I’ve never been to a Seder, and this is the first time I’m hearing this story, but it really resonated for me and shed some new light on an issue in my own life.
I work as a research analyst at a consulting firm. I took the job, and loved it because I get to study all kinds of amazing inventions and the companies developing them, and help more of them scale up and come to market. For the past few years, though, I’ve kinda stopped caring about any of that. I’m still good at helping my clients make good strategic decisions and reach their goals, or analyzing companies and technologies and markets, but it feels so far away. For a while I blamed that on depression, but I’ve been basically out of my depression for 2 years now and still feeling this way (also looking for a new job, but that’s a separate thing).
When I first started there was one senior consultant was was really smart and knowledgeable about so many topics, but whenever I asked him a question, he’d respond with a 20 minute story that didn’t seem to have anything to do with what I asked. I joked that he was Yoda, or a Zen master, and someday I would understand him and become enlightened.
And then one day, I started being able to talk to him. I saw how what he said ultimately connected to the object level question, even though he was mostly talking about things several layers of abstraction or metaphor removed from it. I think simulacra levels are a good model for this: he knew how to switch among simulacra levels in order to get people to make good decisions (based on their eventual object level results), and was just really used to talking to managers and executives who don’t really understand the object level much.
I think I need to seriously reset my thinking by focusing on the object level, even if it feels awkward right now.
I’ve never been to a Seder, and this is the first time I’m hearing this story, but it really resonated for me and shed some new light on an issue in my own life.
I work as a research analyst at a consulting firm. I took the job, and loved it because I get to study all kinds of amazing inventions and the companies developing them, and help more of them scale up and come to market. For the past few years, though, I’ve kinda stopped caring about any of that. I’m still good at helping my clients make good strategic decisions and reach their goals, or analyzing companies and technologies and markets, but it feels so far away. For a while I blamed that on depression, but I’ve been basically out of my depression for 2 years now and still feeling this way (also looking for a new job, but that’s a separate thing).
When I first started there was one senior consultant was was really smart and knowledgeable about so many topics, but whenever I asked him a question, he’d respond with a 20 minute story that didn’t seem to have anything to do with what I asked. I joked that he was Yoda, or a Zen master, and someday I would understand him and become enlightened.
And then one day, I started being able to talk to him. I saw how what he said ultimately connected to the object level question, even though he was mostly talking about things several layers of abstraction or metaphor removed from it. I think simulacra levels are a good model for this: he knew how to switch among simulacra levels in order to get people to make good decisions (based on their eventual object level results), and was just really used to talking to managers and executives who don’t really understand the object level much.
I think I need to seriously reset my thinking by focusing on the object level, even if it feels awkward right now.