True appreciation...

Money follows hype. Recognition follows hype. “Success” follows hype. No, they don’t follow excellence.

The truth is that the world has become too big (although we say it is shrinking) for excellence to thrive on its own. There is too much going on that it needs to supported by a good dose of marketing / hype. And the interesting thing is, mediocrity supported by hype will be more recognized because most of us have lost the ability to evaluate something (or even someone) on our own. The “shrinking” world has increased information density tremendously and since there is so much competition, to make information stand out, it is constantly being processed and repackaged.  And we fall for the packaging like sitting ducks. Because it is too much work to evaluate something independently, see? And since we are busy taking in more processed information, lets us just outsource the thinking part. In essence, we are hiring someone else to THINK for us. 

Appreciating true beauty requires you to understand it. Feel it. It takes effort. We are too lazy to put in the effort. We have been pampered so much by all the processed ready-to-eat information that we keep eating it and follow the hype like a herd of sheep.

True satisfaction comes from excellence. Not recognition. Not money. Not glory. Not success.  

The interesting thing is, true satisfaction also comes from true appreciation. Appreciating excellence. Genuinely. Because YOU think it is awesome and not because someone told you it is supposed to be awesome. So, try as we might to eat processed information and feel like we know everything, we dont. We are puppets who have lost our independence and feel so very comfortable about it.

No, actually we dont feel comfortable about it. I am sure of it. I refuse to believe that this is the limit of human pride. It has been shown otherwise. So, let us start thinking for ourselves and stop riding the bubble someone else has created. It takes effort. Let us put in effort. I know that deep deep inside our hearts, all us want to be free.