The Brutalist is a kind of movie which makes you think what it is about. It does not follow a typical success story. Unlike Whiplash, it is not about talent justifying the means to achieve a goal. It’s’ not about immigration. And it’s not about refugees. While it touches on all these topics, it anyway don’t push any of them enough.
A few days after watching the picture, I came across an essays on what it is about eventually. One idea stood out: the vaguely presented elements in the movie serve only as context for a central message. The 3-hour film shows a person’s need to express their inner self. The words are too shallow, too flat in doing so. The architecture—as in the reference—can do the trick more subtly even if there is an absolute brutality in its core.
In this badly dramatic context I’d started to think about my motivation. Putting aside basic extrinsic factors like money, promotion, and recognition, there are always more valuable and intriguing intrinsic motivations to explore. The inner you is actual you and and that’s a way to look at what motivates you from another angle.
I’m not an artist; I am a products creator, builder, designer, manager in the digital space—whatever we can call it to shape the scope. However, I still create nonexistent before things because something internally motivates me to do so. I do this at work, build pet-projects, and create micro-products for myself. And I do so because I am a person who loves to organize life. I have several bags, slings, and backpacks only because each of them is for a particular reason and can’t fit all my daily goals. I build products for myself because there are no proper alternatives on the market. I create products at work because I do believe I can do it better than others in the current environment. I organize my life with systems and dislike it when they break down. I do tiff with my grilfriend over wrongly placed things in our household or schedules broken (I’m sorry, my piglet!).
That’s my motivation. If I can create things to express how I see the world in a more organized way, I’d love to do it. Everything else is just context. If my employer cannot provide an environment that supports this and instead pressures me to create contrary to my worldview, we will part ways. If I’m not paid enough and my efforts go unrecognized, making me uncomfortable and anxious, I’ll leave. Or if my team makes the things I am entitled to create more messy, we will not fit together.
It is who I am and I want to express my inner self through things I create.