Final Paper Part III: The Ant Effect
There are so many people in the world, yet so little see their own worth. Realistically, all you really need is a paradigm shift, a change in perspective about yourself. Not everyone can be a leader, not everyone should be. The way that our society is run, we simply have many roles that need to be filled in order to keep the machine of our daily lives running. That is to say, it is always important to set realistic expectations for yourself and what you may ultimately achieve; know what is possible for you, and what’s probably not. Find passion and purpose in what you choose to do. No matter where you are, no matter who you are, you have power. The gift of life has been granted to you, as long as you can draw breath, you can change the world. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been unloved, beaten down, or have cause for shame. Take a look at the movie The Drop Box: babies that are abandoned when they can still find life, joy and happiness not just for themselves but for others. Even those than cannot speak or move, whose functions are basically non-existent, they matter so much more than anything else in the world. How much value must have that you fail to acknowledge, or simply cannot see?
Let us examine the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. A prevalent point throughout the book is that world changers are not born, they’re made. In order to create a person that breaks all boundaries, all the right pieces need to be put in place. For Bill Gates it involved getting access to computers, for Joe Flom, it was being in a Jewish family that made clothing. Maybe the person's ethnic background shaped how they tackle problems, or maybe they happened to be born in the right place at the right time for a miracle to happen. The point is, there’s a lot of hidden factors that go into building these people; besides these hidden privileges, there is always things that we cannot see that are crucial to these people’s lives. Like what? Well, people need to eat, yes? So, the hands that helped grow the crops and raise the animals, to harvest and transport them, to process and cook them, in a way, they made things like the creation of Microsoft possible. Look around you, think about everything you see, and all the people that made all these things possible. Think about the people who thought of the ideas, the people who helped create it, and the people who helped distribute it. Everything in the world is interconnected in a universal web of actions that no individual could hope to comprehend. Your actions matter, no matter how insignificant it may seem.
Let us examine the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. A prevalent point throughout the book is that world changers are not born, they’re made. In order to create a person that breaks all boundaries, all the right pieces need to be put in place. For Bill Gates it involved getting access to computers, for Joe Flom, it was being in a Jewish family that made clothing. Maybe the person's ethnic background shaped how they tackle problems, or maybe they happened to be born in the right place at the right time for a miracle to happen. The point is, there’s a lot of hidden factors that go into building these people; besides these hidden privileges, there is always things that we cannot see that are crucial to these people’s lives. Like what? Well, people need to eat, yes? So, the hands that helped grow the crops and raise the animals, to harvest and transport them, to process and cook them, in a way, they made things like the creation of Microsoft possible. Look around you, think about everything you see, and all the people that made all these things possible. Think about the people who thought of the ideas, the people who helped create it, and the people who helped distribute it. Everything in the world is interconnected in a universal web of actions that no individual could hope to comprehend. Your actions matter, no matter how insignificant it may seem.
Perhaps then, we should not discuss the butterfly effect, of small actions snowballing into something significant, but rather we should think about what I will dub the ant effect. When we look at ants, they're tiny, and while they have a pretty high strength proportional to their body size, an individual ant does not have very much going for it. But how does an ant colony survive? Like many insects, it is a group effort, something that requires all its members to put in a small part for the good of the collective. Just because a single piece cannot do a majority of the work, does that make that piece worthless? Your body is made up of trillions of cells, which compose the tissues and then the organs which will then form the full systems that run your body. Can one part of the body call another part useless? Of course not, we're greatly affected whenever any of these sections are missing or not performing optimally.
Why then, must we undervalue our place in the world because of who we think we are,where we are, where we have been, what we have done, so on and so forth? Try driving a car whilst removing one of its pistons. It's much easier to miss something when it's missing. Just because you aren't always focusing on the basses in an orchestra, doesn't make them worthless. How different would the world be if you didn't exist? Probably a lot more than you know. What we lack most in modern life is our passions in what we do. We cannot always see what comes from our actions. For example, if you lived in a small town as the local tanner or blacksmith, you would see the work you have done, you'd probably proudly sell it to your neighbors and be assured that you had done great work. But now, the fruits of your labor are not nearly as tangible as the once were. Maybe you happen to be stuck in an education system that teaches you things that are seemingly pointless, you learn about how the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell, but you have no idea how to manage the powerhouse of your own house. As everything becomes more digitized, we begin to separate from the people that we serve. Maybe we only hear voices at a call center, maybe all we see are numbers and text on a screen, perhaps we serve food to people we will never see, all the same repetitive motions again and again.
Well, once again, I cannot say that I can offer any real solutions, I can speak so well about these things because I happen to be in the same boat. What I can attest to however, is to always be seeking, to find where you may belong, or to discover just how important your everyday actions happen to be.
Next: An Open Mind
Why then, must we undervalue our place in the world because of who we think we are,where we are, where we have been, what we have done, so on and so forth? Try driving a car whilst removing one of its pistons. It's much easier to miss something when it's missing. Just because you aren't always focusing on the basses in an orchestra, doesn't make them worthless. How different would the world be if you didn't exist? Probably a lot more than you know. What we lack most in modern life is our passions in what we do. We cannot always see what comes from our actions. For example, if you lived in a small town as the local tanner or blacksmith, you would see the work you have done, you'd probably proudly sell it to your neighbors and be assured that you had done great work. But now, the fruits of your labor are not nearly as tangible as the once were. Maybe you happen to be stuck in an education system that teaches you things that are seemingly pointless, you learn about how the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell, but you have no idea how to manage the powerhouse of your own house. As everything becomes more digitized, we begin to separate from the people that we serve. Maybe we only hear voices at a call center, maybe all we see are numbers and text on a screen, perhaps we serve food to people we will never see, all the same repetitive motions again and again.
Well, once again, I cannot say that I can offer any real solutions, I can speak so well about these things because I happen to be in the same boat. What I can attest to however, is to always be seeking, to find where you may belong, or to discover just how important your everyday actions happen to be.
Next: An Open Mind
Comments
Post a Comment