For some of us, the point of almost any endeavor in life is to be “good” at them. That isn’t even to say you can’t enjoy it, or you have to feel anxious about whether you’re good enough at it. The point is the go through the process of becoming good at the things you choose to do because we acknowledge that there is something beautiful and admirable about expertise.
Someone who feels dejected — because he can’t see the reason in doing something unless he’s already hit the requisite hours to be ‘good’ at it — probably needs to hear that he needs to unlearn whatever makes him feel bad about being ‘bad’ at the start, instead of hearing that it’s okay to suck at something as long as he enjoys it.
Otherwise, all you’re doing is trading one form of anxiety for another (I must be good at X vs. I must feel good about X), and he’s still going to notice that he sucks at the thing (playing guitar, golfing, whatever) and find difficulty enjoying it from there.
What does "suck" even mean in this context? A composer might still "suck" if they compared themselves to Johann Sebastian Bach, but is that the most important question in the scheme of things?
The one thing we can all become experts at is being ourselves. Nobody in the world, in fact, can do it better. I think it's best to focus on that.
The anxiety you're describing, I think, is endemic in modern society, especially among the professional class. Whether or not we choose to adopt it is up to us.
After that the pressure was off and now I just do dog photo's for instagram from the dog park :)
I fall into this pitfall a lot, whether it be working on small personal projects or playing a video game. I think a large part of it comes down to comparing yourself to others.
I took up drawing a year ago and it was completely new to me, as well as the first hobby in a while I went into without caring how well I did. And as a result it was fun and relaxing. A few months ago I started looking at other artists and their work and started comparing my work to theirs. And guess what, I began feeling like drawing was a chore or work.
More and more I am starting to believe the phrase 'Comparison is the thief of all joy'. I try to remind myself of this when I notice that I'm comparing myself to others.
If you haven't already, I highly suggest making a child if you can. It seems to snap all of this into focus - it did for me anyway.
I mean I still have a ton of existential dread and still often wonder what the point is but I do find purpose in providing for my family and trying to raise a human that can do good - maybe better than me and the author of that NYer piece :D.
Put like this, it is actually mind blowing and betraying the belief of my whole life.
To me, hobbies are activities that you enjoy so much you eventually get good at. My definition of talent is the ability to persistently and consistently improve yourself in a field. This definition includes the ability to efficiently obtain positive dopamine feedback to continue training and effectively curb burnout.
I really wished I can say I am talented, both in my works and my hobbies. But maybe, just maybe. Getting good is not really important after all.
(And about work: Maybe getting good at work and advancing career is also not the point? What is work anyway? Contributing to society in exchange of being let alive? Lol)
I think his point is that being really bad at something is no fun. If my goal is to have fun I would rather do something I will enjoy right away.
Children are terrible at everything but they have a lot of fun anyway. Clearly it is possible, which makes this a mindset issue. Thankfully, that is within your power to change. Start having fun today :)
Therapy can be such a powerful force for self-discovery and mental well-being. To think that believing a given philosophical statement can have the same effect as deep inner work is to completely write off the power of therapy. I would highly recommend it for anyone who has grown up in less-than-ideal social systems (pretty much all of us) and who wants to improve their life.
If you're fucked up, try drugs, (preferably the _legal_ kind, but certain herbs work really well) before you try therapy. Therapy is expensive for a reason; it's 50% a scam.
There are forms of therapy as interventions that are generally shown to be effective according to research (e.g. CBT and variants), and I think we'd be rid of a lot of confusion by better distinguishing one therapy from another.
If seeing a therapist is to be maintained indefinitely, then it's not triggering meaningful long-term change. You can't chalk up a problem of this scale to a matter of education.
Why can't I do that? It seems to me that if different countries have much better generalised psychotherapy results, I can absolutely ascribe that difference to education.
First off, that's a bold statement that I need something to back it up, unless it's just your opinion.
For the sake of argument, let's say it is true, though. Is the more likely reason that there are different societal pressures, expectations, and outlets inherent in different cultures, causing different mental health outcomes and needs?
Why? It's just a simple statement of (alleged) fact. Like, say, "Shaker furniture isn't really a thing in Australia"; that can be true or false, but WTF is particularly "bold" about it?
> that I need something to back it up,
Why? That assumes everyone having regular therapy is the default and not having it is the weird exception. What's to say it isn't the other way around, so you are the one who needs to back up their statement?
But OK, let me disabuse you of your misconception: The only place I've ever heard of people undergoing years-long regular psychotherapy are pop-cultural references, film and TV... American film and TV. I get my films and TV perhaps mostly from Scandinavia, Germany and Britain, but as I'm sure you know America exerts a huge pop culture pressure in Europe. But in none of that is "I can't on Thursday afternoon, that's when I see my shrink" a cliché like it is in American stuff. (Not to forget, as late as the 1990s that whole trope was used self-ironically in at least one but I think several films by Woody Allen, making fun of his own neuroticism -- because back then it still wasn't the norm in America either.)
Needless to say, I've never come across the phenomenon in real life either, in any of the Northern European countries I more-or-less regularly frequent. You'd think if it was even remotely normal here I'd have come across a remark like "X couldn't join us today because of their regular therapy session" at least once in the last four decades, but I haven't.
> unless it's just your opinion.
It's a claim of fact, provable or disprovable; it literally can't be an "opinion". And, as per the above, all evidence I've ever seen strongly points towards the statement being true.
> For the sake of argument, let's say it is true, though.
Nah, not "for the sake of argument". Let's say it's true because it is.
> Is the more likely reason that there are different societal pressures, expectations, and outlets inherent in different cultures, causing different mental health outcomes and needs?
Yeah, sure. Mainly, AFAICT, because seeing your shrink once or twice a week like you see your barber every few weeks isn't a fashion accessory necessary for your status in the rest of the world like it seems to be for the American (upper?) middle class. Which IMO seems to indicate that the societal pressures, expectations, and outlets inherent in most other cultures are healthier than those of the American one. HTH!
So few moderns have a third place now, that they pay people to take that role.
The point of hobbies is not "getting good at them". It's enjoying them for their own sake. Otherwise they turn into ... work.
> I'm just a blip in the universe and when I'm gone it will be unchanged, the same as if I had never existed.
Yes. The Universe doesn't expect or have any special plans for you.
But hey, that is not that bad. Consider the opposite. The Whole universe having a plan for you. The whole infinite Cosmos. Just thinking about you and having a plan for you.
I don't know about you. But it would give me a panic attack.
It's ok that the Universe doesn't have a plan for you. This frees you to assign your life whatever meaning you want - and to change it at any point! You can also feel gratified about fulfilling your self-assigned potential or feel extremely disapointed if you did not. Or, change them again. Some hold that the secret to happiness is having the right expectations about oneself.
> And now what?
Therapy worked for me.