Cost of skiing

The injury has made me think of skiing almost as paying a "cost" of trauma on my knee. My current diagnosis of my knee is a Grade II MCL tear (S83.411A), but I think it's on the mild end of that (hopefully less than 50% of the fibers are torn). I'm already at pretty solid ROM and the inflammation is mainly from additional skiing trauma. In any case, any time I spend skiing (and especially the increased risk of falling and slowing down the healing process) is time I'm directly paying risk for. There's a tension with this conception of skiing and the abundance mindset - still trying to learn how to better navigate that tension.

For the cost I paid today though, I think it was well worth it. Some sick lines and exploration throughout Lake Louise. It's a pretty cool setup with a lot of interesting terrain off the bowls. We found some powder stashes and softer snow in West Bowl, but unfortunately the storm was weaker than expected.

Baseline Expectations

I waver in the level of cognitive bandwidth I dedicate to thinking about expectations pretty dramatically - for a time in September/October, I was incredibly dialed on how great I had things. I think it kind of boils down to the fundamental truth that my biological lived experience is so absurdly nice compared to the vast majority of humans to have existed. I'm reading Man's Search for Meaning, and that really hammers home that point. Frankl is talking about people freezing and waking up to put their feet in wet shoes (in very terrible circumstances) while I'm in a hot tub reading. There's something to be said about practicing that gratitude.

I did a bit of a deep dive into gratitude earlier today after thinking more about this stuff. I still don't fully know how to feel about using ChatGPT to really come up with random frameworks, but for now I'm pro, because I think it helps break down more vague, larger things, into smaller, discrete conceptual chunks. Quick overview of gratitude below:

Gratitude Framework

With the assistance of ChatGPT

Gratitude, in it's different forms, impacts the brain / mental health through a couple levers:

• Attention re-allocation: Focusing your thinking and attention on positive / good things vs. negative / bad things (mental salience models)
• Reward circuit reinforcement: Your brain literally habituating and learning positive vs. negative thoughts based on dopamine-powered learning mechanisms
• Stress regulation: Thinking about positive things helps encourage parasympathetic tone in the body
• Social bonding:
• Meaning integration: Gratitude feeds your sense of identity and self (e.g., I am the type of person that good things happen to)
• Predictive model updates: Gratitude helps correct for implicit negative bias when calculating predictive probabilities / risks.

I think gratitude is also kind of a vague term, so it's good to define specific 'gratitude practices':

• Existential gratitude: Being thankful for the cosmic improbability of being you
• Baseline gratitude: Grateful for basic necessities (e.g., water, food)
• Event-based gratitude: Grateful for good things that happen
• Relational gratitude: Grateful for people doing something (encodes trust)
• Effort-linked gratitude: Grateful for the impact of some sort of effort, either from yourself or others (encodes agency)

In true consulting form, turned this into a nice table

I think the most helpful is an actionable way to practice gratitude every day, which Chat spat the following out for:

1) Select (2 min)

Pick one specific event from the last 24–48 hours.

Write one sentence:

What happened?

Knee example:
“I walked 40 minutes and my knee didn’t flare.”

Traffic example:
“I stayed calm in heavy traffic instead of getting irritated.”

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2) Trace (3 min)

Identify the causal chain.

Ask:

• What actions led to this?
• What conditions made it possible?
• Did anyone contribute?

Write short bullets.

Knee example:

• I’ve been consistent with rehab.
• I didn’t increase mileage too quickly.
• I’ve been sleeping better.
• I stopped when I felt early fatigue.

Traffic example:

• I left earlier than usual.
• I noticed tension rising and slowed my breathing.
• I didn’t check email at red lights.
• I’ve been practicing not reacting immediately.

This reinforces effort → outcome links.

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3) Counterfactual (2 min)

Ask:

How could this realistically have gone worse?

Name the plausible fork.

Knee example:

• It could’ve flared halfway through.
• I could’ve skipped rehab this week.
• I might’ve pushed harder to “test it.”

Traffic example:

• I could’ve gotten angry and carried it into the day.
• I might’ve driven aggressively.
• I could’ve started the morning stressed.

This sharpens salience and encodes contingency.

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4) Update (2 min)

Extract one belief shift:

Given this, what is slightly more true?

One sentence only.

Knee example:
“Consistency with rehab actually works.”

or
“My body responds when I treat it patiently.”

Traffic example:
“I have more control over my reactions than I assume.”

or
“Small regulation skills prevent escalation.”

This is predictive updating.

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5) Reinforce (1 min)

Take one tiny aligned action.

Knee example:

• Schedule tomorrow’s rehab session.
• Stretch tonight.
• Keep mileage steady instead of increasing.

Traffic example:

• Leave 5 minutes early again tomorrow.
• Keep practicing slow breathing in the car.
• Avoid phone stimulation while driving.

This locks in reward reinforcement.

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