See update to this post.

It seems many people’s innovative drive come from a reactive desire to prove themselves. They try to prove, often to the opposite sex, that they are someone worth knowing by showing they are extremely competent in some unrelated discipline like science or technology. It pains me to see people with such a distorted sense of reality. Someone who acts this way surely can’t be happy. But on the other hand, for some people, I think this void in their life leads to them making incredible contributions to society. Here I’m referring to my sense of many science and technology savants who I’ve met and read about.

It is a desire of mine for everybody to live fulfilling, happy lives. It is also a desire of mine that everybody make a contribution towards creating a better world. These things shouldn’t be irreconcilable. Shouldn’t happiness and contribution be related? In this case, though I think the social frustration of geeks leads to a net gain for society. Would spending more time nurturing deep relationships and taking care of a family decrease their productivity? Almost certainly, yes, in the short term. But what about over the long run? I’m not so sure about this. For one, it’s important to note I think we always need to look both long and short term and the most people have a tendency to only look short term. In fact, thinking exclusively short term is a societal epidemic. And we deprive ourselves of long term gains by not focusing on robustness and short term sacrifice for long term gain. Saving regularly and reaping the benefits of compound interest is the canonical example. The latest outbreak would be the current economic crisis.

But returning to geek innovation, would the more sustainable lifestyle of having both a solid work and social life lead to increased innovation and contribution over the long term? I hope the answer is yes, that would fit with many of my current assessments of living effectively. One argument that comes to mind against sustainability is that great things often require intense focus and full immersion. So let’s say societal contribution and personal happiness are at odds. How do we reconcile the two? The selfless answer it seems would be to take a short term hit on your internal happiness for the good of society, is it not?

I’m planning to write another post about how almost anything that increases your happiness has the potential to increase lifetime impact. And also a more detailed post about the relationship between sustainability and impact.