Review of David Rendall’s “FREAK FACTOR"
This piece plays on the misconception that anyone that is different or not part of the so called “crowd”, I see thought of as an outsider and wrong, therefore ultimately needs to change. It also continues to discusses how people get caught up in becoming perfect. In this attempt people put too much emphasize into exterminating their own weaknesses; when in reality they should focus on improving their strengths.
One of the thing that is mentioned is “Forget It: Don't Try to Fix Your Weaknesses”, right away I was drawn in. it was fascinating to me because we are all expected to correct and remove whatever "weaknesses" we have. However, David makes some strong arguments against dismissing your weaknesses and focusing instead on your strengths. First, it is to much work to try an correct your self errors. Secondly, it hurts. It is not a fun journey to try and get better at something ones bad at. Thirdly, fixing a weakness is distracting. The time that we spend on making a weakness less weak could be spent on activities that complement our strengths or increase our skill in things we are good at. Finally, and most importantly, David suggests that any attempt to fix a weakness will fail. Even if we are able to turn a negative trait into a neutral or slightly positive one, it's not a powerful strength. At best it's a mediocre strength that really isn't useful for anything.
Another section I thought was interesting was title “What's My Problem?” This section’s ideal is particularly significant to me because it's something that I've noticed all around me throughout my life. People seem to believe the misconception that if they have weaknesses, these problems need to be addressed and handled. But Weaknesses he says are in fact good signs, they point to the strengths that we all have. The man who doesn't respect authority often is the man who starts his own business and takes charge. The one who is disorganized is creative. And the list goes on and on. These so called weaknesses are admittedly problematic in typical workplaces...but when given the opportunity to flourish and work on their own, such problems reveal great strengths and the ability to succeed.
“Focus: You Can't Do Both" relates people to commercial stores. The discussion’s main points focused on the idea that as a business you can only focus on fixing a weakness or building strength. Unfortunately, many people try to do both at the same time, and the result is largely that they fail at both. The example used was of Walmart and Target. Walmart's strength is low prices; its weakness is low quality products and unhelpful employees. Target's strength is the opposite: good quality products and employees, but at a higher cost to the consumer. Both stores focus entirely on constructing their strengths, while ignoring their faults, which is something we should all strive to do. Kmart was used as an example of a store that tried to both advertises its strengths while working on its weaknesses at the same time. The result was a mediocre store with mediocre products, with consumers who had decided not to shop there. He relates it back to people in that your relations with people will result on how you approach your strengths.
In the creative process, my strengths sore in the aspect that I am very creative. I have a lot going on inside my head, many ideas, and many concepts. I also think that another of my strengths is that I am very interest creatively in fine arts as opposed to media arts. I think that this interest allows me to look at media in a more dynamic way. I have many weaknesses all well, and like the essay advises is that don’t focuses on them, and in my life I have tried to do just that. However doing this also creates a weakness in that now my art focuses sole on things that I know I am good at, allowing for a lot less risks being taken on my part, at least as it relates to fine arts.
No comments:
Post a Comment