have you ever caught yourself being a slight bit superstitious for just a second?

[lazarus]

I'm the opposite of superstitious (not sure what word that is besides rational and skeptical), but I actually caught my subconscious trying to play a trick on me a few weeks ago.

Haele and I are taking college Spanish right now. We have tests every other Thursday. Through pure happenstance, I wore the same outfit for each test for the first half of the class. Aced every test.

Then came the test I was convinced I had screwed up and gotten a B on. I had worn a different outfit that day, and the thought came unbidden that I had messed up by changing the outfit. That lasted approximately 0.3 seconds, of course, and I got a real laugh out of it.

It's amazing what a world - and early life - of woo can do to your subconscious.

(I ended up acing the test.)

[Lisa0825]

1. Sure... I am afraid to jinx myself....

I often don't share info about something I am waiting to happen, because I feel like I will jinx myself and something will go wrong.

[onager]

2. I do that too.

The old "mention it and you will jinx it" idea.

I'm also irrational, sometimes, about thinking that inanimate objects are Out To Get Me. My co-workers even joke me with about me muttering darkly at my computer. And sometimes more than muttering.

But I blame heredity for that one. Once when I was a kid, my Mom kept yelling at my Dad to go sweep the front porch. He finally did, but it didn't work out and ended with him slamming the broom into the wall and breaking it in half, interspersed with a stream of awesome profanity. I was about 10 years old and even I could see the problem - he was sweeping against the wind, so every time he swept, the dirt came right back. But he seemed to think the broom was doing that, just to personally annoy him.

[Odin2005]

8. LOL, people thinking that inanimate objects are out to get them is funny.

I've never done it, probably because of my Asperger's. I always though that was the basis of Animist belief systems.

[Odin2005]

7. LOL, I do that too!

:rofl:

[EvolveOrConvolve]

3. I wear the same shirt during game days

I posted this in an interesting *ahem* thread in the Health Scare forum.

I coach youth football, and I still wear the same shirt on game days, even though it's a complete piece of shit and falling apart. It's the shirt I wore when I got my first win as a head coach, and it's become part of my ritual of game day preparation. I'm not sure I'd call it superstition. Maybe irrationality?

As humans, I think we tend to repeat conditions where we had a positive outcome. It's probably insecurity - we want to control the outcome, but often we can't, so we control the things that are controllable. That provides security in an unknown situation.

BTW, on game days, I also listen to the same Metallica mix on the way to the game, and I also spend a couple of minutes on the 50 yard line just before the coin toss. I always have 2 water bottles with me, even though I usually don't even have time to drink 1 of them. I lay my gear, helmet parts, clipboard, and water bottles out on the coach's bench in a specific order, and I use the same worn-out clipboard that I've had for years, even though my wife has purchased newer ones for me.

For me, the routine is important, even the less rational parts of the routine. It sounds silly, even to me, but I won't stop doing it.

[lazarus]

5. "routine" can be a valid help

it can help put you in a proper mindset. That's why ritual is so important in churches.

It's a form of autohypnosis. You're putting yourself in the proper mindset to perform.

[trotsky]

4. Oh absolutely.

Which I think just goes to show how ingrained the pattern-recognition programming is in our brains, and how damn hard it is to overcome it.

[Odin2005]

6. My subconscious mind is so superstitious it is hilarious.

It's probably part of my OCD and OCPD, certain things I just HAVE to do in the right order otherwise I feel like the world is gonna end! :rofl:

For example: my bet-time "ritual" involves taking my multivitamin and melatonin, shutting all but one living room light off, turning my bathroom light on, go back and turn of the last living room light, turn my bedroom radio to the BBC World Service, go use the bathroom, turn off the bathroom light, go to bed. In that exact order.

[Silent3]

9. For more than just a second

I think the main thing that makes most skeptics skeptics is not a lack of superstitious thought or other forms of irrational thought, but skill in recognizing those kinds of thinking and skill in compensating for them.

[Behind the Aegis]

10. Sure.

I don't walk under ladders. One thing I am trying to overcome now is not allowing the foot of the bed to face the door. Given the layout of the house and how the cable and things were set up, the beds really need to face the door and I have found myself quite pissed off. I still "kiss" clocks when they show the same number (11:11, 2:22, etc.) and make a wish. I do other things too, but it isn't a compulsion like the ones mentioned are.

[immoderate]

11. Step on a crack...

These little compulsions we can pick up are part of our structure. It's sub-reason.

--imm

[RebelOne]

12. Many years ago, I had a minor fender-bender accident

on my way to work. Then when I was fixing coffee at work, I spilled the whole pot of hot coffee all over me. I figured that all this happened because it was Friday the 13th.

[Iggo]

13. Back when I smoked, I'd avoid 3-on-a-match...

...which is lighting more than two successive cigarettes with the same match.

FWIW, I think the rule started back in like WWI so a sniper didn't have time to get a bead on you in the dark.

But I didn't know that then, though. All I knew was "Hey! No 3-on-a-match, dude!"

[LeftishBrit]

14. Oh yes

I was given a toy donkey (very appropriate to DU!) as a good-luck charm for university Finals, many long years ago. It 'worked' and I still keep it for times when my friends or I need luck. I make it 'walk' over my grant applications and the like; sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't!

I keep my fingers crossed in anxious situations.

Lots of things really; but I *know* they are superstitions even if I use/do them.

[provis99]

15. superstition appears to be built into us.

Being rational means coping with and confronting one's own superstitious tendencies, not denying they exist.

[MineralMan]

16. I can't think of any instances, but it wouldn't surprise me if

there were some. Certainly not consciously, though.

[WhollyHeretic]

17. The only times I can think of are occasionally when I watch baseball

I'm a Red Sox fan. In 2004 I went over a friend's house to watch game 4 of the world series. I left my champagne out on the porch until after the last out had been made. There were a number of other people who brought champagne and no one would bring it inside until the game was over. Growing up a 3rd generation Red Sox fan will definitely make you at least somewhat superstitious.

[Evoman]

18. Well..sort of. I have a supersitious believe in luck....and my utter lack of it.

I overcome incredible odds to lose. I get hit with cars, work for the worst bosses, got shit on by random birds more times than is plausable or even possible. I will go to the casino with my bro occasionally, and will ALWAYS (100% of the time, no exceptions) lose, while he plays the same amount and leaves with sometimes hundreds of dollars (his losses to win is about 1:2...meaning he wins more than loses). And neither of us play games of skill...mostly slots and roulettes, just for shit and giggles). The one time I won anything (raffle..won a stereo), it was stolen in a break in a week later, along with my tv and vcr.

Life keeps kicking me in the balls. I try not to believe the universe hates me, but it's really hard. My girlfriend and brother, who are very rational people, think I'm the exception to the free-will rule.

Seriously, have you been shit on by birds 13 times in your life?