psychology

Peter Principle — “The selection of a candidate for a position is based on the candidate’s performance in their current role, rather than on abilities relevant to the intended role. Thus, employees only stop being promoted once they can no longer perform effectively, and ‘managers rise to the level of their incompetence.’”

Karl Marx had a different view: that being occupied by good work was living well. Engagement in productive, purposeful work was the means by which people could realise their full potential.

The belief that human behaviour can be perfectly modelled, predicted and controlled entrains as a consequence the collapse of equitable relations between individuals and trust in institutions, and the substitution of algorithmic certainty for any semblance of participatory, democratic society. There is no appeal to collective, contestable

The stage you are in determines much of what you notice in reality and the opportunities available to you.

And the higher stages you reach, the more you can tap into the stages beneath, meaning you have both the ability and wisdom to spot opportunities for varied versions of success and achieve them with grace as you move up the spiral.

The question

The dollars and hours pile up as we aim for a good life that always stays just out of reach. In moments of exhaustion we imagine simpler lives in smaller towns with more hours free for family and hobbies and ourselves. Perhaps we just live in a nightmarish arms race: if we were all to disarm, collectively, then we could all live a calmer, happier,

So often we spend life simply existing, but to live is the rarest thing in the world.

Meaning, when you understand what stage you’re in and the exact “conditions” you need to make progress, what seems impossible now becomes inevitable.

Your mind literally reconstructs how it processes reality.

High-context vs Low-context Culture — “In a higher-context culture, many things are left unsaid, letting the culture explain. Words and word choice become very important in higher-context communication, since a few words can communicate a complex message very effectively to an in-group (but less effectively outside that group), while in a