This is a piece I wrote some two years ago, a piece for my daughter before she was born. The reason I did this was because I felt that if something happened to me, I wanted her to have some idea as to who her father was, I wanted her to not be left wondering with nothing but the words of others. It is also where I began to actually connect with her, it made me think more heavily about who I am and what kind of parent I aim to be. It is also where I really started to connect with what I wrote. Perhaps there is some value in it for others too.

This is for the new tag #forthechildren

To Part Three

The Endless Conversation (part four)

Ever heard of happiness being in the now or be grateful for what you have? How can we live in the present or be grateful if we are continually chasing the future security for the very things we are meant to be enjoying and being thankful for as they are now? Not what they may or may not be or whether they are even there, damaged, destroyed or stolen tomorrow. As the saying goes: we don't know what we've got til its gone. This again suggests we will not move or pay attention until in pain.

When we are unattached we can see it clearly, hold it as it is and love it for what it is and, if we must, let it go cleanly having experienced it fully and being thankful for it. But this is not the way we generally work, if something we experience brings joy, we want to stretch it further, protect it, possess it. And when we think it is ours, we will hide it away, cover it up, save it. We become collectors. Even of people we say we care about. And if someone shows a little too much interest in what we hold, we will defend it, attack them and stake claim to what is 'rightfully' ours. Yet an uncomfortable question often remains unasked or ignored: These things we claim as ours, did we ever own them at all?

The things we enjoy we protect and the things that bring pain we avoid. We are encouraged to do what we want, but what we want seems to follow the trend lines of the group with which we identify. I asked students from different companies and fields what is their definition of success. The answers were both interesting and expected. At first each was unwilling to answer and all gave their first answer as: 'success is personal and unique'. Very uniform.

For each I asked a followup question: What are your indicators of success, how do you know you are successful? Each took a moment to think and came back with the first indicator being how they feel with their performance of the task and the following results. They went on to add things like feedback, reward, promotion, recognition, respect, advancement. And for each, to continually feel successful, progress in these areas would need to be made.

I know this isn't a very in-depth study and I don't think it will satisfy rigorous scientific evaluation for methodology, but it was quite uniform in response. What I find interesting is that the first indicator was an internal evaluation of the self in respect to process and result, all the rest were external. If our indicators for success rely on the opinions and judgments of others our definition of success is a lot less individual than we seem to think.

On top of that, requiring progress means a need for continual evaluation and advancement. More can always be added. It may be called feedback for a reason, the monster is insatiable. I then asked another question, if you feel successful yet all the external indicators say otherwise, are you successful? Again interesting results. All said that they would and it doesn't matter what others may think. I am doubtful but will take it at face value for now. How about you?

If our pay desire depends on meeting a boss, company or client expectation but to do so, we would have to perform our work in a less than personally successful manner, what would we do? Is it possible that our best work or the necessary work gets deferred to the will of an external indicator or to the cultural norms of a business? Do we begin to focus on what will get us noticed or a pay rise and promotion (the indicators of success) rather than the best work we can do? Are we able to fully question a system on which we depend for our income, social status, family security and the roof overhead or do we justify our behaviour because of them?

We are back to the problem about questioning society. We can't be objective because we are invested in particular outcomes. And when it comes to success, the indicators are often uniformly dictated and rated by the culture and society of the time. Even our own feelings of success may be learned and therefore not 'ours'. This means we will bend to its will because to do different will likely bring discomfort and feelings of failure from the societal standpoint.

So our personal feelings of success seem to be largely influenced by how our group judges success and we know that groups don't shift quickly. When we apply this to innovation and development, the value of something is more about the perception of value than real-world value. Most new products are geared toward the avoidance of pain and discomfort or marketing of them rather than the understanding or healing of the pain itself.

The entertainment industry comes to mind where massive amounts of money are generated but the value added to society may be negligible. This of course can be argued but you may have heard the quote asking: "What if the cure for cancer is trapped inside the mind of someone who can't afford an education? Instead, What if the cure was trapped inside the mind of someone highly educated but spends their hours throwing a digital candy pig at an angry viking farmer? Seems silly again, doesn't it?

I read somewhere that there were over 300,000 App companies and obviously many, many more developers within. With reportedly 2% of the companies making 50% of the profits, perhaps the market was a little saturated. Especially since one might question the differentiation between the apps and value of said differentiation when there were millions of apps already created that satisfy very similar needs.

At my gym, there are people that have different approaches to exercise. Some stretch a lot, some do cardio, some lift heavy weights, some use machines, some split their body part training days, some interval train and probably many other variations. Some of them, thankfully less than earlier it appears, only work their upper body with heavy weights. These people invest all of their time and energy (resources) into a section of their body that returns limited benefits in the practical world. Others however, apply many methods to all body parts and often randomise the training in order to never get too comfortable.

I am not sure, but without going too deeply into this here, one approach has a narrow view and application and one broadens potential body usage and perhaps offers wider practical benefits. My point might be that perhaps these highly educated app developers could spread their skills a little broader than currently. Perhaps we would micro pay for that.

Taraz

To Part Five

Perhaps you have heard some of this before, perhaps not but it is was a point where many ideas converged and a point from which many more sprang. This was almost a year before I joined Steemit and started to write. Some of my thoughts might have changed, many have stayed the same but, I do feel like I am growing and each day, becoming a better parent than I was yesterday. Feel free to comment and add your views. I will link the next tomorrow.