Do you know your default shape?

Notes on a concept we've been exploring together

1. There’s something odd about human behavior. It’s not quite literally true, but it’s close enough to be astonishing: How people respond to anything is how they respond to everything. People have a default perceptual lens that gets applied to everything from world affairs to their marriage. A default shape. Like, “friction is a sign that something bad is happening,” or, “I need to figure out what’s reliable so I don’t get taken advantage of.” The default lens isn’t necessarily wrong in any particular case — it’s just interesting the way it seems to apply to everything. This way of looking creates habitual responses, which, executed over and over again, exert a shockingly large influence on everything in our lives.

2. For example: Cate is prone to thinking that if she isn’t exactly the right way in relationships, people will abandon her. Also, that if she doesn’t say the right thing in her writing, people will decide she’s overhyped and unsubscribe. And that we’re on the verge of fascism and nuclear war and a pandemic and AI takeover and …. The default shape is something like: “We must do this exactly right, or things will be irrevocably fucked.” This has made her a highly competent person who can also be a ball of wire. Sasha is prone to thinking, in relationships, that everything will be fine, might as well pretend the bad feelings don’t exist. And that, in terms of how he plans his future, might as well see what happens, life is just a series of mistakes. And as far as the course of world history goes, everything will be fine, might as well pretend the dangers don’t exist. The default shape is something like: “Everything must be okay.” This has made him a plucky, resourceful person who can be flaky and irresponsible.

3. These shapes are adaptive. They allow us to see what our personality is good at handling. They are how we find leverage. Cate saved an organization millions of dollars when she saw its financial planning and thought, “I think something could go terribly wrong here,” and nobody else had the same suspicion. Sasha has built a unique life around his talents by continuously experimenting with new ways of being, assuming that every new venture will turn out okay. But these shapes are also limiting. Sasha is prone to avoiding hard things, Cate is prone to distrusting the possibility of a non-hostile universe.

4. These shapes are pre-verbal emotional processes that the mind latches onto. Cate does not think, “it’s time to look for an incoming crisis.” Instead, she feels a sense of vigilance, and then her thinking mind searches for the crisis she ought to be aware of, etc. So, while these shapes can be pointed at in language, with personality typing systems and whatnot, they are not conceptual. They are experiential reflexes that kick in before language begins to sort experience.

5. People often attribute the shaping of their personality to traumatic incidents. But do they have the causality backwards? Perhaps the shape of your mind determines that which you find traumatic, not the other way around. Cate looks back on her childhood and finds an incident: At Christmas, when she was 4 or 5, she accidentally unwrapped someone else’s present and felt deeply embarrassed. For a long time Cate identified this as one of the originating experiences of her fear of her own selfishness: a moment where she experienced humiliation from being seen by others to be obliviously self-involved, and therefore developed hypervigilance down to the level of a personality trait. Only in the last year did she realize, no, this would never have been a mortifying event in the first place for most kids — they simply would have thought “oops,” and moved on to the next gift. Young Sasha probably would’ve forgotten this incident; he never minded mistakes much. What pained him as a child was feeling invisible — if only his mistakes had received more attention!

6. Your reaction to the idea that everything is a projection of your default shape will, itself, reveal something about your own projections. Some people might take it as an invitation to relax and play: “Oh, wonderful, I don’t have to believe what anyone says, they’re all just making it up.” Some might take it as a reason for caution: “Everyone is just bullshitting based on their personality, I need to stick to what’s tried and true.” Some might instinctively want to believe they’re above it all: “I’m authentically myself, unlike all those idiots who are just playing out a choreography.” This is the sound of default shapes expressing themselves.

7. You will live a terribly limited life if you don’t understand your default shape. Compulsivity is the opposite of flourishing. A slot machine addict exists in a highly structured reality of default response. Meanwhile, people at the height of creativity, and people in deeply authentic relationships, can select from a wide palette of responses. Understanding your default shape allows you to swap in others, or to entertain ambivalence and ambiguity. This is necessary to see when your default shape is causing you to avoid life, to defend yourself from what has to be done.

8. At the same time, it’s also foolish to renounce your default shape. Skill is the product of fascination, of acting on the detail that excites you. Default shapes are, primarily, about what you notice. Let’s say that your default lens is “I must occupy a special reality, a supra-mundane plane.” This lens produces annoying people, but also, great poets — the sustained enchantment required for much creative work is, fundamentally, self-indulgence. And while your default shape makes you unbalanced, the human species would be much worse off if everyone embraced balance as an overriding priority.

9. The more you understand the diversity of default shapes, the less you have an instinct to control people — you give up on the hope that everyone will be interested in your program of self-improvement, your favorite art, or your political priorities. Trying to coerce others in this way is like ordering food for someone with a completely different set of tastebuds. They are perfectly capable of selecting from the menu.

10. When people rhetorically ask, “why does everyone like Taylor Swift so much,” or, “why do people fall for conspiracy theories,” they are often displaying incuriosity about the shapes of others. Take a second to be curious. Imagine the satisfactions that could be derived from, say, believing that you are smart enough to see through the lies of the international pedophile ring running the world. Or that you are united with millions of other women in worship of one prophetess who clarifies your common condition. Thus the lovely Henry James advice: “Try to be one of those on whom nothing is lost.” Perhaps a more realistic version is: “Try to be one of those who doesn’t assume that others are lost.”

11. Punditry is self-portraiture. The writer who claims that nothing will ever change is terrified to lose their little perch. The cynic is repulsed by their average neediness and long-exiled innocence. People can’t accurately describe what they have, but they’re wonderfully articulate about what they long for.

12. Related: The default shape points the way to our deepest wounds. If, like Cate, you’re always on the lookout for something to control, perhaps you struggle with the knowledge that you’re a naked ape tossed around by circumstance, vulnerable to disease and death. If, like Sasha, you’re always looking for the next fun time, perhaps you’re alienated from the tenderness inside, the part of you that’s not having fun and doesn’t want to discuss it. Thus, ironically, dropping the default shape, and looking at what is underneath, is our only shot at more enduring happiness. The lenses that help us navigate this mortal world have the minor side effect of blocking out the undying light.

Did you know we wrote a book, You Can Just Do Things, together? We did, and it comes out July 21. You can just order it now.