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Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

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Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#21

Post by conceit »

tintor wrote: post #17
ams6110 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if everyone is this way, but at 50 I am losing a little of the starry-eyed excitement. I've seen a lot of the same ideas come around again and again as a new great thing. And yet the pace of change is so fast, if you try to stay current you feel like you never really become an expert in anything. You get jaded. If and when I "retire" I would not see myself not working, but I do think I might do somthing…

> When you would leave the house or office, nobody would be able to get in touch with you and you could do what you wanted to do without interruption or distraction. It was nice. It was nice? You can still leave your phone at home.

apparently, for some, many even, this puts them under some stress and pressure, socially and organisatoric.

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#22

Post by bpchaps »

xirdstl wrote: post #9
bpchaps wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Find a problem to solve in your local community and do what it takes to fix it, no matter how small. You'll learn, do good and get involved with your community more. I recently took six months off to try and solve some local problems. There hasn't been a dull moment. :)

What kind of problems were you working on?

Lots of the work is just me identifying problems that I see and trying to fix them. Most of it is just exploratory and can be stressful at times, but it's overall very rewarding. I just accepted an offer in the infosec field to get out of the stress and to, well, get out of a financial hole.

-Heck of a lot of FOIA requests to get the Chicago mayor's office's phone records.

-Went to a hackathon a couple months back and made a domestic violence shelter map which has since been taken over by a small team of volunteers.

-Got some wrongful parking tickets and started a project to map out Chicago's parking tickets using FOIA data.

-Started setting up a LAN party with some friends which we hope will have 160+ people.

-Freelance work here and there for some cash to help pay the bills.

-Found some security vulnerabilities that could have impacted comcast's network which I helped fix. Did the same with Northwestern, but they didn't fix it.

-Lots and lots of learning of random things.

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#23

Post by Retra »

ams6110 wrote: post #13
nevster wrote: post #10

I'm thinking I'll code till the day I die. So much cool tech is always coming out - so much to play with and invent! I also have very time consuming hobbies - reading, playing video games, pen and paper role playing games, board games.

I don't know if everyone is this way, but at 50 I am losing a little of the starry-eyed excitement. I've seen a lot of the same ideas come around again and again as a new great thing. And yet the pace of change is so fast, if you try to stay current you feel like you never really become an expert in anything. You get jaded. If and when I "retire" I would not see myself not working, but I do think I might do somthing…

There are a lot of unsolved problems in the world, and computers are a great place to explore their potential solutions. I don't really understand this "same ideas come around again and again", because maybe that means you're not properly keeping up with the state of the art. Maybe you should broaden your horizons?

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#24

Post by IndianAstronaut »

nevster wrote: post #10

I'm thinking I'll code till the day I die. So much cool tech is always coming out - so much to play with and invent! I also have very time consuming hobbies - reading, playing video games, pen and paper role playing games, board games.

I worked with a 63 year old who didn't plan on retirement. He was physically and mentally active. Always up to date on new frameworks, languages, etc. He could also pick a new project very rapidly.

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#25

Post by 50CNT »

conceit wrote: post #21
tintor wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When you would leave the house or office, nobody would be able to get in touch with you and you could do what you wanted to do without interruption or distraction. It was nice. It was nice? You can still leave your phone at home.

apparently, for some, many even, this puts them under some stress and pressure, socially and organisatoric.

In which case you need to delineate your channels of access more clearly. Move your main communication to something more asynchronous (email, text, wechat/whatsapp, slack), set a time where things will be checked, and perhaps offer an emergency line over real-time messaging (phone calls fit the bill best).

Most things are not time critical, and a sizable portion of the things that are, are not mission critical.

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#26

Post by somethingsimple »

ams6110 wrote: post #13
nevster wrote: post #10

I'm thinking I'll code till the day I die. So much cool tech is always coming out - so much to play with and invent! I also have very time consuming hobbies - reading, playing video games, pen and paper role playing games, board games.

I don't know if everyone is this way, but at 50 I am losing a little of the starry-eyed excitement. I've seen a lot of the same ideas come around again and again as a new great thing. And yet the pace of change is so fast, if you try to stay current you feel like you never really become an expert in anything. You get jaded. If and when I "retire" I would not see myself not working, but I do think I might do somthing…

I'm 28 and have lost all the starry-eyed excitement :(

I was top of class in college, then advanced in huge strides in the first years of my career; now I just want to go home and read a non-technical book.

I might be burnt out.

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#27

Post by ams6110 »

xirdstl wrote: post #14
waterphone wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Volunteer. There are so many good opportunities most places, you just have to find ones that interest you.

Speaking of which, why hasn't anyone built Uber for volunteers

On-demand volunteers? Hmm.

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#28

Post by ams6110 »

IndianAstronaut wrote: post #24
nevster wrote: post #10

I'm thinking I'll code till the day I die. So much cool tech is always coming out - so much to play with and invent! I also have very time consuming hobbies - reading, playing video games, pen and paper role playing games, board games.

I worked with a 63 year old who didn't plan on retirement. He was physically and mentally active. Always up to date on new frameworks, languages, etc. He could also pick a new project very rapidly.

Had he been in development for 40+ years? Or was it a newer line of work for him?

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#29

Post by firebones »

FWIW, I started this thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12013621 with the hope that we could collect some good examples of how people stay busy after retirement.

A great example for me is Don Melton, formerly of Safari and WebKit, who tweets routinely about his work on video transcoding [1]. I follow him on Twitter (@donmelton) and he gives me hope for any future retirement I might be lucky enough to have.

[1] https://github.com/donmelton/video_transcoding

Re: Why Continuing to Work Is Good for a Man’s Health

#30

Post by andyjdavis »

somethingsimple wrote: post #26
ams6110 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if everyone is this way, but at 50 I am losing a little of the starry-eyed excitement. I've seen a lot of the same ideas come around again and again as a new great thing. And yet the pace of change is so fast, if you try to stay current you feel like you never really become an expert in anything. You get jaded. If and when I "retire" I would not see myself not working, but I do think I might do somthing…

I'm 28 and have lost all the starry-eyed excitement :( I was top of class in college, then advanced in huge strides in the first years of my career; now I just want to go home and read a non-technical book. I might be burnt out.

Entirely possible. When I was about your age I wound up taking off and teaching English to little kids in Thailand. That was a great experience that involved a refreshing amount of time away from a computer.

I was able to pick up my career afterwards easily enough. I actually wound up working on education related software so my little teaching experience may have even helped.

The only lasting (sort of) negative was that I met so many people in Thailand who were living dramatically different lives that the idea of living out the rest of my days in a cubicle become less palatable.

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