SeaYellow's blog

By SeaYellow, history, 2 months ago, In English

(This is a shitpost. There is no scientific evidence for what I say. You shall not take it seriously.)

As a matter of fact, psychology is a magic for tracking our minds. Most people don't understand why they lose their temper when they are offended, but I do. That's why I always understand why I want to f*** someone. For two apparent reasons, I shall claim that psychology helps with CP:

  1. It helps you to know your thinking better. Yes, but, even if you don't formally know psychology, maybe you are already aware of your thinking process. However, there are a lot of numb nerds who never pay attention to their minds, so it's necessary for them to take a dose of psychology. After all, your brain is your weapon. If you use your weapon without knowing its mechanism, how are you going to maximize its efficiency? It's almost like using Windows operating system for 20 years without knowing how to ctrl+C and ctrl+V. You are wasting your talent. Also you can't pride yourself for knowing algorithms when you can't even talk about your brain's algorithm.

  2. You know better your negative emotions. Do you notice how many people care too much about their rating (me included)? And could you recall your sweaty hands and pinky face when you are coding a problem in the last few minutes in ICPC? And don't even forget how negative emotions affect training: you grind on a 1600 problem for 100 hours because you are afraid of admitting being a failure? However, spending over 5 hours on a goddamn 1600 problem is very stupid. Even if you finally solve it, it's an unnecessary invesment of time, which can be used otherwise (dating, watching Squid Game, learn how to binary search like Um_nik). What's more, when you need to take a hollistic view of a problem, you dive too quickly into the details because you are too anxious and impatient to "feel" about the problem. Yes, to feel, like how you feel the taste of a cheeseburger you ate yesterday. That's why people like galen_colin claim they can "smell" the solution of a problem. Besides, I don't know how many of you have insomnia, but I clearly have. Imagine how easy it would be for me to reach 2300 from now (2082) if my sleep becomes God-tier. Insomnia is caused mostly by anxiety and depression, which are God's punishment for highly intelligent people (This is backed up by science).

How about philosophy? Well, philosophy broadens your view. When you can't solve a less-than-2200 problem for an hour, chances are, your mind is too fixated on your habitual way of thinking. To clear up most people's misconception, CP is not about speed, but about thinking out of the box. jiangly solves most div2E within 20 minutes, and I solve in 2 hours, not because he thinks 6 times as fast, but because he takes fewer stupid steps in wrong directions. Philosophy mindsets raise enormously your sensibility to challenge the usual way you perceive the world, which I believe emcompasses the CP problems in this world. Therefore, you have to be constantly questioning your habitual way of formulating/guessing/proving/coding for a problem. And such endeavor of forever questioning of our habits is no difference to philosophical thinking.

In conclusion, psychology and philosophy are really good weapons for CP, and beyond. They also help you quit CP when your life is a mess i.e. when you realize you have no friend. Aside from all the crap we went through in this CP journey, I still want you to remember: there's beauty in this suffering, and always, always try your best to appreciate, how much meaning and purpose, this little mental game has brought to our lives. Thank you for reading.

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2 months ago, # |
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thanks, now I understand why I can't sleep at night (but my rating disagree)

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2 months ago, # |
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Thanks, now i will AK div2 today because of this blog

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    2 months ago, # ^ |
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    This blog suggests the opposite of impatience. And your profile suggests you will AK div2 one day if you grind hard on both problems and yourself.

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      2 months ago, # ^ |
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      how does one begin to work hard on himself?

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        2 months ago, # ^ |
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        Unfortunately there is no single answer to this, and everyone finds their own way. But my suggestion is, don't blindly grind problems. Go discover other things, hang out with smart people, talk to them, read their posts and books. Try to challenge yourself to learn unfamiliar subjects (could be anything, like a foreign language, economy, anthropology). Appreciate what you learn, don't just memorize things. Write, to reflect on your thoughts. Learn to do math proofs. Learn about human emotions and their powerful implications, exercise deep thinking... There are infinitely many things to try. And the gist is simple: open your mind, be creative, don't get fixated, keep curious, have fun. I know, this sounds absolutely weird to most CP grinders because isn't CP all around grinding problems? Yes, if you spare some training time to do other things, you progress slower in the first one or two years, but also it becomes harder for you to plateau. There are so many people who cease to make progress after 2 or 3 years of training. That's when they should look at my blog.

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2 months ago, # |
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lol

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2 months ago, # |
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this is not a shitpost, this is the truth

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2 months ago, # |
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First Blog?

Don't tell me there is more of this shit coming..

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    2 months ago, # ^ |
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    Sure you can't embrace different opinions and immediately deem something as shit. Therefore it's even more helpful if you study some philosophy.

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2 months ago, # |
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so it's not true that anyone can be red ?

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    2 months ago, # ^ |
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    No. This is so apparent. Imagine how many people who can't even learn to code. Intelligence is determined mostly by genetics (backed up by research in psychology).

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2 months ago, # |
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Can u recommend a yt playlist or a course (Free if possible ) in psychology or philosophy

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    2 months ago, # ^ |
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    YT playlist "Introduction to Psychology with Paul Bloom", YT channel "HealthyGamerGG" (by the way what he says is not 100% legit but he provided a list of good research papers). I learnt CBT too, which is very powerful, but most training was done with my therapist. Claire Weekes has self-help books on anxiety. Alan Watts has the book "Stillness is the Key". Textbook "Introduction to Philosophy: Logic". And I also do a lot of GRE reading and writing.

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2 months ago, # |
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Fair point, I actually did experience the negative feedbacks and realize negative feelings (negative rating, test failed...)

Realize I'm a failure and it's time to learn and appreciate more new stuff than it's just CP only (or whatever you choose to excel, gaming, CP, new foreign language...)

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2 months ago, # |
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But I don't have a girlfriend or boyfriend for dating :(

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2 months ago, # |
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Awesome view!I like this post!

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2 months ago, # |
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Waiting for My Second Blog — Why Understanding Psychology and Philosophy is Good for having a girl friend

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2 months ago, # |
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The LGM roadmap.

Choose at least 3 for you.
1. IMO(International Mathematical Olympiad)
2. IOI(International Olympiad in Informatics)
3. IPsyO(International Psychology Olympiad)
4. IPO(International Philosophy Olympiad)