Direct Mail: Giving Zero Fucks…
Dear Vikram, how do I recover my creativity after Silicon Valley slurps up my soul? I feel like I’ve lost direction and even worse my ability to focus. I don’t even want to do technical things anymore. It is like the worst Silicon Valley hangover, your brain uses up all its ambition and fight with none left over for the next day.
I got this message from a longtime friend of mine just after I’d finished my morning asanas on the rooftop under the breezy heat of South India’s winter. She’s an amazingly brilliant and empathic woman in engineering which often equates to having a target on your back in this male dominated sector. I’ve been in her shoes, we all have…you put your heart into something and just as results start to show some guy makes the call to turn out the lights that you’d rather just stay in bed.
Dear Slurped Soul,
Sometimes it seems like the entire world is always ready to affirm how you’ll never be as good as a mediocre male CEO that you figure it must be true. Remember, this was the same guy who after hearing I lived in Oakland, said, ‘Don’t shank me bro.’
So on behalf of men, I’m sorry you weren’t born with a phallus that diverts significant blood from your brain but grants you a pass to privilege. So long as you and I live, there will always be situations like this. The enlightened kingdom you and I believe in simply doesn’t exist in their world.
Despite all the affirmational double speak in Silicon Valley vernacular that promises untold glory in return for your soul, I’ve found that rejecting the false promises of salvation and practicing Stoicism helps. Read Indifference is a power and remember that discontent arises from not accepting situations for what they are.
Stoic: Someone who does not give a shit about the stupid things in this world that most people care so much about. Stoics do have emotions, but only for the things in this world that really matter. They are the most real people alive.
Which is to say, when you apply Stoicism to work life you understand that:
- Work is a transaction where you and an employer or founder agree to trade some monetary and stock amount for the value you deliver.
- Every startup values better yet seems worse than it actually is, which is why so many of them eventually fail.
- Silicon Valley pathologically ignores the dark passage of its workers in favor of positive thinking unicorns.
I know that you and I are both in a dark passage, or at least a very dim one, that we both booked tickets to exotic destinations. Mind you, I’m writing this for myself as much as you, what now?
Really hear me when I say this…Silicon Valley doesn’t define your self worth, you are loved for who you are and not what you do, or how much you make. Tune out of all the noise, start giving zero fucks about what Silicon Valley thinks and all the fucks about what makes you happy on a daily…exercise, cooking, outdoors, friends, family, crafts, hacking and even looking for a new job. Go at your own pace but go nonetheless, creativity has a way of blossoming when the mind is empty and body, nourished.
Just so you know I’m doing as I say, I’ve uninstalled nearly all the apps on my phone, I logout out of all platforms daily, I do yoga first thing in the morning, I read a book daily and I replaced coffee with three cups of tea and already I feel great.
Slurped Soul, you’re nothing short of ambitious and accomplished that I wouldn’t yet worry about whether you’re building the next killer robot today. I’d be lying if I also hadn’t considered quitting design altogether just a month ago, but the world is vast and possibilities are endless. I prefer Chris Dixon’s approach of climbing a series of hills rather than seeing your career as ladder.
I’ll see you as soon as I get back, may the force be with you.
Direct Mail is a collective where friends share candid, intimate thoughts in the original form of communication: letters. No postage necessary.
