The mind is its own place and in itself, can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. --John Milton
Dinosaurs would disagree with the common perspective that evolution necessarily means progress. Natural selection, one of the major mechanisms that propels evolution, "decided" that the qualities of dinosaurs weren't the most fabulous for the purpose of indefinite reproduction. Hence nature--or whatever the hell you choose to call it--discarded the dino option.
The treehugger in us mourns extinct species but we are natural hypocrites. We are not thrilled about a pack of Canis Lupus roaming our backyards, but we consider it a cruel deed when a wolf gets shot in Alaska. Honestly, you don't want to find your Toyota under a pile of dinosaur excrement when you are about to drive home from church. And who enjoys getting stepped on by large animals? The fact that dinosaurs fell victim to extinction is reason to celebrate. What you may call progress meant death for dinosaurs.
Death of a species is not always caused by the evil human race. Tens of thousands of species had become extinct before homo sapiens popped up. And to this day, a bunch of species die PARALLEL to our existence and not because of us picking our noses the wrong way.
Hate me if you like, but I think it's a blessing that certain creatures are dead. Actually, that is true for some people also: who would want the Mao monster back? Or Hitler, Stalin, Che Guevara--I know, there are folks who are in awe of murderers like Che--and Pol Pot? Evolution kills things, and not only bad and creepy guys with body odor. Evolution couldn't care less about good or bad individual specimens of a species, and it doesn't give a rat's pink behind about a single species, either.
Evolution is a process from inferiority to superiority, from worse to better? Bollocks. Adaptation to a changing environment, spruced up by occasional random changes--genetic drift--does not imply that the environment causes a species to improve. Homo Sapiens of the 21st century may be better suited to procreate in an increasingly Orwellian world and perhaps we are fit enough to survive our own idiocy, but that does not say anything about us being a better edition than the Mesopotamian dorks of the iron age some 3,000 years ago.
Do you seriously believe the average dunce of today is advanced compared to the average contemporary of George Washington? I am confident Mr. Washington could smoke each and every politician of today's world in his pipe. Since George Washington, politicians have certainly not progressed. Or do you think they lie so much better today than they did 200 years ago? One wishes politicians would become the new dinosaurs, following the brittle crop of banksters on their heels, but unfortunately they are as resilient as a bad strain of the flu.
We are freaks, and the human race is a strange species. But, that is not what I intend to talk about: I have evolution on my mind, evolution free of progress.
Apropos '200 years' of development and progress: Matt Ridley, an Oxford-educated zoologist, said in a recent interview: "It is conceivable that some people in Africa are living at a lower standard of living than anyone was 200 years ago." (Reason magazine, February 2009). Yes, we are progressing indeed.
Evolution has no interest in pacifying an individual or a collective perspective of "better" or "more" in any department of our humanness. Sure, the tools and technologies we employ today are superior. But are people better individuals today? Are we happier? Objectively, the improvement of quantities or qualities is hardly on the menu of evolution, and it would be silly to expect that the universe increases income, health, or freedom naturally as an organic function of evolving from one Monday to the next.
Survival of the fittest? Really? My observation tells me that the fittest die as well, sooner or later. Often sooner. Athlete's heart, you know? Yeah, I am aware that my exegesis stinks and that I am bending scientific truths for my devious purposes. But some of those truths are crooked and questionable. For instance, people are peddling barrels of snake oil under the intimidating banner of "quantum physics." It's all made up out of thin air anyway, without the slightest scientific base but people are buying it with hard currency. You care for solid evolutionary truth?
It is a fact of evolution that everybody ends up dead. Nobody survives evolution. Nobody wins. If death is progress from your perspective, then yes, evolution means progress. Otherwise, I'll continue to have my doubts.
You want to believe in evolution or in creationism, 'Intelligent Design?' Have it your way, I don't care. Peculiar to me is the fact that the defenders of a creator do not trust their God, just as the church of evolution--c'mon, for Richard Dawkins evolution IS a religion--does not trust the inner workings of evolution.
Denouncing progress in the church of evolution is heresy, and I'm afraid the mind of the average intellectual has not improved since the Catholic church and the Holy Inquisition put Galileo Galilei under house arrest 500 years ago. For the Catholic church on the other hand, progress CAN be heresy if it interferes with the church's manic opportunism:
In 1990, Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI., cited some current views on the Galileo affair as forming what he called "a symptomatic case that illustrates the extent to which modernity’s doubts about itself have grown today in science and technology." As evidence he quoted philosopher Paul Feyerabend, as saying:
"The Church at the time of Galileo kept much more closely to reason than did Galileo himself, and she took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's teaching too. Her verdict against Galileo was rational and just, and the revision of this verdict can be justified only on the grounds of what is politically opportune."
Two years later, in 1992, Pope John Paul II. vindicated Galileo. It must have been "politically opportune," as the church--according to Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI.)--obviously doesn't give a crap about what's true.
The Catholic church does not trust God's creation, and she does not feel comfortable selling creation "as is" to her flock. In this case, church executives waited half a thousand years before they felt sufficiently comfy to inform the faithful of what they had known to be true all along. When the church offers truth eventually, please be aware that it may come with a 500-year delay.
Ultimately, it doesn't matter whether you believe God created the status quo or evolution delivered us where we are today: as a society, we don't trust either of the two. What do I mean? We do not trust free markets! Truth is not opportune and we prefer to fight it with as much money as we are willing to print. Perhaps not for 500 years, because even the dullest union member can calculate that foolishness can't be financed indefinitely, but we are determined to cover up reality with mountains of money.
If you can trust the existence of progress and evolution, why can't you trust the market? Products come and go. The markets are subject to evolution also. Some inventions stay for a long time and adjust to changing requirements. The wheel, for instance, has been around for awhile. Entire professions have come and gone. Other products and services become obsolete within months of their introduction or after a few years. The elevator man, for example, is a rare phenomenon these days, and if you want an exquisite carpenter for your project, you need to go to the Amish or you are out of luck.
I suggest we continue paying all former elevator people. Let us build elevators--useful or not--so that the last remaining elevator men can drive up and down all day until their last pitiful brain cells croak. Manufacturers of typewriters should be enabled financially to employ their workforce again and until the end of time. Steam engine operators, weavers, pardoners (licensed to sell Papal indulgences), and postillions need to get back on somebody's payroll.
Insane? I don't understand! Small business owners who earn barely $25 an hour (and cannot afford health insurance) are forced to pay General Motors' workers who are making $39.68 an hour (including base pay, cost-of-living adjustments, night-shift premiums, overtime, holiday and vacation pay), plus another average $33.58 an hour (health-care, pension and other benefits). Difference between the two is that one is productive and the GM employee is not.
GM can't sell enough cars to justify their business model. For years to come, millions of factually obsolete jobs will be artificially propped up by those of us whose services and products find buyers. We may just as well pay everybody royally whose profession has become superfluous during the course of history. A trillion dollars more or less won't make a difference.
When you own a restaurant and you manage it poorly, you'll have to face reality. When arrogant dicks like John Thain run a 95-year old company like Merrill Lynch into the ground, Bank of America may pick up the pieces on paper but the productive tax payer will be forced to deal with the consequences. Mind boggling, that people have to work their asses off on productive jobs and in money-producing businesses--large AND small--to finance jobs that will disappear once it'll be "politically opportune" to describe the Emperor's Clothes as what they are.
If you believe the rich have to pay more in the future to finance the poor, you are so wrong! The productive are being punished for their productivity and forced to pay for the unproductive. Individuals who have to come up with the dough to keep useless jobs on life support, may have less money than those who benefit from this disgusting scheme.
AIG Insurance, the 18th largest company in the world, is "too large" to let it slide into bankruptcy. Your puny business and mine are apparently not too small to support giant losers like Bank of America (who has received $45 billion), AIG Inc. (who has access to $190 billion), and Shitty Group (who has received $50 billion). Goodness, AIG lost $62 billion buckaroos in the last quarter of 2008 alone! How does one do that (unless that money was never really there; unfortunately, that comes painfully close to the truth)?
Dinosaurs die. That used to be an evolutionary fact. Since governments never met a crisis they didn't like, dead dinosaurs are being mutated to Trojan dinosaurs or transformed into economically undead, if you will. The harsh reality of boom and bust cycles is "politically not opportune" anymore for the pussies--oops, please accept my sincere apology!--we have become while progressing lazily. We are crying for mom to help us, and the political nannies are thrilled to comply. With a little unforeseen twist, that is.
Am I angry? Not at all. Frustrated, demotivated, or depressed? On the contrary.
Freedom and individuality have always been fragile and precious, and this moment is as good as any to claim them for yourself. Governments come and go, and what one government can give you, the next may take away from you. Getting upset over government waste is a waste of time. Evolution has not been able to improve politicians, and neither will we perform such a miracle.
The real question is: will you allow anyone--the recession or the undead--to take away your happiness? Don't. That is the first step into freedom. Reclaim your full power over your happiness! The following steps may not be as easy, but they will be simple as well.
The fight to expand your individuality is so hard because it must be fought against and for yourself.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: To all of you who have purchased my new book:
Thank you so much! I feel privileged that you chose to read my rebellious and provocative material. Not everybody can digest it without (growing) pain and I appreciate the daring individuals who are embracing the challenge. You are truly exceptional!
'How to Better Hate Your Job' is now available on
www.amazon.com (ISBN: 978-0-578-00314-6).
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
hate responsibly
Things you don't like are more powerful than things you do like. Think about your job, and then agree with me: collectively--and perhaps individually--we are making more money hating what we are doing than by loving all the way to the bank.
Even if we are self-employed, if we chose our profession deliberately, and if we honestly love what we are doing with a passion: there are aspects of our work that we don't enjoy. We hate firing people, for instance. We despise pouring over our income taxes. Or, we aren't too ecstatic about a difficult customer stealing our precious time. You may be the grand master of delegating unwanted tasks but if you are telling me you love everything you do--all day, every day, and everybody you are dealing with--you are losing credibility rapidly.
It is similar with children. We love our offspring, sure, but do you truly LOVE dealing with every issue your teenage kids bring up? Rubbish! They're confronting us with ample material we can hate. Pulling a condom out of your 14-year old daughter's jeans pocket while doing the laundry or discovering your son's stash of weed in his chest of drawers calls for conversations you might file away labeled as 'tough love,' while the brats are increasingly convinced how much you must be hating them. No, we don't love everything we say we love.
Our work entails details we are not too thrilled about. There are elements we hate. And we are doing it anyway. Hatred for disliked parts of our jobs has become integrated in our overall passion for the things we do. Long ago we may have stopped dissecting the emotional layers of our work world, separating the likes from the dislikes. We are simply lacking the time for silly exercises like that and besides, it's superfluous. The work must be done anyway. The brood wants to be raised (they disagree, though). There is no reason for us to stop doing what we hate, and we won't.
On the contrary, we are making money by hating things. To a certain degree, hatred has a cash value attached to it for every one of us. Talk about peace and love as much as you want but please do tell me, what percentage of your rent or mortgage payment requires from you the discipline to do what you are hating. That works the other way around as well. We have disciplined ourselves to hate what we are doing, because we are aware of its value.
More than 87% of Americans hate their jobs. That means the overwhelming majority pays bills with the cash equivalent of hatred. Love doesn't seem to be as trustworthy or as bankable as hatred. Hey, I didn't invent this idea! Neither am I trying to convince you of anything. I am stating facts that others--Forbes magazine, for example--have gathered, and I am offering you an unusual perspective.
Did I suggest you should be hating your job instead of loving it? Nonsense! I am writing about the often painful reality of hatred for our jobs. Pointing out alternative options for the interpretation of that reality, is my aim.
Oh, I know you don't enjoy hearing this. I could sell so many more copies of my book by telling you instead what's pleasing to your ears. Sorry, I won't harass you for the umptieth time with motivational syrup how doing what you love will make you rich by Tuesday afternoon. I am confident you'll find enough of that gooey stuff elsewhere. I prefer talking about subjects that stink.
Back to hatred. Making money with hatred is one thing, but our relationship with subjects of hatred is deeper than love for money.
Power.
A common opinion states that individuals are continuously on a quest for power. Power over other people (one reason to make children, if you are allergic to cat dander). Power over money. Power over a piece of the environment.
True, we are freaks, but I disagree with the general theory that human beings are seeking power. If we did, why are so many of us settling for so little of it? No, the average person is satisfied wielding an ounce of power necessary to report her neighbor's messy front yard to the homeowners' assassination. Beyond that, we prefer secondhand power: we are in awe about OTHER people's power or with the power we believe they have.
The masses enjoy the small mindedness of admiring those in power positions, and we love to see some of those who climbed high drop out of power. The secondhand power trip permits our own behinds to stay in life's security zone. Fascination with power cannot be fully understood if we leave out the thrill the mob derives from the destruction of power.
From the blood drenched French Revolution and the murder of the Russian Czar family, to a time when every schmuck feels entitled to limiting the salaries of "greedy" executives in the ivory towers of "evil powerful" corporations--witnessing the so-called powerful fail is equally entertaining to us as it is to cheer them on while they are rising stars. No, baby, most of us do not yearn for such power. Most of us don't have the sick desire to fall victim to our neurotic ilk. And then, that describes a certain form of power we are milking out of a status that pretends to be powerless, or do we not?
But I digress.
"Things we don't like are more powerful," or so I said. Why? Because we are not actively hating anything. Hating is a passive act. Say wha ...? In our younger--and arguably dumber--years some of us were victims of love. We "fell" in love until we fell out of it, involuntarily. As if the objects of our love--girl, car, beer, boy, motorcycle, etc.--had had the slightest power over us and over the way we chose to feel. We were craving a powerful car under our scrawny arses precisely because we lacked the balls to assume power over those feelings and emotions that we believed cars and girls had over us.
We did not love. That stuff "made us" love it. Small wonder we began a frustrating and eventually unsuccessful quest of unearthing the ultimate IT (job, house, partner, religion, anything). Pretty pathetic. Meanwhile, a bunch of us have figured out that our love interests happen to be rather brief infatuations unless we inject an active element. We started to choose ("Honey, I'd love to go to Disneyland!"), and we have experienced some value in actively following through. We have discovered how to love by choice. Damn yeah, there can be freedom in it!
Things we hate are so powerful because we don't hate anything by choice: what we are hating seems to make us hate it. "Honey, let's hate the Jews." That's not how NAZI Germany's dogged family daddies succeeded murdering 6,000,000 individuals. Seriously, the good old German butchers were convinced IT happened to THEM as it did to Jews, homosexuals, Gypsies, intellectuals, artists, and countless others who were seen as responsible for their executioners' deeds.
"I hate my job," means I am not responsible for hating my job. It suggests my job is so bad that I am practically forced to hate what I do. And it means I believe in the higher power of the things I hate. What I hate determines my life. If I am holding down a job I can hate, I am relatively safe. Hatred is the provider for nations. It buys lunch.
"Dear Lord, don't ever let us run out of stuff we can hate!" It's the prayer of journalists who desire to sell copy. You, too, ought to be grateful for work you can hate passionately. The public is getting giddy about the future creation of millions of hated jobs, since we know that economies are falling apart when our collective and personal hatred drops to mediocre regions.
On a personal level, that translates to an increase of income and to improved happiness if you can manage to discover more work projects you can hate. Double that offer if you bring yourself to the realization that the power behind the scenes is yours.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: My book 'How to Better Hate Your Job' is now available on Amazon.com. As rebellious and provocative as it is, you should not read this disturbing material. Not you!
Even if we are self-employed, if we chose our profession deliberately, and if we honestly love what we are doing with a passion: there are aspects of our work that we don't enjoy. We hate firing people, for instance. We despise pouring over our income taxes. Or, we aren't too ecstatic about a difficult customer stealing our precious time. You may be the grand master of delegating unwanted tasks but if you are telling me you love everything you do--all day, every day, and everybody you are dealing with--you are losing credibility rapidly.
It is similar with children. We love our offspring, sure, but do you truly LOVE dealing with every issue your teenage kids bring up? Rubbish! They're confronting us with ample material we can hate. Pulling a condom out of your 14-year old daughter's jeans pocket while doing the laundry or discovering your son's stash of weed in his chest of drawers calls for conversations you might file away labeled as 'tough love,' while the brats are increasingly convinced how much you must be hating them. No, we don't love everything we say we love.
Our work entails details we are not too thrilled about. There are elements we hate. And we are doing it anyway. Hatred for disliked parts of our jobs has become integrated in our overall passion for the things we do. Long ago we may have stopped dissecting the emotional layers of our work world, separating the likes from the dislikes. We are simply lacking the time for silly exercises like that and besides, it's superfluous. The work must be done anyway. The brood wants to be raised (they disagree, though). There is no reason for us to stop doing what we hate, and we won't.
On the contrary, we are making money by hating things. To a certain degree, hatred has a cash value attached to it for every one of us. Talk about peace and love as much as you want but please do tell me, what percentage of your rent or mortgage payment requires from you the discipline to do what you are hating. That works the other way around as well. We have disciplined ourselves to hate what we are doing, because we are aware of its value.
More than 87% of Americans hate their jobs. That means the overwhelming majority pays bills with the cash equivalent of hatred. Love doesn't seem to be as trustworthy or as bankable as hatred. Hey, I didn't invent this idea! Neither am I trying to convince you of anything. I am stating facts that others--Forbes magazine, for example--have gathered, and I am offering you an unusual perspective.
Did I suggest you should be hating your job instead of loving it? Nonsense! I am writing about the often painful reality of hatred for our jobs. Pointing out alternative options for the interpretation of that reality, is my aim.
Oh, I know you don't enjoy hearing this. I could sell so many more copies of my book by telling you instead what's pleasing to your ears. Sorry, I won't harass you for the umptieth time with motivational syrup how doing what you love will make you rich by Tuesday afternoon. I am confident you'll find enough of that gooey stuff elsewhere. I prefer talking about subjects that stink.
Back to hatred. Making money with hatred is one thing, but our relationship with subjects of hatred is deeper than love for money.
Power.
A common opinion states that individuals are continuously on a quest for power. Power over other people (one reason to make children, if you are allergic to cat dander). Power over money. Power over a piece of the environment.
True, we are freaks, but I disagree with the general theory that human beings are seeking power. If we did, why are so many of us settling for so little of it? No, the average person is satisfied wielding an ounce of power necessary to report her neighbor's messy front yard to the homeowners' assassination. Beyond that, we prefer secondhand power: we are in awe about OTHER people's power or with the power we believe they have.
The masses enjoy the small mindedness of admiring those in power positions, and we love to see some of those who climbed high drop out of power. The secondhand power trip permits our own behinds to stay in life's security zone. Fascination with power cannot be fully understood if we leave out the thrill the mob derives from the destruction of power.
From the blood drenched French Revolution and the murder of the Russian Czar family, to a time when every schmuck feels entitled to limiting the salaries of "greedy" executives in the ivory towers of "evil powerful" corporations--witnessing the so-called powerful fail is equally entertaining to us as it is to cheer them on while they are rising stars. No, baby, most of us do not yearn for such power. Most of us don't have the sick desire to fall victim to our neurotic ilk. And then, that describes a certain form of power we are milking out of a status that pretends to be powerless, or do we not?
But I digress.
"Things we don't like are more powerful," or so I said. Why? Because we are not actively hating anything. Hating is a passive act. Say wha ...? In our younger--and arguably dumber--years some of us were victims of love. We "fell" in love until we fell out of it, involuntarily. As if the objects of our love--girl, car, beer, boy, motorcycle, etc.--had had the slightest power over us and over the way we chose to feel. We were craving a powerful car under our scrawny arses precisely because we lacked the balls to assume power over those feelings and emotions that we believed cars and girls had over us.
We did not love. That stuff "made us" love it. Small wonder we began a frustrating and eventually unsuccessful quest of unearthing the ultimate IT (job, house, partner, religion, anything). Pretty pathetic. Meanwhile, a bunch of us have figured out that our love interests happen to be rather brief infatuations unless we inject an active element. We started to choose ("Honey, I'd love to go to Disneyland!"), and we have experienced some value in actively following through. We have discovered how to love by choice. Damn yeah, there can be freedom in it!
Things we hate are so powerful because we don't hate anything by choice: what we are hating seems to make us hate it. "Honey, let's hate the Jews." That's not how NAZI Germany's dogged family daddies succeeded murdering 6,000,000 individuals. Seriously, the good old German butchers were convinced IT happened to THEM as it did to Jews, homosexuals, Gypsies, intellectuals, artists, and countless others who were seen as responsible for their executioners' deeds.
"I hate my job," means I am not responsible for hating my job. It suggests my job is so bad that I am practically forced to hate what I do. And it means I believe in the higher power of the things I hate. What I hate determines my life. If I am holding down a job I can hate, I am relatively safe. Hatred is the provider for nations. It buys lunch.
"Dear Lord, don't ever let us run out of stuff we can hate!" It's the prayer of journalists who desire to sell copy. You, too, ought to be grateful for work you can hate passionately. The public is getting giddy about the future creation of millions of hated jobs, since we know that economies are falling apart when our collective and personal hatred drops to mediocre regions.
On a personal level, that translates to an increase of income and to improved happiness if you can manage to discover more work projects you can hate. Double that offer if you bring yourself to the realization that the power behind the scenes is yours.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: My book 'How to Better Hate Your Job' is now available on Amazon.com. As rebellious and provocative as it is, you should not read this disturbing material. Not you!
Saturday, January 31, 2009
money motion
"To play at the top of your form, you cannot be emotionally involved in the results." --Arnold Snyder, Card Player magazine
Showing--your true--emotions in a game of Poker makes you predictable. An expensive idea. Somebody at your table will be taking advantage of your vulnerability. To add insult to injury, sure as hell you will be a victim of your emotionally altered state of mind, and your impaired judgment will cost you. Overt excitement is counter productive for the purpose of making money, and so it is letting other players see how angry or how depressed you are.
Permitting emotions to be important disables rational thinking and overrides adequate decision making. Duh. What a concept! You knew that, of course, and you would not make the mistake of worrying about outcomes or of getting aroused in expectation of money you may be getting in the future.
You have noticed, we are not talking about Poker anymore. The word 'money' alone is a crank you can use to drive the best of us crazy with. I don't mean crisp bank notes. No. The associations each one of us comes up with involuntarily, when the issue of money enters the thought process, are clouding our rational mind. Our fears, hopes, dreams, and traumatic experiences easily dominate the moment. Collective fears--about the recession for instance, expressed in the media or at the water cooler--may affect us more than the recession itself.
Pleasant emotions about the expectation of huge piles of future dough and uncomfortable money-related emotional states are equally distracting. To be exact, it hardly matters whether you think of money as a past experience, as your current situation, or as a future event. Further, it is of little consequence if you feel positively or in negative terms about money.
The fact THAT you are permitting yourself to react to money with ANY emotional state renders every single undertaking less productive and less profitable.
Our emotional responses to money are similar to our reaction to mom. When you are at a critical point of negotiating an important business transaction or you are being interviewed for your dream job, the last thing you desire is for your mother to pop in. Well, unless something went awry with you in the distant past.
Loving your mom or mammon has nothing to do with this phenomenon. It's not about losing interest in money or in spending time with dear old mom. On the contrary, and as you may recall it's not even about mom or money. The money--and your mom--IN YOUR HEAD must respect boundaries. Just as listening to your mother's chatter about her experience at the hair salon can't possibly improve your game at the card table, the voices in your head chattering away about money need to shut up!
While you are working on the suicide clutch of your 1948 Harley-Davidson Panhead, it is incredibly dumb to be in tatters over your financial situation. Are we finally agreeing with each other? Now, while you are working on ANYTHING, it is advisable to leave your stupid emotions aside.
You cannot make decent money while thinking about money and worse, while being bullied or lured into a corner by your money-induced emotions.
I know, I have said the same thing over and over again, but in this case redundancy was necessary. Why? Because you and I, we both have allowed the occasional meddling of money-baggage and money-hype with our work that we should have solely focused on. You haven't? Good for you. Most of us are guilty of having done so too often and for too long.
Not being "emotionally involved in the results" of your business supports the purpose of a business to produce hefty profits. What is more important to you, your silly emotions or profit? In all likelihood you can't have both. We cannot be happy if we permit emotions to run our lives, and we can't succeed financially when we give our emotions the upper hand in business decisions.
Whatever you are feeling as far as money is concerned is poisonous for the actual making of money. As paradoxical as this idea may look to you, it is simplifying life.
Just work!
No painful worries are wearing you down. No addictive hopes are lifting you up to fake highs until natural boom-and-bust cycles are tossing you back into the ditch of--equally artificial--hopelessness.
Do what you know best. You will live through times with a bunch of money. Relatively speaking, that is. And it is probable that you will be experiencing times with relatively little income. Not everybody goes from a small income to a large one over the decades and fortunately, not everyone drops from lofty monetary highs to pitiful lows. Realistically, both versions can happen to any of us. Whatever it will be for you, you'll fare better leaving your damn emotions out of the equation.
Work. And enjoy your work. Especially if and when you hate it.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: My new book 'How to Better Hate Your Job' is rebellious in its nature. Who would have thought! A provocative perspective on employment, work, and money. Go get your copy!
Showing--your true--emotions in a game of Poker makes you predictable. An expensive idea. Somebody at your table will be taking advantage of your vulnerability. To add insult to injury, sure as hell you will be a victim of your emotionally altered state of mind, and your impaired judgment will cost you. Overt excitement is counter productive for the purpose of making money, and so it is letting other players see how angry or how depressed you are.
Permitting emotions to be important disables rational thinking and overrides adequate decision making. Duh. What a concept! You knew that, of course, and you would not make the mistake of worrying about outcomes or of getting aroused in expectation of money you may be getting in the future.
You have noticed, we are not talking about Poker anymore. The word 'money' alone is a crank you can use to drive the best of us crazy with. I don't mean crisp bank notes. No. The associations each one of us comes up with involuntarily, when the issue of money enters the thought process, are clouding our rational mind. Our fears, hopes, dreams, and traumatic experiences easily dominate the moment. Collective fears--about the recession for instance, expressed in the media or at the water cooler--may affect us more than the recession itself.
Pleasant emotions about the expectation of huge piles of future dough and uncomfortable money-related emotional states are equally distracting. To be exact, it hardly matters whether you think of money as a past experience, as your current situation, or as a future event. Further, it is of little consequence if you feel positively or in negative terms about money.
The fact THAT you are permitting yourself to react to money with ANY emotional state renders every single undertaking less productive and less profitable.
Our emotional responses to money are similar to our reaction to mom. When you are at a critical point of negotiating an important business transaction or you are being interviewed for your dream job, the last thing you desire is for your mother to pop in. Well, unless something went awry with you in the distant past.
Loving your mom or mammon has nothing to do with this phenomenon. It's not about losing interest in money or in spending time with dear old mom. On the contrary, and as you may recall it's not even about mom or money. The money--and your mom--IN YOUR HEAD must respect boundaries. Just as listening to your mother's chatter about her experience at the hair salon can't possibly improve your game at the card table, the voices in your head chattering away about money need to shut up!
While you are working on the suicide clutch of your 1948 Harley-Davidson Panhead, it is incredibly dumb to be in tatters over your financial situation. Are we finally agreeing with each other? Now, while you are working on ANYTHING, it is advisable to leave your stupid emotions aside.
You cannot make decent money while thinking about money and worse, while being bullied or lured into a corner by your money-induced emotions.
I know, I have said the same thing over and over again, but in this case redundancy was necessary. Why? Because you and I, we both have allowed the occasional meddling of money-baggage and money-hype with our work that we should have solely focused on. You haven't? Good for you. Most of us are guilty of having done so too often and for too long.
Not being "emotionally involved in the results" of your business supports the purpose of a business to produce hefty profits. What is more important to you, your silly emotions or profit? In all likelihood you can't have both. We cannot be happy if we permit emotions to run our lives, and we can't succeed financially when we give our emotions the upper hand in business decisions.
Whatever you are feeling as far as money is concerned is poisonous for the actual making of money. As paradoxical as this idea may look to you, it is simplifying life.
Just work!
No painful worries are wearing you down. No addictive hopes are lifting you up to fake highs until natural boom-and-bust cycles are tossing you back into the ditch of--equally artificial--hopelessness.
Do what you know best. You will live through times with a bunch of money. Relatively speaking, that is. And it is probable that you will be experiencing times with relatively little income. Not everybody goes from a small income to a large one over the decades and fortunately, not everyone drops from lofty monetary highs to pitiful lows. Realistically, both versions can happen to any of us. Whatever it will be for you, you'll fare better leaving your damn emotions out of the equation.
Work. And enjoy your work. Especially if and when you hate it.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: My new book 'How to Better Hate Your Job' is rebellious in its nature. Who would have thought! A provocative perspective on employment, work, and money. Go get your copy!
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
niche
In my new book 'How to Better Hate Your Job' I advocate the exploitation of things you hate, for fun and profit. What does that mean? Isn't it more profitable to do what I love? Shouldn't I concentrate on activities I love just because love feels better? And anyway, isn't love morally superior to hatred?
Instead of filling another useless book with the futile attempt of a dissatisfying answer, I shall give you two practical examples of individuals whose lives are clearly expressing how enjoyment and--if you so desire--monetary gain can be derived from subjects you did NOT like so much, originally.
We talk about freedom a great deal, but since freedom is not expensive--it's free, in fact, unless you live in Russia or in South Korea (South, you read that correctly, where blogging the wrong thing can get you arrested)--we don't value freedom as much as we could.
Half the nation complains that something they hated has been taken away from them?! We hate our jobs, but we demand not to be deprived of what we hate. Hey, don't give the subject of our hatred to people in developing markets. The stuff we hate is still too precious to be wasted on desperate people in China and Vietnam. They deserve worse than that. Individuals in India may love what we hate, and that is a clear sign our hated jobs are still too good for them.
Looks to me that the only thing we love about our work is the absence of individualism and freedom! At least 87% of employees hate their jobs, but the truly disturbing news is that they seem to hate their own individuality MORE. I am wrong? Of course, I am wrong: we bring the kids to soccer practice; we buy expensive rims; and we tattoo our asses to express how cool and individualistic we really are. Right, nobody else does that! You mean fashion equals individualism?
Apropos 'fashion:'
Enough ranting! Here are the examples I promised you. Nancy Judd used to work for the city of Santa Fe--the trash department, to be exact--wearing a furry blue "Carlos Coyote" costume and raising awareness for recycling in new Mexico (Wall Street Journal, Jan. 13th, 2009). She ran workshops and aired radio advertisements to get New Mexicans to recycle. And she hated that people weren't paying attention.
Today, Nancy Judd produces Dumpster Couture, "trashion." She crafts clothing from plastic bags, electrical wire, old cassette tapes, Obama campaign posters and fliers, glass shards, rusty nails, vinyl convertible tops, door hangers, etc. On Saturday, her work will be shown in Washington at the Green Inaugural Ball honoring President-elect Barack Obama.
Ms. Judd cannot sketch. She has no training in fashion. She gets her design ideas from old paper dolls. She solved the problem of making a saucy cocktail dress from a shower curtain.
Nancy refuses to make money with her work, even though she could: she markets her stuff as educational tools, illustrating problems with solid waste and raising awareness through instructive art exhibits (shown at the Pittsburgh Airport, for instance).
The creation of a single piece has taken her as long as 200 to 400 hours of work!
Now, I am asking you, can you see hatred, passion, fun, yes and even your damn love, profit potential, and above all: individuality in the mix?
Next case, Gilbert Kaplan (source: The Economist, November 2008), an economist and former publisher of a newsletter for investors, analysts, and money managers: In 1965, he heard Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 2 in c minor, the "Resurrection" for the first time, and he just found himself "sobbing, absolutely hysterical."
Mr. Kaplan, a perfectionist, wasn't pleased with the way professional conductors interpreted Mahler's work. He didn't like Leonard Bernstein out-mahlering Mahler, for example. Kaplan had no tolerance for conductors overruling or ignoring Mahler's meticulous instructions, while caring more for their own egos.
Ergo, Gilbert Kaplan began conducting Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 2 himself! I believe, he does not conduct anything else. Mr. Kaplan has dedicated the last 40 years to conducting this one symphony. A nut? Probably, in the eyes of many. But with a sober scholarly approach, this bloody amateur and unskilled dreamer is now acknowledged as the leading technical authority on Mahler's 2nd symphony.
Meanwhile, Kaplan has conducted ensembles at La Scala in Milan, Munich, Vienna, and opened the prestigious Salzburg festival. He gave Mahler's work its Chinese premiere in Beijing. His recording has outsold Bernstein, Pierre Boulez, Claudio Abbado, and everybody else's. On December 8th, 2008, Mr. Kaplan conducted the New York Philharmonic 100 years to the date after Mahler, with the same orchestra, conducted the American premiere of this piece.
Gilbert Kaplan has done something that Gustav Mahler failed to accomplish himself: he diverted public attention away from the morbidity of some of Mahler's music. Thanks largely to Kaplan, Mahler's image as a "composer of doom" has been put to rest.
We crave to be so damn creative, but we easily miss the simplicity and the genius of the "Kaplan approach." The man has not invented anything. He has doggedly studied something that exists already. Plus, he absorbed every note, letter, and detail of and about Mahler and this particular piece of music. That alone is an invention, and Gilbert Kaplan changed history.
I don't think Mr. Kaplan sat down one day, thinking what he could do or how he could make more money. He had NO CHOICE. He had to do what he has spent the last four decades on, dictated by his passion. He didn't ask his cousin whether it would be a good idea to pick up conducting Mahler. EVERY cousin and well-meaning friend would tell you "NO!" Don't do such a foolish thing!
There is NO motivation for you to be passionate and free, to do what you can't not do, and to be the individual you are. I am convinced every single human being is a damn genius in at least one particular field. And not a single one of us is too dense or too dull to figure out what the hell that individual genius department may be.
And the best of all: there is no how-to manual available or necessary for you to be the individual you are and to enjoy your freedom to the max.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: Hey, buy my book 'How to Better Hate Your Job.' It's about time, and I'll be glad you did!
Instead of filling another useless book with the futile attempt of a dissatisfying answer, I shall give you two practical examples of individuals whose lives are clearly expressing how enjoyment and--if you so desire--monetary gain can be derived from subjects you did NOT like so much, originally.
We talk about freedom a great deal, but since freedom is not expensive--it's free, in fact, unless you live in Russia or in South Korea (South, you read that correctly, where blogging the wrong thing can get you arrested)--we don't value freedom as much as we could.
Half the nation complains that something they hated has been taken away from them?! We hate our jobs, but we demand not to be deprived of what we hate. Hey, don't give the subject of our hatred to people in developing markets. The stuff we hate is still too precious to be wasted on desperate people in China and Vietnam. They deserve worse than that. Individuals in India may love what we hate, and that is a clear sign our hated jobs are still too good for them.
Looks to me that the only thing we love about our work is the absence of individualism and freedom! At least 87% of employees hate their jobs, but the truly disturbing news is that they seem to hate their own individuality MORE. I am wrong? Of course, I am wrong: we bring the kids to soccer practice; we buy expensive rims; and we tattoo our asses to express how cool and individualistic we really are. Right, nobody else does that! You mean fashion equals individualism?
Apropos 'fashion:'
Enough ranting! Here are the examples I promised you. Nancy Judd used to work for the city of Santa Fe--the trash department, to be exact--wearing a furry blue "Carlos Coyote" costume and raising awareness for recycling in new Mexico (Wall Street Journal, Jan. 13th, 2009). She ran workshops and aired radio advertisements to get New Mexicans to recycle. And she hated that people weren't paying attention.
Today, Nancy Judd produces Dumpster Couture, "trashion." She crafts clothing from plastic bags, electrical wire, old cassette tapes, Obama campaign posters and fliers, glass shards, rusty nails, vinyl convertible tops, door hangers, etc. On Saturday, her work will be shown in Washington at the Green Inaugural Ball honoring President-elect Barack Obama.
Ms. Judd cannot sketch. She has no training in fashion. She gets her design ideas from old paper dolls. She solved the problem of making a saucy cocktail dress from a shower curtain.
Nancy refuses to make money with her work, even though she could: she markets her stuff as educational tools, illustrating problems with solid waste and raising awareness through instructive art exhibits (shown at the Pittsburgh Airport, for instance).
The creation of a single piece has taken her as long as 200 to 400 hours of work!
Now, I am asking you, can you see hatred, passion, fun, yes and even your damn love, profit potential, and above all: individuality in the mix?
Next case, Gilbert Kaplan (source: The Economist, November 2008), an economist and former publisher of a newsletter for investors, analysts, and money managers: In 1965, he heard Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 2 in c minor, the "Resurrection" for the first time, and he just found himself "sobbing, absolutely hysterical."
Mr. Kaplan, a perfectionist, wasn't pleased with the way professional conductors interpreted Mahler's work. He didn't like Leonard Bernstein out-mahlering Mahler, for example. Kaplan had no tolerance for conductors overruling or ignoring Mahler's meticulous instructions, while caring more for their own egos.
Ergo, Gilbert Kaplan began conducting Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 2 himself! I believe, he does not conduct anything else. Mr. Kaplan has dedicated the last 40 years to conducting this one symphony. A nut? Probably, in the eyes of many. But with a sober scholarly approach, this bloody amateur and unskilled dreamer is now acknowledged as the leading technical authority on Mahler's 2nd symphony.
Meanwhile, Kaplan has conducted ensembles at La Scala in Milan, Munich, Vienna, and opened the prestigious Salzburg festival. He gave Mahler's work its Chinese premiere in Beijing. His recording has outsold Bernstein, Pierre Boulez, Claudio Abbado, and everybody else's. On December 8th, 2008, Mr. Kaplan conducted the New York Philharmonic 100 years to the date after Mahler, with the same orchestra, conducted the American premiere of this piece.
Gilbert Kaplan has done something that Gustav Mahler failed to accomplish himself: he diverted public attention away from the morbidity of some of Mahler's music. Thanks largely to Kaplan, Mahler's image as a "composer of doom" has been put to rest.
We crave to be so damn creative, but we easily miss the simplicity and the genius of the "Kaplan approach." The man has not invented anything. He has doggedly studied something that exists already. Plus, he absorbed every note, letter, and detail of and about Mahler and this particular piece of music. That alone is an invention, and Gilbert Kaplan changed history.
I don't think Mr. Kaplan sat down one day, thinking what he could do or how he could make more money. He had NO CHOICE. He had to do what he has spent the last four decades on, dictated by his passion. He didn't ask his cousin whether it would be a good idea to pick up conducting Mahler. EVERY cousin and well-meaning friend would tell you "NO!" Don't do such a foolish thing!
There is NO motivation for you to be passionate and free, to do what you can't not do, and to be the individual you are. I am convinced every single human being is a damn genius in at least one particular field. And not a single one of us is too dense or too dull to figure out what the hell that individual genius department may be.
And the best of all: there is no how-to manual available or necessary for you to be the individual you are and to enjoy your freedom to the max.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: Hey, buy my book 'How to Better Hate Your Job.' It's about time, and I'll be glad you did!
Saturday, January 10, 2009
loaded and useless
Who cares about becoming a millionaire?
Millionaires are too common: now, you can find self-help books promising to get you on the road toward ending up a billionaire. Oh my Gawd, how intimidating! Last title I looked into explained thoroughly how to save $1,000 when you purchase your next car. You buy a million cars and you have saved a billion bucks. Everybody can do that! What?!
Call me a sucker. For the past 35 years I have read a plethora of get-rich material, nearly a thousand books filled with money-making, success inducing snake oil. Everything I have read could be condensed to a 25 page manual if you want to waste that much paper.
You don't get rich with that type of nonsense, but it used to be somewhat entertaining. I can't help it, I am merely bored out of my skull reading such garbage today. Mostly it is recycled waste from the 1970s and '80s. What idiot does one have to be to entertain the goal 'millionaire' or 'billionaire,' anyway? As if that had a quality just by itself.
Please do understand me: I have nothing against billionaires! People do what they want to do and they end up in the money, preferably lots of it. Fine! Absolutely fantastic and I have respect for a bunch of them. Please understand me again correctly: I do not respect individuals for the heaps of money they have accumulated. I respect them--if I do--for the character they have and for certain things they have done. Their money is almost meaningless. I am glad it's there but that is that.
On the other hand, desperately trying to make money no matter what, in order to call yourself millionaire or billionaire is as empty as anything can be. Such folks are living--do they, really?--breathing pathetic jokes.
The question is not 'what to do to become a millionaire,' but why?
To be better off? To buy yourself out of the trouble you are in now? To gain freedom you don't experience today? To feel more relaxed? To be less depressed and more happy? To end discomfort and tension?
On January 5th, a German billionaire, Adolf Merckle, threw himself under a train and successfully committed suicide. "I am sorry," said the note he left behind for his wife. In 2007, Mr. Merckle was No. 44 on the Forbes list of the world's wealthiest people.
On sunny days he rode his ancient bicycle to work, and when it rained he drove his VW Rabbit. He employed about 100,000 people, supported a Leukemia charity, he collected supermarket stamps, and returned empty bottles for the deposit.
I am sure a lot of billionaire wannabes dream of returning their empty water bottles to the grocery store for a nickel each, once they get rich. Get-rich-quick aspirants can't wait to enjoy their daily commute to work on their rusty bicycles. And when they get home after a 16-hour work day, they are checking their local rag for coupons.
Hey, I am not making this up! This was the REALITY of a 74 year old billionaire until last week. It differs a bit from what those who haven't made it yet expect from the typical billionaire life style, doesn't it? And then, there is something else that separates insipid money dreams from the facts:
There is no sum of money large enough to protect you from yourself!
One dead billionaire should be sufficient proof for you that money will never buy you out of feeling sorry for yourself. Tension, problems, the emotional roller-coaster we all know too well--all these experiences and challenges may very well be related to monetary issues, but we cannot solve them by throwing enough dollars at our problems. We can't.
Financial salvation is a childish dream. The sooner we realize that, the easier it is to make money and to enjoy it for what it is. Currency is useful to purchase goods and services with. That's it. It cannot fulfill dreams. Cash is a bad pacifier and money is certainly a cruel people-pleaser.
Adolf Merckle was a wussy. He was not a billionaire I have respect for. Adolf M. was the same type of shit weasel like those who wait for more money to end their "unbearable" situation, so that they can enter "financial independence.". Five bucks an hour or $40 billion dollars of annual revenue. What's the damn difference if you can't stomach the tension that comes with life, naturally?
You know, there are billionaire dorks. And for each dorky billionaire, there are millions of dorks eager to get there as well. That's great and I am thrilled you are not one of those people! It is helpful and clarifying, though, to see it from time to time.
Once more: I am not making fun of or writing against having oodles of money. On the contrary, money is fine ... as long as you don't lose yourself in it or die for its cause.
Do what you want, baby, even if you hate it!
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: Oh, and buy my damn book 'How to Better Hate Your Job.' I promise, I'll be glad you did!
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
question and answer: 'slaves'
A reader asked me, "So, Mr. Sukop, you say that people hate their jobs and are slaves to the system, what exactly do you suggest they do in this down-turned economy?"
Firstly, I did NOT say that employees 'are slaves to the system.' Modern wage slavery is voluntary, and those who spend good portions of their lives with activities they despise are slaves to their own perceived lack of options. There is no 'system,' no conspiracy, that deviously demands submission from those who want to make a living.
Employees, unhappy with their status quo, settled for long term misery before our current economical challenges became obvious, and they will do the same during and after. I don't have the right answers for my own life, and I certainly cannot tell anybody else what they should or should not do.
With one exception: if you choose employment, you better make damn sure you are happy with your choice. You owe it to yourself to enjoy what you do, the parts you like AND the annoying details.
If you happen to be employed and employment is not your first choice, then establish a business parallel to your hopefully temporary employment. Enjoy the freedom of trial and error under the umbrella of relative job safety and its benefits.
It doesn't matter whether you start trading goods, manufacturing gizmos, or if you offer a service: when you ask 'what exactly do you suggest they do,' I have one definite answer. You must get used to the idea of SELLING the goods or services you choose to deal with, FOR MONEY. If you don't want to do that, it doesn't matter what you do. If you are indeed willing to do that, it also hardly matters what exactly you choose to do.
Unless you are motivated by immense pressure, don't quit your hated job until you know what alternative HAS PROVEN to work for you financially.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: Have you bought my book yet? It's about time you do: 'How to Better Hate Your Job.'
Firstly, I did NOT say that employees 'are slaves to the system.' Modern wage slavery is voluntary, and those who spend good portions of their lives with activities they despise are slaves to their own perceived lack of options. There is no 'system,' no conspiracy, that deviously demands submission from those who want to make a living.
Employees, unhappy with their status quo, settled for long term misery before our current economical challenges became obvious, and they will do the same during and after. I don't have the right answers for my own life, and I certainly cannot tell anybody else what they should or should not do.
With one exception: if you choose employment, you better make damn sure you are happy with your choice. You owe it to yourself to enjoy what you do, the parts you like AND the annoying details.
If you happen to be employed and employment is not your first choice, then establish a business parallel to your hopefully temporary employment. Enjoy the freedom of trial and error under the umbrella of relative job safety and its benefits.
It doesn't matter whether you start trading goods, manufacturing gizmos, or if you offer a service: when you ask 'what exactly do you suggest they do,' I have one definite answer. You must get used to the idea of SELLING the goods or services you choose to deal with, FOR MONEY. If you don't want to do that, it doesn't matter what you do. If you are indeed willing to do that, it also hardly matters what exactly you choose to do.
Unless you are motivated by immense pressure, don't quit your hated job until you know what alternative HAS PROVEN to work for you financially.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: Have you bought my book yet? It's about time you do: 'How to Better Hate Your Job.'
Sunday, January 4, 2009
parrot job
Questions for you:
Do you wish to get yelled at? Are you eager to work for a crooked employer whose standards of integrity are a couple of notches below yours? Is it fun for you to defend flawed products? Will it be entertaining for you to upset people all day, every day? Do you enjoy feeling sorry, for yourself and for those who yell at you? Can boredom provide you with a better sense of fulfillment and meaning than happiness?
If you answered one or more questions with 'Yes,' you should demand from your favored politicians to bring all outsourced slave jobs back into the U.S.. You don't deserve better than to get what you ask for. Perhaps I should explain myself ...
Yesterday I talked to a few extremely friendly Kodak employees who are populating a yell center in India, about a brand new camera that never worked. Koduck's consumer friendly customer policy states that they will try to repair the garbage we buy from them. If their bungleware can't be repaired, they will generously send us a refurbished model, out of the goodness of their hearts. In other words, they never really owe their customers a new camera. With the help of an army of nice and underpaid folks in India, Koduck gets away with giving us crap for scrap, while charging the full retail price.
Everyone I talked to--and their supervisors--appeared to understand my perspective. They would be pissed off as well if they had to accept a used, refurbished item after paying for a new one. All of them expressed how sorry they were and apologized profusely for the messed up company they work for.
As resource for their answers, they seemed to access approximately a hundred vaguely related phrases. The same phrases were randomly repeated in an endless loop. I could still be talking to them and hear the same things, and they would continue to be friendly. Marvelous! One day, all those outsourced jobs will be re-outsourced (outside our species) from India to a special breed of parrots.
I said all this to say: for all of you who still believe in Tom Peters' long debunked excellence myth, some companies outsource their dirtiest jobs because not enough Americans care to guard corporate garbage heaps anymore. Especially not when you get compensated only with an excellent kick in the pants.
Neither do U.S. citizens stand in line to work on gorgeous 140 degree Fahrenheit summer days in Arizona to trim palm trees while breathing dust and cutting up their hands. More or less legal Mexicans are sort of reverse outsourcerers, and they are not here because they are criminals but because there is an economic vacuum they are willing to fill.
The question is not 'How can your job be protected from unChristian Indians or illegal Mexicans?' The real questions: why are you such a masochist that you are willing to mobilize the world to continue your own misery? Why are you too lazy to find something that does not insult your intelligence? You make sure your husband goes to jail if he beats you, but you demand to be abused and exploited on a sorry job for life?
If you feel your job is somehow threatened by your employer who ogles the outsourcing option or who might replace you with a damn immigrant, your job is not obsolete:
You are.
You sure you are taking the proper medication?
It's not about outsourcing or the threat of illegal immigration, and those who fear it or fight it have something wrong with their heads. Are we all going bananas? Mindless journalists pretend to bemoan the loss of jobs. Mindless politicians proudly brag about the creation of jobs. Mindless readers and voters worry about or hope for jobs.
The thought that creeps through my warped mind is that NOT one of the people who decry outsourced jobs would actually want to have one if they were immediately returned and delivered to their doorstep. NOT one of those dillweeds who'd love to call the governmental pest control on all Mexicans would be eager to take over an immigrant's crappy job. The cry for jobs sounds to me like a hypocrite's last yelp.
Jobs.
Media, politicians, and unions freely use the term as if it had a value per se. More is good and less is naturally bad. We want more jobs! Why? Not all jobs are created equal. Government jobs, for example, are not productive. I guess that's why the government is the largest employer in the country. People feel good about not being productive. Making money is evil, while taking money from those who make it is morally superior. Come again?
Anyway, non-governmental jobs are not all productive, but outside the government you can find employees who do create value with their work. You can also find jobs that destroy more value than the most productive job can generate. Ask your banker, how. It's rather idiotic to assume that an unspecified glob of jobs is homogeneous and worth being prayed to and for.
Interesting that job security exists in reverse proportion of a job's productivity. The more profitable you are for your boss, the easier you may find yourself sacked. Um, let's not even go into the corporate fairytale of performance and its deeper lack of meaning.
If 'a job' stands for one and the same thing by definition, what might that be? I have thought long and hard about that issue for the last three minutes, and the common denominators I came up with are mainly two:
Jobs suck and secondly, those who occupy a job feel underpaid.
Jobs suck: 87% of Americans openly admit hating their jobs. Consider the number of weasels who won't tell and you get dangerously close to 99%. Now, most jobs may not be awful as such. The reprehensible elements are added by a loud, gray, or otherwise unpleasant environment, back stabbing colleagues, mind numbing policies, head banging decisions, commuting, unreasonable customers and yes, blood boiling boredom. And, let's not forget daily stress over seeing one's life slip away. Precious minutes we could use for fun and profit ... even for meaningful things.
Low pay: How many people do you personally know who have complained to you about excessive compensation?
Jobs are voluntarily pursued by people who don't see another option. Similarly, senate majority leader Harry Reid believes America has a voluntary tax system, but I must warn you before you try out Option B. In general, jobs are chosen by those who aren't aware of a different choice, and the dividing line between employment and slavery is damn thin.
Sure, employees may choose where they want to live--unless their company suggests they move--they don't get raped (at least not sexually) or flagellated, and a bunch of human rights apply—including the Right to Work. But, plenty of employees are being told EXACTLY what to say and what not to utter, what to do and what not to do under any circumstances. The major difference between slavery and the world of jobs is (insufficient) monetary compensation.
Today, individuals voluntarily sell themselves into partial and temporary slavery for a wage or a salary. Jobs are the contemporary equivalent of slavery.
And I am having a hell of a difficult time comprehending why more slaves than "owners" move mountains to protect current forms of slavery, and calls for the abolishment of employment would be considered the devil's work.
I am afraid, freedom, individuality, and creativity aren't valued highly by us and by the school teachers' union, as long as we can have a job.
Historically, everything that works has been built on a flawed past, on trial and error. Evolution happens to operate that way. America is a nation of bunglers, of people who are willing to try and fail repeatedly. The alternative to covet a secure job is not to be scared of making mistakes and of making mistakes frequently. Hardly anything is as productive as the willingness to make mistakes and yes, the freedom to even repeat the same mistakes until we get it right.
Scary? Of course it is. But your mistakes can never be as scary and disastrous as mistakes your governments and your employers are making for you and with you.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: Go in peace and buy my damn book 'How to Better Hate Your Job.'
P.P.S.: Now!
Do you wish to get yelled at? Are you eager to work for a crooked employer whose standards of integrity are a couple of notches below yours? Is it fun for you to defend flawed products? Will it be entertaining for you to upset people all day, every day? Do you enjoy feeling sorry, for yourself and for those who yell at you? Can boredom provide you with a better sense of fulfillment and meaning than happiness?
If you answered one or more questions with 'Yes,' you should demand from your favored politicians to bring all outsourced slave jobs back into the U.S.. You don't deserve better than to get what you ask for. Perhaps I should explain myself ...
Yesterday I talked to a few extremely friendly Kodak employees who are populating a yell center in India, about a brand new camera that never worked. Koduck's consumer friendly customer policy states that they will try to repair the garbage we buy from them. If their bungleware can't be repaired, they will generously send us a refurbished model, out of the goodness of their hearts. In other words, they never really owe their customers a new camera. With the help of an army of nice and underpaid folks in India, Koduck gets away with giving us crap for scrap, while charging the full retail price.
Everyone I talked to--and their supervisors--appeared to understand my perspective. They would be pissed off as well if they had to accept a used, refurbished item after paying for a new one. All of them expressed how sorry they were and apologized profusely for the messed up company they work for.
As resource for their answers, they seemed to access approximately a hundred vaguely related phrases. The same phrases were randomly repeated in an endless loop. I could still be talking to them and hear the same things, and they would continue to be friendly. Marvelous! One day, all those outsourced jobs will be re-outsourced (outside our species) from India to a special breed of parrots.
I said all this to say: for all of you who still believe in Tom Peters' long debunked excellence myth, some companies outsource their dirtiest jobs because not enough Americans care to guard corporate garbage heaps anymore. Especially not when you get compensated only with an excellent kick in the pants.
Neither do U.S. citizens stand in line to work on gorgeous 140 degree Fahrenheit summer days in Arizona to trim palm trees while breathing dust and cutting up their hands. More or less legal Mexicans are sort of reverse outsourcerers, and they are not here because they are criminals but because there is an economic vacuum they are willing to fill.
The question is not 'How can your job be protected from unChristian Indians or illegal Mexicans?' The real questions: why are you such a masochist that you are willing to mobilize the world to continue your own misery? Why are you too lazy to find something that does not insult your intelligence? You make sure your husband goes to jail if he beats you, but you demand to be abused and exploited on a sorry job for life?
If you feel your job is somehow threatened by your employer who ogles the outsourcing option or who might replace you with a damn immigrant, your job is not obsolete:
You are.
You sure you are taking the proper medication?
It's not about outsourcing or the threat of illegal immigration, and those who fear it or fight it have something wrong with their heads. Are we all going bananas? Mindless journalists pretend to bemoan the loss of jobs. Mindless politicians proudly brag about the creation of jobs. Mindless readers and voters worry about or hope for jobs.
The thought that creeps through my warped mind is that NOT one of the people who decry outsourced jobs would actually want to have one if they were immediately returned and delivered to their doorstep. NOT one of those dillweeds who'd love to call the governmental pest control on all Mexicans would be eager to take over an immigrant's crappy job. The cry for jobs sounds to me like a hypocrite's last yelp.
Jobs.
Media, politicians, and unions freely use the term as if it had a value per se. More is good and less is naturally bad. We want more jobs! Why? Not all jobs are created equal. Government jobs, for example, are not productive. I guess that's why the government is the largest employer in the country. People feel good about not being productive. Making money is evil, while taking money from those who make it is morally superior. Come again?
Anyway, non-governmental jobs are not all productive, but outside the government you can find employees who do create value with their work. You can also find jobs that destroy more value than the most productive job can generate. Ask your banker, how. It's rather idiotic to assume that an unspecified glob of jobs is homogeneous and worth being prayed to and for.
Interesting that job security exists in reverse proportion of a job's productivity. The more profitable you are for your boss, the easier you may find yourself sacked. Um, let's not even go into the corporate fairytale of performance and its deeper lack of meaning.
If 'a job' stands for one and the same thing by definition, what might that be? I have thought long and hard about that issue for the last three minutes, and the common denominators I came up with are mainly two:
Jobs suck and secondly, those who occupy a job feel underpaid.
Jobs suck: 87% of Americans openly admit hating their jobs. Consider the number of weasels who won't tell and you get dangerously close to 99%. Now, most jobs may not be awful as such. The reprehensible elements are added by a loud, gray, or otherwise unpleasant environment, back stabbing colleagues, mind numbing policies, head banging decisions, commuting, unreasonable customers and yes, blood boiling boredom. And, let's not forget daily stress over seeing one's life slip away. Precious minutes we could use for fun and profit ... even for meaningful things.
Low pay: How many people do you personally know who have complained to you about excessive compensation?
Jobs are voluntarily pursued by people who don't see another option. Similarly, senate majority leader Harry Reid believes America has a voluntary tax system, but I must warn you before you try out Option B. In general, jobs are chosen by those who aren't aware of a different choice, and the dividing line between employment and slavery is damn thin.
Sure, employees may choose where they want to live--unless their company suggests they move--they don't get raped (at least not sexually) or flagellated, and a bunch of human rights apply—including the Right to Work. But, plenty of employees are being told EXACTLY what to say and what not to utter, what to do and what not to do under any circumstances. The major difference between slavery and the world of jobs is (insufficient) monetary compensation.
Today, individuals voluntarily sell themselves into partial and temporary slavery for a wage or a salary. Jobs are the contemporary equivalent of slavery.
And I am having a hell of a difficult time comprehending why more slaves than "owners" move mountains to protect current forms of slavery, and calls for the abolishment of employment would be considered the devil's work.
I am afraid, freedom, individuality, and creativity aren't valued highly by us and by the school teachers' union, as long as we can have a job.
Historically, everything that works has been built on a flawed past, on trial and error. Evolution happens to operate that way. America is a nation of bunglers, of people who are willing to try and fail repeatedly. The alternative to covet a secure job is not to be scared of making mistakes and of making mistakes frequently. Hardly anything is as productive as the willingness to make mistakes and yes, the freedom to even repeat the same mistakes until we get it right.
Scary? Of course it is. But your mistakes can never be as scary and disastrous as mistakes your governments and your employers are making for you and with you.
Egbert Sukop
P.S.: Go in peace and buy my damn book 'How to Better Hate Your Job.'
P.P.S.: Now!
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