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

Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

971–980 of 1001 posts

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#971

Post by mk30 »

wmil wrote: post #866
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #617

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's quite simple: there are many more men in the Bay than women I’m in Manhattan. The single sex ratio is reversed. (More single women than men.) Male FAANG employee rants about how they should be magnets for women, but can’t find a date because something is wrong with all women, are equally prevalent here. They’re all (a) the same rant and (b) as boring as the last one. There’s a selection effect among well-paid…

> That or these jobs turn interesting people into those who believe they should be magnets for the opposite sex, which tends to be a turn-off for most people. Tech selects for people who are object focussed as opposed to people focussed. Most women prefer to date men who are good at wooing and entertaining them. Which means more people focussed than object focussed. The tech men are frustrated because they are basica…

"Realistically they can't develop those skills easily."

software skills can't be developed easily either, yet programmers have powered through, persevered, and figured it out. where would programmers be if they shied away from skills they couldn't develop easily?

also, if you have underdeveloped social skills, you are not 'basically your best self'. i believe in the tech men! i believe that they can put their cleverness & perseverance to work developing their social skills! you can do it!

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#972

Post by mk30 »

Zenbit_UX wrote: post #523
NeverFade wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Engineers in places like SFBA severely underestimate how attractive they would be anywhere else in the country/world. I agree completely. > Her exes and her friends' husbands are shockingly anti-intellectual, didn't attend college, have some substance abuse issues, and/or make well under 6 figures. Here's what happened: Guys who are intellectual, attended college, have good discipline, and stayed away from substanc…

> she'd find at least one guy who is an exec or VC making 7 figures per year, and it would usually be a match. > "120k/year"? You'd make her laugh. I don't understand this fixation on earnings, I wasn't making half that when I found my partner. Making 7 figures won't get you a girlfriend, but thinking it will makes it likely any partner you do find won't stick around long. One of two things are happening, either a, a…

ding ding ding: "Making 7 figures won't get you a girlfriend, but thinking it will makes it likely any partner you do find won't stick around long."

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#973

Post by mk30 »

darkerside wrote: post #463
NeverFade wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's true the male/female ratios are worse The fact that there are way more men than women in the Bay is a statistical reality, which you admit yourself. Then you bring an opinion blog-post by a single woman as counter-evidence. Ironically, all these complaints about "guys there that have a disgusting sense of entitlement" just go to show how picky she is, and can afford to be, in San Francisco. Nothing in GP's pos…

> guys who would be considered attractive and desirable in most other locations Your conception of what women are looking for in a man might not hew as closely to reality as you think.

this right here: "Your conception of what women are looking for in a man might not hew as closely to reality as you think."

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#974

Post by mk30 »

svincel wrote: post #889
uwuhn wrote: post #860

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being tall is a huge advantage. Over 6' is tall in the Bay. So is being white. Don't sell yourself short.

The parent commenter doesn't realize just how large of an advantage this is. There's lots of empirical evidence demonstrating that height is one of the strongest preferences women have for men. I have personally made fake dating profiles with the same pictures/bio, but different heights here in the Bay Area. The 5'6 profile did not get a single like in a week. The 6'4 profile had inbound interest from a wide variety…

a programmer friend of mine used to date online. he's not a tall guy and he was convinced that he would never get a date let alone a girlfriend... he started dating offline & has now been with his gf for a number of years! online isn't the only way to go.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#975

Post by mk30 »

0x262d wrote: post #931
wpietri wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I've only lived in the bay area 20 years, but this strikes me as quite dramatic. I know literally dozens of men in tech happily raising families in the Bay Area. It's true the male/female ratios are worse (although we should certainly adjust for the large gay male population). But when I talk to friends who are dating, it's the women who seem to be struggling to find anybody decent, not the men. Perhaps the p…

The latent shallow male entitlement is gross. However, there is a valid point made that if all the single, unhappy men became cool and attractive, many would statistically still be out of luck. So my suggestion is that in addition to becoming interesting, learning about feminism, etc, they should also recognize the statistical disadvantage as the socioeconomic problem it is, and fight those broader socioeconomic cond…

i agree with all of this.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#976

Post by MiroF »

thedaemon wrote: post #955
MiroF wrote: post #947

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you must be new here

I'm just horrible with acronyms because I work in IT and the health industry, previous the security industry. They all have acronyms and the same acronyms. So they all mean different things to different people. Acronyms are a lazy person writing and you have to be "in the know" to know what they stand for. 100 years from now, no one will be able to understand them.

"communicate so that everything you say can be understood 100 years from now" seems like a terrible standard to hold conversation to.

What is "IT", by the way?

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#978

Post by musicale »

Sounds like you have a pretty good work-life balance. ;-)

In my experience, once you have enough money then friends, family, social life, and pursuing your own interests are a lot more important than working for a company, and far more deserving of your time and attention. As they say, nobody on their deathbed ever says "I wish I'd spent more time at the office."

I don't like the idea of checklists of technologies to learn.

Instead, I like the idea of thinking about important problems that you would like to solve and then investigating technologies that might help you to do so.

I would also consider looking for some more interesting and fun work within Google.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#979

Post by tomxor »

NeverFade wrote: post #458
tomxor wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know some women in the Bay, working in areas like recruiting and marketing, who are dating VCs and CEOs exclusively and consider dating "plain engineers" to be beneath them. That sounds more like bullets dodged than a loss (for the engineers that is).

Sure. If that appeals to you, you're welcome to move to the Bay. You'll dodge so many bullets, that you'll forget what a date with a woman is ;-) More seriously, while we'd love to impose moral views on reality, the simple fact is that when people can afford to be picky, they will be. I don't know what you value in a romantic partner, but for simplicity, let's assume it's looks. If you arrived at some magical island…

I have no idea what your point is... i'm talking about avoiding women who are only interested in money or power, i.e gold diggers - that's not a healthy relationship for anyone.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#980

Post by indiebeers »

thrownaway954 wrote: post #613
md5wasp wrote: post #162

Hi there, I did the exact same thing as you (at Google Sydney), before eventually deciding that I must strike out into the wilderness. In the few years since I left; I worked as a solutions architect managing a team, a team lead, a remote dev, and now in a startup. Front-end, back-end, flip-side, all the ends. So I've been deliberately trying different angles of my career to see what suits. I'd describe this process…

"If you stay at Google, make the most of it by progressing deliberately in your social life. If I'd've stayed, I could have comfortably raised some kids with my wife by now - but that's still on the todo list." THIS all the way. When we are young, we think that we will be remembered by the company that we worked for and the people that we worked with. The sad truth is that in 99.9999% none of those people will rememb…

I'm so sorry to hear this. If you ever need a non-judgemental stranger to talk, please feel free to message me (temp email robbrobsonnn@gmail.com) and I'll respond on my real one.

Things can always get better.

Post reply on HN