Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 312 posts

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#141

Post by car »

Tade0 wrote: post #103
eludwig wrote: post #21

Physically, my best advice is to take good care of your back and your teeth. These 2 things can make a huge quality of life difference once you are past 40. I would also add your eyes, but there is not a lot you can do about that one! Almost everyone needs reading glasses by 40. Glasses suck, but you get used to it. Psychologically, the best I can say is to forgive yourself for any stupid things you did when you were…

Almost everyone needs reading glasses by 40. Not if these eye drops can help it! http://fdaaa.trialstracker.net/trial/NCT03809611/

Thank you for posting. This compound to soften the solidified lens is a good idea.

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#142

Post by car »

jedberg wrote: post #101

No matter how you live your youth, you will probably regret it when you are older. Unless you inherit so much money that you don't have to ever work in your life. If you spend your youth having fun and enjoying your youth, then when you get to middle age you'll have wished you worked harder and saved more so you could be wealthy and comfortable. If you work your butt off in your youth and have lots of money and succe…

Your career won't suffer if you take a week long vacation.

Move to Europe, and you can take a month long vaction like everyone else.

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#144

Post by didip »

Don't wait until you past 40 years old to take care of your health. Starts now.

Physical exercise becomes more important to fight against aging. Especially core exercises to take care of your back.

Watch your diet and eat well because it's so much harder to lose weight when you are older. Not to mention your innards are deteriorating fast if you abuse them.

Contact sports or extreme sports has super high cost when you are older. Imagine breaking your wrist playing snowboard and you have to be out of work for multiple months, unable to make a living by typing, etc.

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#145

Post by greenyoda »

axaxs wrote: post #54

I'm not 'old', but I'm not young anymore either, though I still remember it. My biggest personal gripe is my brain slowly slipping. It's just not as fast as it used to be, and my memory not anywhere as good. I was always a person who could remember everything, even playback full conversations in my head. Now I barely remember what I had for dinner a couple days back. This has affected my work as I used to just be abl…

> Also, I find myself having to take notes to come back to later.

I rely on notes too. I'm not sure it's entirely due to my memory getting worse with age. It's also that as you progress to more senior or leadership roles over the course of your career, the rate at which you become interrupted by questions or meetings increases, and the number of different issues you need to juggle also increases. I use my notes as a non-volatile memory to save my current mental state so I can resume after these interrupts.

If I'm coding uninterrupted and in a state of "flow", I can still remember details of my code from years ago.

Cartoon about interrupting a programmer: https://heeris.id.au/2013/this-is-why-you-shouldnt-interrupt...

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#146

Post by nullsense »

irvingprime wrote: post #72

What's it like to be old? My boss is younger than I am and is absolutely sure he knows more about my job than I do, even though I've been doing it since before he was born and he never did it at all. People on TV keep trying to sell me stuff like Metamucil, some new kind of cane or similar silly gadget, or a scam investment, none of which I want. My grandkids can't understand why I can't read things they're holding r…

I'm 32 and already starting to feel this way.

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#147

Post by kinkrtyavimoodh »

Being generally mindful of what you eat and how much you weigh should be second nature to you, not something you start doing frantically when you are 50 pounds overweight.

Weigh yourself at least once a week in a consistent fashion (say, in the morning after peeing and pooping). If you notice your weight drifting up (> 1 lb over long-term baseline) for two weeks, do a quick audit of your diet, cut on excess sugar, carbs etc. until it's back to the baseline.

It's relatively trivial to lose 1-2lbs over a few weeks. But doing it once you are 50 lbs overweight will be one of the hardest things you will do, coz you will feel like shit on most days.

Also, if you have not generally been athletic in your youth, beware of doing extreme bulk-cut cycles to gain muscle in your 30s and later. It's easy to gain fat, hard to gain muscle, and you are much more likely to end up just fat while convincing yourself you are 'bulking'.

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#148

Post by nullsense »

snomad wrote: post #82
gautamcgoel wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you please expand on that advice? What should we be paying attention to?

I like Dan Millman's lesson in a Peaceful Warrior What time is it? Now Where are you? Here

I really like the scene in the movie where Socrates throws him off the bridge and Dan flips out and Socrates simply responds something along the lines "but while you were flying through the air your mind was completely focused on one thing. You even had a name for it: arghhhh!"

Man that book was epic when I discovered it all those years ago. Especially since I had a habit of visiting gas stations at odd hours of the night too.

Re: Ask HN: What is it like to be old? What advice would you give to younger people?

#150

Post by NaOH »

What stands out to me as I’ve aged are the people I’ve known, the memories of experiences with them, and the times I’ve given and received the kinds of help which benefit lives. None of these things compel me to words of reminiscence, but remembering them brings feelings of grace and gratitude.
Post reply on HN