goal structure for stopping nail biting?

Currently I’ve structured my goal to be a “do less” goal with the weekly
rate of 0.

This would mean one slip up and I’m done. So no yellow brick road really.

Is this too rigid or have you found a better way to do it?

Thanks!

-Kenny


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Thanks for reminding me to try harder with this goal – one I’ve had myself.

I had good luck in the past with bittering nail goop (
Amazon.com)
but I didn’t keep re-applying it, so the habit came back, although much
less bad.

So what I’ve just done is Beeminded “applying nail goop” once every two
days.

On Tue, Jul 8, 2014 at 4:36 PM, Kenny Yang yangkennyk@gmail.com wrote:

Currently I’ve structured my goal to be a “do less” goal with the weekly
rate of 0.

This would mean one slip up and I’m done. So no yellow brick road really.

Is this too rigid or have you found a better way to do it?

Thanks!

-Kenny


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“Akratics Anonymous” group.
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email to akratics+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
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I couldn’t figure out how to edit my original post so here’s a couple extra
questions

As for pessimistic presumptive reports, will it auto add +1 to my goal if I
don’t report? If so, would my goal automatically derail and I lose my
pledge since my hard cap is 0?

Also. Currently my nail biting goal is green. Is there anyway to trigger it
so that it’s red everyday if I don’t report that day?


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Zero rate do-less goals are slightly pathological because any day you
don’t report will instantly derail you. So even though it says you’re
green you’re really red. You’re just always red.

If you change the rate to be just ever so slightly positive, you might
find the results slightly more useful. You could even keep yourself in
the orange by entering the (very small) daily rate each day (instead
of 0). But this is pretty convoluted.

Or if it is something you don’t ever want to ever do, as opposed to
limiting it, the old standby of tracking a do-more !{bad thing} days
might be a better solution.

Bethany

On Tue, Jul 8, 2014 at 1:48 PM, Kenny Yang yangkennyk@gmail.com wrote:

I couldn’t figure out how to edit my original post so here’s a couple extra
questions

As for pessimistic presumptive reports, will it auto add +1 to my goal if I
don’t report? If so, would my goal automatically derail and I lose my pledge
since my hard cap is 0?

Also. Currently my nail biting goal is green. Is there anyway to trigger it
so that it’s red everyday if I don’t report that day?


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“Akratics Anonymous” group.
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http://beeminder.com – Reminders with a sting


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I’d start by setting a super modest limit and just record data to see where
you stand. Then adjust the road steepness from there. But I think your main
problem is going to be recording your data. Nailbiting is semi-autonomous
so it’s hard to measure except in retrospect (and even then, do you count
episodes, time, number of nails, or what?). It occurs to me (though not
from experience) that random sampling with TagTime might be the perfect
solution to both problems.

On Tuesday, July 8, 2014 4:36:00 PM UTC-4, Kenny Yang wrote:

Currently I’ve structured my goal to be a “do less” goal with the weekly
rate of 0.

This would mean one slip up and I’m done. So no yellow brick road really.

Is this too rigid or have you found a better way to do it?

Thanks!

-Kenny


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To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to akratics+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
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When I was stopping myself biting my nails, one of the methods I used
was to record at the end of the day whether I had “ten neat nails” or
not. This didn’t necessarily mean that I had not bitten my nails at
all that day. If I started biting one, or even all ten, and then
stopped and filed them until they were all neat and they stayed that
way until bedtime, then that counted as a success for the day. This
also meant that if I bit one nail so much that it was short and jagged
and could not be made neat, then I’d fail the “ten neat nails” test
for a few days in a row, until it grew out enough to be filed. That
(usually) gave me a lot of incentive to stop biting as soon as I
noticed I’d started. It also rewarded me for not biting my nails for
many days in a row, because then I’d have larger nails that could
stand a tiny bit of biting in stressful times without failing the “ten
neat nails” test. Another benefit was that it forced me to keep my
nails neat even when I wasn’t biting them, so there were fewer times
when there were jagged edges that would tempt me to bite.

Another strategy I used at a different time was to record at the end
of the day simply whether I had bitten my nails or not that day -
record a 0 (good) or 1 (bad) for the day.

Also, for a while I was recording how many times I bit my nails, and
keeping it under a certain limit.

All strategies were (mostly) successful at different times. I’d find
after a while that one technique stopped working for me, so I’d adjust
it a bit, and that seemed to give me more motivation to stop biting.
The “ten neat nails” strategy was usually my favourite.

With an ingrained, automatic habit like biting your nails, it can be
very hard to stop. You might find that one measurement technique won’t
be enough, or will work for a while and then stop working. Don’t be
discouraged. Find some way to adjust it so that it starts working
again. I still bite my nails occasionally but MUCH less than I used
to, so it is achievable.

On 10 July 2014 17:34, Alex Schell schell.alex@gmail.com wrote:

I’d start by setting a super modest limit and just record data to see where
you stand. Then adjust the road steepness from there. But I think your main
problem is going to be recording your data. Nailbiting is semi-autonomous so
it’s hard to measure except in retrospect (and even then, do you count
episodes, time, number of nails, or what?). It occurs to me (though not from
experience) that random sampling with TagTime might be the perfect solution
to both problems.

On Tuesday, July 8, 2014 4:36:00 PM UTC-4, Kenny Yang wrote:

Currently I’ve structured my goal to be a “do less” goal with the weekly
rate of 0.

This would mean one slip up and I’m done. So no yellow brick road really.

Is this too rigid or have you found a better way to do it?

Thanks!

-Kenny


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“Akratics Anonymous” group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an
email to akratics+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.


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When did this become the case? I used to have a 0-rate do-less goal without
any problem. Are there plans to fix this bug (or is it just a matter of
unchecking things like “pessimistic presumptives” in the settings, etc?

On Wednesday, July 9, 2014 7:00:51 PM UTC-4, Bethany M. Soule wrote:

Zero rate do-less goals are slightly pathological because any day you
don’t report will instantly derail you. So even though it says you’re
green you’re really red. You’re just always red.

If you change the rate to be just ever so slightly positive, you might
find the results slightly more useful. You could even keep yourself in
the orange by entering the (very small) daily rate each day (instead
of 0). But this is pretty convoluted.
beeminder

Or if it is something you don’t ever want to ever do, as opposed to
limiting it, the old standby of tracking a do-more !{bad thing} days
might be a better solution.

Bethany

On Tue, Jul 8, 2014 at 1:48 PM, Kenny Yang <yangk...@gmail.com
<javascript:>> wrote:

I couldn’t figure out how to edit my original post so here’s a couple
extra
questions

As for pessimistic presumptive reports, will it auto add +1 to my goal
if I
don’t report? If so, would my goal automatically derail and I lose my
pledge
since my hard cap is 0?

Also. Currently my nail biting goal is green. Is there anyway to trigger
it
so that it’s red everyday if I don’t report that day?


You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
Groups
“Akratics Anonymous” group.
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an
email to akratics+u...@googlegroups.com <javascript:>.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.


http://bethaknee.com
http://beeminder.com – Reminders with a sting


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I have a goal to try and break a habit. Something I was doing between 15
and 20 times a day on some days. Instead of trying to go straight to 0, I
started really high and slowly (very slowly) have been working my way down
over the last months. (You could go quicker, of course.) I would say start
with less than you’re currently doing and then keep bringing the rate down.
Tracking it will make you aware of it at first, which for me was half the
battle, and then you can adjust depending on how you’re doing. With
something as unconscious, half the time, as biting your nails is, I think
going straight to 0 is likely to be frustratingly unsustainable. Start by
becoming aware of it and by limiting it at least to some degree through
tracking, and then see from there how much you think you can challenge
yourself depending on what that looks like. It’ll take longer, but I have
found this way has worked way better for me and the 0 rate did not work at
all. At least now I’m very close to extinguishing this habit when, with the
cold-turkey way, I would have failed. But YMMV.

On Tuesday, July 8, 2014 4:36:00 PM UTC-4, Kenny Yang wrote:

Currently I’ve structured my goal to be a “do less” goal with the weekly
rate of 0.

This would mean one slip up and I’m done. So no yellow brick road really.

Is this too rigid or have you found a better way to do it?

Thanks!

-Kenny


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To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to akratics+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
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