Tag Archive for 'Philosophy'

Do more with the same

Published
by
Gary
on January 4, 2007
in Thoughts
. 4 Comments

From sunrise to sunset, we all get the same amount of time. Yeah, obvious, but it puts humanity in perspective—the challenge in life is to take those identical minutes and do more. My day has the same number of minutes as Coppola’s and Brion’s, as Jobs’ and Clooney’s, as Koolhaas’ and Obama’s. Clearly they know how to use their time better than I do.

Sitting around the office, I’ve realized that’s exactly what my bosses are doing. Sure, they get more money when their job titles are acronyms. But, more importantly, instead of doing the tedious repetitive crap themselves, they get other people to do that for them. Instead of getting one project done every few months, they’re getting ten projects done by proxy.

A boss extends his own time by paying other people to give him their time. It’s just like jacking everyone’s cash and suddenly being able to buy a Ferrari.

That’s how we mere mortals can do more with our lives—get promoted into a corner office and fight quality with quantity.

Destiny

Published
by
Gary
on October 14, 2006
in Thoughts
. 1 Comment

There’s no such thing as destiny.

If the future was written out, then it’d already be the past. We can’t live both ahead and behind the past.

Therefore, there’s no such thing as destiny. It’s too bad, the idea of life as being on immutable rails is a comfortable thought.

Nothing lasts forever

Published
by
Gary
on October 8, 2006
in Thoughts
. 0 Comments

“Nothing lasts forever.” For most people, that’s a horrible thing—the realization that their feelings will change, their lives will change, their love will change, that nothing they make will last, that there’s nothing they own and so nothing that’s theirs to give. They realize that and crack a little. “Crack.” May be imperceptibly, may be alcoholically.

When I realized that, I took it and bought contentment. I like it; it keeps things fresh, it fights stagnation. But, it’s a dangerous thing to embrace; it’s perhaps led me to murder my own feelings and turned to listening, reading, and watching as instantaneous substitutes. I now rarely spend my emotions—I keep them inside until they die and harden, become flat cold and cemented. It goes hand-in-hand with my eternal impatience—”nothing, lasts forever.”

Acceptance is really a wonderful thing.

How I made myself

Published
by
Gary
on September 19, 2006
in Thoughts
. 2 Comments

I’ve ranted on the suffocatingly serene, the grinding vanilla of the corporation and of the Singaporean society that magnifies it. But, the situation’s not unforgiveable. Let me explain.

For a moment, I’m going to step in front of myself and look back. This corporate way helps define me. My identity comes from my desire to resist it, from my modest disgust with it, from my —in short, what I am is how I react, and this is what I’m currently reacting against. The corporation lets me feel unique; it’s my fount of individuality.

In a perverse way, it galvanizes me to be me—it prods me to seek out new music, interesting art, intriguing movies, and all that other hipster crap I’m into. Of course, I do these foremost because I like ‘em, but snug in my subconscious is the threat: stop and lose what you see as yourself.

Imagine that the whole world has the same values you do. Everyone thinks what you think is great; everyone praises your decisions because they’re their own; everyone has your morals and shares your delights and your disgusts, you taste and your thoughts. How would you define yourself? You wouldn’t—definition comes from difference.

Yes, I don’t squint when I look at the bright side, because I’m out of here in a year and my many colleagues aren’t. But that, itself, is part of the point.

Do I think bland complacency with life is bad? Do I think that living a secure but pointless life is bad? Do I dislike peeling myself away for pennies so that others may profusely profit? With my best brief black-and-white Bush-ness, I’ll say “sure.” But are these things really?

Don’t praise mediocrity, but appreciate it.

Corporate Kid

Published
by
Gary
on September 17, 2006
in Thoughts
. 5 Comments

I’m getting uneasy. The month I’ve been here is a week; I live only two days, named Mtwthf and Satsun.

I’m working on patience, I’m realizing my trade, but I’ve a sense that gray days like these could easily become tepid years like that. The barely-beating heart of a corporation offers simple security, comfort in regularity, and all other manner of techniques to make my life as worthless as possible. It’s easy to slip in and forget to dash out, because the corporation makes life easy: “don’t worry, we’ll take care of the harsh brutish world—jump when I say so and we’ll be fine.”

Being an office worker is like being a child, helpless at the hands of the cheerful machine. I’m surrounded by those who’ve submitted, kind helpful people whose eyes leak varying degrees of resignation. At night we silently slip out, a ritual that resembles escape except by day we’re right were we started. There are a those I’ve pulled from the background, of whom I fantasize of “rescuing,” though where we would go I wouldn’t know. A place where we matter? I’ve teased such places from modern histories that read like mythologies, places whose fame guarantees their passing. In truth, if I wasn’t a poseur I might actually know.

Meanwhile, at the edge of everything interesting, I’m desperately sucking at every straw of culture this city of complacency confers. I’m trying to remember myself, remember my future, and remember to mature.