What makes you feel good about your job?

What writers must remember in order to remain sane and reasonable.

Every profession has its intellectual biases: Engineers tend to think everything is getting gradually better, even as the flood waters encroach. Accounting people tend not to recognize the existence of anything they cannot count. Plumbers generally aren’t strong on philosophy, and philosophers couldn’t snake a drain if their examined lives depended on it.

My own chronic mental mistake—and I imagine I may have this in common with other writers and mass communicators—is a bias toward big influence and broad change. Accustomed as I am to making broad pronouncements to audiences of thousands, I must constantly fight a sense of arrogance toward people whose work is accomplished on a smaller scale.

I’m uncovering wrongs! I’m changing minds! I’m changing behavior!

Luckily, my wife is an art teacher in an upstart charter elementary school on the rough and tough West Side of Chicago, so I get a reminder every day of what it means to help in more concrete ways.

Hey Honey, get this: My blog entry today started a real kerfuffle in the blogosphere! I’m talking, 12 comments and two trackbacks!

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