Illusions of Control

Greetings, readers. I write to you in the midst of what’s certainly one of the oddest moments of my life to date. All the petty trivialities and routines of daily life have been halted while nearly every country in the world simultaneously battles a crippling global pandemic. 

It’s taken me some time to string together some thoughts and process what’s been happening. If you know me well, you know I’m usually the naively optimistic person in the room, but lately it seems increasingly pointless to continue seeking silver linings amidst so much synchronous suffering. Still, I feel a duty of sorts to share some calming words of wisdom despite these anxious and sombre times.

To the best of my knowledge, the source of my personal anxiety flows from the chaos and uncertainty that this pandemic has caused. I like my routines. I feel safe when there’s order. But, these past months have humbled me deeply.  

How am I coping with the stress? I’m borrowing a page from the stoicism playbook by simply trying to see the world as it is and focusing my attention only on what I can control. The disruption to “daily life” as we know it has actually liberated me from whatever illusion of control that once preoccupied my attention. 

I can’t stop a virus no more than I can lull a hurricane or hush an erupting volcano. I’m reminded of the late astronomer Carl Sagan’s sage words about The Pale Blue Dot image taken of Earth by NASA’s Voyager 1 as it transcended our solar system:

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

Today, the only thing I can control with any certainty is myself, and it’s precisely within myself that I must find the peace and tranquility that I so crave. I wish you all continued health and endurance during these challenging days. May we someday emerge to a kinder world and remember to cherish the lives we’re still lucky to have.

If I can be of any help or assistance to you in any capacity, please don’t hesitate to send me an email. 

Free Thinking

Over the weekend, I watched The Great Hack, a new Netflix documentary on the subject of professional influencing and the backstory of Cambridge Analytica. It’s the kind of documentary that makes you immediately want to delete all the apps from your phone and reach for the nearest tinfoil hat. Although I resisted the temptation to throw my phone in the river, I was astonished at the scale of metadata living freely on the Internet, and how easily it can be exploited to serve any number of unknown purposes. 

In Cambridge Analytica’s own marketing material, the company claimed to own “5,000 data points on every American voter”. I’m not sure how exact this figure is, but if it’s anywhere remotely close to accurate, it’s beyond alarming. 

The documentary made me question just how independently I form “my” opinions. Are they genuinely my own? Or, am I just another pawn in some big system? 

Behavioral change and advertising is, of course, nothing new. Companies and politicians have been buying and crafting clever ads to influence people for centuries. So, what’s so different about it this time? 

The unnerving component of new age behavioral influence to me, is the stealthiness of its effects. For example, when I see a 100 ft billboard by Nike, I know I’m looking at an ad. But when an unsuspecting citizen uses Facebook to keep in touch with friends, and is silently being nudged to like a particular political candidate, it just feels wrong. 

The big point I’m trying to make in this blog post is that I’m now highly skeptical of the quantity of my own thinking that remains untouched by the paws of unwanted influencers. My guess is that absolutely zero percent of what I believe to be “independent thoughts” are indeed free and clear. 

Worse still, there’s really no stopping this freight train. Data is becoming one of the most, if not the most, valuable asset in the world. The organizations that collect and own data have a societal responsibility to be transparent in how and why they’re using consumer data. 

Just “my” thoughts.