What is achievement that can never be realized?
Episode 50 of the Make Saints podcast: “Achievement”
the episode script
Unmeasured goals are unmet goals.
Whether meeting our goals means anything, however, is a whole other story.
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When I was young, I loved seeing the world in Top Five lists. Like the character of Rob in High Fidelity, I evaluated everything.
And the best part of offering a discriminating attitude toward music, films, books, and restaurants was that it offered new ways to recognize achievement.
Being an arrogant jerk, my top five favorite movies were all serious and melancholy. Also having a teenage sense of humor, I had a top five stupid movies list. And a top five rewatchable movies. Because some of the movies the arrogant jerk picked were never going to be seen a second time.
Seeing the world as different, relative, and dependent on the situation has a way of rendering the idea of best kind of useless.
My Talented Friends
In college, I never missed a play or a concert. When you know people on the stage, you’re more inclined to want to show up.
I also had the chance to see some real talent perform. People who have made professional careers from their craft.
Watching them achieve on a small stage was brilliant. And yet the inner evaluator is always judging against some amorphous ideal. If landing a major role in a Hollywood film is the baseline of achievement, then millions of people are total failures. Which really seems like a strange way to view the world.
And, of course, our warped minds take it even further. Being in one film isn’t enough. Neither is playing a support role. And ultimately, isn’t an Oscar win necessary to truly achieve anything in film?
Achievement is a Ridiculous Concept
We hear this word used at every Academy Awards ceremony: each award is given for “achievement in filmmaking”. Which is a funny thing to have people vote on, if we think about it.
Best movie? Actor in a lead role? Cinematography?
Each of these is an achievement. We’re just deciding that some are achieveyer than others.
Achievement is a ridiculous concept. If we have a heart for evaluation. But if we have a heart for celebration, it means something completely different.
Achievement in 2023
I make no resolutions. Instead, I choose three words and let them guide my year. I also set a few goals and make commitments with myself. That’s what I do.
And I do this because I am too prone to evaluate myself based on irrational expectations.
The reason I haven’t written a book is that I compare my ideas for a book against Paul Tillich and Li-Young Lee and Samuel Beckett. And I go, “yeah, that sucks.” Because the evaluating mind calls that achievement.
The celebrating mind, on the other hand, says writing a book is an achievement. We need the celebrating mind in control if we have any goals we hope to meet.
Now, the arrogant jerk still lives inside me. He’s 20, long-haired, always wearing shorts. Loves absurdist theater and tinkering with dadaism. That guy is still in there.
But there’s another one in there, too. Looks exactly the same. He also loves Chumbawamba’s international hit “Tubthumping” because it is a perfect pop song. And he’ll watch “Say Anything” over and over.
Because evaluation doesn’t get us any achievements. We have to do something to achieve something. And true beauty comes in many different ways.
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I’m Drew Downs. Thanks for listening to Make Saints. Because (eternal) life is hard. And we could use all the help we can get.