- Sep 2024
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andymatuschak.org andymatuschak.org
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When the insight arrived, I didn’t notice the connection to the trail I’d laid on the preceding pages. My experience was of making no progress, and then, finally, making some. In hindsight, I can see that I had been making plenty of progress over those weeks; I just couldn’t tell at the time. I suspect this is pretty common in my work. So, “I feel like I’m not making progress” is probably not a good local heuristic for guiding my work. Alternately, the lesson might be that I need to become more sensitive to the many subtler flavors of progress in this kind of work
This rings true. The friction, the struggle is the work, at least when it comes to my knowledge work. Interesting is that when the jump happens I tend to phrase it as an escape, a way of fleeing forward. When I got stuck in a major research project in 2020, the key insight to unlock it was a gasp of desperation more than a bolt of lightning. Colleagues immediately told me that was the key, but to me it felt like using a cheat code. Now in hindsight, I think it was the best possible outcome but that oroginal sense of escape remains.
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ut I’ve also noticed that when I focus my work on particular people in particular contexts, that more immediate emotional connection sometimes overpowers the day-to-day frustration that comes with being lost in the woods. For several long stretches this year, I found the work really gratifying, both in the moment, and retrospectively over the long term.
Matuschak through focusing on specific people in a specific context, entering into a deeper emotional connection would provide meaning both in the now and over the long term. This certainly applies to my work #hazp08 and perhaps all my project that stand out in hindsight either have that or are singular efforts where the doing held such a link to myself.
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By contrast, when I’m doing work that I find gratifying and meaningful over the long term, the day-to-day experience is usually frustrating and unpleasant. The work is gratifying because it’s deep and personal and unique. Unfortunately, in my projects, those same attributes also mean that progress tends to be inconsistent and hard to discern; it’s rarely clear what to do next; there’s rarely anyone I can ask for help; I usually feel incapable.
I find the concepts behind my work meaningful, and enjoyable, but usualll not the work. The most enjoyable work usually is disconnected from anything else.
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Throughout my career, I’ve struggled with a paradox in the feeling of my work. When I’ve found my work quite gratifying in the moment, day-to-day, I’ve found it hollow and unsatisfying retrospectively, over the long term. For example, when I was working at Apple, there was so much energy; I was surrounded by brilliant people; I felt very competent, it was clear what to do next; it was easy to see my progress each day. That all felt great. But then, looking back on my work at the end of each year, I felt deeply dissatisfied: I wasn’t making a personal creative contribution. If someone else had done the projects I’d done, the results would have been different, but not in a way that mattered. The work wasn’t reflective of ideas or values that mattered to me. I felt numbed, creatively and intellectually.
[[Andy Matischak]] on the value and quality of his work. Over the long haul, he found his work (at Apple) meaningless, even if it felt good at the time. The statement 'if someonee alse had done the work' the results would have been similar chimes. My work may be seen by others as meaningful in the moment, but I only see that it doesn't matter in the long run. A million others for any of us. M writes he felt confident, I never had any answer to the question what I'm good at. I just get total internal silence in response, and always have gotten.
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