4. put yourself in a position where you deal with other people who value logic and reason.
I mean, you need some of 3, as well... Personally, I have succeeded at 4. to the point where I am one of the more emotional and irrational people in my life.
I think my life got a lot better when I stopped listening to people who said I was too analytical. Sure, we are none of us completely rational, but I think there is a difference between striving for rationality and consciously avoiding it.
I have no idea why it's so common for people to consider it a virtue to coddle insane and irrational behavior.
Look, if someone tells you they feel very strongly that running across a busy highway is a safe thing to do, you'd think that person was nuts, right? because we recognize that emotion is not a tool of cognition, and that using it in that manner is a really really bad idea. So what about a person who doesn't know how to communicate properly and tries to deal with various problem solving tasks that come up in life via emotion? does the fact that it's a few levels of abstraction removed from concrete facts somehow make it fundamentally different?
Have you read anything like Predictably Irrational, or the less famous Stumbling On Happiness, or maybe The New Brain? Or Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me)?
They all make psychology and behavioral economics research very digestible, and all underscore the point: we're not rational. Even if we think we are. Our brains are essentially wired to be tangled up and self-deluding.
Moreover, lots of people use "logic and reason" as shield to hide behind when they say and do unfeeling, cutting things to other human beings who happen to react with emotions.
re-read my comment. I recognize that we are not completely rational. Rationality and logic, though, are still very powerful tools, even when wielded by emotional beings such as ourselves. Some of us are more comfortable with logic and rational models than we are with emotions.
What I am speaking of has much to do with cultural values. Just like a Scientist is not going to feel valued by a community that believes science can teach us nothing, I didn't feel valued when I was around people who valued emotions over logic.
I'm not really sure where you think you are in conflict with what I said.
Emotional people can have high value, and you are missing out if you avoid them completely. I earn about 300% more when I let a recruiter get me a gig than when I contract myself out.
All I'm saying is that when I feel like 'everyone' doesn't value rational thought and logic as much as they value some emotional quality I don't understand, yes, I don't feel valued. I have seen programmers in environments like that quit and dedicate their lives to creating mediocre music. (Not that musicians aren't valuable... but I have seen some really awesome world-class programmers go on to be mediocre musicians, which just seems like a waste.)
"I don't know everything" and "I might be wrong" are core to creating a useful rational model from incomplete data. I think that surrounding myself with people who are more rational and/or more intelligent than I am helps to develop that humility. Spending my days amongst managers does the opposite.
4. put yourself in a position where you deal with other people who value logic and reason.
I mean, you need some of 3, as well... Personally, I have succeeded at 4. to the point where I am one of the more emotional and irrational people in my life.
I think my life got a lot better when I stopped listening to people who said I was too analytical. Sure, we are none of us completely rational, but I think there is a difference between striving for rationality and consciously avoiding it.