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"If you want to avoid challenges in life and just get a job so you can retire 50 years later with nothing remarkable in between, that strategy works." I find th

"If you want to avoid challenges in life and just get a job so you can retire 50 years later with nothing remarkable in between, that strategy works." I find this to be hyperbolic. Compliance and presenting yourself as having more value than the person next you have are not deterministic in "avoiding challenges in life" and not accomplishing anything remarkable. I don't want to run a startup. I want to put my head down and get shit done. Does that mean I don't want challenges in life? No. Does that mean I won't accomplish anything remarkable. No. One should be aware that compliance and process has its place. One could argue that the special ops schools (like BUDS) drills into you that you are but one of many and to be compliant (even thought BUDS itself is an audition) and that you are a commodity. Please tell me that Navy Seals avoid challenges and accomplish nothing remarkable.

spodek 8y ago
"If you want X, Y works" doesn't imply that "doing Y means you want X," which, unless I misunderstand you, is what you were reacting to. Speaking of SEALs, I just wrote about them in the draft of my next book, on becoming entrepreneurial, in relation to ASEEP fields, which may be relevant to this thread, since military training trains performance: "Entrepreneurship is as active, social, emotional, expressive, performance-based as any field. Most books and courses on entrepreneurship teach entrepreneurship appreciation, not practice. They may not hurt, but they don't necessarily develop you to genuine, authentic, free self-expression. Business literature isn't written to help you become more entrepreneurial. If all the business articles about Navy SEALs -- to pick one genre of entrepreneurship literature -- helped people perform as SEALs do, SEALs would read business literature instead of train. They train because it works."
- castlecrasher2 8y ago
  I feel like this is something I've known about but never could quite describe it. Do you have any books or other resources you could link or DM me? I'm interested in learning more.
  - spodek 8y ago
    I wrote my book to fill the gap I saw between teaching about leading people and developing leadership practices. Amazon has the preface and first chapter in the "look inside" link above the picture of it https://www.amazon.com/Leadership-Step-Become-Person-Others/dp/0814437931 https://www.amazon.com/Leadership-Step-Become-Person-Others/..., which develops what I wrote here more. The movie Most Likely To Succeed http://www.mltsfilm.org http://www.mltsfilm.org is about project-based learning. The books and articles by the guys behind it, Tony Wagner and Ted Dintersmith, are on active education and I found valuable. Here's a post of mine with a video of Ted and the movie director: http://joshuaspodek.com/another-problem-with-traditional-education-employers-dont-want-traditionally-educated-students http://joshuaspodek.com/another-problem-with-traditional-edu... and links to relevant posts of mine.
mlevental 8y ago
>Please tell me that Navy Seals avoid challenges and accomplish nothing remarkable. wut
scarface74 8y ago
"If you want to avoid challenges in life and just get a job so you can retire 50 years later with nothing remarkable in between, that strategy works. Despite all of the hyperbole in tech, that's what most of us are doing. We work to provide for our family and if we get hit by a bus tomorrow, the company we work for will put out a req for an open job position and life goes on. It doesn't matter whether you are the janitor or the CEO. Out of the billions of people in the world, a minuscule number make a long term difference.
- feistypharit 8y ago
  And on the scale of millennia, nobody has any lasting impact. The only lasting impact we all have is our DNA.
  - jonny_eh 8y ago
    And what value is there in our individual snowflake DNA?
LoSboccacc 8y ago
I'd love to be a commodity tbh. I work just to pay off stuff, and I work hard because I want shinier stuff, but if I had a decent pay at a modest job I'd take it in a heartbeat.
walshemj 8y ago
Actually the military is far more about the smaller team bonds SF even more so i.e. don't conform to grooming regs use first names.

spodek 8y ago

"If you want X, Y works" doesn't imply that "doing Y means you want X," which, unless I misunderstand you, is what you were reacting to. Speaking of SEALs, I just wrote about them in the draft of my next book, on becoming entrepreneurial, in relation to ASEEP fields, which may be relevant to this thread, since military training trains performance: "Entrepreneurship is as active, social, emotional, expressive, performance-based as any field. Most books and courses on entrepreneurship teach entrepreneurship appreciation, not practice. They may not hurt, but they don't necessarily develop you to genuine, authentic, free self-expression. Business literature isn't written to help you become more entrepreneurial. If all the business articles about Navy SEALs -- to pick one genre of entrepreneurship literature -- helped people perform as SEALs do, SEALs would read business literature instead of train. They train because it works."

castlecrasher2 8y ago
I feel like this is something I've known about but never could quite describe it. Do you have any books or other resources you could link or DM me? I'm interested in learning more.
- spodek 8y ago
  I wrote my book to fill the gap I saw between teaching about leading people and developing leadership practices. Amazon has the preface and first chapter in the "look inside" link above the picture of it https://www.amazon.com/Leadership-Step-Become-Person-Others/dp/0814437931 https://www.amazon.com/Leadership-Step-Become-Person-Others/..., which develops what I wrote here more. The movie Most Likely To Succeed http://www.mltsfilm.org http://www.mltsfilm.org is about project-based learning. The books and articles by the guys behind it, Tony Wagner and Ted Dintersmith, are on active education and I found valuable. Here's a post of mine with a video of Ted and the movie director: http://joshuaspodek.com/another-problem-with-traditional-education-employers-dont-want-traditionally-educated-students http://joshuaspodek.com/another-problem-with-traditional-edu... and links to relevant posts of mine.

mlevental 8y ago

>Please tell me that Navy Seals avoid challenges and accomplish nothing remarkable. wut

scarface74 8y ago

"If you want to avoid challenges in life and just get a job so you can retire 50 years later with nothing remarkable in between, that strategy works. Despite all of the hyperbole in tech, that's what most of us are doing. We work to provide for our family and if we get hit by a bus tomorrow, the company we work for will put out a req for an open job position and life goes on. It doesn't matter whether you are the janitor or the CEO. Out of the billions of people in the world, a minuscule number make a long term difference.

feistypharit 8y ago
And on the scale of millennia, nobody has any lasting impact. The only lasting impact we all have is our DNA.
- jonny_eh 8y ago
  And what value is there in our individual snowflake DNA?

LoSboccacc 8y ago

I'd love to be a commodity tbh. I work just to pay off stuff, and I work hard because I want shinier stuff, but if I had a decent pay at a modest job I'd take it in a heartbeat.

walshemj 8y ago

Actually the military is far more about the smaller team bonds SF even more so i.e. don't conform to grooming regs use first names.