Weihnachtsjäger School of Charm — Introductory Pontification
Posted By Randy on January 1, 2024
“Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.” ~ Lao Tzu
Within the framework of First Principles, Tools are born of Competence. For just as it is rightly said that, “Necessity is the mother of invention,” so must Competence first exist to recognize Necessity so the inventing can begin.
Competence further enables evaluation of problems in measure of their solvability within the Natural Framework:
- Tools (your Garniture of skills and artifacts);
- Energy; and
- Time.
When a problem has no solution within that Framework, it’s not a problem — it’s a fact, and those fall under the Natural Rule of Three:
- Adapt;
- Migrate; or
- Die.
It should be obvious that within those options, Competence will lend itself to devising acceptable workarounds where such facts as unacceptable stress and conflict come to roost, in service of options offered by the first two, and avoidance of the third.
“Everything in Nature is about efficiency and balance, which is why life is, first and foremost, an exercise in energy management. For example, the Way of the Wild demands of each parent that their offspring be made self-sufficient as quickly and efficiently as possible. A tool need not be a physical artifact – rest assured that skilled parenting is a Tool – but to be True it must help, not hinder, such processes, and must never represent a brilliant answer to a question that was never asked.” ~ Worldly Wisdom Wednesday — Tools
In devising a Tool, first know what the Tool is for. At its most basic, it exists to leverage Competence, and not to compensate for lack of it.
“Competence and favourable outcomes in the face of hard problems, both personally and professionally, is what we’re after, and what one brings to the BYOT (Bring Your Own Tools) party we call Life needs to support that goal.” ~ EDC — TMI
And how does all this have anything to do with Charm?
I once defined some absolutes by which the Trueness of a Tool may be measured, and posit here that they serve equally well in defining Competence:
- It must be maintainable.
- Its durability and longevity must not constitute a built-in guarantee of waste.
- Life with it must be superior to life without it.
- Neither its use, nor the job it was devised to perform, shall represent the creation of an equal or greater problem while solving another.
- It must not represent the lesser of two or more evils.
- For any given task, it must provide a dividend in the form of time expended, materials used, and/or energy required.
- It must exist to do a job that is necessary within the context of sound ecological and ergonomic practice.
Nothing is more charming than Competence, and these foundational matters underpin the syllabus for lessons to follow.
Welcome to School.
Ah, the Charm of Competence. Well put and the development of a ‘tool;’ culture that is at once understood with both the tool and the ‘toolie’
Few understand the necessity of using the tool to enhance one’s life rather than to cover up inadequacies of the use which inevitably ruins the perfection of the tool while not appreciating the need for mastery that the tool itself implies and gives of itself.
Excellent.
Thank you Goode Sir! I believe you will enjoy this new Charm School series, however charming you may already be.
“One of the first precepts is that ‘The vessel must be worthy of what it is to contain’ – otherwise the experience is rather depleted and never has a chance to ‘set up’ – or properly cure over time into a true enlightenment.” ~ James A. Keating