Ask HN: Do you feel like you're missing out? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Do you feel like you're missing out?

#71

Post by andrea_sdl » Sun, May 24, 2015, 5:55 PM UTC

The missing out sindrome is normal. It's part of growing, and I believe everyone will sooner or later experience in some areas of life.

But this shouldn't fake reality. Dig deeper into the stories of the many rich people and you'll discover passion, devotion, late night work, single men and women, solitude, failure.

Many "overnight" success were planned with lots of work. Don't be fooled. :)

Responding to your question: Yes, I feel like I am missing out a lot. Living in italy I feel like I'm many steps behind the internet world. I'm trying to improve, but there's this voice in my head that keeps telling me that all of this is not important, that our human goal is not competition, is helping the world with our work. Every day that passes reinforce this thought, and I hope one day it will also shut down my fear of missing out forever.

Re: Ask HN: Do you feel like you're missing out?

#72

Post by gumby » Sun, May 24, 2015, 6:22 PM UTC

In the late 70s, as a teen ager, I was disappointed that I was just a little too young to have participated in the computing boom. I got to program big iron, but all the cool stuff had already been done: early computer vision algorithms, hard drives, semiconductors, the "ultimate" papers (i.e. scheme), the ARPAnet, bitmapped display etc. I loved programming but wondered if really there was anything exciting ahead or if it would now be just more of the same.

My model was of how physics had had an astounding boom from about the 1880s-1940s (roughly Maxwell->semiconductor), and then it just got hard for a small number of people to make big changes.

Of course that was foolish: computing is still roughly where mechanical engineering was in the late 1800s: lots of lore, much disastrous failure, but a marvelous cambrian explosion of experimentation and development of theory.

Re: Ask HN: Do you feel like you're missing out?

#73

Post by akhilcacharya » Mon, May 25, 2015, 2:23 AM UTC

Short answer - yes.

I'm not entirely convinced that there is anything to miss out on, but if there was, I'm certain that I'm missing it.

I attribute this to geography - I live 2,842 miles from the Valley and don't go to a feeder school for the Valley - the cultural gap is too great.

Re: Ask HN: Do you feel like you're missing out?

#74

Post by dcarmo » Mon, May 25, 2015, 1:07 PM UTC

ljk wrote: post #64

fsloth wrote: post #38

Dude, do you realize there are areas on earth where inhouse toilet and running potable water are luxuries? Besides,studies have shown that a) Financial income above a specific fairly low and professionally attainable threshold does not bring any more happiness (70k a year or so) b) most happiness peoples experience per achievements are due to achieved intrinsic goals (art, science, learning to play the piano, whateve…

It's funny that I've quit social websites like twitter/fb(only checking messages, not obsessing over people's statuses) but I just spend more time on hn and read about way smarter people writing about way cooler things, I guess in a sense it's more enriching, but also in a way still feeling like OP..

I did the same thing and ended up with the same feeling.

Re: Ask HN: Do you feel like you're missing out?

#75

Post by StefanBG » Tue, May 26, 2015, 2:37 AM UTC

JDDunn9 wrote: post #11

I've been there. It took me a while to figure out that the media manufactures stories to get eyeballs. Do some digging and you'll find a different story. Once you know the translation key, it is much less envious. - Overnight success => Decade of work - Owner is worth an estimated $100 million => Owner is saving for a couch (Kevin Rose said this after his cover story in a magazine) - Innovative idea => Ripped off a c…

- Overnight success => Decade of work = Even what Appears to be an Overnight success (Facebook/Instagram) was developed by people who worked on their craft for years.

- Owner is worth an estimated $100 million = On Paper which he can not really sell

- Innovative idea => ..Better Marketing = Great Ideas and Products don't always win out. Just look at VCR

....Lied/cheated/stole = BUT You Don't Have To