yourself differently and then to become
different in the 1970s I participated in
a two-week workshop known as Erhard
seminar training usually abbreviated in
lowercase as s on the second day the
group was led through an exercise called
the truth process I found to my surprise
that the exercise completely eliminated
an annoying habit of speech that I had
picked up years earlier I was naturally
impressed and I incorporated the
exercise into my teaching the results
have been very favorable it’s a good
tool for getting rid of aspects of your
self-image that stand in the way of
developing your achievement habit over
time my version of this exercise has
changed I don’t run it with a written
script and each year it comes out of my
mouth a bit differently I don’t think
there is any critical exactness to it
the same ideas have been applied in many
versions long before my first experience
with the truth process in this exercise
you become mindful of as many things as
possible associated with a specific
issue it will work best to lie down in a
quiet place and close your eyes if you
are doing this in a group someone can
lead you through it if not you can
record the instruction and lead yourself
once you are settled do a short
meditation to allow
a good way to do this is to become aware
of your breath and notice the
temperature of the air going in and
coming out then move your awareness
slowly around your body the meditation
script given previously for guided
fantasy works nicely after the
relaxation think of an issue that you
are willing to be rid of the issue can
have to do with a relationship and your
personal or professional life a
mannerism you have or a decision you are
troubled about it can be anything that
has an impact on you on a personal level
it should not be something global like
world peace or saving the planet unless
those are personal parts of a problem
that you are actually dealing with once
you have an issue you are willing to
have disappear from your life you can
proceed to work through the steps and
the exercises we’ll cover in just a
moment if at any time during this
exercise you feel that you have rid
yourself of whatever you want it to be
rid of you can move directly to the last
two steps in the exercise steps in this
exercise one first in your mind’s eye
create an object that represents your
issue that is give the issue in actual
physical embodiment imagine this object
being a few feet in front of you with
your eyes closed
look at this embodiment become mindful
of its physical properties by doing an
inventory using the following questions
how tall is it now why does it how deep
is it what is its color
what is its texture what is its
temperature
does it have an odor
and what is it sound too now recall the
last time this issue of hurt in your
life then recall the previous time and
keep going back in time until you come
as close as possible to the first time
it occurred three when you are finished
again imagine that your issues physical
embodiment is a few feet in front of you
and repeat the inventory of its physical
properties usually the object’s
properties will have changed slightly
for now recall all the things that you
are sure are correct about this issue
but don’t lie to yourself five when you
are finished imagine yet again that the
object’s physical embodiment is a few
feet in front of you and repeat the
inventory of its physical properties
note repeat this survey of the object’s
properties after each of the following
items 6 next tell yourself all the
things you think might be correct about
this issue 7 now look at all the things
you think might be incorrect about this
issue 8 now recall all the things that
happen to your body when you experience
this issue
9 what are your body positions when this
issue comes up for you 10 do you have
any physical reactions associated with
this issue 11 now recall all the
emotional states you go through when you
have this experience think back to the
actual experience not your ideas about
it 12 now look at all the sensations and
feelings you associate with this issue
don’t lie to yourself 13 next look at
all the evaluations and judgments you
have regarding this issue 14 now tell
yourself all the things you get out of
keeping this issue in your life don’t
lie to yourself what does it do for you
to keep this issue 15 now imagine being
upset about this issue next imagine not
being upset about this issue
again imagine being upset and then not
being upset and repeat this about five
times then imagine having an upset about
this issue next imagine not having an
upset about this issue again imagine
having an upset and not having an upset
repeating about five times
next imagine being upset and then not
being upset and then having an upset and
not having an upset sixteen now imagine
you are in front of a white board
mounted on a frame with wheels on this
white board write a list of all the
things and people’s names that are
keeping this issue in your life at this
point again imagine that the object’s
physical embodiment is a few feet in
front of you and repeat the inventory of
its physical properties for the last
time 17 now imagine you are again in
front of the whiteboard and that you
have an eraser in your head look over
your list of what is keeping this
problem in your life erase all things or
people’s names that are no longer valid
now imagine pushing the whiteboard up to
erase anything else you want from it and
then push the board over the precipice
19 now imagine yourself at the beach on
a nice sunny day do your favorite thing
for a while when you feel ready open
your eyes and slowly get up and finally
20 take all the time you need to quietly
digest what you went through during this
parting lessons from friends I have
always felt affection for the Welsh and
Irish poets and playwrights Dylan
Thomas’s poem do not go gentle into that
good night as always resonated with me
and earlier in my life I thought of
myself going to the grave kicking and
screaming
unfortunately I have had too much
contact with death to remain guided by
my youthful emotions what I have found
is that death like lives are unique and
that if I pay attention each death
provides me some wisdom Karl Deleuze
death was a celebrated murder case karl
was a mathematics professor and a close
friend who lived on the same street as i
on the Stanford campus he were frequent
visitors to each other’s homes two
nights before Ruth and I left on a trip
Carl and I were amusing ourselves
reading bizarre ads in a Berkeley
newspaper one ad was for an audio tape
that explained how to return from the
dead it came to the t-shirt the ads
irresistible appeal was its statement
buy this shirt and tape who wants to be
dead forever
so he said away for the shirt a new tape
when Ruth and I returned from our trip
we were surprised to find Carl’s wife
sit up at the San Francisco Airport to
meet us she was wearing the t-shirt Carl
and I had ordered I started to joke
about the shirt when she stopped me to
tell us that Carl had been murdered
bludgeoned to death by tedster Levski a
longtime PhD candidate and Stanford’s
Department of Mathematics talansky felt
he had not been treated fairly by the
department and he wanted to bring public
attention to his case even though his
advisor had recently told him that his
work was acceptable for submission as a
PhD dissertation and graduation was
finally in sight he felt his life had
been ruined by the long delay in
obtaining his degree many mathematicians
had done their best work when they were
young and now he felt he was too old to
become great he was stuck in the
wrongheaded view of achievement that
says accolades and awards of the most
important things in life
he had brainwashed himself into thinking
that this was all that mattered and
because of this he was more interested
in his grievance than in his degree
he considered the standard avenues of
redress such as writing letters to
newspapers Stanford administrators or
Stanford alumni or filing an official
grievance he decided these would not be
strong enough he concluded that he could
get much greater publicity if he
murdered someone prominent and then went
to trial he made a hit list of several
professors in the mathematics department
and then used public transportation from
his apartment in San Francisco to
Stanford in an incredibly circuitous
route when he finally got to Stanford he
was unable to find the first few people
on his list then he got to Carl’s name
and unfortunately Carl was in his office
waiting the final exams from his summer
class Valesky had brought a small
sledgehammer and used it to murder Carl
he then left undetected a few days later
he surrendered to the police his idea
was to plead not guilty and have a trial
that would be covered by the press
during his trial he planned to have
members of the mathematics department
faculty on the witness stand and
questioned them so as to publicly reveal
practices that he felt were abusive he
succeeded to a certain degree
he got publicity and there was some
linking of his case to the general
plight of PhD students as a political
underclass this incident was a prime
example to me of the weakness of pure
logic Stralis Keyes logic was impeccable
in terms of his desire to get the most
publicity for his case except he forgot
the commandment thou shalt not kill
unfortunately this kind of omission is
much too prevalent in decision-making at
various levels of our society
velasca was just another tragic example
I went to the trial every day Strahovski
pleaded not guilty even though he
admitted committing the murder as well
as having planned to do it using the
sledgehammer he brought with him his
lawyer wanted him to plead not guilty by
reason of insanity Strahovski refused
because he did not want to be regarded
as insane he wanted to convince the
media that the murder was logically and
morally correct and that it was a
political statement about the
department’s treatment of its graduate
students here was a bright man who could
have had a good lie
and he not been so fixated on when he
felt was Odin if he couldn’t have his
perfectly planned life as a math genius
then he would make people pay in doing
so of course he made himself miserable
too there is no degree award job or
referral worth dying or killing for of
course most people are not murderers and
this is an extreme case yet it
highlights the danger of being too rigid
in your view of what your life path
should be life will throw you curveballs
if you adapt you can’t find happiness in
any situation my close colleague grows
fast as death was remarkable in that he
did not follow the expected knee-jerk
reaction of seeking survival at any
price to be a traditional achiever
you’re supposed to fight fight fight for
your life
Ralph didn’t really care about what
others thought however his achievements
would be on his own terms after he was
diagnosed with stomach cancer he noticed
that when he visited his regular doctor
the experience left him feeling bad when
he went to a Zen master he came home
feeling good he resolved to treat his
body as a sacred gift and not to poison
it in the name of survival he made it
clear he did not welcome visitors
advising him the Sikh standard
chemotherapy or radiation treatments he
spent his time quietly meditating and in
positive conversations with his family
and friends he died according to the
same principles
by contrast another colleague it was a
difficult person totally changed while
undergoing hospice care he was not
someone I was close to
we had a cordial relationship even
though I did not enjoy his company after
he got sick I went to visit him at home
out of obligation to my surprise he had
changed and was now engaging to be with
I ended up visiting him frequently other
colleagues started coming regularly to
visit we all found him to now be a very
attractive companion finally close to
death he had stopped posturing and was
simply there with us it was a pity he
had to be dying before he felt free to
be at ease with his true self he and
everyone around him would have had a
better life if he had arrived there
bill Moggridge was a close friend who
had a strong sense of self then was
extremely independent nobody could get
him to wear a bicycle helmet even when
he came roaring down the mountain
passing cars on blind turns when he
asked himself the question who are you
that’s what he came up with he decided
how he wanted to live his life and
didn’t let anyone interfere when he
became ill he adapted the same inner
strength toward the invasive treatments
his positive attitude gave him a
remarkable ability to maintain a normal
work life in conditions where most
others would simply shut down finally
when it was clear he was dying he made
it easy to be open about his situation
the first morning I walked into his
hospital room he asked me if I had been
at the bedside of many dying friends I
knew he was telling me it was okay to be
open and talking to him about his
condition it was an extremely generous
gift bill was hospitalized in a
substandard situation in New York there
he became accepting of various abusive
and neglectful practices I was surprised
at how accepting he was then I realized
it was protective behavior he was going
along in order to get along he probably
figured if he was no trouble he would
get as good care as they were capable of
providing finally his care conditions
got so bad that it was decided to move
him from New York to a hospice facility
in San Francisco the move required an
overnight stay in a motel near the San
Francisco Airport
the next morning five of us were
involved in moving bill from the motel
room to a waiting station wagon he could
not walk so we moved him in a chair from
the motel room to the door of the
station wagon because he was a big guy
it was not clear how best to maneuver
him onto the front seat his two sons
Eric and Alex Izzie a friend from New
York Matt Bill’s trusted colleague from
work and I we’re discussing different
ways to proceed unfortunately it was
cold due to raw summer fog and chilling
wind the discussion went on too long
finally bill it had enough he had said
almost nothing in the past day and when
he had spoken it was very soft and hard
to understand now in a booming voice he
said Bernie you shut up is he
you shut up Eric you shut up Alex you
shut up
Matt you decide it was a magic moment my
friend bill had come alive and he was
expressing his own self-image to us he
was a problem solver till the end and
had taken charge of the situation
with his British accent It was as though
Dylan Thomas himself was telling us he
would not be going gently into that good
night that was his great gift to us all
your turn
imagine you have only ten minutes to
live what would you do imagine you have
only ten days to live what would you do
imagine you have only ten months to live
what would you do imagine you have only
ten years to live what would you do
imagine you have only the rest of your
life to live what would you do
looking at your answers to these
questions you have a lot of information
about yourself in this exercise we’re
talking about your endgame can you think
of any changes you would like to design
into your self-image start designing and
changing none of the friends I just told
you about knew when they would enter the
final countdown
I don’t know when mine will come and you
don’t know yours either one thing for
sure it is closer today than it was
yesterday and it will be closer still
tomorrow so now is the time to develop
into the person you want to be
[Music]
point-of-view revisited
story writers are concerned with
different points of view they classify
them as an objective point of view a
third person point of view a
first-person point of view an omniscient
point of view and a limited omniscient
point of view and the objective point of
view the writer takes the position of a
detached observer never telling more
than can be directly inferred from the
dialogue and action in the third person
point of view the narrator does not
participate in the action of the story
we find out about the characters through
the narrators outside voice in the
first-person point of view the narrator
is a participant in the story and now
the trustworthiness of the account is in
question because it might lack
objectivity in omniscient accounts the
writer knows everything about all the
characters and actions or in a more
limited version knows everything about a
limited number of characters or actions
in real life we get to write our own
stories some people may be arrogant
enough to think they can take on an
objective or omniscient point of view
and some rare people might be
dissociated enough from their lives to
take on a third person point of view
some people have the delusion they can
take on any point of view perhaps they
can for brief moments but most of us are
all limited to a first-person point of
view and just as in fiction the question
of reliability arises because we are
writing our own life stories in the
first-person we need to realize that we
give ourselves and all the other
characters there are many factors that
play in determining your self image you
can shape and redesign that image at
will whenever it doesn’t suit you
whether that includes physical things
like getting a haircut or losing weight
personality based things such as
correcting bad habits or improving
skills or changing pieces of your
identity outright like changing a name
it’s important to know that your
self-image doesn’t have to stay stagnant
if you’ve defined yourself as lazy a bad
speller messy easily distracted or
selfish that doesn’t have to be an
you can make a decision right now to see
yourself differently and then to become
different the big picture chapter nine
insanity in individuals is something
rare but in groups parties nations and
epochs it is the rule Friedrich
Nietzsche life and every level is full
of complexity and uncertainty as
individuals we face a life of unknown
duration during which we are likely to
go through periods of family career or
personal crises the world around us is
even more unpredictable I am always
amazed that things work as well as they
do it’s a very good idea to have a
general sense of your goals in life and
an equally good idea not to get too
rigid about your path stay open to
possibility let other people in and
listen when new opportunities present
life as chance
my life seems to have been punctuated by
a set of unforeseen details followed by
surprising right and left turns anything
other than a series of planned rational
steps this puts me in a difficult
situation when students ask for career
advice I attempt to give it my best shot
which is a rational linear extrapolation
from the present to the future now I
know that the chance of what I say ever
becoming reality is very slight I
sometimes tell students life is an
adventure so loosen up stop trying to
figure it out just go with the flow
this does not seem to satisfy most of
them so I play the sage knowing full
well their lives will soon deviate from
any rational life path that they may
have laid out I don’t have the time or
audacity to tell the students how I
ended up living and teaching at Stanford
but I will tell you here my wife and I
both grew up in the same New York City
neighborhood near Bronx Park despite my
inauspicious start as a lazy high school
student who spent his time on the
streets I went on to college locally
where I nearly flunked out the wake-up
call I needed was the letter from the
Dean telling me that I was on academic
probation wait I can’t flunk me out I
thought I knew I wasn’t stupid from then
on I was a straight-a student I learned
to love school but I wanted to continue
so I went on to graduate school as a
graduate student I also began lecturing
at City College and teaching spoke to me
I really enjoyed it as I was nearing the
completion of my PhD studies at Columbia
University I had a discussion with my
thesis advisor about my future to my
absolute delight he suggested I apply to
join the Columbia faculty
he cautioned me that it would be prudent
to also apply elsewhere because there
was at the time some pushback about
inbreeding in the mechanical engineering
department he mentioned that Cornell
University was looking for a young
assistant professor I in turn recalled
that several years back I had spent a
summer in Los Angeles and heard that the
area around Stanford University was a
nice place to live
I asked if my thesis adviser knew anyone
on the Stanford faculty yes he knew
professor Arnold herein lies the tale of
coincidences that got me to Stanford
where I have spent well over 50 years of
my life the international conference for
teachers of mechanisms was held at Yale
University in March 1961 under the
auspices of the National Science
Foundation the organizers of the
conference mailed an invitation to
professor Arnold at Stanford University
at Stanford’s department of mechanical
engineering there were two people with
the last name Arnold John II Arnold was
a famous professor in both mechanical
engineering and the business school he
was the founding head of the
department’s design division Frank a
Arnold on the other hand was a lecturer
associated with the thermo Sciences
division which was interested in the
aerodynamics of flight not mechanisms
the conference invitation mistakenly
went to Frank rather than John not to
tear by this obvious error Frank
accepted the invitation and attended the
conference where he met my thesis
advisor thus when my advisor wrote about
me to his acquaintance he was writing to
the wrong person
happily this time Frank passed the
letter on to John my adviser had a very
strong reputation and based on that John
Arnold invited me to come to Stanford
for an interview
meanwhile I had received an offer letter
from Columbia University I had accepted
the position of assistant professor and
was to start that September I was
looking forward to teaching at Columbia
working closely with my thesis advisor
I was nevertheless glad to be offered a
free interview trip to California in
late July my wife and I arranged for a
nanny to watch our two young boys and my
12 year old sister who lived with us and
we boarded a train for California at
Stanford I was very impressed with John
Arden I learned he had been a popular
professor at MIT and had only been at
Stanford a few years the design division
he had created was composed of three
young faculty members at the beginning
of their careers and the atmosphere was
very different from what I was used to
at Columbia John at a special slant on
education in engineering that was
influenced by his having studied
philosophy before going into engineering
most of all I noticed a special twinkle
in his eye that made me feel that it
would be interesting to work with him I
was thus pleased when after a half-day
of interviews and lunch meeting the
chairman of the department told me they
would be recommending me for a
three-year tenure-track assistant
professor appointment that evening the
concern set in my wife was very
attracted to the area and John Arnold
and the job seemed appealing however I
really liked New York my thesis advisor
and Columbia
besides Columbia University was starting
the fall semester in a month and I had
already accepted the appointment what to
do if I did move to Stanford I would be
arriving in a month with a family and no
place to stay I put down a deposit for a
house rental knowing full well that the
odds were I would forfeit the deposit
and end up staying in New York my wife
and I agonized over this decision during
the long train ride across the country
back to New York when I arrived back at
Columbia my thesis advisor asked what
had happened and I told him I’d been
offered the job without hesitation he
told me he had been discussing that
probability with his colleagues and that
they had heard that Stanford was going
through a large building up a faculty
they believe Stanford was headed toward
a new era and felt it would be in my
best interest to accept the offer
furthermore I should not be concerned
about my last minute we negging at
Columbia in an instant the problem with
Columbia was resolved that only left the
task of informing our families that we
were leaving and taking the children
3,000 miles away and yes my club
year-old sister was horrified at the
prospect of having to leave her
girlfriends
I have had a long and satisfying career
at Stanford and it took a host of
improbable events for me to get here in
the first place my life is punctuated by
milestones that would have never
happened except for the combination of
unplanned and improbable chance events
most people I know have similarly
nonlinear life trajectories how about
you have you had enough unexpected
developments in your life to sign on to
the life is a chance theory if yes learn
to enjoy the trip and not waste your
cross-country train ride worrying about
what to decide opportunities some people
almost never need to make agonizing
decisions life for them just seems to
flow along and when the big transitions
happen they notice they were big only in
hindsight I am one of those people I
consider myself lucky to have had that
type of a career and thinking about the
many crossroads in a long and full
career I now see that if I had not
responded to certain opportunities my
life would have been quite different I
will never know of course what might
have been still I have no regrets there
are two extreme types of people in the
world those who say yes to every
opportunity and those who say no I place
myself in the middle I have found that
it’s important to be mindful of my
reactions to opportunity
there’s no way to know in advance where
these will lead some may lead nowhere
and some to disaster yet when
opportunity presents itself we have no
choice but to respond the ignoring
opportunity is itself a response
several life-changing opportunities have
come to me in the form of out of the
blue phone calls the first came in my
second year at Stanford I answered my
office phone and was asked to hold dr.
of course I knew the name Frederick
Terman was Stanford Provost a legendary
electrical engineer who had been the
mentor of Bill Hewlett and David Packard
however I had never met him what could
he possibly want with a young assistant
professor Terman informed me that he was
calling to suggest and I provide some
expertise in the design of machines to
John McCarthy a mathematician who had
just won a large government grant to
found the Stanford artificial
intelligence laboratory part of the
grant was to go toward the development
of robotic devices
Herrmann had been told that John was too
mathematical to handle the design of
actual devices and that I could provide
necessary engineering skills Chairman’s
phone call led to my close collaboration
with the Stanford artificial
intelligence laboratory and my immersion
in robotics which became a major part of
my creative work for over 40 years I
became one of the founders in the new
field of robotics and John grew to be a
lifelong friend he was one of the main
creators of the field of artificial
intelligence a true genius with an
incredibly inquisitive and creative mind
I soon found out he was much more
practical than Herman had been led to
believe
Johnetta charming belief that he could
solve any problem in the early days I
traveled with him to Houston for the two
of us met with oil company executives
and fancy conference room near the top
of a large skyscraper
John was trying to convince them to fund
the development of a robotic coal mining
machine we had never done anything
remotely like that but John described in
detail what he imagined such an
undertaking would accomplish he showed a
film our students had made if a robotic
arm assembling a tower of blocks the
background music on the film was Scott
Joplin’s ragtime melody the Entertainer
which had been used in the film the
sting in the film two hustlers played by
Paul Newman and Robert Redford con a mob
boss out of a lot of money as I sat
there i realized john was not aware of
the strong parallel between our fanciful
request and the students plot we never
got the money through this day I am sure
the oil man saw the irony and had a good
laugh I remember that my initial
reaction determines phone call was at
best neutral at first I felt that the
opportunity presented was a distraction
from my main research however it turned
out I was able to bring my unique
perspective to what John was doing and
the robotics work in turn enhanced my
main area of interest in the matters
another phone call that changed my life
is from my friend Mike Robbins a
professor at Texas A&M University
who wanted to know if I’d organize a
summer creativity workshop my immediate
reaction was an emphatic no way but just
as I was about to hang up I realized it
could be a good opportunity for my
friend roll faster to build up his
reputation and get promoted
he and I wound up leading these
workshops for 10 years the opportunity I
reluctantly accepted for reasons that
never materialized Rolfe never applied
for the promotion ended up having a
major impact on me teaching methodology
and experience based learning became a
big part of my life and I had a new
basis for interacting with colleagues
throughout the world these two big
changes in my career were instigated by
phone calls that I had no idea were
coming I immediately accepted the life
changes offered in the phone calls in
retrospect I had no idea how large a
change
to come each started out as just another
everyday occurrence there were no
agonizing decisions no long-term life
plans nothing other than the ordinary
flow of my life I was not looking for
change and would probably have had a
fulfilling and rich life without those
changes happily they were more than
satisfied looking back and thinking
about those phone calls I realized that
I could have just as easily said no to
both of them and in doing so missed two
of the most gratifying developments in
my professional life life is full of
junctures and opportunities and it is
impossible to know in advance which way
to go and which chances to take I feel
very lucky that I said yes to these
the blessing of wood much has been
written about automation and the
replacement of human workers with
machines two main justifications are
usually given for mechanizing jobs once
done by humans first that the work is
tedious and dangerous so it’s better to
let machines do it for the workers sake
and second that workers are expensive
and unreliable so machines can save
money while retaining or improving
quality these ideas are basically
derived from the context of blue-collar
factory work they do little to address
the computer revolution and the great
changes that have occurred across the
workforce replacing a large number of
highly trained and educated scientific
and technical workers with machines this
trend toward more and more automation
brings into play the question of what
meaning we give to work the current
situation was in some ways anticipated
by writers as far back as the earliest
days of the Industrial Revolution
one of the most prescient books in the
genre was written by Kurt Vonnegut right
after world war ii in player piano he
describes a future America where the
majority of the people are either
unemployed or working in highly
alienating jobs in a desultory army or
doing meaningless public works projects
these people live across a river they
could just as well be the other side of
the tracks or highway from a small
educated elite that runs the economy in
this society machines do most of the
work and the jobs left for the majority
of the human population provide no
satisfaction a more nuanced
understanding of the changes brought
about by the way people choose to
develop technology can be found in Harry
Bravermans scholarly treatise titled
labor and monopoly capital Braverman
points out that work that allows for
self-expression satisfies human need and
he traces the roots of the trend toward
de-skilling of both work and workers and
Bravermans terms the machines that
enhance people’s skills are considered
life-supporting while those that Dees
kill people and devalue their work our
life destroying
perhaps the best spokesperson for the
need to define the proper role of
machines is Mahatma Gandhi asked whether
he was opposed to machines he answered
how can I be when I know that even this
body is the most delicate piece of
machinery a spinning wheel is a machine
a little toothpick is a machine what I
object to is the craze for machinery not
machinery as such the craze is for what
they call labor saving machinery men go
on saving labor till thousands are
without work and thrown on the open
streets to die of starvation I want to
save time and labor not for a fraction
of mankind but for all I want the
concentration of wealth not in the hands
of a few but in the hands of all today
machinery merely helps a few ride on the
backs of millions the issues raised by
Braverman and Gandhi are eloquently
reinforced by EF Schumacher who looks at
work from a Buddhist point of view in
his classic essay titled Buddhist
economics Schumacher points out that
work serves to feed our basic mean for
association with other people in fact
work supply several of our basic human
needs such as one it gives people a
chance to utilize and develop their
faculties two it enables people to
overcome their ego centeredness by
joining with others in a common task and
three it brings forth the goods and
services for a becoming existence with
this in mind Schumacher points out that
work is a basic human function that
transcends the usual economic meanings
associated with it he writes
to organize work in such a manner that
it becomes meaningless boring
stultifying or nerve-racking for the
worker would be little short of criminal
it would indicate a greater concern with
Goods than with people and evil lack of
compassion and a soul-destroying degree
of attachment to the most primitive side
of this worldly existence equally the
strife for leisure as an alternative to
work would be a complete
misunderstanding of one of the basic
truths of human existence namely that
work and leisure are complementary parts
of the same living process and cannot be
separated without destroying the joy of
[Music]
if I am inspired by the humanity and
beauty of Schumacher’s description of
the Buddhist conception of what is
called Right Livelihood what does that
leave me in terms of the current
conditions in my own society the answer
for me comes from a strange place I
found it in Lawrence Wechsler book
titled seeing is forgetting the name of
the thing one sees an examination of a
life and work of the contemporary artist
Robert Irwin what is unusual and
inspiring about urlan is the
experimentation he brought to exploring
the boundaries of his craft to me
Irwin’s journey is a model for anyone in
any walk of life take control over your
life and work it tells us instead of
following the normal course of his
profession
Irwin followed his curiosity and created
a unique path of exploration and
wonderment that provided a life force
based on self-expression at least two
things happen to most students who read
Irwin’s biography first and most
important they realize that they do not
need to stay within the bounds of their
profession as taught in school are
practiced by their peers second they
learn about perception which is for most
of them a useful new way of seeing the
world as the title says seeing is
forgetting the name of the thing one
sees even those who stay in the system
can make meaningful choices that support
their principles and set them apart from
their professional colleagues some
people for example myself included do
not as a matter of principle do military
work others choose to work on social
betterment projects
more telling than the choice of work is
an individual’s attitude toward and
relationship to his work many people
associate the freedom to make such
choices only with highly skilled
professional work my experience is that
such choices are available even in the
most seemingly menial jobs I worked my
way through school with various jobs I
have worked as a gas station attendant a
Riveter a handyman a warehouse hauler a
door-to-door salesman
a stock clerk a delivery man a street
vendor a postal clerk a chicken farmer
an engineer and a teacher was I any less
intelligent or less of a person when I
didn’t have a PhD attached to my name no
matter what work any of us does or a
background we come from we get to decide
how we see ourselves and the world when
you hold yourself in high esteem and
keep a positive outlook on your future
others usually follow suit by choosing
the meaning we give to the people and
things in our environment ultimately we
control our own experiences no matter
what work we are doing fulfilling others
expectations one of the hardest things
can be to follow a path that’s different
from what your family or society expects
of you it’s very possible that you are
expected to join the family business or
have the same career and life trajectory
as your parents and maybe that would
make you happy and maybe equipment when
I grew up in the Bronx my friend Mark
got a lot of pressure from his parents
because he was not paying attention to
his schoolwork he spent all of his time
on the street fixing cars they insisted
he go to a counselor who put him through
a battery of tests the results showed
that he had an aptitude for doing things
with his hands he ended up moving to a
small town where he opened a printing
business and lived happily ever
like mark many of us do have a sense as
to what kinds of things we are good at
and what naturally appeals to us you
know we are surrounded by well-meaning
people like marks parents who have
formed ideas about what is the best path
for us the two idea streams are often in
conflict when my wife Ruth was in school
her parents insisted that she studies
something marketable like secretarial or
teaching skills instead of doing the
artistic and creative problem-solving
work she was born for this pressure led
to a wrong professional choice and it
took many years for her to get on the
proper path sometimes though you can be
lucky and have a protector
Andy was my closest friend in graduate
school during his funeral in a very
moving eulogy his nephew tearfully
expressed his gratitude the nephew now a
successful architect felt deeply
indebted to Andy for having taken him in
and supported his studies in
architecture after his own father
disowned him for deciding not to go into
the family business
mark Ruth and Andy’s nephew all faced
conflicts about career path choices such
issues are very common for college
students even without outside
constraints it’s not uncommon for people
to change their choices in midstream
some do it several times others spend
most of their working lives hunting for
the right career and some drop out
completely often when I speak with
students I explain to them that many
people even very successful ones do not
know what they will do when they grow up
it’s all part of the adventure of life
and the best thing is to enjoy the
voyage
the constraints on our career path is
tend to be self-imposed it is said that
we all rise to our level of incompetence
I can’t say that I have found much truth
in that when I find more to be the case
is that we tend to rise without thinking
there was a ladder that exists in many
career paths and society brainwashes
people to think they are supposed to
climb it not every new award degree or
promotion is a good thing for the
individual there are a great many X
something’s floating around it would
have led much more satisfying and
productive lives if they had stayed in
the trenches doing what they really
enjoyed rather than moving in what
looked like an upward direction a woman
named Diane spent many years as a nurse
before getting promoted to supervisor
and then to administrate it was a lot
more money and power yet she realized
that she wasn’t helping anybody anymore
and quit being so far removed from the
patients she cared about it killed her
enthusiasm for the job now she’s a
martial arts instructor instead if in
doubt go back to the earlier exercise
where you asked yourself three questions
Who am I what do I want what is my
purpose it’s a good idea to revisit that
exercise frequently now I’d like you to
do it once more and add a new word what
do I really want keep asking it over and
over until you feel you have gained
insight into your own desires so you’re
no longer at the mercy of society’s
ideas of what is good for you what we
take for granted
the most important things we can know
about a man are the things he takes for
granted and the most important things to
know about a society are those which are
simply assumed and seldom noticed Louis
worth the things we take for granted and
simply assume are the basis for our
self-image and give the things in our
lives their meaning by making our
background assumptions explicit we are
able to affirm them or change them doing
this gives us the opportunity to change
ourselves from puppets to truly
autonomous beings some people achieve
autonomy through sheer stubbornness and
rebelliousness although that may work
it’s not a healthy way to approach
change a more rational approach is to
look at everything that is obvious to
you your turn
make a list of all the things in your
life that you do not normally notice a
good heading for such a list is things
that are too obvious or too trivial to
list for example your list might include
the following one I don’t really listen
when my wife talks to me – I will never
clean out the garage Green I do not get
enough sleep for I never seem to get
around to phoning my cousin 5 I always
support the same political party that my
parents do and 6 my attitude toward
money is the same as my father’s in the
coming days notice how much of your
behavior is based on items on this list
if you are happy with these things go on
with your life if you want to change any
of them cross them out on the list
both actually and metaphorically one of
the things I very much like about
problem statements in the form of points
of view which we discussed in chapter 3
is that the POV statement tends to
reveal underlying assumptions and make
the desired objectives explicit formally
many people operated on the basis of
unspoken and unnoticed assumptions now
with POV more assumptions are stated
explicitly
unfortunately countless assumptions
still go unnoticed and may in fact
unnecessarily bias the solution the role
unquestioned assumptions play becomes
obvious if we look back at
socio-political norms of the past things
like the absolute power of royalty
political participation only for men
property passed to the eldest son
slavery serfdom a prohibition on divorce
only men being allowed to file for
divorce only property holders being
allowed to vote child labour
colonization and the white man’s burden
for a long time each of these was
assumed to be an intrinsic part of the
given culture and passed unnoticed and
uncontested until its presence was
brought into the foreground and its
legitimacy questioned a parable that
nicely illustrates the relativistic
nature of our social norms is the story
of the young man who walked into a small
town dressed only in a white sheet and
did not speak except for babbling
sentence the townspeople assume the poor
fellow was insane and locked him up in
their mental hospital a week later 20
more people walked into town dressed
identically in white sheets and babbling
in the same way as the original film at
this point the townspeople released the
first man clearly he was part of a
religious sect the overriding message
here is that if you were going to do
something outlandish you would better
get a group together otherwise people
will think you’re crazy many
institutions in our society are widely
accepted and yet if you looked at them
with in the white sheet babbling
framework they would make no sense if
there weren’t a lot of people
participating in them imagine what would
happen if there were no universities and
I approached you on the street and
suggested that you pay me a lot of money
for at least four years in return I
would give you lectures on subjects you
have never heard of that I happen to be
interested in and if you jump through
enough hoops at the end of the four
years I would give you a piece of paper
with your name on it let’s call it a BS
would that sound reasonable
I once heard an Indian guru give a
parable describing the history of
banking and then was sitting on his
front porch watching the world go by
when suddenly he got a vision consisting
of four letters B a N and K so he got a
piece of chalk and wrote the letters on
his front door shortly thereafter
someone came up to him and gave him some
money
the man was surprised and perplexed so
he put the money in a large box all day
long people kept giving him money and he
kept being perplexed and putting the
money into the box finally at the end of
the day the man went into his house and
took all his money out from under his
mattress and put it in the same box the
story was told to warn the Guru’s
followers about self delusion and false
prophets it makes the point that if
enough people do it it stops being crazy
and instead becomes the accepted norm
the famous tulip stock market calm and
housing bubbles are just the tip of the
iceberg for this type of me2 behavior
unfortunately this tendency to re label
the crazy as normal doesn’t apply only
to financial situations it is also at
the heart of some of the world’s
greatest political and social conflicts
in the many ongoing conflicts between
people and nations each side justifies
itself by pointing out some wrong done
to it by the other side each side story
makes perfect sense and justifies
whatever they do in response the
interesting thing that often goes
unnoticed is that the justification
depends on where they start the story I
call this a question of punctuation and
although it goes unacknowledged by the
belligerents it is of utmost importance
history is an ongoing flow for all
practical purposes other than in our
individual lives there is no beginning
or end
so all stories that are told with a
beginning are distortions of what has
happened where the story starts colours
it so as to justify the storytellers
position the ongoing slaughter between
Muslims and Hindus did not start with
who threw the first stone after the
Indian subcontinent partition the
trouble in your marriage did not start
when your wife went out with her
ex-boyfriend while your husband did not
clean the garage by deciding where to
start the story or where to put the
period you give the story its meaning by
changing the punctuation you can make
the hero into the villain and vice versa
the problem is that most of us are too
busy seeing all the babbling sheets
around us if that is all we see it
becomes very difficult for us to see
that we and our fellows are not acting
like autonomous reasonable rational
beings in many ways our self-image is
intimately related to what we choose is
our identity we often hold a few items
so strongly that we lose our autonomy
and in effect become puppets
these items should certainly be on your
list of things that are too obvious or
too trivial to list if you are willing
to cut the puppeteer strings while still
holding on to your identity you might
free yourself to rewrite your conflicts
toys with different
situation sometimes you’re going to
screw up somewhere along the way all of
us will screw up some of us will screw
up more than others it’s just plain
going to happen you’ll fudge something
on a resume and get caught you’ll say
something insulting about your boss and
find out he’s within earshot
you’ll accept credit for something that
was really someone else’s idea you’ll
sneak into work late I pretend you were
there all along here’s the thing
presidents Richard Nixon and Bill
Clinton both screwed up yet what got
them into real trouble wasn’t the
original sin it was the lies they told
afterward and each of them fest up their
troubles would most likely have blown
over much faster instead we remember I
am NOT a crook
and I did not have sexual relations with
that woman
as punchlines lies and snowball you tell
one and then you have to tell another to
back it up when you feel painted into a
corner there’s a good solution tell the
truth it’s uncomfortable and you may get
into trouble yet it will almost
certainly be less trouble than if you
compound the issue by lying again
when you get caught with your hand in
sometimes we can get so caught up in the
minutiae of our lives that we forget to
step back and see the bigger
possibilities out there for us if you’ve
been following a conservative path why
not take a chance and veer off it for a
while
change your surroundings agree to a
friend’s crazy blend tag along in a
cross-country trip learn about
communities different from your own and
figure out where you fit in remember
that the real big picture is this you
don’t take anything with you when you
die so you might as well spend your time
on earth experiencing all that you can rather than stagnate and accumulate