There are four kinds of people in the world, made up by some combination (or lack of) two traits. There are those who value things, and those who find things valuable (and by extension, there are those who are both and neither, making four).
What does that mean?
There is a fundamental difference between valuing something and finding something valuable. This discrepancy is the explanation behind why someone who is enamored with history and biographies might study finance in college. Clearly, this person values history, but finds finance to be a valuable skill.
It can best be described as the presence of subjectivity and objectivity, albeit an oversimplification.
Take a moment to decide where in the matrix you lie. It is possible that you neither value anything nor do you find anything to be valuable. It is possible that you have and understanding of both, and it is possible that both what you value and what you find valuable are the same thing. Try this exercise again, but instead use a friend or colleague as your test subject.
I will now attempt to describe what it means to be in some region of this matrix. Remember that there are four possibilities. You understand what you find valuable but not what you value, You understand what you value but not what you find valuable, you understand both what you value and what you find valuable, and you don't understand what you value nor what you find valuable.
The seekers
First, those who do not value and who find nothing valuable. This is probably the smallest subset of the population. These people are likely to be surprisingly capable. In fact, it is important to note that none of these are better or worse than the others (with one exception we discuss later), but instead have some tradeoff. For this subset, such a tradeoff is quite evident upon close inspection. This kind of person is capable of extreme objectivity, able to rapidly synthesize information to come up with the best possible solution to any dilemma they find themselves in. However, this comes at a cost. There is a sense of longing, often a form of despair, in that they are detached fundamentally from this world. This is different from psychopathy, a legitimate disorder. Another interesting phenomenon arises from our thought experiment: you may be able to think of someone who didn’t use to be like this, but became this, or vice versa. It is possible to transition between subsets of the matrix, although it is not frequent.
The knowers
Next, we look at those who find things valuable, but do not value things. This is a common group of people, probably the largest subset. These are the “reasonable” types. The average person may not have strong convictions and passions, but understands the basic concept of material and emotional value. These people are driven to seek out the things that they have deemed valuable, be it a relationship, a certain career, or a material form of wealth. However, upon being asked to talk about themselves, or relay what they’re passionate about, they often use some scripted answer that they have drilled into themselves subconsciously (while not often actually scripted, these people will categorize themselves as such). One indication that someone is in this group is the seasonal change of interests, drifting across space. It is a fundamental point in this theory of value that those who lack, long for it. Thus these people will have passions, but they are transitory at best, and some people will maintain a large portfolio of such transitory passions to avoid having any gaps at all.
The wanderers
After that, we flip the previous situation: people who value things, but do not find things valuable. This is a strange group to think about, but it is possible to name a few examples with some thought. How can someone value something, and yet find no value in it? It seems oxymoronic. But the truth is hidden in the connotation of the phrases, not the denotation. This is a small subset of people, as for most the cognitive load of the strong dissonance in this subset often pushes them into the adjacent categories, the knowers and the hobbyists. Wanderers have a overriding passion: for instance, my overriding passion is history. I absolutely love history. I could (and I have) watched history documentaries for hours on end. Note that this is not a particularly strong passion, nor is it my only passion. I also love science, video games, and writing. But, at the end of the day, I do none of these things. A wanderer would stop right there. I have passions, but they are not intrinsically (or materially) valuable. I can’t make a life out of being a historian. Thus they wander, seeking something they can find value in. This is especially difficult, because when compared to what they value, there is no comparison. Nothing looks good next to your favorite thing. The vast majority who are in this group abandon their passions and only then find something valuable. A few, however, do complete the search successfully and move to this final subset of the matrix.
The hobbyists
This is not the best subset, as tempting as it is to label it "the best". It is important to note that while a person in this subset might find something valuable, this is most likely to be different from what they value. This is a lesser form of dissonance, and most people in this subset tend to deal with this by justifying it. Thus the passion becomes diminished into a hobby. In this way, people in this subset can have both what they value and what they find valuable, simply by choosing to prioritize what they find valuable. It is almost never the case that the opposite happens (priority is given to the hobby), mainly because this is pretty clearly unsustainable. If there is value found in something, a human will instinctively seek that item. These people are only marginally better off than the knowers, and depending on the hobby, there may be almost no benefit to having one overriding hobby as opposed to a rotation of multiple such hobbies.
The believers
Within the hobbyists, there exists another smaller subset. These are the people for whom what they value and what they find valuable are one and the same. These are those who believe in a certain thing. I believe in something because not only do I find personal value, but I find that it has material value as well. This intersection of objectivity and subjectivity combine to form conviction. Conviction is especially powerful. This is the only subset where there is a tangible upgrade from being in the rest of the matrix. It is literally the realization of dreams. These people tend to be happy and self-satisfied, and thus come off far more confident. While the majority of the leaders of the world are purely by statistics of the knower class, people within the believer class will have a much higher chance of becoming a leader in whatever they do. This can be almost accidental, as people will naturally look up to someone who seems to have it “all figured out”, when really they must have just hit the biggest jackpot in the Theory of Value by complete chance.
Conclusions
Finally, we discuss the beginnings of a transition model from one such class to another. We are all born as seekers, and some do not ever exit this stage. While it may seem a pitiful state of being to those of us who have left that stage, it is more often than not simply the reality of the situation for those who have stayed behind. There is no sadness to be derived, so they often do not care about this. In fact, there is a good chance that if you’ve made it this far in the article, you are neither a seeker nor a believer. A seeker would generally find this to be a strange waste of time, while a believer would realize that the theory does not apply. They are in the objectively better state of being. The rest of us mill about in the other three states, hoping to find some way to elevate ourselves. Thus we live our lives, sometimes transitioning from one state to another.
An example of such a transition is the interesting phenomenon known as “mid-life crisis”. Upon realizing that half of their life is over, and more importantly the young half of their life is over, people often desperately seek out new, exciting activities that may not be within their normal character. This is the person who seeks transition out of the knower class into the hobbyist or sometimes wanderer class. Some knowers experience this merely as a strange phase, and return to business as usual soon afterwards. Others do transition into being wanderers, if they become sufficiently disillusioned with their previous life, or into hobbyists, if they successfully find an activity that they value. The daring few may venture into the land of believers, but to enter that realm without the all important conviction is a recipe for failure. To enter with half-baked conviction is to beg for disaster and a sheepish return to the knower status.
A caveat to those who may agree with this classification scheme (and perhaps a reward to those who while disagreeing, made it this far anyway). There is no reason that this scheme should describe all people. There may exist intermediary classes , or classes outside the realm of the basic four we described. It is possible to merge some classes, to assign subsets to the four major classes, just as we did with the believers. It is an open question, and a personally derived theory with little scientific backing, only personal and anecdotal evidence. While I implore you to take a minute to understand what the Theory of Value exactly is, I also gladly accept all those who reject this idea.
And lastly, if you’re reading this for inspirational advice on how to achieve the status of a believer, and thus find happiness, success, and material gain, you’ve misunderstood this theory entirely. This is not a conscious choice. If we could choose, there is no doubt that we would all be of the believer class. The important thing to note is that while not all of us have the ability to be in the believer class, we also do not know whether or not we belong there or not.
The only way to find out is to try.
