How to get anything you want in life

The Unfair Advantage

In the “How I got into Waterloo Software Engineering Video”. There was a point I mentioned about not using social media. To be brutally honest with myself, this was the only advantage I had over other people. I wasn’t as smart or hardworking but I didn’t have to be. In this world, your strengths might be decided at birth but your weaknesses are solely your own choice. So what I’m saying is that it is easier to resolve your own vices than to muddle over not having as much as others.

Flow, but before it became mainstream

In highschool, I didn't have any social media accounts, and back then you didn’t need to boot up the computer to do your homework. I really only used it for Google Docs when we had to type something up. As a result I had very deep work sessions and a healthy attention span without even realizing those would become valuable assets. I worked without music, and without the constant urge to pick up my phone. It's the kind of work where the world goes quiet and time seems to jump forward every time you look at the clock.

Young Love, COVID, and social media addiction

Nowadays I’m pretty sure I have a social media addiction. I check my phone like 40 times a day, scrolling reels, watching youtube, texting people, just drowning all my brain power and free time. After some intense pondering, I recalled exactly how I ended up like this. Now this didn’t happen overnight, but as the years have gone by it has only gotten worse and worse.

Let’s dial the clock back to 2018. I was in the tenth grade, and had my first ever crush. The reason I installed instagram was to text her. I’m sure many others who first installed the apps did so for similar reasons, whether because all their friends were on it, or they just felt they were missing out on something.

The more important thing to mention is this created a correlation between dopamine and social media in my mind. When you like someone, simply talking to them creates dopamine, and when they often appear as little blips or beeps on your phone, you start to correlate that sound, or the act of checking your phone with the same joy you get from physically seeing them. Quite simply love has “Pavloved” you into a phone addiction. We’ve all done it, checked our phone 1000 times hoping to get a message from them. Even when your feelings for that person are all but gone, that pathway connecting happiness to your phone is still etched into your mind.

When COVID hit I was immediately jolted from a life of running around doing things 24/7 to absolute stagnation. Now I was no stranger to wasting time. I binged 70% of Naruto Shippuden on Crunchyroll in 2015. You have no idea how many swiffer ads I’ve watched. But even the most avid anime fans get bored eventually and move on. But short form content is different. You can scroll forever, and it's always there. I’m not going to boot up 3 minutes of a show while I’m in line for food. But a couple of youtube shorts could do the trick.

Lockdown, the perfect time to prime the human subconscious

During the lockdown I was trying to drown my loneliness in media and it really fucked up my brain. The damage that short form content, and passively viewing of the lives of content creators can cause became extremely apparent to me. I started to become very socially anxious and had a hard time differentiating between what was on screen and what was real life. Because I had gotten so used to seeing the world from a screen. I also noticed that I was susceptible to having my views changed through what the algorithm pushed to me. I used to think all these headlines of people being radicalized by facebook were crazy. But the power that priming has on the human subconscious is very real. And when we are being exposed to certain types of content day in and day out, our views can be changed. It just happens so slowly that we barely notice it until someone brings it up, or you do or say something that you later regret. Just think about how much your opinion on a post changes when you open up the comments.

The Path to Addiction

Imagine your brain is like a forest, and the connections in your mind are like roads you pave. When you are seeing something for the first time, it's confusing, you are walking through leaves and pushing past bushes. But eventually if you take that path enough times, you start to cut down the trees, step on the grass. It becomes easier and easier to take that path, and eventually it becomes a habit. Something that can even be done subconsciously. Of course after enough time passes, the greenery will grow back, and the road will fade. But if we continue polishing that road, it will become more and more present. Texting your crush is like that initial creation of the path, it takes strong emotions because it's the first time your brain is learning something. Each subsequent time you log onto the app, check something random, get a little hit of dopamine, you are polishing the road.

I passed classes but killed my potential

Ever since then my attention span has never recovered. Throughout all of University the only way I managed to pass my classes was by optimising the little mental resources I had left. I started to hate reading, and hate working. I could pass classes, but I had lost my passion. Every free moment was spent “relaxing” on my phone, I used it like a crutch to help me get through the stress of assignments and exams. But therein lies the problem. Why is the phone framed as a positive thing, while school and work are framed as the negative things? Science tells us that going on your phone is not actually relaxing, it just makes us feel good. Sometimes, I like to imagine how I would have gone through University without a phone. How would I have spent that extra time, maybe I would have cultivated a genuine curiosity for learning, maybe I would have played a sport or socialized more. At this point it sounds like I’m pinning everything bad that ever happened to me on social media. That's not the case, these are my choices. The same way gambler can’t blame the casino for taking their money. I can’t blame these companies for taking my time.

Delayed Gratification- The Most Important Skill

Look I don't know if this is just me, but school life is much easier than work life. Easy in the sense that effort and rewards are linear. If I put in one hour of effort, I can see that reflected in whatever mark I get on the quiz. But real life is not so simple. I could sit here and write a hundred blog posts and there's no guarantee someone will read it. Regardless I still have to learn, and improve, I still have to stay focused and stay passionate. Anything worth doing in life should have exponential returns. It’s the very definition of hard work paying off, at a certain point you want to get more out than you are putting in. The current financial system is designed to keep you exactly where you are in 10 years. Whether that's through inflation, rent, hospital bills or just general unemployment.

When I was still in school, I was able to get away with social media addiction because I didn’t need delayed gratification. However, now that I’m an adult I realized that if I treated work the same way I did school, I won’t make anything meaningful out of my life. What defines greatness is the work that is put in outside of 9-5. A dream of mine is to make a business, and I’ve tried a couple times, and each time after a couple months and the project still isn't going anywhere, I give up. Say maybe the idea was bad, maybe it wasn't my time, maybe it's not meant for me. I’m wasting time.

Break out of the Cycle

1. No more instant

In many self help books I’ve read, in regards to time management advice they say to schedule a time to check your email and to only respond during those times. This way people will not disrupt your flow. Our GENz version of this is instant messaging. Slack, Discord, Instagram, or anything that sends you a notification and demands your attention NOW. So schedule times where you respond to messages, and remove all notifications. The tricky part will probably be communicating this to your friends, but after a couple of weird looks they will likely understand. If it is an emergency they're better off calling 911 anyway. If there are certain people you need to reach you no matter what, I’m sure you can figure out how to configure it on your phone.

2. Take Real breaks

When I used to work from home, I would experience periods of exhaustion throughout the day. My bed was one staircase away so I would often lay down for a “quick rest” that turned into a couple of hours.

I’m sure many of you have experienced that same thing, your bed just feels so nice that getting up feels like a herculean task. But I’m willing to bet that 99% of us have something in common at that moment, we are on our phones, we are watching something. I realized that I didn’t want to lay on the bed and relax, I wanted to lay and scroll on my phone. If I just laid there and stared at the ceiling, I’m sure I would have been back to work in no time.

Amazing things happen when we are bored. But pointless entertainment monopolizing our dopamine has taken that away. Social media is the one everyone points the finger at, but before that it was Television - yes I was around during that time. And in the future it might be something else.

The point is if you’re tired, rest. But don’t delude yourself into thinking that you're worn out when you just want some “Tiktok time”.

Read Atomic Habits (Summary)

To learn the science behind how to break bad habits, I suggest reading Atomic Habits- the summary

How to create a good habit:

• The 1st law (Cue): Make it obvious.
• The 2nd law (Craving): Make it attractive.
• The 3rd law (Response): Make it easy.
• The 4th law (Reward): Make it satisfying.

How to break a bad habit:

• Inversion of the 1st law (Cue): Make it invisible.
• Inversion of the 2nd law (Craving): Make it unattractive.
• Inversion of the 3rd law (Response): Make it difficult.
• Inversion of the 4th law (Reward): Make it unsatisfying.

Quiting Social Media

First + Third Law

• Turn off notification for all apps
• Uninstall apps off my phone
• Youtube autoplays music on a different device while I work, so I’m not tempted to mess with my music, and then scroll on shorts. - Installed a youtube shorts blocker
• Added an instagram blocker to my chrome
• Put phone far away from bedroom, not tempted to go for it in the morning

Second Law

• Always have multiple things to work on
• Have some places you’ve wanted to go
• Have books on hand to read
• Have physical activities planned
• Other hobbies: BasketBall, Rock Climbing