{"id":1116,"date":"2008-02-15T07:36:52","date_gmt":"2008-02-15T05:36:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/general\/in-a-world-of-professionals-i-am-a-perennial-amateur.html"},"modified":"2026-08-13T14:20:43","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T12:20:43","slug":"in-a-world-of-professionals-i-am-a-perennial-amateur","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.martinvarsavsky.net\/?p=1116","title":{"rendered":"In a world of professionals I am a perennial amateur"},"content":{"rendered":"

Of everyone I know I am probably the person who knows how to do the most things….badly. Allow me to explain. I am like a perennial amateur. Ok, one thing I seemingly do well which is to have original ideas, like Fon<\/a> and turn them into businesses. And that I do well. Maybe not Michael Dell well, but well enough to have started and sold 3 businesses for over half a billion. But other than that I am an amateur at so many things that I love to do but others do better!<\/p>\n

The list is enormous. I love to cook and I cook reasonably well, very fast, people enjoy my food but of course there are so many better chefs than I am. I was also a diplomat for 4 years representing Argentina during its worst crisis. And I did what I could, in the States some still call me Ambassador cause once an Ambassador always an Ambassador in the States, but frankly, how can an Ambassador be a blogger? I was not a good Ambassador because I like to tell what I believe in. So much for being a diplomat. And what about being a Jet pilot? Yes, I am a pilot with a private pilot license and I did my Citation Jet certification. I had to pass 11 exams, take many classes and I can fly a Jet. But of course I am a so so pilot compared to most jet pilots. I have no doubt that most jet pilots are better than I am, still I greatly enjoy piloting my plane. And how about sailing? I have sailed since I was a teenager, I sail around 30 days per year in the Mediterranean or the Caribbean and I am studying to be the skipper of my 92 ft sailboat that I have had for 8 years. And I do know a lot about sailing and my sailboat but I know very little compared with professional crews. Still I know enough and can sail my boat from an island to another island. And by next summer I will have my skipper title. Again an amateur.<\/p>\n

And the list goes on. I write for newspapers, magazines and have been writing for them since I was in college when I was a correspondent for Spanish and Argentine media. But am I a journalist? Even though articles of mine have appeared in books and 300K people per month read my blog, I could hardly call myself a writer, even though in practice I am and I do spend an hour a day or so writing, like I am doing now.<\/p>\n

Another job I have is to organize conferences and events including some very large ones like the ones we organized at my foundation, Safe Democracy<\/a> or the Menorca TechTalk. But even though I spend a significant amount of time organizing events, I know many people who do that for a living, people like Klaus Schwab for example. And even though many heads of states have attended conferences that I have organized I am no Klaus Schwab nor a professional conference organizer. And as far as being a speaker I have been paid sums like 14 thousand euros for speaking for one hour. But I decided not to charge for speaking and only speak at events I enjoy and be an amateur speaker. Somehow I feel uncomfortable about getting paid to speak, I feel that my freedom to say whatever I want is restricted. So I speak in around 30 conferences per year but I would not call myself a professional speaker. I guess the common theme in all I do is not being a professional, that I am not except as an entrepreneur, but being extremely curious and being fearless about trying new things.<\/p>\n

I also have this necessity to be the boss of everything I do which is probably a disease. So if I am in a car I want to drive, in a boat I want to steer, in a conference I want to speak, in a plane I want to pilot, in a kitchen I want to cook. I know I should just let go, rely on others, and to a great extent I do as I have pilots, crew, driver, etc. Being a blogger is a good example. I used to write more for newspapers and magazines and I know that if I continued to do so I would have more readers. But being my own editor and publishing what I want when I want is more important than being read by tons of people. I prefer to publish in the Huffington Post which gives me total journalistic freedom than writing for Newsweek as I once did and had to deal with an editor telling me to add or take away words and change my piece. And I do write for the leading news magazine in Argentina, Noticias but that is because they are crazy enough to publish articles that are sometimes 9 pages long unedited. And I guess people like them cause they are now complaining I have sent nothing for a few months.<\/p>\n

In short, in a world of professionals I am a perennial amateur. I do what I do out of love and probably a sick desire to be the master of my own life. I don\u00b4t care about doing things perfectly well. I care about doing reasonably well and having fun in the process.<\/p>\n

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Of everyone I know I am probably the person who knows how to do the most things….badly. Allow me to explain. I am like a perennial amateur. Ok, one thing I seemingly do well which is to have original ideas, like Fon and turn them into businesses. And that I do well. Maybe not Michael […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t