Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

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daylen
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by daylen »

P_K wrote:
Wed Oct 16, 2019 12:52 pm
For some/many this can be enough/a fulfilling life. That is fine, no judgment here. Whatever it takes to get through this life and be happy and spread happiness is fine by me.
This assumes that other people need less to live a full life, hence there is judgement on your part. My point was that their lives could be equally complex, because the surface representation hides the layers underneath. Campitor made this point concisely.

daylen
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by daylen »

P_K wrote:
Thu Oct 17, 2019 10:45 pm
What I was intending to do was point out one possible cause for sticking with one profession/place and how that cause and the result of that cause could work out well for some/many but might cause accidental harm for others. It is then those others who would benefit from knowing the alternative paths. Hell, everyone would benefit from knowing about other paths (maximizing optionality) but for the people who are unsatisfied and unhappy and confused as to why that is and why the same life choices make their friends happy would benefit a great deal more. I personally know too many excellent humans who fall into this category (and by this I mean I wish happiness for them, not that I regret knowing them).
There is a definite limit to maximizing optionality; there is a limited amount of time and many decisions to be made. You do have a point that often the problem appears to be a lack of option knowledge, and this relates to Se and Ne (action functions) which explore the physical and metaphysical realms. Se and Ne are linked to Ni and Si which are knowing functions.

With the added context of profession/place, strong Ni has an idea of what all people could do or where they could live (the universal lifestyle blueprints). If Se has been constrained to first-world countries then Ni could benefit form being shown how people live in other countries. The Si user would benefit more from integrating their past experiences to determine what roles have worked for them and where those roles are best leveraged. Se success is measured by checking off points in a list; Ne success is measured by connecting points to other points/lists. Ni strives for one path connecting many points and Si strives for one point with many emanating paths.

Si is often discounted on this forum, but imagine that everyday you go on a walk. The path stays mostly the same. Though, overtime you start to notice small changes such as a house being painted or a stray cat wondering in the bushes. Perhaps you start to recall old memories when walking past a particular spot or hearing a particular bird chirping. The seasons are cycled through and your clothing is altered accordingly. After five years this walk brings you nostalgia where all these memories become intertwined and synergistic with your ability to contemplate how other such routines could evolve. Suddenly, each walk becomes an adventure into how other people live their lives in parallel to the ongoing metaphor of your walking routine. Si allows access to rich examples of evolutionary processes under particular circumstances (unlike Ni which is always accessible), so that Ne brainstorming can be turned on by initiating the Si routine. Each Si routine could be associated with a different flavor of Ne simulation.

However simple Si-Ne may appear on the outside, it may surprise you as to what is going on beneath the surface. Complexity of behavior in some ways is inversely correlated to complexity of the concurrent mental processing. In neuroscience, movement is better understood than the simulation of movement. Animals have been moving for billions of years, primates have been thinking about it for far less. I try to treat each activity as equally complex (mind/body or physical/mental symmetry) in principle.
Last edited by daylen on Fri Oct 18, 2019 8:38 am, edited 1 time in total.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Campitor wrote: there are no boring <insert job or topic here> only people who lack imagination for the subject. Anything can be made interesting with imagination, focus, and the ability to still the mind - it's a skill that can be cultivated but few try.
I agree in the sense that "a cardboard box is the best toy." I disagree at the level that it is a known thing that most people hate micro-managers and I am eventually driven insane by living with grouchy old engineers. It's one thing to "only" give a child a cardboard box with which to play. It's another thing to direct every freaking second of the child's play with the cardboard box.
daylen wrote: I typically see a disconnect between this core (sleep, eat, cook, clean) and the gradient of different categorical resolutions (4 temperaments/quadras or 16 personalities).
I see them as very much connected, especially if you add aggression (fight)/anxiety (fly/scream/hide)/sexuality (third f) to the core mix. For instance, some temperaments/personalities are obviously better suited to guarding giant stockpiles of corn and eating only corn while other temperaments/personalities are obviously better suited to exploring new territory and taking risk at testing unfamiliar foodstuff. The problem which is the obvious conflict between these two personality types becomes its own solution when the overwhelming feeling of boredom and frustration that ensues from being given exact instructions on the one exact correct method on how to load the dishwasher or make a pot of coffee results in the very natural resolution of seeking new territory away from such oppression, until the next time the "chipmunk" is tempted out of her free woodland habitat by some park bench loiterer waving a big bag full of already conveniently, very efficiently processed nuts.

Campitor
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Campitor »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Fri Oct 18, 2019 6:50 am
I agree in the sense that "a cardboard box is the best toy." I disagree at the level that it is a known thing that most people hate micro-managers and I am eventually driven insane by living with grouchy old engineers. It's one thing to "only" give a child a cardboard box with which to play. It's another thing to direct every freaking second of the child's play with the cardboard box.
Some may be putting up with micro managers because their job is only a means to an end. I used to work in a pharmacy where this lady worked the most mind numbing possible job - counting pills for a dispensary. It's hard to believe that counting pills could be micromanaged but it was. And the lady ate the same lunch (PB&J every day) and dressed the same way every day (multiple pairs of the same clothes). Everyone thought she was dull and lacked ambition. I knew that she put up with the job because it allowed her to take year long sabbaticals (no guarantee of job on return) so she could do cool stuff like motorbiking across china or hitch hiking across America. The job always welcomed her back because apparently counting pills and being micromanaged while doing it isn't a popular job.

I'll leave you with some Stoic quotes:
  • “If you are pained by any external thing, it is not this thing that disturbs you, but your own judgment about it. And it is in your power to wipe out this judgment now.” - Marcus Aurelius
  • “External things are not the problem. It’s your assessment of them. Which you can erase right now.” – Marcus Aurelius
  • “How does it help…to make troubles heavier by bemoaning them?” – Seneca
  • “The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control. Where then do I look for good and evil? Not to uncontrollable externals, but within myself to the choices that are my own…” – Epictetus
If stoicism doesn't do it for you perhaps Buddha then? "We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves"

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Eh, I can't stomach Marcus Aurelius. Just another privileged E-J bragging about how he exhibited just enough self control of temper to avoid having a slave beheaded for dropping his dinner and patting himself on the back for exhibiting just enough self-control of libido to avoid doing the dirty with the concubines of his grandfather.

OTOH, I do agree with Seneca's take on bemoaning. I shouldn't be moaning. I should be gathering up the scattered shards of my adult masculine energy ,then forming them into a something like a clamshell around my juvenile feminine energy, and then if he yells at me again about something stupid like leaving my towel on the rack in the bathroom, I will pack up my stuff and leave AND also block his calls and texts in case I get weak. IOW, make a choice which I can control like Epictetus.

Campitor
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Campitor »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Sat Oct 19, 2019 7:24 pm
Eh, I can't stomach Marcus Aurelius. Just another privileged E-J bragging about how he exhibited just enough self control of temper to avoid having a slave beheaded for dropping his dinner and patting himself on the back for exhibiting just enough self-control of libido to avoid doing the dirty with the concubines of his grandfather.
Huh? Marcus Aurelius' Meditations was a private journal meant to remind himself on the virtues of life and stoicism - it was never meant to be published nor a source for bragging. If anything, his journal shows how much he struggled with being virtuous since it depicts how frequently he needed to remind himself to live by his stoic principles. Reminding himself to proverbially count to 10 over the decades implies that emotions were still forcing him to count to 10 - only groupies would believe he was perfect.

Calling Marcus Aurelius a "back patter" would be like calling Buddha a bloviator. And even if he was patting himself on the back, which I don't think he was considering the levels of self glorification he could have indulged in as the emperor of Rome, it doesn't negate the wisdom of his stoic philosophy. If I hated a math teacher, it still wouldn't negate the usefulness of math.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@Campitor:

My use of the phrase “concubines of his grandfather” was meant to signal that I was being somewhat facetious.

For the most part his writing strikes me as irrelevant. Me reading Marcus Aurelius is like Amy Poehler accidentally seating herself in the circle of Charlie Sheen’s Anger Management Group instead of the Cheese Making Seminar in the classroom down the hall. People who are naturally tending towards cheerful, oblivious and assertive rarely have to remind themselves to count to 10.

Socrates, John Stuart Mills, Journals of Benjamin Franklin are more to my liking.

Campitor
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Campitor »

@7wb

Socrates, John Stuart Mill, and Ben Franklin writing are certainly worth reading although I must admit that I haven't had the opportunity to read and JSM - only Socrates and Ben Franklin - its on my list of things I must do. In regards to Stoicism, Seneca for example does an excellent job illuminating WHY stoicism is a worthy model and how it can make life richer. What makes Marcus Aurelius' writing worth reading is that he encapsulates these stoic ideals into short exhortations that can be used as mnemonics to help guide oneself daily. Knowing that anger and emotions should be controlled is one thing but being able to use a succinct exercise to calm oneself is very valuable. And the end of the day, counting to 10 works because it's short and easy to recall - this is the power of Marcus Aurelius' writing.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

I don’t doubt that reading Marcus Aurelius would prove helpful for Yosemite Sam or Daffy Duck. I am just noting that Bugs Bunny is not usually in need of such exhortations. Maybe Bugs Bunny is a natural Stoic?

Campitor
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Campitor »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Sun Oct 20, 2019 2:49 pm
I don’t doubt that reading Marcus Aurelius would prove helpful for Yosemite Sam or Daffy Duck. I am just noting that Bugs Bunny is not usually in need of such exhortations. Maybe Bugs Bunny is a natural Stoic?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UetUwNg1yBg

Jason

Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Jason »

7Wannabe5 wrote:
Sat Oct 19, 2019 7:24 pm

OTOH, I do agree with Seneca's take on bemoaning. I shouldn't be moaning. I should be gathering up the scattered shards of my adult masculine energy ,then forming them into a something like a clamshell around my juvenile feminine energy, and then if he yells at me again about something stupid like leaving my towel on the rack in the bathroom,
I don't know much about Stoicism but I can understand the philosophy behind keeping a Roman bathhouse tidy.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@Campitor:

LOL- Very ENTP. You can observe how Bugs' Socratic Dialogue with himself is trying very hard to speed up slow secondary Ti function. Also note how in last frame he is already grinning again, because ENTPs are too future-oriented to hold a serious grudge* and the type most likely to enjoy taking on an impossible challenge.
Jason wrote:I don't know much about Stoicism but I can understand the philosophy behind keeping a Roman bathhouse tidy.
I don't mind the perfectionism so much (your house-your rules is not a huge problem for easy-going, adaptable ENTP) as much as the yelling, especially first thing in the morning. ENTPs are very big on self-improvement, so I have been doing a lot of reading on ESTJ (director)/ENTP (explorer)relationship dynamic. Unfortunately, because female ENTP's are rare in the population, I can only come up with working examples where the male is ENTP and the female is ESTJ. For instance, Major Margaret Houlihan and Captain Benjamin Pierce from "M.A.S.H." or Monica and Chandler from "Friends." It's objectively clear to me that Chandler needs to pull himself together, be a bit less goofy, and rise a bit towards ENTJ (leader/commander), in order to firmly address Monica's anxious-aggressive directive perfectionism. However, although I strongly believe that temperament/personality is more critical than gender, it is more difficult when you are a female ENTP dealing with a male ESTJ who is more like Alec Baldwin or Gordon Ramsay. Also, since I am a not very extroverted NTP, it is easier for me to just attempt to "escape" into my "I" while in his company, because it's very difficult to actively direct another person's reading. "Hell's Library" is not a thing. It is also quite a bit easier (hard tug on the steering wheel to bring this thread back to topic) for Ne dominant individual to simply choose to leave and explore other options rather than stay in less than ideal situation.

*Comical grudge, like the one I am holding against J.Bozo, because it amuses me to imagine one of the wealthiest men on the planet as my arch-nemesis, is another matter :lol:

horsewoman
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by horsewoman »

@7w5 - for what it's worth here is another female ENTP with low extrovertism (is this a word?). I can attest that yelling at me will seldom improve a situation and that I'm not able to hold a grudge.
My husband is ISFP with ADD and hyperactivity, so I cannot further your studies in this regard. But it is probably what you meant with ENTPs taking on challenges :)

But I suppose we are getting somewhat off topic here.

Campitor
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Campitor »

I've taken the myers brigg test 2x under the supervision of a MB professional - I scored in the middle. I can be I or E depending on the circumstances. If Myers Briggs was put on an XY axis - I would be in the center according to the guy who gave me the test. He said this was a bonus because it allows me to bridge the gap between the various I's and E's in the organization I work in.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@horsewoman:

Yes, I think being on the lower end of extroversion means that we naturally tend towards being on the absent-minded professor side, like INTPs. I am not at all a good aural learner and being yelled at just makes me feel nervous which actually increases my tendency towards distraction or fumbling incompetence. I mean, I have no difficulty with preparing a simple breakfast if left to my own devices, but if a person is Gestapo-style attempting to direct me into following his algorithm for frying eggs rather than my own, it becomes much more likely that I will burn the toast. Then I end up feeling like a sad, floppy Raggedy Ann doll rather than my usual cheerful, bouncy self, and the fact that my BF tried to amend for his behavior by giving me his credit card to go out shopping was pretty much just adding insult to injury. I was out to lunch with my DS31 INTP the other day and he said "Maybe you just need to stop dating bastards." , but he is obviously biased in my favor.

@Campitor:

I think it is usually the case that being close to X in any category will increase fluidity, empathy, and overall functioning. In fact, I believe that XXXX would be most like MBTI Wheaton level Jesus.

Jason

Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Jason »

That alternative paths are important is an assumption not a fact. As a matter of fact, they are relatively recent development/possibility. No one is talking about any of this before the automobile which has been depreciated by the internet. But back in those yonder days, you're marrying your second cousin and positioning the mare so it kicks your drunken father's head and you can inherit the horseshoe shop.

If you are getting philosophical about it, I would use the the Aristotelian four causal factors. To use the normal analogy, the conversation seems to revolve around only the material - the statue is made out of marble - and the efficient - Michelangelo made it. The formal - what kind of thing the statue is - and the end - to what the statue is ordered i.e. what is life and what is it's end are being excluded. These are the kind of things that cannot be identified by location or occupation. I recently met someone from Italy who was excited to walk over the Brooklyn Bridge because he was tired of driving his cab around Vatican city. One man's garbage kind of thing.

Some would say this emphasis is emblematic that society has moved from solid forms (Guns and God) to fluid forms (sexual identity/gig economy/alternative paths). In the past the husband went to the machine shop because he wanted to honor God and put food on his table for his family. Solid stuff. Now people want to Uber about while deciding what sex they are irregardless of what they feel when they grab their crotch. Fluid type of stuff. Maybe its get off my lawn shit but I think judgment should be withheld as not all four causes are visible to the naked eye.

ZAFCorrection
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by ZAFCorrection »

To pile on with alterna-skepticism, I am not sure how alternative the so-called alternative paths actually are. ERE is some old-timey wisdom + systems thinking, polyamory is the bright idea to join a club of people who officially have relationships with more than one person, atheists get their beliefs from REASON and still share 99% of their values and world view with bible thumpers, etc. Not to talk shit or belittle the aforementioned systems, and maybe I am setting a high bar for "alternative," but a lot of them seem fairly close to the status quo. Just a couple principles and methods tweaked here and there. I'm still waiting for the human paperclip maximizer.

Could be it's a wheaton scale perceptibility problem, or human biology just doesn't allow that much variation in desire or process.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@ZAFCorrection:

I get what you are saying, and I somewhat agree, but I have to note that choosing to overtly (okay, semi-overtly) practice polyamory did feel pretty radical for this old woman. However, I would imagine that it could feel less so for a young man. For me it was a synthesis of the Joan Jett era feminism of my late adolescence and being partner to an Islamic contract in my 40s, which is kind of an unusual combination of experiences/cultures, which opened up an alternative path which I still had to kick through a couple pre-installed barriers to travel.

OTOH,my puppy-love interest in the 5th grade was a precocious-adopter Atheist, and I tried to bring him back to the fold by observing that the Bible was shelved in the non-fiction section of the library :lol:

Jason

Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by Jason »

ZAFCorrection wrote:
Thu Nov 07, 2019 12:05 pm

Could be it's a wheaton scale perceptibility problem, or human biology just doesn't allow that much variation in desire or process.
I think it's both and why I believe at its root, "alternate" for the most part, applies to ethics. It's not the "what" that truly separates us, its the "why." The real difference between polyamory and monogamy is not in the activity it's in the ethical position towards human relations. Polyamory has been an activity engaged by both the free loving and the highly religious, although my understanding is that if I inadvertantly walk into a threesome, I can assume they are not Mormons because their polyamory is undergirded by a concept of marriage. But the point is there are a finite number of activities and a finite number of ethical positions. ERE is the economic equivalent of Nirvana. ERE was alternative when its JLF and Nirvana was alternative when they were signed to sub-pop. But eventually if it has legs, it gets packaged. I guess that makes MMM the David Geffen of ERE. Well, not really a guess. But I would say the difference between JLF and MMM is ethics and that takes a level of knowledge and observation to notice and why such distinctions are usually only recognized by the adherents and not those outside the movement.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Why some stay in one place for decades; and, the importance of alternative paths

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@Jason:

I agree. Since, as you have noted, I am something like a Scientific-Pantheist, the practice of polyamory is not in conflict with my core ethics.

BTW: Since I am in the mood to post things I may choose to later edit, I will reveal that a hotel maid did walk in on a threesome formed by me and a blonde. handsome gentleman age 62 and a brunette, handsome gentleman of 59. "Sweet Jesus" was her brief exclamation before slamming the door shut. Therefore, I would assume her core ethic was other than Scientific-Pantheist.

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