Emotional Attachment to One's Job -

I think we, ambitious, studious, people, try very hard (and earnestly believe) in the capacity for our jobs to be fulfilling.  After all, there are tons of Emotionally Fulfilled people out there doing jobs that seem rather fantastic.  Solving big problems.  Making lots of high level decisions.  Etc.

But over time, most of us, as a rule, simply see our jobs for what they are, and become less engaged with them.  We're "on the clock" and that's about it.  We want to be comfortable.  We want to be paid for it.  Etc.

It's Complicated

Simplification is nice, but often simplified elegance loses a lot of the necessary details to understand an experience, on the ground, step-by-step.  Of course, describing, in full detail, an entire experience is also tantamount to actually experiencing it, and as such, we who want to figure some stuff out conceptually before we actually participate in the stuff, have to find a way to get information that's neither too limited and not actionable, on one hand, or, on the other, so thick that it is impossible for us to differentiate signal from noise.

We basically need smarter people to tell us what's important.

And we need it bad.

Don't believe me?  Fine, go out and make your own mistakes.  But being bitter doesn't make anything better, trust me, and less ego earlier may lead to better results later.  Maybe.  I'm not sure.  See, I also know that assholes, i.e. those with high ego, may in fact have more courage to get what they want faster and with less shame than those with less ego and more concern for others.  At some level of decision  making and action, after all, we will run into the problem of competing interests.  It probably happens all the time.  Structural coordination that isn't highly efficient leaves loopholes for assholes to exploit and get ahead, and create more structural loopholes for their assholish behavior.  Fair doesn't cut it, in that world.  Knowing how many assholes are out there, and what their strategy is, and how to deal with it or undercut it, is much more effective, for instance, than muttering asshole under one's breath and losing a couple bucks/minutes in frustration.

I'm not advocating for assholes.  I am also not advocating for pure peace.  Simplification is an easy tool to let oneself become blinded, because it allows for post-hoc rationalization of everything and anything, and therefore, disallows learning, whether emotional or intellectual.  See, again, I'm forced to admit that learning is difficult because it is often times the place where waste happens unintentionally.

Damnit,

My bank account still reads only $313.12!  No magic jackpot!

Skin In The Game

Conceptual understanding is fine. It is, after all, most of what we do.  But it doesn't quite indicate how we would act if we had to navigate the parameters of our conceptions.  We chronically under-value lots of important stuff and over-value our own positions.  That's not new.  But actually having skin in the game, wherein decisions have some realizable impact, sure does change how we evaluate and act.  Which is interesting.  If individual conceptual understanding doesn't do a good job of showing what we'll actually do in a given situation, what does?  Forced skin.  Money on the line.  What have you.  That's the only real answer, as unappetizing as it might seem.

Living Life Better

It is a may be even cliched reasoning, but when we become autonomous and independent enough to make our own decisions, we, in one fell swoop of energy,  blossom, also, into the realization that those in charge of making decisions for our lives previously weren't quite as bad as we thought they were.

Or maybe I'm just telling an American story.  Maybe this story isn't so true in other countries.

Either way, it tells of our budding narcissism, even in, or especially in, youth, and I don't know what to do to change the patterns.

Everything is stereotype and real at once, and that is not a truth people want to acknowledge, or to repeat.  It is a complicated truth, instead, one that moves when you push on it.

Easy to . . .

Come up with complicated historical narratives for why and how things are fucked up (and how multifarious that fucked-up-ness is).

Much harder to carve out a positive and good-natured future existence.  Clean and honest and resolute.

Too easy to justify one's ego and indiscretions for an honest appraisal ever to get done, mostly.  That's the fundamental error in human reasoning, me thinks.  Wink.  Yes.  I'm flirting with you.