Intellectual energy

'you're only winning the argument because you're smart, not because you're right'

I'm pretty sure I'd often end up losing arguments with very smart and debate-happy socialists, libertarians, postmodernists, neoreactionaries, anarchoprimitivists or jesuits if I got into them, but I don't think that means I should end up agreeing with the world-views of all of them.

I've had this happen too and what's funny is that my apparent "smartness" was simply due to a familiarity with strong counter arguments to their position, and nothing to do with intelligence.

It's quite common to get that kind of a compliment even if you say something relatively stupid they agree with.

Sure there is: the satisfaction of pulling it off.

Sadly, one cannot eat satisfaction.

Thank you for posting about this. It takes both courage and respect for truth.

I've made a huge amount of progress shutting down self-hatred. Unfortunately, I haven't kept a diary, so this is from memory, and I'm not completely sure which of the many things I've tried were crucial. I also do have therapy (only once a month-- the style is influenced by Somatic Experiencing). I think it helps, but it isn't the main thing.

This is going to be a core dump. I recommend that if you start feeling swamped, pull back from it.

Here's what I've written in the past.

I strongly recommend Transforming Negative Self-Talk by Steven Andreas-- it's an NLP-based approach of modifying the speed, volume, pitch, direction, etc. of the attacking voice. I found it did a lo quiet mine, and one of my friends found it helpful. The book says that these methods don't work for everyone, so if you try it, please view it as an experiment. It is absolutely the most obviously effective self-help book I've used.

I've seen some talk about the need for compassion and courage to get out of self-hatred, but I find these abstractions are too grand and frightening. Fortunately, getting in on small facts and grinding can be very useful.

Two mottoes: "I will not do my enemies' work for them." "I will not beat myself up for symptoms of depression."

I've found that fits of self-hatred are not under direct conscious control, but they can be examined and this helps. Partly, it's that the process of examination is very different from being caught up in self-hatred.

Even if you can't prevent self-hatred, experiment with self-care afterwards. You've just had a rough time, and you won't be struck by lightning if you take a moment to come back to the ordinary world and let yourself feel steadier.

It's done me some good to look at self-hatred as a passion. I still don't know what's going on, but just acknowledging that high-energy inventive hatred is a strong drive helped somehow.

It also helped to realize that part of my mind must be terrified of something to be working so hard to constrain me, even though I haven't figured out what it's afraid of.

It helps (in a slow grind sort of way) to keep coming back to whether what the voice is saying is true-- the universe is remarkably tolerant of people who don't meet random ideal standards.

Compassion and Self-Hate-- a good book on the subject, with focus on men's issues. I Thought It Was Just Me (but it isn't)-- another good book with focus on women's issues.

Would you like to join my Minecraft server?

No, really. As far as games involving problem-solving go, Minecraft with a large set of tech-mods is pretty high up there, and adding the social element helps motivation. I'm not sure what the best fraction of time to spend on games is, but it's almost certainly >0.

This very nearly spiralled out of control at the start of my PhD. Doesn't sound as extreme as you so my advice probably won't be of much help. Collecting small victories helped.

Ha.

Sorry. I meant I think I suffer from the intellectual OCD as you've described it. How would you suggest I rid myself of it?