I am tied down trying to finish a book chapter. I'm overdue and have put other writing aside until I finish. That's a pity, for I had got a real run on certain threads. In this context, Winton Bates has carried a comment thread from an earlier post (Monday Forum - micro-management, the evils of performance measurement & whatever else you like!) across into a full post, Should people seek contentment or accomplishment?. I will come back to the goal setting issue, but while I'm unavoidably detained, feel free to chat with Winton!
In the meantime, this is shot from Saturday watching my old school TAS (white shorts) playing Shore.
And here is another one. Since they restructured the Sydney GPS rugby competition I have become quite addicted.
5 comments:
Good luck with the deadlines and major project Jim!
I read Winton's piece at 11.35 a.m. - mainly because I was intrigued by his self-imposed publication deadline - and I have to say that the very first word - 'should' - raised amused hackles. And I've since been thinking just why that word so offends.
I think it's mainly the judgemental paternalism - probably best illustrated by his closing sentence: In my view it is not possible for individuals to be fully flourishing if they just drift aimlessly – unless, of course, drifting aimlessly is a goal they choose to pursue with a great deal of passion.
As our Kevin would say/tweet: "whatevs" :)
kvd: Thanks for your comment. Unfortunately, I am unable to respond right now.
That made me smile, kvd.
kvd:
You make me wonder whether I could be guilty of paternalism. I certainly don't want to interfere with the choices adults make, so I don't see myself as paternalistic. It gives me some pleasure when other people make good choices, but I think that just makes me human.
My main point that humans need to make conscious choices in order to flourish involves a judgement that seems to me similar in many ways to the judgement that humans need exercise in order to be healthy.
Would you rather your child was good or smart? (And no, you cannot say both.)
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/questions-of-goodness-raise-quite-a-few-ethical-dilemmas-20130807-2rgsf.html#ixzz2bK2A82N8
Winton, I would certainly never suggest you were being paternalistic; more just that your query posed yet another of those 'binary only' questions (see above) and then compounded the irritation by prefacing it with a 'should'.
Not to bang on too much, but (as in the above) I object to such simplistic questions where there can be an unstated corollary that if a) you are good, you are not smart and b) if you are smart, you cannot also be good.
The same issue arises in your own proposition, but your post makes clear that you feel both are achievable - so good for you! But that leaves hanging that 'should' word...
But forget about 'should' for the moment: I'd suggest there is little in life which is binary; it's all mostly a grey mish-mash of 'best course' through a multiplicity of options. (Except for life itself, where the binary is death).
kvd
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