on passion

[ursula]

In a conversation about SCA recognition, ayeshadream wrote:

I had a deep discussion with a friend about this the other weekend who was visibly upset about how a competition turned out. I said so long as they do what they're passionate about then nothing else matters.

"Follow your passion" is fairly common advice in the SCA, in any small-liberal-artsy context, in life. I find it mildly alienating. I am never that certain about my emotions, nor that focused in my enthusiasms. Of course there are broad themes (playing into my SCA activities are affinities for grammar, for checking out too many library books, for teaching, writing, repetitive crafts), but I know full well that there are all sorts of ways to satisfy my interests. There's an alternate world where I quilt, run the website for a small literary journal, and study classical Chinese poetry, and I'm perfectly happy there.

I use the SCA like a lens. I'm motivated by conversation, by the gaps in conversation, and sometimes (I admit) by the wish to show off. I enjoy formal competitions, because they provide structure, deadlines, concrete goals. And you know what? I do want to be a Laurel when I grow up. I don't want to be a Laurel to the exclusion of sanity, or a real job, or rereading Jane Austen and petting the cats. But sometimes a little bit of ambition can be useful.

Comments

[viking-food-guy.livejournal.com]

I agree wholeheartedly. I find that competition is a great way to get motivated to a) finish something I always wanted to finish or b) take some project to the next level where I otherwise wouldn't have bothered. Plus they have deadlines, which I have discovered are a must if I'm actually going to get anything done.

[ursula]

Yes, I need deadlines, too. My ongoing challenge these days is that the SCA actually gives me *more* deadlines than the Ph.D. does, and I have to be careful not to let the SCA take too much.

[aelfgyfu.livejournal.com]

Agree. That I why I don't jab at you more seriously. ;-)

[ursula]

I was actually thinking kind of seriously about bardic (well, a composition-primary set of entries), but then I decided to get married . . .

[aryanhwy.livejournal.com]

Quite a lot of people on heraldry lists that I'm on, and non-heralds who contact me because of my articles, assume that I must be a Laurel or a Pelican. In a way, their belief that my research/service is at a peerage level is worth as much to me as an actual peerage would. One of my favorite award medallions is for an award I never got. It was for a principality award, and when Northshield became a kingdom and there was no longer any chance that I would be given the award, the friend who had made me the medallion (cast in 24 carat gold from a mold of his own medallion for that award) gave it to me in front of all my friends from my original shire saying that they couldn't understand why their recommendation letters had never been acted on.

This is not to say that I wouldn't dearly love to be made a Laurel in onomastics someday! :)

[ursula]

Really, nothing sounds more impressive than "Laurel in onomastics". They should make you one just so you can make the council more intimidating ;)

[freewaydiva.livejournal.com]

I don't want to be a Laurel to the exclusion of sanity, or a real job, or rereading Jane Austen and petting the cats. But sometimes a little bit of ambition can be useful.

Exactly.

[mmcnealy.livejournal.com]

And you know what? I do want to be a Laurel when I grow up. I don't want to be a Laurel to the exclusion of sanity, or a real job, or rereading Jane Austen and petting the cats. But sometimes a little bit of ambition can be useful.

Yup, me too.

I enter competitions so that I take things to the next level and compete against myself. Of course this works best when I give myself enough time to actually do a good job, not just try to rush things at the end and hope that it all works out. Writing the documentation the night before is *not* a good thing I've learned.

[glasseye.livejournal.com]

I think most of us learn that the hard way. :)

[ursula]

Well, some of us know it's a bad idea and try it anyway ;)

[philthecow.livejournal.com]

"Follow your passion" is fairly common advice in the SCA, in any small-liberal-artsy context, in life. I find it mildly alienating.

I'm not sure about what the rest of the post means, but about this I agree entirely. Wholly, wholly alienating.

[ursula]

Yeah, sometimes I just want room for dispassion and dilettantism and paradox-of-choice-style "screw this, I'm just going to get a job and bake cookies."

(The Order of the Laurel is one of the SCA's most prestigious arts awards. To be made a member of the order you have to demonstrate chivalry, service, and crazy craft/research skills. The current members of the Order choose new members in consultation with Their Majesties. In other words, it's impressive and the selection process involves heavy doses of geek politics. I think the conversation about the Laurel is a little bit like conversations about Honors-- of course lots of people want High Honors, heck, even Highest Honors, but if you SAY you want Highest Honors people will treat you like an imminently-explosive stressball.)

Possibly a bit more accurate...

[glasseye.livejournal.com]

The current members of the Order choose recommend new members in consultation with to Their Majesties.

:D

Re: Possibly a bit more accurate...

[ursula]

Well, yours is a more precise legal description, but it's a lot like saying Congress recommends laws to the President-- it's not necessarily the most effective way of communicating the attendant politics.

Re: Possibly a bit more accurate...

[glasseye.livejournal.com]

Well, the president can't make any law he likes. The royalty can (and have) elevated people that the majority of a given polling order have opposed. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't.

Re: Possibly a bit more accurate...

[ursula]

On the other hand, Congress can't wait six months for a new president.

wow, I missed this great opportunity to say . . .

[ursula]

You must be thinking of a different President.

[otherwind.livejournal.com]

I also find the platitude "follow your passion" to be less useful than I once did. I have many passions (most everything I do I am passionate about) but I think that in my family, that directive carried an unintended message--as in, 'do something you love, something artsy, something that comes easy, don't worry about doing things that are really hard, they might be too hard--do something fun.' It took me until recently to realize, hey, I've got more in me than that--I can be more than an artsy-fartsy English major (would you like fries with that?). I _can_ do math, (or statistics anyway), I don't need to settle for being a teacher at a little private school with crap pay, I can reach much higher. I can even be a PhD.

Also, speaking as a laurel, I think ambition is definitely a good thing. I love it when people come right out and say they want to be a laurel and are humble enough at the same time to recognize the areas where they need to grow (both before and after the acolade--laurel is just a threshold, not a destination, as any real artist knows). A real desire for the rank and realistic self-assesment are both critical (and for me, that self-awareness has less to do with craft skills than with PLQs--graciousness, leadership, non-reactivity, having little to prove, ability to give loving and non-judgemental feedback).

For me showing an unconflicted desire for the laurel is just part of the job interview--why on earth would you give a job to someone who thinks they should claim not to want it?

(And by the way, I second glasseye--all we do is recommend--we live in one of the most royalist kingdoms around, and even though the laurels try to be bossier than the other councils, in the end, our only real power is persuasion.)

[ursula]

I've very much enjoyed your accounts of your studies-- especially because my little sister is also planning a psychology Ph.D. & an eventual practice, and it's interesting to me to see the different ways to travel the same path.

Definitely thinking about balance vs. out-of-balance vs. stasis is more useful for me personally.

(glasseye and I like our online snark, but I don't think we're actually in disagreement. I'm more inclined to focus on the process of persuasion, and to see the means by which the council persuades itself as an integral part of the process rather than a black box emitting proposals, and to hope that Their Majesties and the council are in agreement *before* a formal recommendation is made, and, heck, to believe Their Majesties' greatest power is persuasion too. But this is mere philosophy. ;) )

[ryunohi.livejournal.com]

You guys are what's good about the SCA. I just managed to eat half a bag of pretzels without realizing it and feel nostalgic about not SCA while I was reading all of this.

[ursula]

Awwww.

You should come to an event with us sometime ;)

[inseriatim.livejournal.com]

This made me think about why I like to do the things I like to do! Thanks.

[gwacie.livejournal.com]

Rather than "Follow your passion" I would say "Do it because you like doing it; not for any outside reason." and that is the only way to guaranty not to be disappointed. If you love the craft and do the craft for the love of it. Too many people look for external validation, which is never as lasting as internal.

That said, I love competitions and pitting myself against the criteria, bwahahaha!! And showing off, of course :)

[kthrockmorton.livejournal.com]

Yes, this. Awards are nice, but in the end, if you play in a big kingdom, or spend a great deal of your time on pursuits that don't attract a great deal of attention (like heraldry), odds are that you aren't going to get the awards very fast. So doing it for the awards, in my observation, often results in nothing but frustration when you don't get the awards you "deserve".

[gwacie.livejournal.com]

It's not just the awards, it's any external validation. A lot of people enter A&S Competitions just wanting to have someone tell them "Ooo Pretty! You're so good!" which the competition isn't designed to do; a display is a better place for that.

Not that I don't need external validation, everyone does to a certain extant, but you should have an internal validation for why you're doing it too.

Am I babbling?

Nice arms, btw :)

[kthrockmorton.livejournal.com]

I agree that external validation is important. But the thing of it is, most people in the SCA get the kind of external validation that you are talking about from their friends, or from other SCAdians who share their interests, which seems to me to be a more appropriate place to get external validation, than awards.

I don't think that it is wrong to want to get awards, or to be a peer. *I* want to be a peer, because how else will I ever get to be called by a persona appropriate title ;). But I've also heard people say "If I don't get X in a year, I'm quitting", and then do it, or engage in really unethical behavior in order to get a desired award. I guess that what I'm trying to say is that when becoming a peer becomes the *primary* motivation for doing X, then angst and drama generally ensue.

Thanks for the compliment on the arms. I was just thinking that your's are remarkably attractive as well.

[ursula]

Conversations like these always make me value the sanity of my acquaintance.

Speaking of awards, yay, Panache for Ary!

[gwacie.livejournal.com]

Even when it is about the awards, it's not about the awards.

A lot of people who are desperate to achieve rank X find the victory hallow and unsatisfying, because that award they thought would make them happy didn't. And this can spiral into them going after the next highest award because this one will really make them happy because it's shiny and important! And that one doesn't either.. because what they really want they need to look inside for.

It's all about -why- you want it, not that you want it. I would like to be a Laurel when I grow up; because Laurels seem to be pretty cool people and I like hanging out with them, but being a Laurel or not isn't going to change my opinion of my self worth.

[aelfgyfu.livejournal.com]

Well, actually, you will get a lot of ,"Oh pretty," out of competition, just not from the judges. ;-) Not that I ever look for external validation or anything... But agree about internal stuff being important also.

[gwacie.livejournal.com]

The way we do A&S competitions here in the Midrealm; not so much. The entrants and populace aren't allowed in the room while judging is going on, and since judging starts early in the day and ends late (and entrants tend to pick up their work soon as judging is done) which means most often only three judges get to see your work, and no one else. (Unless you're entering Performing Arts, which the populace is encouraged to view) :( It's a problem I think, especially since a lot of people come to the A&S to show off what they do. For last year's regional A&S I tried to schedule time for the entry hall to be open for populace viewing; not sure if that helped like I hoped or not.

For less formal competitions at events, yeah, you get a lot of "ooo pretty!" and mass love. It's all about the love, really ;)

[ursula]

An Tir puts everyone in a big room. On the other hand, we don't have the regional structure that the Midrealm has, just Kingdom A&S and Kingdom Bardic.

[ursula]

My personal rule is "Never take an SCA job that doesn't sound fun". Because if it doesn't sound fun starting out, when will it?

[gwacie.livejournal.com]

Good rule!