Riddle Me This...

I like riddles. I like word puzzles. I like word play. I like all of that stuff. Brent...does not. He feels like riddles are trying to trick you and that makes them and the people who write them dicks. I also think they are trying to trick you but I think it's fun.

It's reflected in a lot of my short stories. I like a good twist. But it has to make sense once you know it. If you get to the end, get hit with the twist, then go back and reread the story you will see the places where I mislead you, made you think you were seeing something else, and you will see that I didn't actually tell you that, you did that on your own. You will also see where the seeds were there for what was really happening, you just missed them because I had shown you something shiny in a different direction and let your mind take the lead.

Riddles that work like that are called "stumpers." (Something I just learned from The Hidden Brain) they are the ones that posit a question in such a way that your brain takes you in the wrong direction and it's hard to get it turned around. When you are given the answer it's usually something super obvious (his mother was the doctor) but because of the way societal conditioning works, or the way we group phrases, your brain didn't see it. Almost couldn't see it.

Stumpers are some of my favorite types of riddles. I know when I'm presented with one that it's trying to stump me. That it's trying to lead me down a certain path. So I stop and really pay attention to what I'm actually hearing, not what I'm trying to oh so helpfully fill in. I know you're trying to trick me, I just don't want to let you. If you still trick me I will clap my hands with glee.

Today during my workout I was thinking of how many times just basic communication ends up working like a stumper riddle. The speed run workout I'm doing on Fridays uses the barbell the whole time. You don't put it down at all during one long superset. The problem I was having was that one of the sets in the superset was squats with the barbell across your shoulders and without the pad it was a little uncomfortable but the grips I needed for other sets the pad on the bar didn't work. You are supposed to do the sets in a certain order and the squats were right in the middle.

Brent had the solution instantly, just put the pad on for the squats, it would only take a few seconds to ditch it again, it wasn't going to mess up the timing really. But because I was thinking about the pad and the problems it would cause in other sets I wasn't really hearing what he was saying. I kept saying that I couldn't have the pad on for the triceps extensions (the set right before the squats) or the split squats (the set after the squats) so it wouldn't work. Finally he slowed it way down like he was talking to a five year old and said, put it on before the squats and take it off after. Don't have it on for anything else. It will take a few seconds.

Oh. Right. That works.

And it does. Yes, I break the momentum from the triceps extension into the squat but it is literally a second. And after this four week cycle I'm going to sub in triceps kickbacks with dumbbells so there will be a natural break there anyway.

But it made me think about how many times that sort of thing happens. Not just between me and Brent but with anyone. How many times are you not really hearing what the other person is saying because your brain has started down a different path. Filled in things that weren't said, or weren't meant. Sometimes it works out fine, and sometimes it just doesn't.

So today I challenge you that the next time you are having one of those discussions that seems like you are speaking a different language you stop and think, okay, this is a stumper riddle. What am I missing? And then really listen and try to understand.

It might work.

Unless Brent is right and the person is just a dick who is trying to trick you.