Are you a dasher or a slasher?
My friend Sarah says: “I guess the main difference is that a dasher is someone who is mainly operating in one field, but working on various aspects of it and a slasher is someone who pursues a variety of different fields at the same time.
A dasher is a teacher who gives lectures at a university and gives private lessons and teaches at school, all at the same time.
A slasher is a painter, and a fashion designer, and an actress/singer, and a teacher, and an events manager all at once.
I think the dash person is definitely the healthier version of the two multi-taskers.
Dash don’t slash.. the jack-of-all trades is a slasher.”
What do you think? I think I disagree with her.
When I was in school, I was a dasher. I loved anything that had to do with self-expression, and that’s quite a small field when interest circles were so wide. My friends had different passions, including movies, science, or sports, or video games. It’s a slash between drawing and writing, because when you’re best friend is a soccer freak, anything that involves sitting down and using your hands is almost the same.
When I was studying Fine Arts, I started becoming a slasher. The passions of people around me became much more confined, and by moving away from art and also being passionate about words, I kind of stepped out of dasher boundaries.
When I started working as a designer, I officially became a slasher. While my friends are obsessed with the smallest details in design, like typography, lithography, or any other word ending in -”phy”, I often have a hard time describing to people what I really do.
‘Cause as much as I love design, a “designer” is no where near who I am. I am a word person too. And an internet person. And an art person. And a person person. The slashes for me almost never end, and I really like that. It never feels like I’m working, no matter how many things I’m doing, because there’s always so much variety. I’m never bored, and my attention span is tiny, so that’s saying a lot.
Are you a slasher, a dasher, or a… one word? :)
You like that? Related posts:
Chris
December 22, 2009 @ 7:23 am
Non-work multi-slasher, and I don’t mean a multi-murder slasher, or do I? Hmmmm…. :D Same architect/contractor boss but work slasher also. Help design and build landscapes in the summer, paint in the winter. Love both, especially the bit where we debate colors over a pile of paint chips.
Mesh
December 22, 2009 @ 7:54 am
I am a dasher and/or slasher
woops :)
To me slashes are more expressive, and they are more recognizable than dashes when separating/combining words that leads to the opposite/same meaning.
i actually use dashes rarely, mostly for command parameters.
Razan Khatib
December 22, 2009 @ 10:34 am
slasher for sure!
Roba
December 22, 2009 @ 11:15 am
Chris, ooh you’re an architect! Architecture is awesome. And I guess it’s hard to be a creative and not be a slasher, right? Afterall, we’re not accountants!
Mesh, I’m the opposite of you. I love dashes. I’m always trying to control the amount of dashes I type in! :)
Razan, yeah? IT and…?
Isam
December 22, 2009 @ 11:34 am
I am the worst slasher anyone has ever met. and it’s not even funny anymore. I know something about everything but never everything about one thing.
I think a slasher is someone who is not satisfied with what he does or maybe a person who still doesn’t know what he wants to do in his life …
Mesh
December 22, 2009 @ 11:38 am
Or Have Multi-Core – Hyper Threading Brain Isam :P
Jo
December 22, 2009 @ 1:43 pm
The question is not valid in all contexts.
You dont expect a heart surgeon to be a jack of all trades?
I wouldnt want to go to a heart surgeon that can also work as an electrician.
Mesh
December 22, 2009 @ 4:40 pm
how about date roba ?
you use dashes ? or slashes ? :P
Roba
December 22, 2009 @ 5:10 pm
commas :)
Ghaida
December 23, 2009 @ 1:57 am
Funny when I first read the title in my RSS feed I read it as “داشر” lol Interesting article, I find myself struggling with being a slasher all the time, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Sarah
December 23, 2009 @ 3:37 pm
How excited to see that people actually care about our silly conversations Roobee!
Whats the next topic?
And I agree with Jo…
Hannah
December 26, 2009 @ 6:12 pm
I’m definitely a slasher. My interests are varied, so much so that it doesn’t take much to distract me. :lol: I love Margaret Lobenstine’s descriptive phrase for slashers. She calls us “Renaissance Souls”. I’m down with that. :D
@Isam: Please check out Lobenstine’s book, “The Renaissance Soul: Life Design for People with Too Many Passions to Pick Just One”. I sense a kindred spirit in you in the frustrated slasher department. :mrgreen: Excerpt from the book Characteristics of a Renaissance Soul
Warm greetings to all from Florida.
Roba
December 26, 2009 @ 11:59 pm
Ghaida, Slashers rock! :)
Isam
December 28, 2009 @ 7:30 pm
@Mesh you dont understand I already have that … I dont want it anymore
@Hannah Thanks a lot !! I will make sure to read the book. and greetings from Florida are always warm :)
@Roba Sorry for using your blog as a forum :)