavior.
Self acceptance, however counterintuitive, can be the critical first step to exiting these kinds of behavioral traps. So there you go. The secret to willpower is giving up. Wait, what?
Not so fast! There are plenty of instances where the agenda of cognitive change (cognitive restructuring) is effective. In my opinion, acceptance and mindfulness based approaches are best when offered in concert with traditional CBT. I like to say, you can change the cognitive content (traditional CBT) or you can change your relationship to the cognitive content (Mindfulness Based CBT). What ever works for you. It's just that most people are oversold on the agenda of cognitive change and under trained/educated on the agenda of acceptance. For me, it's all about embracing the dialectic of Acceptance and Change.
SUMMARY: the ABC's of willpower are A: self care, B: self awareness and C: connecting with what matters most in life (i.e. values). The rest is simply a matter of practice.
Every event (including human behavior) has a natural cause (of some sort or another), and there's no such thing as ghosts, so please get over it, it's 2013 for fux sake.
That being said, it is pretty clear that people make choices, and the choices they make, make a difference. It's gonna take people smarter than myself to sort out all of the apparent contradictions and tangles inherent in this particular philosophical puzzle. So I'm not even going to try. And frankly, neither did the author of The Willpower Instinct (Kelly McGonigal), and I for one, think that's a very good thing.
McGonigle does a decent job of revitalizing this decidedly uncool and very unfashionable topic, due in part to the fact that she kept that shit simple! Simple language, simple ideas, simple simple simple. I loved that about this book.
Many people erroneously think that the answer to their problems will come from learning some complex theory or idea, and once they have the magical information, than their life will "fall in to place" with little to no effort.
In my experience, the opposite is true. The information needed to understand most of life's challenges is typically quite simple and readily available. But the actual solutions are usually difficult and typically take some real effort.
Willpower is one of those things. If you lack willpower, the explanation is not complex, McGonigal explains the issue quite easily, in very simple language. But actually changing that situation for yourself will require effort i.e. practice. Willpower is like any other psychological skill. It's like a muscle, it gets stronger with practice. It's not hard to understand, you just have to actually do it.
McGonigle didnt exactly get creative with the format though (for better or worse). It's a standard formula for popular psychology books to (a) identify a problem that nearly everyone suffers from, (b) Identify all the ways that commonsense notions about the issue are wrong, (c) summarize the what the "new" science of ______ says about the subject, (d) bombard you with a litany of interventions and exercises, followed by (e) case study examples of dubious authenticity, and (f) copious research findings. Again, McGonigle doesn't even try to do it differently. She pretty much just did one of those. And it works pretty good. Cha Chunk - one pretty decent pop psych book, made to order, nothin fancy.
WHERE THIS BOOK SHINES!
McGonigle does do a particularly good job of describing how negative self evaluation can be deleterious to our willpower. According to McGonigle, self criticism and self castigation is counterproductive to adaptive behavioral change. Many people think they need to be "hard on themselves" in order to "keep them selves in line". But negative self talk (and the feelings and beliefs that accompany it) can actually keep people trapped in cycles of maladaptive, out of control behavior. For example: people who over eat to manage negative feelings may harshly self castigate, leading to enhanced negative feelings, which trigger more of the unwanted impulsive over eating behavior -and so on -and so on -and so on...
I am currently working as a clinician in a addiction recovery program. Our clients come to us FULL of shame and self criticism. It's normal, it's natural, but it doesn't help them change the behavior. If shame worked for that, they wouldn't be addicts. Shame actually makes the problem worse because it makes them feel worse (see above) and it diverts attention from the real problem, making arriving at a reasonable solution pretty dang hard.
One component of this phenomena is the Ironic Rebound Effect:
This refers to when attempts at cognitive control/suppression backfire and result in increased incidents of the undesired cognitive content e.g. feelings, mental images, self talk etc. For example: after individuals attempt to disregard doubts about themselves, their self esteem actually declines and their anxiety rises (Borton, Markovitz, & Dieterich, 2005). Likewise, when individuals feel compelled to condemn some activity, such as a risky act, they are actually more likely to undertake that activity in the future (Maio & Olson, 1998).
According to McGonigle, the intervention for ironic rebound effects is, simply put, to "give up". Let go of the agenda of cognitive control. Surf The Urge! In other words, allow yourself to have the problematic feelings or thoughts (or what ever), with equanimity, i.e. without resistance or self judgment, and (most importantly) without reflexively acting on them. From this platform of self acceptance, the individual can begin to gain insight into the actual triggers and mechanisms of the behavior, and make the needed adjustments necessary to retrain the maladaptive behavior.
Self acceptance, however counterintuitive, can be the critical first step to exiting these kinds of behavioral traps. So there you go. The secret to willpower is giving up. Wait, what?
Not so fast! There are plenty of instances where the agenda of cognitive change (cognitive restructuring) is effective. In my opinion, acceptance and mindfulness based approaches are best when offered in concert with traditional CBT. I like to say, you can change the cognitive content (traditional CBT) or you can change your relationship to the cognitive content (Mindfulness Based CBT). What ever works for you. It's just that most people are oversold on the agenda of cognitive change and under trained/educated on the agenda of acceptance. For me, it's all about embracing the dialectic of Acceptance and Change.
SUMMARY: the ABC's of willpower are A: self care, B: self awareness and C: connecting with what matters most in life (i.e. values). The rest is simply a matter of practice.
Vehicles: Experiments in Synthetic Psychology by Valentino Braitenberg
5.0
This book is a magic treasure chest of deep insights. Pure joy. If you are interested in the mind, behavior and evolution, you just found a secret classic. READ THIS BOOK!