Lately, I have been trying to get a rational grip on my tendency to be risk averse. One of the therapeutic techniques of which I am aware is called Rational Emotive Behavioural Therapy. The gist of this technique is to examine one's assumptions with regards to irrational behaviour, identify incorrect assumptions, and logically argue with oneself to correct one's way of thinking.

I conducted a thought experiment this morning to help me get a better understanding of some of my irrational behaviours. Specifically, I went to a club last night and I didn't dance at all because I became anxious about the possibility of failure. This is a negative feedback loop because the more anxious I become about failing, the greater the real probability of failure is. (Failure in this instance doesn't just mean getting rejected. It includes the possibility of being accepted and then embarrassing myself.)

I drew up a grid with the four possibilities on it. I could either act or not act and I could either fail or succeed. On a scale of 10, if I were not to act, my utility would be 5. If I act and fail, my utility would be 0 and if I act and succeed, my utility would be 10. In the short term, either acting or not acting seems like rational behaviour. On any given night, the expectation value of both options is 5.

The insight that I had this morning, however, was that the long-term expectation favours acting. Why? Because each time I act and fail, the utility of acting and failing increases slightly. This creates a positive feedback loop around action. Even though any individual experience might make me want to curl up and cry, the average expectation value of acting will slowly ascend and given enough time, there will even come a point where I derive more utility from acting and failing than I do from not acting.

OK, I'm confused. If you assign a zero value to a failure, then at what point is 0+0+0+0+0....> 5 ?

I mean, if the long-term expectation favors acting, I would be more inclined to see this as a refinement process (i.e., you either get better at what your doing, so that the failures can be reduced and perhaps eventually eliminated, or you accumulate a group of people around you, over time, who aren't quite so judgmental about the concept of "dancing failure") -- but I see that as more experiential/sociological than mathematical.

And then there's the subjectivity/perception angle -- what you perceive as "dancing failure" might not seem quite so negative to another observer....

isn't this kinda like .... if at first you don't succeed.... try try again?

The 0's never exceed 5, but after every failure, it becomes a little less terrible. So after one failure, maybe it'll be 0.1. If the trend continues, then after 50 failures, I'll be indifferent to whether or not somebody laughs at me or I make a fool of myself.

Also, remember, acting and failing is balanced by acting and succeeding, which carries a high utility value. Assuming that the probability of either occurrence is 50%, then the expectation value of acting (which includes both the possibilities of failure and success) is 5.

As for my perception of a dancing failure, it IS somewhat subjective, but I'm pretty sure that if I had went rigid with a panic attack out on the dance floor, that would constitute a failure by any measure.

Raineegirl, it IS sort of like that, only backed up by a benefit analysis to prove to myself that it's actually worthwhile to try, try again.

Why don't you change your entire thought processing rather than counteract it with try/fail/try/fail????????

you can do musical chairs to any variation of music...



it's still musical chairs....

it's amazing what we will invent to regiment ourselves into a 'safe' and familiar environment...

so basically you're learning to not care what other's think of you...

Here's my advice: next time you're at a club, get up and dance ur a$$ off! HAHA! Who cares if someone laughs? They weren't brave enough to do it. Basically it comes down to just being you and learning that no matter if you fail or succeed, your opinion of you is the only one that matters. You never know how you will do unless you try. Hell, just trying to dance puts you so much ahead of most men...lol. In any situation, just be you. You seem like a pretty cool guy, and if people laugh, just laugh with them. Learning to laugh at your own silliness is the best way to not care what others think. Life's too short to be so serious

First of all if you did dance, hopefully its with a female.
So you are way ahead of all the guys not dancing and if the are laughing. You can ask them if they like apples, most people do and reply yes. Then you tell them you got the lady dancing with you, how do you like those apples.

J/k