“Why do you keep trying to help people?”
“Why do you care what others think?”
“Why do you keep trying to understand others?”
These are three questions that keep coming up this week in multiple settings.
My DevOps team and management seems actively self-destructive and “anti-pattern” when it comes to effective DevOps management. Like most cycles of self-destruction, we know we have issues, but unable to self-correct or break out of the vicious cycle.
In several personal circles, I open myself up and allow myself to be commented on or ridiculed. There’s an easy answer, “Don’t.” But I still put myself on display or give a shit.
Case in point:
I post a picture of my home office. The responses were:
1) “that’s cool, Ken.”
2) “that’s a neat monitor.”
3) “you need more monitors, Ken, maybe close yourself off from the world?”
4) “too much stuff”
All four are correct. All four were comments in reply. One of them came from a family member who spent the latter half of her life enjoying and getting the better things but is still passing judgment on me for mine.
I thought long and hard about nuking all of my social media accounts and web presence this week, for multiple reasons. I looked at the histories and answers people have given on each.
I met several dozen very interesting people on Facebook that I genuinely care about and would like to stay in touch with.
I have a dozen people on Twitter that I am genuinely interested in, and would like to stay in touch with. Oddly, the very person who commented “too much stuff” contributes absolutely nothing to Twitter and yet comments on others’.
I met other cancer survivors, radio technicians, DevOps Engineers, fellow geeks, anime fanatics, and some very interesting people through my blog.
So, the opinions and interests of a couple dozen very cool people matter more to me than the negative opinions, gripes, and judgements of a handful of people who attempt to exert some force on my life.
I deny you that right.
Your opinion means nothing if you pass judgment on me. You stopped having value when you stopped contributing constructive criticism or a modicum of praise.
Continued thoughts:
I really do need to find other hobbies and other outlets. The more I listen to amateur radio, the more I hear the same as what I hear on social media:
the desire to hear others,
the desire to be heard.
Whether social media, IRC, BBSes, blogs, amateur radio, or screaming at the universe, it’s all a clamor of voices where people seek solace, comfort, advice, and shared communal experience.
It begins by seeking the humanity of others.
It ends with us tearing each other down or passing judgment on others because their interests don’t align with ours.
There’s a line from Almost Famous that always resonated with me “The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you’re uncool.” To me that boils down to connection and authenticity and the fact that nothing else really means much without them.
One time when I was a kid my stepdad’s grandmother was in the hospital and the extended family was there bickering over her estate. When the doctor came to talk to them they tried to draw him into their dysfunction while shouting at each other. The doctor just turned around and walked away. I didn’t have a lot of good role modeling at that age, but it seemed to me was the only healthy way to handle the situation and it stuck with me.
I’ve said before that I’m highly restrictive with who I let into my life. It’s not out of egotism or smugness, it’s a way to protect myself. A form of self-preservation in a gritty, abrasive world where people are so desensitized that everything’s turned up to 11 and shock value is ubiquitous. Where people have numerous socially constructed excuses to mistreat each other. None of it holds water under closer examination which is why closer examination is shunned and vilified. Time and energy are so precious that I only want to invest in people who treat me the way I want to be treated and who attempt to understand and appreciate my values, or at least my motivation and intent.
My favorite quote of all time is from Oscar Wilde “We’re all lying in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” I look for the other people who are also looking at the stars. They’re the ones you can confide in. If you can make them understand what you need, they’re the ones that will always try to come through. You care because you’re a good person and that’s fantastic, but you need a different set of expectations for people who haven’t noticed the stars yet or decided they weren’t interesting.
In some ways the internet is the worst thing to happen to mankind maybe ever. If it’s this hard on us as adults, think what it’s doing to the minds and identities of our teenagers and kids. That’s our future and our legacy.
In conclusion, my favorite meme. It makes a good mantra to remind yourself when you’re tempted to engage.