All tagged Avoid Cynicism
Experience is a great educator. Over time, it teaches us and provides us with a reasoned view of life and all that makes us who we are.
However, as I discuss in today's episode, this isn't an automatic process. It's one that requires a strong sense of perspective, as well as the right mindset.
Every game has its own rules. They’re there for a reason - so that everyone works to a level playing field. That there’s no unfair advantage. So that there’s no bias in how one team or player is judged relative to another.
Of course, teams push the boundaries. They’ll operate at the margins of the rules where they can, in order to gain some sort of advantage. I get that.
But underlying it all, it’s important for everyone to operate on the basis of fairness and the principle of good faith performance. Surely, we all want that.
…Is not a phrase I’m entirely comfortable with.
Sure, there’s a maturity that comes with age - what we can refer to as wisdom. This experience also has a way of tempering our roughest, ‘least-rounded’ impulses which. in so many ways, is not at all a bad thing.
But the idealism of youth brings with it a daring, an audacity that has (more often than not) broadened our way of thinking, pushing our boundaries and forcing us to confront those things that hold us back yet we’ve taken for granted.
If you spend any amount of time in the Bay Area, you can’t help but be struck by the entrepreneurial spirit on display (seemingly) everywhere. Billboards promote the latest AI startup, not the usual Fortune 500 monolith. Coffee shops all over are filled with twenty and thirty somethings typing code, while random overheard conversations inevitably turn to the latest tech venture or entrepreneurial startup.
Change is scary.
There’s a comfort in stability, in consistency, in predictability. I know what to do, where to go, how to do it. There are no unforeseen circumstances, no surprises for me to react to, and as a result, my heart rate and blood pressure stays constant and manageable.
There's certainly a value to be placed on growth. On the continual pursuit of expansion.
It drives us to look for development opportunities, to rethink how things are done, to change what we think is 'conventional' i.e. "the way it's always been".
Growth is a tremendous value creator.
This is freedom. This is love for what you do. This is where your work is your art.
Thom Yorke’s performance is open and honest. He’s immersed in his art, his work. He’s not afraid of being vulnerable.
I've never bought the premise that we "shouldn't take it personally, it's just business".
What it suggests is that we are detached from what we do. That we conduct our work devoid of any emotion. That, on any given day, we engage in our work dispassionately.
