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Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

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Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#781

Post by jobigoud »

billfruit wrote: post #148
yaman12 wrote: post #19

Learn a another human language. You don’t have to be good at it or even able to converse. Languages are systems of thinking as much as they are systems of communication. Some thoughts only make sense in a given language! The process of learning a language builds cognitive skills and perhaps fights cognitive decline. If you have absolutely no “ear” for human language start with Esperanto and work your way to additiona…

I would perhaps recommend Latin, because it has a huge and rich literature, and uses essentially the same script as English.

I don't know the numbers but I would assume there is more literature in French and Spanish by now, and more diverse.

To learn a language effectively it's important to be able to immerse yourself in it. Youtube with auto transcripts, Netflix w/ subtitles, news in written form, chatting with native speakers in a language exchange by texting or skype, tutoring, etc. Once your reach A1-A2 level by any traditional mean, you will have a lot of options to get to fluency.

Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#782

Post by jobigoud »

voidmain0001 wrote: post #230
gh0t1 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would suggest using a French or Canadian person.

Agreed. My language learning skyrocketed once I forced myself to only converse in the language. Regrettably for that you need to have native language speakers available which was something I was able to avail myself of.

Online tutoring platforms like iTalki have tutors from all over the place. Including in countries with vastly different cost of life. For spanish for example you can get an hour of one-to-one tutoring with a pro teacher for less than $10. Lots of teachers from Venezuela for example where this is more than the average monthly salary.

Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#783

Post by boring_twenties »

sharadov wrote: post #613
boring_twenties wrote: post #569

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."

Working my way down that list!

I suggest reordering some of the items.

Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#784

Post by dynamite-ready »

andrewzah wrote: post #394
oh-4-fucks-sake wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I understand how many people dislike cooking, I guess. For me, it's a very creative, relaxing, rewarding, (and necessary) process in my life. For me, it's like coding, but with ingredients. Take a bunch of relatively trivial components, and combine them creatively into something complex, useful, even beautiful--inspiring. You generally follow "industry best practices", but there's plenty of room for interpret…

It’s like coding but with none of the frustrations. You can’t get stuck midway because you have an incompatible version of carrots. All you need is ingredients and a good repertoire of recipes to draw from.

Well, yes... But once compiled, you can never make a change and rebuild!

Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#785

Post by mackrevinack »

asdff wrote: post #775
cactus2093 wrote: post #634

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the sound of this but what does it look like in practice? By "arise early" are we talking like 4 or 5am, or just early enough to get to the office slightly before 9am and be the first one there by a few minutes? By "jump into the most important tasks of the day", would you consider working out to be one of those? It's important in the long run to do consistently, but on a given day it's not usually what I woul…

For a lot of people, being 'productive' to them means burning the midnight oil which is hardly actually productive. If you do things when you are alert it makes them more effective. It also gives you the rest of the day to just breath and not be hard on yourself for getting tired and your performance faltering throughout the day; after all you got all that stuff done earlier. Ever have a weekend when you got everythi…

for me it depends on what I'm doing. if its something creative then i find I get better results late at night. if its more technical then early in the morning.

the quote from hemmingway "write drunk, edit sober" comes to mind, if you replace drunk with tired

Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#787

Post by sjapkee »

langitbiru wrote: post #223

Here are what I am learning in 2020. I try to be a holistic person. So I am learning technical skills, business skills, and social skills. Technical: Blockchain programming (mostly on Ethereum). I believe Ethereum is the future. Programmable money. How cool is that? However if you think blockchain is fad, you could replace it with cybersecurity. Business: Corporate finance (stocks, bonds, future contracts, options, e…

[flagged]

Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#788

Post by bashwizard »

Hitton wrote: post #473
dfansteel wrote: post #446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cook or eat left overs 6 nights a week at this point. Beyond saving a massive amount of money it's shocking how much better the steak I make myself is than one I can get out. Most cities have kitchen equipment stores (not just Bed Bath) that actually have cooking courses you can take. Now "home made pasta" starts with flour and eggs.

Saving massive amount of money? Judging just from demographic that uses hackernews (mostly tech workers), I think it's actually cheaper to eat out if you measure price of your time by how much money would you earn in that time while working compared to shopping for the ingredients, cooking and doing dishes.

Even if I charge $250/hour I'll still save both money and time when doing grocery shopping and meal prepping every sunday night. It's not like I'd been working on a sunday night anyway so I can't count those 5-6 hours/month spent on grocery shopping and cooking as a "loss of income".

Re: Ask HN: What Skills to Acquire in 2020?

#789

Post by etherealG »

valtism wrote: post #408
TheHegemon wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would second this. I took up bouldering and it's amazing how much more energy I have. My lower-back pain from sitting has nearly disappeared. It's a true full-body workout (including the brain).

It's not so good for lower body or cardio. Supplementing it with something like cycling can really help get the whole shebang.

While I agree supplementing with cycling or running is great, on the boulders if you’re too “top heavy” try focusing on “wobbly” problems more. Find a gym with a slab wall, and practice balance style climbing where you don’t need strength in the arms & shoulders. Doing that regularly will balance out the legs portion easily if biking or running isn’t your thing.
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