Speaker 1: Anyway, so there's Horus, and then there's the guy on the right there, is Set, and he's like the precursor of the Christian representation of Satan, in fact the name Satan seems to have been a transformation of the name Set, and Set is actually, he's like the god of totalitarian possibility, because in Egyptian mythology he represents the brother, the evil brother of the rightful king, who's always plotting to overthrow the rightful king, and And Horace is his natural enemy. And what this means, I'll tell you man, it's really important. So I have in my clinical practice frequently people who are stuck in the middle of absolutely moronic bureaucracy. So I can give you an example of this, I just love this. One of my clients who worked for a large corporation, who's a pretty sensible woman, she was being driven mad by the political correctness that had infected the organization. She sent me 32 email letter exchanges that were circulating around the word flip chart. I don't know if any of you have heard the flip chart controversy, but it's pretty mind-bogglingly moronic. The deal was that somebody, you know what a flip chart is, right? It's one of those paper pads that you flip paper over. It turns out, hypothetically, that flip is a pejorative term for Filipinos. They believed that the idea, the flip chart phrase was no longer acceptable because it was potentially offensive to Filipinos, although I bet they would have had to vacuum up the whole planet to find one Filipino who actually cared whether or not someone called that a flip chart. And that person would have had plenty of problems that were worse than that. Anyway, there was like 32 serious email exchanges about what terminology should be used instead of flip chart. So that's what people were doing instead of trying to actually have a life and do something useful and it was driving her completely mad They didn't rename them and made it It made part of corporate policy that it was inappropriate to use the word flipchart I don't remember what the hell they called them. Who knows? but But the reason I'm telling you this story is a lot of you are going to find yourself embedded in bureaucracies and you know and there's that for better or for worse and one of the things that are going to is going to happen to you, is that people are going to ask you to do stupid and ridiculous things, and the fact that they're asking you to do stupid and ridiculous things is going to do two things, three things to you. One is it'll warp you so that you'll pretend that you agree with it, and then eventually you will, and like, good so much for your soul. And then the other thing is, is that it'll demotivate you because you'll think, why should I be like slaving away at this job when, you know, I'm being pecked to death by morons with stupid rules. And the third thing that it'll do is make you resentful and irritated, and that will also undermine your motivation and make your life miserable. And so you might think, well, what should you do about that? And the answer to that is, you should object at the earliest possible point. Because first of all, you'll find that if you do, if you object to radical stupidity when it first emerges, you kind of make people aware of the fact that what they're doing is radically stupid. And they'll usually back off. And so then they won't torture you to death. So you have to take a risk, which is, oh no, what happens if I complain about this? But it's another one of those situations where you're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't. So if you complain, that'll cause some trouble. Although usually it causes way less trouble than you'd think, because people are generally not very courageous. And if you push them with some strength when they're doing something absolutely moronic, They'll usually back off because they don't know what to do when they're being challenged. And then you won't have to put up with it for the rest of your life. And so why I'm telling you this is because all sorts of bureaucratic entities, corporations, government institutions, non-profit organizations, anything that's above a certain size, because it doesn't matter if it's government or corporate, it's all the same bloody foolishness when it gets too big, is like those things tend towards totalitarian structures. It's part of the innate danger that's associated with social organization. And so then you might say, well, how do you keep the enterprise that you're part of alive and dynamic, and also keep it a place that a sensible person who's got a proper orientation could stand to work? And the answer is, do not do things you know to be stupid. Stand up and say, look, that's dumb. I'm not doing it. And if they ask you why, then you can say, well, A, I think it's stupid. B, if I do it, I'm going to get irritated and resentful, and also if I do it, it's going to decrease my motivation. So I'm not doing it. And then if they push you too hard, it's like, hey, it's time for a different job. And that might be the best thing that ever happened to you, because if the structure you're in is going in that direction, and you can't stop it, it's like, get the hell out of there and find something else. So it's not that hard to find a job when you already have a job. That's another thing to keep in mind, too. You know, whenever you're working, and you will be, especially in the world of today where jobs are relatively uncertain, you should always have an escape route planned. And it should be active, because if you don't have an escape route and you can't get away, you can't say no. And if you can't say no, you can't bargain. And if you can't bargain, you're a slave. So that's how the world is set out at the moment. It's probably always been like that. It's something that you really need to know because you got to watch if you're if your being is Objecting to someone to something that someone is forcing you to do Maybe you're right Maybe you shouldn't be doing it and lots of people end up living meaningless lives And that that's a that's not a very good term because there's no such thing as a meaningless life because one of the meanings of life is suffering and There's no bloody way you're going to escape that so you will not have a meaningless life you'll have a life that's only suffering and I wouldn't recommend that because it'll make you one miserable creature and plus you warp everyone around you because you'll be vengeful so if these things are really important they're

Speaker 2: really important so you need to know what your temperament is and then you need to know the temperamental demands of the job now most jobs are are mastered with a combination of intelligence and conscientiousness but the other temperamental factors play a moderating role so for example extroverted people tend to be entertainer types and highly social and so if you're interested for example in if you're extroverted then a career in sales is something that you might consider a career that involves a lot of public communication and interaction with groups whereas you're an introvert you're gonna work you're gonna want to work a lot more you're going to be suited to work on us in a solitary manner a lot more. If you're agreeable, you're going to be suited for taking care of people. If you're disagreeable, then you're a tough bargainer and a hard negotiator and litigators, for example. Lawyers are often low in agreeableness. So if you're conscientious, well that tends to be a very good trait for any kind of managerial and administrative job and for simpler jobs as well. It's a great predictor of military prowess for example. If you're high in openness then you're going to want a creative career and that might make you an entrepreneur or a musician or an artist of that or something like that. That's often very very difficult to monetize but one of the funny things about openness is that if you're high in openness it's not that helpful at the bottom of hierarchies because you're basically expected at the bottom of most hierarchies to act more or less like a functionary but it becomes of critical importance at the top of hierarchy so So it's a personality trait whose utility can really kick in, in the later stages of your career. Because in really complex positions where things are changing dynamically, you need to have a high intelligence and you also need to be creative. So how can you determine if a job is a good fit or a terrible mistake? Well, I would say you can tell if it's a terrible mistake if you dread going. And also if you're working hard and doing what you're supposed to and you're not being rewarded for it or and there's no chance for advancement so that those are good reasons to to leave.