Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life

by Burgis, Luke

Published: June 1, 2021

Read: June 7, 2022

★★★★★

Review

The first few chapters are great intros to the compelling ideas of Mimetic Theory. The actual explanations and examples the author provides were a little too polished and dogmatic for my taste. Anecdotes and pop culture examples instead of rigorous analysis of any kind. But it is a human emotional problem of desire and stirs important questions. What do you want? What should you want? A perspective to try on more than to convince anyone. Was particularly relevant for me as the author is a founder that questioned his own desires and motivations. Does offer solutions and generally a reminder to reflect, but just left me with more questions about the core ideas. Key Quotes: “We want what other people want because other people want it” “I had this core life crisis when I realized all these hyper track competitive things I was after were for these bad social reasons” - Peter Thiel “We don some professional or moral costume so as to hide from ourselves our own desire and wants”

Notes

Part one, cycle one destructive desire

Chp 1 power why people want what they want

Chapter two - mimetic desire works different when relationship with model

Chapter 3 groups

Chapter 4 scrapegoats

Part two the pro social cycle

Chapter 5 chef story

6 disruptive empathy let’s us make thick desires

7 leadership

8 future of desire

Aristotle- “imitation is natural to man from childhood, one of his advantages over lower animals being this that he is the most imitative creature in the world”

Dana “We want what other people want because other people want it”

note to reader

this book is about why people want what they want
But how do we want?
Freedom is hard won
Author is founder seeking respect,
- gets relief when leaving
  - Success felt like failure and failure felt like success
Rene Jarad, followers to 21st history
- Most of what we desire is mimetic, imitative, not instrinic
  - We learn to want what others want and play by same cultural rules
  - Allows us to build culture and tech
  - We go to things that seem like we desire but don’t and leave us unfulfilled
- Peter thiel is his student
Value of mimetic theory
- Money prestige or comfort could be not what you want
- Could make you money or find a way out
- It’s like gravity, if we build the right muscles we can counteract or let it take hs
Being an entrepreneur has high mimetic value, chase more freedom
- Mimetic desire could be your tryant, you don’t have a boss

prologue

2008 author could cash out with Zappos buying it
- Zappos started with bonus in 2008 and ended with layoffs
- His company had unsure financial future
- Zappos decided not to acq instead they changed their minds
Had a company making wellness but as it got better he got less motivation
He would be bankrupt in 6 months without Zappos
- He was relieved

introduction: social gravity

Met Peter thiel
Personal moment when you find it in your own life
lie that you are sovereign king of what is wantable
- You are part of an ecology of desires
Insight when Rene forced to look at classic novels
- He looked for patterns and found characters rely on other character to show them what is worth wanting
- novels are desire driven, actions shaped by desires and whose desires become intertwined with who
- Imitator and model
- Characters are so realistic because they don’t want things from within but by imitating
Food, shelter, and security are needs
How do we want things when no instinct?
- No clear hierarchy of desire
- Imitation to desire is because we are so open to others
- Instead we look at models who show us what is worth wanting
  - Mimesis, gravitational center
- We have shifted from world of needs to world of desire recently
- Why do you strive towards rhese achieviements
- Mimesis is what causes people to fall into and out of live
Thiel says he is most prone to mimetic than most people
- Went to Stanford because it’s just what people with his background did
- Diversity of career goals for freshman but they converge as they get older
“Humans being fight not because they are different but because they are the same. And in the attempt to distinguish themselves
Rene thought mimetic desire was related to sacrifice
- Root of most violence is mimetic desire
- Sacrifice in all societies
  - Cats and dogs domestication couldn’t have been intentional, practical because we integrated animals so we could sacrifice them
thiel- “ I had this core life crisis when I realized all these hyper track competitive things I was after were for these bad social reasons”
- Intellectually he saw it in others, but not himself
Use mimetic theory to lead when leading PayPal predecessor
- When rivalries flared up, he would give each one clearly defined distinct tasks
- When two companies rival, they go to destruction
- Thiel saw Fb was built around identity, desires.
  - Platform for differentiators of desires
  - Before models had to be friends or family, but now we have any model that feels close
  - I bet on mimesis
“Mimetic desire spreads person to person and through a culture”
- First cycle breaks relationships as competing desire compete
- Second cycle goes towards common good
- History is story of desire
- Humans go to great lengths to hide desire
Can’t afford to ignore
- Mimesis can high Jack our highest ambitions
  - When mimesis takes over identity, we can’t escape as that becomes our reason for being
- Crisis of desire
  - Sameness is not good, as pressure to want the same thing and fight to differentiate
  - Many cultures of sibling/twin rivalry
- Sustainable depends on desirability
  - Sustainable must be attractive, not enough to be good and true
Each interaction enables them and us to want more less or different
- What do you want and what have you helped others want?
  - One question answers the other
greatest advances are “when someone wants something that didn’t yet exist and helping others want more than they thought was wantsble”

Part one - power of mimetic desire

Chapter 1 - hidden models, romantic lies, invention of pr, why playing hard to get works

when people tell you what they want, they tell a romantic lie
- I came I saw I conquered
  - Can lay eyes to know it’s desirable
- Straight line between them and the things they want
  - “Desire requires models, people who endow things with value simply because they want things”
If you don’t know your models, you getting wrecked
Where do models get their desire?
- Other models
- Roman’s modeled after the Greeks
- Serpent modeled desire for Eve
- Greater obstacle greater attraction
Models are a persons secret idol
1950s mad men

2, babies secrets keep

babies love imitating
By 3rd trimester, babies mimic noises they hear in the womb
- More complex intonation for crying if Chinese which has more complex intonation
Babies aren’t a blank slate and antisocial, we are born imitators
- Stuck tongue at 32 hours and they mimicked facial expression well
- we follow gaze to guess desire
  - Adult pretend to pull toy apart
    - 40/50 times baby would just pull you apart
    - Did what they thought they wanted, not imitating them
- 19 months will help adults fulfill their desire
  - Adults compete with them to get it instead
- Baby has more than just mirror neurons
communication runs on mimesis, emails match tone
- Mirroring posture and speech negotiate and reach settlement 5x in student experiment
when someone becomes a model
- You start measuring yourself and evaluating others by him, envy
- Could mirror and do opposite of other
- We are on the look out for models

Chapter 3 torches of freedom

Connect personal issues to product
Doctors and teachers were expert models
Berna advertising, trying to get women to smoke in public for Lucky Strike
- Smoking would have to be against male power
- In NYC parade, paid 10 high fashion models to puff
  - Good looking but not super models
  - Some Women should have men with them
  - Almost theatrical and said freedom torches to spontaneously desire
Models are most passionate when they are hidden
Lucky strikes sales triple by next year
Mimetic game, Games of desire
- Romance
  - Women suggested they get married and he had less desire, but later he was drawn back
  - More she denied him the more he wanted her
  - Introduce her to all his friends
  - Being wanted by another man who you want to be
    - Making spouse jealous
- VC
  - Shader doesn’t give exploding term sheet offer
    - And someone else was chosen, posture as demanding shows value
  - Everyone believes they are unaffected by mimiseis and do some much to be different
Tactic one: name your models
- Role models
- Personal trainer is model of desire, wants something enough for you
- Less acknowledged but powerful are those you want least to succeed
Tesla had crazy rally’s
- Not efficient market hypothesis
- Feb 4th, 55B of stock changed hand most of any stock ever
- “Should I “Google autocompleted as buy Tesla”

2 distorted reality

Jobs was invited to watch someone have sex, Robert freed land
- Jobs was bare foot, barely took showers,
“People are drawn to others that seem to play by different rules”
“We are fascinated by people who have a different relationship to desire, real or perceived”
- Antimimetic is fasoncsting because most people aren’t

two kinds of models

we imitate the master
But imitating is taboo in social life if we just copied a friends haircut exactly
Holmes actively mimicked Jobs, but what if someone did it to Holmes
Celebrstan
- Different universe of desire
- No chance desires conflicT as outside social sphere
Freshmanastan
- Same social space as in freshman we have to differentiate and compete

celebstan

untouchable social spheres, out of your league
Imitated freely and openly
Saint Francis renounced all hereditary and made vow of poverty wearing robes
- Many copies even pope named himself after it
Need to retire to be more
Hiding your identity elevates your celebrity
- Bitcoin founder is so legendary because he is unknown so harder to mimic

freshmanistan

can compete directly and friends live here together
Mimetic desire is bond and Bain of mimetic desire
- Can be friends because same goals
- But can breakup friends if compete for exact same thing
Unspoken battle of differentiation

Distoration 1 - the misappropriation of wonder

Metaphysical desire is desire to be different type of person
- All true desire is metaphysical, it’s not a purse you want it’s entering a new world
Cats seem far less needy, mercurial, don’t care about opinion
- Thought of as gods

distoration 2 - Cult of experts

thiel fellows model different track with low acceptance rate
We don’t rely on priests and philosophers but instead the experts
How do we choose experts
- Expert status can be created in less than four weeks if you understand basic credibility signals
- Rene said everything boils down to choosing the right expert
- Fastest way to became expert is to make a few select people call you an expert
- road to favorite experts could be mimetic too
Find sources of wisdom that defy mimesis
- Sources that stand test of time
- Hard science have less mimetic experts

Distoration 3 - reflexivity

George Soros believe markets respond to reflexivity
- Self fulfilling prophecy
- 1992 soros bet British couldn’t keep currency stable which put even more pressure
Spiral of silence
- People worry what people will think before they say something so how people think others will react will change how they talk
- controversial opinions are more likely to stay silent
People think they want things sponetously but nope
- Smart investors in creates spiral of desire
1991 west coast east coast rivalry
- Tim dar attacked west coast rap for ignoring east coast
- 1992 snoop mentions Tim
- Big who shot ya, mocked Tupac
- Tupac and big g both needed up dead
In this spiral, you want something because someone else wants it
Hipster are reflexive of rival and ribs is model fo what not to desire
“Effort to leave beaten path leaves us all in the same ditch”
Finding out someone you don’t like liked someone you do makes you like them less
Renouncing rival defuses the desire

(Why can you both want what a model wants and want the opposite)

toxic models, don’t check on others
Smart phones are variable lottery machine
- But better design would help, but problem is smart phone projects global desire
- Mimetic desire is engine of social media

chapter 3 social contagion

If we desire what others desire, rivalry is at the heart of human social relations
Few things are more mimetic than aggression
Marx thinks people fight because people are different and desires, shakespheare thinks they fight because they are similar

Lamborghini vs Ferrari

Lamborghini founder raced the Ferrari race cars test drivers as they tested on real roads
Lamborghini noticed he needed better clutch and made upgrades so he beat the Ferrari testers
- Lamborghini was tractor manufacturer
- Ferrari founder was angry at stupid Lamborghini
- Now the founders came from ceebistan to freshmanistan
- Lamborghini decided to make best race car
1964 Lamborghini historic first car, then second
- In three years, he released car better than Ferrari in almost every category
- 170k in todays dollars
- Lamborghini loved bull fighting
  - Submission through it h agility and psychology
  - First matador gets to know bulls movements
  - Second sharp barbs wear down bull
  - Third matador kills bull by getting it to physical and psychological exhaustIon
- So he wouldn’t fight until the end and do race car driving as there was no end
Competition is hazard for entrepreneur so avoided racing wars, key is knowing when competition is good
“Use imitation to drive innovation”
- Pentagram, big design firm, sometimes starts with noticing what is out there then innovation comes later
- Steal like an artist, can embrace influence

Memes and mimetic theory

Dawkins coined term meme in selfish gene
- Meme is spread of non material things like ideas, behaviors, and phrases
Both memes and mimetic theory agree imitation is core to humans
Dawkin memes
- Spread person to person like virus
- Memes are discrete static and fixed but mutate
- Memes allow culture,
- Not internet meme
- Imitation is att worst neutral
Mimetic theory by Rene
- Culture through imitation of desire
- People aren’t just carriers of meme, but imitate to forge identity
- Imitation easily leads to conflict

flywheel effect

negative cycle that we both can’t win though scarcity mindset
Positive cycle of common good through abundance mindset
new helmet with ventilation
- Wanted right influencer
Flywheel
- Invent great product, get great athletes to use it, get weekend warriors to mimic, get mainstream, build brand power
- Be cool with high prices and invest into next great thing
Flywheel has every next step follow previous easily
Best flywheel are from people who know themselves well
- Choices we make today affect our decisions tomorrow
- Find core desire and find steps that connect and lead back to first

Destructive cycles

Zappos culture was idolized
- Zappos needed customer retention to make it profitable so they needed great service which needed great culture
- CEO thought happiness was what companies delivered so understanding it was key to business
- CEO released delivering happiness book
- CEO tried to make downtown seedy Las Vegas
  - Many suicides in project
  - Flat structure made it unclear what to do
When people deny they are being mimetic they are must likely to be unhealthy cycle
- Return on collision,
  - value of community is when you meet randomly and get value
  - Went for many random encounters through many social events
  - Shared desks
- In Las Vegas
  - Now comparing yourself to same ambitious people in downtown creating anxiety
Wholearchy, Zappos and medium
- Idea
  - New system to manage
  - Self organizing teams working on projects
  - Constitution with an election process to do a role temp
  - Don’t have ceo instead separate person from role
- Problem
  - Didn’t account for need for models and network of desire
  - Got more political because people weren’t secure in their jobs and roles
  - Some people had infinite power because access to Tony
Happiness
- When you don’t know what happiness looks like, it because a meme of how to do it
- Look for models of happiness
Inner ring, CS Lewis, everyone always desire to be on the inside of a certain ring and terror to not be

Hierarchical value

Need to understand how leader decisions affect web of desire
CEO lead flag football which created a rivalry as it was ceo important
Economic incentives work but you can’t buy desire
“Marketing, money, and models distort desire for people if there is no clear hierarchy of value”
- College majors impressionable, ask what their hierarchy of value is
- Values act to order desire
- Companies have mission statement, but not hierarchy of value
- Mimesis becomes primary driver without values
Hierarchy of value is antidote to mimesis
- (How can you just rank values when there are quantities of value)
- If everything is equally good, harder to make decisions

The collapse of desire

Tony was the model in downtown Las Vegas, he stood out
Egypt mummified cats, ritual offering
Ritual firing of ceos for blame

Chapter 4 invention of blame, ritual scrapegoats

“disaster draws people like flies” artist would put quotes like this all over New York
“Protect me from what I want”
Rene saw people Converge on one group and expel, someone who is a proxy for all their enemies
- Mimetic desire creates violence
- Through mimetic desire we impose our will
- On war book, War is escalation of mimetic rivalry and duel on larger scale
- Desire to destroy other escorted the other side
Humans like to use violence to expel violence
- All against all goes to all against one
- Rene thought this was Foundation of all culture
Jews would take a goat and priest would put sins on it then send it out, this scrapegoats
Ancient Greeks would humiliate some deformed person and expel them
- Catharsis, stand in for what they want to do for each other
- Paintball war are good catharsis, need for company to

Saving people from themselves

electricity in ocean is fine, but pool we ate screwed. Just like mimetic contagion
- Each person will act as better conductor than water
- Accusations are mimetic
- Scrapegoats mechanism is good way to expel mimetic contagion
Mimetic contagion is mob mentality, surrendering desire to mob
“Their violence like all violence seem justified”
Scrapegoats usually physics or mentally different, deviants, unable to fight back even if they are king they can be overwhelmed
- Unite people and defuse mimetic conflict
- Usually kings or beggars
- Rene wondered whether plague in Oedipus could have been mimetic conflicts
mimetic system are as important as physical systems

dancing mania of 1518

young woman started just dancing wildly for days
- Blood soaked
- 30 people got it
- Most people who danced went through some kind of trauma
- It was social contagion
“Let anyone among you who is without sin cast the first stone”
- First stone doesn’t have mimetic model
Angry spreads best in social media because angry spreads well in weak ties
don’t share votes publicallu when voting

The joy of hate watching

trump resolving mimetic desire by firing someone made him a cult priest creator of scrapegoats
Stephen king wrote carry who was made a fool during prom and enacted revenge, real scrapegoats don’t have power
Sports team love purging when something isn’t working
Scrapegoats problem or solution?

the scrapegoats wins

Rene wrote” scrapegoat remains effective as long as we believe in its guilt”, can’t prescribe scrapegoat
We invented science when we stopped blaming witches, scrapegoat held up progress
10th commandment about adultery and goods
- Desire for same things create conflict
Rene looked at Jesus crusifixarion as very interesting scrapegoat subversion
- it was seen as a scrapegoat mechanism plainly on an innocent person

self awareness self hatred

you will never find anywhere in history the modern concern of victims
- Comes from biblical stories, innocence and injustice of victims
- Western culture has developed around protecting vulnerable, church’s were past social safety net
- Abortion both sides play this language
- No one has more power than someone seen as victim
Victim status claimed to gain power
Phrasis praised prophets but killed Jesus

signs of contradiction

“protect me from what I want”
City dependent on one child’s suffering
- Some accepted it and some went off away from city to some unknown place

Part 2: transformation of desire

anti mimetic is being able to counteract bad forces of desire

chapter 5 anti mimetic feeding people not system

June 2017 restaurant asked to remove 3 Michelin stars from his restaurant
Obsession with goal setting, more important to choose goals
Mimetic desire sustain education, social media, and vc
- Education about going for college apps and then going for college ideal jobs
- VC want tech startups and status game to get right check
- Social media should draw as many people into convoseratikns as possible
Being watched and rated
- Michelin star add or removal can make or break business
- Marks of status and prestige
- Map out systems of desire in our world
  - Pandemic showed us so unprepared
  - We need to want to build, but interia and path of least resistance
- Michelin Guide mediator of desire
The one less traveled by
- Michelin started selling marketing tools, you now start playing their game
- Steve Jobs, death bed is where unfulfilled desires are exposed thiknabout it now
Modeling a new mindset
- 2017 3 star Michelin chef 46 year old wanted to redefine what was essential and get delisted
  - Many 3 star chefs understand, 2 star focused on third don’t understand
  - Would get reposted with 2 stars
- Do you have to be rich to decide it isn’t worthwhile? Sour grapes?
  - A fox by itself doesn’t have others signaling value
  - Do you need to taste to believe

disruptive empathy, breaking through thin desires, more sex less envy

Author failing company after Zappos needed to choose who to pay first
- Dave Romero was a vendor and at 7am asking for money almost threatening, I hear your having a barbecue tonight
  - Dave asked more and more personal questions and connected
- This distiptied the cycle with empathy
Passive aggressive spreads like wild fire
Rene talks about how rejecting handshake makes someone withdraw, imitates the refusal
- Negative mimetic cycles
Share and listen to deeply fulfilling action to produce empathy
The problem with sympathy
- Sympathy is easily hijacked by mimesis
- Empathy is going into other experiences
  - Undertaking intentional journey without imitating or identifying with them too much
  - Connect deeply with others without becoming like others and their desire
thick desires
- Thick desires are protected from changing circumstances unlike thin desires which are mimetic and shallow
- More intense often thinner
- We learn what desires leave us unfulfilled as we get older
Shaking the dust
- Author asks why he wants to start a company
  - Wanted to create value
    - But he started craving prestige
  - Wanted to carve our lifestyle with balance
    - But he started wanting to be ideal entrepreneur
    - Consumed entrepreneur content
- Prestige comes from word illusion, move looking sideways to measure success
  - Rene said people talk about sex but not envy
  - Envy is destructive mimetic desire
- Author realized desires were shallow
- He wanted to explore life big questions
Fulfillment story
- Start with thick desires you have
  - Listen to life telling you, who you are
  - Spirituality happens when you open yourself to something greater than yourself
    - Nature, friendship, love, religion, helping others
  - Sense of connected ness to self and others
  - Desire is social, it is connectedness
- Identify core motivation drives to achieve a pattern of results
  - Being control, evoke motivation, elicite response
- Ideal question: tell me a time in your life when you did something well and it brought you a sense of fulfillment
- fulfillment story
  - You took some action, not some concert, but could be learning
  - You did it well, achieve something
  - Fulfillment, long term satisfication
- Sharing creates sharing and makes you remember more moments for you
Motivational patterns
- Motivation code trademarked quiz
- Every core drive is inherently good
- Explore, discover what is mysterious to him
  - Travel and taste, cocktails, crypto
  - Be intentional for value creating
  - Not motivated to master
- Master, gain complete command of a skill
  - Doctorate in physics, few deep interest
  - No desire to start band, mastery
- Comprehend and express, understand, define and communicate it in some way
  - writes book reviews on blog, Comprehend family dynamics and explains people
  - Loses motivation without outlet to express learning
  - Understanding and experience is clarified in act of expression
- Core drivers are where people feel most deeply engaged themselves, fulfillment is not happiness
  - Fulfillment often things people would consider good like success to team and common good
- Knowing motivation let’s you understand people
- Cycle 2 is for shared good that is abundant, thick desires

chapter 7 transdent leadership

Bumble, Heard ceo
- Hardest thing she did is enter india, India has crazy sexual violence
Leaders and company direct people to want more, less, or differently
- Company create and shape desire
Eminent desire
- Sacred center, systemic desire, no models outside office, main purpose is sustaining itself
Transcendent desire
- Models of desire outside, greatest artists and models look at
- MLK went for concrete justice
Transcendent do 5 things well
- Shift gravity away from themselves to transcendent goal
  - Montessori look at kids and had taught them how to reach new status in society and grow up
    - Learn with natural curiosity and cultivate desire to learn
    - The thing kids secretly care most about is growing up
    - Withdraw as mediator of desire
  - A good teacher withdraws as meditator of desire, give ray of light and go on your way
- Speed of truth, health of org is speed of trust
  - Truth is anti mimetic
  - Nietzche contribute most of anyone in devalue of intellect in favor of will
  - How quickly does crucial info go from salesman to ceo/where it needs to go
  - Test truth by have anonymous people plant info that someone else should know and see how long it takes to kn
  - What’s the most difficult sacrifice you had to make for the truth?
    - If an job interviewer can’t answer they don’t have complex relationship to truth as they should
- Discernment
  - Personal goals and spouses are areas that transcend reason
  - Joker says detonator on both boats and will blow up both
    - Transcends self interest
  - Pay attention to emotions and whether generous or loving, att piece on death bed, where desire comes from
- Sit quietly in a room
  - Many Monks go with vows of silence and ascetic life
  - Silence is where we learn to be at peace with ourselves
  - Retreat centers, 490 mile pilgrimage walked in silence in 30 days
  - Retreat is needed to Jack up opportunity cost of bailing
  - Set 3-5 days a year in deep silence with books
    - Major benefits once it all goes away
- Filter feedback
  - Look at thick desires not market reports or news
  - Lean startup isn’t leading but following, adaptive design isn’t how you make a company or life
  - Musk doesn’t look at market reports but believes he is a model of desire

chapter 8 what we will want tomorrow, sex robits, magic pill

Singularity coming so what will we desire
Prediction: We will have more sex with robots in 2050
- Robots show they want to have sex with pursued lips and lowered eyes
- Female sex robot wants to get to know you first
- Avoid uncanny valley by making it different enough, similarity is too strong we find it creepy
What do we want to want, end of sapiens
- We can want to want something but not just want it
60s America more mimetic
- Evidence: social media as scrapegoating, polarization, voltaile markets
Future desire is how we manage mimesis
- By the time you go to bed, you will have made it harder or easier to want something
Quality of life decreasing, many diseases, purchasing power hasn’t grown, cultural stagnation, we can’t imagine tracendent things
- Spiritual decline and weaker institutions
- Bad money drives out good money, bad desires drive out good desires
Google pretends to have answers so no need for a coach or teacher
Every tech company taps into need
- Google answers our prayers
- Facebook love and belonging
- Amazon security with good
- Apple gives status and sex with sexy brand
End of space age was turning inward and loss of faith in institutions
Reason is mimesis
- We lack transcendent reference point outside the system we just copy others
- Increasing individualist, could have more envy as minor slights are more noticeable
- We lack hope
  - Hope is desire for good hard and possible thing in the future
  - Hope is where thick desires grow
Two approaches to escape cycle one
- engineering desire with Silicon Valley and cult of experts and authorization
  - Get people to want what a group wants to want
  - Tech companies are mediator of desire
    - Google started surveillance capital that lets you exploit desire
    - Page wanted to go from search to satisfy
  - What effect does political system have on what people want?
    - We usually think about restricting actions, but authority comes from re-educating desire
    - Internment camp prisoner “We don some professional or moral costume so as to hide from ourselves our own desire and wants”
    - Ideologies are closed system of desire, Rene defined as define everything as either good or bad
- Transformation of desire happens through relationships
Maturity is hold onto conflicting tension and desires, look for coexistence of opposites
- Humble and confident, don’t map on how I think world works point to something beyond your understanding
Calculating vs meditative thought
- Calculating is searching and plotting how to reach objective without thinking if objective is important
  - Young Monks bring so many books believing that without input there is no output
  - Primer in our tech world withou any meditative
- Meditative thought is slow nonproductive non reactionary thought
  - Doesn’t look for solution but sinks into reality
  - What is behind this situation? Truth
  - Try having a drink then starting at a tree with no goal for an hour
  - Allows looking at new situations with thick desires
Pivotal spaces
- Many relationships are held together by mimetic bonds like players going for coach respect, or professors going for tenure
- Best friend and good relationships prob tinged with mimesis
- Family
  - What we can desire is what our family presents and reward us for
  - Good child, older sibling, religious
  - Kids as mimetic as people around then
- Imagination
  - We can only desire what we can imagine and know about
  - Fluency, emotional intelligence we have tacit knowledge we can’t explain
- Work
  - Purpose of work is to become more and not just about output
  - Step outside industry standard
Three inventions
- Rene worried future would have more memisis
- Three social inventions to counteract mimesis
  - Scrapegoat
    - Less effective now as we no longer believe that what we are doing is just in the 24 hour news cycle
  - Market economy
    - Economic competition is coup de tae but starting your own company
    - Compete to have nicest car not kill neighbor
  - We need new way to channel desire in productive ways
    - Maybe it’s a Archaic religion replacement
    - Maybe it’s space race
    - Maybe it’s better money to reward value
    - Maybe it’s education so everyone can forge their own path
Single greatest desire
- Metaphysical desire, we want to be something else
- Winning mimetic competition is how you lose
- Every is either a model or signaling that they should be
- Naval said you should choose your greatest desire and it’s ok to suffer over that one
- Weasel hits eagle neck at eight spo
  - Grasp one thing at pulse, core
- Stalk your highest and noblest desire in the form of a model
  - Find a character from a book, heroic action, the greatest ideal
  - Die from holding onto thigh desire and holding on until nothing is left
  - Love is wanting what’s good for another, French says I want your good
- Transformation of desire happens when we care for the relationship we have with others, it is the very pathway to fulfill our own
- Develop thick desire that we can sink our life in
Live as if you have an responsibility for what other people want

Afterword

first draft is coming to grip with what we want and strikes blow to their pride and vanity
- Writer begins again without romantic lie of good and evil