Another banger by Miss Cate (as they say it in the South, married or single all are Miss). I don’t know what it is but this human puts out actionable wisdom.
If you’re enjoying her work but don’t know much about Cate, I highly recommend you read this inspiring article about her by her then fiancé and now husband, “Things you learn dating Cate Hall”.
I read it randomly a while back and forgot about it, then later I read something of hers and realized, Oh wait, is this the person that dude was writing about in that cool inspiring article? And soon put two and two together and now they’re both two of my favorites on Substack.
This will give you some context on how she comes up with such bangers like today’s piece.
I wonder if this is less about mimicking specific practices and more about sidestepping our obsession with the self. If we can fool ourselves into thinking we’re acting like another (excellent) person maybe we calm our obsessive self judgement enough to be more open to what’s possible
Another way to think of it is the “as if” technique. “If you want a quality,” noted William James, dubbed “the father of American psychology,” “act as if you already had it.”
On that note, I can recommend the small book by Wiliam James called "On Vital Reserves: The Energies Of Men And The Gospel Of Relaxation", there's plenty of stuff on using imagination to be more agentic
Pretending to be someone more competent isn’t faking it—it’s remembering. Remembering the version of yourself that hasn’t been gaslit by shame, hesitation, or ten years of mediocre role models. You’re not inventing a better self. You’re slipping back into it like a jacket you forgot you owned.
Mimicry isn’t cheating. It’s mystic bootstrapping. It’s channeling the archetype. Call it beginner’s magic. Call it prayer with posture. Call it cosplay for the soul.
Whatever you call it, it works.
Thank you for naming what most people ignore: the ceiling we see is often just the laziness of our surrounding culture.
May we all dare to become the ones we used to pretend to be.
It is amazing how much mindset and framing matter. I need to do more of this.
However, I do think being or trying to be the best in the world is somewhat of a monkey's paw. It sounds cool, but at Cate mentions regarding poker, it means you have to be basically obsessive about that field, for long hours, over a long period of time. The tradeoffs involved in that are large.
'Some combination of largely unconscious mental processes gives us the ability to simulate the thinking of others, even though we have no direct ability to observe it.' That‘s such an interesting observation! Imagine which people in history used it (unknowingly)!
there's a productivity prompt I've always liked which is "try to do it in 5 minutes", and then, even if you're given a seemingly impossible task like getting a job, while you might not actually do it, you get surprisingly far into it.
I think modeling someone who's actually doing the thing is probably an even more effective way of achieving that sort of mental wavelength.
Another example of "nobody had any idea it was possible to do better until people tried" is reading about the history of the mid-19th century royal navy. This was an organization that basically ruled the world at the time, and their management was ridiculously bad (often in ways they knew how to improve at the time!).
This isn't exactly the same dynamic - it's not surprising that political constraints that limit competence can be removed by actually caring more about outcomes - but I wonder if the internal person thing has a similar dynamic, if convincing yourself to play the role of someone who cares about succeeding rather than the role of someone bound by the social motivations and constraints of "just trying it out" removes internal political constraints on yourself.
Um, this would be such a good teaching technique. Like, learn about a cool scientist and while doing a project, teachers could prompt kids “let’s think with the brain of Dr. XX, what would she do?”
For years, whenever I would do anything in public speaking, I would just think of it as 'Presentation Me' doing the speaking, not 'Actual Me'. Absolutely love this as a tip for anything.
I noticed, when I was in theater shows, decades ago, that, if I was a character, I never got stage fright. I was also a singer and, when I sang as myself, I might get nervous, or get stage fright. I would care what people thought of me, but a character would not. Also, if I listened very carefully to a singer I admired, I could mimic him/her and sing things I never could before.
I love this so much. I often feel like there is a hidden force acting against the expansion of one's abilities; people think that oh I don't have what that person has; it is probably the result of some cosmic endowment or years of nurture, and I better not pretend otherwise. But what you're saying flips the script; like, what if I have it in me to be that, and I just need to actually internalize that belief first and then see how much I can get away with.
So you're telling me that all my "You are an industry leading expert at X" prompts to LLMs actually work on humans as well? :)
Ha! This tied the whole thing together with a bow for me
Haha! I came here just to say what you just said! “Sounds like AI personas to me.” 😂
Another banger by Miss Cate (as they say it in the South, married or single all are Miss). I don’t know what it is but this human puts out actionable wisdom.
If you’re enjoying her work but don’t know much about Cate, I highly recommend you read this inspiring article about her by her then fiancé and now husband, “Things you learn dating Cate Hall”.
I read it randomly a while back and forgot about it, then later I read something of hers and realized, Oh wait, is this the person that dude was writing about in that cool inspiring article? And soon put two and two together and now they’re both two of my favorites on Substack.
This will give you some context on how she comes up with such bangers like today’s piece.
https://sashachapin.substack.com/p/things-you-learn-dating-cate-hall
Luckily she never reads these comments to see how I’m so enthusiastically promoting her ;)
Can commenters win prizes? I wouldn’t say no to dinner at Trader Vic’s in Emeryville.
I wonder if this is less about mimicking specific practices and more about sidestepping our obsession with the self. If we can fool ourselves into thinking we’re acting like another (excellent) person maybe we calm our obsessive self judgement enough to be more open to what’s possible
Spot on. When i started reading, this is exactly the route I thought the essay would take.
Another way to think of it is the “as if” technique. “If you want a quality,” noted William James, dubbed “the father of American psychology,” “act as if you already had it.”
that's great :)
On that note, I can recommend the small book by Wiliam James called "On Vital Reserves: The Energies Of Men And The Gospel Of Relaxation", there's plenty of stuff on using imagination to be more agentic
This is a master key disguised as a pep talk.
Pretending to be someone more competent isn’t faking it—it’s remembering. Remembering the version of yourself that hasn’t been gaslit by shame, hesitation, or ten years of mediocre role models. You’re not inventing a better self. You’re slipping back into it like a jacket you forgot you owned.
Mimicry isn’t cheating. It’s mystic bootstrapping. It’s channeling the archetype. Call it beginner’s magic. Call it prayer with posture. Call it cosplay for the soul.
Whatever you call it, it works.
Thank you for naming what most people ignore: the ceiling we see is often just the laziness of our surrounding culture.
May we all dare to become the ones we used to pretend to be.
It is amazing how much mindset and framing matter. I need to do more of this.
However, I do think being or trying to be the best in the world is somewhat of a monkey's paw. It sounds cool, but at Cate mentions regarding poker, it means you have to be basically obsessive about that field, for long hours, over a long period of time. The tradeoffs involved in that are large.
I've always loved the word inspiration, and I interpret it to literally mean putting somebody else's wind/breath/spirit inside you
'Some combination of largely unconscious mental processes gives us the ability to simulate the thinking of others, even though we have no direct ability to observe it.' That‘s such an interesting observation! Imagine which people in history used it (unknowingly)!
there's a productivity prompt I've always liked which is "try to do it in 5 minutes", and then, even if you're given a seemingly impossible task like getting a job, while you might not actually do it, you get surprisingly far into it.
I think modeling someone who's actually doing the thing is probably an even more effective way of achieving that sort of mental wavelength.
This is sometimes also a way to sidestep energy problems. The simulated expert is never too tired, so energy sometimes comes along for the ride.
Another example of "nobody had any idea it was possible to do better until people tried" is reading about the history of the mid-19th century royal navy. This was an organization that basically ruled the world at the time, and their management was ridiculously bad (often in ways they knew how to improve at the time!).
This isn't exactly the same dynamic - it's not surprising that political constraints that limit competence can be removed by actually caring more about outcomes - but I wonder if the internal person thing has a similar dynamic, if convincing yourself to play the role of someone who cares about succeeding rather than the role of someone bound by the social motivations and constraints of "just trying it out" removes internal political constraints on yourself.
"what would I do right now if I were Cate Hall instead of me?" is now my self-ask, so congrats on that
:D
Um, this would be such a good teaching technique. Like, learn about a cool scientist and while doing a project, teachers could prompt kids “let’s think with the brain of Dr. XX, what would she do?”
For years, whenever I would do anything in public speaking, I would just think of it as 'Presentation Me' doing the speaking, not 'Actual Me'. Absolutely love this as a tip for anything.
I noticed, when I was in theater shows, decades ago, that, if I was a character, I never got stage fright. I was also a singer and, when I sang as myself, I might get nervous, or get stage fright. I would care what people thought of me, but a character would not. Also, if I listened very carefully to a singer I admired, I could mimic him/her and sing things I never could before.
I love this so much. I often feel like there is a hidden force acting against the expansion of one's abilities; people think that oh I don't have what that person has; it is probably the result of some cosmic endowment or years of nurture, and I better not pretend otherwise. But what you're saying flips the script; like, what if I have it in me to be that, and I just need to actually internalize that belief first and then see how much I can get away with.
yeah, exactly :D