You’re a High Performer, Relax
I particularly enjoyed the last few minutes of Oppenheimer (which was better than Barbie). As I’m not sure if I need to add a “spoiler alert” before talking about a biopic, be forewarned that the following discusses details of the film other than the creation of the atomic bomb that we all knew about before walking into the theater. Let’s press on…
In the last moments of the film, Strauss is complaining that Oppenheimer turned the scientific community against him thereby denying him a cabinet confirmation citing a scene where Oppenheimer met Einstein at a pond in Princeton under Strauss’ watch after which Einstein walked away without giving Strauss a second glance. Hearing these complaints, Strauss’ unnamed confirmation hearing handler, who starts out a sycophantic know-it-all but turns into an antagonist-cum-saboteur after realizing Strauss to be a realist politician (though maybe that’s redundant), says that maybe just maybe Strauss has it all wrong.
They might have, he points out to Strauss, talked about something more important than you.
Then we see in a moment of clarity that Einstein and Oppenheimer, two of the most brilliant scientists to walk the face of this Earth, didn’t use their few minutes together to kvetch about Strauss, but rather to ruminate about the fate of the world in light of each of their discoveries.
Go figure!
Strauss, though, is a high performer. And Strauss really was a high performer, his accomplishments undeniable. But even if your high view of yourself is correct, it doesn’t mean that other people are always talking or thinking about you.
Which may also have been Oppenheimer’s problem…
The point is, if you’re a high performer, people see it; you don’t need to throw it in their faces. And also that one should give others the benefit of the doubt. If you’re excluded from a meeting that you thought you might be a part of, it could be the case that people aren’t freezing you out, but are rather being respectful of your time.
Can you go unseen for a while? Sure. But relax. Maybe I’m wrong, and I will die on this hill if I must and I’ve said it to my own kids and kin so I am eating my own cooking, but the world is more merit-based, and more people want it to be so, despite injustices, than it appears.
Have a great weekend.
– By Tim Hanson