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Let's talk openly about depression

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Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#21

Post by cylinder »

gc123 wrote: post #3

As someone who does the tech 9-5, I've found it difficult to make small talk/form deeper relationships with people outside of tech. Conversations often tend to die off after the initial "What do you do? Oh that's cool..." or "About that weather we've been having..." Any tips on expanding your network outside of tech?

I think what has happened is that people have become averse to and afraid of making set, hard plans to socializing. It's always "let's exchange numbers/Facebook and get a coffee sometime." Or I'll see you around.

We know how connected we are and how easy it is, so we don't set hard plans. Better to defer the potential rejection or obligation.

If it weren't so easy to connect there'd be more pressure to just set a hard time and calendar it right?

Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#22

Post by sndean »

lowglow wrote: post #2

Living for your dream isn't a walk in the park, so it's important to build up a network of people you trust and can talk to. Anyone that wants to talk about entrepreneurship, building, whatever and depression just hit me up online or available for coffee whenever in SF. Contact info in my profile. Reach out. :)

> it's important to build up a network of people you trust and can talk to.

From my experience with a lot of family, friends, classmates, coworkers, I agree that this can really help out someone who's depressed (PTSD too).

Texts or email sent back and forth, meeting up for dinner, coffee, or a beer have all seemed to help. Getting them a light box has helped, if they use it..

Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#24

Post by taurath »

lowglow wrote: post #2

Living for your dream isn't a walk in the park, so it's important to build up a network of people you trust and can talk to. Anyone that wants to talk about entrepreneurship, building, whatever and depression just hit me up online or available for coffee whenever in SF. Contact info in my profile. Reach out. :)

Any advice to building a network when at small startups with most people older than you?

Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#26

Post by onion2k »

taurath wrote: post #24
lowglow wrote: post #2

Living for your dream isn't a walk in the park, so it's important to build up a network of people you trust and can talk to. Anyone that wants to talk about entrepreneurship, building, whatever and depression just hit me up online or available for coffee whenever in SF. Contact info in my profile. Reach out. :)

Any advice to building a network when at small startups with most people older than you?

Don't assume too much about people. Someone twice your age might have twice as much experience with the problem you're facing. Anyone can be a useful part of your network.

Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#27

Post by mercer »

lowglow wrote: post #2

Living for your dream isn't a walk in the park, so it's important to build up a network of people you trust and can talk to. Anyone that wants to talk about entrepreneurship, building, whatever and depression just hit me up online or available for coffee whenever in SF. Contact info in my profile. Reach out. :)

I'd extend the same to anyone in the, uh, NL area. Perhaps we should set up an IRC channel specifically for this? Or does one already exist?

Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#28

Post by mercer »

0xcde4c3db wrote: post #16
lowglow wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take a genuine interest in what others find passion in, and you'll find making friends is easier than you think. A good start would be replacing "What do you do?" with "What do you love to do?" or "What are you passionate about?" :) Good luck!

I find the idea that once can just consciously decide to "take a genuine interest in" something to be entirely alien. Is this something that most people are able to do? I can direct my attention toward something, but that doesn't make boring subjects interesting.

I've found that few things that people are passionate about are truly boring, especially to curious hacker types like myself.

The difficult part is to find that part of the subject, even if it's just a kernel, that triggers the interest you potentially have. This can take a while, sometimes. Perhaps reading up on how to interview people can help in this regard (it's helped me!).

In my case, but I suspect this is true for most humans, my 'genuine interest' activates once the 'human interest' angle, to put it vaguely, starts appearing. Probably because that's easier to relate to.

I hate talking about football, for example, but I've had wonderful conversations with football fans once they started sharing personal stories of things they experienced, adventures they had, or stories of how they used to go to games with their fathers, and how this was one of the few ways in which to connect with them, etc. In the process, I learned some interesting things about football too, but that wasn't really the point for me.

Over time some of these football fans became close friends of mine. We don't talk about football much nowadays, because it's clear that I find the topic mind-numbingly boring. But we do still talk about dads, and that's very valuable.

Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#29

Post by wcummings »

gc123 wrote: post #3

As someone who does the tech 9-5, I've found it difficult to make small talk/form deeper relationships with people outside of tech. Conversations often tend to die off after the initial "What do you do? Oh that's cool..." or "About that weather we've been having..." Any tips on expanding your network outside of tech?

Smile, nod, laugh

Re: Let's talk openly about depression

#30

Post by Natanael_L »

projektir wrote: post #7
lowglow wrote: post #2

Living for your dream isn't a walk in the park, so it's important to build up a network of people you trust and can talk to. Anyone that wants to talk about entrepreneurship, building, whatever and depression just hit me up online or available for coffee whenever in SF. Contact info in my profile. Reach out. :)

Does private messaging on HN require some amount of karma or is it simply not supported?

The only option is whatever contact method listed on the profile page of the person you want to contact, if any.
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