You are the sum total of your skills

A little epiphany that has been nagging at my sub conscious for a while now, which I've decided to actually listen to.

I'm a needy person. I need things. Everyday I need something be it a cup of coffee a cigarette a piece of cake or a glass of wine, these things I need, and everyday someone fulfills my need. Someone I've never met, probably never will, but that someone services my need/s and yours.

Let's take something simple such as a cup of coffee. I have no idea how coffee is made until it reaches my house in my storage jar and I boil the kettle and make it. That's as far as my knowledge goes. But....saying that....the guy who grows the coffee has no idea how its frozen or labelled or manufactured into jars. The guy on the conveyor belt sticking the labels on the jars has no idea how the coffee is grown or marketed, the advertising gurus and marketers haven't a clue how its grown or freeze dried and the Company Director of the coffee company has no idea about either or any of those things, he just runs the company.

So, in effect when I get my morning cuppa, quite possibly a few hundred or even thousand people have made that possible. We all collaborated to fill my need.

If I was a self sufficient type person, I would in all likelihood have to forego my cuppa as I've no idea how to make it unless I mastered the skills to make it and all the related steps to get that wonderful morning cuppa, therefore I would be in lack and not a very happy old bird!

Collaboration = wealth & happiness
self sufficiency = poverty & lack

We have been lead to believe that society is based on and has its roots in money, I believe that whilst money plays a huge role in our society at present, society throughout the ages has always and will always be based on need & skills. The barter system was evidence of this. You needed something, you traded something for it whether it be a skill or an item you produced but it still boiled down to need

Collaboration = wealth & happiness
self sufficiency = poverty & lack

Therefore, I think it goes without saying (but of course I'm going to ) that if you have no skills you cannot fulfill other people's needs and therefore are percieved as having little or no value. It doesn't matter in this society that you may be a wonderful person, kind to animals and kisses his mum goodnight everynight, if you are unemployed those traits count for nothing, it you have no skills then you are invisible.

Example.
My car breaks down. I've no idea how to fix it. Some guy comes along stops and offers to help which I accept. I have a need for someone to fix my car. He lifts up the bonnet/hood and umms and ahhs for a bit before saying "I'm a nice guy you know and a good listener" I nod but then ask him if he can fix the car He tells me that he's good with kids and loves animals I'm getting frustrated now and say "Ok great but can you fix my car?" He accuses me of being a bit shallow and not appreciating his good points I by this time lose my temper a touch and tell him I don't care if he's the second coming, if he can't fix my car he's of no value to me. I don't need a nice warm hearted guy I need a mechanic!

I knew a surgeon when I lived in London. He was an obnoxious arrogant arse and for the life of me I couldn't find one redeeming quality in the man, but when I needed an operation, he was the one I went to. He had skill, it didn't matter what he was like as a person, I needed him.

So in essence, being doesn't cut it....its the doing that counts
You can be all you want but if you don't do then your value decreases, so some of us need to make changes in order to fulfill needs and thereby increase our value and gain respect. Change is hard, misery is easy. The second you try and make changes there will be those who will try and stop you.

Your fat friend will try and stop you losing weight saying you don't need to, your unemployed friend will tell you there's no need to work and won't want to see you successfully start a career. Why do they do that? Because they are not doers, they are not creators, they do not fulfill any need. They live in fear of failure and its far easier to slag off others than actually do something themselves, after all if you never do anything you can't be critcised can you?

If you bring nothing to the table then don't except to eat at it!!

So despite the concensus stating that we are NOT our jobs, I think we most definitely are! Let me put it this way, if you were to die tomorrow you would be remembered for what you did, not what you were i.e. Fireman dies in house fire, Film Star dies in drug overdose, Miner dies in underground cave in.....the headlines wouldn't read Kind Hearted Person dies in Crash or Good Listener Drowns in River

I could go on and probably on a bit more lol but I know how folk like to read in bite sized snack portions so I'll leave it there
For now

First, I'd like to suggest that you stop lifting your philosophical notions from old cracked articles.

Second, in practical terms, the division of labour CAN improve everyone's quality of life, but only if the system works. E.g. if everyone made their own pencils from scratch, it would take much longer for everyone to make one, but everyone would be able to make their own and wouldn't need to rely on anyone else. If a cog breaks down, we're all up the creek, since no other cog fits where that cog used to be.

You assert that division of labour is the path to high quality of life, which can be correct. Self sufficiency has a narrower range of happiness than division of labour, but division has a higher ceiling and lower floor.

You're right that everyone needs to have a use in society, but your implication that uses have to be purely practical is wrong, I go to a surgeon when I need surgery, a mechanic when I need mechanicery, and nice people when I need comfort and support.

reply to post by phyllida


constant pressure and drive for success, stresses you unconsciously and wears you down, ultimately eroding your true happiness. Drive for Success and achievement should always be for your self and not others to "remember" you by.

submitting to be a slave to the monetary system? No. But developing and mastering skills are important because this is one of the key ways to move society forward as a whole.

reply to post by Dispo


I agree if a cog breaks we can be up poo alley, that is one of the downsides of specialisation. Come the apocalypse we will be buggered as no one person in today's society knows how to produce from start to finish.

But I think my philosophy is sound, in so far as we are indeed a very needy society but far from being a bad thing it creates so much

Not sure what you mean by a cracked article....sorry I'm not up on all the jargon yet. I couldn't find anything similar to my thoughts previously written on here I DID use search too before I get accused of that failing

I think the only difference here is that you have taken collaboration for granted while in the process you have given up on honing your self-sufficiency a long time ago.

Most people are like this and wouldn't be able to survive if something terrible happened to the current system.

collaboration = taken for granted
self-sufficiency = no longer an option

reply to post by LesMisanthrope


Absolutely. Society as a whole operates as a whole with collaboration from others to fulfill need. But as I state in the op even in the days of barter, there was still collaboration and still a society based on need just to a smaller extent.

And yup highly unlikely we 21st century peeps would be able to managed true self sufficiency, unless we gave up on many many "needs", which then indicates lack and certainly gives the impression of poverty relatively speaking

reply to post by phyllida


Ah, sorry, I was referring to this article:
www.cracked.com...

Let's say that the person you love the most has just been shot. He or she is lying in the street, bleeding and screaming. A guy rushes up and says, "Step aside." He looks over your loved one's bullet wound and pulls out a pocket knife -- he's going to operate right there in the street.

You ask, "Are you a doctor?"

The guy says, "No."

You say, "But you know what you're doing, right? You're an old Army medic, or ..."

At this point the guy becomes annoyed. He tells you that he is a nice guy, he is honest, he is always on time. He tells you that he is a great son to his mother and has a rich life full of fulfilling hobbies, and he boasts that he never uses foul language.

reply to post by Dispo


Arghhh ok now I just want to curl up and die! Besides the fact its written far better than mine! That site looks like blogs, is this someone you know, the person who wrote it that is? Took me a good hour or more to write my post too and now I'll have to see if it can be deleted grrrr! So much for being unique

My epiphany which apparently isn't a bloody epiphany at all now, happened over a period of a fews weeks before Christmas due to having miserable friends, stuck in a rut, constantly moaning about not being able to get a job, having no talents and always attracting the same blokes that never stuck around. One long night and several bottles of wine later, I was losing patience and it hit me that in effect they had nothing to offer and who'd want to be around them in the first place? My man friend is practically unemployable and spends all day everyday playing computer games. My girlfriend continues to be a victim going from one failed relationship to another and is a definite misery loves company person. I got a bit hacked off and started with a few home truths as I saw it.For the life of me I couldn't see what on earth she even brought into a relationship and told her so.

Needless to say we aren't friends anymore but from what I hear along the grapevine they are still exactly the same, doing absolutely nothing

reply to post by phyllida


Your post is just as eloquent as theirs, don't delete it. I thought you just lifted it straight from there at first, but if it's something you came up with, fair play.

It's sort of a blog, it's a collection of authors who write articles, infographics and make photoplastys and post them there. Some of it is jokey, some serious, but mostly a mixture.

I feel for you about your friends, but there's a difference between "if you're not productive you're useless to society" and "these people moan all the time and it pisses me off."

As I said earlier, being nice and being a good listener and making people feel happy IS a skill, and a useful one. It's not something I'm great at, but I appreciate that without nice people, regardless of whether they can do surgery or fix a car, the world would be a much worse place.

reply to post by Dispo


Still feel like a prat lol that article now gives my post nil value and being that value was one of the core tenets of the post.....

I have no idea what an infographic or photoplasty (sounds like a surgical procedure) is but I'll be sure to look it up!

I suppose the concept of us all collaborating together and working as a whole isn't new, it just felt new to me at the time it kicked in. Reading so much on here about how we are all such awful beings and the world is going to hell in a handcart etc kinda got me a tad annoyed but then again I'm old and frosty So I began wondering about isolating oneself from society, becoming self sufficient, not needing from others, and found it would probably be impossible to do

There is only so much sympathy you can have for certain people. Sympathy serves absolutely no purpose except to keep that person in the same position/state of mind that they are already in. They grow so used to the sympathy it perpetuates their misery.

I'm not saying being kind caring and a wonderful husband/wife isn't good, I'm saying that society as a whole doesn't actually care about that, just what you can deliver, how you can meet the needs of the whole. Now we are so specialised that it would be difficult indeed to ever be self sufficient without giving up a lot of what we've grown used to.

When my friend said "I think I'm too needy and that's what scares men off" it struck me that yes she was but then through the discussion, it became apparent we are ALL needy whether it be material goods, love & attention, recognition fame & fortune, we all have needs and fulfilling those needs makes us happy. That's why dieters are always miserable....they are doing without what they need, what makes them happy

On a sidenote, I think that the basis for my philosophy, which I might add has improved my life quite dramatically in only the last two months, is probably an old book I read online about 3 years ago, The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace Wattles. I've read it numerous times and each time a little bit more gels with me particularly about the value issue.

Just goes to show, when it comes to philosophical debate, there really isn't anything new!

Just found the link to the book
The Science of Getting Rich

reply to post by phyllida

Come the apocalypse we will be buggered as no one person in today's society knows how to produce from start to finish.

Today's society, which society is that?

Big city society yes to most but not all, many can produce all their need from start to finish, go further away from modernized society where people live more of the land and you have many more that can produce their need from start to finish.

You seem to confuse needs for wants

reply to post by InhaleExhale


I don't confuse needs for wants, what I am saying is we ALL confuse needs for wants. Yes we can have all that we need self sufficiently, if we are prepared to step backwards and reduce our needs to that of the basics, but we have been brought up to expect far more than just the basics, and I have to say why shouldn't we have more?

I need my train to be on time in the morning to get me to work, I need the paper I write on to adquately do my job, just like I need the pen to write with. I need the baker to make the bread overnight so I can have my breakfast and lunch. My needs create their value to society. We are no longer individual little units of self support, if we ever were.

To me self sufficiency doesn't equal value & happiness but fulfilling others needs can

Self sufficiency doesn't give back anything to society as a whole collective, it is a selfish pursuit resulting in isolation and lack

Originally posted by phyllida
reply to post by InhaleExhale

 

I don't confuse needs for wants, what I am saying is we ALL confuse needs for wants. Yes we can have all that we need self sufficiently, if we are prepared to step backwards and reduce our needs to that of the basics, but we have been brought up to expect far more than just the basics, and I have to say why shouldn't we have more?

I need my train to be on time in the morning to get me to work, I need the paper I write on to adquately do my job, just like I need the pen to write with. I need the baker to make the bread overnight so I can have my breakfast and lunch. My needs create their value to society. We are no longer individual little units of self support, if we ever were.

To me self sufficiency doesn't equal value & happiness but fulfilling others needs can

Self sufficiency doesn't give back anything to society as a whole collective, it is a selfish pursuit resulting in isolation and lack

edit on 9-1-2013 by phyllida because: (no reason given)

Well you are speaking politically which means you are either deceitful or ignorant, (no offense intended please read on to see why)

I understand that many confuse needs for wants but you keep describing wants when none of them are a real necessity and one would call being without these wants poverty when another would say they are free from societies chains.

Saying "we" as opposed to "me" or "I" when explaining points of view is what professional liars do to group like minded individuals to back their agenda and a group is almost always perceived as being more productive than an individual.

You saying you need your train to be on time also says that you need the stress of it being late, Why? Because that is the reality of a scheduled timetable, the more importance a person puts on something the more power it has over them, a need is very important, a want is what we should rid ourselves of to get what we really need if we can see the difference between the two.

Yes we can have all that we need self sufficiently, if we are prepared to step backwards and reduce our needs to that of the basics, but we have been brought up to expect far more than just the basics, and I have to say why shouldn't we have more?

We do not need more we need less so to better see ourselves, we want more because we are greedy

reply to post by Americanist


Awfully sorry but I fail to see the relevance of your video link to the op. Interesting vid but nothing new. Sorry but my thanks for participating

reply to post by InhaleExhale


Again sorry but not sure what you mean by speaking politically. I use the we to encompass the whole. I cannot simply state me or I, as that would indicate that everything in my op is totally subjective and not also employed by the whole i.e. society in general. Using generalisation is not a crime..I hope!

To me greed is obtaining and having more than you can efficiently or logically utilise and giving back nothing of value. For example, I may need a new car, with that new car I can take my children to school, I can avoid pain of carrying heavy bags when shopping, I can take my elderly neighbour shopping and sightseeing, I can take my parents to visit relatives. My having a new car has value...use value. If, however, I were to get 4 new cars, then that would be greed. I couldn't possibly utilise and use all 4 cars so there would be little value and a lot of "waste". Greed is having things objects items that you don't utilise as opposed to need whereby you do use the items procured.

A self sufficient claiming person would probably say "Ahh well I don't need nor use a car because I'm all green and environmentally aware"...fair enough but they would probably have a bike or take the bus or use the train either way, they are using and getting value from, something that someone else has made or produced.

We all have the right to be rich do we not?