Hobbies and Careers, Why I'm Not Going for "What I Love"

"You have to do something that you love," is a phrase I often hear uttered when the topic of education and future careers paths comes up. While I think there is quite a bit of wisdom behind choosing to pursue a degree and job that will be able appreciate even after dedicating a very large portion of your time and energy to it day after day, I am not convinced that trying turn your favorite pastime into a career is the wisest choice or that "do what you love" is the best bit of advice to give someone.

Why? Why wouldn't you choose to take the thing you love doing best and turn that into your job? I mean, who wouldn't choose to get paid for doing what they already want to be doing?

Maybe this is a trait unique to me, but I personally find that my interest in and motivation to pursue things drops dramatically when they become something I am supposed to do. It isn't true that I suddenly dislike that which I previously enjoyed simply because it becomes a required task, but often times I feel like a good portion of the joy and interest I have in things drops when a deadline and consequences are attached along with commanding instruction.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a very duty driven person and I think structured responsibilities, assigned tasks, and jobs to fulfill are important. I don't mind them, and I actually believe I perform much better when I am given something to do and a goal to strive for. As long as I can understand the purpose and concept behind the rules I'm given to work with, it is entirely possible for me to function happily and contentedly under a set of restrictions. When left to my own devices for an extended period of time, I tend toward being frustratingly idle and unproductive.

So, it isn't true that some driving sense of rebellion quivers at the thought of having my hobbies regulated and transformed into a form of day to day labor. Instead, I am just keenly aware of the fact that what I am required or supposed to ends up getting exhausting and tedious after a few months of repetition. Even when I enjoy what I'm doing, if I'm expected to not only do it every day but do it to the same level of perfection on each go around, my enthusiasm begins to wane. I'll still do it, and I like to believe that I still do it willingly, but it loses its appeal somewhere around the ten millionth go around.

I am very thankful, for example, that college classes switch every semester. By the time week 12 or 13 rolls around, I'm ready for even my favorite and most engaging classes to be done. My professor may be great, my classmates may be great, the material may be incredibly interesting, but there is something about the idea that I've been working on one class for three plus months that gets rather depressing towards the end. My spurts of enthusiastic productivity become fewer and farther between the closer the finish line gets, and the more I check off my list, the less appealing those last four or five assignments become.

I'll admit, it is 100% a psychological issue, and lacking motivation won't prevent me from crossing the finish or from doing whatever I can to secure A's in my classes. Wavering motivation has not yet shown any sings of crippling my grades or leaving my responsibilities dangerously wanting. Only at my weakest moments do I ever forsake a task entirely, and usually I feel guilty afterwords to the point where I try to go back and amend my laziness as much as possible. My point is merely that the joy and enthusiasm diminishes and deteriorates the longer I am set along a single track, and if that track becomes a long term assignment I am not given the option to simply take a breather and break from the monotony for a while.


This semester I've been told by multiple people that I should be a Theater major, and I've been told by a number of other people that I should pursue philosophy or something based on writing, but as much as I enjoy acting, the theatrical arts, philosophy, logic, and writing, I could never convince myself to make those, or any number of other degrees/career paths, my own. Why? Because they are means of relief for me. They're escapes from the assigned tasks and delegated responsibilities. They're among my sources of entertainment and solace when I need something different. If I were to choose pursuing acting as a degree and ultimately a job, I am pretty convinced that I would end up hating myself and regret my decision immensely on top of being financially unstable simply because the role of acting would lose so much of its appeal as soon as it became something that I had to do and had to do as often as possible or face negative repercussions. 

My philosophy homework is usually the last set of assignments I do in my week even though the subject matter ranks among my favorite. Weird as it may seem, I put off doing the homework despite the fact that I am almost guaranteed to enjoy it once I start because the two or three it will take to read the necessary material and answer the assigned questions loom over me as a burden I must shoulder instead of the enjoyable exercise of mental capacity it really should be. A mental block is created that turns answering queries about Plato, Descarte, and the existence of a God away from what would have been an enjoyable pastime into an arduous slog that I must complete if I want to master my course.

At one point in time, I toyed with the idea of pursuing something in the culinary arts, but after looking into the nitty gritty of the field and after speaking with friends of my family that also happen to be professional chefs, I realized that the pleasure I take in cook and baking comes primarily from the freedom I have to experiment, to take my time in the kitchen, to try out random new things based on what just happens to be in the pantry, and on the fact that (if I really want to) I could opt for a bowl of cereal if I really want. The idea of having to crank out dish after dish in a heated (literally and figuratively) environment regardless of whether or not I really feel like cooking seemed less and less appealing to me the more I thought I about it, and thus dreams of being a chef or baker were cast from my mind in light of the fact that something I currently enjoy would likely become something I would dread doing before I even made it out of my college education.

The same goes, I think, for most of the things I enjoy doing in my spare time. A lot of the things I love to do could potentially be turned into a career path if I was willing and interested in dedicated a great deal of time and energy into making it so, but that directly conflicts with the whole idea that my hobbies are an escape. They're what allow me to do what I need to without losing my mind.

That's kind of how I ended up as an Accounting major.

Sometimes I question whether or not I'm really going into a field that I should be. When I hear my music major friends animatedly discuss various composers and musicians, when I hear my cast members for A Midsummer Night's Dream talk about how much they love doing what they do, or really any time anyone I know starts talking about how passionate they are for their degree I can't help but feel like my interest in Accounting is kind of underwhelming.

I'm not getting my degree because the idea of being an Accountant gets me all excited. Crunching numbers doesn't give me a warm fuzzy feeling inside oddly enough. While I do find a lot of the stuff I've learned thus far about my future field quite fascinating, and while putting together financial statements and the like can feel like a mentally invigorating puzzle, I highly doubt you'll find a lot of people dreaming of jobs as Accountants in their youth.

I'm not in it for the money either though. Depending on the route you take, I understand that Accountants can make some pretty good money and while I have no intentions of saying no to decent sized paychecks, I could probably pursue more lucrative tracks if that was really my driving motivation.

Instead, I chose Accounting because it interested me, was something fit my skill set, and most important, was something I could see myself doing day in and day out without hating it or totally losing any interest. Like I said before, I don't dislike having things I'm supposed to necessarily, and I feel like what I've learned about Accounting indicates that the job offers to meet me needs for order, structure, and logically methodical tasks while its requirements matched the abilities I have to offer. (Numerous personality quizzes say so :P)  As an Accountant I should be able to pay the bills and have some job security such that I will be free to pursue my interests, hobbies, and the things I love at my leisure.

I'll find a way to be happy and content with whatever path I'm given to take, but the more I think the about it the more confident I am that I'm on the right track, because when I come home from a long day of work I don't want my hobbies and passion to be the source of my exhaustion and stress. Instead, I want my job to be something worthwhile and reliable without being all consuming.

I believe my job should give me the ability to do what I love, but I don't what I love to become my job.

Pax

A Bit of What I Do

So, I had what I felt like was an interesting philosophy assignment this week. It is kind of long so you may or may not feel like reading the whole thing, but since I found it interesting to do I thought others might find it interesting to look at the assignment and how I responded to it. Also, if anyone is brave enough to work through the whole thing, I would be interested in hearing their thoughts and opinions.

As a disclaimer, I did end up working on this several hours after I usually call it quits on homework for night. My brain starts to rapidly lose functionality after nine or ten o'clock where my studies are concerned, but hopefully I come across as at least kind of intelligent.

Then, as another side note, I can't seem to change the formatting here... I've tried putting spaces between my paragraphs and the updating the post, but it resets itself back to the way it is now... so I apologize if it seems crowded or hard to read. I did my best to fix it, and my best wasn't good enough.
 

Anyway, enjoy!

Here is the set up given in my assignment...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

General Introduction (read this first)

It’s the year 2025.  The Earth is under attack by an alien race known as the Vogons, who wish to destroy Earth to make way for an Interstellar Super Highway. You have been chosen as part of a contingent that will carry on the human race by traveling to another solar system which contains an earth-like planet called Krypton, a planet that by all indications is capable of sustaining human life.  You will have to make three major decisions along the way. 
At each decision point you will be presented with two choices, and each time you should choose the option that gives YOU, individually, the best chance of survival.   By this I mean that you should choose the option in which you are least likely to die (You’re not worried about survival here in the sense of life after death.  You want to make decisions that will keep you alive). Also, you should not take quality of life into consideration here—just make the choice that is most likely to keep you alive, no matter how poor your quality of life may be.  You will then describe why you made that choice.  Each of these decisions confronts you with a major question about personal identity and what it means for you as a person to survive.  So, think carefully about each of your decisions. 

Scenario #1:   Spaceship or Teletransporter?

The first decision concerns how you will travel to Krypton.  There are two possible methods of transport.  First, scientists have constructed an incredible spaceship similar to the Space Shuttle (but much bigger) that will carry up to 100 people comfortably to Krypton, with plenty of oxygen, water, food, opportunity for exercise, entertainment, etc. (think of the Axiom, the spaceship in the movie Wall-E).  The trip will take approximately three years.  Due to the great length of the trip, there are many dangers.  Lots of things could go wrong (oxygen tanks could rupture, you could be hit by interstellar debris, some illness could befall you for which you have no cure, etc.).  The best scientific minds on Earth estimate that you would have about a 70% chance of surviving the trip to Krypton via spaceship.  

The second option is a recent technological development called teletransportation.  Here’s how it works (pay attention to how it works—it may be different than what you’ve heard before about teletransportation, say, from Star Trek).  The teletransporter performs a complete scan of your body, atom for atom, molecule for molecule, to capture all the physical information about you.  This scan actually destroys all the molecules of your body while simultaneously shooting a beam of energy carrying all the information about the physical structure of your body to the planet Krypton.  The beam of energy arrives on Krypton, where the energy causes existing molecules on Krypton to be arranged exactly like your body on earth (it’s like being “raised from the dust of Krypton”).  The whole process (from the beginning of the scan to the assembling of molecules on Krypton) is virtually instantaneous (let’s just ignore limitations imposed by the speed of light, etc.  It’s my example after all!).

Teletransportation has been tried on human beings on earth thousands of times.  After some initial problems (disintegrations, people emerging with arms on the top of their heads, etc.), the process is now virtually perfect.  For the last ten years covering thousands of cases, in every case the person emerging from the transportation process is an exact physical match to the person entering the transporter. Furthermore, the person that emerges from transportation appears to be an exact psychological match.  This means she has all the same memories, beliefs, hopes, personality, etc. as the person who entered the teletransporter.  The person emerging describes the experience as such. “I have a memory of stepping into the transporter, I saw a bright flash of light before me and then the next thing I knew I was in a completely new place.”  Also, friends and loved ones of the post-transport individual always report nothing out of the ordinary about the subject upon completion of the process – the person recognizes her friends and family and has completely normal conversations with them.  Friends of the patient who did not know she had undergone transportation are unable to tell that it has ever taken place.   The post-transport person reports having all the same beliefs, desires, hopes, and dreams as before transportation.  All the top minds working on transportation believe that transportation to Krypton will be just as successful as transportation on earth (there is absolutely no reason to think it would not be). 

What will you do? The Ship or the Teletransporter?  Why?

Scenario #2:   Vaccine or Silicon Replacement

So let’s assume you’ve made it to Krypton.  At first it’s not so bad.  The planet is very much like earth, though without pollution, deforestation, reality TV, and other ugly things mankind has done to earth.  In a way you feel as if you are in a new “Garden of Eden.”  But after a few weeks you discover that life on Krypton is not a bed of roses! Many of your party start exhibiting a marked decrease in powers. Eventually this malaise affects all of you.  Your speed, your strength, and even your mental powers of memory, reasoning, etc. are being sapped.  Your group begins to refer to this as the “reverse Superman” effect.  Some of you are starting to be rather forgetful – forgetting other people’s names, even forgetting some basic things about your past.  The scientists among you determine that Krypton’s sun has an extremely detrimental effect on all carbon-based life forms – it causes all carbon molecules to slowly decay.  Left untreated, this condition, over a period of just a couple of years, will lead to the complete wasting away of your bodies, your minds, and eventually death.  Your science team has not lost all hope forever—they surmise there are two things that might be done to reverse this condition. 

First, they have developed a vaccine that might reverse the effects of Krypton’s sun.  If it works, it will immediately stop the decay process and you will gradually be restored to complete health.  However, they are not overly optimistic about the vaccine’s working on each person. Whether the vaccine will work in you depends upon myriad aspects of your genetic make-up; however, the scientists do not have the ability to test your genetic makeup and predict whether the drug will work.  The general thinking is that the vaccine will work in around 50% of those who take it. 

Your other option is much more radical, and this is to undergo silicon replacement of all your body parts.  Silicon (not silicone—that is something completely different!)  is an element similar to carbon that behaves very much like carbon, and could easily serve as a basis for biological life. Over a period of one month, you will undergo a series of four surgeries in which different parts of your carbon-based brain will be replaced by a silicon part.  Then, after your last surgery, your entire brain will be transplanted into an artificial silicon body, which will be constructed to look very much like you and will be functionally equivalent to a human body (i.e., capable of pretty much everything a human body is capable of).  As with transportation, this silicon replacement process has been tried on humans before.  Each time, upon waking from each of the four brain surgeries, the subject reports having all the same beliefs and memories she had before surgery, and interacts the same with family and friends.  And the same is true of the subject whose brain is transplanted into a silicon body.  

You can only choose one of the options.  Taking the vaccine and waiting to see whether it will work eliminates the possibility of doing the silicon replacements (you’ll die too soon). 

What will you do? Why?

Scenario #3:   Your mind wiped clean?

So let’s suppose you’ve made it to Krypton and survived the “Reverse Superman Effect”.  Things are fine and dandy until you discover that, despite what you previously believed, there are other people on Krypton.  And human beings at that—who speak English (albeit with some kind of accent to indicate they are the bad guys)!  One day you find your camp suddenly surrounded on all sides by thousands of these Kryptonians. It turns out they are not hostile and wish you no harm; they just want to “assimilate you” to their society.  What this means is the following—you will be given a drug that puts you to sleep, wipes your mind clean, and “installs” new memories, beliefs, desires, and the like.  After taking the drug, your body will be perfectly healthy and unaffected, but the person that wakes up will have no memory of earth or of any of the hopes, beliefs, desires, likes, dislikes, etc., she had before the drug was taken.  Rather, the person who awakes will believe she is a Kryptonian, born and raised on Krypton, and have myriad “memories” of her life on Krypton, along with a very different personality, hopes, and desires.  

But the Kryptonians are a rather fair-minded lot.  They don’t want to force anyone to take the drug.  They inform you that you can, if you wish, choose to be banished to the Kryptonian desert.  If you make this choice, your mental life will be left entirely intact, but you’ll be forced to traverse the desert.  The Krypotonians tell you that on the other side of the desert, which extends for hundreds of miles, is a virtual paradise where you will be able to live happily.  However, the Kryptonians tell you that you have at best a 10% chance of making it across the desert without dying. 

What will you do?  The drug or the desert?  Why?

Final Summary Section

You have made three decisions about personal identity.  I want you to evaluate your own decisions.  Did any of your decisions change as you moved along?  In other words, did thinking about a later decision make you change a former decision?  Why was this? 

Do you believe all of your decisions are consistent?  In other words, have you used consistent criteria in making your decisions?  Can you identify what criteria you have used? 

Finally, can you give a one or two sentence summary of what YOU actually are?  What is absolutely essential to you?  Is it your body, your mind, both, something else?  Do your decisions make it clear to you?

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

And here is my response... 

Part I: How to Reach Krypton

            Based on the description of the Teletransporter (Henceforth called the TT), the likelihood of it doing what it is supposed to is almost 100%. Which means the probability of success for the TT is 30% greater than it is for the Axiom equivalent. As a result, if the TT performs the goal of keeping me alive properly, then it is the logical choice as my means of transportation. The question then, of course, is whether or not I will survive using the TT. Since we are assuming the TT has an almost 100% chance of success the question of survival then comes down to whether or not it is actually me that would end up on Krypton or if I would cease to exist. Since the TT apparently sends the information about my physical form to Krypton, but not necessarily the actual atoms that make up my body, the physical form that would end up on Krypton with my likeness and conscience would be made up of entirely different material substance than that which currently makes up my body. 

            However, by all accounts, it seems like the mind or conscience operating the new physical form (identical to the one I currently have but made up of entirely different stuff) would be also identical to my own. So then the question becomes one of whether or not it is my physical form that is the primary foundation of my “self” or my mind, memories, and conscience. Honestly, it is more or less the Rodd, Maud, and Todd or Sili-Me question from the very beginning of class. What causes me to be myself, and what has to be changed to make me no longer exist? 

            If I were to lose a limb, or two, or three, or even four, I would still be considered the same person I am now… more or less. True, my appearance and capacity to accomplish certain tasks would be diminished, but my family and my friends would still consider me to be me. Similarly, my doctors would still expect payment from me as if I were the same person they removed tainted limbs from, and the law would still consider me to by myself such that I wouldn’t have to re-register to vote or re-sign up for the draft (ignoring the fact that I would be incapable of serving in the military).  If somehow I managed to survive losing almost my entire body while maintain my intelligence, sense of self, ability to communicate with others, I would still be considered to be me. True, we are faced with the fact that using the TT would completely destroy my entire prior physical form and if my entire physical form were destroyed by some other means without my conscience being transported to another body, we would consider me to be dead and gone, but my point is that a very substantial portion of my physical form could be lost or altered without most people considering my “self” to be gone. 

            Additionally, I can’t think of another possible measureable foundation for my “self” than my body or my mind. As a result, I feel that I must conclude that my “self” is based not on my body but on my conscience, my mind, and my memories. If not completely, at least to a greater extent than it is based on my body. Because of this, my primary goal in attempting to survive (assuming that survival is maintaining my “self”) should be not to maintain my body but my mind. If I use the TT there is a 100% chance that my body as it is will be destroyed and only a 30% chance of the same happening if I take the Axiom equivalent. However, my mind seems to have a near 100% chance of survival if I use the TT and only a 70% chance if I take the Axiom. Consequently, I feel that I should use the TT over the transport. 

Part II: The Reverse Superman Effect  

            For this portion we are faced with the fact that our mind, conscience, and memories, which we identified in the last portion as being the most likely foundation for the “self” we are trying to keep alive, is actively deteriorating. In order to combat this we have two potential options with some similarities to the options we had for getting to Krypton in the first place. One option has a chance of keeping us alive more or less the same as we are now while the other also has a chance of keeping us alive but at the cost of our entire body being destroyed and recreated. The two most notable differences are that the percentage chance of success for the less extreme option has dropped from 70% to 50%, and the method of destroying and rebuilding my body is actually more extreme than before because it will result in my body actually being made up of a different kind of substance. In the previous example, or reformed body was explained to be identical to our current one in that all of the building blocks and materials forming it were of exactly the same type as original. In this example, the Silicon treatment would change the makeup of my body into something very different in some ways from its current state.

            Just as with the first problem, if the surgery has the inexplicitly assumed success rate of 100% that the problem indicates it does and manages to keep my “self” alive, it is the obvious choice because it would have 100% chance of success as opposed to the 50% chance of success that the other method has. The drop in probability of success for the less radical treatment actually doesn’t change the outcome of the problem at all, because I am still faced with a 0% percent chance of survival for one option and a more than 0% chance of survival for the other if what matters in keeping my “self” alive is keeping my body alive, and a 100% chance of success for one option and a less than 100% chance of success for the other if it is my mind that matters. 

            Against, just as before, the answer seems obvious if we can distinguish between whether my mind or body is the primary thing we want to keep alive. Even though the silicon surgery will more dramatically change my body than when I used the TT, if my body is not what my “self” is based on, that fact shouldn’t be a determinant in my decision making. Going back to the loss of body parts example I gave previously, if I had the majority of my body replaced with artificial limbs, but continued to be the same person mentally and emotionally somehow, friends, family, legal entities, and my medical personal would all consider me to be the same person. As a result, I am led once again to conclude that transforming my body into a different kind of substance would not actually destroy my “self” and for the same reasons that I chose to use the TT as opposed to taking the transport, I would chose the surgery over the antidote. 

Part III: The Kryptonian Ultimatum 

            In Part III we are faced with a scenario very different from the previous two in some notable ways. First, the option with a 100% chance of success is not one that destroys our body but maintains our mind, but rather one that maintains our body and destroys our mind complete. Likewise, the option with a specified non-100% chance of successes is our only option for keeping our conscience completely intact (assuming we do not go mad in the dessert). 

            I would like to propose once again that the difference in percentages does not actually have a notable impact on my decision making. The question will still come down to what part of our “self” is it that we are most ardently trying to keep alive, and if we can answer that question our answer will be obvious. Why? Because once again, we will either be faced with one option that either gives a 100% chance of survival or a 0% chance of survival. 

            Interestingly enough, my body isn’t necessarily specifically at risk in this situation. True, my body will be dead if I die in the dessert, but so will my mind and everything else about me as well. 

            So, in essence, I still only have to return to my original reasoning that led me to believe that my mind, memories, and conscience are what I want to maintain above else, to determine that I should go through the dessert. True, this time I don’t actually have a 100% chance of success if I go with the option that maintains my mind as I did before, but the 10% chance I do have is significantly better than the 0% chance of keeping my mind if I were to take the drug being offered. 

            There is something worth considering though, that isn’t specifically addressed within the question. While the set up for the question seems to give the impression that there is no way that I could ever regain the memories, mind, and conscience that I had before taking the drug, if there was in fact a chance somehow of returning to the same mental, and emotional state prior to taking the drug, I would have to reconsider my decision based on how likely that return would be and if at that time I would have a greater chance of getting across the dessert. Since there doesn’t seem to be a chance of regaining my memories ever however, I would have to go with the attempting to cross the dessert. 

            Also, it may be worthwhile to note that my above average intellect, physical prowess, and all around superiority to others would likely give me more than a 10% chance of success in crossing the dessert. 

Part IV: Summery of Thoughts

            I feel fairly confident that I remained consistent and reasonable in my rationale throughout the exercise even if my reasons and perception of things was faulty. Starting with the first scenario I established what I felt were the key criteria and applied them to all three situations despite changes in what was going on. 

            The main problem with the reasoning I applied, as I see it, is that I don’t actually think my “self” is based solely on my mind. Rather, I do believe that humans have a soul that is separate from their memories and consciences and that would continue to exist even in light of memory loss, total physical destruction, or a coma. The problem with trying to apply that belief to this argument is that I cannot identify a way of testing whether or not the soul would remain after any of the potential processes. I cannot evaluate or confidently stipulate about the location of the soul after a TT has been used, or after a silicon surgery has been performed, because I cannot confidently identify what the exact characteristics of the soul are and how it reveals itself. One, because I don’t think I’ve seen what a living person absent a soul looks like, and two because the processes presented in our scenarios aren’t not real and we have no way of extensively examining a product of such a situation. 

            As a result, I was going off of the assumption that our souls have something to do with our personalities, the way we think and reason, and what kind of a person we are. If that is true, than the soul is actually linked to the mind even if they are separate things, and because I do believe that is the case, I went with the options that I felt were most likely to keep the mind intact in hopes that the soul would follow the mind over the body. 

            It was a little bit more difficult to come up with a solution around the soul in the last scenario, because I believe that a person retains their soul even when they enter into a comma or suffer amnesia and the effects of the drug seem somewhat comparable to something like that. However, since, as I already stated, I have no way of evaluating whether or not the soul is present on its own, and since I chose to use the presence of the mind, memories, and conscience as my standard for the other two options, I felt it was necessary to use the same standard for the last scenario. While I didn’t feel satisfied in my reasoning, I couldn’t come up with a better method, and so used the option that seemed the best given what I felt I had to work with.

 

A Life Hack Post

I don't know about you, but I've seen a lot of lists shared across Facebook and the rest of the internet sharing various "Life Hacks" or "Things Everyone Needs to Stop/Start Doing" or "Ways to Be Happy." While some of these posts actually have some pretty worthwhile and notable things to say, I would say that I find the majority of them to be pretty discouraging and disappointing. Some of them actually seem have a pretty rebellious or hostile tone to them as if their goal is not to help people learn how to be content but instead help them to create excuses and establish an emotional ventilation system designed to justify personal flaws.

Perhaps I am being too harsh, and maybe I'm just reading a more negative tone into them than is meant by the post's authors, but in any case, thinking about these lists and a few recent posts I've seen on Facebook over the last few days have given me incentive to fashion my own list of "Life Hacks." Within the depths of this post you will find a list of things that I think most people would benefit from doing/thinking more, and I include my self in that. I do not maintain the same kinds of standards I am about to put forward by any means, but they are the kinds of standards and goals that I strive toward and my best days are the ones where I stick to my guns and the kinds of ideals you'll find below.

Now, the single most significant, beneficial, and life changing life hack that I can recommend to anyone would be that they become involved in a conservative church (preferably a confessional Lutheran one), and I honestly believe that a great deal of the frustrations, complications, and troubling questions we face in life can be eased and even eliminated by belonging to the confessional Faith. However, I have a feeling that those of you in my audience who might agree with me on that already know and believe that particular observation, and those of you who would be more inclined to disagree with me on that point are not likely to be swayed through the ramblings of my blog so instead I will focus on a compilation of other observations about life that I have accumulated over the years.

Enjoy.

1) Be an Optimistic Realist 

 Optimism is a great thing, especially when the alternative is pessimism. Life seems significantly more enjoyable if you can look at the bright side of things and believe there is a hope for humanity. At the same time however, we all know that there are a lot of things about our world (and humanity) that are, quite frankly, pretty terrible. People do stupid things. We do stupid things. Time runs out, resources run out, patience runs out.... lots of stuff runs out. So, my solution for dealing with unfortunate complications and obstacles in life is to approach them with a sense of optimistic realism. Have ideals, believe that their is something good worth striving for, trust that there is hope for successes, but temper your enthusiasm with a realistic understanding of what kind of constraints you must operate within. Know your limitations, and know that there is also a chance for failure.

Another way of putting it would be this: Have ideals and strive for them, but keep your head out of the clouds and your feet on the ground.

2) Anticipate Pleasure Not Pain 

Life becomes really unpleasant if you assume the worst of people and going around expecting bad things to happen. If you operate under the assumption that others are going think poorly of you, will judge you for your actions/appearance/personality, or simply do stupid thinks, you're going to live in a perpetually miserable state of existence. Yeah, I know there are going to be plenty of people who unjustly judge you for doing things you are perfectly entitled to do, and I know that isn't fair, but until it happens you really don't need to worry about. Honestly, you don't really need to worry about it when it does happen. Formulating comebacks in your head, and memorizing retorts to throw back at people who make nasty comments is actually pretty nasty in and of itself.

At the same time, if you spend your time expecting something bad to happen, you are going to a lot less inclined to actually enjoy the good things that are happening around you at the same time. If something bad happens it happens, but until it does you should be taking the opportunity to enjoy what you have while you have it. Give others the benefit of the doubt, and take time to smell the roses and I think you'll find yourself being much more content with your lot in life.

"Anticipating pain was like enduring it twice. Why not anticipate pleasure instead?"
- Robbin Hobb

3) Ask More of Yourself than You Ask of Others

There are people who demand too much of themselves, I will acknowledge that. There are also people who spend a lot of their time sacrificing their own well being without asking those around them to contribute their own fair share, and I will also acknowledge that. However, I think we are often too quick to place a much greater value on our own actions and sacrifices than is really reasonable, and undervalue what other people are doing at the same time.

A good leader doesn't ask his followers to do something he isn't willing to do himself, and a good person shouldn't expect others to make up for the slack they're letting loose.

"Once you're perfect you can start criticizing everyone else," my dear not-so-old matriarch always says, and she expresses a very worthwhile and valid mentality. Don't establish standards and expectations for other people until you've actually met, nay surpassed, those standards yourself. It isn't fair, and it isn't going to make you happy, to wait on other people to make things better for you. Push yourself to be the best you can be (and that would be better than you are now, I can guarantee it), and develop a personal sense of responsibility and accountability that doesn't depend on others lifting their own share of the load... because their share of the load in making your life better and happier is pretty minimal. That's not their job. It's yours.

In my experience, people thrive best when standards are set high. Not so high that they have no hope of reaching them, but high enough that they have to stretch their strengths and test themselves. The rush of well earned pride and accomplishment that comes with reaching that bar you thought was beyond you is a lot more satisfying than having someone lift you up the whole way.

I'm not saying we shouldn't help each other, but there is a lot of contentment and satisfaction that comes from self dependency, and I actually think that many people find themselves more inclined to be more generous and sympathetic towards the struggles and challenges of other people when they've had to fight themselves. Once you've climbed the ladder and have an idea of the effort it takes, maybe you'll find yourself more inclined to lean over and help pull the next person up rather than criticize them.

4) Act With Confidence and Humility 

Usually people excel at one or the other, but learning how to be both humble and confident at the same time is an art I have yet to master. It pays to be sure of yourself, move with a purpose, and speak with a surety that demands attention, but it also pays to leave yourself open to learning, tread softly, and listen with the ear of a student. You should express your beliefs and your resolve with confidence and certainty, but you should also be aware of the fact that you have a lot to learn and that other people have things to offer than you could benefit from. Confident humility is at the heart of courtesy, respect, and nobility and it requires a gentle heart and steady head.

In a way, you think of yourself like you would think of one of your children or siblings. Be proud of yourself, your accomplishments, your talents, and your successes, but also be keenly aware of your faults and how far from perfection you still are.

5) Know Your Limits. Push them. 

I think it is very important to know what exactly your limitations are. How much time can you put into something before you exhaust yourself? How long are you able to operate within a social environment before you feel like strangling people? What is the greatest amount you can life? How much pain can you endure? What all can you take on before your efficiency and quality suffers?

These are all questions we should be able to answer about ourselves, and we can only know the answer by testing the extent of our limitations. At the same time however, rarely should we accept our limitations as fixed costs to operate around and accommodate. Always push yourself to move past the very limits you have discovered, and ever strive to become a better and stronger person.

Just do so within reason, and don't kill yourself on the way up.

6) Expect the Best. Prepare for the Worst.

I suppose this is kind of an extension of Optimistic Realism. Expect the best of people, expect the best of your work, and expect the best from others, because that way you will be motivated to make the best possible outcome become a reality. People are a lot happier to work towards a goal if they know you have faith in their ability to reach it (yourself included), and if you go back to the Anticipating Pleasure point, you'll be a lot happier if you expect good things to come.

At the same time, we don't want to be caught emptied handed when the rainy season hits. Have contingent plans in place, set up your safety nets, and have the emergency rations readily available. Most of the time Plan B will never need to become a reality, but when it does, you'll be mighty happy and relieved if Plan B already exists and is on hand, because when the excrement hits the fan you don't have to begin fashioning your helmet.

The zombies apocalypse is never going to happen, but if it did, would you be ready?

7) Know What You Believe

Seems like a pretty silly thing to say, but when someone asks you "Why?" have an answer ready for them. There is not much quite so disconcerting as having someone rocking your boat and realizing you don't know why you're on it to begin with.

Whatever you believe, know why you believe it and be able to tell someone else. If it is really something you think matters then you should probably know why and what it really means.

I've heard this can also be pretty useful in interviews.

8) Learn from Your Past and then Share. 

We all make mistakes... and quite a few of them at that. Hindsight is 20/20 and we can learn pretty quickly that setting that particular thing ablaze wasn't a good idea.

Learn from your mistakes, and don't let your own personal history repeat itself (well.. not the bad parts anyway). Ask yourself why things when downhill when they did, figure out where you went wrong when you did, and actually think about the implications of your past choices. When you do that, you are far more likely to make the better choices in the future (disclaimer: you will still make mistakes. That isn't avoidable).

Once you have learned from your past, and have successfully determined how not to do something, share your newly discovered wisdom with others. When you have children, younger siblings, or younger friends going through life situations you know you personally struggled with a lot, it would be a pretty spectacular idea to share some pro tips and point out the major pitfalls ("See that mark on the floor there? That's where I tripped, fell, and totally destroyed what could have been a long and fruitful relationship.")

You can't erase or eliminate the errors of your past, but the second best thing is helping to make sure that other people don't rack up as many of their own.

9) Have a Plan and then Deviate from it. 

Know where you want to go in life and what you want to do. Draw up a map, mark it with an X, and have a sense of purpose and goals to strive for. It is really hard to cover any ground when you're just flopping around in the dark waiting for something to present itself to you, whereas a great distances can be traversed in remarkable short spaces of time if you know where it is you want to ultimately end up. Always have steps one, two, and three at the forefront of your mind as you face hurdles in your life. Complications and unfortunate circumstances are a lot easier to move past if you have something worth fighting for in mind.

At the same time though, be flexible enough to comfortably deviate from what you had in mind. Know the rules of the engagement, and then find a way to break them beneficially. Not everything is always going to go according to your plan, so prepare yourself early on and don't let yourself get caught unawares and just take the initiative in derailing your own course. Figure out how to take the road least traveled by and still end up where you want to be.

10) Work 

Push yourself, and do something worthwhile with your time. Laziness, procrastination, and sloth may seem like highly appealing and wonderful options from time to time, but when you let them become the predominant and driving factors in your life, you trap yourself in a self-degrading and miserable mindset that you won't be content with forever. No one likes a bum, especially when that bum is yourself. When you don't do what you're supposed to you feel bad and beat yourself up and consequently lose motivation and confidence in yourself. That then leads to failure in some other responsibility that leads to a great drop in motivation and confidence that leads to more failure that leads to a never ending cycle that results in one very bummed out and unhappy camper who isn't even camping because packing a tent is too much effort and sitting on the coach eating chips and drinking beer while watching a soap opera is much more enjoyable anyway...

Work, be active, push yourself, and do contribute to your family, your friends, and your society. It will make you feel better about yourself, and will benefit others in the process.

11) Love 

While you are working, make sure you take the time to dedicate your life and your actions to something. If you don't have someone, or a group of someones, in your life that you love and you are willing to die and sacrifice yourself for, then you are going to run into trouble and run out steam eventually. At some point along the line you will end up asking yourself "Why am I doing this? What's the point? Is it really worth putting in the effort?" and if all you have to draw upon at that point is your own self worth and your own well being you're going to have a hard time carrying on in the face of adversity. If you instead have people that you love and that love you, and that are worth fighting and working for, you will be much better equipped to carry on through the torrential sea of troubles that pound against us through life and suck it up, because there are others counting on you and you would do anything for them. Love makes it worth it.

12) Trust

The last thing I want to suggest to anyone reading this post is that you need to be able to trust people. I'm not suggesting that you naively go out into the world believing that everyone always tells the truth, and that everyone has your back and will help you up if you fall down (because that isn't true), but you have to be able to trust people if you wan to live a happy and fruitful life.

No matter how many times you get tricked, or cheated, or taken advantage of, try not to lose your sense of trust, because once you start questioning everyone's motives, intentions, and reliability, you become like Gollum in the Lord of the Rings.

And no one wants to be like Gollum.

Always have a group of people you can trust, and always put value in the words and promises of others, and on the flip side of that coin, conduct your own words, behavior, and actions in a way worth of another person's trust. Relationships, whether they be romantic, familial, or commercial, can not function properly without trust, and human beings as social creatures can not function properly without relationships.