Comment by J-dawg | Hacker News Reader

Comment by J-dawg | Hacker News Reader

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I recently had some counselling, and one thing the therapist spent a long time talking about was self-agency. It was something of a revelation for me. I realised I had essentially been drifting along in life for a long time, allowing decisions to be made for me and avoiding conflict wherever possible. He described self-agency as like a muscle that needs to be exercised, even in small day-to-day ways.

A sense of self-agency seems to be fundamental to good mental health.

>> Me personally, I have just one regret in life: that I didn't rob a bank when I had the chance.

Oh come on, you can't just leave that hanging there. Hope you can share the story without incriminating yourself!

EDIT: Great story, and for what it's worth I think you probably made the right decision. It could easily have ended up being the story of how a bright kid had his prospects ruined over the theft of 20 cents, because of the bank's "we always prosecute" policy and an over-zealous legal system.

Cheers. Re: the Self-Agency stuff, I agree completely. I've personally selected the psychological viewing platform that "I create the whole of my own reality". [1]

The key word is "whole" - with this perspective, I am 100% responsible for everything that happens in my world. I get cut off in traffic - I created that; a song comes on the radio - I created that song.

Now, intellectually, it's complete BS. My brain will never accept that extreme level of self-agency. And I don't pretend I do an amazing job of living it all day every day.

But from a happiness perspective? (Hence referring to it as a 'viewing platform' - one perspective on the world.) It's incredible. Fundamentally liberating because I don't live in a world of blame, excuses, regret, other people letting me down. Something incredible happens - I take full responsibility. Something terrible happens - I take full responsibility.

Perhaps a little too 'out there' for most, but I'm happier than I was before and I believe that self-agency filter I choose for everything is the reason.

[1] See http://www.openup.com.au And yep - I found them through my father. Man that guy knows everyone!

I'm intrigued by your viewing platform. My brain instantly wants to reject it too. Also, it seems like it could lead to a lot of self-recrimination and beating yourself up. Why should I feel responsible for someone else cutting me up in traffic?

I feel like I'm probably misunderstanding something fundamental. Seeing as we seem to be on the same wavelength I'd like to try harder to understand it.

I have lived in a (self-created) world of blame, excuses and regret. Especially regret! Anything that helps to move away from that can only be a good thing.

The way I've found to reframe that conversation:

For some reason I chose for that person to cut me off in traffic. What message am I trying to send to myself? Or maybe by being cut off now, I prevented myself from being in a fatal accident a few minutes down the road...

The other thing I find liberating about this platform is that you give yourself permission to always take responsibility for things. Someone is angry at you for something? No problem, sorry, my fault, I'll try and do better.

If all they needed was to be heard/acknowledged/an apology, you're all good. I can't tell you how many situations are smoothed over with this one. And if they need more, you're in charge of deciding whether or not to offer it or to do something else.

Very glad to see this come up on here!

Apologies for the delayed response - my email is in my profile, so feel free to drop me a note with yours and I'll send you some links etc that might be of use. Thanks for your sharing in this thread! Jacob

That reminds me of solipsism* : the idea that your own mind is the only thing surely existing and might contain everything else; the universe, other minds within.

* https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism

Sometimes before falling asleep I wonder if the instance of my mind that wakes up is really the same mind or just someone else with the same memories and body as my mind.

Fortunately this doesn't actually stop me falling asleep.

I have a friend who habitually says "goodbye forever" before going off to sleep.

It makes you think.

> It was something of a revelation for me. I realised I had essentially been drifting along in life for a long time, allowing decisions to be made for me and avoiding conflict wherever possible. He described self-agency as like a muscle that needs to be exercised, even in small day-to-day ways.

Really interesting. Did your counselor give you any `exercises' to start working on that ? Have you started implementing changes in your day-to-day life ? I am kind of living the same thing at the moment.

Yes, he said to start with simple things like interacting with friends. Arrange to (e.g.) have dinner, pick the restaurant, invite the people you want to spend your time with.

It sounds so trivial, but it hit me like a punch in the guts when I realised I hardly ever do anything like this. I've always gone along with whatever other people have planned, reassuring myself that I'm 'easy-going'.

This is what he meant by 'exercising the muscle'. Get used to getting your own way, getting what you want from the world, and taking responsibility for any conflict that arises as a result.

I guess the idea is that you become accustomed to getting what you want and taking responsibility when the decisions really matter.

Even reading back what I've just written feels silly, and embarrassing to admit to. But I hope it's gone some way toward answering your question.

DISCLAIMER: I'm a complete beginner at this stuff and very much still finding my own way. So please take anything I say with a pinch of salt and consider seeing a therapist yourself if you're still curious.

Thank you for sharing that :).

You're very welcome. I found the whole experience pretty mind-blowing, the way a few minutes of talking to this guy could alter my whole perception of my life, past and present. I highly recommend giving it a go, even if you're not feeling depressed or anxious (although I was).

Do you know what kind of background he has ? Master in psychology, psychiatry or psy bachelor ? Did that play any role when you chose to make an appointment ?

I actually just picked someone in my area and he turned out to be very good. I didn't look at his qualifications. I've read stories of people having very mixed experiences with counselling, so I guess there's an element of luck involved.

Sorry I can't give a more satisfactory answer. I would perhaps advise being prepared to try 2 or 3 different counsellors until you find one you click with. If my experience is anything to go by, you'll probably know whether you click during the first session.

It's okay, your experience reflects mine. One of the key point I read some time ago (here on HN) is that one of the best indicators for success in therapy is the quality of the relationship between patient/client and the counselor.

Indeed, it's really important to try different counselors until it clicks. In the long term it'll be less expensive and time wasting to go trough 2 or 3 or 4 then getting stuck with a bad fit.

Thanks again for sharing that.

I know that +1 answers are generally bad form, but I also just wanted to thank you for that comment.

It's something that really does make sense once you think about it, but I would never have thought about it like this in the first place, so this perspective helped me a lot.

The 'exercising the muscle' analogy is also used in "the willpower instinct, which I found quite interesting (though I have to admit it did not help me, because I did not stick with it).

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