When you were young, what did you expect your life to become?
Granted, we aren't "meant to have expectations" as it only leads to disappointment and assumptions, and they are apparently dangerous. But from the eyes of the child unyet broken down by the pains of experience, I believe that most start to have a sense of what their life may become. They might not know exactly, exactly what will happen, or what career, but rather a general sense of the future. Will their life be good or bad, healthy or ill, happy or sad.
As a child, I never had a sense of what I might become and the only real sense I had of the future, was that I was likely going to have to do it on my own. As a young child, I faced a bit of a struggle socially and in the family and this caused me to be independent, even though that isn't part of my nature. Essentially, I had to overcome myself in order to be able to survive, because the environment wasn't suited to my kind of person. So my expectation was that if a person is to succeed, they have to do what it takes, even if conditions aren't favourable.
I feel I have never had favourable conditions.
Well, that is not completely true and I assume (dangerous remember) that everyone feels like this sometimes, but it was because every time life looked somewhat up, something dramatic happened to take it away, with most things being completely out of my control. Before I was an adult, I had the sense that life was conspiring against me, though logically and ideologically, I know this isn't the case, because "life" is blind, random, inconsiderate, because it doesn't care equally about anything.
The universe is unconscious.
What I thought as a child though was that whatever happens in life, I will be able to handle it and so far, this has been the case. Yet, what does "handle" mean - is it coping, survival, thriving? What are the boundary expectations of a "life worth living" and what happens when our living standards and wellbeing expectations are not close to met?
I question this because I think that everyone has some opinion about the way their life (and the life of others) should be at some level, and I don't think that most people feel completely fulfilled in the experience they are living. At least for me, I see a lot of apathy and avoidance, which I think is caused by the constant pressure and chaos that the world has become. Yes, some people shut it all out, but avoiding it doesn't take away the relationship.
What you resist, persists.
It takes energy to resist something, which is why so many of us suffer the costs of temptation when we do not have enough mental or emotional resources to deny ourselves. The obesity, depression and loneliness "epidemics" are lagging indicators of how our lives have degraded, even though from a technological level, we should be enjoying greater health, wealth, and wellbeing.
The other day, I was talking with friends about resilience and again, I somewhat disagreed with their position. They were saying that we should be "more resilient" with which I agree, but I also think that resilience has become an autoresponse conditioning that is made to convince us to do without, to do with less, to crush ourselves down and be happy with dwindling availability and opportunity. Yes, "happy with less" has value, but what I think is happening is a manipulation of the masses to drive more wealth and control into the hands of the few.
It is not new, it has been happening for decades, but with the advent of the internet and globalised corporations, it has been taken to unprecedented new heights and levels. A lot of children today have the lofty dream of being an "influencer" in the world, to be famous for being famous - the state of workless wealth as I have coined it in the past. Yet, think about that for a moment. When the majority is an influencer, who is being influenced? How many makeup tutorials can be viewed, how many models in bikinis, or men with sixpacks? There is a saturation point, and this is linked to the ability to consume. If everyone is selling products that have little supply chain, where is the money coming from to buy?
How resilient are we?
A couple of times I have mentioned ways to reformulate the global economy away from the US consumer mindset and policy of increasing debt to buy global control. The pushback on it is almost always the same, saying it won't happen because it is too disruptive. Yet, that very disruption is what is needed in order to make the world a better place, as the status quo is failing us all.
Yes, all.
Let's assume that global catastrophe happens and the majority of the population is destroyed, but the billionaires and their families retreat into their bunkers and underground cities and survive.
Is survival worth it?
I don't know many kids who think living confined in a bunker, unable to go to the surface due to radiation and contamination, living life as a prisoner, is a good life. The money might have kept the species alive, but is that something to be proud of, to celebrate, when the destruction itself is self-inflicted and avoidable?
It is avoidable.
Even the most pressing of issues, such as climate change is still able to be dealt with, But it cannot be adequately addressed in the status quo environment and economy we have, because to deal with it is going to be massively disruptive.
And this is the problem I have with resilience.
Because the people who generally claim resilience are the ones trying to hold onto what they have now, to make do in the current world, to avoid disruption. They don't have the resilience to embrace uncertainty and do what is necessary to change the world. Their resistance is flexible, it is rigid. They want to stay unchanged, they aren't antifragile. The pressure of change should grow us, not reduce us into a continually worse form of ourselves, where we are less skilled, less capable, less compassionate as humans.
We don't want resilience to maintain the status quo, we want the willingness to change.
Do you see the challenge?
We have conditioned our expectations to have a future similar to what we have now, when what we need is highly disruptive change that tears apart almost everything we have come to accept as the way it is. The economic policy and practices need to be adjusted so heavily, that the entire way our lives are structured will change and shift the supply chain to provide a different offering, a different experience. Our daily lives need to shift instead of trying to stay the same, because the conditions have changed since they were first set. We don't live in the same environment now, we have to adapt, we have to change, we have to grow.
Yet, those children of today looking to be influencers, are again looking to live in the world we had. One where profit at any cost is the mechanism used to drive all levels of decision making. Even though that mechanism, is exactly what has incentivised our behaviours and driven us to end up where we are as a society - collapsing. But it isn't their direct fault that they think like this, because they have been conditioned by the consumer model to behave and they are behaving exactly as expected.
They are not disruptive.
They are products of the status quo.
My life has not turned out as I had expected. I thought I would do better somehow than I have done, but I had no definition on what that would mean or look like. I wasn't clear in my projections and ass a result, the default life happened and here we are. But is it too late to make a significant change and pivot toward something meaningful? To become antifragile instead of resilient? To welcome disruption because that is what is needed right now?
Can I overcome myself again?
Taraz
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This perplexes me. You have so very much of what I deem success. You have tenacity, too! You made incredible adjustments after your stroke, so much so that I can't tell from your writings. You seem to me to be antifragile to the maximum. Did you expect to have more money? Too many of us gauge success by money, another topic altogether.
I could never have guessed the trajectory of my life while I was a child, teen, or college student. I thought I would get an advanced degree and go into academia, if I thought anything at all. While I do hold an advanced degree in mathematics, as soon as I got out of the education quagmire, I went into feeding people, and that was that. I did well, not extraordinarily well, but well enough to have retired (unexpectedly) at age 55.
I learned how to be open to other opportunities, one of my greatest strengths I believe. When disrupted, and I have experienced some very traumatic disruptions, instead of getting depressed that my near future was not what I had planned, I looked around for unconventional ways to navigate. I did things most people would not have done. I was willing to let my plans go, to see where that would take me. It worked very well.
I love someone who recently made a "bad" choice for his intended career. He got severely depressed about this. I suggested that perhaps his career was not really what would make him happiest, would make him feel successful. He is now happily considering a range of other occupations. All he needed to do was to let go of his lifelong plans. So was that "bad" choice really bad?
Never.
I think I expected to have less struggle. Times of ease and joy, rather than just constant grind to survive. It isn't that I have done badly, just not as I had hoped. I wish I could provide more for my family than I do, across many areas.
Was there a clear guiding force, or did it just happen?
It is the "letting go" that we mostly struggle with, right? This is what holds the status quo in place, because people don't want to lose what little they have, even if it means having more of something else more valuable.
One guiding force for many is that once you have had a job in a restaurant, it is easy to find employment everywhere you go. An incredible opportunity landed in my lap while I was looking for a job in computers programming. All I had to do was say "yes" when a the only restaurant I applied at called me in to wash dishes one night. And the rest is my history, up until age 55. My father may have asked me when I was going to get a real job until then, too. I didn't live up to his expectations. Maybe a lot of these traps are because we are trying to live up to someone else's expectations.
AND what causes the status quo option range to become narrower and narrower, until we are essentially slaves.
The sad thing is more and more adults aren't moving past that stage of thinking life isn't fair and they carry that with them for a long time. I am dealing with a person like that right now and it is mind numbing. You can't just tell them to get over it (even though you want to). Looking at it from the outside it's so obvious, and sad, but until they are willing to see that themselves they will never change.
Victimhood is in vogue these days: handouts, attention, sympathy and all that useless rot. I don't know what the attraction is myself, I'd much rather be independent and strong, to see myself as such. Unfairness is the most exciting part of life! Tell them to hug trees. That always cheers me up. I'm serious! I think it helps to open the mind,
Reading this, I think you might be right. There is something about being that close to nature that most people miss these days. Gardeners know it :)
As gardeners, we rule. Gardeners have to be a lot of things we do not allow ourselves to be in human relations, ruthless for one. We make all the plans we can, and still fail miserably at some of it. But that's OK! We either try again if it's very important, or shift to be more in tune with the conditions. Opportunities abound for the next year, and again for the year after that, into perpetuity. Great analogy!
What do you think it takes for the "average" person to see themselves?
If I could tell you I could fix so many people. I just asked my wife and she thinks a lot of it has to do with socializing and seeing others in their own peer group succeeding and having a different perspective.
I value you put out your story and where it has led you, however a question arises... We disrupt and then what? What guarantees a better outcome? This has happened many times in human history but the power struggle goes on and on. After the explosiveness the masses feel tired and seek some kind of comfort so they follow the ones who can provide, despite the ethical implications and the wheel keeps turning.
It's not expectation that leads us to disappointment, it's moving towards a desired outcome without paying attention to all the details and bits of information necessary to arrive there safely.
I'm not where I dreamed some time ago either but I'm closer and I have learned something valuable from constantly observing nature: the fastest fruit trees will give fruit in three years and just a few, a little taste. So in any process you embark on life you should know that by the laws of nature it will take you time. Three years at least to get a little taste of what you can get, 20 for the fruit to be falling off the tree without you even being able to consume it all.
It doesn't matter what kind of social system we have, Nature is fair and it's energy is distributed equally among us. People don't see it because they always look up to the elites and think they get everything instantly, but in truth those dynasties have been built for hundreds of years, across generations.
Anyways, I'm babbling, you know how the game is. I recommend reading Masanobu Fukuoka. He was able to produce more than the agroindustry just through understanding of Nature and community work.
To see disruption as opportunity!
I don't think Nature is fair. It is capricious, doesn't care if many creatures will suffer and which humans among us have the most money and things. Nature does correct inequities, over very long times, much longer than it takes a tree to produce an abundance of fruit. I like that metaphor, but would add that even if year 20 produces an abundance, year 21 might produce nothing at all.
You could have an example of one tree that produced nothing, yet most trees will, specially those that were pruned with care and the soil around them was fed.
I don't think there's any capriciousness on its behalf, rather many humans that don't understand it's patterns and have no patience to observe and learn. Humans usually chase the shiny lights and forget about the roots. Those who look at what grows in the depths (both literally and metaphorically) always find a way even if the circumstances are challenging. Those who just want to believe in what is easily seen are prone to be manipulated and managed like herd because most of it has been managed for millenia now. It's like the internet, if you consume what it gives you off the bat you'll just be put to sleep in the dream of eternal desire. If you search deeper you will gain knowledge and insights that can change your life for the better.
In my opinion, disruption is opportunity but mainly for the overlords as they have already lived that shit a million times and have protocol on how to take advantage of it.
Silently learning to detach from the system and returning to a more direct understanding of how our surroundings work so that we can cooperate for mutual benefits seems like a more lasting and powerful (r)evolution.
You know, I think you've hit a nail on the head here. Seems like those would be the people who would be more likely to feel like failures, because they would be less likely to see opportunities when things went "bad."
Yeah, though it's not easy either, I think we all go through that process from time to time
Nothing guarantees a better outcome. That is the point of uncertainty. the thing is, the current trajectory is guaranteed a bad outcome. There is no alternative without a hard pivot.
I don't think it has. It has just been "reset", not replaced.
Law of nature dictates this for sure. Yet, we are told only to care about the moment, and feeling good in it. It is a losing strategy, naturally.
Bad outcome isn't guaranteed either. But you know what would be interesting? To have a global forum where the goal is to see what all or most humans can agree on as the "good outcome". I wonder...
I think as a child, we are growing up with the expectations of what we want to become in the future. Many attimes we talk of becoming a doctor, nurse and engineers and some people talk about becoming astronaut. All these are shaped by our society anyway as we really can't become what we don't have around us or what people have done or the trends and paths people have go through.
I remember when I was younger, I also thought life would somehow work itself out, that if I just did the right things, everything would fall into place. But growing up taught me that life doesn’t always follow our expectations. I could relate to what you said about facing challenges and having to “handle” things even when the conditions aren’t favourable. Sometimes, it feels like resilience has become another word for just enduring pain instead of creating change. I like how you challenged that idea — it made me think about my own life and how I often settle instead of embracing real transformation. Most times, challenges and conditions are what make our expectations scattered, and we are not left to go on with life as we see it. Many of us find ourselves where we are today, not because it is what we want but what is available for us.
What do your students say about it? What do they want to be now?
And I think that these are two different animals, aren't they?
I finished highschool more than a decade ago. While in highschool, I had high hopes for my future. I envisioned myself finishing my undergraduate studies in time, also acquiring a second and third degree and becoming a famed academic figure in the society.
But fate wrecked all my wonderful plans. I suffered a medical condition in highschool that affected my psych and caused me lots of depression. Because of the condition, I had to relearn things I already knew how to do before. My dreams were brutally halted.
I just recently got my first degree. Most of my school mates have finished their doctorate. But I'm learning to accept things as they are. But I only accept things as they are when I've tried my best to make it work my way and failed.
"Brutal" is a good descriptor for it. I feel for you, truly. Even slight issues can have profound effects on us, so major things can just crush.
Congrats on your degree!
Thank you.
When we were young, when our teachers asked us what we wanted to be in the future, we would say without any knowledge that we wanted to be a doctor, an engineer, or an accountant. But no child ever said that they wanted to be an entrepreneur. But by the age of 16, we can start making plans to get to where we want to be in the future. But for that, it is very clear that we need to maintain good discipline. But behaving as we expect is not an easy task. Due to my lack of discipline, I also had to struggle with life from a young age and made many mistakes. I was unable to reach the level I had hoped for. Laziness, addiction, restlessness, and loneliness were the stressful situations that gripped me. Nowadays, most people do anything to survive.
This was about as close as I came to wanting to be "something" as a kid. Mostly because I didn't know what else I would be good at - so entrepreneur can be anything.
I think so too. But, is survival enough to warrant living?
Expectation reduces joy - I learned the bitter truth of life pretty early in life. So I never make any expectation . On the second count, i belive in destiny ...so whatever happened , happen for a reason. I knew many wont be agree with me...but to make a better life, we only do that makes sense and give the best in making it. The outcome is not in our hand but at least we can get the satisfaction of giving our best....
And this is what we should be doing in the now - all we can.
I wasn't expecting anything..... I realized early on, as a young man, that the problem is not me, the problem is this fake society that is programmed to move us in the wrong direction. 🤷♂️🧘
Aren't you part of society too?
No , and why ?
wait. is there wifi in the bunker?? :p
I am 51 now and just divorced. for me, I did the checklist.. married, kids, made a little money.. now its all roses for me!
Hive on!
What is next on the list?
😋🤔 let's see.. :P
When I was in school, I imagined my life would be happy, like a fairy tale. Then I came back down to earth a little. And at 30, I realized again: life is a wonderful fairy tale. Your photo in this post is very appropriate.
life is a fairytale - full of monsters and witches!
The photo is from sunset overlooking Dubrovnik :)
Expectations can be a double edged sword. It'll bring hope which is a good thing to have, that's why some don't give up, they have hope but it's also setting us up for hurt when reality hits and it's usually disappointing.
Hope is good, but action is better, isn't it?
It absolutely always is
I value you put out your story and where it has led you, however a question arises... We disrupt and then what? What guarantees a better outcome? This has happened many times in human history but the power struggle goes on and on. After the explosiveness the masses feel tired and seek some kind of comfort so they follow the ones who can provide, despite the ethical implications and the wheel keeps turning.
It's not expectation that leads us to disappointment, it's moving towards a desired outcome without paying attention to all the details and bits of information necessary to arrive there safely.
I'm not where I dreamed some time ago either but I'm closer and I have learned something valuable from constantly observing nature: the fastest fruit trees will give fruit in three years and just a few, a little taste. So in any process you embark on life you should know that by the laws of nature it will take you time. Three years at least to get a little taste of what you can get, 20 for the fruit to be falling off the tree without you even being able to consume it all.
It doesn't matter what kind of social system we have, Nature is fair and it's energy is distributed equally among us. People don't see it because they always look up to the elites and think they get everything instantly, but in truth those dynasties have been built for hundreds of years, across generations.
Anyways, I'm babbling, you know how the game is. I recommend reading Masanobu Fukuoka. He was able to produce more than the agroindustrial tactics just through understanding of Nature and community work.
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STOPI used to be a controlling person and believed I needed to take firm steps. I used to make plans for five or 10 years into the future. Would I enjoy it? Of course not. Then I gave up on that. I decided to live my life based on how I could savor the moment, the immediate future. I'm going to sleep in a few hours, and until then, I'm thinking about how I can be productive. I'm planning where I'll go tomorrow to find the most fun. My life right now is more enjoyable.