Thoughts About Accomplishments…

…and the direction of the world this week

In an attempt to understand what career I should pursue I began to follow a method suggested by someone on the internet. I began to list down my accomplishments.

As I wrote down my experiences, I realize that I haven’t done enough in my life to even write down 25 experiences as a shortlist. I wonder if now would be too late to create more experiences. I kept doing things that “seemed” right for the longest time. Whatever looked like the correct thing usually that was to do from my mother’s perspective. I think I found this shortcut where I could make things appear to be something even if they really weren’t that thing. Perhaps this is what led to the choices that I made later in life. If I was to correct those things what would they look like?

I think the first thing that comes to mind when I think about looking for a career is money. I realize that money is only a measure of value. However, that measure could be broken and it’s not necessary that every time a job that pays substantially high adds the most value. It is quite likely that what appears to add the most value to society only appears so and is not really the case. Take for example jobs where people are trying to solve societal problems.

Such jobs are usually within non-profit organizations and do I even need to say more? On the other hand, you look at jobs like those in Finance and they are bringing organization based on rules framed to lead a civilized society. However, society and its civility is a fragile fabric that when disturbed slightly does not take long to dissipate. What then happens to those financial roles?

This being said I realize that as I was talking about essential roles in society and I digressed into the question of what role would suit a society whose civil fabric is disappearing. Perhaps then a pertinent question to ask is what state of society am I considering when I’m thinking about a career? Indeed, this is a question that has come up more frequently now that GPT models are changing the way AI and ML are used to do everyday tasks and even eliminating common tasks within organizations.

Many strongly believe that ‘Experiences’ is the way to go. I don’t disagree and it seems what is “real” does become more important when the “artificial” will take over everyday life. In order to provide expertise in this area one would need to be initially familiar with and then later in charge of providing the experience. Many times this would entail experiences in the wild. (in future there will be an article titled ‘Can Outer Space be Wild?‘) Perhaps survival skills that can enable existence in the “wild” is something that becomes somewhat of a niche skill that initially becomes more wanted and ultimately proliferated throughout society.

The fact of the matter is that when I list down the ten instances I consider accomplishments in life, quite a few of them are related to said Experiences. These threads were not initially connected but appear to be such. Whitney, BJJ, the Appalachian trail – they all have a few things in common. While I might be passionate about technology, it doesn’t figure in the top things I consider my accomplishments in life. As technology is disrupting lives, I wonder if the things that bring me the most pleasure in life start to become a foundation for skills that become ultimately the most valuable in society.

Structure

Something that is so elusive to me. It seems the more I am trying to build towards it the more it gets away from me. However, I’m not letting that stop me because if anything Jiu Jitsu has taught me that if nothing you have to keep on keeping on and then one day overnight you find you have made progress.

I don’t think I naturally am the most structured person and I revel in the spontaneity of human thought, random occurrences, and chance and probability. Well, that last one might just be an outcome and not necessarily anything related to structure.

For the latest portion of my professional career, I have fought against my natural instinct of being a non-linear thinker and tried to build more structure in my thought and conversations. I have seen progress towards that goal of getting more structure. The more I have tried to build it, the more I feel there is to learn. However, that is not necessarily a bad thing. It may mean that I am getting to the most nuanced portions of understanding and applying structure. Yes, some people are already there and I experience that. I very much appreciate learning from them.

I will keep learning and keep going forward. This blog post was an effort in creating a structure to some extent. I also know that I could have done so much better.

About Jordan B Peterson

After having read his book and following him for a few years, I recently saw this movie about Dr. Jordan B. Peterson. I have gone through various feelings towards him through the years but this movie highlighted a few things I felt were important to note.

The documentary is called “The Rise of Jordan Peterson” and is available on Amazon Prime (maybe available on other platforms as well). I think it doesn’t do justice to both sides of the picture that is the life of Jordan Peterson at this stage. There is his life as an individual and a public intellectual while there is the second part that is his role in the minds fo the audience that interpret his message to the world outside. I still grapple with the role of a public intellectual or an influencer. I don’t know to what extent an individual has authority over how their message is interpreted by the public or the mob. However, there is an aspect of that that needs to be explored. While the documentary does explore some parts of that picture it is more heavily weighed towards the story of him as an individual. It does not make the story wrong, just incomplete to an extent.

The second part is that JBP has been a strong influence on me. I think that is important to state at this point. While I agree with a lot of his messages, there are parts of his message that could be incorrectly interpreted if the intent is not taken into consideration. I’m not sure how intent can be measured and it is getting even harder with the increasing noise on most platforms both the internet and traditional media platforms. His personal story does help to interpret the intent but to understand intent completely there is some work that is needed on part of the audience as well. There is some basic understanding of history, culture, art and science required to interpret most things. However the more nuanced a conversation gets the more it behooves us to enter with apriori knowledge. Again, thanks to the almost seemingly inifinite dissemination of information due to new media this is getting harder because of the level of noise.

I hope I can bring some clarity to what I’m trying to communicate. However, there will be some level of familiarity with the topics that will be required as time moves on in my life. I will not always be able to explain the chain of events for how I have framed opinions because most of that knowledge will become “tribal” at some point. What i perhaps need to ask of the reader is to appreciate that the intent is always good. Perhaps another blog post to describe what good means and entails but for now that is all I have to say after watching that documentary.

The days are getting easier

Either the days are getting easier or I’m just losing touch with my challenges in growth. I’ve been fully immersed in the project at work. I feel like I’m doing great but whenever I pause or get distracted by things around insecure thoughts about the future start to creep into my mind.

Every time there’s a project on this team the work feels great. Especially when you seem to be hitting goals and getting noticed for your work. The conditions there are that projects need to be coming, which is something completely out of my control. Secondly, I need to be hitting my goals, which includes overpreparing for everything because I, like many other people, have imposter syndrome, and no matter how much I put in, it never feels like enough. Finally, I need to be appreciated for the work, which means it depends on the other people on the team and their experience of things more than just my work on the project.

Whenever I’m not staring like a zombie chipping away at work, I stare into the abyss of what it is that I am actually doing at work. I think that feeling quickly goes away as I get my paycheck. This is clearly indicative of an underlying problem that I need to be doing more than just remain satisfied by a simple “job”. It isn’t even a question about what because I have explored that and I am fairly confident that I know what I want to do outside of work is something of my own. The ambiguity is around the “something”. As long as I keep this zeal of wanting to do something I think I am in a good spot because I’ll keep looking.

So, yes, the days are getting easier but not because it’s getting easier with any of the tasks within the days but because the vision of the future is getting clearer every day. I’m glad about it but I also know that there is a lot of work left to do with regard to delving into the details.

Jiu Jitsu start makes the day seem less hectic

Today was another hectic day. At work it seems that leadership wants the materials quicker and yet folks are leaving the project rather than staying on. I like this intense part of the project perhaps because everyone is super focused and I can’t afford distractions.

Talking about focus, starting continuously at the screen has been showing it’s affects on my eyes. I’m probably headed to a pair of glasses and weakened eyes. I don’t know if I can or want to do anything to avoid that situation.

The day started with Jiu-Jitsu so it wasn’t going anywhere but down from there. However, when you start the day with learning to choke fools and get choked there isn’t much that’s shaking the Earth under your feet. Unfortunately, it is getting so much harder to take out time for anything besides work. A part of me knows that the more I’m giving to this work the further away I’m getting from it. Not because I don’t like hard work but because I know I’m not getting my due.

This brings me to the ongoing thought about starting my own thing. I know I have the skills but do I have the perseverance? Isn’t this the time when I pursue something that really energizes me? I’m now almost relieved of financial burdens and should pursue something more meaningful without being tied to anything.