"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results." (Rita Mae Brown).
Mental
Hamstringing: A self-restrictive practice occurring when one
assumes the current approach to solving a problem is the only (or
best) approach and thus fixates through iteration on this process
without looking for other means or methods of problem solution.
Mental hamstringing limits perception causing all opportunity costs
to be severely discounted or ignored.
Mental
hamstringing is more likely to occur when one is under intense
pressure to solve a problem (when put “on the spot” to quickly
come up with a solution and thus forced to prematurely narrow focus).
Conversely when there are disincentives to solve a problem,
ineffective and stultifying iterations can be the preferred course:
to intentionally “kick the can down the road” and to by design
“stay in a rut”--to use circumscribed iteration to complicity
indulge in the act of mental hamstringing through calculation—a
strategy of dutifully playing the violin while Rome burns.
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