Prospective retrospective

Tomorrow is my birthday, assuming that I publish this today–and I predict that I will.

I spent the morning catching up with my friend Elsa. This post is dedicated to her because I needed a better reason to post than it’s the day before my birthday. So I said I would, and now I won’t disappoint. Anyone else want a post dedicated to them? Ask, and you shall be given.

Here’s part of the chat:

Do you remember when you were coaching me and we made a plan and you checked in with me and I said that the plan had failed and that I was not surprised?

And I realized that I made lots of plans that (if I had been asked) I would have predicted would have failed. But I never had asked

So we came up with a new process. Make a plan. Predict the outcome. If the prediction was failure, then predict reasons for failure, take them into account in the plan.

The goal was a plan that would either succeed or if it failed would fail in an unexpected way

Quoting from a blog post:

“I remembered an earlier time, working with Elsa, my personal coach. I’d made a plan and didn’t do what I had planned to do. When we talked about it, I said that I wasn’t surprised that my plan had failed. I’d made plans that had failed hundreds of times before. My failure was unsurprising. We then worked to make a plan that might fail—but whose failure would at least be surprising.”

Haha I could have saved all that typing just by quoting Past Me

Fucking brilliant guy, Past Me.

Indeed!

Moving backward: I started chatting with her because last night, as I was drafting a post, I asked myself whether or not I’d end up finishing and posting it.

What did I predict I would do?

I predicted that I would not.

And I was right.

But before I was right, I thought: if I’m intending to publish a blog post and predict that I will not do it, then there’s something wrong.

And that reminded me of Elsa.

Something was wrong.

I set out to discover what was wrong and correct it.

This post provides some evidence that I’m on the right track.

Meanwhile, I’m going to post this one and make my prediction accurate.

Click here to subscribe to 70 Years Old. WTF! by Email

​

Vote arete!

Arete, in its primary sense, says Wikipedia, means “excellence” of any kind.

I want to compare arete with commonly chosen alternatives: adequacy and mediocrity.

Fitness

Let’s start with fitness.

Fitness means “being suitable for a specific task or purpose.”

The task or purpose defines the level of fitness needed for its doing.

Some tasks demand excellence, but most do not. They only what is adequate to do the job.

I will call that minimal level of fitness “bare adequacy.”

Sufficiency, in contrast to adequacy, would provide a comfortable margin of fitness.

Bare adequacy is the minimum.

Mediocrity

Mediocrity means being “in a middle state.”

The word carries negative connotations, but I’ll use it neutrally.

To carry out a task requires bare adequacy.

To carry it out with a comfortable margin for failure requires sufficiency.

To carry it out in the best possible way would require excellence—arete.

To carry it out in ways that are better than barely adequate, yet less than excellent would be to carry it out in a mediocre way.

Mediocrity is sufficient, by definition.

Mediocrity is inevitably popular and acceptable because, on average, people are average.

The average person is average

How could it be otherwise?

Only the most capable people doing their best can achieve excellence. Some do, and this sets that standard for excellence.

Some competent people routinely do less than their best. They strive for some level of fitness, often to be above average, but not for arete.

Why is this?

The common wisdom is that efficiency has replaced arete as a virtue.

It’s possible to both seek efficiency and excellence, but an acceptable level of efficiency is deemed sufficient in general.

People reward others for doing what it takes to get by with a modest cushion for error.

If there’s no benefit to doing a better job, we’re told, don’t waste the resources.

But every decision to do that is a secret vote for mediocrity.

It’s a vote for mediocrity for yourself, your children, and the world around you.

Vote arete, I say!

Being better than average

Most people want to be above average—but not too much above average. There are social reasons for this.

If everyone did their best, then people with average talents would have to do their best just to achieve an average performance.

There was a time when getting a “gentleman’s C” was the norm.

When I was at MIT we were graded on the curve. Everyone could do the math (of course). People who raised class average made it harder for everyone less talented to get a passing grade. The best were both admired and resented.

And in truth, how could one strive for excellence in a system where that caused needless suffering? Was causing others to suffer a virtuous act?

Luckily for average people, not everyone does their best. People who can do better than average can do less than their best and still be above average. And they do.

The more capable a person, the further from arete they can move and still pat themselves on the back for being above average.

This pulls the average down.

So average people can do their best and be better than average. In some cases, considerably better.

Or average people can be efficient and settle for just above average. They’re never going to be excellent, and who cares what level of mediocrity they reach?

But anyone doing their best can still achieve personal excellence.

Unfortunately, few applaud them for that, and no one teaches them to commend themselves.

In this kind of system, there are powerful reasons for people to vote for mediocrity.

Senator Roman Hruska got his fifteen minutes of fame defending mediocrity.

In 1970, Hruska addressed the Senate, urging them to confirm Richard Nixon’s nomination of G. Harrold Carswell to the Supreme Court. Responding to criticism that Carswell had been a mediocre judge, Hruska argued:

Even if he were mediocre, there are a lot of mediocre judges and people and lawyers. They are entitled to a little representation, aren’t they, and a little chance? We can’t have all Brandeises, Frankfurters and Cardozos.[11]

Why arete?

For the Greeks, (at least the ones we mythologize) arete was a moral virtue. One might as well ask why be moral? Why be virtuous?

In some sense, I’ve always done my best. Indeed, I’ve tried. I wrote about it here: We always do our best..

I’ve also always aspired to do better—but often did not act in accord with my aspirations.

There was a time when I saw that as a failure of character. Now I see it as a lack of knowledge.

I wanted my kids to be the best—or at least the best they could be. Still do.

My question to them was always: “Did you do your best?” With a little thought (which is a motivation for writing this, might discover a better quetion.

Like lots of other people, I want the sports teams that I cheer to be their best.

People want their country to be the best.

So why not ourselves?

What I do I teach

I wanted my kids to do their best (and still do).. I could say that it would have been hypocritical not to teach them by example. But I think that the truth is somewhat different and needs exploration.

How I see things now

I’m not dead yet, and that means I’ve got responsibilities.

If I am not working toward personal excellence, I’m casting a vote for mediocrity and teaching everyone around me to vote with me.

That is an idea, a bit of knowledge, that I need to keep handy.

When people like me, those who can do above-average things, settle for mere fitness instead of arete, we let the average drop.

Then the average person can do less and still be above average, and the average drops further.

Do it enough times, and civilization unwinds.

I like to think that what I do makes a difference. The difference may be small, but it is a difference.

I’m not dead yet, and as long as I’m not, I’ll do my part to Vote Arete! and #keeptheaverageup.

Click here to subscribe to 70 Years Old. WTF! by Email

​

Solve for X! Xplained.

Dear Future Mike, (my next post after this one began):

Your last post was profoundly satisfying to the person who you were during the time you were writing it. It’s also satisfying to who you are at this moment.

I hope you continue to find it as helpful as your Past Selves did.

In case you don’t remember, a series of drafts began with words like “Solving for X” or “Solve for X.”

That post was the first draft that you completed. That was when you began to see what “Solve for X” (and eventually “Solve for X!” could mean to you.

If you get stuck again, take my advice: Solve for X!

Again.

Best Regards,
APS (A Past Self)

Solve for X! is a trick

Solve for X! is a trick. Today it’s a good trick. Tomorrow it may not work as well. Or at all.

Likey, one day, Solve for X! will become useless. Every other trick I’ve come up with has eventually stopped working, so why not that one?

But right now, it works. So, until it fails, I’ll keep Solving for X!

Then I’ll do something else. And later, perhaps, I’ll discover this post or this one and give it another try.

A theory: why Solve for X! works for me

In many past moments, it was a fact that I had a goal. It was a fact that I was doing nothing to progress toward the goal.

In those past moments, based on those facts, I repeatedly drew several conclusions. I concluded that I didn’t know why I was doing nothing; my behavior made no sense.

Each conclusion was an ending. And each carried with it the same hidden assumption: “I don’t know the answer.” And more: “I should know the answer.” And more: “There’s something wrong with me.”

But along comes a different assumption. I could define X and solve for it. As I worked with it, the idea of solving for X became Solve for X! It was a kind of rallying cry.

Ideas are alive. They come to me when I invite them—and sometimes they come on their own.

Solve for X! is an idea, and so is each X.

Some ideas are familiar, like old friends.

Some ideas are unusual.

Some are wild.

Some ideas contain new information, and new information can open new possibilities.

“Like me!” Says the idea, Solve for X!

“Like you!” I say, reflecting its enthusiasm.

Solve for X! creates new opportunities. So also can be the ideas, the X’s that are solved for.

“I’m what you needed to get this post written,” says an idea. It had appeared when I started to write this post and solved for X.

“Actually,” it corrected me, “that’s when you noticed me. I was here before that.”

“It was,” another idea agreed. “The universe conserves information. Like all information, knowledge, and ideas (which are, after all, just forms of information), that idea had always been and always will be. It’s been waiting for the time to make its presence known.

“Me, too,” it added.

“Now is my time!” Said the idea that I had first noticed. “Or was!”

I sat for a moment, thinking idly. I wasn’t completing the post. Then I realized what I needed to do. I solved for X!

“Excuse me,” I said to an idea that had distracted me, “I’d like to finish writing this and posting it, and you’re kind of in my way.”

“Oh, sorry,” said the distracting idea. “I had no idea that I was doing that.” It laughed. “No idea! You get it. I’m an idea and I had no idea!”

“I do,” I said. “And thank you. But…”

“I know,” said the idea, “I’m still in your way. No problem. I’ll just step aside.”

It did. And a few minutes later, I posted this.

Click here to subscribe to 70 Years Old. WTF! by Email

​

Solve for X!

Because I’m not dead yet, I can describe how I would like to live the life that remains for me.

(I might describe it in another post. But not now. This one is about Solving for X! )

Most of my life is consistent with the description I might write, but there are mismatches—things that I would like to be doing, am physically able to do, and yet not doing.

Why would that be?

I’ve puzzled over that for weeks. Maybe months. Perhaps years.

Now I have a theory.

My theory is this: something that I believe or have decided must be wrong or unknown.

Let’s call what’s wrong or missing X.

I want to solve for X.

“Done,” says a voice in my head. Or some typing at my fingers.

“Done what?” I ask.

“You’ve solved for X!” Says the voice, or the typing or whatever. “I am X! You’ve solved for me! Now you can get to living the life that you might describe in a later post.”

“But I don’t know what X is,” I complain.

“Of course you do!” Comes the reply. “It’s me! Didn’t you just define me? Am I not here!”

“Not exactly,” I say. “I defined the properties of something that I called X. I said that X is what I believe and is incorrect, plus what I don’t know.”

“Exactly!” came the answer. “That’s what I am! You’ve found me! Get on with your life!”

“You mean that’s all I had to do?” I ask. “It seems like cheating.”

“It’s not cheating!” comes the answer. “I’m the answer! You’re writing this, aren’t you? You’re going to post it, aren’t you? And then you’ve going to work on some other things, aren’t you?”

“Which other things?” I ask.

“I’ll tell you when it’s time!” is the answer. “You’ll know. All you have to do is Solve for X!”

“Meanwhile, post this.”

I did.

And then I wrote a post explaining it to my future self

​

Conditional happiness and conditioned misery

Anthony De Mello says that the first step toward awakening is to realize that you don’t want to awaken. And the first toward happiness is to realize that you don’t want to be happy.

That last made no sense. Me, not want to be happy?

Then he explained.

Then I got it.

Conditional happiness

People are willing to be happy, he explains, but only conditionally. “I’ll be happy, but only if I get this. I’ll be happy, but only if they do that.”

People don’t want to be happy. They want what they want, and they’ll be miserable if they think it will get them what they want.”

People believe that conditional unhappiness is beneficial.

We think that because we’ve been taught to use unhappiness to control ourselves.

We’ve learned to punish ourselves to help ourselves. We’ve learned to torture ourselves to control ourselves.

De Mello says:

All I can do for you is help you to unlearn. That’s what learning is all about where spirituality is concerned: unlearning,

I’ve learned how to be conditionally happy. Now I need to unlearn it and learn just to be happy.

Examples abound

If I write this blog post, then then I will be happy.

No, if I write a post every day, for many days, then I will be happy.

No, I’ll only be happy if I write very high-quality posts in great abundance and people love them.

I’m willing to be conditionally happy. Why not be unconditionally happy?

If I can set the conditions for happiness, why not remove those conditions?

I’m not alone in wanting only conditional happiness.

If my wife/husband/son/daughter/friend stops doing that annoying thing, then I will be happy. Well, maybe not happy. Perhaps just a bit happier. Because they have this other annoying thing that they do. If they stopped doing all those things, then I’d be happy.

If my co-workers stop doing stupid things, then I’ll be happy.

If Donald Trump loses(or wins) the election, I’ll be happy.

In every case, De Mello points out, we are holding happiness hostage. Being happy does not depend on any of these things, so why make a condition? We can just be happy.

I can be happy whether or not I write a blog post.

You can be happy whether or not the people around you are acting like idiots.

We can even be happy while Donald Trump is…well, it’s a stretch, but it’s possible.

De Mello says:

Some people make awakening a goal. They are determined to get there; they say, “I refuse to be happy until I’m awakened.”

That was me. Unhappy until I’m awakened.

How did we learn

I came to believe that conditional happiness (and unhappiness) was useful.

I learned to believe that the way to get what I want is to hold my happiness hostage—to refuse to be happy unless I get it.

I’ve used what you might call purposeful unhappiness to get what I want.

Everybody says it. No pain, no gain.

Want gain? Have some pain.

Pushing ourselves

We who want to improve believe that pushing ourselves is the route to success. We could push ourselves joyfully, but that’s not what we’ve been taught. We’ve been taught to torture ourselves to get better.

We don’t think about it as torture.

Torture: the action or practice of inflicting severe pain or suffering on someone to force them to do something

Want to get better? Make yourself suffer for not doing it.

Our parents taught us initially. We continue to refresh the lessons.

How we learned

It started this way.

When we did something that our parents didn’t want us to do, they physically stopped us. They controlled us. And at the same time, they showed unhappiness or even anger.

Like Pavlov’s dogs, we associated their emotions with control. Soon they didn’t have to touch us. They could give us a stern look or talk to us in a certain tone of voice. They conditioned us to obey.

My parents did it to me. I did it to my kids. Sorry, kids.

Kids become conditioned to respond to the unhappiness of adults around them.

That’s a starting point.

Teaching the happy to be unhappy

Children are naturally happy. They will happily track mud into the house, happily throw food on the floor, happily bop another kid on the head. When parents reprimand kids for such behavior—and they should—they demand that the kids demonstrate understanding.

Words are not enough.

If a parent remonstrated a happy kid for tracking mud into the house, and the kid apologized but remained happy, most parents would assume (maybe correctly) that the kid didn’t get it, and the apology was not genuine.

The real test of understanding would be: did they track mud in the next time? But no one can wait around for that. So parents train kids to show them that they understand. Unhappiness after a reprimand is acceptable evidence of understanding.

So kids are trained.

“Wipe that smile off your face!”

“This is no joke.”

Punishment

When parents deem that some level of expressed unhappiness is insufficient evidence of learning, then—with the best of intentions—and I mean that without irony—parents punish us. If they were to punish us—say by sending us to our room or depriving us of a favorite toy or activity—and we did not demonstrate enough distress, they’d find something that made us more unhappy.

The greater the offense, the greater the required degree of misery. All for our own good.

What our parents learned, they taught. They’d learned to punish by being punished. And by punishing us, they taught us to punish ourselves.

Anticipating reprimands and punishment

They taught us to anticipate their reprimands and punishment and restrain ourselves from doing things they wanted us not to do.

We learned to reprimand ourselves before the fact and punish ourselves—with guilty feelings—after the fact.

That’s what was done to me. And that’s what I did to my kids. Sorry, kids. If I ever have more kids, I’ll do better.

Do unto ourselves

We learn to get ourselves to do things that we find hard to do by doing to ourselves as was done unto us. We might start by asking ourselves. We might argue with ourselves. And if that doesn’t work, we threaten ourselves, criticize ourselves, punish ourselves, torture ourselves until we do what we want. We might also promise ourselves a reward. But for most people, threats, criticisms, and punishment are important motivators.

If we reach a satisfactory level of success—whatever that might be—we’re happy to relax into a routine. And why not? Things are good.

The road to greater success

We know that the way to greater success is more self-threats, self-criticisms, self-doubt, and punishment. We’ve had enough, thank you very much. And please don’t criticize us for not wanting to go further!

If our level of success is not satisfactory, we know why. We didn’t threaten ourselves enough. We didn’t force ourselves enough. Not enough torture. Not enough gain? Must have been not enough pain.

Another way

I believe that there is another way.

That way is through awareness and understanding.

De Mello says:

That still leaves us with a big question: Do I do anything to change myself? I’ve got a big surprise for you, lots of good news! You don’t have to do anything. The more you do, the worse it gets. All you have to do is understand.

What can I say here?

I like what De Mello says:

One cannot say anything about happiness. Happiness cannot be defined. What can be defined is misery. Drop unhappiness and you will know. Love cannot be defined; unlove can. Drop unlove, drop fear, and you will know.

 

​

Do your job, (redux)

Jordan Peterson says that we don’t understand ourselves as well as we think we do. If we observe ourselves, we may learn something that we didn’t know about ourselves.

The other day I learned something important about myself: I do my job.

A projects guy

Years back, I realized that I couldn’t just call someone up and “catch up on life” the way some people can. I relate to people mainly through projects. Give me a project, and I’m happy to talk. No project? Not so interested. Want to have a relationship with me? Find a project.

“I’m a projects guy,” is how I framed that idea about myself. And I wrote a blog post about it.

I do my job

The other day I realized something else about myself.

I do my job.

I may procrastinate and do my job at the last minute, but if it’s my job, I’ll do it.

Here’s the story of how I came to this insight (this time), why it’s important, and why I think it’s going to stick

How I got here

I’ll start the story two days ago, as I was considering a fundamental existential question: of what value is my existence?

In other words: why should I continue to live?

My ADD had been in full rage. I was not getting things done that I wanted to get done. I was frustrated and angry and becoming depressed. And I was becoming too tired to try.

I was not suicidal. I’ve been through this cycle often enough to know this will pass.

But still.

What’s the use of living that sort of life?

When shit like that happens to my brain, I’ve found one reliable way through it.

I pull out a computer or a notebook, and I write and write and write.

Eventually, my thoughts clear, and I can get on with life.

This time they got very clear.

Does my life have value?

What’s the value of my continued existence? I asked.

I know that Bobbi and the kids (including the kids-by-marriage) would suffer loss if I were not around.

For there to be loss, there must be value.

So my life had value—to them, if not to me.

I wanted my life to have a different kind of value, and it did not. But that didn’t matter. It had value to them, and it was my job to preserve that value.

It was my job to keep living for them, if not for me.

How should I live?

I could keep living the way that I was at that moment, miserable and frustrated. Or perhaps I could find a way to be happy.

If I continued to live in misery and hid it from the people who loved me, I would be dishonest. And I place a high value on honesty.

If I continued to live in misery and revealed it, I would make the people who loved me unhappy. I’d be spreading misery.

So this thought arose: it was not only my job to live, but to be happy.

It was my job.

Sometimes, it’s hard to be happy. So what?

Flashbulb memory. I remember sitting in a bookstore, in a sunny place, reading a book of quotations. One, my memory tells me, said something similar to what I had just concluded: that it’s our job to be happy.

When things are going well, it’s easy to be happy. And when things are going badly, it’s hard.

But if it’s my job to be happy, the fact that it’s hard doesn’t matter.

It might take a lot of work. I might try and fail. That’s happened before.

But I can’t think of a realistic situation where I’ve been able to bring about a better outcome by being miserable than being happy.

(To be clear, by “happy,” I don’t mean tra-la-la laughing and giggling. I mean with a calm and aware mind, looking forward to acting to improve whatever situation currently exists, with hope for something better.)

And I think well of myself—or anyone—who works at a job that’s not easy if it’s the right thing to do.

It’s my job

So, I concluded, being happy may take work, but it’s my job.

And just like that, my attitude changed.

I had a job to do.

I remember a favorite scene from “Person of Interest.” John Reese, one of the story’s heroes, has been drinking himself to death. Harold Finch another leading character says:

Finch: I don’t think you need a psychiatrist or a support group, or pills…

Reese: What do I need?

Finch:: You need a purpose. More specifically, you need a job.

Thinking of being happy as a job changed my mind.

That surprised me.

It made me happy.

That also surprised me.

I thought about it for a while and realized in addition to being a “projects guy,” I’m a “do your job guy.” Doing hard things when it’s my job has been a pattern in my life.

Being an extravert was my job

In my working years, I had a lot of public-facing roles. In meetings, I expressed my views. At trade shows, I was quick to start a conversation with a passer-by who might be a customer. On a customer visit, I was happy to be the center of attention. I had little hesitation speaking in front of an audience.

People who knew me in a professional context were often surprised when I said I was an introvert.

“You, an introvert?” I was asked more than once. “You don’t seem like an introvert.”

“I know,” was my answer. “I’m an introvert on my own time. But when it’s my job to be an extrovert, I’m an extrovert. I do my job.”

And that was it for me. I did my job.

Frustrating and loving

Later, after reading Martin Seligman’s book, “Learned Helplessness,” I realized that it was my job as a parent not just to support our kids, but to frustrate them. The idea was to help them learn to deal with frustration so they wouldn’t grow up helpless. I did my job. I wrote about it here.

Still later, after the kids became independent and sometimes behaved in ways that I intensely disliked and thought would harm them in the long run, I realize that part of my job was loving them, without regard to that behavior. I wrote a little about that here (“From Spark to Post”).

I take doing my job seriously.

When I was raising my kids, I sometimes loved them because they were cute and loveable. But sometimes they were awful and unloveable. Still, I loved them. Because it was my job.
So I did my job and did not let my feelings about their behavior get in the way of loving them.

Will the insight stick?

So being happy is my job. Interesting insight. Will it stick?

This blog records other insights that I’ve had and decisions that I have made. Some have stuck. Others have dropped out of working memory. (Fortunately, my blog makes up for my memory failures.)

I’ve had other insights not recorded here—though it might be useful for me to do that—and there’s a pattern to the ones that have stuck.

I’ve written about this idea before:
here (The Stoic Challenger).

I learned that being a father and a husband were jobs that I had. What my kids did or what my wife did was not something I could control. What I could control is what I did, and not always that. But it was my job to do my best.

and here (Do your job!), it hasn’t stuck yet.

I think this is different.

It feels different. But I could be wrong.

We’ll see.

Click here to subscribe to 70 Years Old. WTF! by Email

​