Lack of purpose haunts students

Re:The “Non-Adult” Meme

Woah, dude. You sound like the kind of person I’d really want to hang out with! 🙂 If for no other reason that you know where your priorities lie. That, if nothing else, makes you an adult in my book.

Me, I’m almost everything they would consider to be an adult. I’m happily married. I have a child who just celebrated his first birthday yesterday.

But…

I still place self-gratification at the core of my values. “They” might denounce me as selfish, but that’s only because they possess a single mindedness to say that you can have one and only one motiviation at your core. Obviously I place self-gratification at my core. Anyone who says they don’t are not to be trusted. (Unless they happen to have a shaved head and wear saffron robes.) Yet self-gratification is not my only motivation. My core motivations include other things, among them are providing for my family, advancing my career, and seeking ever more knowledge. That all sounds good philisophically, but it can be viewed far more superficially than that.

I want to provide for my family. Don’t forget though, I’m a member of my family. Therefore I want to provide for myself too. I want to advance my career. Why? So I can better provide for my family, and thus myself too. I want to learn more and more and more. Why? Because learning is very pleasurable to me. Moreover, I can use my knowledge to further advance my career and better provide for my family. So not only does learning satisfy a self-gratification, it satisfies other core values which are tied to self-gratification.

Adults, like everything else come in different shapes and sizes. I have a friend who’s very much like Korpios. He’s in his thirties. Unmarried. Works IT. Owns his own house. He works IT because he loves computers. Almost all of his paycheque goes directly to his own enjoyment. After bills and other necessities, he can pretty much buy whatever he wants. He’s a geek, like me. His living room includes a large set of tables where we play tabletop RPGs every weekend and a white board on the wall to keep score and draw maps. Much of his money goes to “toys,” yet no one could deny that he’s an adult. It just that his living room looks nothing like mine which is usually bestrewn with children’s toys.