Half Dad, Half Misfit

 

The (imaginary) readers of this blog will know that I am very interested in the topic of narcissism and assholes and how they affect the world. What they won’t know, is that I also love reading Matt Levine’s daily Bloomberg email “Money Stuff”, which lately has had lots of information about Elon Musk attempting to buy Twitter. I have a personal opinion/theory about Elon Musk. The following is where I state that theory/opinion. I deliberately over-simplify. Lucky Asshole Theory My theory is that Elon Musk is a “lucky asshole.” He has had success twice in taking other people’s ideas and companies and making money: once with Paypal and once with Tesla. He has gone on to continue his good luck with SpaceX. But, like many rich people, Elon doesn’t realise he’s lucky and surrounded by great people who compensate for his assholery - he thinks he’s gifted. He has come to believe in his own brilliance, and believes everyone should listen to him on all topics. The book Loonshots called this &quo

A book about corporate cultures and how they can inhibit innovation or encourage it. It was a long book filled with many stories, was enjoyable, but I only got two real ideas from it: Strategy Innovation vs Product Innovation - both are important Balancing your organisation at a critical point between two states - ensuring that the "franchise" part of the business balances with the "loonshot" part of the business, with neither part of the business stifling the other part. Enjoyable listen, 4/5 for the excellent anecdotes.

From the Hidden Brain podcast a 50 minute discussion of rudeness .

I love the Ask A Manager blog; as I've stated before, it's a great resource for finding examples of people pushing boundaries in the workplace and suggestions for how to enforce those boundaries. Watching other people hold their boundaries is a great way to learn about how to maintain your own ones. But this morning's letter prompted me to give my own advice: should you turn on an out-of-office message when you’re away for a few hours? : I work for a medium-sized office, managing a small team; this team interacts with other internal staffers, primarily on non-urgent matters. Right now, leadership is brainstorming how and when it is most appropriate to use an out-of-office message. [four more paragraphs deleted, and a whole bunch of Alison's opinions on out of office messages] Your problem here is not "what's the right way to use out-of-office messages?"  Your problem is "leadership is brainstorming how and when it is most appropriate to use an out-of

A few times on Twitter, I've seen two types of complaints. People with diagnosed Personality Disorders (e.g. Narcissistic / Borderline) complaining that people don't give them a chance and that they feel sad. People complaining that we shouldn't diagnose other people, because we aren't a psychiatrist. I'm going to address these using analogies of Lions and Wolves. Analogy 1 - The Room With The Wild Lion Let's say I present you with two choices: A. Spend 5 minutes in a small room with a wild lion. B. Don't spend 5 minutes in a small room with a wild lion. Which one are you going to pick, if you want to survive? Option B, of course. Yeah, the lion might feel sad and lonely, but guess what, you didn't risk getting a leg bitten off. You didn't die. You took the right choice for you. Maybe there is someone out there who can safely spend time in a room with a lion without getting hurt, but you're not that person. The lion would've been happy, if on

Was just watching this video,  https://youtu.be/mHHXxA3FYt4, and at the start she said  "It normally takes two people to have an argument" It reminded me of a (Scottish?) expression I once heard: "They could start an argument in an empty house." And I just remembered how often I used to think that during the relationship. Another phrase I've used a lot over the years to describe a narcissist in my life is: "If they won the lottery jackpot, they'd ring up and complain that the cheque was the wrong colour." Another video I saw recently said that when trying to describe a narcissist to someone in authority (like a child protective services, a judge or the police), you shouldn't use the word "narcissist" as it will actually count against you; because you, a non-psychiatrist, 'diagnosed' someone else, so you are the labelled as the inappropriate one.  But the helpful advice in that video was to use the word "antagonistic"