Scanners and Financial Independence
No not… Oh for god’s sake these are getting worse every week!
I came across an intriguing term the other day while on my internet travels: “Scanner”. Someone followed me on twitter which led me to their blog, so naturally I did one of the first things we all do which is to check out their about page, which in turn led me to the following passage:
“Margot and Barbara is the distillation of many hours spent trying to make sense of my giant, sprawling list of interests. I’m a scanner. Multipotential. Dilettante. Whatever. What that means is that I will never find the perfect job, never settle down to just one thing. Never grow up.“
Another hit for the wonderfulness of the internet/blogging world, I love it when stuff like this happens! The site in question, margot-and-barbara.com, is run by a lady called Elizabeth, who suggested also on her about page to check out the site Puttylike if we wanted to learn a bit more about Scanners.
What is a Scanner? Am I one?
Puttylike says that a Scanner is another name for a Multipotentialite. If this doesn’t clear things up for you here is the definition they give for Multipotentiality, which is actually from Wikipedia:
“An educational and psychological term referring to a pattern found among intellectually gifted individuals. [Multipotentialites] generally have diverse interests across numerous domains and may be capable of success in many endeavours or professions, they are confronted with unique decisions as a result of these choices.”
There are also some great questions/statements here to determine whether you are a Scanner or not, here are a few highlights:
“I lose interest in things I thought would interest me forever.”
“I get bored as soon as I know how to do something.”
“I can’t pay attention unless I’m doing many things at once.”
“I’m too busy, but when I do find time I can’t remember what I wanted to do.”
Does this sound like you? If so then you are probably a Scanner! A lot of these sentences sound a bit negative but don’t worry if you suspect you may be a Scanner, there is some really rather excellent news coming up.
Scanners and FI
Anyone remotely aux fait with Early Retirement Extreme will instantly see that this fits nicely in with Jacobs advice to become a Renaissance Man, i.e. develop many useful skills that will end up saving you lots of money over the long term. Puttylike even mention the term Renaissance Man, sorry, Renaissance Person :), on their definitions page in fact.
It seems to me that the Scanner is perfectly suited to the challenge of attempting and achieving Financial Independence.
Not only that, they will benefit from the lifestyle once they achieve this goal much more than the average person, being then free with their time to devote it to whatever interest their whim decides on that particular day/week/month.
I’ve only read a handful of pages of the Puttylike site but I’ve already found a few nods and winks to the FI mindset, check out this article here for example: The Biggest Lie You’ve Ever Been Told
Here is a key snippet: “I will say though, that this requires an open mind. You have to be willing to think about money/work in new ways and at least be open to considering some alternatives to what we’ve been told repeatedly growing up: that you go to school, get training, get a good job, save for retirement, and then at age 65 you are free start living your dreams.”
I think this could be my favourite new blog!
Until I get bored of it and move onto the next one of course, that must be the hardest part of making a website for Scanners – keeping the audience to stick around 😉
My Life as a Scanner (aka the self-indulgent bit)
After reading up a bit on Scanners I naturally wondered whether I could be one and I’ve decided that I most probably am. Here is some evidence I came up with:
- I got good grades at school in a wide range of subjects from the Sciences to Art/Graphic Design
- Once I’d learnt something at school I tended to get bored very quickly, which would mean that getting into trouble for either mildly playing up, or looking like I wasn’t paying attention, was common. (I guess this is true for many and doesn’t necessarily mean you are a scanner by itself). I would often infuriate my teachers by then answering all their questions designed to show me up for not listening correctly, or scoring high test scores despite predictions of the contrary 😉
- I therefore found it very hard to whittle the GCSE level subjects down into 3-4 A-Level subjects at the age of 16 (again, this is true of many of perhaps even almost all pupils I think) but ended up taking Physics, Maths, Computing, and Further Maths
- I was also was very interesting in music production and did that as a side hobby (including DJ’ing for a while)
- I eventually ended up sacking all the science/maths stuff off and did Music Technology at University
- I then got a job in a totally unrelated field (websites) and re-trained myself up to be a programmer
- Since being a programmer, rather than specialising in one particular area or language as many do, I have worked across a spectrum of areas and dabbled with many languages
- I’m interested in pretty much every sport out there, and am reasonable at most, but could never fully commit to just one to become a specialist at it (I guess you could argue golf is becoming “the one”, but I still enjoy and play others fairly regularly)
- After a bit of a “learning dead zone” in my mid twenties, I’ve recently re-found my passion to absorb as much information as possible, and am now learning about shit I never even knew existed. You could say I am realising my potential as a Multipotentialite 😉
- Wikipedia is my bible (I can get absorbed for hours reading about random stuff, linking from article to article, and end up completely forgetting about the original thing I fired up my laptop to do!)
- In my job or with personal projects I have an overwhelming desire to do everything myself, i.e. I have a hard time delegating tasks to others and letting them get on with it. I used to think that this was because I was a control freak, and perhaps that is partially true, but I also think part of it is that I want to learn all there is to learn about something and understand processes from front to back for myself.
- I am chasing FI so I can spend my days learning many subjects and engaging in many activities that interest me. Some may make money, others won’t, the point is it won’t matter by then!
The Future as a Scanner
I don’t think this whole Scanner revelation will particularly change my life or my plans for FI, but it does feel good in a weird way to be able to label yourself. I don’t think labelling yourself in itself is necessarily a good thing, or feeling like you have to belong to a certain group or way of thinking, but knowing that there are others out there like you, and enough for people to start a website about it, is somewhat comforting. Not to mention of course that these websites look like a great resource for ideas and motivation!
To me, Puttylike, Scanners, Multipotentialites, it’s all just a slight variation on a theme of what I talk about and strive for on theFIREstarter, so it fits in perfectly with my mindset, whilst at the same time being wonderful to get a slightly different view on the whole thing without personal finance being at the central core matters.
So the big question then… Are YOU a Scanner, dear Reader? 🙂
Tell us your thoughts, stories, or reasons why you think yes or no!? If there are any staunch Specialists out there as well, please feel free to chime in with your comments! Thanks!
Discussion (22) ¬
Yep, that sounds like me. Really interesting stuff…I want to learn more about it!
Glad to pass on the info DB40! Enjoy!
Interesting post, never heard of the term before and I can’t say that I’m one myself, despite displaying one of the traits quite strongly, namely “I can’t pay attention unless I’m doing many things at once,” which pretty much sums up how I am both at home and at work. Anyway, congratulations on finding out more about yourself today! 🙂
Cheers weenie, you are clearly a very effective multi tasker if not a Scanner then!
Yea bit of a random thing to write about really. It still amazes me that you can find out things on the internet that you have never heard of on a regular basis. It’s the classic old saying of “The more you know, the more you realise there is to learn” – or something along those lines anyway.
New reader from US delurking – expat Brit 🙂 .Great post! I definitely agree being a scanner can be a help on the path to FI, not only with saving money but also with just being interested in learning how to manage money/how to invest etc. Barbara Sher is the one who coined the term scanner originally, and she has several books on the subject which you might find interesting. The puttylike website sounds neat, I’ll have to check it out, thanks!
Hi Cat, thanks for the comment and delurking! 🙂
Yes I came across Barbara Sher in my initial research on the subject and her books definitely sound like they are worth a read. Thanks!
How are you getting along in your efforts in FI over that side of the pond? It always sounds “easier” from what I’ve read but I also think that this may just be a case of the “grass is always greener” and the UK is probably just as good as anywhere else…?
Hmm, this undoubtedly describes me. I’ve never heard the term before either!
I could have had a good crack at at least a dozen different careers. That sounds arrogant, unless I follow up with the reality that I haven’t been able to make the very best of any of them. I drift and get bored. Ho hum! At least I know (a bit more) why now. 🙂
I get a feeling that a lot of bloggers, not just PF ones, may well fit the bill as well, as although we have chosen a niche to write about it is clear that most have a wide variety of interests and other blogs they follow, you can often see this from the eclectic blog rolls. Glad to pass on the insight and thanks for the comment (and for linking to the article… cheers!)
Interesting article FS (as always). But I tend to think that, rather than being an “unusual” type of personality trait, scanning is actually the default human approach to life. Some people are just better at it, have more energy, curiosity and what used to be called “brains” so they get more done faster in the areas they choose to concentrate on and maybe drift on to something else a little quicker and more often than the average bod.
The really unusual types are those who are absolutely sure what they want to do and stay loyal and dedicated to one interest/work area all their lives, those that have a vocation or obsession that overrides the urge to investigate all the other interesting things that life has to offer.
Great comment Cerridwen, thanks!
You know what the more I read of the puttylike website and comments over there, and even when writing this article (see the: hard to narrow down the subjects when at school part, I am certain 99% of my peers were exactly the same) the more I started to think along the same lines.
However as you say there are clearly various levels of being a scanner and some people are just not cut out for it despite the best of intentions and/or genuinely being interested in lots of things, they may never even get to a basic level of competency in any of them.
One other point I would make though is that a lot of people I do know do eventually narrow down their interests as they get older rather than increase them, which doesn’t make much sense (to me) because you should theoretically have more experience in more areas the older you get, which should actually increase your interests over time.
This is one of the key and best points of the puttylike website I thought: finding that inner child*/scanner that may have been supressed by our society, which tries to pigeonhole people.
*Apols for the bullshit new age speak there!
I came across a group ‘London scanners and renaissance souls’ on the internet- had never realised before that some people were self identifying with this tendency. I think I’m with Cerridwen on this though, that it is a result of our natural human flexibility and adaptability and that narrow focus is the more unusual tendency. The problem is that our jobs tend to constrain us, both in terms of the skills they require us to develop but also by taking too much of our time and energy such that little is left for our natural curiosity. Children don’t suffer this and are usually curious about just about everything!
For myself, I don’t like doing loads of things at once but I do have wide ranging intellectual interests and like drawing across them to find the conceptual similarities. I tend to be absorbed in something for a while and then move on to the next thing. I’ve more or less exhausted my enthusiasm for my work field after 15 years in the same area…
Thanks for the comment Elliott and yes I do agree as well with what you say – it is a shame that by working age or shortly thereafter most of our natural childlike curiosity has been crushed out of us! Also great to see that there are a large group of people fighting to get that back!
Hmm. From your description of your life, you’re actually not that interested in dealing with other people. Your A-level mix is particularly un-Renaissance.
With respect, none of your jobs seems to have much to do with human relationships — no selling, no marketing, or presenting.
You sound like someone with diverse nerdy interests, but come on — it’s not that unusual for a programmer to be interested in multiple languages.
If your career included periods working as a mercenary in Bosnia, acting as chief executive officer for a humanitarian charity, and selling life insurance too, then you might qualify.
I think you’re comparing yourself to the wrong baseline.
Hi Jonathan,
Thanks as always for your comment! You always seem to pick up on things from a different angle which keeps things interesting at least.
First up, I didn’t read anything in the definition of a scanner that you had to be interested in dealing with other people. Maybe I’ve made the error of including the term ‘Renaissance’ but I’m just quoting that from the puttylike and ERE websites/books in any case.
Secondly, I think it’s clear from your comment you’ve missed the purpose of both the puttylike website and my article which is to tell people who are bogged down with societal norms that it is OK, even beneficial, to have such varied interests and that you can make a successful and productive life out of not just sticking to one thing.
Maybe I did want to work as a mercenary in Bosnia, act as chief executive officer for a humanitarian charity, and sell life insurance too, but society does not tell us that this is a viable life plan. Same with the A-Levels, we are told to keep things in one area or we may not get onto the university course we want to do, where we specialise even further of course.
I would also love to know how many 33 year olds have done all of that, you say I’m comparing myself to the wrong baseline but your baseline is so high in the sky I reckon about 6 people in the country would qualify to be termed a scanner. 🙂
The popularity of the puttylike website tells me that there are lot’s of people out there like us and that definitions can be fast and loose when it comes down to how people would like to define themselves, which is in no way a bad thing.
Finally maybe it was the “about me” section that came across as a bit of a boast, but it wasn’t intended that way, and I even made the title a bit tongue in cheek to try to get that tone across.
Thanks again for the thought provoking comment! 🙂
Sounds like me too! Once upon a time I thought engineering was the greatest thing and something I wanted to do for the next 30-40 years… After 3-4 years, I realized, nope, not for me! I want freedom of choice… I like to scan around 🙂
FIF I remember the first post I read of yours was the multiple phases of your life where you planned out to do many different things in each. Loved that post!
Wow. You just described me to T.
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Interesting concept! I’ve never heard of the scanner terminology.
Hi! Thank you for sharing my blog here. I’m glad that it was useful. I agree, it might not change who you are or what you do, but it’s always good to find that you’re not alone in feeling the way that you do. Modern society has dictated that we should all be specialists, but more and more of us are realising that it’s not the only way. If it was good enough for Leonardo da Vinci, it’s good enough for me 😉
Thanks again to you Elizabeth! Ha ha careful with the comparisons there, Jonathan (above) might get on your case 🙂