Of course, you haven’t heard of him! How do you even get famous when your contemporaries were Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung? But what Alfred Adler (1870-1937) had to offer followed me to New York.
I discovered the book "The Courage to be disliked" by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga thanks to a podcast. I read the book mostly because I had a lot of free time, and I am a big-time nerd, but thank God I did. Very few books have made such significant impact on my life.
After my first read, I started recommending the book to everyone. They have said profound things about it. So I thought I’d give it a second read. Fortunately, I had two airport layovers for almost 12 hours each while traveling to New York from Kathmandu. Here is what stood out during the second read:
Adler’s ideas can sound very radical at times. He can sometimes make you wonder if he is a philosopher or a logician. The distinction is: a philosopher molds his philosophy to fit the circumstance, and a logician manipulates the variables in the circumstance to fit his logic.
So without further adieu, let me tell you that I was most intrigued by the idea of 🥁🥁🥁”The Separation of Tasks.”
The separation of tasks means knowing what my duties are and perhaps more importantly what they are not.
As I wait for the traffic light on the crossroad to give me a walk signal, my task is to wait for the walk signal. Knowing or submitting to New Yorker’s busy life of ignoring the signal isn’t my task. Not being in the way of a skateboarder who thinks he is faster than a car approaching isn’t my task. When the light signals walk, my task is to cross the road. Simple!
In life, we find ourselves worrying about tasks that aren’t ours, far too often. It is your task to vote. Running a country isn’t your task. “Should I not be bothered by how my country is run?” I hear you ask. From what I understand from Adler, you shouldn’t. But you should also remember that it is your task to vote. Do that properly.
An extension of the idea is: Task without responsibility is what creates suffering. Running a country isn’t your task, but you think it is. At the same time, you are not willing to go into politics and get your hands dirty. You want the task (or it's result) but not the responsibility that comes with it? Hence the social media rant that all of us get tired of scrolling.
How about a few more practical examples of the separation of tasks?
If I make a mistake at the hospital, reporting it and learning from it is my task. As I am a PGY1 and there are tiers of supervisors above me, correcting me is their task. I should not feel guilty about them doing their jobs; neither should I feel hesitant about doing mine.
When I throw my garbage in the dumpster, doing the best of my ability to sort trash is my task. Ensuring the dumpsters are free of litter and having enough space for people living in the apartment isn’t. That is the manager’s task.
Life seems easy when we separate tasks. Mistake not, we have always separated tasks. What Adler is arguing for is being aware of the separation.
A semi extreme example from the book is…” It is my task to tell my child that I am there for him if he needs help with his studies, but it is not my task to ask him to go study. That is for him to know.” Let us seperate the tasks
A reason for disputes in many families is that their child is not studying. Well, Adler says that the one who is not taking their task seriously or taking someone else’s task in their hand is to blame. I have heard young children complaining about how their parents don’t let them do things their way more than a couple of times. You be the judge of the rest.
I believe in the truth-in-context ideology. Simply put, nothing is right if taken out of context. So the truth isn’t a sentence but a paragraph, sometimes a manuscript. Therefore, understand my hesitation while describing what I took away from the book while reading it for the second time. Maybe a helpful back thought would be that I am not advertising or endorsing this book or the philosophy. I am rather questioning it every day as I keep practicing it. I urge you to examine it too. But what is a more potent way of asking a question than practicing it daily and seeing for yourself, if it works at all?