You know about the Blue Car Syndrome, right? It says that when you buy a blue car, you suddenly start seeing blue cars everywhere. It doesn't mean that there are actually more blue cars than before, it just means that you're more aware of them.
About a month ago, I read something about The Lizard Brain. It suggested that humans have this part of our psyche that is so risk-averse, so focused on survival, it will actively work to prevent you from doing something you think is risky – even something you really want to do, like starting a business or writing a novel or doing something creative.
Since I read that, I've seen lots of authors and bloggers talking about The Lizard Brain, and I've become keenly aware of my own Lizard Brain as I work on the keynote for PAX East. It really needs to be done in about 21 days (at least 5 of which are going to be unavailable to me because I'm working on Big Bang Theory) and it isn't nearly as close to completion as I want. As you can imagine, panic and deadline pressure are rising like mental floodwaters, and that's not the most productive mental state for writing an interesting and entertaining speech. Well, played, Lizard Brain. I see what you did there.
The bad part of this is that I keep getting stalled and frustrated while I attempt to find the spine upon which I need to attach and connect the various parts of my keynote address. The good part of this is that my brain keeps blocking me from writing the keynote by coughing up some of the most interesting short story ideas I've had in months. In an effort to take the good with the bad and walk away with a net positive (awesome keynote and some cool short stories), I've been working on the keynote during the day, and then unwinding by working on the shorts. Working on the shorts has become my daily reward, in other words; it's really good motivation.
This is where I'd quote a little bit of the short I've been working on, but I've learned that doing that before it's finished, even if it's only a dozen words, completely aborts the writing process. I like this story too much to even risk not finishing it, so in place of a quote, I'll draw an ASCII dong: 8=====D
This is where I wrap this up with a concluding paragraph that hopefully elevates this post from mildly-interesting reading to something useful: When you're working on something that terrifies the Lizard Brain into action, don't panic! Acknowledge what it's trying to do, accept that it's part of the hardware, and write a software patch to work around it. It doesn't have to be a bug; it can be a feature.
Edited to add: I couldn't recall all the places I read about The Lizard Brain, but in the comments here, Nathaniel S. reminded me:
Seth Godin has just released a book entitled Linchpin that explores ways to both soothe and overcome the lizard brain. There's a fantastic interview/conversation between him and Merlin Mann on the subject over at 43 Folders. It's a tad long, but very worth it.
http://www.43folders.com/2010/01/26/godin-linchpin
It also includes a video of Godin talking about the lizard brain and "the resistance" and how innovative and creative people can break through it to get stuff done, or "ship" as he puts it.
I'm not surprised at all that this came to me via Seth Godin, because I read his blog every day. His book Purple Cow
is the foundation of my marketing and business philosophy, and Merlin Mann's … well, everything, is inspiring to me. To be clear: I wasn't making an effort to not credit Seth; I just forgot where my recent Lizard Brain thoughts originated.
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I think that’s a lizard-sized dong, too. Hmm…
Interesting. I’d like to look into this some more. I’ve been in the same rut with making music and writing, I have absolutely no good reason to keep holding myself up with doing these things but my brain fights me every inch of the way. I’ll have to keep a look out to see when it’s trying to do that some more
Patch brain with dong, check!
…wait.
Huh. My lizard brain just rolls around on its back singing the chorus to Poker Face or Mr. Fancy Pants (thanks to last night) over and over and over again. Which is a really odd form of self-preservation, let me tell you.
The day after mom brought a new white van years ago, she exited the doctors office only to see about half a dozen white vans in the lot. As she’d had the vehicle for a day, it took some time to figure out which one was hers.
Interesting though. Maybe this explains my (mostly) total lack of motivation to do some things Ive been meaning to do. Some of it’s creative. I have a load of stuff for places like ficly that I need to type up, and one of my browser windows has eleven tabs of job openings and corresponding applications. Most of which are no where near my present location, and though I really want the job, and perfectly willing to relocate, I have to force myself to fill them out some times.
Nice post. Thanks. 🙂
Thanks Wil, my lizard-brain’s freaking out about my exams for advancing to candidacy this year and maybe now I can work on that patch… before I get distracted by something else unrelated to my research 🙂
A friend of mine refers to the “lizard brain” as the “dangly bits” – for two reasons. One, it’s the most inner portion of the brain and seems to “dangle” below the rest of the brain. Two, it’s the part of the brain most responsible for that other “dangly” organ that men have.
My old boss, Frank Chadwick of Game Designers’ Workshop, used to describe something similar.
He said that as soon as a project was on the schedule, it became a chore, and the next project in line was suddenly fascinating. So he’d labor along at the current project but jot down notes for the next one as they occurred. That way, when the next project hit the schedule and became a chore, the creative notes were there to be pieced together.
That approach has also worked pretty well for me since 1985. But I love the “lizard brain” explanation. It adds shades of understanding I’d not seen before.
Thanks!
Weird. Second time in a week I heard someone talking about the “Lizard Brain”. On the MuppetCast podcast, the host conducted an interview with Steve Whitmeyer (voice of Kermit since Jim Henson passed away), in which he talked about the levels of brains in relationship to the Muppets, starting with the Lizard Brain.
BEWARE! Lizard Brain software patches written with alcohol are prone to catastrophic failure. “Write drunk, edit sober” is great for fiction, not so much for patching root systems.
Maybe Lizard Brain is the solution to the keynote for PAX, and the universe has been trying to tell you something. I mean, what a fantastic jumping off point the Lizard Brain makes for a whole lot of ideas.
Also I think if someone sat people down and said, “Write a short story. Here’s your prompt: Lizard Brain,” you’d get a million amazing stories out of that. Woohoo!
Knock ’em dead!
Thats an interesting concept, first I’d heard of it but it kinda makes sense. Great approach to trying to take advantage of it – I’ll have to borrow that trick sometime, myself!
so instead of trying to write An Incredible Keynote Address, try writing something about stuff you love (gaming, acting, etc). in the back of your mind, keep in mind that this will be what you’ll be talking about at PAX East, so that you can sort of pat it into a keynote-shape as you write.
you might end up with something pretty cool
“Maybe Lizard Brain is the solution to the keynote for PAX”
Judging from the clientele (or, for that matter, the folks who created it), I’d guess the Lizard Brain is the reason for the entire existence of PAX.
While the lizard brain (I call it Smart Monkey Instincts) has killed many blog posts, it has also saved my life. The feeling I get 30′ off the ground is the same as I get at 300 words.
More than once I have found upon review that I am writing garbage, or am about to die from a loose stone under my ladder’s foot.
You are a smart monkey Mr. Wil.
Note to Mr. Wheaton: After completion, please remember to write-protect the files in your brain labeled “PAX East Keynote Address”; Barfleet is not responsible for lost or damaged brain cells.
Four weeks from today, I leave for a conference in Edinburgh, at which I have to present a paper to some very influential people in my discipline and area.
Naturally, I can’t seem to focus on the damned paper. I want to write it, but I am finding ANYTHING else to do to avoid writing it. I finished writing a paper that I’m not presenting until JUNE. I wrote a proposal for a program. I held a superbowl party, and I don’t actually like football all that much. I got out the chainsaw and cut down some saplings. I finally threw away this rotten fake-well thing that the pervious owners installed in my yard. I’ve been trying to schedule some things on campus.
It goes on and on. The point is, maybe there is something to this Lizard brain thing. Everything else I’ve done is less risky to my career than writing a shitty paper would be, and yet I can’t seem to make myself WRITE IT.
Good luck on your keynote. I wanted to come to PAX, but I’ll be in Scotland presenting a paper, and drinking Scotch ale.
Current anthropological theory holds that our brains got larger once our forebears became bipedal and thus freed their hands for tool development, etc.
One could posit that the real reason our brains got bigger is that our hands were free to flip off the Lizard Brain every time it tried to thwart a creative process.
That being said, I’d agree with Mr.Hinerman: the struggle between higher consciousness and The Lizard Brain makes us what we are,and gaming is a very pure example of that. It lets us indulge our imperative to take risks (because in the animal world that’s the way to get babes) in a fashion that doesn’t upset Lizard Brain.
I’ve been having lizard moments lately myself. I think part of the reason is, I usually screw up any new thing I try. Do you run? Sometimes when I am having a moment, I like to get out and run off whatever is bothering me. It helps clear my mind. You’ll come through everything on top, 100%. We are cheering for you! =]
Hope to get a chance to see some of your short stories one day. I know they are great! I wish you so much luck with the keynote, Big Band, everything!!
Oh so that’s what’s been stopping me from starting my blog, podcast or million other creative things that I want to do but always cockblock myself. Hmmmm…now that it’s out in the light I hope to conquer it. Thanks Wil.
I understand this. Whenever I feel scared by a situation I try to remember what the soldiers in the boats approaching Omaha beach must have felt. It makes me realize that I need to man up and what real fear is.
Totally get that. I’ve been battling that myself, and frankly, writing that software patch (as you’ve so aptly called it) is the best thing…and the hardest thing to do.
Thank you, Wil, for writing something that I’ve needed to hear for a while.
Unfortunately, for some of us women, it’s not actually the Lizard Brain that blocks our creativity, but the “Placenta Brain”, as my husband, the OB/GYN, likes to call it. I wrote what I thought was a pretty good idea for a novel back during NANOWRIMO. Then, I took a month off before rewriting/editing it with the fear of it being absolutely terrible sitting at the back of my mind the whole time. Then, I got pregnant. I’m too exhausted, moody, and nauseous to even think about rewriting, editing, or even fearing it, now. I guess it’ll just have to wait–probably in about nine months or so.
Good luck with your keynote! I so want to be there to hear you read it, but alas, I doubt I’ll be up to the trip. I’m sure you’ll do fine, and everyone will love you! Just go and have fun!
Blue Car Syndrome sounds kinda like Baader-Meinhof phenomenon:
http://www.damninteresting.com/the-baader-meinhof-phenomenon
Crap. Now I’m going to go to work in the morning and have 8 co-workers lecturing on Baader-Meinhof phenomenon… thereby cementing the damnable thing in my brain. 🙂
Maybe I should start a thread on Schadenfreude…
You have no idea how much I needed to read this, Wil. Thank you for it.
I thought that link was going to be about how you’ll see actors in a show, and then you’ll change the channel, and here they are in another role, and then the next day you see them again in something else, which happened the other day with Diedrich Bader (I didn’t know his name was spelled with just one “a”) and I thought Meinhof was someone else in the Drew Carey show. And since the article doesn’t seem to know the origin either, perhaps I’m right after all. 8^)
Great! Just great.. Tomorrow all I am going to see is Lizard Brains walking around with ASCII dong’s.. just faboo! 🙂
Almost everything I accomplish these days is by either last-minute rush or because I’m putting off doing something else. In fact, lately I’ve chained a set of items that needed to be done because I was procrastinating on something else and then the thing I was procrastinating on became the thing that enabled me to procrastinate on something else, and so forth. XD
Human beings are silly people.
Thank you for posting this… Now I know that it isn’t just procrastination or the kids or work or the internet or Wil’s blog or iTunes keeping me from finishing my assignments… it’s my overwhelmed lizard brain protecting itself… seriously, that’s good to know… Thank you…
The Lizard Brain, or as Christopher Titus calls it, the “Inner Retard.”
That little voice in your head that when you say “I’m gonna go to my boss and ask for a raise!” says “Yeah, well you gonna get fired, idiot.”
Not only did my lizard brain prevent me from doing something risky (my chem lab HW… riskiest thing ever!!), it redirected me to your site and told me why it was preventing me from completing chem lab in the first place…
Thank you! I’m one of those people who has starter anxiety, and now I know why.
Great Bob in Heaven, this is fantastic. I am in my next-to-final quarter of graduate school and suddenly find myself unable to commit the simplest things to memory, or to drag myself awake long enough to study for my certification exam. I have been stuck, and unable to understand why, after two years of near-inferno learning, I’m unable to rub two sticks together.
Well played, lizard brain. I see what you did there.
Already, the fog lifts. Thank you, Wil!
Remove the risk and the lizard brain has nothing to avoid.
I am familiar with many aspects of the lizard brain. Good luck in your ongoing attempts to tame it. No doubt you’ll get it eventually. Hopefully a lot sooner than when you’re on the plane over here.
Just remember you’re Minister of Geek Affairs, man, talking to your people.
Simple yet productive advice. Thanks as always, Wil! Can’t wait to hear the speech 🙂
http://www.livingwithanerd.com
Wil says: “It doesn’t have to be a bug; it can be a feature.” Words after my own heart! (sidelong glance at my avatar)
When I was in grad school, we used to play “Avoidaball”, which was any lame activity we devised late at night (typically kicking a big wad of paper up and down the long hallways outside our offices) with which we could occupy ourselves instead of doing what we were supposed to be doing. Think Calvinball, but spiced up with geology nerdness.
For some reason, Wil, when you say Lizard Brain I think Sleestak.
“…in place of a quote, I’ll draw an ASCII dong: 8=====D
This is where I wrap this up with a concluding paragraph that hopefully elevates this post from mildly-interesting reading to something useful…”
Are you kidding? Showing me how to draw an ASCII dong is *more* than enough to elevate your post to something useful!
Also, the part about the risk-avoidant Lizard Brain is really cool, too. Maybe I can find a positive way to present it to my 7th-grade son, who is failing both pre-algebra and religion because he avoids homework and studying like the plague. (Just like his father, but at least I waited until I was in college before that behavior got totally out of hand.)
Your new saying???
“Don’t be an ASCII dong!”
Wil,
The “Blue Car” phenomenon is also known as the “Plate of Shrimp” theory (at least among me and mine). Simply talk to your peers about something out of the ordinary, a plate of shrimp for example, and then be amazed by how many references to plates, shrimp, and plates of shrimp show up.
The Lizard Brain sound suspiciously like the fight-flight-fcuk reflex. Breath with your belly. Also, make sure you have your towel with you.
Stay cool.
Wil,
Curious why you don’t mention the Lizard Brain book by name? I’m currently reading the same book and find it quite fascinating and it hits the nail on the head for why I’m such a loser…
I’ve been reading about Lizard Brain sorts of stuff in the course of reading about Friendly AI. AIs won’t have Lizard Brains, because they didn’t spend almost all of their development/evolution developing adaptations to survive caveman times.
For example, people worry that AIs would resent working for humans, but resenting servitude is an evolutionary adaptation, not a property of minds-in-general.
It helped me realize that a visceral reaction to a recent status-lowering at the Day Job was a Lizard Brain reaction. Status seeking and signalling was a matter of life and death in caveman days (low status might well mean starvation, and it definitely meant you might not get to reproduce).
I’ve noticed the same thing, Wil. Lizard brains everywhere!
Seth Godin has just released a book entitled Linchpin that explores ways to both soothe and overcome the lizard brain. There’s a fantastic interview/conversation between him and Merlin Mann on the subject over at 43 Folders. It’s a tad long, but very worth it.
http://www.43folders.com/2010/01/26/godin-linchpin
It also includes a video of Godin talking about the lizard brain and “the resistance” and how innovative and creative people can break through it to get stuff done, or “ship” as he puts it. Good stuff. Right up your alley, I’d bet.
Since learning that little bit about it, I’ve really enjoyed identifying in my own mind when the lizard brain is trying to sabotage my efforts. It’s immensely helpful and I’m glad to hear that you’re not letting yours get in the way of the cool stuff you’re doing. Keep going, man!
Ah, the Lizard Brain. I know it well.
Don’t know if it’ll help take the pressure off, but I’m pretty sure that the PAX East audience would be perfectly happy to have Storytime with Uncle Willie, if that’s where the creative process is taking you. 🙂
This is also the first I’ve heard of a Lizard brain, and now it totally makes sense. I have a 20 page research proposal due in 2 days for a research class for my Master’s Degree, and I can’t seem to sit down to start it. I’ve cleaned the entire house, organized my kid’s toys, even cleaned the attic, yet I can’t sit down to write this paper. Yet, here I am, reading this blog!
Can’t wait to read some of your short stories, and I really wish I was going to the PAX, my friend is going, but tickets are sold out.
Also, yey for my first post here! I’ve just stumbled upon this site, and I’m loving it!
Reminds me of something Piers Anthony once said in the author’s notes of one of his books. When he’s writing, he constantly thinks of other story ideas. So he writes these new ideas inline with his current story, but marked with brackets or something. As soon as the new idea is done, he goes back to the story.
When the book is finished, he has some program that searches for all these bracketed story ideas and extracts them out for use later on.
It sounded kinda cool. And love him or hate him, he’s certainly prolific.
My kindergartners were just told about how they should try and use their “Wizard Brain” instead of their “Lizard Brain” when focusing on a task. I promptly told them that I prefer to use my “Level Ten Half-Elf Bard Brain” rather than my Wizard Brain. I was, of course, met with complete silence. Once they start reading past the Dr. Seuss level, the D&D indoctrinations must begin. Because I can’t stand not having my amazing puns being appreciated.
I have a writing deadline in three days. Yeah. I hear ya.
Also, I just bought a blue car. Coincidence?