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rePost:: Are Passions Serendipitously Discovered or Painstakingly Constructed?

Short Case Study #2: The Bored Programmer
Let’s tackle a non-academic example. Imagine a young man working in web development firm. His days are spent hacking CSS and doing some mild javascript programming. The pay is fine and the projects are interesting enough, but a feeling of dread is starting to tinge his daily commute.
“I’m not passionate about this,” our fictional programmer thinks. “Do I really want to spend the rest of my life doing the first random job I stumbled into, even if I don’t love it?”
The traditional view of passion recommends that this programmer immediately summon the courage to quit his job and find something that fits his passion. (Tim Ferriss tells the canonical story of this form: an overworked LA lawyer who dropped everything to open a surf shop in Brazil.)
The mastery-centric view, however, denies that such a priori passions exist. There’s probably no new job that would immediately grant him the feeling of passion he seeks. That can only come from mastery.
Assuming that the programmer doesn’t hate his job and the people he works with, he should instead consider generating a passion for his work by finding something he can master.
For example, over the next couple of years, he might put in serious time to become a Ruby on Rails expert — allowing his company to branch off into more complicated projects, and earning him more respect, pay, and flexibility in the process. Gaining this mastery could transform his view of his job as something he tolerates to something he loves. And it will accomplish this feat with more certainty than a sudden move to Brazil.
via Study Hacks » Blog Archive » Are Passions Serendipitously Discovered or Painstakingly Constructed?.

I recently quit my job for the same reasons. I’ve been asking these questions since. Interview after interview I am faced by the seeming lack of interesting programming jobs here. Mind you I didn’t even say Interesting and Well Paying programming jobs. This I admit is a little disheartening. What am I to do???? Hope I find out before the middle of march.

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Quote::pillar management | Gapingvoid

There’s no corre­la­tion bet­ween crea­ti­vity and equip­ment ownership. None. Zilch. Nada.
Actually, as the artist gets more into his thing, and as he gets more suc­cess­ful, his num­ber of tools tends to go down. He knows what works for him. Expen­ding men­tal energy on stuff was­tes time. He’s a man on a mis­sion. He’s got a dead­line. He’s got some rich client breathing down his neck. The last thing he wants is to spend 3 weeks lear­ning how to use a rou­ter drill if he doesn’t need to.
A fancy tool just gives the second-rater one more pillar to hide behind.
Which is why there are so many second-rate art direc­tors with state-of-the-art Maci­notsh com­pu­ters.
via pillar management | Gapingvoid.

This post was prompted by the fact that I’m getting frustrated with the specs of my pc. The post was a good read!

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QOTD::The Steve Martin Method: A Master Comedian's Advice for Becoming Famous

The Steve Martin Method
People often ask Martin about the secret to making it in the entertainment industry. His answer often disappoints. It does not involve any tricks (or, as we might call them: “hacks”). No insider path to getting an agent or special formatting to get your screenplay read. Instead, it’s all built on one simple idea:
“Be so good they can’t ignore you.”
via Study Hacks » Blog Archive » The Steve Martin Method: A Master Comedian’s Advice for Becoming Famous.

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Travel Hacking: Smart Ways to See the World | Get Rich Slowly

ravel full-time for less than $14,000 per year
While I was blowing $530 on a single day in Orlando last month, professional world-traveler Nora Dunn was contributing a guest post at I Will Teach You to Be Rich in which she describes her own quest to see the world. Dunn writes:
I “retired” from the rat race at the tender age of 30 to embrace my life-long dream of traveling the world, before life had a chance to get in the way…I am not rich. I am not a trust child, nor do I have rich parents, a sugar daddy, or a stream of income that allows me to live the high life on the road. Full time travel doesn’t have to be expensive, and after two years on the road, I’ve learned plenty of tricks to travel the world without breaking the bank, and without an end in sight.
via Travel Hacking: Smart Ways to See the World | Get Rich Slowly.

I’m seriously trying to think if this is possible for me. BTW the linked article was a treasure trove of advice.

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rePost:: Why You Should Quit Your Job and Travel around the World

It happens to me every time I travel overseas. I talk with people who hear about where I’m going, and they always say the same thing: “That sounds amazing! I wish I could do that.”
My reply is always the same: “What’s keeping you from it?”
I’m not being judgmental; I’m just trying to figure out what people’s motivations and priorities are. There really could be a good reason why someone doesn’t travel much, but the responses I hear back is usually variations of these answers:
via The Art of Non-Conformity » Why You Should Quit Your Job and Travel around the World.

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rePost::Norman Borlaug, Michael Jackson, and the Invisible Hand | Angry Bear

But there is another problem which seems to be less highly recognized, namely that the whole concept of the Invisible Hand itself is bull$#^&. As an example, I’m writing this a few minutes after reading about the death of Norman Borlaug. He was a Nobel Laureate who developed disease-resistant and fast growing crops. Depending on who you ask, his work saved the lives of somewhere between a quarter of a billion and a billion people. So far. If we don’t all die in some sort of cataclysm in the next fifteen minutes, that number will only grow.
Now consider another person recently deceased – Michael Jackson. I believe Jackson was finally buried some time last week. Aside from being known the world over, Jackson was very wealthy, despite his clear incompetence with money. He probably made at least one dollar for every life saved by Norman Borlaug, so far. Norman Borlaug, on the other hand, to the best of my knowledge, did not. Furthermore, this discrepancy in income is very, very, very hard to attribute to government interference.
Which means, there are two possible alternatives:
1. Michael Jackson did more positive things for the world than Norman Borlaug.
2. Michael Jackson did less positive things for the world than Norman Borlaug.
There is no third option. None. Now, I think very, very few people, even die-hard Michael Jackson fans, when presented with numbers like “a quarter of a billion lives saved so far” would agree with option 1. Which leaves option 2. And if option 2, then the Invisible Hand is bull$#^&. Which means capitalism doesn’t work or is immoral. That does not imply any other philosophical system would work better, mind you, but trusting the market to do its thing provides perverse results.
via Norman Borlaug, Michael Jackson, and the Invisible Hand | Angry Bear.

I’m cleaning house. I wanted to post this last year but forgot about it.

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rePost:: Beware of Life

Several weeks ago, three hikers also died on our nearby Mount Hood in a tragic accident.
After their deaths, there was the usual pontification about what they could have done differently. Despite the fact that they were all experienced climbers, and despite leaving for the hike when weather conditions were good, some people blamed their “risky behavior” and suggested various reforms that wouldn’t have made any difference in their case.
While I was away for my end-of-year vacation, I scanned through the comments on our newspaper’s website. “I don’t want to say they deserved to die,” one person said, before going on to explain why they deserved to die for pursuing their passion.
Fatal accidents are sad. I wish they wouldn’t happen, and I wish we could bring back the lost hikers. But I also don’t think they should have stayed home, and I don’t think they are that different from the 21,833 others who died earlier this year.
I propose that the greater risk is to play it safe all the time. Properly experienced, life is a very risky behavior.
via The Art of Non-Conformity » Beware of Life.

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rePost::Why I Love Scientists – Freakonomics Blog – NYTimes.com

2. When Amy Wagers surgically joined a young mouse and an old mouse so that their bloodstreams became shared, healing to muscle damage in the old mouse occurred much faster than it did in other old mice. Something in the young mouse’s blood helped repair the old mouse’s tissues. If that “something” can be isolated, who knows how many different uses it might have.
My prediction: the first humans to get their hands on that “something” will be professional bike racers.
via Why I Love Scientists – Freakonomics Blog – NYTimes.com.

I’ll gladly join an experiment for this if that someon you will be joined with was hot. hehehe.

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rePost:: 50 Things we know now that we didn't know this time last year

This is a nice list of factoids. Read it at the linked site!!!!

If there was an award for best quote of the year, our money would be on Richard Fisher, the director of NASA‘s Heliophysics Division.
Fisher was interviewed in October by National Public Radio after NASA scientists discovered a mysterious ribbon of hydrogen around our solar system.
The layer, a sort of protective barrier called the heliosphere, shields us from harmful cosmic radiation. Its existence defies all expectations about what the edge of the solar system might look like.
Fisher’s response: “We thought we knew everything about everything, and it turned out that there were unknown unknowns.”
In other words: We don’t know what we don’t know until we know that we don’t know it.
Life is funny that way. You think you’ve got the world wrapped up in string, only to watch some bit of news come along to unravel your comprehension of how things work.
One thing we did expect: that 2009 would be full of strange and wonderful revelations.
via AT&T – 50 Things we know now that we didn’t know this time last year.

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rePost:: Thanks for leading

Leadership is scarce because few people are willing to go through the discomfort required to lead.
The scarcity makes leadership valuable. If everyone tries to lead all the time, not much happens. It’s discomfort that creates the leverage that makes leadership worthwhile.
In other words, if everyone could do it, they would, and it wouldn’t be worth much.
It’s uncomfortable to stand up in front of strangers.
It’s uncomfortable to propose an idea that might fail.
It’s uncomfortable to challenge the status quo.
It’s uncomfortable to resist the urge to settle.
When you identify the discomfort, you’ve found the place where a leader is needed.
If you’re not uncomfortable in your work as a leader, it’s almost certain you’re not reaching your potential as a leader.
via Seth’s Blog: Thanks for leading.

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