Competence is how good you are when there is something to gain. Character is how good you are when there is nothing to gain. People will reward you for competence. But people will only love you for your character.
~ Mark Manson
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Character →
Antifragile →
The aims of safety-ism were noble. They saw that young people were experiencing greater amounts of anxiety, stress, and depression than previous generations and sought to remedy their angst by protecting them from anything that could potentially harm or upset them.
~ Mark Manson from, Trigger Warning: Reality Hurts
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It always seemed obvious to me that wasn’t going to work. When I find something which triggers me, that’s a problem with me; That points me towards something I can improve upon. The problem is not the problem. The problem is my attitude towards the problem.
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But I wanted to be special →
But at our core, whether we’re an insecure teenager from Quebec, an overworked woman from India, a worrisome grandmother from Texas, or a desperate immigrant living in Australia, we all seem to struggle with the same small grouping of stressors and anxieties[.]
~ Mark Manson from, Everyone Is Mostly the Same… (And Why This Is Good News)
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In recent years—particular in that one where I regularly had a therapist—this became glaringly obvious to me. First, I started noticing when my petulant child arrives with a list of grievances, and using that as a cue that it’s time to shift gears, shift tasks, take a nap, or something. I note that my mind loves to believe it’s, at the very least, in control of itself. But that turns out to be absolutely false, because about half of my central–nervous system is in my skull, and the other half is hanging down connected to all sorts of non-conscious things.
Second, rather than try to help everyone else with the same problems I have—uh, hello, if I have the problem it’s clear I don’t know how to fix it. Instead, I’m dashing off into the mountain flowers working on things which are fun. Because that really does help me. How cool would it be if some other people (with the same problems as me) would also be helped?
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That says it all →
And worse, when something truly significant does happen, it blends in seamlessly with the continuing shitstream that is information in the social media age.
~ Mark Manson from, The Outrage Cycle
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Manson lays it out pretty much as he always does. He’s not swinging a baseball bat; No it’s one of those bats from a zombies movie with nails sticking out of it. But the point is valid none the less.
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Magnanimity →
Instead, Will redefined success for himself as winning in such a way that others are satisfied with his success. This implies not only excellence but also magnanimity. It’s like when opposing crowds would give Michael Jordan standing ovations. Or when fellow golfers would congratulate Tiger Woods on his shots. Or, you know, when conceding politicians used to say nice things about their opponents.
~ Mark Manson from, 3 Life Lessons I Learned From Will Smith
I’m reminded of zero-sum games, versus synergy. My definition of success precludes my participation in zero-sum games. I find that Mahatma Gandhi’s, “an eye-for-an-eye just leaves the whole world blind,” brings clarity when I’m uncertain. I often joke, “chaos? disorder?! …my work here is done.” Joking aside, and truth be told, I like to imagine leaving a wake of joy and improvement as I move through the world. I’m also reminded of…
To laugh often and much, to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children […] to leave the world a bit better […] to know even one life has breathed easier because you lived. This is to have succeeded
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Dissonance for the win →
The same way having a diversity of traits within a population is optimal (yet uncomfortable) in nature, and having a diversity of personalities/beliefs/backgrounds is optimal (yet uncomfortable) in society, I would argue that possessing a diversity of values, perspectives, and inclinations as an individual is optimal (yet uncomfortable) for our psychology.
~ Mark Manson from, How to Cultivate Wisdom
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That’s an insightful observation.
In certain circles there are some oft-posed rhetorical questions: What’s the work only you can do? What, if you ceased doing it, would people miss? …because there’s a lot of other stuff you could choose to do. Stuff which is easy, and which can be done by anyone. And then there’s the other stuff: The stuff that requires us to balance competing priorities, to resolve conflicting requirements, and to choose among exclusive options.
When’s the last time you made a sub-optimal decision knowing that doing so was better than doing nothing?
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Silent majority →
The great biographer Robert Caro once said, “Power doesn’t always corrupt, but power always reveals.” Perhaps the same is true of the most powerful networks in human history.
Social media has not corrupted us, it’s merely revealed who we always were.
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There’s a lot of good—writing, concepts, anecdote, data—in this article. But the thing that leapt out at me was something I’d already known, but seem to have forgotten… or, if not fully forgotten, I’d failed to connect it to other things in my model of the world: The idea of the silent majority.
About 90% of the people participating on social networks, are not even participating. They’re simply observing. It turns out that the other 10% are the people with extreme views; not “blow stuff up” extreme, but simply more towards the opposing ends of whatever spectrum of views you care to consider.
Two things to consider: First, boy howdy guilty as charged! I’m on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn— but the only content I post is related to my projects. I don’t engage with anything, reshare… or even, really, participate unless it’s related to a project. *face palm* Woa! I’m literally a member of the silent majority. Perhaps you are to? If 10 of you are reading, then 9 of you are just like me.
Second, because math! If you look at the stream we all like to say, “it’s endless!” Right. There must be thousands of posts, right? I’ll pause while you do math… right. If there are only thousands of posts for me to see, I’m clearly not seeing all the activity from the millions of people. Sure, some of that is the platform filtering, but I have the feeling that the numbers hold true: If everyone posted a lot we’d have thousands of times more stuff flying around.
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Why we all need philosophy →
Philosophy is, therefore, undismissable for the simple reason that it encompasses all of conscious experience. To criticize philosophy, you must rely on some degree of philosophy. To shit on systematic frameworks of understanding, you must generate a systematic framework of understanding.
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Irreverant as usual, but—as is also often the case with Manson—an insightful look at why you are already doing philosophy.
Years ago, when I said, “screw this I’m starting,” and tried to get Philosophy wrapped around my brain… Years ago, one of the most profitable things I ever did was subscribe to a little podcast called Philosophy Bites. And then listen to all of them. I’m still not an ivory-tower armchair philosopher, but there’s a crap-ton fewer unknown-unknowns.
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You don’t deserve happiness →
Happiness isn’t something that is deserved or earned from something outside yourself. Happiness is created within yourself. And it’s created by the simple and constant choice to accept what is. To look at the pain in the face and not blink. To confront one’s fears and struggles and embrace them rather than fight them.
~ Mark Manson from, 5 Simple Ideas That Can Change Your Life
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Manson has written a number of articles that feel like the fist from the adage: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.” (~ Mike Tyson)
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Anti-productive →
These distractions aren’t just unproductive, they’re anti-productive. They create more work than they replace.
~ Mark Manson from, The Attention Diet
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I wish I had learned much sooner the idea that distractions aren’t just wasting the time spent on the distraction, but are in fact decreasing the value of the time I do try to spend on anything focused and productive. Alas, it took me decades of experimenting to deeply understand it for myself before I could truly learn the lesson. Manson’s article is, as usual, irreverent and explicit—but it has some terrific points in it about how to go about crafting an attention “diet” to take back your mind.
My mind does need a lot of down-time and relaxation. But none of that looks like distraction. I deeply love sitting down to some great science-fiction movie with popcorn. I also deeply love me some burly physical work where my mind can press the “body: do things” button and then wander out of the control room for a snooze on the terrace. (I imagine Homer Simpson’s sipping-bird left in the control room; but mine’s pressing the, “continue hard labor,” button rather than his nuclear reactor alarm reset.)
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