There’s this paradigm of “being vs doing”, in which, you become the person you want to be — rather then continuously pressure yourself to perform a certain way, continuously proving yourself, continuously exerting yourself
There’s a place for this paradigm
For instance:
-you can establish good habits once — and benefit from them your entire life
-you can fix certain problems of yours — and have them fixed forever
-you can develop a skill set — and benefit from utilising it ever since
-you can invest money once — and have it grow itself
etc
But I think this is a wrong division
It conceals the truth, and misleads
The right division is ELEVATION vs STAGNATION
“Being” is an equivalent of SCALING, in business
“Doing” is an equivalent of labour
Sure you want to scale
Sure you want to become
But “becoming” itself is “doing”
You becoming “the best version of yourself”, or “owner of substantial equity in a growing business”, that itself is a process of doing
So BEING is INSEPARABLE from doing
The relevant difference is what kind of “doing” you do
Is it the kind of DOING which will benefit you long term, and at scale?
Or is it the kind of DOING which will only benefit you temporarily, and proportionally to the effort you put in?
And then, once you’ve became, what happens?
You became and now you believe for this state to persist? To be permanent?
Have you ever seen something permanent?
You consider the great men of history permanent — but you’re forgetting the great men of history that came before them; You remember the most powerful man ever, and the richest man ever, but you don’t remember the one that came before him, like your children will only remember the one that came after him
There’s obviously nothing permanent
You think you could establish such advantage for yourself so that it would not lose relevance within your lifetime: your wealth, your expertise, your status
But deep within you know that it is losing relevance every single day
Because deep within you know that the only direction is forward
And the moment you cease moving you know you’re dead — because that’s how it feels: boring, stagnant, lifeless
Obviously you want to engage in the RIGHT ACTIONS, right “doing”
You don’t just want to do random haphazard nonsense — you want to LEARN as much as possible, as you’re TESTING AND TRYING AND TINKERING
And once you have a great solution, obviously you scale it; You use it again and again and again, having once figured it out, and benefit each time
But all that is still DOING
You’re scaling “DOING”; You can’t scale “being”, because nothing about “being” scales.
You’re scaling “doing”, and the leverage you earned by “doing” as well: by learning, by studying, by testing, by trying, by innovating, by making great things, by selling
So yes get your fucking leverage
Get your fucking scale and scale things
But don’t call it being
It’s always doing
And don’t hope of “being”
Because “being” is BEING DEAD
You want to be evolving, changing,
You want to be doing, be living, be breathing
There’s more to it
This “being” paradigm is really detrimental
Since it’s founded on delusion — delusional believe that something is permanent, in it’s value and significance — it lends itself to delusional conclusions, corollaries
There emerges what we call entitlement, in it’s worst, most delusional form:
-you viewing yourself as entitled to certain results
-you viewing yourself as entitled to certain relationships
-you viewing yourself as entitled to certain rights
In each case the “being” paradigm separates you from the truth, by distracting you form the elementary rule of the world:
Everything in this world is governed by CAUSE AND EFFECT
And every relationship is a VALUE EXCHANGE
Relationship is a value exchange
It’s not “hard work”, mind you
But it’s not you “earning it”, singularly
You could say it’s you “being” — being the right kind of person — but that itself changes
Your business relationships, your romantic relationships, your social relationships — all involve different kind of challenges, which change through time
If you view it as merely “being” and “having earned it” and “being entitled” — before long you will obviously under-deliver
At which point the relationship should crumble, with a whiff of betrayal and disappointment
Everything in this world is governed by cause and effect
How is BEING the cause?
Being is status-quo; It doesn’t exert any force in any direction
You think you’re today entitled to great opportunities and what-not
You’re as entitled as valuable is what you give, what you do
Returning to the notion of ELEVATION: Elevation presupposes the DOING, leading to evolution, to growth, and thus it presupposes value-creation
You create value — you can exchange value; Simple
You do, you are at the cause — and you get effects
The direction is up
You look for ways to accelerate that process, scaling it, leveraging it, improving it
You never consider NOT doing — practically or philosophically
because Not-Doing, practically, would make any result, any progression unfeasible,
and philosophically… philosophically, it would just be so fucking boring
so dead and boring