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andrewduckerI've recently been feeling conflicted about achievement. On the one hand, I despise the focus on success and achievement that pervades much of modern culture - the overwhelming push to be the best you can be, at the expense of actually enjoying life. On the other hand, while fulfilling someone else's criteria for success is completely pointless, feeling a sense of achievement at what you do seems to be vital for mental health and well-being.
Over the last while it seems that I've been too aware of the former, and not aware enough of the latter, rebelling against 'success' has left me feeling unsatisfied with myself.
So I've decided that I will _make_ myself do something productive on a regular basis, even if it kills me. When something annoys me I shall go and do something about it, and then share the results with others, making me feel better about the thing, better about myself, and like I'm helping other people.
First item - go look at GreaseMonkey and see how to make a small change to the way that LJ comments work...
Over the last while it seems that I've been too aware of the former, and not aware enough of the latter, rebelling against 'success' has left me feeling unsatisfied with myself.
So I've decided that I will _make_ myself do something productive on a regular basis, even if it kills me. When something annoys me I shall go and do something about it, and then share the results with others, making me feel better about the thing, better about myself, and like I'm helping other people.
First item - go look at GreaseMonkey and see how to make a small change to the way that LJ comments work...
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Date: 2006-01-07 08:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-07 09:21 pm (UTC)Fulfilling the corporate definition of success does very little for me most of the time, but there's something great about being able to say you've achieved a personal goal. I also find I cope better with external 'pressure to achieve' when I'm happy with my own personal productivity.
Translating that acknowledgement to an increase in productivity is another matter for me, however...
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Date: 2006-01-08 01:36 am (UTC)I'll stick with doing whatever makes me happy, which, it seems is working for a living, doing things that involve other people's deadlines in my extracurricular activities and reading as much as I can lay my hands on.
The "achievement" portion of this is meeting other people's deadlines for extracurricular activities. I think that's quirky, but .. on the other hand, there's a tangible "I did this, in time, yay me!" result which is very satisfying.
A daily deadline is best of all, but something regular is wonderful. Hence laying out a magazine in my spare time. Perfect.
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Date: 2006-01-08 11:35 am (UTC)Yeah, personal productivity is important. We can achieve much more of the things we feel good about achieving than we usually do. Let's try and do that.
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Date: 2006-01-09 10:39 am (UTC)Problem I have is getting round the arbitariness of my own choices of stuff to do.
Now, I really must must must plan and prep this nav course I am teaching for the next 3 months....
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Date: 2006-01-09 01:04 pm (UTC)Aaaah - I've found a simple solution - I've defined "worthwhile" as "stuff that gives me a sense of achievement to do it."
It may be circular, but as the required end result is "Andy feels happy", I'm fine with that!
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Date: 2006-01-09 06:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-10 10:08 am (UTC)I'm not being solipsist, I'm saying that trying to abstract my behaviour out to a description and then work out what I want from that description might not be the best way to discover what I want. And that trial and error, using some kind of instinctive heuristic based on induction rather than deduction, might be more effective.
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Date: 2006-01-10 10:12 am (UTC)