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Cobalt

Mar 11, ’23 10:34 PM

“The eldest, Peter, wore blue jeans, plastic slippers, and a red shirt with the letters AIG stitched on the front. Imagine that on a remote hill deep in the Congo’s mining provinces, a child can be found digging for cobalt, wearing a muddy shirt with the logo of the behemoth American financial services company that had to be bailed out for $180 billion during the 2008 financial crisis. Imagine what even 1 percent of that money could do in a place like this, if it were spent on the people who needed it, not stolen by those who exploited them.”

Cobalt Red by Siddharth Kara

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Crisis Management

Mar 24, ’18 2:10 PM

“Doba’s response to Gabriela’s concern about what he’d do in a crisis, if the closest land was the bottom, was to say there will be no crisis. He did not say this because he’s naïve. He said it because he has reimagined the concept of crisis, just as he has reimagined the concept of suffering. A crisis, in Doba’s worldview, is an opportunity for triumph. So Doba moves toward the crisis, just as he moves toward the suffering. By choosing it, he casts himself in the role of hero, not victim. He gives himself control.”

Why he Kayaked Across the Atlantic at 70 (for the third time), Elizabeth Weil, The New York Times

 

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“You are here”

Apr 11, ’11 7:16 PM

What if I left my job, packed my belongings, electronically disconnected, boarded a plane, explored the places I have always wanted to see … and then started again?

I recently received a copy of Timothy Butler’s book “Getting Unstuck – How Dead Ends Become New Paths.”  While I have only started reading it, the first chapter highlighted a few interesting passages that are worth repeating here.

Remaining Stuck: “… we are afraid of the dark.  We want to move in the sunshine, walk along familiar streets, and have experiences that are sure to give us pleasure.  We want to feel that most of life can be planned that we have a reasonable chance of avoiding pain.  The idea of staying with things just as they are, without a plan, of suspending our model of how things work, puts us at a frontier of unknowing, which is to say at a place that is “dark” to our previous conception of things, to our plan for ourselves and our notion of how everything works.  We avoid this dim frontier, and so we stay stuck.”

False Reasoning: “Sometimes we can’t help seeing impasse as failure, rather as a necessary crisis in the service of larger creative movement.  There is a danger of internalizing the experience of impasse as evidence of personal deficiency, as a statement about our self-worth. This can be painful.  We may need the help of a friend, coach, or counselor to reflect the reality of the situation back to us and remind us that this is a tough time and not a statement about who we are in the core of our being.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Mental Evolution IV (“Discovery”)

Dec 18, ’10 7:01 AM

After determining that what I was ultimately dealing with was a underlying belief of “learned helplessness” (pessimism), I decided to purchase Martin Seligman‘s book entitled “Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life.”  Within the first fifty pages of the book is a “test” that explores the degree of pessimism one possesses.  While the overall results were not surprising to me (“average” to “moderately pessimistic”), I found Seligman’s framework for understanding the degree of pessimism very interesting.

According to John Teasdale, Seligman’s colleague, the premise behind one’s degree of helplessness ultimately boils down to the manner in which one explains bad events; this is known as one’s explanatory style.  Seligman outlines three dimensions to one’s explanatory style:

  1. Permanence – How long does someone give up after failing?  Explanations that are more temporary in scope translates into increased resilience – i.e. “This failure is just a minor setback.  What’s next?”
  2. Pervasiveness – Does someone utilize universal or specific explanations for their failure(s)?  Those that employ a universal perspective for their failures give up on everything, while those that describe their failures using specifics can compartmentalize their failures in one area and progress naturally in others.
  3. Personalization – Does the individual blame themselves for their failures or the circumstances?  Those that internalize their failures tend to have a lower self-esteem than those who place blame on external circumstances.

Not surprisingly, the test is structured around these three dimensions.  Below is a more detailed view of my results:

Permanence – I have a tendency to think about bad things using extreme descriptors (always, never, etc.).  When good things happen, I tend to believe that these events are not long lasting, but they are also not necessarily fleeting.

Pervasiveness – I tend to believe that bad events have specific causes, and are thus not universal in breadth.  I also believe that good events enhance everything that I do.

Personalization – I fall in the middle of blaming myself and external circumstances for my failures.  However, when I believe that I cause good things to happen, my self-esteem is much higher than the average person.

Overall, when bad things occur, I’m moderately pessimistic and when good events occur, I am just the opposite.  If you guess that this is “average”, you are correct.  So, perhaps the problem of pessimism or “learned helplessness” isn’t to the degree that I had imagined – or is it?

When one experiences a stream of continuous failures, one’s ability to remain optimistic becomes more difficult.  While there are those that have “bulletproof” levels of optimism, I unfortunately do not currently fall in this category – at least not yet.

Crises that I can “plan” for (e.g. burglary, fire, etc.) are easier for me to maintain a high level of optimism than those that I cannot foresee.  Since there will be many challenges that will not display a “early warning signal”, my main challenge is to learn how to develop the skills necessary (i.e. an enhanced explanatory style) to ensure my optimism remains high independent of the crisis encountered.


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