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Time anxiety: is it too late?

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Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#11

Post by overcast »

Ancalagon wrote: post #8
overcast wrote: post #5

Welp, this article can't have come at a more appropriate time in my life. Definitely struggling with these exact thoughts, constantly. Finding something meaningful, and rewarding to be a part of has become obsessive. Always thinking I'm wasting time if I'm not somehow maximizing it, with the end result being I spend more time worrying about it than actually doing it.

Maybe you're like me, maybe not, but meditation and CBT helps with this a bit. Also - and I'm gonna say this may make your anxiety better, it may make it worse - think about the most influential people in the last 100 years: Einstein, Turing, FDR, Obama, etc. Now think about the most influential people in last 1,000, then the last 10,000. How many people can you name from over a thousand years ago (hopefully you're n…

Thanks for the response, I've taken up meditation for the last couple of weeks. Definitely helps clear my head, at least for a short period of time. I'm really not concerned about being known throughout history, my only goal is that by the end of my life, I feel like I've done something fulfilling and rewarding enough to warrant the incredibly good fortune I've had being born during this time, to this family, in this part of the world.

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#12

Post by Ancalagon »

overcast wrote: post #11
Ancalagon wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you're like me, maybe not, but meditation and CBT helps with this a bit. Also - and I'm gonna say this may make your anxiety better, it may make it worse - think about the most influential people in the last 100 years: Einstein, Turing, FDR, Obama, etc. Now think about the most influential people in last 1,000, then the last 10,000. How many people can you name from over a thousand years ago (hopefully you're n…

Thanks for the response, I've taken up meditation for the last couple of weeks. Definitely helps clear my head, at least for a short period of time. I'm really not concerned about being known throughout history, my only goal is that by the end of my life, I feel like I've done something fulfilling and rewarding enough to warrant the incredibly good fortune I've had being born during this time, to this family, in this…

Well my point with that response was more of: by who's metric are you measuring your warranting being here? If it isn't history's, then I think it should be your own. And if its your own, I really believe as long as you put in a good effort - not even necessarily your best effort all the time - then that should be good enough. A higher sense of purpose is excellent but you also have to understand that life is really weird and almost never works out how you expect it to.

But I'm guessing you already know all of that. At this point its probably more about moving your own metric and zeroing in on what you want to do.

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#13

Post by bumby »

CalRobert wrote: post #4

I believe the word for this is Torschlusspanik https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Torschlusspanik - and sums it up nicely. I'm a kind of morbid person by nature, but the more time goes on the more I realize that awareness of my mortality is helpful for getting me off my ass to get things done. Not necessarily work, just life in general. I wanted to live abroad "someday" and finally tried it when I was 30 (in the nick of…

I think there's a stoic principle of "Memento mori" -- remind yourself that you'll die so that you can make the most of your life now.

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#15

Post by programmerdude »

hinkley wrote: post #3

I know there are some people disproving parts of Malcolm Gladwell's theories, but sometime in the last year or two it occurred to me that one of the consequences of the 10,000 hours theory is that you actually have time to get expert-level good at three or four things in your life even if you spent part of it 'fucking around'. I've expanded that into a philosophy about 'Software eats the world": the only way that doe…

As a software eng who has always had a lot of hobbies, it's almost alienating how so many people in the office are only into TV shows, super hero movies, sci fi books, video games... It's like, there's a whole world out there people!

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#16

Post by ksdale »

hinkley wrote: post #3

I know there are some people disproving parts of Malcolm Gladwell's theories, but sometime in the last year or two it occurred to me that one of the consequences of the 10,000 hours theory is that you actually have time to get expert-level good at three or four things in your life even if you spent part of it 'fucking around'. I've expanded that into a philosophy about 'Software eats the world": the only way that doe…

I would take it even farther than that and say that people vastly overestimate the time it takes to get good at most things. It might take 10,000 hours (or more) to be considered an expert pianist, but you could spend a tenth that much time getting good enough to impress everyone you know with a few songs at parties, and with just 50 hours of practice, you'll be better at the piano than basically everyone you know (you might not be "good", but a lot of people are also easily impressed, if impressing people is your thing.)

I think this is true of practically everything that we don't personally make a profession of. A few tens of hours doing carpentry, fiddling with plumbing, or hooking up electronics, and you'll seem super handy to someone with no experience. What passes for expert-level in a lot of arenas is more like what an actual expert would consider passing familiarity, but passing familiarity is enough to feel good and to be really helpful to your community in a lot of circumstances.

I agree completely about hobbies. I think I read somewhere long ago that we ended up with a zillion apps for ordering food because that's the kind of thing that college kids think about. If we all learn a lot more about a lot of things, we'll end up with a much more interesting tech-ecosystem.

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#17

Post by deltron3030 »

hinkley wrote: post #3

I know there are some people disproving parts of Malcolm Gladwell's theories, but sometime in the last year or two it occurred to me that one of the consequences of the 10,000 hours theory is that you actually have time to get expert-level good at three or four things in your life even if you spent part of it 'fucking around'. I've expanded that into a philosophy about 'Software eats the world": the only way that doe…

You'll need less hours for your second thing if there are concepts that you can translate, or if you maybe start with a third thing in between that can be a bridge between the other things.

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#18

Post by Grzegrzolka »

programmerdude wrote: post #15
hinkley wrote: post #3

I know there are some people disproving parts of Malcolm Gladwell's theories, but sometime in the last year or two it occurred to me that one of the consequences of the 10,000 hours theory is that you actually have time to get expert-level good at three or four things in your life even if you spent part of it 'fucking around'. I've expanded that into a philosophy about 'Software eats the world": the only way that doe…

As a software eng who has always had a lot of hobbies, it's almost alienating how so many people in the office are only into TV shows, super hero movies, sci fi books, video games... It's like, there's a whole world out there people!

Serious question, what other hobbies can one have?

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#19

Post by dcolkitt »

Personally speaking, the biggest specter for time anxiety is age-related cognitive decline. Unfortunately it happens much earlier than most people think. Especially with regards to both creativity and fluid intelligence.

Tech entrepreneurs are disproportionately clustered at 20-34. The probability of making a major scientific discovery starts declining at 40. Poets peak in their early 40s, and novelists not much longer after that. Mathematicians and physicists may on average peak as early as their late 20s.

Anyway as someone in their mid-30s, who would still like to accomplish a lot more than what I have so far, this has been bothering me a lot lately. I'm happy to hear any perspective that others have here.

[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/work-pe...

Re: Time anxiety: is it too late?

#20

Post by tayo42 »

Grzegrzolka wrote: post #18
programmerdude wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a software eng who has always had a lot of hobbies, it's almost alienating how so many people in the office are only into TV shows, super hero movies, sci fi books, video games... It's like, there's a whole world out there people!

Serious question, what other hobbies can one have?

There's so many where do you even start? Arts, sports, cooking, reading can all be broken down into probabaly hundreds of things to do
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