Forums IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ Beyond Human Confusion

Hi all,

I've been pondering the importance of confusion lately. People have to take quite a lot of confusion everyday. Decision making involves a state of confusion before the decision is made (there are other steps to be sure).

Today it occurred to me, if someone had a strategy which combines confusion with some unpleasant feeling. In fact I noticed I do exactly that. I combine confusion (or uncertainty) with the feelings of guilt and shame. Or it feels like I do that.

This observation allows quite big changes to be made in my system. (Thanks to my OTC that allowed me to have enough sensory acuity to notive this!).

Anyway, I have to go, but couldn't resist to write this down here in the forum.

[He].2s2.2p4

Confusion is a sign that the brain is working on it\, creating new neural networks and on the border of breakthrough. The problem with confusion it has a lot of similarities to frustration, not getting ahead, feeling stuck.

The main theme of frustration is not knowing what to do.
The main theme of confusion is not knowing what to do, yet and knowing or expecting the solution or answer to show up soon enough.

So confusion in many ways is good thing. It's expanding your comfort and experience zone.

Alex
Alex

Yes, that's what I've been working on lately! Confusion is essential! But if confusion, in my strategy, leads to extreme shame, that's not very useful. In fact it makes that strategy quite painful for me.

Today I have hopes to think this thing through properly. I have some free time.

Let's see what comes out...

[He].2s2.2p4

just shows that you have to USE whatever you HAVE, steer whatever energy that comes up into a constructive avenue.

I mean, I know that's been said before, your example just reinstates that.

I would wager that it is far more common for people to consider confusion a negative thing than a positive thing.

If you asked a sample of people if they thought confusion felt mostly pleasant or mostly unpleasant, I think the majority of replies would be that it's an unpleasant experience.

So I don't think you're alone. I think the ability to tolerate ambiguity and confusion is a tremendously useful skill, but it's awfully rare.

Your comments on Confusion interest me. Confusion was something I became interested in many years ago when in the Navy steaming boilers.
On occasion we would lose fires, the lights would go out and it was a mad panic to get things started again. At this moment it was total chaos and no one knew what to do. I finally had enough of this scene repeating itself and just observed what went on. When this moment hit everything was pure instinct but no one had any experience for dealing with this. The possibility of having a boiler explosion and getting cooked in seconds was very real, there was some justification for the panic.

So in my search I found a book by L. Ron Hubbard (I'm not selling scientology or advise it to anyone) tittled "Problems of Work" which he discusses "Confusion and the Stable Datum". This was the first place ever that this subject was addressed to my knowledge. I'm using this application loosely, but when confusion hits you have to mentally make some decision wwhether it is right or wrong, once you have a stable datum to operate from you are out of confusion.

I took this to the ship and tried it out the next time we lost power. So thinking before hand what would be the best "stable datum" to throw out there for all the guys I yelled to the Burnerman to light a torch. This really was ahead of where we where in preparing to lights fires again but everyone saw the torch and knew what to do. The confusion was gone. We went from getting back on line in an hour to maybe fifteen minutes with no panic. All I could say to myself was "Wow!" So I have to give Ron some credit there.

This is an extreme case of confusion. There are many other kinds that come into ones life. Sometimes you have that one I call the "developement confusion" when you are growing and learning. You are shedding old ideas and picking up new ones. Your mental machinery is breaking down and has to be replaced with new better stuff to continue to function at a higher efficiency. Education really helps and so do tools like Holosync (am I starting something here?) Usually these are slower more mundane cycles of confusion like midlife crisis or possibly depression that everyone gets at some intensity or another.

These types I have found that it is best to just stick to your guns and continue doing what you where doing when it started. Big changes are ahead so it is worth doing.

Best of Luck

Jeff

Hi 'xas, baba and jeff,

Thanks for comments!

From my point of view I would like to add the old metafore: How do you make tiger stew? First you catch the tiger. Then you make the stew. Catching, is the härd part;-)

[He].2s2.2p4

That is pretty cool , Jeff!

vitaman

You always have really cool stories, Jeff.

It makes a great deal of sense. Once someone has something stable to cognitively fixate upon, they can build a complete reality orientation around that.

Bandler and Grinder would use confusion as a teaching technique.

I never personally experienced Grinder's style of teaching, but I've attended a Bandler seminar, and I can tell you first-hand that he induces confusion. It can be pretty harrowing at times.

The thing about it is, when you're confused, your brain is desperate for something to latch on to, something to build a stable orientation around. When it gets it, it can cling to it pretty tightly.

Some people use it in teaching to really drill something in.

Unfortunately, some things learned this way can become a fixation point and your thinking and behavior can become "calcified" around it. Very rigid, unchanging, inflexible.

I've heard that in teaching Jeet Kune Do, the teachers do something like this, but constantly induce confusion and information overload, to try and keep the person lively and on their feet, out of their minds and in the moment, so to speak. Don't know if that's true, it's what I was told by a martial arts guy.

I've found confusion particularly hard to deal with. I was one of those smart kids to whom things came very easily. When stuff got tough, when I'd really have to strain and thing about something complex, a whole load of negative self-judgments and panic set in. I still have a lot of that stuff. It's a hard thing to deal with. Confusion can be a real pain.

I think for the latching onto the datum thing to work, it has to be something that you're really familiar with.

On a recent programming test for a job interview over the phone, they asked me to code something with the guy waiting on the line that I had absolutely no idea how to approach. I tried focusing on the simplest, most certain thing, but I got panicy, drew a lot of blanks, and just couldn't think. When I'd start to get oriented, some other unknown or the idea of the time constraint or some other thing would come into my mind, and I'd have to start all over again. It was a nightmare.

I know that I'll have to go through a lot more interviews before I get my legs and take it as it comes without freaking out. I guess it's just one of those things.

Hi Babayada;

When I was younger and just getting out there in the world my conditioning was such that I "had to control confusion", confusion was not not an optimum state to be in.

Having been one of those skinny kids that seemed to get beat up all the time, confusion to me was like ones of these bullies. The panic attack, fear wave was just another bully to overcome.

Going beyond this, what I really had to learn was to overcome myself.

So what if there is confusion? It is an energy that has a life of it's own and must run it's course or you can latch onto it and control the direction it takes if you are prepared to do such a thing.

Jumping into a bunch of confusion without a plan is like jumping into a tornado. See you later Toto.

When I look back, at the time I thought, it seemed that learning of the "Stable Datum" and lighting a torch for all to see was a masterpiece of work. It has been a valuable tool for me in life.

Now with a few years of maturity, probably "the moment" was sitting there and just observing it all. I was empty of mind, had no control, it was dark with steam valves screaming and people running all over the deck plates.

Boiler water under pressure is fine. If you lose pressure the water will flash and one gallon of water becomes 1700 gallons of steam. No escape from that.

So there really wasn't anything to worry about or another way of looking at it, worrying would do nothing for us.

When your mind is amped out you will not come up with any answers or proper actions.

So in this and other training my boiled down principle that surfaced for me was " A calm mind is your greatest asset." period.

When confusion or daily life strikes.

rule 1:
A calm mind is your greatest asset.

rule 2;
Enjoy boredom. It's your friend.

I think this also is the point you want to get to in Martial Arts training. My Sensei always scolded me to "Just Relax, do nothing" but he was not talking about my body, which took years to figure out.

All the best

Jeff