The pleasure of watching someone do something that they’re great at, no muss, no fuss, no fireworks, no disasters, just a dang beautiful cake. This experience-this experience of having a predictably successful outcome-is what we devalue, what we elide, what we gloss over and play down and underestimate. The oven will work, the ingredients will be there, the cake will not be burned, the decorating will be glorious.

Sitting on your couch, watching a hyper-competent woman do what she does best. It’s profoundly comforting, even relaxing. (Her dirt cake is better than yours.) But just watched Martha, in a kitchen, by herself, doing what she does incredibly well? These shows are competitive, challenging, exciting-but they’re also very much designed for our “go big or go home” society, to elicit spectacular success and spectacular failure.Ĭonversely, have you ever sat down and watched Martha Stewart bake? Not with a guest, where she’s quite happy to show you her competitive side. In many ways, the show is the player’s antagonist, just as much as the other contestants. The former is designed for fireworks: appliances that don’t work, forced partnerships, ingredients that no one should ever have to combine. But I recently realized the profound difference between watching Top Chef or MasterChef and watching Ina Garten or Martha Stewart cook. I watch a ton of reality television, much of it competition reality shows. Better to shout platitudes from a metaphorical mountaintop than to offer a workable, detailed plan.Īnd that goes for our media as well. Better to fly too high and perish than to quietly get shit done. And while so much of so many things is gendered, even putting that aside, we-societally-would rather an Icarus than an Ariadne. I’ve been considering this recently for any number of reasons, not the least of which is watching the United States’ 2020 presidential campaign season roll out appallingly early.

As if, simply by instilling challenges or drama or a 30-foot drop into the process, the outcome will be more satisfactory. Instead, we value any number of flashier things: talent, danger, a metaphorical or even literal high-wire act. And I think much of this underestimating comes from the fact that competence is so often quiet. We underestimate how much work and skill it requires. I think, societally, we underestimate competence. As if having the necessary ability, knowledge, or skill to do something successfully is not, in fact, success. (I looked it up!) But that’s not how we use it, is it? When we say someone is competent, we mean they’re fine, I suppose. The word “competent” means having the necessary ability, knowledge, or skill to do something successfully.

Furyborn goodreads