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Systems are good, but if your system doesn’t adapt you are wasting time and energy.
You don’t need to treat a fluff book like a research paper, or a practical guide like a deep novel.
However, with people we should fight the willingness to categorize and treat them in efficient, prescribed ways. By listening we can almost always find value, which enriches us both.
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The paradox: we know that the "right thing to do" is to think long-term, which tends to be a costly upfront sacrifice, but it incurs the greater benefit (and less heartache and loss) in the future through less living now.
As a slave to the future we increasingly aggregate metrics on a weekly, daily, or hourly basis. Our new "living in the present" is the hyper-granular metrics of productive achievement for the future.
And yes, getting 1% better daily, aggregating marginal gains, and system optimization can get you to your goal. But even if you have to schedule it in, put down your system and return to the land of the living at least once a day.
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You can do things alone and it is difficult. You can have help and perhaps it’s easier, but sometimes you’re still alone and you need a third hand.
Clever use of scaffolding clamps and tricks, bracing, can turn your environment into a second person.
The benefits are 1) you feel clever and 2) that system won’t chastise your silly pridefulness.
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Given a real world situation there are a set of constraints leaving maybe 2 or 3 realistic, rational, and cost effective options open.
Thus, we all end up looking, doing and thinking the same way because of the "rational efficiencies" we are surrounded by.
The more creative you try to be the more costly the effort in terms of time, money, and trust extended. Kudos to those who undertake the challenge.
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We want people to change so the world will be better and easier. Yet we seldom follow the adage: “In order to change the world, you must first change yourself.”
In the only realm we could possibly hope to have influence or a modicum of control, we do nothing, yet we continue to cry out for change.
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Understanding a simple concept thoroughly is more beneficial than knowing complicated systems.
This concept seems simple, but isn’t. Likely you are already bored.
Example: A simple concept like "leverage" underpins all societies and economics. How about "reciprocity"? What is the difference between "price" and "value"?
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An old watch is complicated, but open it up and you can see the gears and (maybe) figure out how it works. Remove a gear and it no longer functions.
A complex system has many interlocking variables, take one out and something else will replace it, making it a robust, dynamic system. Cascades of unforeseen consequences create change.
