The Nation of the Glorious Turnip

I once had an assignment that involved me writing 'learning logs', this is one of these logs.

THE POWER OF AWESOMENESS

“It is said that his enemies would go blind from over-exposure to pure awesomeness!” - Po, Kungfu Panda

Awesomeness is something that does not come to everyone in the same way. For some it comes in small doses, to others it is full dose, all the time, what makes it that awesomeness is so unevenly distributed? Could it be a mental thing, or is it just a perception by the innocent bystanders that boosts a person's awesome rating. When we apply the pareto principle to this, it tells us that most likely 80% of all awesomeness is found in 20% of the people. This sounds awesome, but what if you are not one of the 20%? Are you short on awesomeness. Do you really need awesomeness to be awesome... These questions are difficult to answer, maybe even impossible, but if this dilemma could be solved, it would mean a radical departure from the accepted norm that some people are just awesome wheras others aren't.

Let's first try to define awesome. What exactly is it? One defining aspect of awesome is that it is better than the norm. It defies normality in ways that seem impossible. To the untrained eye an awesome person can appear larger than life. But they are not, as life is the one characteristic that everyone shares. No one is larger than life, so awesome must be an illusion that a person casts on those around them. That could make awesomeness a powerfull tool in a capable person, who understands what it can do. It can be used to influence people, make people like you or just simply make a person feel happy. Of course there are also negative aspects to awesomeness. It can make less awesome people feel bad about themselves, it can be used to make people do things that they do not want to do, that is the influence of awesomeness. The power of awesomeness enables a person to effectively influence their surroundings. But with great awesomeness comes great responsibility. In the hands of the wrong person, awesomeness can be used to manipulate people into doing things they do not want to do, or can it? Awesomeness is not like other powers, it is extremely fleeting, and when used for the wrong reasons, will automatically eliminate itself, rendering the previously awesome person quite awesomeless. When this happens, a veil drops and the person behind the awesomeness is revealed to their surroundings. The awesomeness must than go somewhere, and because it gets dispersed, rubs off on all of the people that were previously less awesome than the awesome person. This dispersion seems to be evenly distributed and everyone gets an even amount of awesomeness, making all of them more awesome than the one that previously had the awesomeness. However, since everyone gets an equal amount this awesomeness is not perceptible by anyone but the person who is now devoid of awesomeness.

Let's use this in a historical context. There have been many people that were thought to be extremely awesome. For quite a while in the 20th century, the Germans thought that Hitler was awesome. This awesomeness boosted him to an incredible level of political power and it took him to a great many evil deeds. Even the rules of the western world thought he was awesome, people like Churchill and Roosevelt did not see that his plan was the erradication of 'inferior humans' and the creation of the Third Reich. I was not until 1939, when Hitler invaded Poland that their eyes were truly opened and most of Hitlers awesomeness went away. Even then there was still doubts whether it was not an awesome thing that he did in many people. The war didn't fully expand untill 1940 with the invasion of France and then eventually the battle of brittain was the final blow to Hitler's international level of Awesomeness. In Germany however, a lot of people still believed in his awesomeness. “Wir haben es nicht Gewußt.” is what many Germans said after the war. Hitler's awesomeness had finally faded away entirely. Most of his awesomeness went to Churchill and Roosevelt, who as supreme leaders of their respective nations fought back and finally beat Hitler and Nazi-Germany together with Stalin and a coalition that included many other nations. There will always be people that dwell on faded awesomeness. The so called Neo-nazies, who, by attempting to be like Hitler and the other Nazies hope to become as awesome as der Führer once was. This however is idle hope, in a changing world awesomeness is unique to every person and to every situation. Trying to recreate awesomeness will only be met with contempt and will not be accepted by a society where people desperately search for their own awesomeness.

Without dwelling on historical awesomeness too long, let's have a look at what it can do in a business environment. Can it help with decisionmaking? If in a group there is a person who is more awesome than others, people will automatically look to this person to make decisions for them. This ofcourse is not necessarily a good thing, since awesomeness alone does not constitute a good decisionmaker. No, it can even be dangerous if the person is a notoriously bad decisionmaker. However, this is where the self-eliminating principle of awesomeness comes in and will prevent a person who is in total control of his awesomeness from making a bad decision. This is where we must differentiate between perceived awesomeness and true awesomeness. If there is only a level of perceived awesomeness, the person that is expected to make the decisions will likely be more prone to bad decisions and as such quickly loose his level of awesomeness and it will then flow back to the rest of the group. This will make the group bond and allow them to function better as a team, creating a situation where people are able to make decisions for the team and put the team's interest first. The only downside to this is that the person who through no fault of his own was seen as more awesome than others is now considered to be a fifth wheel on the wagon and will likely not be a integral part of the group from that moment on. With true awesomeness there is no risk of this hapenning, because a truly awesome person will always be able to make the right decision, he might even include the other members of the group in the decision making process, listening to input and eventually using all the input to make a decision for the group as a whole. The group will automatically accept this persons decisions as being the right one at the right time.

These awesome people are often seen to be natural leaders, even though they might not see themselves in that light. They might think they are loners, they might even have a huge amount of self doubt. But when push comes to shove, they always stand up and do what needs to be done. In that way, it can be said that a truly awesome person is the ultimate decision maker. Sure he might make a wrong decision once in a while, awesomeness does not make him perfect, but by handling the wrong decision in an awesome way will diminish the effects of it, and will allow him to retain his awesomeness.

It is rare to find a truly awesome person. As mention at the beginning of this log, 80% of awesomeness is found in 20% of the people, and most likely, withing this group of people, 80% of their combined awesomeness is found in 20% of this group.

Unfortunately, since I myself am only a moderately awesome person, there are many things of awesomeness that I do not understand. Nor do I know how one can become awesome. Sure there are techniques and methods to raise the perception of awesomeness, but to reach a state of true awesomeness, one must simple be, AWESOME!