Month: April 2016

Better Than Perfect

If there’s one aspect of our collective behavior that will continually baffle me, it’s the relentless quest for perfection. It makes us act in strange ways, waste money on trivial things and cast shade on significant moments of achievement, due to the presence of minor flaws.

Perfection is fleeting. It’s tantalizing. Sportscasters wax poetic about it, Lexus bombards us with car commercials about the pursuit of it, brides spend the months leading up to their big day obsessing over it.

Perfection is seemingly all around us, yet barely out of our reach.

But why do we strain for that escaped balloon, time after time? What is it about perfection that makes us fixate on it, like a diamond under the glass in a jewelry store?

Is it because perfection puts us on God’s level? We should know better. Both the Bible and Greek mythology contain cautionary tales about those who had the Hubris to ascend to where they did not belong. When Icarus flew too close to the sun, his wax wings melted and he plummeted back to Earth. When people teamed up to build a tower to Heaven, God foiled the plan by splitting up the languages of the conspirators, making collaboration impossible.

What about the prospect of living without blemishes? Is that what allows our hearts to fix on perfection? This thinking is foolish, shallow and arrogant. Blemishes and flaws allow us to be different, what allow us to be free. We are not carbon copies, devoid of any sign of character. We are humans, with unique personalities, looks and behaviors. “Blemishes” may represent deviation from a mean, but they also help us connect, learn and grow.

Yes, if we are to progress as a society, we must learn to embrace our imperfections, instead of relentlessly chasing perfection. But that doesn’t mean we must stop seeking a better way, a higher standard.

We must aim for ideal. Ideal is attainable; perfection never will be.

Think about it. Did the humbling experiences of the falls of Icarus and Babel cause us to stop building or innovating? Not by a longshot. Look up on a bright sunny day in the big city, and you’ll likely see airplanes soaring well above the peaks of skyscrapers. These innovations are below the level of perfection, yet above the standard of adequacy. To a certain degree, they’re ideal.

Along the path to ideal, we learn to live with our differences, our blemishes, our flaws and imperfections. We collaborate, grow and build a more nuanced culture. Some of us even learn how to speak the languages of others — breaking through the barrier of Babel. If perfection were attainable, we wouldn’t have the opportunity to improve our society in these mutually productive ways.

So strive for ideal. It’s better than perfect.

FOMO Is Dumb

If there’s one emotional trigger that’s all over pop culture these days, it’s FOMO (or Fear of Missing Out). In a Millennial culture dominated by the process of stacking up personal experiences as much as possible, the event is everything — and missing out on it constitutes a crushing blow that necessitates emotional CPR.

This sentiment has taken hold from coast to coast. It’s why events ranging from South by Southwest to the latest iPhone release have a ridiculous amount of in-person interest. It’s why live streaming has gone from a novel idea to something that invades all corners of our life within a four-year period. It’s why we get so many marketing emails warning us that the clock is ticking on the next big thing. In short, it’s the fuel for the way our culture currently operates.

But FOMO is Dumb.

This phenomenon has invaded our society like a cancer. It’s brought the peer-pressured environment of high school into the mainstream, playing on our sense of belonging at the expense of what really should be important.

Much like the proliferation of selfies, FOMO gives us a mainstream excuse for carrying on childish behavior at an age when we should be much more mature. While selfies satiate our ever-growing narcissism, FOMO plays into our teenage desire to be “cool.”

This misguided emotional trap leads to predictably ugly results. We act irresponsibly, overspending both our time and our money to continually be present on the social scene. This means big business for organizers who can play off our addiction to routinely fill to capacity everything from an arena to a bar, solely off of the mystical social status that attendance at these events provides.

Of course, half of the people present for these events and activities don’t much care about them at all — they’re just on the scene so that the world knows they were there.

This is ridiculous.

It’s high time we take control of our own destiny. Our lives should be about more than where we’re visible at. It’s not like anyone is keeping score anyway — at least not in a way that really matters.

We should instead devote our attention to what we’re passionate about, and the people that mean the most to us.  If we shift our gaze in this direction, we’ll attain necessary balance in our lives.

In fact, we’ll find that we’re not missing anything at all.

Keeping The Balance

Not long ago, I denounced our society’s excessive reliance on money as a determining factor for all that we do. I’ve also recently outlined the ramifications of upsetting the apple cart.

So what gives?

In truth, neither have to.

We can gradually improve the system we have without causing undue strife. We all stand to gain from this track — our socioeconomic model moves closer to ideal without us sacrificing our identity.

Consider what some prospective leaders of this nation are proposing — that we all reap the benefits of something others pay for. Others could be foreign nations or, more troublingly, our own financial elites. In our money-driven society, many might consider this a dream come true — we can reap the benefits of healthcare, education, housing and more at the expense of those who stash their money away in offshore bank accounts. The recent revelations of the measures the global rich take to keep that money from being taxed has added the fuel of righteousness to these arguments.

In light of all this, many are supporting the idea of requiring the rich to cede even more of their wealth to fund services for the less affluent, to funnel more money towards the financial mean. In reality, this solution would bring unintended consequences.

While it’s true that a surplus of money leads to all the ugly behavior wealth preservation brings —selfishness, egotistical behavior — the possibility of accruing wealth in our society is a powerful incentive. The opportunity to provide ourselves and our loved ones a better life is something that drives us to give our 100% professionally. If we were to compress everyone to the financial mean, to remove the carrot of potential wealth by redistributing those earnings among the masses, there would be no stick driving us to give our all — as we’d end up at the same point no matter how much effort we put into our vocations.

This is why communism and socialism don’t work for our society. In those models, people have very little control over their destiny; no matter what they do, the government has a stranglehold on what they get and pay for. There is little incentive to grow professionally, to stay engaged, to avoid the debilitating effects of laziness.

Capitalism, ostensibly, gives us equal opportunity to determine our own fate. While the side effects are notable — a sizable income gap, greed, aggressive behavior and class divides — it does provide us with the inspiration to innovate, grow and expand our potential. It’s key for us not to attack this system, but instead to fix the inefficiencies that deny so many that equal opportunity they should be provided. Furthermore, we each have a responsibility to both act ethically and keep our financial status separate from our obligation to contribute to the communities we reside in.

With some small improvements — many from within our realm of personal responsibility —  we can help make the system more efficient, and our society better from top to bottom. All while keeping the balance.

Meeting Our Needs

We all have our priorities.

If we’ve heard this line before, it most likely came gift-wrapped in a derisive tone. We can be quite the judgmental lot as a society, and when someone’s set of priorities dares to defy our expectations, we all too often find ourselves scoffing in indignation.

But what are the right priorities to set? What are the expectations that should be met?

These questions will often bring an uncomfortable silence among the self-annointed peanut gallery. After all, it’s easier to point a finger at what’s considered wrong by society than to articulate what’s considered right.

Truth is, there is a road map to these questions. It’s called Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.

Without digging too deeply into this theory (since I ain’t got a couch for you to lie on and tell me your feelings), it outlines a pyramid of needs, starting with the most basic and foundational and reaching its peak at self-actualization.

I remember vividly the day I discovered the truth behind this theory. I had just landed in Chile for a college study abroad program, and was in a private van heading with my classmates from the international airport in Santiago to Viña del Mar — the city we’d call home for the next two months or so.

Shortly after we got on the highway, the orange juice I’d downed on the plane caught up with me. After about 10 minutes of trying to soldier on, I asked the driver to pull over. He obliged at a scenic overlook, one that was conspicuously missing the type of thick roadside shrubbery those who make these types of pit stops hope to find. I ultimately had to climb a hill and wind around some barren desert plants to find a place where I could be comfortable relieving myself.

As I stood there, looking out across the Andes Mountains, I knew exactly where my priorities were. I was alone on a continent where I didn’t know a soul, en route to living quarters I knew little of. If there was a moment in my life where I was most out of my element, this would be it. But even at this moment, when nature called, I took great liberties to make sure my core needs were met. I even made sure my senses of safety, belonging and self-esteem (the middle sections of the Hierarchy of Needs pyramid) were met by making the extra effort to find a spot shielded from view to…you know.

As I returned to the van, I felt at peace. The unknown still awaited me, but the most basic level of normalcy had taken hold.

So what can we all learn from this, besides the fact that the terrain of Chile is quite rugged? Quite simply, our quibbling over our priorities in life is trivial. How we spend our time and who we spend it with is important, but the attention we give it is as overblown as the headlines in the gossip magazines in grocery store checkout aisles.

Are we fed? Are we clothed? Are we safe? Are we happy? These are the needs we must meet, the priorities we must set. For without these, we can’t function properly, let alone soar to our potential.

So the next time someone makes mention of your priorities, think of these basic needs — for both yourself and your loved ones. If these needs are met, and morality is ingrained in your actions, you’ll be off to a good start — no matter what the peanut gallery says.