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How to Change What you Want

2020-12-18 · letter vlog · Hank · 3:36 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Philosophy & meaning · mode: Personal essay

Hank argues that we cannot stop wanting things but can steer our wants by what we engage with, since engagement teaches us stories about value; society's defaults make some wants easy, so the most successful people are often the least interesting, and prizing the weird keeps you out of societal ruts.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Insights from a phone call with John; insight one: you cannot stop wanting, and may not want to

  • ★ Hank had a great phone chat with John this week (week of 14 December 2020) and wants to share insights the brothers have developed together over the years but may never have discussed. — 00:00:00 · John Green
  • ★★★ Insight one: it is really hard, maybe impossible, to stop wanting things, and it is not clear that wanting nothing would be good. (hedged) — 00:00:15
  • ★★ Hank wants to want to live, to make a better future for people and to spend time with his family, though not to want a new car; he is not sure he wants to stop wanting. — 00:00:22

00:00:29 — Insight two: wants cannot be forced but can be steered by engagement (Crash Course, family)

  • ★★★ Insight two: maybe you can steer what you want, though wants are hard to control and cannot be changed by sheer force of will. (hedged) — 00:00:34
  • ★ Hank cannot simply decide to stop wanting Coca-Cola and start wanting to volunteer all the time; what he actually wants is to drink Coca-Cola and watch TikToks. (playful) — 00:00:45 · TikTok
  • ★★★ Hank has found ways to alter his wants: to want to work more on Crash Course he engages with education through podcasts and talks about making college accessible, and the more he engages, the more he wants it. — 00:00:58 · Crash Course, education

00:01:20 — Content steers wants (getting rich, pro gaming, beauty); goodness and social praise also raise them

  • ★★★ To want to spend more time with his family Hank has to spend more time with them: doing something teaches you a story about its value, so the more you do it the more you want it. — 00:01:20
  • ★★★ Hank often sees people engage with content without noticing how it steers their wants: consuming content about business success and getting rich makes you value those things more. — 00:01:27
  • ★★ Likewise, watching people play video games professionally makes people value those skills, and engaging with content about being more beautiful makes you value beauty more. — 00:01:49
  • ★★ Engagement is one of three ways wants grow: the things are also good (money gives security, games are fun, fashion and makeup are art), and society praises them highly, lowering the barrier to wanting them. — 00:02:00

00:02:19 — Wanting what society prizes less is hard; successful people are the least interesting; prize the weird; sign-off

  • ★★★ Hank does not think it is wrong to want these things, but it can be limiting if they are the only things we let ourselves want; we can ignore them or diversify from them. — 00:02:22
  • ★★★ Wanting what society prizes less is harder: the less you engage with a story the harder it is to want that thing, and with few stories about it, it becomes really hard. — 00:02:33
  • ★★★ So the most successful people in society are kind of the least interesting: they are just good at pursuing the default thing society tells them to want, and only sometimes become stories that change what society wants. — 00:02:48
  • ★★★ Prizing a little bit of the interesting or weird, as Hank does, is a baseline story you can always believe in that keeps you from getting stuck in societal ruts. — 00:03:06
  • ★★ Hank is not always good at this and finds his want hard to steer, but he will keep trying because he feels he is getting better and the results are positive. — 00:03:20

In the description and comments

  • ★★ In the description Hank says understanding exactly how and why his internal calculus changes, and that he did it to himself, never makes his desires feel less real. — video description

Threads in this video

Mentioned

Central: desire

Also: Coca-Cola · Crash Course · education · Esports · self-control · social norm · TikTok

Also centred on desire: Let's Talk About Death · Moon Joy

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