Tag: resistance

The only way

FabrizioLeave a comment

With the amount of possibilities out there, with all the options one has to learn new things and reinvent themselves, it is very easy to get stuck.

It is the feeling of never being enough, the search for perfection, the impression to always need something more before actually getting going.

It is resistance.

Sit down instead and do the work. You’ll get better at it with time, better also at judging what to adjust, in which direction to progress, what else to learn, who to listen to. Doing the work is the only way.

Safe in the drawer

FabrizioLeave a comment

It is terrifying to show the work you’ve done.

They might not like it. It might be they think I am a fraud. What if there’s a typo I have missed? I have absolutely no authority to do that. Probably better if I give it another review. I can always publish it tomorrow. Everyone is so busy. Nobody is probably going to read it. After all, who cares? Is it really something important that I have to say? I might get fired for that. I look dumb in the video, I need another take. It’s not my best job. The concept I am trying to express is too weak. I am not a graphic designer, and the presentation looks dull. I’m not a native speaker, they’ll find out right away. They are crazy if they think I am going to do that.

And the most horrible of them all.

What if somebody likes it, and I have to continue …

On the other hand though, what good is it to keep that manuscript, that video, that drawing, that blog post, that article, that idea, that question safe in the drawer?

Important and not

FabrizioLeave a comment

Can you listen to an argument you do not support without interrupting?

Can you accept someone speaking at a public event near you about a topic that is sensitive and towards which you have a strong opinion, without mounting a protest and demanding the event cancelled?

Can you survive your favourite TV show being cancelled, or ending, or going through a disappointing season, without getting in touch with fellow fans and coming up with displays of affections towards the show that almost cross the limit of aggression?

Can you continue on your path when your community is led by a person you vividly dislike and disagree with, without being sucked up into the cult of that person and discuss what they do, say, tweet at every occasion, in disdain and disgust?

Some things are important, and worth figthing for.

The vast majority are not.

At some point along the road, we have lost the capacity to distinguish between the two. Everything upsets us, makes us mad, forces us to take unprecedented measures, promotes us to paladins of moral enlightment and rightfulness. We do not realize that even just by doing that, we flatten a multitude of interesting topics, solid arguments, and valid positions into an ocean of noise, resentment and, eventually, irrelevance. And that, slowly, happens also to us.

“Distraction” is a very appropriate way to describe all this. It’s a form of resistance that prevents us from persistently doing the work that eventually will lead to actual change.

Past commitments

Fabrizio1 Comment

When you are on the wrong track, the wisest thing to do is to change course.

It’s complicated, because even if we often know when it is time, we fail to grasp clear reasons why and we fail to act. It’s that combination of past commitments and unconscious awareness that things are not working. It’s that place where projects and enteprises go to die.

When this surfaces, we should be brave enough to take the commitment out of the equation. Forget about the time we have put in, the energy, the money, the people we have brought onboard, the ones we would fail, the knowledge, the connections and relationships, the opportunities.

If we keep looking back, we won’t move forward.

A way to hide

FabrizioLeave a comment

For years, I have built a narrative for which everything that happened was done to me.

I had the feeling everyone and everything was against my legitimate pursuit of happiness and success, I was constantly complaining about any tiny little difficulty, I would break relationships because in front of my grandiose gestures the counterpart would not reciprocate.

Now I am lucky enough to see that was a convenient way to hide.

Hide from my responsibilities as human being, employee, partner and friend, and most of all hide from my feelings. If others and external circumstances were responsible for them, why should I bother investigating them further? The most reasonable thing to do would be to simply build a wall around myself and make it as impenetrable as possible.

We are powerless with respect to what is going to happen tomorrow, and yet we can have total control on the way we are going to face, absorb and narrativize it. That’s where we should spend most of our time: building this form of control.

To accuse others for one’s own misfortune is a sign of want of education. To accuse oneself shows that one’s education has begun. To accuse neither oneself nor others shows that one’s education is complete.

Epictetus