When does it go from learning to mental masturbation?

[JaxAttacks]

I'm completely addicted to learning. While this is generally a good thing, I know that I also like mental masturbation. (Its just so nice!) Where do you draw the line between learning and mental masturbation?

On one hand, I think feeding your mind with new information is great. It gives you more ideas to connect, etc. (It's early morning so please forgive if I can't articulate my thought process as well as I should.)

On the other hand, you don't want to just be an insight junkie and not put your knowledge to use.

 

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[Vigilante]

If you are moving forward, taking action, and not standing in the same place as you were yesterday, it is learning.

If you are still here a year from now... reading books, posting lambo colors, and playing entrepreneur poker with your new business cards, it's mental masturbation.

You should spend a lifetime learning. It's in application that many people fail to convert knowledge into action.

 

[Imgal]

Here's the difference for me. I am committed to always learning, whether it's reading a book, taking a course or just reflecting on what I've done and what has and hasn't worked out. I don't allow it to turn it into mental masturbation because when I learn something I immediately convert it into an actionable item.

Take for example learning a new FB ad targeting method. I read up about the method, make sure I truly understand it and immediately do I work out how to use it for one of my projects, jot it down on a pad (very similar to the great @Vigilante legal pad method) and it becomes a To Do, not a Here's Another Thing For My Mental Filing Cabinets I 'll Never Look At Again. Sometimes it's an invaluable addition to what I'm doing, sometimes it's a complete waste of time, but I know whether to try to expand my knowledge on it or not. Your brain wants knowledge and it wants to be able to apply it, if you don't allow yourself to prove it right or wrong then you'll get caught in a loop of mental masturbation hoping each time you do it you're going to find the one thing that gives you the definitive answer to it all.... truth is though a sex toy (mental masturbation) really is never quite as good as the real thing (just getting out there and doing it)

 

[Vigilante]

Here's the difference for me. I am committed to always learning, whether it's reading a book, taking a course or just reflecting on what I've done and what has and hasn't worked out. I don't allow it to turn it into mental masturbation because when I learn something I immediately convert it into an actionable item.

Take for example learning a new FB ad targeting method. I read up about the method, make sure I truly understand it and immediately do I work out how to use it for one of my projects, jot it down on a pad (very similar to the great @Vigilante legal pad method) and it becomes a To Do, not a Here's Another Thing For My Mental Filing Cabinets I 'll Never Look At Again. Sometimes it's an invaluable addition to what I'm doing, sometimes it's a complete waste of time, but I know whether to try to expand my knowledge on it or not. Your brain wants knowledge and it wants to be able to apply it, if you don't allow yourself to prove it right or wrong then you'll get caught in a loop of mental masturbation hoping each time you do it you're going to find the one thing that gives you the definitive answer to it all.... truth is though a sex toy (mental masturbation) really is never quite as good as the real thing (just getting out there and doing it)

Lol.

 

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[Supa]

When I decided to start learning how to create hiphop beats back in 2011, one of the first things I did as soon as I came up with a nice producer name and bought a domain for it, was to order business cards. I had not even made one good beat or anything. I was just feeling cool I guess lol, but guess what it did for me? Right, absolutely nothing. I imagined myself listening to tracks I produced on the radio and thought of all the awesome beats I'm going to create, while reading through articles about music production. I read so much stuff about how to sell beats before I even started making beats. It took me some time to realize that this won't bring me anywhere near my goal of selling beats. Then I started to learn about music theory, watched the pros make beats, listening to music figuring out how the beats were made, and finally putting the learned into action.

 

[sija1]

I'm completely addicted to learning. While this is generally a good thing, I know that I also like mental masturbation. (Its just so nice!) Where do you draw the line between learning and mental masturbation?

On one hand, I think feeding your mind with new information is great. It gives you more ideas to connect, etc. (It's early morning so please forgive if I can't articulate my thought process as well as I should.)

On the other hand, you don't want to just be an insight junkie and not put your knowledge to use.

I am also like you. Being addicted to learning is an incredible thing for self development. I was curious about how everything is correlated so I made a mind map. I won't be explaining the whole process but I will talk about the learning part.

You starting point is learning (theory) by reading and listening and through research and observation. What you get of it, is information. You use your logical reasoning to process that information (based on what you already know or what you saw, you decide if you hold that information true or false). That info becomes a part of your knowledge. If you look at information from a logical and non emotional perspective, you are able to achieve objectivity. When you see things objectively, you see them for what they are, instead of what they mean to YOU, hence the importance of using the head, a not acting under emotions (people who tend to act emotively don't think, they act impulsively and subjectively which makes them have poor decisions, choices and finally take wrong action).

Your objectivity will give you clearer thoughts which in return will impact your mindset in a positive manner (ex: saying I can't become a millionaire is subjective - there is proof everywhere around you. Saying I can become a millionaire, and doing SaaS will help me more get there then being in a MLM or selling sand in Dubai is being objective and based on MJ's book also). When your beliefs arise from objectivity, they will help you shape a goal. Your mindset will present you with choices. With a clear goal and possible choices, you make a decision which finally leads you into action. The action you take will have a certain outcome which, good or bad, will give you an experience. You can discover new information from this experience and use it the next time you take action. And the circle continues.

TLDR; The action you take is based on your mind. If you use emotion and subjective thinking instead of logic, either fear will overwhelm you or you will take poor course of action because you don't believe in what you can achieve. It will affect your course of action negatively because you will make poor decisions.

Knowledge (theory) and field experience (practice; action) are both required for a field mastery. The better you become, the more creative you are going to be.

 

[Mattie]

I'm learning something new every day. I also apply it every day. I think it only becomes masturbation when you're not applying it to your business and doing nothing with it, but allowing it to rot away in your mind.

 

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[NVious]

https://www.thefastlaneforum.com/co...e-action-vs-pure-knowledge.62517/#post-483541

Also consider (these are 2 articles I wrote for something, so disregard that it isn't necessarily addressed perfectly)

Worst case scenario

Average case scenario

Best case scenario

This is what needs to be considered when using the Von Manstein Matrix because there are certain things in life that’ll give you results no matter what, even in the WCS or the worst case scenario.

Take reading or going to the gym, even if you didn’t know what to read, how to exercise or anything apart from the activity, it may be better than nothing IF you are going to work ON the activity as opposed to just in it. Otherwise you run into the problems of

1.Opportunity cost in asking yourself what COULD you be doing

2.Sunken cost fallacy in that a ton of wrong actions taken could make it a lot harder to reverse than stagnation or small missteps

Meaning that it is not so much that momentum exists in the absolute sense, but what DOES exist is neural wirings for habits, therefore anything previously done will feel easier and more natural so if you’re ingraining negative ways of doing something that has a huge upside like physical or mental exercise, then not only will you have THAT working against you, but you will ALSO have the discouragement that’ll come from NOT getting those results that you KNOW could be gotten.

So yes, there are certain activities that just doing something is better than nothing as in you’ll get SOME results even in the worst case scenario, BUT that can be just as bad for you in the long term as not doing anything at all as it can turn you off the activity entirely due to a lack of result.

Now there are activities when the worst case scenario can be even worse, say starting a business because unlike reading or exercise where you’ll see some results from both meaning a slightly better body in the way of added muscle or a bit of fat dropped and better vocabulary and a bit of extra knowledge….business is not the same, sure it may give you some knowledge, but that can come at a very high cost of losing thousands of dollars and possibly even going into debt and even then….everything is as opposed to what

Could that knowledge have been learned from books? How much would that have cost?

Could that knowledge have been learned buying 2-3 hours of other business owners in the area? How much would that have cost?

Could that knowledge have even been learned from videos on the internet? How much would that have cost?

There is NOT just the cost of money in your business, but there is ALSO the time cost because at least even in a worst case scenario of those that say “oh there are people that are all theory, spend all their time reading, studying and not taking enough action”…well are they reading 40, 50, 60+ hours a week like many business owners are putting in and even then…what is the cost of the books and material that they are reading? As long as you’re not getting scammed in the way of some gender studies degree and you’re learning in a smart/efficient and cost effective way, chances are it’s not costing you nearly as much if close to at all what a business costs to run and operate.

So….not only is the time cost greatly diminished and can be diminished much further if you are learning smart, but also the monetary cost is MUCH lower AND you are not negatively wiring neurons and myelin in a way that can destroy future attempts,

What you DO want to do is merely stay limber, agile and flexible to possibilities while doing exactly what Perry Marshall, Warren Buffet, Marc Cuban and countless others tell people by reading and thus working on their unique selling point aka the 10,000$ an hour activity.

What have we learned from the Von Manstein Matrix so far:

1.Human progress is hell bent on SMART work over hard work, it’s why a slave 2000 years ago will have worked harder in a week than some top CEOs do in a life time and why we’re infinitely better off in our current world.

For when civilization begins to prioritize thought over brute force, we see progress as a whole, this is even true in combat, but especially so in the world as we have now moved towards THE most cooperative, THE most peaceful and THE most prosperous time and are we working more? Are we working as hard as just 100 years ago when the majority of people were farmers this being down to 3-5% in 1st world countries nowadays? Or is it thought that is driving us forward, lazy and intelligent thought.

2. Exercising, based on the metrics of:Energy output

Pleasure derived

Pain derived

When you ask, what is the return on energy investment? While even if within those 3-4 hours of exercise, they don’t like the exercise itself….those are JUST 3-4 hours of the week aka just a few total percent of your week’s time, but what are the net gains?

What are the net gains in how other people perceive you?
What are the net gains in how you perform in other activities that interest you?


Even exercise becomes a quote “lazy” activity that is if we define lazy as energy conservation, pain minimization and pleasure maximization because even IF energy and pain is high during it, pleasure will be very high afterwards, pain will be lower for the duration of your time and in OTHER activities you will have higher energy potential, thus your performance will require less of it AND you will ALSO be able to perform better which will mean your pleasure derived will be higher due to not just your performance but the added external compliments that’ll come combined with the lower pain derived from usually sucking.


3.Sunken cost fallacy coupled with opportunity cost and negative neural and myelin wiring and firing can mean that action can be just as if not in some cases WORSE than inaction as in everything comes down to three categories, worst case scenario, average case scenario and best case scenario. With mental or physical stimulus even the worst case scenario will yield at least some OK results, but in business the worst case scenario can REALLY F*ck up your life.


4.What got you here will NOT get you there or performance vs potential meaning that some people may be performing at naturally high levels, but so what if it is completely underwhelming relative to their potential? Meanwhile others may be performing lower, but may have achieved much more in their progress relative to their potential.


So what is the REAL action to be taken on any activity, in using the methods described in the shortcuts video, it is taking MENTAL action vs physical action because working ON your activity will always yield WAY better results as opposed to IN it.


Figuring out how to exercise, how to eat, how to program your split long term, what are the benefits to different lifting and cardio programs is WAY more valuable in the long term than just doing them


Figuring out how to read faster, what to read and even when to read over just reading


Studying businesses, studying business practices and working on your own unique selling point is way more valuable in taking physical action in starting your own business without any knowledge.


So take the REAL important action in your life and then use the highest speed of implementation, but only when you have diligently worked ON your activity and not just IN it or done the Josh Kaufman first 20 hours.


Consider the WCS, ACS, BCS of ALL activities

Consider opportunity cost, sunken cost fallacy and negative neural wiring or negative momentum leading to discouragement

And ALWAYS work on your USP while looking for BETTER ways to do just this as in not just working IN your activity, but also ON it.

Here are some very practical examples where doing NOTHING can actually be INFINITELY better than something:

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/the-...izzly-what-to-do-if-you-encounter-a-bear/117/

• If the bear charges, stand your ground (you cannot outrun it).
• Don’t scream or yell. Speak in a soft monotone voice and wave your arms to let the animal know you are human.
  
  http://www.michelemmartin.com/beyondtheglassceiling/2011/04/stand-still-when-the-hippos-charge.html

Stand Still When the Hippos Charge

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zugzwang

Zugzwang (German for "compulsion to move", pronounced [ˈtsuːktsvaŋ]) is a situation found in chess and other games wherein one player is put at a disadvantage because they must make a move when they would prefer to pass and not move

 

[LifeTransformer]

This thread links well to the one I started, that @NVious mentions above.

I think you have to find a balance in it, I was all about action until I was about 23 maybe even 25.

I think pure action can be tied to money chasing, if all you want is to make money, then that's the way you'll head, it's not Fastlane being a pure action person, I know, again could say more here but would rather not.

Mental Masturbation is an oxymoron anyway, what other type is there? You're either F*cking, or your thinking about it and masturbating, there's nothing in between.

Actually there is, it's doing neither, AKA nothing.

 

[jlwilliams]

There is nothing wrong with mental masturbatory learning. Even learning about something that seems unrelated to what you are doing may shine light in an unexpected direction. What does a salsa dancing class have to do with entrepreneurship? Probably nothing. Then again, maybe you meet someone who becomes an integral part of you life or your business. Maybe you mind clicks onto the solution to some problem while you are shaking your groove thing. Maybe it just lets off some steam. Whatever the case, learning something new is worth while simply because you learned something new.

If someone limits what they will read, look at or study to only that which they see has immediate use may limit themselves too much. If you will only learn what is "useful" you are betting that you know what it is that you don't know, and that's unlikely. I say go ahead and learn whatever catches your eye. Is it mental masturbation? Who cares?

 

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[The Autobahn]

Too much learning by the definition of theories, is like going too much to the gym. Of course you will get smarter or fitter but in the end it counts how much you can translate it to the real world success.


Gesendet von iPhone mit Tapatalk

 

[TheSilverSpoon]

If you are learning stuff because it will "be useful someday in the future" it's mental masturbation.
If you are learning stuff because "I'll need to know this when I launch my _____" it's mental masturbation.

But, if you are learning stuff because you are doing ______ today, then that's good, practical just-in-time learning.

 

[Rawr]

learn something - must apply it - learn from doing, and seeing how it is in reality, learn more specifics about how to do it better.

not

learn something, learn something else, learn something else, never apply it to anything or apply very little.

 

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[Malika]

I like that thread title