I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected • Hacker News Board

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

#401

Post by dpoochieni » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 3:57 AM UTC

kcb wrote: post #164

turk73 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should throw out all the games. I'm serious. I never really began to succeed until I stopped playing stupid games and became a man. Now I'm managing younger guys who can't put down the controller. Last fall I had to fire someone who was clearly staying up all night playing video games and was never prepared for work nor doing an adequate job at it. Sadly, his own sense of privilege prevented him from being able t…

I never really began to succeed until I stopped playing stupid games and became a man. Nice work. You're so manly now.

More than some.

I think he triggered some people because they know he is right, he has lived both sides unlike your common gaming addict with no real breaks in their activity for years.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by bitexploder » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 4:28 AM UTC

vagab0nd wrote: post #381

bitexploder wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you see using the knowledge that you are smart to your advantage in a given field? You still have to do the work? (my line of thinking is something like: You produce what you produce in your field. To me the effort you put in matters the most. Smart is a meta quality to your work)

Yes it is a meta quality, and that's why it's not irrelevant. For instance, when told something is "hard", you can calibrate yourself on what that means. You also get the correct sense of what's possible and what's not, in what amount of time. This helps a ton with planning and decision making.

Thanks for clarifying. I am not sure how important it is to know you are “smart” vs just doing what comes natural in a given situation. It’s just how you will work problems. But I do think there is something there, about being Meta-analytical. I think good leaders have this. The ability to be two feet above a battlefield. I am not convinced it’s completely even a “smart” thing so much as a distinct problem solving methodology that works well (which might just make you smart based on the observables). I am rambling, anyhow. This was a cool thread in general.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by headsupftw » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 5:27 AM UTC

ken wrote: post #304

microtonal wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was your criteria for choosing the city you are in presently? We lived in Tübingen (Germany) for five years. But the city was just a tad too small for my taste. There are only few stores (outside tourism-focused stores) and it there is fairly little to do in terms of concerts, etc. It is part of the Stuttgart metropolitan area, so there are a lot of work opportunities. I loved the scenery of Southern Germany, bu…

> It's really a drag that you can't do groceries on a Sunday, In America I can buy groceries any day of the week, but as someone who often works odd hours, I find it a drag that almost none are open past 10 or 11pm. The buses don't run after midnight~1am, either, so if I need a dozen eggs at 3am, I have to get in my car and drive. I feel that's not the sort of behavior that a city with aspirations should be encouragi…

"In America ... I find it a drag that almost none are open past 10 or 11pm"

I used to live in Atlanta and there was a 24-hour Kroger right across the street from my townhome. One night at 2am, I bought a gas grill at that Kroger on a whim. Good times.

Now I live in Silicon Valley and there are quite a few 24-hour grocery stores according to google map.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by 0815test » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 6:17 AM UTC

motohagiography wrote: post #217

0815test wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Management and leadership involve plenty of problem solving! It's genuinely hard work, not just faffing around - that's just the stereotype that prevails among people who have never been in a management role in the first place. For one thing, if you're in management, there's probably a higher-level manager that you're accountable to! Funny how people seem to forget this.

So the problems you solve in management are how to get people to solve problems, not the physical/logical problems themselves. It's not faffing around, and it's a higher level of abstraction, arguably something gifted people would be good at if they hadn't been trained to solve problems like a super IC.

You specifically said that management doesn't involve "talent", "problem solving", "intelligence" or "creativity". And often the best managers are people who are just as familiar with the physical/logical domain as the concrete "problem solvers" - after all, much of the difficulty of "getting people to solve problems" is things like knowing when to call BS on someone vs. when there's an actual issue that's gumming up the work and that one should deploy resources on. Stuff that's way too hard unless you actually grok what's going on.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by ido » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 7:06 AM UTC

enraged_camel wrote: post #364

redisman wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's mostly job security. I've worked on many technologies that I really enjoyed despite the flaws that every tech has (Flash for example) that have 0 jobs 10 years later.

On the other hand, if you are a COBOL expert today, you will be in high demand and will make enormous amounts of money.

For a while! Probably a better position for a 55 year old developer to be in than a 25 year old one.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by ido » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 7:12 AM UTC

microtonal wrote: post #290

cheschire wrote: post #196

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Smaller cities present issues in Germany (and Europe as a whole) for a multitude of reasons, for example healthcare[0], reliable bandwidth, older populations[1], etc. Choosing a small city with a train station, however, can dramatically improve your access to most of these things as the trains typically imply population, which typically begets services such as internet, pharmacies, etc. So honestly my first recommend…

Smaller cities present issues in Germany (and Europe as a whole) for a multitude of reasons, for example healthcare[0], reliable bandwidth, older populations[1], etc. Well, Nentershausen is very small ;). We had weekends with friends in Nentershausen for a couple of years. It's a village, not a city. I was more thinking along the lines of (random Dutch/German university cities): Heidelberg, Tübingen, Ulm, Erlangen, N…

I've had good experience in the outskirts of Berlin.

It's a big city but it's so spread out that living in one of the outlying districts can be like living in a small town near a big city (in many ways Berlin feels more like an agglomeration of many smaller cities than e.g. Vienna).

It's also (still) a relatively affordable city, especially outside the central districts.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by ido » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 7:46 AM UTC

simmanian wrote: post #362

cheez wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't say I pushed them in a positive way :) Sometimes they need their heads pounded figuratively. But generally, I talk to them about their goals and ask them if they really want them. Usually the answer is yes. Then I say something like "Are you willing to give up some play time with fortnite (or equivalent)" to achieve your goal? Usually the answer is yes. Then I ask them how they will know they are getting clo…

How old are your kids? My worry is that if I do this with my future kids they'll simply tell me what I want to hear since they won't have developed a clear understanding of what they want in life and what's possible to do in life.

just knowing that you care & realising that they have the agency to choose what it is they want out of life is already a plus.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by BlueTemplar » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 8:15 AM UTC

jdefr89 wrote: post #322

nestorherre wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You should throw out all the games. I'm serious. I never really began to succeed until I stopped playing stupid games and became a man. I feel related to this comment and I think I know what you mean, and it's most likely that the other guys are misunderstanding you. And obviously, the guy "beta testing a new optimization to play and be productive" is having addiction issues. What I relate to is that most of my life…

There is obviously a balance. If you get a lot of joy from gaming and still lead a productive life you should keep gaming. The "work all day everyday do nothing else!" mindset is destroying our society and causing depression/addiction. Too much of anything (yes even work) is simply not good for you. Balance is so important and yet it is almost like everyone has abandoned it for a radical mindset. It is like you canno…

"Finding balance" might be a pipe dream and a trap when someone is struggling with addiction...

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by mnky9800n » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 10:04 AM UTC

Consultant32452 wrote: post #299

nugget wrote: post #208

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I would argue that as University education has scaled up and become commoditized, the value of a generic degree as a signaling function has decreased, and that in response the value of matriculation to a top school has only increased. Schools are just brands and become an extension of the personal brands of their students and alums. Unless you're studying a hard science or similar, I'd bet that the value of lower ran…

I think education is going to radically change in the next decade or so. Online education is going to come up to par with the greatest of institutions. The missing link is the actual credential. The signal of the end of education as we knew it in the past is when a wealthy/powerful person comes out and endorses one of these things in a real way. For example, if Elon Musk comes out and says SpaceX considers a cert fro…

People have been saying this about most new technology for a long time. Between the printing press and the television this isn't new. The University abides.

Re: I Grew Up Gifted, but My Life Didn’t Turn Out the Way I Expected

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Post by theelous3 » Sat, Jun 01, 2019, 10:09 AM UTC

I think just leaving your kid to compete normally is the best option. Don't skip grades, only put them in summer classes and advanced classes if the explicitly ask for it. If a kid actually is extremely intelligent, they should have no problem succeeding amongst their peers. If the additional work given to them isn't their idea, all you're doing is impeding their social life, and status. Don't run around telling them how amazing they are all the time. The creation of an ego starts early, and if your kid is to function happily for the rest of their lives, you want it to be a good one.

As an aside, calling a kid with ADHD neuro atypical is a bit much. I hope the kid doesn't know their parent uses that terminology about them. That could be crushing, or set up a crutch to use in justifying failure, or the perceived lazyness associated with ADHD.