Deep! (02/11/2011)
Hello!!!
This week I've got a blog that's deeper than Nietzsche and Dostoevsky at the bottom of the Mariana Trench!
When I'm driving my friends to the pub or a gig, I'm also usually driving them up the wall with the latest bands and artists on my iPod. In fact, I've recently become so obsessed with the latest new music, I'll even check the release date before downloading a new album. For some bizarre and highly irrational reason, I seem to have arrived at the conclusion that when it's less than a year old, it's gold. This will often sway my thoughts away from buying an album from a band that's a couple of years old and, instead, towards a newer band, even if they're not as good. I also seem to have a tendency to forget about the 110 gigabytes of my existing music collection because of the 'moth to flame' enticement to new music that's out there.
This is where the Genius that is Rory Sutherland comes in. He is the CEO of a company called Ogilvy Group UK, a successful worldwide advertising company, and has an amazing outlook on the world. In the clip below he asks 'why do we always get drawn towards novelty, instead of celebrating the positives in what we've already got'. It's counter intuitive but I certainly see his point.
This got me thinking. Sometimes you just want a product to do what it was initially designed to do. A great example of this is my iPhone. It's great for playing Angry Birds but, by the time you've unlocked the screen, entered in your password, closed the app you were previously in, checked your contacts list, realised you don't have the number in your contacts list, entered the number in on the keypad and waited for the reception to reach anything that doesn't resemble a Fat Boy Slim remix, you've forgotten the reason you wanted to make the call in the first place. However, I believe I would've suited the 1920s much better. In fact, if you've seen me prancing around in one of my trilbies, you'll probably feel the same way.
Sutherland also mentions that often we're so focused on the engineer's solution of shortening the time it takes to get from 'A' to 'B' that we actually forget to enjoy the journey. What use is knocking 30 minutes off a 3 hour journey if it's still 2 and a half hours of time you wish you were somewhere else? After thinking a long time about my daily commute to work (especially whilst commuting in road work season), I now leave half an hour earlier, whack on some of my favourite tunes, drive a little less frenzied and arrive a little more contented. It's amazing how a calmer start to the day can create a calmer day all the way through.
Your mission, if you choose to accept it.
Finish listening to this awesome remix of Little Fluffy Clouds by The Orb, watch the video of Sutherland's speech and listen to a few of your favourite timeless classics on your next journey into work.