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“I am not afraid of my truth anymore and I will not omit pieces of me to make you comfortable.”

—

Alex Elle

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So. Being yourself is a tricky topic. In business, Life & deciding what you want to do.

I know <I know>.

Seems like “being yourself” should be simple. Like ‘breathing’ type simple.

But it’s not. It’s not because there is a constant struggle between an internal part <’who am I’ type shit> and external <figuring out how ‘who am I’ should actually act in public>.

For example, one of my favorite young writers, Jamie, describes herself this way:

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I’m a writer, pretty much by process of elimination. I am also a professional aspirationalist.

That’s not a word, but I’ve made it into one, since there was nothing that could quite describe me because I didn’t want to say I’m a “professional dreamer” because that sounds like some hippie shit.

I have aspirations, like, lots of them. If you’d like me to create a TV show, get in touch with me. How about publishing my memoir? Get in touch. If you are from The Ellen Show, I will, of course, accept your interview and would be delighted to dance it out with my girl, so long as she doesn’t prank me by making me eat cilantro. In fact, I want no cilantro in anything.

<Jamie Varon>

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Professional aspirationalist. Not ‘professional dreamer’ nor ‘professional pragmatist.’

Ok.

Professional aspirationalist is just awesome.

If I could ever vote for a new term, that would be it. It’s fucking awesome. It captures the essence of restlessness & hope & striving & unlearning &, well, all the things I believe are good and healthy with a person seeking to be better tomorrow than they are today.

What I truly love about it is that she came up with a term to capture her “self.” I love it because being yourself, and even recognizing who ‘yourself’ is, is hard. And when I say hard think even harder than maybe becoming a Navy Seal type hard.

……….. self …….. an entanglement of nuances ………….

It is incredibly hard because the truth is that ‘my truth’ , more often than not, is most likely an evolving tangled web of characteristics which, as it evolves, simply becomes more tangled <rather than untangled>.

Yourself is constantly adapting to new learning, new learning about things and new learning, and unlearning <changed beliefs, opinions, attitudes, perspectives>, about oneself.

That’s why I love professional aspirationalist.

True north on Jamie’s compass is defined. And its not a destination, but rather it is a direction.

Aspirationalist is a moving target. It is restless and unmoving at exactly the same time. It is an adventurer with some pragmatism. It’s not being on Ellen <although she would be delighted to do so> because once that happens there will always be something else.

Being an aspirationalist means not only having dreams, but dreaming … oh … and doing.

Yeah.

Doing. As in doing lots of different shit.

Uh oh.

That also means … well … increasingly more and different dreams <and aspirations>. And increasingly doing more and different shit. Dreaming and doing. Lots of different dreaming and doing.

In the end <to me> being a professional aspirationalist means being a restless soul. Restlessly seeking, traveling, doing, thinking. Professionally constantly in motion <mentally or physically>.

I love it because it captures my personal belief that becoming ‘better’ as a person is experiential rather than tangible <although tangible ‘doing stuff’ is certainly a component>.

I love it because it isn’t for the faint of heart.

And isn’t what truly being yourself is all about? Having some courage to even suggest ‘I will not omit things just to make you comfortable.’

Professional aspirationalist reminded me of this other quote:

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“I am a world that cannot be explored in one day. I am not a place for cowards.”

Caitlyn Siehl

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Yes.

Being a professional aspirationalist means you are not a place for cowards.

Anyway.

I wish I had come up with this word, but I am not as talented a writer as Jamie.

I like it for its sense of Life’s paradox. Paradox in that it is independent and dependent at the same time.

I like it for it’s sense of Business’s paradox. Paradox in that success in business is a combination of stillness, at the right times, and movement/restlessness at all times.

I like it because at its core it doesn’t mean shunning the world and simply being a dreamer. It has rich & royal hues of reality threading its way through its fabric.

I would like to believe I am also a professional aspirationalist.

Now.

To be clear <because Jamie is correct the word selection was thoughtful to avoid the ‘hippie shit’>. Pragmatically, we aspirationalists do seek <some> approval and acceptance <ohhhhhhhhhhhh shit>.

Accept what I just wrote <that last sentence>. Don’t fight it <even if you are one of those who say ‘I don’t give a fuck what anyone thinks”>.

Because you do care.

Whether you like it or not, whether you think it is right or wrong, whether you think it is a good thing or bad in that it makes you ‘weak’ in some way, just get it set in your head – in some form or fashion – we care.

Don’t worry … we all care <not just aspirationalists>. We all care what the people around us think about us. And by ‘people’ I mean everyone from those closest to you <who would most likely accept you in any shape and form you ended up in … but you don’t want to disappoint them> to society overall <there is some value in gaining credit for who you are and what you do>.

Some acceptance from others feeds our self-esteem & self-worth <and all that Maslow stuff>.

Ah.

Please note I used the word “feeds.” Approval and acceptance is not the only nutrition necessary for a healthy esteem and worth.

It is simply one part of the diet.

Even we aspirationalists need a balanced ‘self diet’. We do not seek sole value from proving ourselves to others. And we don’t accept sole value in and of ourselves.

Being an aspirationalist is … well … the paradox. Independent dreamer with some dependence on external cues as to the value of our aspirations.

We want to fit into the world on our own terms.

Regardless.

What a description:

                       Professional aspirationalist:      I am not afraid of my truth anymore and I will not omit pieces of me to make you comfortable. I am a world that cannot be explored in one day. I am not a place for cowards.

We need more of these people in our world — in Life & in business.

Me? I will continue living life, trying to do good shit in Life & business, as a Professional Aspirationalist.

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“We’ve all started to put down the virtues of the other factions in the process of bolstering our own. I don’t want to do that. I want to be brave, and selfless, and smart, and kind, and honest.”

Four <Divergent>

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“Virtue refuses facility for her companion … the easy, gentle, and sloping path that guides the footsteps of a good natural disposition is not the path of true virtue. It demands a rough and thorny road.”

Michel de Montaigne

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Dauntless and being dauntless.

I thought about this after reading this quote from Rob Estreitinho: “Serve the idea. Solve the problem. Everything else is ego talk.”

In order to live your business Life to this ideal one would have to be, well, dauntless.

I love the word Dauntless.

I rediscovered the word in an otherwise incredibly poorly written great story <the Divergent trilogy>.

The book places society into five different factions — each espousing one specific virtue <at the expense of other virtues>.  I imagine one of the points is that making one virtue your Life focus is bad in that we are a complex balance of a number of virtues.

Anyway. The factions are <virtues>:

Abnegation.

Amity.

Erudite.

Candor.

Dauntless.

But it is in the Dauntless idea in which I found something that truly struck a chord.  Something I found valuable to think about. Okay. Not just for me but society, business and people in general.

—

“We believe in ordinary acts of bravery, in the courage that drives one person to stand up for another.”

Dauntless Manifesto

—

Well. There is a thought. No. there is a BIG thought. In a me, me, me world <or at least it sometimes feels that way these days>, in a world where if I see something like ‘no one will stand up for you but yourself’, or, hear ‘the only one you can count on is yourself’ one more time, I will begin thinking we have lost our humanity compass (or, at least, lost sight of what is important).

Important?

Ordinary acts of bravery.

Bravery as in everyday actions and not in running into fires to save someone or stepping in front of a bullet.

Bravery as in stepping in front of criticism.

Bravery as in stepping in front of ‘doing nothing.’

Bravery as in stepping in and doing what is right <even if it may not be the easiest thing to do>.

Bravery as in stepping up for an unpopular idea.

Or. How about these words:

“We believe in shouting for those who can only whisper, in defending those who cannot defend themselves.”

I am not suggesting shouting, but rather speaking out for those who only whisper and defending those who cannot defend themselves. This includes ideas.

Look.

The world is made up of a bunch of different people. It is crazy, fucking crazy, to criticize and diminish the people who only whisper or do not always defend themselves. Yeah. We may not like it, we may wish that they stood up and spoke out, but just because they don’t doesn’t make them ‘lesser than.’ It is simply what it is. Accept it. And if you can make a difference, and you want to make a difference; then make a difference. You are no better than the other person, you are simply doing what you do.

In other words. If you are dauntless, then be dauntless.

But, I imagine my real point is, if you have this dauntless virtue than accept the responsibility.

It is who you are and you should be it.

My next point?  Fearless and dauntless are two completely different things.

Dauntless doesn’t mean you do not have fear … it simply means ‘going the way despite maybe having fear.’ Dauntless is a relentless pursuit of what you believe is right.

As Montaigne suggests, it is not an easy gentle slope of living life; it is a rough and thorny road.

I found it interesting that the author of the Divergent trilogy in an appendix suggested the following lyrics to this song captured the essence of what she was writing about <and I thought it also was relevant to being dauntless>:

“Hold on to the world we all remember fighting for

There’s some strength left in you yet

Hold on to the world we all remember dying for

There’s some hope left in it yet

Arise and be

All that you dreamed.

Flyleaf <Arise>

Ah. Arise and be all that you dreamed.

Do we not all dream about standing up for those who cannot stand on their own?

Do we not dream about speaking up for those who can only whisper?

Or defending those who cannot defend themselves?

If that is being Dauntless … well … sign me up.

Now. We may all dream of being ‘that person.’  But that is not for everyone. And it shouldn’t be. Because sometimes being dauntless means you are simply clearing the way, opening the pathway, so someone can get through and do what they do. And what they do is make the world a little more like the world we remember worth dying for.

What does this suggest? Roles & responsibilities. We all have roles & responsibilities.

Regardless. The Dauntless Manifesto has some thoughtful thoughts. Things we should all think about. Things that may remind us of the world we remember worth dying for.

Anyway.  Parts of the Dauntless Manifesto are silly … but it is a poorly written young adult book so just focus on the sometimes breathtaking choice of words:

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Dauntless Manifesto:

We believe that cowardice is to blame for the world’s injustices.

We believe that peace is hard-won, that sometimes it is necessary to fight for peace. But more than that: We believe that justice is more important than peace.

We believe in freedom from fear, in denying fear the power to influence our decisions. We believe in ordinary acts of bravery, in the courage that drives one person to stand up for another.

We believe in acknowledging fear and the extent to which it rules us. We believe in facing that fear no matter what the cost to our comfort, our happiness, or even our sanity.

We believe in shouting for those who can only whisper, in defending those who cannot defend themselves.

We believe, not just in bold words but in bold deeds to match them. We believe that pain and death are better than cowardice and inaction because we believe in action.

We do not believe in living comfortable lives. We do not believe that silence is useful.

We do not believe in good manners.

We do not believe in empty heads, empty mouths, or empty hands.

We do not believe that learning to master violence encourages unnecessary violence.

We do not believe that we should be allowed to stand idly by. We do not believe that any other virtue is more important than bravery.

——————————-

All that said.

Being dauntless is not easy. Its about accepting fear, accepting doubt and accepting your own demons. Or maybe its just about living with them.

—-

”We never lose our demons. We only learn to live above them.”

Dr. Strange

—-

Ok. Here is what I know about living dauntlessly. It sounds like a simple choice but it is not simple. I believe it was Jaime Lannister on the Game of Thrones who explained it the best:

So many vows… they make you swear and swear. Defend the king. Obey the king. Keep his secrets. Do his bidding. Your life for his. But obey your father. Love your sister. Protect the innocent. Defend the weak. Respect the gods. Obey the laws. It’s too much. No matter what you do, you’re forsaking one vow or the other.

No matter what you do, no matter which direction, or fear, or decision, you face; as you turn away from one thing you will end up facing another. You will forsake one thing to deal with another.

What this means to Dauntless is, well, you may as well take action. You may as well do something.

You may as well try to improve your station and lot in Life despite whatever fears you may have.

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“If you pay attention to the present, you can improve upon it. And, if you improve on the present, what comes later will also be better…”

Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist.

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 Look. As I have said a number of times the whole concept, the whole idea, the whole belief, of a fearless person is a lie. It is bullshit.

Sure. Some of the best of the fearless-like dauntless people have an inner fear compass which enables them to navigate fear little better than the rest of us everyday schmucks.

To be clear. They actually have dauntless guardrails which keeps them from chaos of ‘do anything just to do’ which truly only a psychologically screwed up person would ever embrace.  That means they don’t simply ignore fear & doubt; they accept it and manage it.

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“There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them.”

Andre Gide

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Look.   I am not suggesting that fear doesn’t exist I am simply suggesting we often permit fear to take on superhuman powers and intergalactic sizes in our minds. I am suggesting seeking to be successful through being dauntless means not eliminating fear but simply making it into bite sized portions more easily swallowed <or however you elect to deal with fear … that was just a suggestion>.

Here’s the deal.

All people fear failure.

Everyone.

Even the dauntless.

And anyone who tells you otherwise is lying.

It’s just that some people set it aside and strive to seek something that lies somewhere beyond the fear. Across the chasm as it were. That is what being dauntless is.

Remember. Fear is defined as the emotional response to an actual or perceived threat of immediate or imminent danger or pain.  The capacity to experience fear is part of human nature that has been hard-wired into us. And it is debilitating to most people. It is a fact that a large number of people suffer the often debilitating impacts of fear and anxiety. They suffer a sense of being overwhelmed and helplessness leading to an inability to take action or make changes.

Interestingly I believe we tend to tie bravery and courage with being able to overcome that helplessness brought on by fear.

Well.

I don’t think that’s right.

In most cases it is more about having the ability to see <or conceptualize> what is somewhere across the chasm and using that as the focal point to step toward. That’s not courage … that is simply focusing on what is important.

Or, let’s say, an ability to focus.

Or, let’s say, an ability to envision possibilities.

Or, let’s say, being dauntless.

The ability to keep going with their plan of action, in spite of feeling scared, because they were generally resolute in their decisions, knew the risks attached to what they were doing and in many cases believed that their actions served a larger cause for a greater good <and they had a chance of achieving an outcome they could be happy with>.

People like that don’t lessen the fear … they simply accept it … and focus on the objective.

But.

Here is the true value of being dauntless: it enhances the chance to provide greater joy and expansiveness in other’s lives.

According to a psychologist quoted in a 2009 Psychology Today: “the inaction that stems from excessive, irrational fears or fear-based thinking often shows up as a decision to live life from a “safe” position and not take risks, even if that means forsaking opportunities that might provide greater joy and expansiveness to one’s life.”

As for being dauntless?

What’s important is the action. We take action all the while seeking our own version of the Dauntless Manifesto.

And maybe that is the important closing thought. “My version of dauntless.”

Being Dauntless is a personal choice, personal decision and personal attitude. Comparing dauntlessness is stupid and wrong.

You version is yours, mine is mine. How we do dauntless isn’t comparable; it should only be judged by your reflection in the mirror. That is the only judge that counts.

source: Zach Mercurio

———-

“Books are not made to be believed, but to be subjected to inquiry. When we consider a book, we mustn’t ask ourselves what it says but what it means.”

Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose

—–

“Treat all of your secondary characters like they think the book is about them.”

Jocelyn Hughes

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Purpose, to me, is an intrinsic energy and the moment someone, a business or a person, makes it an extrinsic objective/vision/”Why” I believe they have stepped on the slippery slope downwards to hollow, or hollowing, of behavior. What I mean by ‘hollow’ is as soon as Purpose becomes an extrinsic goal it encourages some aspect of ‘blindness’. It can be ethical blindness (which may seem weird to say assuming Purpose is good, but as Ann Tenbrunsel, Professor of Business Ethics says in this podcast, Overcoming our Ethical Blindspots , often the most altruistic organization can have the most ethically dubious behavior. It can simply be objective blindness (which all business deals with). It can just be an overall blindness toward a myriad of details under the guise of some laudable ‘purpose.’

That said.

In general, I wish all business people would put down the Purpose crack pipe and take a deep breath.

Purpose is an outcome, not an objective.

Purpose is certainly a higher order undertaking, but tying it specifically to business results is not only misguided but a dubious undertaking (Richard Shotton’s chapter in The Choice Factory is an excellent stripping of the Stengel Purpose argument).

Which leads me to books. Let’s say you are interested in business and Purpose and do not want to pay gobs of your hard earned money on some bullshit. Maybe start here. It’s Not What You Sell, It’s What You Stand For: Why Every Extraordinary Business Is Driven by Purpose by Roy M. Spence Jr. and Haley Rushing.

I have noted several times I don’t particularly like reading business books. And then you run across one like this one and it renews your faith in perusing the business book section seeking something to read. This book is chockfull of interesting anecdotes and sound bites. This book was written in 2009 and even by then the premise of ‘purpose driven’ had been talked about for years (don’t buy into the bs that it is some ‘new found soul of business’), but Roy Spence offers a really nice more pragmatic articulation. Much much better, more pragmatic, than Sinek’s “Why.”

Anyway. While I believe every business owner should read this (I believe it should be mandatory reading for every business class in universities) I hope that readers take to heart the individual message. The message that if you, as a person, can get a grip on the idea of individual purpose that you can truly live an extraordinary life. This is a good book. It communicates some great messages and gives you some excellent behind the scenes stories which are just plain fun to know about.

This next book may seem odd in talking about Purpose, but let me explain. The book is Technique for Producing Ideas by James Webb Young. This book (which was written in 1937 for advertising people) is relevant to anyone’s work. This little book is one of the simplest summaries of commonsense—and articulating common sense is this book’s greatest virtue. The book lays out a five-step process for generating novel and not-so-novel ideas, articulating them so that you can put to them to immediate use. It is a powerful guide for gathering information, stimulating imagination, and recombining old elements into meaningful new ideas. It is so simple you wonder why so many consultants make it so much more difficult. But the real point in bringing this up with regard to Purpose is ‘perspective.’ Purpose is all about having, and understanding, perspective and “we” not ‘me’. “How to Produce Ideas” may sound like its about ideas, but its not. its about social dynamics and understanding where you are in perspective to others and other things. I would argue, as does Zach Mercurio, you don’t ‘find your

source: Zach Mercurio

‘purpose’ it is simply there for you to see it.

 ** note: Zach’s book, The Invisible Leader, is actually one of the books specifically written about Purpose worth reading.

Anyway. “How to Produce Ideas” is about seeing and once you see than you, well, see how you can fit in and assist in the progress of things.

Beyond those books I would much prefer business people hunker down on Vision, Mission, Strategy & Tactics rather than Purpose.

Look. Let me try this as an explanation.

We often talk about IoT (internet of things). Internet of Things is about connectivity and platforms for making things happen and lifting all. Maybe we should be speaking of PoT – Purpose of Things. Look at Purpose as structural lift. If you just go about doing things to lift things, well, you have Purpose. You will have contributed. You will have meaning. This doesn’t have to be complicated or complex, simply try in each one of your 30,000 daily decisions to attempt to provide some ‘lift’. Lift the process, lift the system, lift the task, lift the moment and maybe even lift a person.

In the end.

I often find myself in an uncomfortable position. Uncomfortable in that I do not believe Purpose will ever be found by reading a book, but reading books will help you better understand Purpose. So maybe I end with where I began. Reading, with regard to Purpose, should be viewed as an intrinsic task, not an extrinsic – objective seeking – task. The more you read this way the more likely you will intrinsically embrace purposeful living. So don’t pick up book about Purpose, pick up books and read meaningful stories. I promise you that if you can find a meaningful story, somewhere within that story will be a person who purposefully did something that mattered – and it mattered.

I think we all know that not all errors are created equal. That said. Some errors are sneaky. Some errors are simply annoying in the moment, passed over as ‘it is what it is’ and, yet, they lurk gaining velocity as times passes only to rear its ugly head years later.

Yeah.

I know.

I have written about persistent setbacks and how not all setbacks are created equal. Compounding errors are different.

I have written a number of times to suggest Life offers you gobs of opportunities and almost every moment, while important, is simply replaced by more other significant moments. And I still stand by that. Yet. There is still such a thing as a compounding error. Well. I think there is but if you google compounding error you don’t get diddleysquat except in reference to pharmacies. If you dig a little deeper, the google machine will suggest compounding errors is “error propagation” and associated with the propagation of uncertainty.

——————

Error propagation (or propagation of uncertainty) is what happens to measurement errors when you use those uncertain measurements to calculate something else. … When you use uncertain measurements to calculate something else, they propagate (grow much more quickly than the sum of the individual errors).

————–

While all of this is interesting it isn’t what I am talking about. Compounding errors, to me, fall into the category of “additive and multiplicative damage”.
Some errors we make are transactional which simply incur an additive damage (if left alone). Transactional errors are fixable and tend to be isolated events which incur little future value damage.

Multiplicative errors are unfixable and their cost in terms of damage occurs in an exponential fashion.

** note: the rate of the multiplication has no universal norm and is indicative of the universe context in which it resides

Additive errors are painful, but don’t really create structural damage (unless, once again, you do not address and the splinter festers)

Multiplicative errors seem less painful in the moment, but create structural damage so the true cost is in its future value.

For example, here is a compounding multiplicative error:

When I was 27, I shifted jobs. At the time I cashed out a small IRA investment of maybe $3,500. Small decision in the scheme of a quickly rising career.

5+ years later, due to an error I made on my easy form income tax return, I was paying the government $12,500 (that’s the penalty for making an honest error). On the face of it this is a $9,000+ (taxes came out of that 3500 as they were reported as income). Painful, but, seemingly of little structural financial personal impact.

But this is a compounding multiplicative error.

That $3500 then, using the Dow Jones average, would have about a $370,000 value today.

If I had invested just half that $12,500 in stocks (I sold some stock to pay it) in 1994, using the Dow Jones average, that would be over $450,000.

Heck. $25,000 in stocks in 1996 would have a value of $1.4 million today.

This was a painful lesson from which the consequences of the error didn’t really matter until, well, it did.

That is a compound multiplicative error.

The type that lurks, not really mattering, until all of a sudden things shift and it steps forward.

Yes.

Many of these errors remain in the background. They are simply lost opportunities within a world usually offering a healthy diet of opportunities to you. But lurk they do. In fact, to use a Taleb term, they are a fragile aspect of your life that lurk within a larger complexity of your life. It is only when that complexity gets rearranged in a way that the fragility gets exposed that, well, the compounding error screws you.

Maybe another way to think about compounding errors is to make sure you think about Life as consisting of multiple strands – maybe like Life, career path, relationships, living responsibilities (what underpins, materially, your Life), financial, etc.

For example. You can move 4 times in the same city, all of which cost money, demand some shedding of items (call those lost investments) and demand some adding back on items (filling space or refilling what one gave up at some point). This can be as simple as owning a barbeque, giving it away when you move, and then buying another when you get somewhere else. Sounds little, but compounding.

But the larger point, within the multiple strand theory, is all the while your career could be progressing, you are gaining some valuable Life experiences within the moves and you add some valuable relationships.

All that said.

I would suggest compounding errors are kind of like boomerangs. You see them when they happen. They seem aggravating, some waste, but not major. Just a stick of wood you toss away in frustration. And you move on. It is only later on when you either reflect, or have the need, the boomerang comes back and smacks you with the consequences & repercussions.

Philosophically, I could suggest compounding errors are a reflection of lack of understanding the finite and the infinite and complexity. You can even understand that everything is connected with everything and, yet, still see the parts as isolated from the whole. But they are not. and the inverse is true. As Ackoff pointed out “you rarely improve an organization as a whole by improving the performance of one of its parts.” What this means, as a corollary, degradation of one part is likely to degrade the whole.

Anyway.

Life often appears to be a luxury of infiniteness even though parts of Life seem very very finite. As we face a seemingly endless array of to-do’s, tasks, work assignments, responsibilities and whatever else pops up in the everyday life of what happens – all compounded by the additional random unforeseen stuff that inevitably gets layered on top of what you expected and planned for – we all start making choices trapped in the wretched hollow in-between finite and infinite.

I will admit. While I was good at managing this in business, with businesses and doing business, I was not good at this with myself. My point on that, going back to multiple strands in life, is that someone can be very very good at some strands and very very bad at others. But because everything is connected with everything that formula is fraught with peril and compounding errors can seamlessly weave their way into the strands of life without anyone really noticing – until they demand being noticed.

And that is where what you learn from business relates to Life. By the time an error is noticeable, it is typically too late. I am not suggesting they cannot be resolved to stop their compounding, but compounding errors, by the time they become noticeable, have created irretrievable losses.

In the end.

As I have pointed out a number of times, Life does not come with a “how to” manual. For the most part we figure it out, by ourselves, as we go. Yeah. It is possible someone could suggest there are gobs of resources available to assist but the truth is many compounding errors are oversights, not ignorance, and many of the best resources cost money so while offering multiplicative future value have a present cost barrier.

So, ponder. Ponder because compounding errors are real and have very real consequences.

———–

“One of the worst feelings in the world is having to doubt something that you once thought was unquestionable.”

=

unknown teen blogger

—

We all need some stability in our lives. Anyone would be foolish to not agree. I tend to believe that is the root of all our pursuit, and embrace, of certainty. It’s not that we need 100% certainty in everything but we worry when there is too much certainty.

That said. Not all uncertainty is created equal. We accept some, no matter how uncomfortable, but the shifting of something from certain to uncertain is a jolt to the system. The consequence of that jolt is doubt. Yeah. Doubt resides squarely between certainty and uncertainty. So bear with me while I begin with the quote above where the teen blogger is talking about a person because I tend to believe all of us have faced some version of this in our own lives.

So, typical of our own teen years, someone who they were unequivocally certain was one thing (let’s suggest a BFF … gosh .. who would have ever thought I would type that in something I wrote) and then something happens, say that person does something that firmly places them on the uncertainty pedestal, and all of a sudden doubt, who has been standing in the background idly watching, steps forward front and center.

Oh.

And once doubt has stepped into this space it almost always takes on geometric proportions. That is what happens when you start questioning the unquestionable.

Now. While I used a teen to make a point, I tend to believe this is true with, well, everything but, in particular, in business.

Best practice is certain to work, until it doesn’t.

A process is certain to work, until it doesn’t.

A tried & true idea is certain to work, until it doesn’t.

Supply chains are certain to work, until they don’t.

You get it.

You get the point. There are certain things we count on, things we are certain of, and when they fail us it feels much much bigger than a transactional failure, more a failure of structure/foundation.

Now. I personally believe consistency is underrated or at least certainly overlooked. And I say that being a ‘change is my constant companion and friend’ kind of guy.

Which leads me back to the worst of uncertainties – uncertainty with people. This is the worst because no matter how independent we all want to feel, no matter how much we want to say “I control my own destiny”, no matter how much we feel we are accountable for all our choices, we, and our lives, are part of a grander weave of human connections and people doing the same thing I suggested. If you are uncertain of people, the weave doesn’t look like a maze, it looks like a trapeze walk. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out living life 100% like it is walking a trapeze line is not sustainable.

All of this leads me to consistency of character and consistency of values (or ethics).

Well. Let me take that back.

It is simply consistency which begets certainty. That certainty becomes a functional and emotional cornerstone to us. We seek this consistency in ourselves and we seek it among others. It is comforting, steadying and necessary to have a sustainable healthy life.

I say that because when something happens that makes you question what was once unquestionable it isn’t just one of the worst feelings. It’s like getting kicked in the gut. Not because you are disappointed in them or what happened. You are disappointed in yourself. And, as noted earlier, if you aren’t really really careful that disappointment (which lead to uncertainty of yourself) can take on geometric proportions. In other words, doubt steps in to replace certainty.

And that may be the worst feeling in the world.

How do I feel confident suggesting it is the worst feeling in the world? Well. Let’s compare it to what I would consider the best feeling in the world:

“Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind.
“Pooh!” he whispered.
“Yes, Piglet?”
“Nothing”, said Piglet, taking Pooh’s paw.
“I just wanted to be sure of you.”

Let me end where I began.

Not all uncertainty is created equal.

Uncertainty, where there was once certainty, carries a larger negative value than general uncertainty in a situation.

It’s almost like assessing the uncertainty value proposition. The higher the uncertainty value the higher the doubt and doubt is a real sonuvabitch.

Just ponder.

============

“A ship in harbor is safe, but that’s not what ships are for.”

John Shedd

============

“The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”

MLK

===

 The arc of history is irrelevant to most of us. Ok. Maybe better said is that we are relatively indifferent to the arc of history.

Most of us get up, drink our coffee and get going doing what we need to do that day. In doing so we cannot see any fucking arc, we just see what is in front of us. The arc can only vaguely be seen when we look at the news or talk with friends or maybe see some high falutin’ presentation on trends that supposedly impact our business in terms of sales and shit like that.

And we wonder why the world can seem so cold sometimes? Geez. That is our view for the most part. It is our daily grind (responsibilities) interspersed with some outside news filtering in for some perspective.

I would suggest any arc seems like it can almost be a straight line rather than any arc we can see. It can sometimes seem like a straight line of no change, or, a lot of bad shit with small drops of good shit mixed in.

But that’s not reality. The reality is that time and … well … our lives … do arc.

Just like when you are a ship in a harbor thinking about leaving the horizon looks flat and finite. And, yet, once you leave the harbor you realize that the horizon was simply a reflection of where you were and where you stood and that the reality was the world, the universe, arcs and bends to things you could not see from where you once stood.

Yeah. Sometimes that is hard to see.

Yeah. Sometimes we don’t have any time to think about it.

Yeah. But we should … at least on occasion. Because the arc occurs whether we see it or not. You have to be able to figure out how to get done whatever has to be done or the arc will show you what has to be done <or at least the context within which you will make your choices of what you will do>.

Look. I buy the fact that the arc of time bends toward justice. But I think it neglects to point out that people inevitably define the arc. It neglects to point out justice, or ‘good’, is not simply part of the ether, but resides in the hearts & minds of people. Well. What that means is the arc resides within us. All of us. Not just someone standing up in front of us trying to tell us what the arc is or should be.

I sometimes think we mistaken society, a country or a civilization is like a big tanker and we hire someone or elect some to jump onto the bridge of the ship and lead it out of the harbor. That is not so. You would be mistaken to think that. Each one of us is a little ship. We are a fleet of a variety of ships, boats and scows restlessly bobbing in the harbor from which we can actually leave or stay as we wish.

When we hire a leader, or elect someone, we – we little fleet of ships – are actually seeking a flagship. Someone who dares to leave the harbor and lead us over the arc of the horizon. Lead us beyond the current routes we take, lead us beyond the fishing grounds we have always used and lead us to new lands that maybe we had only heard of before.

But. We, we little fleet of ships, also control the voyages because within the hearts & minds of each of the captains resides justice and what is good & right and decide to follow, float or seek freedom.

Therefore we control the arc and bend of justice. No leader does.

I will suggest, consciously or subconsciousnessly, people tend to follow, or guide, based on justice therefore the arc will bend — sometimes too slowly — toward the goodness which resides in humankind. Just like a ship in harbor looking out from a harbor that goodness can sometimes be difficult to see when looking at the horizon but, I can guarantee this, if you leave the harbor it is easier to see.

=====

“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.”

Martin Luther King, Jr.

=====

We like to think of good as solid, 100% defensible and, maybe most importantly in today’s thought, 100% recognizable. We would be wrong to think that way. Good is often nuanced with some subtle distinctions in practice. Good intentions can be perfect, but doing good is more often than embraced by not 100% good people (imperfect people) and actions are not always 100% right (imperfect implementation).

Which leads me to Martin Luther King. He was an imperfect man with a perfect vision for civil rights and humanity. He fought for what is good, and right, nonperfectly but with perfect intentions.

First. While MLK is tied very tightly to the rights of African Americans, I believe he would like to also be noted for his leadership on civil rights – for all. In today’s terms, he held Black Lives Matter in one upraised hand and All Lives Matter in the other. It is a fact he stood tall against persecution of any person regardless of color of skin or ethnicity. Personally, I believe had he lived he was destined for UN ambassador or even UN Secretary General fighting for freedom of choice everywhere.

Second. MLK day is a day celebrated in the US and is a special day to African Americans. I too celebrate the day and the memory of everything MLK fought for and the fight still going on today. I believe no white person can ever truly understand the depth of the persecution African Americans faced and what MLK stands for. Maybe I am naïve, but I just don’t think it possible.

To that last point. There is a fantastic episode of Boston Public which took this issue head on (whether white people have the right to discuss the “N” word and slavery). And while every bone in my body strains to have the depth of understanding and I am (or at least believe and hope I am) openminded as any white person could be, I don’t think it’s possible to truly understand unless you are an African American.

Oh.

And I believe white people who claim to understand are naïve.

That does not mean I won’t try and better myself nor try every time I can to get closer to understanding every chance I get. That doesn’t mean that on MLK Day maybe everyone should at least attempt to.

Let us turn our thoughts today
To martin luther king

So. With all that said. I would like to leave this post with some of the words of “Shed a Little Light” a wonderful song written by James Taylor and a clip of Aimee Mann performing it pulled from a West Wing Episode.

Let us turn our thoughts today
To martin luther king
And recognize that there are ties between us
All men and women
Living on the earth
Ties of hope and love
Sister and brotherhood
That we are bound together
In our desire to see the world become
A place in which our children
Can grow free and strong
We are bound together
By the task that stands before us
And the road that lies ahead
We are bound and we are bound

“We are bound together, by the task that stands before us, and the road that lies ahead.” Imperfect people bound together trying to do what is good and right. In our imperfection, even our versions of ‘good’ imperfect, we will attempt to forge the perfect path forward. And in doing so, maybe we will achieve the vision of an imperfect man trying to do good.

“Why am I grown Old in seeking so barren a Reward as Fame?

The same Parts and Application, which have made me a Poet, might have rais’d me to any Honours of the Gown, which are often given to Men of as little Learning and less Honesty than myself.”

=

John Dryden

——-

“I feel like I’ve swallowed a cloudy sky.”

Haruki Murakami

Fame.

Fame is an appealing concept to almost everyone. Hear me out. Even if you are one of those people who say “I don’t want to be famous”, you actually do.  Yup. Maybe not ‘red carpet’ famous, but instead maybe if but for one minute ‘noticed by many’ famous.

At the crux of this mental battle we all have is: at what price would we pay for it … this ‘fame’? What price would we pay even for a sliver of fame?

Would you pay anything for “so barren a reward as fame” as John Dryden characterized it? What is the exchange you are willing to make?

Which leads me to selfies, instagram, pinterest, tumblr, Tiktok … pick one.

In technology’s world of the web we are not seeking our 15 minutes of fame, but our 15 seconds of fame with two paths lying ahead:

<a> hoping it will either turn into 15 days of fame as it gets reposted & discussed & editorialized, or

<b> hoping it turns into nothing … as it is embarrassing in reflection.

Therein lies the challenge of gaining fame … even a sliver.

Anyway. I have a theory about fame. Ok. I actually have two theories.

To be clear, these theories, theorems, postulates, whatever you would like to deem whatever glimpse of brilliance or absurdity within what I share, its my own with no research; just looking around at people and having listened & watched probably a million through my professional career.

First thought.

Genes. Chrissie Hynde <Pretenders lead singer> said this once:

“As far as success goes, I’ve never really got too excited about losing or winning. I don’t have whatever the gene is you need for that. Whatever the gene John McEnroe has, I don’t have that.

I don’t care.”

Some people don’t simply crave fame. It is part of their DNA. It is in their genes. I say this because far too many of us <myself included> mock the fame seekers as narcissistic or shallow or, well, pick your poison, but, the reality is that they simply have a gene we do not.

This doesn’t mean I have to find it likable. It simply means I need to recognize that not everyone is the same. And it also means we need to step back and recognize that fame can be used for good or for bad and that fame, while sought, is rarely controlled by the ‘soughter.’

Second thought.

My sense is that to most of us every day schmucks that the whole concept of fame is simply a means to an end, i.e., a vague concept that really has to do with esteem and self worth.

What?

Yeah.

I tend to believe most of us don’t really want the spotlight for life. We simply want to know that we are worth a shit.

That we are good at something.

Conversely, we fear be mediocre. Ok. Let me clarify. We fear being 100% mediocre and that fear affects how we view ourselves.

Looking at ourselves internally and looking at our selves externally seem to rarely match. We are either inflated with regard to ourselves or we have some deflated view of ourselves.

Neither is good.

“All I ever asked of life was that it should pass me by without my even noticing it.”

Fernando Pessoa

This is where that 15 seconds, or 15 minutes, of fame steps in. A spotlight shows us, even for a glimpse in time, some reality.

Something, well, good.

That we are actually good at something.

That people recognize it.

And that moment is it.

It’s enough.

Most of us don’t desire more than that. Just the validation is enough. We can step back into our lives content and continue the grind. Even if we continue the grind with a slightly livelier step knowing that somewhere someone valued us and our contribution.

And, yes, I am unequivocally discussing fame.

Not the smile of a child, the nuzzling from your dog, or even some very personal soulful evaluation and endorsement of your behavior which can provide valuable value affirmation, but differently than fame.

I am discussing fame as is in the harshest glimpse of society and life.

The unhesitating judgment of a cold and often brutal world. Unbiased personally you know when you walk away you weren’t cheated in judgment.

And in that judgment you were noticed and passed judgment.

“Everyone deserves a standing ovation at least once in their life because we all overcometh the world.”

R. J. Palacio

To be clear. The corrolary to what i just shared is your flaws, mistakes, misjudgements, also can get scritinized in the spotlight. Hence my opening where I offered an A path and a B path. Wander into the spotlight at your own risk.

That said. Fame, using Dryden’s language, it is most often not found in “the torrent of the people” or “the riot of a multitude.” Fame is most often found in a moment where the price is nothing more than facing our insecurities on whether we are good enough.

And, in that moment, the fame pendulum can swing far one way or the other.

We are not good enough.

And the world stands and stares.

We are good enough.

And the world stands and stares.

Simplistically, therein lies the price of fame.

The fact you will find out whether you are good enough. And maybe that’s why we all seek some version of fame at some point. Maybe we all really do want to know the truth; harsh or not. Maybe, just maybe, that is what fame, to the non-egotistical, is really about.

Because attaining a rich reward, or, so barren a reward, is a reward nonetheless.

==========

“We all have one foot in a fairytale, and the other in the abyss.”

—–

Paulo Coelho

==============

My anger at the world coils inside of me. It’s a directionless seething, there’s no name or face to aim at.”

————–

Claire Zorn

==============

Well. Life demands us to draw a lot of lines.

And more often than we would like to admit it demands we place one foot on one side of a line and the other foot on the other side of the line.

That may not sound … well … right.

Or maybe the best thing to do.

It may even sound like I am suggesting you ‘straddle the fence.’

Nope. This isn’t straddling, this is about being grounded or balancing oneself.

Balancing? If you don’t place one foot solidly on either side, you can be quite easily consumed by the extremes of Life which are, more often than not, found on only one side of a line.

If you don’t place one foot solidly on either side, you can be quite easily consumed by others who seek to consume what you may think you don’t really care that much about <but you should … and actually do when you care to think about it enough>.

If you don’t, you can be quite easily consumed.

I guess what I am saying is that Life demands you pragmatically be active in drawing some lines so that you have some sense of when you are getting too, well, “too”. It helps if you can have some sense of where to actually place your feet that is meaningful.

Maybe what I am saying is that many of us have no problem ‘making a stand’, but if you really aren’t sure where your line is then it is quite possible you aren’t really sure you are taking your stand in the right place.

Okay.

Maybe think of it this way.

It’s kind of like making sure you have things in perspective when you take a stand.

It’s kind of like demanding realistic hope.

It’s kind of like demanding some hopeful despair.

It’s kind of like demanding you believe in some fairytales and some abyss-like darkness.

It’s kind of like demanding lines for yourself so you can deal with the lines Life is going to demand of you.

Look.

I don’t really believe there are angry-only people. They just have so much anger within themselves that their line is drawn differently than others.

I don’t really believe there are dreamer-only people. They just have so much imagination within themselves that their line is drawn differently than others.

But here’s the deal.

You have to draw some lines.

There has to be some reality to ground some imagination.

There has to be some truth to ground some questioning.

There has to be some principles to ground some rebelliousness.

There has to be some fairytaleishness <I made up that word> to balance out some of the inevitable abyss.

You do have to have one foot somewhere other than where your other foot resides.

I know.

I know.

That sounds a little of whack from conventional wisdom because far more often you hear “both feet on the ground” and shit like that. But if you have two feet on the line … well … you have chosen to stand on a thin balance beam and will teeter your entire life. That is tiring & dangerous. But if you have two feet, one on each side, you have chosen a life of fairytales AND a life in the abyss.

All that said.

Yes.

There are times you draw a line and make a choice to shift both feet solidly onto one side. I would suggest this is a situational decision and not a “living Life” type decision. Situational like:

That is right and that is wrong.

That is good and that is bad.

That is normal and that is not normal.

Those are most likely the moments in which Life says “now, in this time and place, here is the line … on which side to you choose to stand?”

I would suggest sometimes we fuck this up by confusing a ‘Life one foot here & one foot there’ decision and a contextual situational decision. What I mean is that in that time and place you may try and keep your fairy tale foot in place and your abyss foot in place … and mistakenly take on a different type of decision demanding a different type of line.

That would be a bad decision.

The good decision?

In that time. in that place. In that moment. You shift your feet.

Sigh.

I never suggested lines were easy. Just that Life demands we draw a lot of lines. I would suggest that if you do not draw some lines you will find yourself lost in anger coiled within, or maybe constantly living a less than fairy tale life dreaming it all away, or stuck in some dark abyss seeing no way out.

Yeah … lines come in pretty handy at times. Pretty handy in managing Life. I can tell you <for sure> that lines can be pretty handy at helping you decide when something should end … and something should start.

==

“ … sometimes i have to wonder if i’m reading the same book as everyone else when they rant and rave about it and i’m practically falling asleep.”

Bookmad tumblr

—————

“It made me feel like a bad English major, and reader, and writer.

I’m a music lover, and my failure to adore Ulysses nagged at me in the same way that I feel like a fraud when I can’t muster up much reverence for The Beatles.

I had gained nothing except the checked box, a mild, fleeting sense of accomplishment, and relief.”

On Learning to Love Ulysses, Finally

——–

“Buying a book is not about obtaining a possession, but about securing a portal.”

Laura Miller

——–

“Then I let the stories live
inside my head, again and again
until the real world fades back
into cricket lullabies
and my own dreams.”

Jacqueline Woodson

———-

“And you can’t help but ask yourself,

‘Is it me?

Am I just not smart enough for this book?'”

——-

No one likes to feel stupid. Period. No real discussion here. I say that to provide some context for this peiece because today I am talking about books, books we have read (or tried to read) and how books can’t make us feel stupid but people can.

What started me down this path is 1984 by Orwell. With all the ‘big tech’ discussion and ‘censorship’ (whether it is actually censorship or not is another question for another day) and silencing voices 1984 has been tossed around as a metaphor for what is happening. Now. I feel fairly confident 80% of the people tossing that metaphor around have never read 1984 and I also feel relatively confident the majority of things being tossed around under the guise of 1984 are quite misguided.

** note: does anyone else see the irony in technology being defined by printed literature?

But 1984 does make me think about how books, and reading, is used by people to make statements about people.

So <part 1>. I am a book lover, a voracious reader and a lover of words.

So <part2>. Some books make me feel stupid.

Trying to resolve thise two things means I have thought about this a lot <far far too often I have stared at the titles of books I know I am supposed to adore, but do not> and I imagine I can summarize my stupid in one of two ways:

1. I just don’t get it.

I pick up a book … read it … and regardless of whether it is popular or not … I just don’t seem to grasp what the hell it is about. Inevitably I feel stupid because someone somewhere had to believe it would have some redeeming value, but I don’t get the book. And even though I know I am supposed to have found the reading of it valuable in some way, I see no value.

2. A lot of other people get it and I get it, but don’t like it.

It is popular, or famous, or is considered ‘great literature’ and I think it is something other than great. In fact. I think its shit. Ok. I just don’t get it’s popularity or fame.

Yeah. I understand the book and a portion of me may not feel completely stupid, but a portion of me does because I believe I must be missing something. Regardless, as I sat there thinking about all the books I was supposed to salivate over and instead was just feeling stupid I found something called “the Hawking Index.”

Basically this index is supposed to measure how far people get into a book before giving up. The index was flippantly proposed by Jordan Ellenberg, an American mathematician, in a blog for the Wall Street Journal. He named it after Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time < a book I have never read nor envision ever reading and apparently one of the least-finished books according to this measure>.

Just to be clear. It’s statistically flawed index model <print readers aren’t counted nor are Kindle-readers who don’t use the highlighting feature>, but I don’t really care about its accuracy because I was hoping it would not only make me feel less stupid but also it sounded interesting to think about.

Anyway. The standard is about 50%. This means about 50% of books picked up <with an intent to read and not used for some other purpose> are actually completely read. For example, Catching Fire, the second Hunger Games novel, scores 43.4%. By comparison, the average reader of Fifty Shades of Grey made it only 25.9% of the way through it.

The best news for me? I felt slightly less stupid because apparently many of the more prestigious pieces of literature have a really low Hawking Index.

But, really, feeling stupid about a book actually has nothing to do with whether you are ‘in the average’ with regard to how many people make it thru a book, it really has to do with whether you ‘get’ a book that somehow has attained ‘great literature’ status. If you don’t get it, you feel stupid.

And this thought led me to an awesome piece in The Guardian on books that make you feel stupid:

—

The blog post, “On the Perils of Feeling Dumb While Reading”, struck a shame-inducing chord with me this morning.

The author, Swapna Krishna, talks about how “you pick up a book you’ve been looking forward to, a ‘smart’ book that everyone and their mother has loved, settle down with it, start reading, and … You hate it. Or maybe you don’t hate it, but you certainly don’t love it like everyone else seems to.

And you can’t help but ask yourself, ‘Is it me? Am I just not smart enough for this book?'”

—

Which leads me to the unfortunate uneasy feeling that the whole ‘books that make me feel stupid’ was me in a nutshell. It is me because I know I have found myself talking to people and they talk enthusiastically about ‘their favorite book’ and it is quite often what could be referred to as ‘great literature’ and, well, my head begins to hurt. And I have to decide whether I want to tell them:

<a> I couldn’t get past the first 25 pages, or

<b> I didn’t get what made it ‘great’ … or

<c> I think I wasn’t smart enough for that book.

Yes. I have examples of my stupidness.

I can only really enjoy Dickens in chapters. I haven’t made it through a full book non-stop. Tolstoy’s War and Peace. I should have loved it <because I love the topic and Russian history>. This novel of the French invasion of Russia is considered one of the greatest literary works of all time weaving its way through the economic, emotional, and philosophical effects of societal shifts from one regime to another. I got frostbite weaving my way through an inetreminable winter of words.

I gave Doctor Zhivago several tries, and Anna Karenina also, but just couldn’t make it through another Russian winter. 

Sticking with great literature,  maybe the worst book I have ever picked up?

Jack Kerouac’s ‘On the Road’ is one of the most painful reads I have ever attempted.

More heresy?

Lots of Shakespeare. To be fair. Though he was a wonderful wordsmith and I love aspects of his sonnets and I could take bits & pieces. But any whole? Shoot me.

Joyce’s Ulysses? Yikes. Wanted to gouge an eye out. I tried reading “Atlas Shrugged” and wanted to gouge the other eye out. Proust? Wading thru quicksand. One grain at a time.

Modern authors? The guy who wrote The Shack. Or was it The Road? I just don’t get it. Harari’s Homo Deus? Garbage. Herman Wouk? I struggled to make my way through his two most famous novels, The Winds of War and War and Remembrance and, yet, Don’t Stop the Carnival was a delightful comedy about escaping middle-age crisis in the Caribbean.

Something else I’m somewhat ashamed of never having finished?

Faulkner. For gods sake all of it bored me.

Now. It helps me that I do like books that can be long like War of the Rats <maybe 500 pages> and I felt it could have been longer. I devour all of Michener books.

I loved 1984, On the Beach, Alas Babylon and even A Clockwork Orange <sticking with a theme here>.

It helps me that I do like books that can be short like The Old Man and the Sea <maybe 99 pages>.

I do know what I like. I like intellectual puzzles <Eco’s Foucalt’s Pendulum, any of Arturo Perez Ravarte early books and Le Carre> and stories that  inspire dreaming despite the cruel indifference of Life, the cruelty of humans and the challenges and everything else that can stand in the way of hope.

All that said it doesn’t change the fact I can feel incredibly stupid when it comes to books. While loving books in general, not liking a book someone else loves, particularly larger culturally loved books, does make me feel kind of stupid <which even as I type sounds stupid>. I feel like I am just not ‘getting’ something. And maybe I am just not smart enough … or at least as smart as the person who does get it.

Maybe worse?

I tend to feel more embarrassed about liking a book that is fashionable to trash.

Which leads me to people rather than books.

Reading is very personal and there is nothing wrong with acknowledging that it might not be the right time, place or chemistry for a positive experience to occur between you, the reader, and the book in your hands. A book is a book and no one should tell you whether you should like it or not or you should feel stupid because one person thought it was great and you did not.

In fact. A book may work for you at another time. I know I loved some great stories when I was younger, but I didn’t truly underatnd the metaphors until i reread therough the eyes of someone a bit more experienced and knowledgeable to gain some context.

All that said. I found that nearly 30% of men have not read a book since school, according to a survey commissioned for World Book Night. The reasons men don’t read are varied, but ‘not really wanting to’ is the main one.

To me? That means someone just has not met the right book.

I am not asking anyone to spending six weeks slogging through some interminable Shakespeare and test themselves with those ‘educational’ supplemental reading questions or even write some thoughtful critical analysis <as many people expect students do at school>.

All of that sounds mind-numbingly boring.

And reading should be anything but boring.

And reading shouldn’t make you feel stupid <but it will more often than you care to admit because people suggest you are>.

In the end.

I imagine I take solace in the fact I always do have another book to read … and an endless supply of books that I have put down in the past as unreadable that I will most likely attempt to read again at some point.

I imagine I take solace in the fact that my <admittedly subjective> experience of reading the final chapter of To Kill a Mockingbird is the closest version to heaven I have possibly attained so I know it is there somewhere else in some other book yet to be read.

I imagine I take solace in the fact that it really isn’t stupidity … it just personal.

Pick a book.

Any book.

You are entitled to be a Roman emperor, thumbing up or thumbing down a book, destining one for greatness or destroying one.

You are entitled to love some weird, scattered, slightly ludicrous metaphor driven novel and bring it to people expecting to be credited with the literary find of their life and hear they hated it <all of them>.

No literary work is greatness to everybody. But the sense that we could find something peerless, or literary greatness, is what tends to keep us death-marching through books that are wrong for us.

It is hope that keeps us trying and that occasional glimpse of literary brilliance and the ‘once in a lifetime read’ that makes us pick up the next book … and the old book we just didn’t ‘get’ the last time we picked it up.

Look. Someone <no idea who it was> once said that no two people ever read the exact same book.

Everyone brings their own history, personality, and feelings to the experience of reading a story, and because they are different, they react differently.

This is why Baskin Robbins stores sell 31 <actually more> flavors of ice cream. Nothing is universally loved; not even chocolate <or vanilla>.

Now. What I do find stupid is referencing a book I have never read to make a point <back to the 1984 reference>. Just because you are supposed to ahve a read book doesn’t mean you have to and because you haven’t does mean you should find another reference point if you want to make a point. In other words. It is okay to not have read something and it is okay to find another way to make your point.

All that said.

—————

friendlybookworm tumblr:

I formally refuse the idea that a book is just a book.

———————

A book is rarely ever “just a book.”

I still feel stupid when I don’t like some book someone else gushes over.

I still feel stupid when I don’t like some book of ‘literary fame.’

I still feel stupid when a book makes me feel stupid.

But at least I am comfortable in my stupidness and still keep reading.