Latest / insyed; cozy psychology / start now or plan forever; why do my sims always live better lives than I do

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start now or plan forever; why do my sims always live better lives than I do · insyed; cozy psychology

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  Welcome back to INSyed, where we take real psychology
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  research and bring it closer to the life you're
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  actually living. Today, I want to do something
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  a little bit different and tell you a story.
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  So, let's take a peek INSyed. I'm sitting at
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  my desk scrolling on my phone. With the bowl
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  of spaghetti on my desk, I call dinner, starting
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  to get cold. It's not that I wasn't eating, but
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  I was just eating very slowly. As I waited for
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  Instagram to refresh, my eyes shifted back and
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  forth between my laptop screen and the little
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  clock on my phone. It was 10 .33pm. I'd been
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  playing The Sims for 6 hours. Roughly more than
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  a quarter of my day, doing something I never
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  planned on doing. That morning, I had sat down
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  with my tea and opened my calendar app. I had
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  everything written down. Write for my dissertation,
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  brainstorm story ideas, go to the gym, meal prep,
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  Everything even had its own colored time slot.
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  I thought I had things under control, like the
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  kind of person who actually knows what they're
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  doing. I opened The Sims just to decompress at
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  first, just for a little bit. If you're unfamiliar,
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  in The Sims you get to create characters and
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  live virtual lives. You go to work, decorate
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  your home, a real sim -mulation that sometimes
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  sprinkles its own wacky scenarios or events.
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  It's a fun game. But when I paused and stared
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  at the screen, I felt something different. Indifferent.
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  My Sim, who I had made to mirror me as much as
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  possible. Same face, same hair, same aspirations.
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  He was sitting at his desk too. But he had just
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  finished writing his third book. His third book.
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  I saw him stand up from his desk, stretch and
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  smile. The little progress bar above his head
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  had filled up and started glowing. Another skill
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  mastered. Another job done. I've seen this a
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  few times before, a sim maxing out a skill. Usually,
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  I'd be happy. I was going to move on and continue
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  playing, have my sim cook his dinner next. Instead,
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  in that instance, I saw myself, my own face,
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  not in my sim, but reflected faintly in the screen.
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  How come my sim progressed so effortlessly? He
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  could do it because the game made it simple.
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  When my sim sat down to write, He didn't hesitate.
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  He didn't check his phone. He never said, one
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  more thing before I start. He just wrote. The
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  game stripped everything down to a single bar
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  above his head. Practice, improve, complete.
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  There was no gap for anything stopping my sim
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  from doing what he needed to do. It didn't complicate.
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  He simplified. Peter Gowitzer called this implementation
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  intentions. The idea that vague goals like, be
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  productive, never work. what specific situational
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  plans do. Instead of thinking, I want to write,
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  I should have said, when I sit down, I will open
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  my document. My sim didn't have ambition. He
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  had an architecture. He knew what he needed to
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  do next to fill that bar because that was all
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  that mattered. Looking at my laptop screen, I
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  had spent six hours building a version of myself
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  who was better at being me than I was. I thought
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  I knew what productivity looked like. I had a
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  plan. I had the intention. I had the whole architecture
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  of what a good day would look like by 9 in the
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  morning, but my sim knew something I didn't.
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  A plan is not the same as a start. I ended up
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  not writing anything for my dissertation and
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  don't even ask if I went to the gym that day,
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  but that didn't mean I could try again. Until
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  death, all defeat is psychological. Although
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  I think I failed, I can always start again. It
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  was time to turn off the sims and finish my dinner.
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  Once I finish eating, I'll wash the dishes. Once
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  I wash the dishes, I'll go to bed. And once I
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  go to bed, I'll try again tomorrow. This time,
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  with my own progress bar, building things one
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  thing at a time. And that brings us to the end
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  of this week's inside. If something today stuck
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  with you, the best thing you could do is share
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  it with someone else it may reach. I hope we
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  all learned something from the story that I shared
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  today, and if you have anything you'd like to
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  share, The best way to contact me is through
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  my website, website .card .co, w -e -b -s -y
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  -e -d dot c -a -r -r -d dot co. And until next
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  week, I hope you have a lovely day, and remember,
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  there's always more, INSyed.