Practice #12 - Mediocrity is Normal

1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,060 I was just at the park on my daily run and this is at my local park so there's a playground 2 00:00:06,060 --> 00:00:11,920 and I just go so I can run around it a couple laps and there's some exercise equipment at 3 00:00:11,920 --> 00:00:13,520 that park. 4 00:00:13,520 --> 00:00:20,260 But I usually go around and every once in a while there's people there. 5 00:00:20,260 --> 00:00:26,360 So often times there's parents with their kids playing at the park. 6 00:00:26,360 --> 00:00:32,960 And this one day in particular I saw one parent at the park with her kid. 7 00:00:32,960 --> 00:00:36,920 Kid was probably four or five years old. 8 00:00:36,920 --> 00:00:39,280 Very happy, very excited kid. 9 00:00:39,280 --> 00:00:41,680 Playing around, running around, screaming. 10 00:00:41,680 --> 00:00:43,320 Super excited. 11 00:00:43,320 --> 00:00:48,960 And she was, the kid was just doing cool things. 12 00:00:48,960 --> 00:00:50,720 You know what kids do. 13 00:00:50,720 --> 00:00:53,480 And she was trying to get her mom's attention. 14 00:00:53,480 --> 00:00:55,360 She was like, mom, look, look. 15 00:00:55,360 --> 00:00:56,520 Mom, watch me. 16 00:00:56,520 --> 00:00:58,200 Like, or mom, play with me. 17 00:00:58,200 --> 00:01:05,880 And I was just, I glanced over and I saw the mom was just completely absorbed by her phone, 18 00:01:05,880 --> 00:01:08,760 completely immersed in her phone. 19 00:01:08,760 --> 00:01:19,480 Now I have no, now I, it does not bother me. 20 00:01:19,480 --> 00:01:25,680 Now I'm not trying to, I'm not trying to tell this mom how she should behave around 21 00:01:25,680 --> 00:01:33,160 her kid, but, and I'm also not trying to knock at this mom. 22 00:01:33,160 --> 00:01:38,800 What I'm trying to say is that we live in a society where this is actually normal. 23 00:01:38,800 --> 00:01:45,000 And if you find this offensive, if you find this story offensive in any way, this video 24 00:01:45,000 --> 00:01:46,000 is not for you. 25 00:01:46,000 --> 00:01:48,360 So you should probably just click off. 26 00:01:48,360 --> 00:01:53,960 But we live in a society where mediocrity is normal. 27 00:01:53,960 --> 00:01:57,880 And we live in a society where it's normal to completely ignore your kids. 28 00:01:57,880 --> 00:02:04,760 It's normal to show your kids that it's acceptable to be completely immersed in this electronic 29 00:02:04,760 --> 00:02:09,160 device that is extremely harmful for you. 30 00:02:09,160 --> 00:02:17,960 It's completely acceptable and normal in this society to sit outside in a park and ignore 31 00:02:17,960 --> 00:02:21,480 your child while your child is having a great time. 32 00:02:21,480 --> 00:02:23,440 That is just not right. 33 00:02:23,440 --> 00:02:26,040 I don't think that's right. 34 00:02:26,040 --> 00:02:30,440 Now maybe this is just because I'm coming from a different perspective. 35 00:02:30,440 --> 00:02:34,040 Maybe it's because I am trying to strive for more. 36 00:02:34,040 --> 00:02:40,160 Maybe not everyone is like that, but I disagree because I think that it's human nature to 37 00:02:40,160 --> 00:02:41,840 strive for excellence. 38 00:02:41,840 --> 00:02:48,840 And I think that the reason why this is a normal occurrence is because our society has 39 00:02:48,840 --> 00:02:56,800 created the most perfect environment for this type of behavior to be available. 40 00:02:56,800 --> 00:03:01,120 Now let me explain that environment piece a little bit further. 41 00:03:01,120 --> 00:03:08,600 Ancient Greece, they had an environment of arete, arete, however it's pronounced. 42 00:03:08,600 --> 00:03:14,080 And this means excellence in any aspect. 43 00:03:14,080 --> 00:03:18,600 Arete is basically how the Greeks thought. 44 00:03:18,600 --> 00:03:26,400 This was the common collective amongst all the Greeks was excellence. 45 00:03:26,400 --> 00:03:28,920 They didn't ignore their kids. 46 00:03:28,920 --> 00:03:30,360 They weren't completely immersed. 47 00:03:30,360 --> 00:03:36,560 Now, obviously there was no phones back then, but they were not completely immersed in unhealthy 48 00:03:36,560 --> 00:03:38,560 habits. 49 00:03:38,560 --> 00:03:41,800 There was no mediocrity because it was not acceptable. 50 00:03:41,800 --> 00:03:48,880 It was not tolerated and the culture and environment around Greece at that time made 51 00:03:48,880 --> 00:03:52,920 it a perfect environment for arete. 52 00:03:52,920 --> 00:03:53,960 Excellence. 53 00:03:53,960 --> 00:04:02,720 And so in our society, we go outside and we see someone on their phone immersed. 54 00:04:02,720 --> 00:04:06,120 Someone listening to music immersed. 55 00:04:06,120 --> 00:04:11,520 We see people who thirds of the population I think is overweight. 56 00:04:11,520 --> 00:04:12,760 What is this? 57 00:04:12,760 --> 00:04:19,880 People have unhealthy lifestyles, unhealthy eating habits, drinking alcohol, smoking. 58 00:04:19,880 --> 00:04:22,440 Everywhere you go, there's someone smoking. 59 00:04:22,440 --> 00:04:29,440 Vaping everywhere I go in my school, every single bathroom smells like weed. 60 00:04:29,440 --> 00:04:34,680 This is not the individual's fault entirely. 61 00:04:34,680 --> 00:04:35,680 Yes. 62 00:04:35,680 --> 00:04:41,760 It is the individual's fault for choosing these things, but the culture and the environment 63 00:04:41,760 --> 00:04:44,000 allows it to happen. 64 00:04:44,000 --> 00:04:49,720 There's a stark difference between the culture of ancient Greece and the culture of modern 65 00:04:49,720 --> 00:04:51,120 day America. 66 00:04:51,120 --> 00:04:58,560 The difference is that of ancient Greece is arete, striving for excellence. 67 00:04:58,560 --> 00:05:01,120 It's not normal to be average. 68 00:05:01,120 --> 00:05:04,360 It's not normal to just get by. 69 00:05:04,360 --> 00:05:06,440 It's not normal to be overweight. 70 00:05:06,440 --> 00:05:08,520 It's not normal to be any of this stuff. 71 00:05:08,520 --> 00:05:13,480 And actually up to recently, a couple hundred years ago, it wasn't normal to be overweight 72 00:05:13,480 --> 00:05:14,560 in America. 73 00:05:14,560 --> 00:05:23,480 I was just reading in a book about how there was a circus and one of the characters in 74 00:05:23,480 --> 00:05:27,960 a circus was a overweight person. 75 00:05:27,960 --> 00:05:29,960 Like a circus. 76 00:05:29,960 --> 00:05:40,080 That is a place where you show off weird things or unusual things, but now it's become normal. 77 00:05:40,080 --> 00:05:44,200 So what's going on here? 78 00:05:44,200 --> 00:05:49,400 Let me go back to what I was saying about how I'm coming from a different perspective, 79 00:05:49,400 --> 00:05:50,400 obviously. 80 00:05:50,400 --> 00:05:55,600 I'm coming from a perspective where I am striving for excellence and I consider myself different 81 00:05:55,600 --> 00:06:00,640 and I don't affiliate myself with these people. 82 00:06:00,640 --> 00:06:06,200 I don't consider myself similar to these people. 83 00:06:06,200 --> 00:06:10,640 But I will say I used to have this lifestyle. 84 00:06:10,640 --> 00:06:14,000 I used to watch TikTok all day. 85 00:06:14,000 --> 00:06:15,280 I used to eat unhealthy. 86 00:06:15,280 --> 00:06:17,440 I used to play video games all day. 87 00:06:17,440 --> 00:06:20,840 I used to be immersed in my AirPods. 88 00:06:20,840 --> 00:06:23,200 I used to do all this stuff. 89 00:06:23,200 --> 00:06:26,200 And you know what I realized after doing all that? 90 00:06:26,200 --> 00:06:27,200 It sucks. 91 00:06:27,200 --> 00:06:29,560 It is the worst thing ever. 92 00:06:29,560 --> 00:06:34,760 That was probably the lowest moments of my life when I was doing these bad habits. 93 00:06:34,760 --> 00:06:38,400 That's how I know that people don't like it. 94 00:06:38,400 --> 00:06:44,840 But the thing is, they don't want to change because the culture around them still finds 95 00:06:44,840 --> 00:06:55,920 it acceptable.