Change
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Every once in a while one needs to make some important observations in order to be able to really progress. I guess it's all part of the great learning experience that life is. It's about change. One can actually change very little. Much less than we think.
Let's start with a metaphore. Just look at XHTML, CSS, web standards and quality web development. One can learn all these techniques and live by them. After this learning experience one can build great websites that excel in beauty, usability, elegance and many other things that seem important to truly dedicated web developers. However... we can't change the web development world as a whole. A lot of people will never see the change, or even value it's importance. A large part of the world won't even take any advantage of the change because they keep using inferior browsers. They'll never see a difference. In fact they might even think nothing at all changed.
The same thing is true for life. Again there's surprisingly little we can change. Some people say 'success is a choice', as if it's up to oneself to be rich, famous, healthy and happy. It's a load of crap usually coming from people who've never had to deal with much trouble to get where they are now. Hard work! Work hard and you'll be rewarded. Another misconception. My uncle worked hard. Very hard. In a factory. Right until his back gave up and he couldn't do a thing anymore. It sure as hell didn't bring him very much except for enough money to survive and... a permanently damaged spinal cord. So screw the hard work thing in an attempt to change things. Some people get lucky, some don't. Life isn't fair. I'm sure people living in the Third World can tell you all about it.
Just like in web development, we can't really change the way people look at us. Whether we've adopted all modern techniques and became a true 'standardista', most people won't ever see the difference. I guess it's time to realize that the only thing one can really change is himself. No matter what we try to tell people, no matter what we do, it's not in our hands to change the way they look at us. In the very lucky case something does change in the way people look at a person it can only mean one thing: It's THOSE PEOPLE who made a change. It isn't the person himself. If one would think he accomplished this himself he'd be fooling himself and giving himself way too much credit.
So here I am... a changed man. Over the year I've become a much better web developer and ... a better person. However... life keeps showing me it's futile to expect other people or anything in the world around me to notice the change. Hmmm... no.. that sounds too harsh. Some part of the world around us and the people around us will notice but to really see and feel the change requires some serious change on the side of the beholder.
So here's some web development reality applied to life itself. We can screw things up in a split second which will take months, years or even forever to repair. Ask that Microsoft developer who applied the wrong box model to Internet Explorer's rendering engine. We can't change things on our own and we can't change a thing about what people think of us. Not Joe Average on the street, not our friends, not our family and not even our loved ones. We can only change ourselves. And ... I swear to God that's what I did and what I'm still doing.
This post may sound 'depressed' but it really isn't. Once you fully realize the only thing you can really change is yourself you'll feel an awful lot better. I'm getting there. Eventually.
At 31 March '06 - 00:29 Jeriko One wrote:
No, honestly, I had this situation on November 15th 2005, the day I realized my life, in this form, isn’t optimal … well, it sucked fits better. This was the day I quitted smoking, started to do sports, learned harder to achieve more (learning applied to my studies as well as life itself).
This was 4 1/2 months ago, and I never felt better. The smoking thing was obvious, but apart from that, only my family and best friends recognized the change. But is it really important? It’s what you make out of yourself, not how you come across as. I did all this changes not for my family, not for my friends, not for my girlfriend … just for me.
At 31 March '06 - 02:12 stefan wrote:
That said, I try to live my life mainly for myself. This may sound selfish, and maybe it is, but I’ve noticed that ever since I’ve been doing this, I’ve been more social to other people as well. I’m not perfect. I never will. I won’t even try. I’m just myself and people will have to deal with that. And that does make my life easier.
At 31 March '06 - 03:55 Tobias wrote:
It also reminds me of the day to day challenges I encouter. I tend to set standards for myself very high and also reflect this to my envirenmont (co-workers, manager etc.) resulting in the fact that I’m a very critical person (which off course is noticed by everyone). But even I am sometimes not able to live up to my own standards let alone someone else. So, I figured I would drop setting the high standards for my envirenmont and be less critical. And guess what, nobody noticed and I’m still (in the eye of the beholder) the same very critical person I was before….
At 31 March '06 - 06:03 Oliver Klein wrote:
At 31 March '06 - 06:36 Ryan Brooks wrote:
At 31 March '06 - 07:56 Stoyan wrote:
I love change. I guess we all do (“we” as in we, the readers of your blog). On the web there’s so much change happening all the time that it’s overwhelming and unless you’re the type of person to embrace the change, hmm… I don’t know.
Tobias, in my opinion your teacher got it all wrong. I guess it makes sense from some rat-racing, ladder-climbing point of view, but it’s totally wrong. You cannot spend your life wondering what the others say, forget it. I’d say one has to be true to oneself, doesn’t matter how it’s perceived. Being honest and true is actually easier (you don’t worry about presentation) and in the long run will be perceived well. Eventually ;)
“Take it easy, baby,
take it as it comes.”
The Doors
At 31 March '06 - 09:08 Max Roeleveld wrote:
It’s all a matter of priorities. =]
At 31 March '06 - 12:09 Tobi wrote:
The teacher brought up this nice example. At one point he felt really at ease in a meeting, and he leaned backwards in his chair. Although this meant he felt comfortable and was really focussed on the discussion, the other attendants blamed him to be distant, and not paying attention.
Ahhhh, communicating, it seems so simple, untill you start!
At 01 April '06 - 23:55 Kloudiia wrote:
I do agree with you to a certain extent. At the same time, I just like to add that whatever the outcome of the communication, the communicator needs to take 100% responsibility, and for things to change, I must change first.
It’s really a matter of time that people start noticing the developments and improvements you’ve had over time and it’s either they follow or they remain where they are. For the latter, it they can’t find a strong reason to get out of their comfort zone, then no one is able to help.
But at least, you have been growing, and that matters the most, isn’t it?
At 03 April '06 - 18:11 paul brian deberry wrote:
At 06 April '06 - 05:30 sham bhangal wrote:
Because you are a designer. Designers dont get famous. Their work does. The creative process isnt particularly photogenic or interesting to outsiders whereas the end result is (unlike, say, rock music where the whole process and lifestyle is, or fiine art, where the high level aim of a work is of interest). If that bothers you, maybe you should have been Bono!
If you are talking about status of web design(ers), then its already there… web design is in the top ten coolest jobs of at least one ‘young people’s coolest most wanted job’ surveys Ive seen (UK). We’re behind footballers and supermodels unfortunately, but you cant have everything.
S
At 06 April '06 - 05:49 Marco wrote:
This piece is merely a personal reflective rambling. It has nothing to do with my design work. In fact I’m doing incredibly well as a designer lately!
At 06 April '06 - 07:18 localhost wrote:
At 22 May '06 - 09:33 major_danny wrote:
I find it easier to adapt to a rendering engine’s flawed box model than the larger physical universe filled with it’s greedy people and corporations. In that sense, much of the web reminds me of my American dystopia, complete with car crashes, nine kinds of industrial pollution and overal lack of civic responsibility. Crowded with more bad choices.
That’s the worst of the web and the worst of change—lots of bad choices. Lots of bad decisions. I would be happy if I had only a few choices, all of them tasty, rather than many, many bad selections to choose from, all them equally unpalatable. That’s the change I want. Now, how do I get there?
Speaking of choices, I wondered to myself if Pivot was a good blogging tool for me, with so many others available. It’s reassures me that someone as talented as you uses it. (Not sucking up, I’m being truthful.) I enjoy your blog, Marco. I discovered it yesterday via the pivotstyles web site.
At 20 December '06 - 01:35 Poul Jones >> Weight management tips wrote:
At 25 December '06 - 05:51 Ken Dryden - Employee management wrote:
I’ve taken a quick look at your postings, which are very interesting. Lots of material and ideas! Congrats on being so focused!