How dare he find meaning in things that are different from you. Congratulations on figuring out how to find fulfillment and a balanced life before the rest of us. Philip's journey toward that is clearly different from yours.
I just find it kind of worrisome that he finds meaning in work that other people are exploited for for a lack of better options. Why would a financially independent person choose to help enrich a large corporation over, say, voluntary work to help underprivileged people, animals or whatever else you can think of?
> I just find it kind of worrisome that he finds meaning in work that other people are exploited for for a lack of better options.
I think viewing every warehouse worker as a member of a lower labor caste who is merely being exploited is not a warranted view. The fact that people can easily find meaning in this labor is further indication it is incorrect.
You're also presuming a rather tyrannical existence for these people.. wherein their path through life must be dictated to them by their "best options." People make suboptimal choices for all kinds of reasons, and they don't view their circumstances as being "exploited." Probably because the companies they work for didn't _create_ the suboptimal choices for them in the first place, their employer is a matter of circumstance, not conspiracy.
> Why would a financially independent person choose to help enrich a large corporation over, say, voluntary work to help underprivileged people, animals or whatever else you can think of?
Again.. people make suboptimal choices intentionally. The explanation here is "this is a very low risk option that can be exited immediately if such a whim arises." And in all likelihood, exiting in this way wouldn't prevent you from being hired back later if your fortunes or whims reverse.
Forgive me, but you seem to be a little too comfortable looking down your nose at these people.
A lot of feel-good jobs have an unfortunate public facing component. There are segments of the population that treat service workers with contempt or sometimes even violence.
Retail workers and social workers dealt with the worst of it, teachers deal with this behind the scenes, and nurses and doctors became (more) exposed to this over the pandemic. People don’t put up with emotional, verbal and sometimes physical abuse, and they shouldn’t.
Something about what you said triggered a memory in me. I remember a story about how westerners embraced meditation and how monks described how they ( westerners allowed into the monastery ) completely missed its point by enjoying staring into sand, when it was in theory supposed to induce boredom.
I will admit that I am not sure how I feel about the article. I might be still processing it.
He describes exactly what things he finds meaning in:
> For me, a lot of my meaning comes from two things. One is doing something in the world that feels like it's actually making things a little better somehow. And so contributing to society in some meaningful way.
The parent is commenting on how Philip's previous (and new!) work positions apparently fulfilled those criteria in no small way, in Philip's view. They are noting that it is striking that this is the case, as from the perspective of an outsider looking in, it does not appear that a director at facebook, nor an amazon warehouse worker, fulfills the stated criteria.
> Launched a global health software nonprofit, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, focused on using smartphones to improve rapid testing in low-income countries.
Granted that is 3 years out of a 20-odd year career, but it's the stint immediately preceding the events of the blog post.
I appreciate him sharing his experiences, and I've only known about it because he blogged about it.
It rings true to some of my friend and is potentially very useful to people in the same situation. Brain chemistry doesn't care about rich or poor, and unprivileged here in the US could be extremely privileged in other parts of the world. Engaging in a race to the bottom is of no use to anyone and solves nothing.
