Originally Posted by
neuroasis
Let me answer your question with a question.
How much control do you think we have over our computers?
Most people have only the most basic. They can manage to get the simplest tasks done such as browsing the web, sending emails, and maybe basic word processing.
They can only manipulate the basic functions of the interface in a very limited way but have no idea even the most rudimentary things that are going on under the surface.
This person usually stores everything on the desktop or in one or two simple folders and organizationally the computer is a mess and mostly they keep most everything, afraid to throw some away they might need.
A next level of person learns to interface with other tools. Maybe they can bring in pictures from a digital camera and even edit some of those pictures. They may have learned better organization skills and keep their folders labeled for easier access.
They might know simple security tasks and maintenance like virus scanning, hard drive defragmentation, and deleting unnecessary files.
Still while exercising a little more skill in working with the interface, they mostly have no idea what is going on below and when difficult problems present themselves they are quickly out of depth and may even be a little too confident in exercising the power of deleting files or running the wrong programs and get into even more trouble.
There are many levels above this but at the top level is the power user. The power user is a master of the computer. They understand the inner workings, the routines underlying the user interface, can completely manage and control all the hardware, software and peripherals.
At will, they can use the computer as a source of creativity, commerce, an expander of their vision and intelligence.
Still, even at this level they didn't create the computer or program the operating system by themselves, so the learning curve never stops.
Our unconscious is just a computer in a sense. It runs programs and takes information from the higher level user information, processes that information, acts upon it appropriately, and returns output.
For those who know the rules, the results are predictable and can be optimized.
Even new pieces of better software more suited for a task can be installed.
But what if the computer that you had was ancient and had been programmed by many people over millions of years. What if it was given to you by your parents and they installed a lot of their programs on it and even put in firewalls and security measures to restrict your usage?
In your early stages you didn't know anything about using the computer so you learned from them and others, and trusted that it must be true that this is the way that it works.
Later, you grow and begin to expand your knowledge and you find other ways of doing things. You gain skill in clean up and optimization, you sensibly remove the things you don't need or update to newer versions.
Sometimes you get burned and screw something up. But even that is a lesson and the more fearless you are the greater your final skill and mastery.
Where do you stop on the learning curve? Do you want to be a power user?
Bookmarks