Comment by jancsika

> And what can show up is that some people aren't actually smart enough to form very good conclusions once they start thinking for themselves.

It's mostly just people who aren't very experienced talking about and dealing honestly with their emotions, no?

I mean, suppose someone is busy achieving and, at the same time, proficient in balancing work with emotional life, dealing head-on with interpersonal conflicts, facing change, feeling and acknowledging hurt, knowing their emotional hangups, perhaps seeing a therapist, perhaps even occasionally putting personal needs ahead of career... :)

Tell that person they can get a marginal (or even substantial) improvement from some rationalist cult practice. Their first question is going to be, "What's the catch?" Because at the very least they'll suspect that adjusting their work/life balance will bring a sizeable amount of stress and consequent decrease in their emotional well-being. And if the pitch is that this rationalist practice works equally well at improving emotional well-being, that smells to them. They already know they didn't logic themselves into their current set of emotional issues, and they are highly unlikely to logic themselves out of them. So there's not much value here to offset the creepy vibes of the pitch. (And again-- being in touch with your emotions means quicker and deeper awareness of creepy vibes!)

Now, take a person whose unexplored emotional well-being tacitly depends on achievement. Even a marginal improvement in achievement could bring perceptible positive changes in their holistic selves! And you can step through a well-specified, logical process to achieve change? Sign HN up!