In terms of morality, it seems that the only effective action possible is to assist in the process of converting the world from a mafia-dominated one to another one. There are many ways of such assistance, but simply excelling at some artform, craft, or science isn’t one of them.

The advice given in this article might be called the ascetic’s advice – don’t worry about the world so much and just do your own thing – do what makes you happy. This has one major flaw – it’s the condition of the world that makes people unhappy, and becoming the “best artist one can be” doesn’t help the world unless it assists in the aforementioned goal.

Here’s some advice to aspiring world savers – begin by understanding the world. Learn what the *world* needs – attune yourself to those needs. Then do whatever it takes within your own life to maximize that assistance, within a kind of calculus including other things you value (friends, family, etc.).

Number 1 and number 2, here’s my advice.

You will need three things before all others. They are oxygen, food, and shelter. With the exception of oxygen (at least for a while longer), you will have to pay or barter for food and shelter. This means, in all likelihood, that you will need money and that means that you will need a job that is dependable.

Sad though it is, most things that you do at a subsistence level are only temporarily entertaining. When you return to your ‘minimalist’ digs for the fourth year in a row and eat your 27th can of beans and franks for the week, you should be asking yourself if you can do better. You see, it’s very difficult to ponder the mysteries of life, let alone make the world a better place, when your stomach is growling and that persistent cough is now generating blood (and you with no health insurance).

I agree with the author on one point, though. Those who hit the ground running and don’t stop are far more likely to get what they want then those who don’t do so.

Want to survive? Learn tool and die making or become a machinist. Then learn CNC programming for several types of machining centers. You will, with some persistence, have a reliable income and benefits package by the time you are 30 years of age. Use this skill set as the foundation for your physical survival. Doing so will lift an enormous burden from your mind.

Now you will be more free to become what you want to become.

Dinosaur brains wearing Alligator shoes and a $5,000 suit while having the soup of the day for lunch, chicken soup and you know they are not exactly telling the truth when there lips start moving but they do have a job that could be best described as the great pretenders.

my wife tells me, Bob (she can’t pronounce Bozh) you are smarter than an ape; so, i don’t need to tell you what to do. if i get mad, she tells me, Bob, why don’t you tie yourself up in knots, you’ll feel better.
and i sure do. so much for telling me that she won’t tell me what to do. thnx

For some perspective, I’m 23 and I live in Canada.

I dropped out of engineering after about a year and a half, not because it was too difficult (I was passing most of my courses with above average grades) but because something smelled fishy, especially after getting a whiff of the co-op program. I was supposed to write a pretend cover letter for Barrick Gold… I was enthusiastic at first, thinking “okay, so now I’ll look up this company so I can write a really good one,” but all I could find on the net was BAD things. That made it a difficult cover letter, and I soon dumped co-op, and not long after that, engineering in general.

When I decided to drop out, and even more than a year after, I couldn’t quite explain to myself why I quit. I had a strong feeling something wasn’t right and my path lie elsewhere, and there was much pondering to do without forking over hefty sums of money to a corporate-dominated university that loved encouraging its students to be a part of the “global village.” That seemed kinda like bull***t at the time too, and I didn’t know about globalization yet.

So I lived the poor life of an average worker, making it on my own away from my family (as I’d always wanted to escape the small town I came from). I even enjoyed making it on my own, even if I find no specific joy in my arbitrary line of work and my “standard of living” was pretty marginal and still is (I have to pay loans off in addition to the usual costs of living, at an unskilled worker’s wage).

I learned the pleasure of nature’s greatest medicine and recreational substance from one of my co-workers, and spent quite a lot of time reading just about any knowledge regarding the plant, such as medical knowledge, “gardening” knowledge, and knowledge of the forces that do everything they can to make such a beneficial plant dangerous to possess.

From another co-worker, a middle-aged philosophical Iranian man with a love for socialism, I learned all sorts of things about politics and humanity, among quite a lot of other things, and this sparked my search for purpose, because I felt my purpose might somehow be related to socialism and humanity in general.

I’m still spending every night after work reading alternative news articles and studying things like socialism and anarchism to expand my understanding of humanity and the paths it might take to further itself, as well as anything under the sun I might like to know about (as the knowledge I collect could be useful), such as history (the uncensored kind), do-it-yourself skills, sociology, and psychology.

Okay, I often spend some time playing video games too, not just reading. :) Keeps me alive I guess.

I’ve given myself piercings, do all my own haircuts and dye jobs, repair my clothes when appropriate, fashioned my own red star patch for my bag, and I endeavor to learn whatever the hell I want without going to a school.

If I can do something without paying a professional, I will.

Sharing knowledge may be my main purpose in this world. Of course, I’ll try to come up with some original knowledge, and I guess I can’t really avoid it if I’m going to be writing about things. My own thoughts will end up on electronic and or real paper.

I also want to encourage my friends to be critical thinkers. I already tell them things I read about in the alternative news, even things I read about in an a book on anarchism lately, and I direct the curious ones to the valuable resources I find. A friend of mine and I have long discussions on these matters.

So I guess my purpose in life isn’t specifically in the career I choose, but rather by being ethically content with the employer I’ve been with for a year and a half now, and I’m content with the work, to the extent that it’s just kinda boring but I get to talk to my co-worker all I want about the most interesting things. That’s a bonus to my search for knowledge, as an opportunity to question my what I think I know, and to learn whatever wisdom and experience he has to share.

Maybe my experience will be useful to someone, even in this little rant of mine, in some little way.

So then, 75% perspiration will suffice for the likes of us?

ALBERT EINSTEIN “Sticking to it is the genius.” Let me add the truth helps a little.