21–30 of 34 posts
Looks like a very interesting book, particularly for those of us who are struggling with the fact that we'll never be the success we once thought we would. Thanks! For everyone else, check out the prologue; it's short and a good read.
Wow, my heart sank when I read this comment. The frustrating reality of life...
> When we win, we try for more; when we fail, we cut back. Thanks for sharing this book, OP. I've personally seen this range of ambition in my own life. I can very much relate to this. When I was younger I was always seeking more out of life. Now becoming an adult and struggling as sole-provider of my family and spending many years attending university while trying to help my wife through severe depression and my spe…
Early in my life when I hadn't experienced failure, I used to aspire a lot and actually did achieve quite a bit despite my shortcomings. Programming whilst depressed isn't an easy task. I've been actively trying to get back into the rat race and trying to pursue something achievable yet worth doing.
So while we cut back, we define our limitations and make further goals achievable (rather than moonshots). I'm not going to be the president or a CEO of a $100BN company anytime soon, but it's not like I couldn't cut it as a dev at a decent company.
In failing we realise our limits and rediscover humility.
It looks like this is a web page that then loads a PDF from https://ambition.gratis/ambition.pdf -- to what end I'm not sure, though it did screw with my trying to directly save it into a "read offline later" folder.
> into a "read offline later" folder. I have a "pretend you will read offline later but never actually read" folder.
Looks like a very interesting book, particularly for those of us who are struggling with the fact that we'll never be the success we once thought we would. Thanks! For everyone else, check out the prologue; it's short and a good read.
Besides your success is entirely how look at it. For me, it's waking up another day to a wonderful family & friends, anything beyond that is a bonus.
> When we win, we try for more; when we fail, we cut back. Thanks for sharing this book, OP. I've personally seen this range of ambition in my own life. I can very much relate to this. When I was younger I was always seeking more out of life. Now becoming an adult and struggling as sole-provider of my family and spending many years attending university while trying to help my wife through severe depression and my spe…
I feel there's more to this. I've suffered from chronic depression throughout my entire life. The last bout caused me to quit my job and move back to our family home. Early in my life when I hadn't experienced failure, I used to aspire a lot and actually did achieve quite a bit despite my shortcomings. Programming whilst depressed isn't an easy task. I've been actively trying to get back into the rat race and trying…
I was just like this too. I would have preferred experiencing more failure when I was younger when the risks held less consequences. Now I feel like I never met the expectations of my former self but now my future aspirations are more achievable. Rather than running my own business like I always wanted to do or working for a big-name tech company, I'll be happy when I self-publish the book I'm working on with no expectation of it being successful. I am happy with progress since progress is better than failure and doesn't have the same negative consequences when I don't succeed.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I feel there's more to this. I've suffered from chronic depression throughout my entire life. The last bout caused me to quit my job and move back to our family home. Early in my life when I hadn't experienced failure, I used to aspire a lot and actually did achieve quite a bit despite my shortcomings. Programming whilst depressed isn't an easy task. I've been actively trying to get back into the rat race and trying…
> Early in my life when I hadn't experienced failure, I used to aspire a lot and actually did achieve quite a bit despite my shortcomings I was just like this too. I would have preferred experiencing more failure when I was younger when the risks held less consequences. Now I feel like I never met the expectations of my former self but now my future aspirations are more achievable. Rather than running my own business…
For sure, we need to keep moving. I like to compare us to sharks, if we stand still we exponentially increase our chances of failing.
I'd love to read that book of yours once it's done. Taking care of the two most important people in your life whilst juggling a career is no easy task.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow, my heart sank when I read this comment. The frustrating reality of life...
Define success. It's impossible for everyone to be way above average. Is it so bad to be a jack of all trades? A good husband, good father and good community member, instead of world domination of some e-commerce area that would have happened anyway? I'm not saying give up, I'm just saying if we were all Steve Jobs (not to pick on him I've no idea if he was/was not a "good" person) it would be a mad world.
It looks like this is a web page that then loads a PDF from https://ambition.gratis/ambition.pdf -- to what end I'm not sure, though it did screw with my trying to directly save it into a "read offline later" folder.
hi syntheticnature, thank you for taking the time to provide this feedback. i am sorry about the website. frontend is still kind of voodoo to me, even as a software engineer. i wanted my grandfather to be able to see his book on his nurse's ipad. i tried pdf.js but the version i selected seemed to not work with iOS devices for some reason. if you have a better idea for how to deliver the pdf to the ipad, i would welc…
It looks like this is a web page that then loads a PDF from https://ambition.gratis/ambition.pdf -- to what end I'm not sure, though it did screw with my trying to directly save it into a "read offline later" folder.
hi syntheticnature, thank you for taking the time to provide this feedback. i am sorry about the website. frontend is still kind of voodoo to me, even as a software engineer. i wanted my grandfather to be able to see his book on his nurse's ipad. i tried pdf.js but the version i selected seemed to not work with iOS devices for some reason. if you have a better idea for how to deliver the pdf to the ipad, i would welc…