These past few months I have been living without cable, and while it has been liberating in a lot ways, the primary result has been an upswing in the amount of time I spend on the internet. Sunday afternoons wasted on marathons of Project Runway have made way for Sunday afternoons wasted at Slate and ESPN.com.
ESPN.com is pretty much just that, a waste, with the notable exception of Bill Simmons, whose column is smart and entertaining and full of fun pop culture references that help me feel better when I don't know what third rate basketball player he is talking about.
Yesterday Mr. Simmons posted a lengthy interview with Malcolm Gladwell which has changed my life in ways both small and large: On the small side of things I plan to go buy "Blink" this weekend. On the large side, I now feel that I understand my lack of motivation to achieve anything with what God/genetics/my surroundings (depending on your views) have given me.
Malcolm Gladwell: Why don't people work hard when it's in their best interest to do so?
The (short) answer is that it's really risky to work hard, because then if you fail you can no longer say that you failed because you didn't work hard. It's a form of self-protection. I swear that's why [Phil] Mickelson has that almost absurdly calm demeanor. If he loses, he can always say: Well, I could have practiced more, and maybe next year I will and I'll win then. When Tiger [Woods] loses, what does he tell himself? He worked as hard as he possibly could. He prepared like no one else in the game and he still lost. That has to be devastating, and dealing with that kind of conclusion takes a very special and rare kind of resilience. Most of the psychological research on this is focused on why some kids don't study for tests -- which is a much more serious version of the same problem. If you get drunk the night before an exam instead of studying and you fail, then the problem is that you got drunk. If you do study and you fail, the problem is that you're stupid -- and stupid, for a student, is a death sentence. The point is that it is far more psychologically dangerous and difficult to prepare for a task than not to prepare. People think that Tiger is tougher than Mickelson because he works harder. Wrong: Tiger is tougher than Mickelson and because of that he works harder.
The rest of the interview may be found here and I encourage you to go read it. And check out the rest of Mr. Simmons work while you;re there; it's all first-rate . Much better than Bravo programming to be sure.
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4 comments:
Annie-
I adore you back, but I feel you missed what I was saying, or rather, what Mr. Gladwell was saying. Maybe you saw the letters "ESPN" and thought, "Jesus Christ, why is he going on about this crap again?" I wouldn't blame you for that.
But the quote had little to actually do with sports, and more to do with the question "Why don't people in general try harder to be successful?"
I think I am interested not so much in sports, but in reading the things intelligent people have to say about sports, and how that relates to other fields of endeavor. Such people are few and far between, but when you find them what they say can be entertaining and valuable. Again, Mr. Gladwell puts it better:
"When you hear a ghost story as a child, or watch a war movie, or read a particularly powerful novel, you don't want to be in the story. You don't even want to be in the stands when the war is going on or the ghost is scaring the bejesus out of people. What you want is to be told the story."
Football IS for dumb folk, but that doesn't mean it can't be interesting.
Bless you and your family in this season of Lent,
Andrew
PS- Look for my new post "Courtney Marlowe forcefeeds the children of Barnes & Noble customers spicy tuna rolls" by the end of this week.
It's a very interesting interview, and I'm glad I read it.
On the other hand, I wanted you to be funny.
So while this was a refreshing change, and certainly made me think, and I'm glad I read it... It's kinda like when Dave Barry's son almost died in a bike accident and he wrong a very serious and heartfelt column about how freaked out and scared he (Dave) was... It was great. Once. And then you don't get to do it again for at least a year.
And let's make Courtney naked in this next blog. Just to switch it up a little.
Rest assured that any time I write that something has "changed my life" I am not entriely serious.
Thank you for comparing me to Dave Barry.
Naked- check.
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