Why does defining work play such a fundamental role in your life?
Most of your life is spent doing “work”. However, the corporate-style work environment is not made for humans. It feels like school, where you, an adult “student” works hard, takes lunch breaks, and eagerly waits for the weekend to escape the torture.
In the industrial age, we began to view ourselves in mechanical terms: ramping up business, digging deeper, and fueling up.
In the digital age, we now use computer-related terms to describe ourselves: multitasking, life hacks, and processing data.
Here’s the issue: We are projecting machine features into humans. This is called mechanomorphism. Treating humans as machines.
It’s no surprise that we struggle to keep up, especially when we’re competing with computers.
Instead of viewing yourself as a machine, start defining your work as a human activity that involves the things that you want to do.
This way work will start becoming more “play” and less “work”.
The way to start is by outsourcing memorization.
“Memory is what computers were invented for in the first place. In 1945, when Vannevar Bush imagined the “memex,” on which computers were based, he described it as a digital filing cabinet—an external memory. And even though they can now accomplish much more than data retrieval, everything computers do—all of their functions—simply involves moving things from one part of their memory to another.” - Excerpt From Team Human by Douglas Rushkoff
Once you outsource your mechanical tasks to software, you begin to get a taste of your humanity back.
The basic idea is you shouldn’t do mechanical tasks yourself whenever you can use a tool to do those tasks for you.
When to be the robot: Engage in tasks that are novel, untested, or seemingly impossible for robots to handle, or where tackling a finite level of complexity by getting hands-on is beneficial.
When to use the robot: Utilize automation for tasks that are highly standardized, where manual intervention might not be necessary.
How many problems can be linked back to outdated work concepts?
The economy, jobs, education, and quality of life. In all these areas where we struggle to make progress, the fundamental nature of work remains unquestioned.
For work to change, we need completely new ways of being organized. While technology is powerful, it’s not very useful on its own. The tough part is changing everything around it like the mental models, habits, and perspectives.
A new definition of work must place humans at its core. Work should not cause suffering.People aren’t just tools, they’re the foundation of a prosperous society.
Timeless Freedom
Survival “All civilizations suffer shocks, only those that absorb the shocks survive.” — Stewart Brand. Absorbing shocks is key to survival. These shocks come from change. Change is how the future invades our lives, and when it outpaces us, it brings struggle. As the world grows more complex, our days fill with endless distractions, chores, and obligations. These constant interferences pull us away from our Native State — our natural way of living. Survival Mode happens when we are saturated...
When you look closely at your life for an extended period of time. Be it months, years, or even decades. You become aware of something. The only constant in life is change. But change doesn't come in consistent, calculated, predictable doses. "There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen"- Lenin. Some changes don't affect you at all. Others affect you for a while. But a few of them, alter the whole trajectory of your life. Things like Moving to a new city...
A new week is here, which means a new chance to get everything in sync. Today, instead of providing a template, I want to discuss a meta folder I always keep handy. This folder offers quick access to all the items that don't fit neatly into any specific life area. I call it the Reference folder. An overlooked issue in the world of systems is the absence of a constant reference point, similar to the "You are here" arrow on a map. Without this clear reference, it's impossible to navigate your...