We do not know everything. Awareness of this fact is an important first step in the intellectual domain. The psychic task which a person can and must set for himself, is not to feel secure, but to be able to tolerate insecurity, without panic and undue fear. [Erich Fromm] Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those…
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Value for Wednesday of Week 28 in the season of Ripening
Being Dedicated
Dedication implies a single-minded focus, and concentration of activity.
- Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. Even a casual look at history reveals that no social advance rolls in on the wheels of inevitability. Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. [Martin Luther King, Jr.]
- We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline, and effort. [Jesse Owens]
- The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand. [attributed to Vince Lombardi]
Dedication is defined as being devoted to a task or purpose. “Dedication to work is about enthusiasm for the job and feelings of pride and inspiration from one’s work, which is important due to its influence on work performance.” It is not transcendent, per se, but is a frequent characterizing feature of the transcendent person.
Dedication has been shown to increase productivity/performance of emergency room doctors, science teachers, and athletes. It is positively associated with well-being.
Real
True Narratives
Marie Curie:
- Eve Curie, Madame Curie: A Biography (Doubleday, Doran & Co., Inc., 1937).
- Barbara Goldsmith, Obsessive Genius: The Inner World of Marie Curie (W.W. Norton, 2005).
- Laura Redniss, Radioactive: Marie and Pierre Curie: A Tale of Love and Fallout (It Books, 2010).
Other dedicated people:
- Charles Slack, Noble Obsession: Charles Goodyear, Thomas Hancock, and the Race to Unlock the Greatest Industrial Secret of the Nineteenth Century (Hyperion, 2002).
- Ashlee Vance, Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future (HarperCollins Publications (2015): “ . . . Musk is brutal on himself, routinely working 100-hour weeks. He is brutal as a boss, too, often berating or summarily firing colleagues while hogging credit for others’ accomplishments. Yet he is without question a leader who pushes risky ideas forward through a combination of long-range vision and deep technical intelligence. He knows how to hire good people and how to motivate them. Most important, he never, ever gives up.”
- Rachel Cohen, Austen Years: A Memoir in Five Novels (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2020): “Cohen read Jane Austen’s work exclusively for seven years — through the death of her father and two pregnancies; her winsome, nuanced account of the experience makes clear the British novelist’s abundant consolations.”
- Tracy Kidder, Rough Sleepers: Dr. Jim O’Connell’s Urgent Mission to Bring Healing to Homeless People (Random House, 2023), “chronicles the work of Dr. Jim O’Connell, who has dedicated his career to caring for homeless patients.”
- Jennet Conant, Fierce Ambition: The Life and Legend of War Correspondent Maggie Higgins (W.W. Norton & Company, 2023): “Marguerite Higgins’s fiercely competitive attitude toward the sexist world of journalism won her a Pulitzer — and made her enemies.”
Technical and Analytical Readings
Photographs
Documentary and Educational Films
- Spellbound, following eight high-level competitorsin the national spelling bee
- First Position: teens and pre-teens competefor honors and future positions as ballet dancers
- Herb and Dorothy: a married couple use their little discretionary incometo collect minimalist art works, creating a valuable collection
- Jiro Dreams of Sushi, featuring a manwidely reputed to be the world’s greatest sushi chef, the only sushi chef to be awarded Michelin’s three-star rating: he considers a day away from his work lost time
- Blindsight: a blind man climbs Mount Everest, leading six blind teenagers toward the summit with him
Imaginary
Fictional Narratives
Novels:
- A.J. Cronin, The Citadel: A Novel (1937), “tells the story of Andrew Manson, a young Scottish medical doctor, who began his career in a Welsh mining town in 1924. Manson was ardent and idealistic and was appalled to discover the general condition of health care in the small community.”
Poetry
Music: Composers, artists, and major works
Sviatoslav Richter was a classical pianist “acclaimed for the depth of his interpretations, his virtuoso technique, and his vast repertoire. . .” “. . . he is, above all, primarily a musician and only then a pianist. The piano for him is indeed merely an instrument, a means to penetrate into music in order to recreate it. That quality of his was noted by critics more than once . . .” Richter was known for practicing incessantly to achieve the level of quality he wanted. A teacher of his, Heinrich Neihaus, noted that when Richter “learned a new composition, he would work eight to ten hours non-stop at the piano, spending an eternity over a single page.” “Richter claimed that he almost never practiced for more than three hours a day, but many of his friends and acquaintances would have found this laughable.” In this documentary film, his wife outed him for practicing ten hours per day. Here is a link to his playlists.
Soul, rhythm and blues artist James Brown was known as “the hardest working man in show business”. In a book title, one author credits him with saving the soul of America. He was extensively captured on video, created many releases, and has a substantial set of playlists.
Rafael Méndez was a Mexican-born trumpeter who transcended the limits of his instrument with lightning-fast runs that are usually inaccessible to any instrument but the violin. “'Probably his greatest desire was to make the trumpet a classical instrument,' said Dr. Robert Mendez of Los Angeles, one of his twin sons.” His long hours of practice and single-minded focus on his instrument were well-known to those close to him. As a niche player, Méndez’s recorded output is not extensive but he did record several albums, which are prized among trumpet aficionados.
Compositions:
- Raga Shivranjani is a Carnatic raga usually performed at midnight. Performances are by Bismillah Khan, Hariprasad Chaurasia and Ali Akbar Khan.
- Raga Gauri is a Hindustani classical raag for late afternoon. “Gauri creates a mood where the listener is encouraged to strive harder in order to achieve an objective.” Linked performances are by Bhimsen Joshi, Sharafat Hussain Khan and Mallikarjun Mansur.
Music: songs and other short pieces
Visual Arts
- Valentin Serov, Portrait of the Composer Nikiolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1898)
- Raphael, The School of Athens (1510-11)
Film and Stage
- The Citadel, about a physician dedicatedto his patients and his profession
- Black Swan, dedicationto the art of ballet, seen from the dark side
- Lust for Life, about Vincentvan Gogh
- Whiplash, about dedication carried too far, and on someone else’s back
