Conversation

Replying to
Deciding to have kids is probably the clearest case of makework. That’s why if you want a problem solved rather than just lived-with, give it to a parent.
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This was my breakthrough insight that launched my consulting— the realization that clients want to solve problem I’ve decided to just live with. So I just had to get theoretically mad at my own philosophies to generate advice and reactions.
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“What would I do if I decided not to live with the problem?” Suddenly all the laziness rationalization I mean philosophy turns into useful raw material.
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This is why with enough wealth, people with low patience for philosophical rationalization end up tackling the ultimate problem — mortality. Me, I’ve accepted living with that problem until I die 😆 The ultimate philosophical accommodation of a problem.
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Mediocritism is mainly about solving problems just well enough to be able to live with them but not well enough to be rid of them
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This is why executives are willing to pay for consulting but ambitious rank-and-file prefer coaches. Most problems at exec level are cheap to live with (“manage”), but really expensive to truly solve. You pick your “solve” battles by mediocritizing everything else.
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Coaches teach you how to work hard and solve problems in an area. That gets you promoted up to a point. To rise higher, you have to learn to half-ass every other problem. And most problems that rise to exec level are not fully solvable, only half-solvable, half-philisophizable.
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The true failure mode is picking the wrong 5% things to put in the “actually solve” bucket. The corresponding consultant failure mode is venturing into that 5% zone by accident and draining full-solving energy with unhelpful philosophizing.
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Pick your battles. Everything else is a half-assed philosophy problem, so talking to somebody full-ass philosophizing it helps sometimes.
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A lot of this comes down to being a bad influence in the right places. Being conscientious everywhere means either being a successful perfectionist at a trivial life, or ineffective at an ambitious one.
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Replying to
This thread is kinda half-assed. Some sloppy inconsistencies and loose ends I’m just going to live with for now unless I decide to turn it into an essay. Caveat emptor.
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