<story><title>It&apos;s worse than you think</title><url>https://ckarchive.com/b/75u7h8hkk9g9e</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>hgomersall</author><text>To quote Greg LeMond: it never gets easier, you just get faster. As someone who arguably has accumulated expertise, I still feel like I&amp;#x27;m winging it a lot. The difference is I&amp;#x27;m now winging it at the boundaries of the state of the art. It certainly doesn&amp;#x27;t feel easier to be here than where I was 20 years ago (though I do feel to be in a better place). There&amp;#x27;s always much more expertise I need!</text></item><item><author>akersten</author><text>Any life philosophy that helps one get through the day in a positive way is good. I do have a nit to pick with part of this one. It leans on the idea that &amp;quot;everyone is winging it all the time&amp;quot; and links to a Guardian opinion(?) piece where they pull quote from people who can&amp;#x27;t read a clock or tie their shoes. I think that&amp;#x27;s both not the right level of assumed incompetence that the author wanted to convey, but also reinforcement of a comforting excuse for failing to flourish. There &lt;i&gt;is&lt;/i&gt; such a thing as expertise, and it (almost) always takes a lot of work to achieve it. So it both denigrates those who have worked hard to be competent in their field and gives aspirationals an out that potentially stunts their growth.&lt;p&gt;I agree that the mantra applies in some circumstances, like casual social interaction (although I&amp;#x27;m sure there are subject matter experts in that realm too who could out-chat any of us), but applying it to your career and goals seems self-defeating to me.&lt;p&gt;But again, we are all different and different motivations work on each of us. Just my unsolicited opinion.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>kryogen1c</author><text>&amp;gt; it never gets easier, you just get faster. As someone who arguably has accumulated expertise, I still feel like I&amp;#x27;m winging it a lot.&lt;p&gt;Yes, I believe the gp has missed the point of the article.&lt;p&gt;The lesson from &amp;quot;your to-do list isn&amp;#x27;t difficult, it&amp;#x27;s impossible&amp;quot; is not nihilism. The point is not that no one is good at anything so why bother; the point is that the feeling of overwhelm, dread, and depression from an impossible- seeming to-do list is rooted in false assumptions. Your to-do list doesn&amp;#x27;t &lt;i&gt;seem&lt;/i&gt; impossibly long, it IS impossibly long! You are born with a to-do list and you will die with a to-do list - but that&amp;#x27;s OK. We&amp;#x27;re all in the same boat.&lt;p&gt;Another helpful way to think about this is a math analogy. Your knowledge is a circle or sphere that has your literal area of expertise. The more your learn, the larger it gets - but you also gain more contact with the unknown.&lt;p&gt;That is the lesson. Imposter syndrome demystified. Only a fool feels in complete control.  One simply does what one can.</text></comment>
<story><title>It&apos;s worse than you think</title><url>https://ckarchive.com/b/75u7h8hkk9g9e</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>hgomersall</author><text>To quote Greg LeMond: it never gets easier, you just get faster. As someone who arguably has accumulated expertise, I still feel like I&amp;#x27;m winging it a lot. The difference is I&amp;#x27;m now winging it at the boundaries of the state of the art. It certainly doesn&amp;#x27;t feel easier to be here than where I was 20 years ago (though I do feel to be in a better place). There&amp;#x27;s always much more expertise I need!</text></item><item><author>akersten</author><text>Any life philosophy that helps one get through the day in a positive way is good. I do have a nit to pick with part of this one. It leans on the idea that &amp;quot;everyone is winging it all the time&amp;quot; and links to a Guardian opinion(?) piece where they pull quote from people who can&amp;#x27;t read a clock or tie their shoes. I think that&amp;#x27;s both not the right level of assumed incompetence that the author wanted to convey, but also reinforcement of a comforting excuse for failing to flourish. There &lt;i&gt;is&lt;/i&gt; such a thing as expertise, and it (almost) always takes a lot of work to achieve it. So it both denigrates those who have worked hard to be competent in their field and gives aspirationals an out that potentially stunts their growth.&lt;p&gt;I agree that the mantra applies in some circumstances, like casual social interaction (although I&amp;#x27;m sure there are subject matter experts in that realm too who could out-chat any of us), but applying it to your career and goals seems self-defeating to me.&lt;p&gt;But again, we are all different and different motivations work on each of us. Just my unsolicited opinion.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>razzimatazz</author><text>You prompted me to think of fitness - as someone who has accumulated fitness I still feel like I am suffering a lot when I run, and I can take that suffering as a bit like winging it. The difference is I am suffering&amp;#x2F;winging it at a decent pace, I&amp;#x27;m accustomed to what suffering&amp;#x2F;winging it feels like and know that I don&amp;#x27;t need to give up, I believe I can push on.&lt;p&gt;And indeed there is always more fitness that I need.</text></comment>