Cognitive Dissonance

Now I have to clear the air. My selective definition of "cognitive dissonance" is "conflicting thoughts or beliefs that occur at the same time" (see Wikipedia for a much more complete description). Following is a picture of what cognitive dissonance feels like to me.

I often find myself in a state of cognitive dissonance. The following quote by Lawrence Peter Berra kind of sums it up for me:

In theory, theory and practice are the same.
In practice, they are not.

I am, by education, a psychometrician. Psychometric training is a largely theoretical pursuit, with little training in the pragmatic constraints of actual testing programs. In many instances, the theory does not go far enough to handle the realities of educational policy and practice. At that point, one enters into the world of psychometric engineering (my own term) where theory and practice diverge, and where the theoretical envelope is pushed to be broad enough to incorporate the strangeness of real world situations and real world data.

In many ways, the professional cognitive dissonance (theoretically optimal practice and feasibly optimal practice) is a very good exercise for me in other areas of my life. Particularly in knowing all that I am supposed to do to be the optimal person I can be, and the weaknesses and defects I possess that keep me from that ideal. Theory and practice are supposed to come closer together, but they never quite get there for me.

What I am and what I want to be are not always the same. I just hope they are getting closer.