Needs and Strategies
Apparently my transition is taking on a fractal pattern: A crisis within a midlife crisis. I went back to school to transition to a livelihood that is more consistent with my values. I slid into philosophy because of timing. And I’ve struggled with that decision before wondering if this is the best strategy to meet my need for right livelihood. Now I am wondering this again… What happened? Well, we are reading Peter Singer in the political philosophy seminar (here’s the article we’re discussing and here’s a more current update on his wonderful work). Then we discussed a response to the article by Richard Miller (chapter 1 in this book). Somehow the response didn’t feel right to me. It sounded like a cop-out: Singer demands too much, so let’s not do so much. Maybe Miller is right. Maybe not. But our discussion didn’t change the problem: We were talking about the details of resolving global injustice but we weren’t changing global injustice! It’s all theoretical. Even if we’d “just” follow Miller’s advice, we’d be starting a massive money redistribution. There are massive problems “out there.” Talking about them doesn’t change a thing. I think it’s time for me to go back to the drawing board and really figure out what strategies would best meet my needs! Maybe it is pursuing the masters degree. Or maybe not. And then, of course, I’ll also have to face up to the dragons that are whispering that I shouldn’t change my plans, that I would let people down and that would be bad and and and… That’s the scary part of this transition! It feels like every decision goes against the social grain.
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Hey Rachel – I love following your comments, on this and other blogs like FLF and Bella’s space in PT.
For “life choices”, I quite like the “weighted pros and cons list” (these are the good things about this choice, these are the “bad” ones, and this is how important each of them are – on whatever scale you choose). I tend to put “gut feel” in there too. It helps to have a reference point too, as to how a certain decision was arrived at – and any points I might want to talk through with those I’m close to before making a final choice…
If it works for you too, great!
Oh, I love pro-con lists! I can’t remember who it was but someone pointed out that we usually don’t make rational decisions, so pro-con lists don’t really work. Even if that is true – and the pro-con list “just” reflects our gut feel – i think they’re a great way to clarify for us what the decision is really about.
Oh, I totally know what you mean! All of my solutions are completely radical to the norm, too! But it’s nice to know I’m not the only one.