Ideas and Reflections
How to know others, the limits of observing, and what you don’t want to know
Knowing and Being Known
Relationships, friendships, and associations are not hard; we simply make the mistake of wanting to be desired more than we desire others. We want to be known without knowing others, we want to be needed while not needing others.
This is not entirely misguided, but extending it beyond what is transactional is. You cannot know 10,000 people, but they can know of you if you provide value that makes it necessary for them to do so. But you must know your friend or spouse, and there must not be asymmetry here. If you won’t, they will leave and be with the one who will.
That is why one cannot love or be friends with many, because she will necessarily neglect them (or attend to them inadequately), for which she will offend them, causing them to leave.
That is why business is easier than the personal. In business, you can provide one product to many, and you can isolate yourself from them by offering them what they seek and proceeding to extract a price for it. Personal dynamics, however, are the opposite: you must be many things to one person.
Many don’t know how to be these many things; others, their notion of value long shaped by the transactional world, don’t see how it can make sense to be these many things to one person.
The paradox is thus revealed: those who succeed at work might struggle to be lovers, friends, and good neighbors, for these things will just never be worth their time as per their calculations. They become withdrawn from life and bury themselves in work. They may complain about it, but look keenly and you will see people who’ve been corrupted and don’t know how to be something else.
Their definition of value is distorted and they cannot be anything outside the world of exchanges. In fact, they secretly desire work, for it is the only thing that loves them.
And because one must find value in what takes their time, these praise money for more than it’s worth, and they, even without intending to, can neither comprehend nor value what money has not valued.
You must take note of such people. Help them if you can (and if they ask). However, if they are too far gone, don’t let them take you downhill with them.
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