White Pill Wednesday #14
Learned Helplessness · Locus of Control
Black Pill(s)
Learned Helplessness
Learned Helplessness: a psychological state that occurs when an individual repeatedly experiences stressful situations they perceive as uncontrollable, leading them to believe they are unable to change or improve their circumstances.
It’s the sinking feeling in your chest after having doomscrolled your way to the National Debt Clock.
The dumbfounded malaise when you learn that your leaders have allowed for a foreign nation to interfere with its elections after denying it ever happened.
The indescribable indignation as billions are sent to fight foreign wars meanwhile your own citizenry overdoses on the street at record levels.
What do these all have in common? They’re all monumental stories that have far-reaching consequences for generations to come. You and I seemingly have no direct means of influencing their outcome. And yet issues like these take up a sizeable portion of our attention spans - at our own peril.
It’s a trap that’s far too easy to fall into. How could one not be enraged at the stories written by the corporate press or floated in our social circles? We have unaccountable octogenarian politicians in charge of the largest bureaucracies known to man, morally deprived social movements propagandized as the next wave of progress, and a self-imposed cost of living crisis.
All of these things and countless others are happening whether we like it or not - and there’s not a thing you or I can do to affect the circumstances. That’s a damn depressing outlook to have and yet to many it has become second nature. Give in to any handful of seemingly all-encompassing narratives and eventually you too will feel as though you’re powerless.
The pipeline goes like this:
Uncontrollable Events —> Perceived Lack of Control —> Generalized Helplessness
Or better yet, refer to the chart below:
Then again maybe you’re not entirely powerless - after all there is always the comment section where you can add your much-needed 2 cents on an issue. Everyone’s got to have a take on a story these days - don’t you know it’s the law? If you’re not an Eastern-European wartime strategy expert then just pivot to AI safetyism - simple as.
I ain’t blameless in this - I’ve spent my fair share of time pursuing this exact same fruitless endeavour. Being so certain that I not only knew I had the “correct” take on an issue but that my voice would help push the needle of progress in my desired direction. Obtuse comes to mind.
But at the end of the day once your keyboard warrior rage runs out of fuel and the self-serving satisfaction ceases to wash over you - know that your worst sin is that you have betrayed yourself for nothing. The headspace you’ve given to these larger than life narratives will only steal your time and give you the false impression of affecting change.
Don’t take my word for it - take 5 minutes right now to peruse the comment section of /r/politics on Reddit and see for yourself. Thousands of those arguments are happening right now across the entire platform as you’re reading this. And that’s just Reddit - nevermind X or YouTube.
Once again - when I say “you” I’m including myself. I’ve spent an embarrassing amount of time and emotional energy on arguing these issues both on and offline. It has directly affected the quality of conversations I’ve had with people close to me and to be quite frank they’ve been nothing but a burden.
The facts of my life - the job I have, quality of life I enjoy, relationships I maintain - none of these are improved when I give sizeable emotional weight to uncontrollable events. There’s something to be said for staying informed and having an idea of what’s going on in the world. But it’s a whole other thing to spend countless hours dissecting and involving oneself in these issues.
It gives you an easy out - you convince yourself that by caring enough to poast and argue about these problems you can affect their outcomes. While at the same time your locality - the streets you live on and the people you interact with - are ignored and left to decay.
If I’m getting too in the weeds let me state my point plainly.
Giving mental space to uncontrollable stories can give one the impression that they are powerless. That decisions made from on high will continue with or without your consent and that you are unable to act in any significant way to turn the tide. And more importantly that one of the best methods of asserting control is found in angrily lashing out either online or in-person on either side of the issue. When in reality it is not only pointless but self-destructive to do so.
The cost of giving in to this vicious self-serving cycle is your finite time on this planet which can instead be spent on directly impacting and improving your immediate surroundings. We’re better off taking an hour to pick up trash in our neighbourhood than we are dunking on TrumpGroyper69 for the lulz.
Or at the very least it’s a better use of our collective time to take a moment and consider how we can affect these larger than life issues on a local scale. Simply nooticing them and moving on is actively conditioning your mind to respond to seemingly insurmountable circumstances with passive resignation. A.k.a. doomerism.
Learned Helplessness is not a competence problem but a control problem. It fools you into thinking you are not competent or capable enough to affect change and so therefore you mustn’t try in the first place. That you’re better off attaining goals that require no effort like venting to anyone that will listen. And when your “side” of the issue “loses” you can’t help but be infuriated by the outcome because you’ve attached so much of your sense of self to it.
Obsessing over what you can’t change or even define is stress and abuse that you willingly put yourself through. It makes you forget what matters, keeps you off balance, and lowers your quality of life. You are much better off either looking after yourself and your neighbourhood or working to build solutions to the problems you pay attention to.
Don’t forget - you can just do stuff. The only person getting in the way is you.
I leave you with the Serenity Prayer that I try to remember whenever I feel overwhelmed by the external chaos we’re bombarded with on a daily basis.
God grant me
Serenity to accept the things I cannot change
Courage to change the things I can
and Wisdom to know the difference
TL;DR touch grass.
White Pill(s)
Locus of Control
Locus of Control: refers to the extent to which individuals believe they have control over the events and outcomes in their lives.
In 1954 Julian B. Rotter proposed that individuals either believe they are in control of their actions for which they take responsibility or that external forces have a significant influence over their lives leaving them powerless.
This theory is not the antidote to Learned Helplessness but it’s certainly as good a place as any to start. If anything it’s a useful dichotomy through which you can analyze your perception of yourself and the world around you.
Locus of Control is a fundamental choice before each and every single one of us. Whether you perceive your life is under your control or that you are at the whims of fates beyond your reasoning. From this distinction stems every thought, spoken word, and action you make - not to be taken lightly.
If you wholeheartedly believe in the External LOC then by extension you:
Attribute your successes and failures to circumstances outside your own actions and decisions.
Shift your focus from your actions to the external circumstances had they been different according to your will.
Dull your sense of self-governance and replace it with a spite towards the external world.
Leaving you anxious and stressed whilst being at the mercy of unpredictable forces.
Whereas if you take the Internal LOC to the extreme you:
Inflate your sense of self-efficacy to the point of believing you can control all outcomes through your efforts.
Excessively blame yourself for failures that were never in your control to begin with. Leaving you guilty and ashamed thinking you could have done more.
Neglect external factors outside of your control that influence outcomes.
Like anything in life - having extremes in either direction can be self-destructive. There is no right choice and the only way to find out which LOC is appropriate and when is a matter of experimentation. The process of which should aim for the optimal outcome for yourself in the long-term - whatever that may be. It’s worth taking time to consider if either end has been neglected or overcompensated for.
Nonetheless it is my impression that the Zeitgeist - at least in this part of the world - is lacking in Internal LOC. The idea that you can just do stuff.
How do I know that we in the West are veering too far into the External LOC mindset? Look at all the moral crises that we are told by the corporate press and political/cultural elite to care about:
The Fat Acceptance Movement: accept yourself for who you are without fault while anyone that goes against you is bigoted and fatphobic. Your weight is out of your sphere of control due to hereditary genes, societal pressure, and cultural stereotypes. Your health is fine and not a cause for concern.
DEI: A faceless nameless system of racists against certain groups pervades every institution which is the only reason why minority x didn’t get the job. To correct for this companies and universities have begun to hire based on certain race categories whilst excluding other races.
Just Stop Oil: Climate change is an existential threat and fossil fuels must be removed from the energy ecosystem of the world NOW or else the world will burn. We must shut down the entire multi-trillion global oil market that billions depend on if humanity is to survive. There is no other solution.
What do all of these stories have in common? They are all misguided attempts at honing one’s Locus of Control which leads to predictable outcomes.
In the case of Fat Acceptance it leads individuals to blame their fatness on anything but their own habits. Some of these people end up dying because they wholeheartedly believed that not only was their weight out of their control but that it was okay.
For DEI it leads companies to embrace the idea that the External LOC of racism is not only real, worse than decades prior but also pervasive and that it must be course corrected with an Internal LOC through DEI departments. Resulting in the hiring of employees based on racial quotas instead of competence.
All in a piss-poor attempt at public relations which has now begun to blow up in their faces. It’s come to the point where major companies have begun purging their DEI departments and positions in order to cut costs. Guess they weren’t so principled about racial equality once their profits were affected.
Just Stop Oil is self explanatory if you watched that brief video above or any of their viral clips where they defile, destroy, or interfere with public events. Nothing short of a hyperinflated Internal LOC that requires you to take radical action in the name of your cause for it is The One Above All which must be shouted from the rooftops at every opportunity.
All these examples I’ve used are mentally and physically unhealthy outcomes of a misguided LOC. Believe the world to bend to your will and you will take extremist measures to make it so. Believe your life to be out of your grasp and you will be lost to the currents. The ideal lies somewhere in between and in a state of negotiation with itself.
Being able to balance between LOCs should ultimately be the ideal guiding principle behind all of our decisions. If used correctly one can make full use of their capabilities whilst recognizing they ought to let go of what they cannot control. If used incorrectly you can refer to the videos above for what failure looks like.
How can you shift your LOC so that it represents the world more clearly and allows you to act in your best interest in the long term? I don’t know. That’s a challenge you have to figure out for yourself - it’s different for everyone.
Personally I’d start by considering what is within my Locus of Control like my health and targeting it in 3 vectors: physical, mental, and social.
Physical
Sleep: Quite literally the foundation of our physical/mental health and performance in all endeavours. This one’s self-explanatory, try sleeping for 6 or less hours for an entire week and see how that affects your health in the short and long-term.
Diet: You are what you eat and food is a global multi-trillion dollar business with an eye towards profits - not your health. Be conscious of what you put in your body because it’ll reflect what you get out of it.
Exercise: You don’t have to be a gymrat. You don’t have to do sprints every day. But if you want to live longer and master your body you must find a way to exercise it.
Supplements: Do your own research - also known as reading. They can be a great tool to fill gaps where your diet falls short but should not be used as a substitute.
Mental
Journal: When’s the last time you were alone with your thoughts? No smartphone, no music, no Netflix - just extended periods of silence. Now add a pen and paper and see what you come up with.
Dopamine Fluctuation: It’s neither good nor bad - it just is. If you find you struggle with motivation, discipline, or focus then it might be a good idea to look into how your body processes dopamine.
General Toolkit: Just throwing this one in here cause it seems like a good place to start if you’re unsure of which protocol may be right for you.
Disclaimer: I highlight Huberman and his podcast because of the plethora of content he produces but also because I’ve tried some of these protocols and have seen great benefits in my life. His advice has helped me take more control over my circumstances and I would gladly recommend his videos as a good starting point.
Social
Clean your block: Got garbage laying around where you live and nobody’s come to clean it? Might as well do it yourself. Take pride in where you live and make an effort to keep it tidy - it reflects on your character. “Clean your room” as Peterson said.
Know thy neighbour: No amount of parasocial anon friendships will lend you a cup of sugar when you really need it. Your neighbours make up your community which has a much more direct impact on your life than online sentiments. Some are assholes that will yell colourful epithets at all hours of the night and others would give you the shirt off their backs. Might be worthwhile to get to know them and know which is which.
Local politics: Federal policies and geopolitics might have an influence on your life sometimes but local politics influences your life all the time. Or at the very least the impacts of which are more apparent when it’s at the local level. Town halls, schoolboard meetings, development hearings - your hard-earned tax dollars fund them so why not go see where your money’s going? You’d be surprised how few people attend these meetings and how easy it can be to implement change you can see.
As for dealing with the External Locus of Control - this is something I’m still figuring out. There’s a fine line between staying up to date on current events and ranting for hours about issues you will never directly affect. Decide for yourself what that looks like - just don’t get caught up in the process.
More importantly all my recommendations with a grain of salt. They are not an end-all be-all comprehensive list of how one can improve their LOC focusing. These are merely a suggestion and ideally everyone should take the time to consider whether their LOC is aligned with their optimal self in the long-term - myself included. For it is not a “Mission Complete” checkmark with a predetermined finish line. But rather an ongoing process that grows and adapts with us all.
Point is - in an age where Learned Helplessness is modus operandi for millions it might be worth reconsidering our Locus of Control and how it colours our thinking. Focusing all efforts on that which is within our grasp and acknowledging but not overemphasizing external forces is the only way to create sustainable progress. Divergence to either extreme LOC creates more noise than signal and only serves to hold us all back.
Remember, it’s a control problem and not a competence problem. You’re more capable of affecting change than you think - now act like it.
That about does it for this week's White Pill Wednesday newsletter - hope you enjoyed reading and be sure to share it, we could all stand to be a little more whitepilled!
You can find me on Twitter as @Wh1tePill where I post more often.