People achieve things every day, without even realising it. The fact that you dragged your lazy corpse out of bed to go to a job you dislike is an amazing achievement; sure there are consequences if you don't, but god damn if your body puts in its two cents about it. Being tired and cold blows, I'd rather be in bed.
Yeah, that's setting the bar a bit low, and yeah, it does kinda trivialise the idea of "achievement" if we reward ourselves for just doing stuff we have to do. But let's not lie to ourselves, we do that anyway. All the time. Even high achievers. Sometimes, you have to tell yourself "well done" when frankly the "well" is a bit of a stretch. Sometimes stuff was just done, with no merit and no point, and it will be forgotten in the sea of little moments that make up life.
The sports-minded confuse the shit out of me for just that reason. Now, I'll concede, I partake in the odd sporting event, I don't mind the odd weekly run around with friends and frankly it makes me feel better about the amount of food I shovel down my throat on a daily basis, but it's social, there's no pressure to win and no training or drills to run. Rock up, play your ball-games, joke with friends, leave. Nice and easy. The kind of folks who go out, join teams of people they've never met and then proceed to spend weeks bonding by training together, getting all sweaty and out of breath, beads of perspiration peeking out from their pores and tumbling sensuously down their cheek to the nape of their neck... I wouldn't do it myself, but I don't begrudge you if running laps is your preferred weeknight time sink. What I've never understood is this idea that after a hard game/training session/season, players have somehow earned a reward. Call me old fashioned, but you didn't earn shit. Common sense dictates that if you joined the team of your own accord, you must have wanted to play, so right there you're signing up for difficult, tiring shit right there. It's inevitable, because you're gonna want to win (or at least have to fake it because you're surrounded by over-competitive dickheads), as will the other team, and it's likely that at some point, you'll play a team that has skills equal to or greater than yours... the challenges you face are neither unexpected nor abnormal. In fact, they're kind of a package deal with the whole "playing sport competitively" thing. So... how exactly have you "earned" a post match drink? I won't take it away, you're probably thirsty and I'm not gonna tell someone not to imbibe fluid, but let's not kid ourselves. You didn't earn shit. You did a thing you paid to do. Oh, you played hard and gave it your all? Well fucking done, you want a medal? Why would you ever not play hard, if you're trying to win? You shouldn't be rewarded for playing hard, you should be punished for not playing hard enough if you suck.
So, will I tell the football team not to hit the bar afterwards? Sweet Jesus no, number one they'd probably beat me up and number two, why wouldn't you want to hit the bar? It's fun. I do it all the time. The great thing is though, I don't have to rationalise doing stuff I enjoy to myself. I don't have to play football/till the fields/solve field equations to "earn" a beer. It's a beer. Just drink one if you want one.
It is my theory that as a society, we've become so meritocratic that we cannot look at joy without looking at achievement. We cannot enjoy something without associating the feeling of enjoyment with the feeling of having "earned" this enjoyment. The idea that anything worthwhile can only come as a result of unpleasantness is so entrenched in our society, drilled into us from the moment we're born, we accept it as some sort of fundamental truth.
In some ways, it's a valid model. Sometimes you do have to work hard to get to the good points. But more than Catholic guilt, more than white guilt, how many people find themselves afflicted with the dreaded lack-of-achievement guilt? How many people feel bad for doing nothing with their time? I won't lie, even I fall victim of this sometimes. Sometimes, I do feel shitty for not fulfilling arbitrary goals I assigned to myself with no rhyme or reason. Shit like feeling bad because I didn't practice guitar much today, didn't read that article I meant to, didn't do that uni work that I could have, didn't do any number of little things that would have allowed my broken psyche quench its thirst for some sort of box to check off, some sort of little trophy I can mentally award myself.
Upon consideration, it's mental. Having objectives to complete is part of life but it doesn't constitute life. Objectives and tasks are the little things that get in the way of living. The idea that you can't have something good unless it's reward for some sort of unpleasantness is nonsensical, encouraging people to do pointless shit to get their achievement fix or puncturing the fragile balloon of self esteem an individual may have by implying that their lack of productivity implies some sort of personal inadequacy.
I'm a fan of the slacker ideology. Do enough to achieve the necessary and disregard the rest. If you're happy with doing just any job, by all means, don't shoot for the stars. You don't NEED to constantly striving for that last little goal that will supposedly bring happiness. You don't NEED to constantly go one better than the Joneses. You can be happy with your lot in life. You can have enough stuff, you can be exactly where you want to be. I'm studying to get a job that won't slowly kill me over 40 years, I'm working to afford beer and petrol and everything else is done because I myself want to. How many people can honestly say that about their lives? How many 40-year-olds can look at what they have and say "this was by my design"? I'd wager the numbers would be a tad lower that you'd think.
Don't do stuff just for the sake of doing stuff. It's pointless and stupid. Do exactly what you want, for whatever reason you want, and if you're still not hurting anyone when you finish, than society can collectively suck it because you just beat its over-achieving, more-is-better fatass ideology. Good for you.
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