Warming Up

Don’t confuse “current status” with “permanent feature.”

There is a series of “status steps” that are often necessary to change a particular status, and the flow is usually this:

“Unpleasant Status” -> “Unpleasant Status + Additional Discomfort” -> “Pleasant Status + Residual Discomfort” -> “Pleasant Status.”

Consider the unpleasant status, for example, of being cold. In order to go from being cold to the (presumably) desired status of being warm, you first have to be cold and inconvenienced by looking for warmer clothes, shelter, etc. In a very strict, very short-term sense, you’re worse off now than a few seconds ago! Before you were only cold; now you’re cold and you have to do something. But soon that task yields results – you get your jacket or you go indoors or whatever. Then there’s a stage where you’re warm but you have to deal with the residual effects of whatever task you took to get there – did you have to buy the jacket? But soon that’s resolved, and now you’re just warm.

Simple enough when you lay it out like that. But the pattern is easy; the steps sometimes are more complex. And that pattern has enough steps that some people start to see a particular “unpleasant status” as a permanent feature of their life. An iron-clad caste instead of something that can shift, like being cold or being wet.

For example, if you’re in bad shape, that’s not permanent. “Overweight” isn’t a species. But if you want to not be overweight, the next step is “overweight, tired, and hungry,” and if you’re a short-term thinker, that certainly feels like being worse off! It’s especially unappealing if you’ve fooled yourself into thinking that “overweight” is something you can’t change anyway. Why be tired and hungry if it won’t change anything, right?

Not every status will be worth changing for every person. Actions have costs, and a fact of life is that you can’t do everything. My goals are not your goals, and that’s okay. But don’t let yourself be fooled into thinking you can’t have goals at all, because your life is carved from stone.

It’s not. You can warm up or dry off or anything you like.