Okay, so today I wanted to mess around with this “ex post facto psychology” thing. I’d heard about it, sounded interesting, and figured, why not give it a shot? It’s all about looking at stuff after it happens and trying to figure out why it happened that way.
First, I needed something to analyze. I could have picked some big historical event, but nah, that’s too complicated. I decided to keep it simple and look at my own recent behavior. I thought about how I’d finally cleaned out my garage last weekend. It had been a disaster zone for, like, a year, and suddenly, boom, I just did it. Why?
So I sat down and brainstormed all the possible reasons. I jotted them down on a piece of paper, just free-flowing thoughts. I came up with stuff like:
- My wife had been nagging me about it (gently, of course).
- I’d tripped over a box of old Christmas decorations and almost broken my neck.
- The weather was finally nice enough to open the garage door without freezing.
- I’d watched a couple of episodes of that organizing show on TV.
- I had a free weekend with absolutely nothing else planned.
Then, I tried to figure out which of these reasons were the most likely to have actually motivated me. The nagging? Probably a factor, but not the main one. The near-death experience with the Christmas decorations? Okay, that definitely played a role! Nice weather? Sure, made it more pleasant. The TV show? Maybe a little inspiration. But that free weekend… that was the big one. I realized I usually put off the garage because I just don’t have the time.
So, I kind of reverse-engineered my own motivation. It wasn’t just one thing, but a combination, with the free time being the key. I essentially conducted a mini-experiment on myself, looking back at the “results” (a clean garage) and trying to figure out the “causes”.
My conclusion
This “ex post facto” approach isn’t perfect, of course. I could be wrong about my own reasons. Maybe I subconsciously just wanted to impress my neighbor with my tidiness! But it was a fun little exercise in thinking about how we can analyze things after the fact, and it definitely made me more aware of how different factors can influence my behavior.
