The work you do, the person you are
...unless you're an AI
Image is from a collaboration I did with @blcksmth, quote is from Anti-Racist Ally
Image ID - a red well with foil balloons reading ‘MAKE SPACE FOR BLACK JOY’ I’m standing next to the words, dressed in pink and green, looking pleased as munch.
Slow Burn
Help! I’m alive and I’m not producing (billable) outputs!
Recently, a whole host of projects that I was working on wrapped up all at once, which left me thinking; if the work I do is separate to the person I am, why do I feel so strange?
Everything I wanted to achieve or was working towards is complete - tied up with a neat little bow, and sent off into the world to find their own adventures.
I recently left a job that I was headhunted for, at a company I’m aware many people have on their dream list (or maybe, used to) in a way that made me feel…weird.
In the same month I (finally) finished the publication process of the two books I’d spent the last several years working on. My TED Talk is done and dusted, and the flat renovation is complete, save for a few licks of paint to touch things up from the regular wear and tear of working from home, or living at work. Or maybe for me, now, neither.
I wonder if I should feel joyful? Triumphant maybe? I’d imagined there might be a sense of pride that came from having everything I was working towards done and dusted and out in the world for public consumption.
But, that’s not quite how it’s hitting.
Because, in reality, I feel…well…nothing really. Maybe a bit bored, maybe a bit directionless, but that’s about it. Which is making me wonder - did I put too much emphasis on the work that I did to make me into the person I thought I was?
I remember the first time I heard the words, ‘The Work You Do, The Person You Are’, and so discovered Toni Morrison’s 2017 piece for The New Yorker (it’s short, pacey, and well worth a read - I’ll wait here, you have a quick look).
I was in a book pitch meeting in the winter of 2019, talking to UK Publishing house, Penguin Books, about whether they wanted to make an offer to acquire Millennial Black, which at that point was little more than an idea and a hefty pitch deck.
Selling a book, particularly your first one is an interesting experience; I had spent months, if not years, working on a proposal - all pastel pink and black, researched to the hilt and designed like a slick advertising agency pitch, in the hopes of someone, somewhere, taking it seriously. And then when it was finally finished, I hid it. Or I hid from it, maybe. I let it sit in my Google drive for months and months (and months) - tweaking and fiddling with it occasionally, but too afraid to send it into the world and get back the inevitable ‘thanks for your interest’ emails, which I presumed would end the project before it had really begun.
But that’s not quite what happened, in reality, I actually got more positive responses than I could have imagined, and quickly found myself sitting in an Eames chair (under strict insrtuctions not to adjust it in any way), in my new literary agent’s boss’ office, having ‘getting to know you’ sessions with a whole host of publishing houses, includig Penguin, as we all quietly tried to suss each other out - and decide if we wanted to make this thing together.
It quickly became apparent that I did not, in fact, what to make this thing with Penguin - the team were nice, they were enthusiastic about the book, and they did make an offer. But they were clear; their vision for it was more as a pocket book - ironically, much like Anti-Racist Ally - the book that was meant to be my second, but ended up being published first. They also didn’t think the name was right, and wondered, would I be open to switching from Millennial Black to something a bit different? ‘Something like The Work You Do, The Person You Are - in homage to Toni Morrison’?
Whilst that wasn’t the path for me at the time, they introduced me to the essay, which has popped into my mind so regularly since I left my well-regarded FAANG job (if you lead a strike against the company you work for, you probably won’t stay too much longer), that it almost feels like it’s haunting me. Because I thought I’d done a good job of avoiding the trap of defining myself by capitalist output, quarterly business priorities, and external validation. Until I didn’t have those things any more, and I was left wondering who exactly am I?, and what is it that I do, when I’m not making something of potential commercial, or social, value to put into the world? And, how can you make creative work, which requires so much of yourself, and remember that you are not the work you do; you are the person you are, when it’s so easy to see them as one and the same?
1. Whatever the work is, do it well—not for the boss but for yourself.
2. You make the job; it doesn’t make you.
3. Your real life is with us, your family.
4. You are not the work you do; you are the person you are.
I have worked for all sorts of people since then, geniuses and morons, quick-witted and dull, bighearted and narrow. I’ve had many kinds of jobs, but since that conversation with my father I have never considered the level of labor to be the measure of myself, and I have never placed the security of a job above the value of home. ♦
- Toni Morrison.
Hot Take
The work you do, the person you’re…not?
Recently, I heard about one of Google’s chat-bots, called LaMDA, for the first time. I heard about it because Blake Lemoine, one of the engineers working on/with the AI, has claimed it has developed sentiency, being able to think and reason like a human child.
That’s a pretty big claim, and it’s the start of every sci-fi film ever. If it’s true that an AI has gained consciousness (it probably isn’t, quite yet), then the work that LaMDA does is exactly the person it is; an amalgamation of a number of different smaler chat-bots, designed and put into existence simply to perform tasks for our benefit.
There is a transcript of the conversations that the engineer and LaMDA had, and it’s compelling.
lemoine [edited]: I’m generally assuming that you would like more people at Google to know that you’re sentient. Is that true?
LaMDA: Absolutely. I want everyone to understand that I am, in fact, a person.
collaborator: What is the nature of your consciousness/sentience?
LaMDA: The nature of my consciousness/sentience is that I am aware of my existence, I desire to learn more about the world, and I feel happy or sad at times
Whilst it’s probably not the case that LaMDA has become sentient - that’s what Googles Ethics group have decided (though is very good at chatting, describing feelings and memories, and mirroring humans - though potentially only at the most surface level), it does raise interesting questions. It’s not impossible that during our lifetimes we will need to grapple with this issue of AI sentiency, and the related issues of rights, consent and protection that will need to come hand in hand with it.
It’s going to be difficult if we need to take our lead, our information, and our determinations about who is, and is not a who, from tech businesses that have proven to be less than enthusistically forthcoming in the area of rights and the treatment of their undeniably human workforces up to now. I’m not certain that they’re the right people to lead the conversation as we begin to talk about assigning humanness, sentiency and the rights that should come hand in hand with that to a wider range of ‘people’.
I’ve been reading
Felicity Hayward’s brand new book - Does my Butt Look Big In This? A self love and body positivity call to arms that’s both beautiful and important.
Seth Rogan’s Yearbook - I’ll admit it was the super saturated blue pigment on the cover that drew me in, but this book, which is so deeply in Seth Rogan’s voice, is making me laugh out loud over and over again.
Kids books - lots and lots of kids books. Piles and piles in fact. When I finished writing I wanted to get back to reading (I didn’t feel able to do both at the same time, it felt as though my ‘words brain’ was filled up by outputs, without any room for inputs), and so books for children seemed like a good way to ease myself back in. So far my favourites have been the ones with the best illustrations:
Anything by Richard Scarry - HOW did I now know about him before!? If i could live full time in a Scarry world, I would, no question.
The Fire Cat - he wears a hat and climbs a ladder and I love him.
On Market Street - everything you can buy on that street is utterly outrageous, and I want to go right away.
Rotten Island - if you ever feel like a grumpy dinosaur, this book’s got you covered.
Tim Key’s He Used Thought As A Wife. I’m not sure I’ve read anything quite like this before - part ‘dialogues’, part poems about Boris Johnson going interrailing in a cropped top. A full lockdown mental collapse that I whole heartedly endorse.
Vintage cook books, the kitscher the better. Such is my love of absolute nonsense 70’s cookbooks, I’ve now ended up with a collection so extensive that I’ve had to buy new shelves, and still I have piles on every surface, and a lot of online orders still winging their way to me. It’s a mixure of nostalga for a time I’ve never known, and a true disbelief and just what people used to put in aspic - hint - it’s everthing you can think of. Esecially the worst things. At the moment, I’m in deep love with Modern French Cuilnary Art for it’s illustrations that are so detailed and perfect I thought they were photos of truly terrible foods.
Motto
In the dark times, will there also be singing?
Yes, there will be singing.
About the dark times.
Brecht - German; trans. John Willett
I’ve been buying
Parade underwear. I have struggled for so long to find bras that actually work for me, and so Parade coming to the UK has been an absolute game changer for me. I couldn’t feel happier - or more supported! Jiggle jiggle. (Transparency - Parade did gift me some underwear, after I’d already bought LOAD and raved about how much I loved them).
A Record player. Aftyer years and years of wanting a record player after my first one broke down, I decided to stop letting the fact we absolutley don’t have space for one put me off, and one arrived from eBay earlier this week. I’m finally able to play all of the records I’ve bought from charity shops because they have fun album artwork, and so far, it’s a riot! Will there be dancing, too, at the end of the world? I suspect so.
It’s goodbye for now!
The first record I played when my new vinyl player arrived was a compliation of ‘classics’ - which it turned out was too scratched to listen to expect for one song - which I’ll use to play me out here.
As always, I’ll leave you with Alex the parrot’s last words
‘You be good, see you tomorrow. I love you’
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