TED Talks were at this ten years ago. I think they were well meaning but I found them to be mostly in poor taste, wealthy and privileged people telling people that they were merely one good idea and some hard work away from their dream when the reality is much more complicated than that.
Today those people are replaced by those selling a “dream” lifestyle that requires you to pay them some money which you recoup by then selling that lifestyle to others rather than actually performing a service or adding value to somebody.
people sneer at the 9-5 but there is still a lot to be said for it!
What the speakers were not talking about is how the network acquired via their expensive education helped them with their idea….journey simply because they did not realise it they had that advantage.
This x1000. They need to teach this in school. I've been drilling this into my teen daughter. Find a job that you're good at and pays you well. Use that to fund your passions. Thank you for the article.
I remember when I entered the job market and was surprised to learn that even mediocre skills in a particular area, like law or finance, are richly rewarded, and the highly skilled in other areas are rewarded much, much less. What you choose to do matters more than how well you do it. This applies to many things, and I constantly think about my priorities. I want to make sure I am focused on the right things, not just the stuff I like or what is easy.
Yeah there's massive asymmetries, which you can take advantage of and live really well and then also do whatever you want. It's so much better than being a starving artist.
Follow your passion is indeed terrrible advice. Lifestyle-centric planning is a much better approach. Cal Newport is a big proponent of this. Highly recommend his podcast and books.
Great take - I was talking to my neighbor who is a musician he said that the key for any musician right now is to learn AI tools and how to use them because the AI is decades away (if ever) from being able to do what humans can do. So the key is to learn how to use AI and then add the human touch.
A company wants a jingle? AI can lay down the groundwork, but it's terrible at refining the sound. That's where his skills as a musician comes in.
Music and touring with his cover band is his passion, but as you said, he's also focused on what the market values.
Take this one step further. In a capitalistic system, you need to aquire assets. Assets of value that can be traded and eventually increase in value, or, at least, can be leveraged with loans, but, avoid the latter. So, buy a house. Start a business. Buy stocks and bonds. Do not borrow money as much as possible. Don't say you can't do it, because it's your only path to relative financial freedom, especially in later life. Once you hit 55, your value in the employment market decreases unless you were lucky to get to a certain level of power and respect you can hold that into your late 60s and 70s, if you want to. You don't get rich working for a living. You get rich buying low and selling high.
Well said. Per Naval, “It’s not really about hard work. You can work in a restaurant eighty hours a week, and you’re not going to get rich. Getting rich is about knowing what to do, who to do it with, and when to do it. It is much more about understanding than purely hard work. Yes, hard work matters, and you can’t skimp on it. But it has to be directed in the right way.”
Also, it's very hard to do hard work after a certain age, and, if you haven't attained a level of financial security near then, you're going to have issues. Anthony Bourdain thanked the heavens more than once he wasn't a chef on his feet instead of a traveling celebrity at age 55. I have spent a lot of time with older ski instructors and patrol people, and that's a great life when 35, but, 60, pre Medicare, with bad knees? Nope.
Weird as it may sound, some few people are in the arts not for profit or fame but because of hypersensitivity. Non-profitable stuff as arts or philosophy are usually the only fields able to nest those who aren't capable of being happy in a world that tells you to be rich whatever the cost. I personally agree with the solution of having a job that pays (luckily, working close to the arts) to be really free to follow my passion. It sound egotistical, "my passion", but artists are the ones that keep alive some values that otherwise would be reduced to commodities, mere trash. It looks dramatic, but for a few people, if there wasn't something like the arts (not the art market, not the show bizz, the arts) suicide would be a better option
There is a fervent debate now on this search for balance or imbalance between passion and work and how our interests should become (or not) and in what way (gradually or drastically, like "I'll drop everything and start with something new"?) our work. This issue has given me several food for thought. Thanks for sharing.
Hmm… maybe it's more about finding the under-addressed problem you're passionate about (and that enough others care about), and then finding a way to make your mark there?
So for your musician friend, not enough people face the problem of not enough good music to listen to and tons of people continue producing music to solve it, which makes that pursuit a crapshoot with crappy dice.
TED Talks were at this ten years ago. I think they were well meaning but I found them to be mostly in poor taste, wealthy and privileged people telling people that they were merely one good idea and some hard work away from their dream when the reality is much more complicated than that.
Today those people are replaced by those selling a “dream” lifestyle that requires you to pay them some money which you recoup by then selling that lifestyle to others rather than actually performing a service or adding value to somebody.
people sneer at the 9-5 but there is still a lot to be said for it!
What the speakers were not talking about is how the network acquired via their expensive education helped them with their idea….journey simply because they did not realise it they had that advantage.
My recent advice to a young relative was to find something that pays, and that you like well enough to keep on doing it for the foreseeable future.
This x1000. They need to teach this in school. I've been drilling this into my teen daughter. Find a job that you're good at and pays you well. Use that to fund your passions. Thank you for the article.
I remember when I entered the job market and was surprised to learn that even mediocre skills in a particular area, like law or finance, are richly rewarded, and the highly skilled in other areas are rewarded much, much less. What you choose to do matters more than how well you do it. This applies to many things, and I constantly think about my priorities. I want to make sure I am focused on the right things, not just the stuff I like or what is easy.
Yeah there's massive asymmetries, which you can take advantage of and live really well and then also do whatever you want. It's so much better than being a starving artist.
Follow your passion is indeed terrrible advice. Lifestyle-centric planning is a much better approach. Cal Newport is a big proponent of this. Highly recommend his podcast and books.
Hence I kept the day job. 🤓
Great take - I was talking to my neighbor who is a musician he said that the key for any musician right now is to learn AI tools and how to use them because the AI is decades away (if ever) from being able to do what humans can do. So the key is to learn how to use AI and then add the human touch.
A company wants a jingle? AI can lay down the groundwork, but it's terrible at refining the sound. That's where his skills as a musician comes in.
Music and touring with his cover band is his passion, but as you said, he's also focused on what the market values.
Take this one step further. In a capitalistic system, you need to aquire assets. Assets of value that can be traded and eventually increase in value, or, at least, can be leveraged with loans, but, avoid the latter. So, buy a house. Start a business. Buy stocks and bonds. Do not borrow money as much as possible. Don't say you can't do it, because it's your only path to relative financial freedom, especially in later life. Once you hit 55, your value in the employment market decreases unless you were lucky to get to a certain level of power and respect you can hold that into your late 60s and 70s, if you want to. You don't get rich working for a living. You get rich buying low and selling high.
A 72 year old.
fully agree
Well said. Per Naval, “It’s not really about hard work. You can work in a restaurant eighty hours a week, and you’re not going to get rich. Getting rich is about knowing what to do, who to do it with, and when to do it. It is much more about understanding than purely hard work. Yes, hard work matters, and you can’t skimp on it. But it has to be directed in the right way.”
Also, it's very hard to do hard work after a certain age, and, if you haven't attained a level of financial security near then, you're going to have issues. Anthony Bourdain thanked the heavens more than once he wasn't a chef on his feet instead of a traveling celebrity at age 55. I have spent a lot of time with older ski instructors and patrol people, and that's a great life when 35, but, 60, pre Medicare, with bad knees? Nope.
Thanks for very good advice! Well put and amazingly true, as a former stagehand, I know how brutal music industry is.
Weird as it may sound, some few people are in the arts not for profit or fame but because of hypersensitivity. Non-profitable stuff as arts or philosophy are usually the only fields able to nest those who aren't capable of being happy in a world that tells you to be rich whatever the cost. I personally agree with the solution of having a job that pays (luckily, working close to the arts) to be really free to follow my passion. It sound egotistical, "my passion", but artists are the ones that keep alive some values that otherwise would be reduced to commodities, mere trash. It looks dramatic, but for a few people, if there wasn't something like the arts (not the art market, not the show bizz, the arts) suicide would be a better option
There is a fervent debate now on this search for balance or imbalance between passion and work and how our interests should become (or not) and in what way (gradually or drastically, like "I'll drop everything and start with something new"?) our work. This issue has given me several food for thought. Thanks for sharing.
Hmm… maybe it's more about finding the under-addressed problem you're passionate about (and that enough others care about), and then finding a way to make your mark there?
So for your musician friend, not enough people face the problem of not enough good music to listen to and tons of people continue producing music to solve it, which makes that pursuit a crapshoot with crappy dice.