The World Is Much More Malleable Than You Think

What if the world is much more malleable than we thought, and we’re not seeing results just because we are impatient?

From observations, it seems that most people wishing for the same thing over say a 10 year period got what they wanted (or they became crazy). The power of the mind coupled with action is super powerful. Modern society doesn’t really teach this – they do, as a moral tale, but like, it can be presented as entirely fictional, and often doesn’t get the details right.

There’s even a tale about 愚公移山. But I haven’t seen any teachers actually grasp the proper moral of the story (the story itself toned itself down a bit too).

What people don’t realize is that, 10 years is a fucking long time, and a substantial part (say 20%?) of your “productive” life. Most people don’t achieve much, not because of lack of talent, but because they: (1) don’t focus enough on important goals (i.e. allow “unimportant” things fill up their life), and (2) actively sabotage themselves in various ways including working in the opposite direction they wish to.

[There is a point to be made that the stated goal may not be the true goal, and one’s true goal may (as perverse at it sounds) actually be to experience failure and stagnation in life.]

Or, to put it in positive terms, if you spend say 10 years focused on a goal and align your mind and body towards the goal, chances are that you’ll succeed or at least have gone a long way. (Especially when compared with others that didn’t focus and align.)

It’s also interesting to point out how the opposite narrative is actively taught in schools, which is the virtue of “hard work”. Before I dissect the concept, it must be stated clearly that “work” is fine. The problem is “hard work”, and especially the idea that the “harder” the work, the better. It’s as if suffering is a virtue on its own.

Some people’s true goals may include experiencing suffering, which is fine for those who choose that path. But it’s not fine for others, especially if state-funded/state-approved institutions force-feed the idea of self-inflicted suffering on young and gullible minds. Work is definitely not better when harder. In fact, work feels “hard” when the body rejects the idea of a particular type of work, and it gets into a conflicted state (disagreement between the rational mind and the body over whether the work needs doing). The work is worse when it feels hard.

Schools do not teach “non-hard work”, which has significant overlap with what they call “play”. This is probably because schools as a state-approved institution (often with parents’ support) want to mold children into some specific form, and in most cases the form does not align with students’ natural inclinations. Most students are not naturally inclined to be good at algebra, at the history of WW2, or at remembering obscure grammar rules. (Natural selection has not caught up to modern society yet.) So the presumption from teachers is that to get a student from their uninitiated state to the desired form, the process must involve “hard work”. It must overcome any natural resistance by force. The expectations of the state and of society must prevail. The human spirit is naturally quite strong, so the transformation is indeed, “hard work”. This context must be kept in mind while interpreting how morals are understood in a school setting.

And thus teachers, among all people, don’t or can’t really understand “non-hard work”. “Non-hard work” is the kind that aligns the mind, body, and, ideally, societal expectations. (The last part is the hard part which nobody knows how to do consistently, so they give up and defer to a standard ideal “form”.) Those who haven’t experienced the wonders of such alignment would be amazed at how fast and efficiently things progress. They usually call this “genius”. “Genius” is actually a thing, but often what they call “genius” is much more mundane, i.e. just a natural alignment of mind, body, and goals, doing “non-hard work”.

Most people don’t actually connect action and thought. This takes on a couple different forms.

Some people fantasize about things, but never take action. Plans to quit a boring job and start a new venture. Plans to eat more healthily and exercise more. Plans to travel around the world. Many people don’t actually do it – there are obviously reasons, but the bottom line is – if you keep think about one thing and do another, you won’t do a good job at either. This is a mis-alignment problem.

Some people worry. I’m a avid believer of Murphy’s Law (while many “worriers” probably aren’t), but when I say “worry”, it’s usually not followed by an action to mitigate a risk. When people say they are “worried about the stock market”, are they selling all their stock? When people say they are “worried that a war will break out”, are they stockpiling on food and water and moving to a safer place? When people say they are “worried that their spouse might be cheating on them”, can they actually do anything about it? If no actions are done or can be done, the whole mental exercise is in vain. This is another mis-alignment problem.

And then there are those who sabotage themselves. It’s the friend who calls you on the phone and complains for 3 hours how horrible their romantic partner was to them… but refuses to break up because “but I still love him/her”. It’s the disgruntled employee who complains about their boss at every opportunity, but never offers the resignation they should. It’s the person who claims they want to be rich, but spends all their money irresponsibly.

These modes of “inaction” are so common that in some sense they are the “default” state of affairs. It is widely considered a faux pas to suggest taking some form of action when people come to one for advice on how to deal with these situations. Imagine that.

Against this backdrop it is easy to see how, if you actually aligned thoughts and action, you’d go quite far relative to the common person. The world becomes much more malleable because your personal impact is greater.

Why don’t more people do this then? Because 10 years is a fucking long time, and nobody wants to “waste” it on something unimportant. There are so many things one could do in life, but among all the options, it is often difficult to choose one among many to focus on for 10 years. And thus those with options lose focus through “diversification” – attempting to do a bit of everything, or perhaps “nothing” at all.

The idle person does not idle only because they hate “work”. The idle person does not appreciate the “value” gained by putting effort into “work”. It is fundamentally not a question of work ethic, but a question of understanding of their own meaning, purpose, and values. The same goes for the confused person with no direction in life – it is not a question of work or “hard work”, but rather an issue of focus and alignment, which in turn comes down to questions of meaning, purpose, and values.

We can all expend “life” as a currency to change a small part of the world. It is that malleable. The question is, what is worth a significant part of “life”? Some people find an answer that addresses great problems with the world, and become great people. Some people find an answer in living a personal experience. They leave the world content with treasured memories. The cynical say “nothing”, yet they too must live and die.