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Rereading old posts and reflecting on the value of being clearly and definitively wrong. One learns from one's mistakes but only if one ventures a clear and definite hypothesis. Otherwise, no learning. Reflecting now on the low nutritional value of 280 character opinionating...
Case in point. I spent 3 years developing this view on socmed gift cultures. It's an accurate depiction of the dynamics of small group activity but I failed to anticipate the evolution of socmed towards trolling, grandstanding, virtue signalling, etc.. https://link.medium.com/K2c0XdEoJ9
Yet don't think I was entirely wrong. At least some of the pernicious & unhealthy dynamics of contemporary socmed can be understood as perverse forms of gift culture. Virtue signalling and trolling, for example, are both reputational devices, performances for different tribes...
These kinds of insights make taking the time to craft a clear and definite statement worthwhile. You may be wrong. But being wrong is not so bad if the subsequent learning takes you someplace interesting. So much of the opinionating we do on socmed feeds the feed and that's it...
But if this shared medium is to be anything more than a massive time suck and dopamine distributor, it needs to feed us - you and me - in a personally and socially enhancing way. This was the dream - it can be again..
But we need to spend time cultivating our gifts so that we can share polished fragments of our best selves. To have the courage and tenacity to do this. And to acknowledge that we will inevitably be wrong in certain respects, but it's the process of learning that's important..
Learning is growth and this kind of growth is fundamental to the life well lived.
So ... take time off this whirligig. Give yourself permission to fall silent. Cultivate your gifts. When you post, make it count. Distribute milestones along the path of your personal evolution.
So ... take time off this whirligig. Give yourself permission to fall silent. Cultivate your gifts. When you post, make it count. Distribute milestones along the path of your personal evolution.
