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Paul's Sudoku Journal

Playing at medium level

27 May	got frustrated
	9 min 33 sec 66%	getting discouraged when don't see something quickly, must be patterns my unconscious is missing, trying to hard to make it work a particular way?, maybe requires not relying on any single strategy?
	frustrated
	frustrated
	frustrated	see pattern of things checked and then lose it
30 May	messed up
	messed up
	8 min 19 sec 56%
	messed up
	frustrated
31 May	7 min 10 sec 45%	had been fairly consistently in this range (after several years or work) before starting recording, performance anxiety?
	7 min 39 sec 50%
	7 min 34 sec 49%
	messed up	pushing for speed?
	8 min 32 sec 58%
2 June	8 min 53 sec 61%
5 June	9 min 2 sec 62%
	7 min 26 sec 48%
6 June	8 min 56 sec 61%
	9 min 23 sec 65%
	8 min 55 sec 61%	what's the problem? unconscious trying to find something new?
	messed up	yep, missing things because looking for subtleties
	8 min 24 sec 57%	Keep it SIMPLE, find the obvious
	10 min 1 sec 69%
	6 min 50 sec 41%	Yeah, keep it simple. And remember that each time you add something things that you looked at before without finding something simple will have changed.
	7 min 29 sec 48%	Enough for today, but think I'm on to something.
8 June	9 min 1 sec 62 %
	7 min 8 sec 44%
	7 min 50 sec 52%	BELIEVE there is a square to be filled in, don't get doubtful that it can be found
9 June	6 min 45 sec 40%	Don't THINK about it, just let it flow (depends on "prepared mind")
	6 min 24 sec 36%	Stop looking for subtle patterns, presume every entry opens a new simple possibility (from Jenna, watching some one else, noticing all the simple possibilities being missed)
	7 min 22 sec 47%	Yep, is hard to stop trying to follow up something that works, notice other openings, maybe that the inertia is also unconscious, need to consciously "reset", ie get out of particular (unconscious?) mindset. "rest" means look fresh, as if haven't seen/been working on it before (works in crosswords too)
	7 min 58 sec 53%	A new way of doing things, betcha it presages a new set of lows
	7 min 39 sec 50%
	11 min 38 sec 77%	Yeah, right. Worked the new way but ... slowed me way down? Will stay at it and see ....
14 June	7 min 18 sec 46%	Yep, if I can keep my mind on "reset" with each new entry ... have faith there is (at this level at least) always going to be a box created that can be filled in with certainty, then ...
19 June	6 min 30 sec 37%	I've been fiddling since last recorded entry, sometimes finishing puzzles, sometimes not. Continue to think the "reset" is something one needs to learn to do, and is hard. I (at least) have a tendency to look for "pattern," pursue it when I see it, get frustrated when I don't. My guess is that is both conscious and unconscious, which may be way its hard to stop doing it. Its not enough to try and stop "thinking." Interesting too to think about why it is (or isn't) important to try and learn sudoku without looking for a "system," a formalization. Such a thing, of course, exists at some level of abstraction. Is it the case that sudoku has the property that no single "system"/formalization maximizes the rate of solution across all possible puzzles? In "real" life, one needs to avoid systems/formalization?
	9 min 24 sec 65%	Loss of concentration or a particular puzzle needing a different strategy?
	7 min 48 sec 51%
20 June	7 min 20 sec 46%
	6 min 59 sec 43%	Is interesting how one ignore the obvious while pursuing some other inquiry (row or column with one missing entry when looking for other patterns). And how the "pop out" gets suppressed in those cases. And how dependent one actually is on "pop outs" that in turn depend on prior experience. On thinking?
	7 min 12 sec 45%
21 June	8 min 14 sec 55%
	messed up
	frustrated
	7 min 11 sec 45%
	7 min 32 sec 49%
22 June	8 min 14 sec 55%
	messed up
	messed up	pushing too hard for speed, still getting better at seeing popouts
23 June	7 min 36 sec 49%
24 June	6 min 24 sec 36%	Yep, always a box created that can be filled in with certainty. Yep, need to develop new ways of seeing popouts. Yep, need to stop trying to find persistent patterns.
	10 min 4 sec 69%	Yep, still missing some kinds of popouts
7 July	10 min 29 sec	Out of practice, but yes, beginning to see additional cross line popouts
8 July	8 min 33 sec 58%
11 July	7 min 47 sec 51%	Is getting down again, with new swing, seeing more things rather than counting them, mostly along cols, rows because of intersections with other cols, rows
28 July	6 min 59 sec 43%	Yep, and helped by helping Susan. Learning by teaching ...
	6 min 53 sec 41%	By making conscious what is unconscious so it can be conveyed to others, and is validated/consolidated in the unconscious
30 July	6 min 48 sec 40%
2 Aug	7 min 21 sec 47%
3 Aug	6 min 30 sec 37%	still "seeing" more rather than counting
9 Aug	7 min 4 sec 44%	is actually "seeing" not only boxes but also columns/rows without giving precedence to any of the three ... originally learned boxes, need to strengthen columns/rows
11 Aug	8 min 54 sec 61%	problem is indeed getting "stuck" by fixating on particular kinds of patterns, failing to notice other openings, "sticking" is unconscious problem, how does one get unconscious to switch more facilely among kinds of patterns?
29 Aug	5 min 55 sec 30%	left some days out but am stabilizing in 6+ min realm, have largely retrained to see new patterns and move more fluidly among them. Is, I think, critical to remember that any given change may produce new opportunities re any given kind of pattern

Paul's Sudoku Journal

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