Searching for the end....
As each of us grow up we get exposed to what I can only describe as sturctured competition -- competition where the metrics of success or failure are clearly measurable. You either pass or you fail. You either come first or you don't. You win the game or you don't. But in each case, the metrics are clear. They are well defined. The amount of time is well defined.
Say for example a video game, you have a fixed number of lives, or a fixed amount of time to rescue the good guys and finish off the bad guys. If you do it you win. If you don't it is simply "Game Over". If only everything was that simple.
More and more after having gotten out of school, I've encountered things in which the metrics are not well defined. There is no clear marker to signify that yes, you're done. Because eveytime you reach that point, the markers moved a step further. A little harder, a little further, a little faster.
There have been key incidences which have helped to shape my outlook on competition. I am fiercely competitive -- not in sports or doing stupid things, not for just doing things which I say I would like to do, but fiercely competitive for things which I have personally committed to myself to do. The competition is internal. It's manifestation may or may not be external.
In sophomore year I was thinking a bit too much for my own good -- similar to what I'm probably doing these days. Thinking about things which most people probably think about at a later stage of their life than while they are in college. I got to the point there that I had to literally pull myself out of it and realize that the things I was thinking about had no easy answers and in order to be able to maintain any semblance of order in my life, what I had to do was create milestones... short steps -- the markers which signified that yes, this is done!
The first few markers were obiously academic - and in that effort I put in more time and more effort towards achiving those markers than I would ever want to again. Taking upto 78 units (26 credits in a single semester) and having absolutely no semblance of a life whatsoever. The next marker was to build a company -- that marker was passed as well and it just moved on to a new position.
The problem with the markers of personal and professional life is that they move to easily... they are redefined to esily. I guess that is why I am tempted to go back into a more structured environment of academia... where the goals are well defined and there is an end -- in most cases.
Say for example a video game, you have a fixed number of lives, or a fixed amount of time to rescue the good guys and finish off the bad guys. If you do it you win. If you don't it is simply "Game Over". If only everything was that simple.
More and more after having gotten out of school, I've encountered things in which the metrics are not well defined. There is no clear marker to signify that yes, you're done. Because eveytime you reach that point, the markers moved a step further. A little harder, a little further, a little faster.
There have been key incidences which have helped to shape my outlook on competition. I am fiercely competitive -- not in sports or doing stupid things, not for just doing things which I say I would like to do, but fiercely competitive for things which I have personally committed to myself to do. The competition is internal. It's manifestation may or may not be external.
In sophomore year I was thinking a bit too much for my own good -- similar to what I'm probably doing these days. Thinking about things which most people probably think about at a later stage of their life than while they are in college. I got to the point there that I had to literally pull myself out of it and realize that the things I was thinking about had no easy answers and in order to be able to maintain any semblance of order in my life, what I had to do was create milestones... short steps -- the markers which signified that yes, this is done!
The first few markers were obiously academic - and in that effort I put in more time and more effort towards achiving those markers than I would ever want to again. Taking upto 78 units (26 credits in a single semester) and having absolutely no semblance of a life whatsoever. The next marker was to build a company -- that marker was passed as well and it just moved on to a new position.
The problem with the markers of personal and professional life is that they move to easily... they are redefined to esily. I guess that is why I am tempted to go back into a more structured environment of academia... where the goals are well defined and there is an end -- in most cases.
posted by sneaker @ 8:15 AM
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