“The Chairman said, “What is your substantive field?”
Phaedrus said, “English composition.”
The Chairman bellowed, “That’s a methodological field!”
— Robert Pirsig, “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
“
We tend to define ourselves by what we do for living. This is particularly true in North America, where the stereotype is that people live for work. Perhaps, this is how North Americans like to think about themselves more than how they actually live, but apparently, Europeans are a bit more relaxed in this regard. One way or another, this relationship with work surfaces in many forms, including the dilemma of whether to specialize in a narrow field or to strive to be a polymath.
Robert Pirsig’s brilliant “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” has an interesting insight into the root of this issue – a discussion of the difference between the substance and the method of work. He says, “Substance doesn’t change. Method contains no permanence.” Perhaps, there is hint there, that we should not let the methods that we use define the substance of what we do. Also, no matter how much we work on diversifying our arsenal of skills and techniques, this doesn’t automatically mean that the underlying direction of the work has to change.
Related
