What happens when your career becomes your whole identity • Hacker News Board

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#61

Post by randycupertino » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:18 PM UTC

hackworks wrote: post #24

Analogous to “putting all eggs in a single basket”, the risks are very high. You end up becoming hyper sensitive at work, start taking everything personal -well, it is your identity or ego at stake. Leads be becoming very closed, guarded and aggressive. Everyday becomes a fight for survival. I personally went through this phase for a long time. Looking back, some of my managers exploited this by reinforcing. They kne…

Same thing happened to me. I realized that I actually do better work now that I'm more chilled out and my life is more balanced.

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#62

Post by lesdeuxmagots » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:21 PM UTC

nugget wrote: post #7

In my experience extreme workaholism can often be a way to avoid or defer major life decisions that someone doesn't want to make or even consciously recognize. High status careers are often structured, full of positive feedback loops, and well compensated, all of which can strengthen the urge to defer existential questions about meaning, purpose, community, and identity until some unspecified future date, even (perha…

That positive feedback loop is one of the key things to watch out for.

Work tends to have many mechanisms which directly links what you put in with positive feedback in a relatively short amount of time, which leads people to optimize for that short term maxima. Putting in more effort, more hours, etc for a positive outcome on a project, a promotion, etc is an easy decision to make, can be almost addicting for many high performers.

However, the neglect that one does to long-term feedback cycles, like not spending enough time with your spouse, children, friends, family, personal hobbies, only manifest negatively in the long run. The investments on the positive side also play out mostly in the long run as well, so the direct feedback cycle isn't quite there.

Using work to get those satisfying consistent wins can have its costs if you aren't deliberate about balancing against investments towards the long term maxima.

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#63

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:23 PM UTC

alexpetralia wrote: post #44

nugget wrote: post #7

In my experience extreme workaholism can often be a way to avoid or defer major life decisions that someone doesn't want to make or even consciously recognize. High status careers are often structured, full of positive feedback loops, and well compensated, all of which can strengthen the urge to defer existential questions about meaning, purpose, community, and identity until some unspecified future date, even (perha…

To play devil's advocate, what is to come of deliberating on existential meaning at great length? Do you think you'll find an answer, rationally speaking (that is, using the tools of reason and logic)? Notably, Godel's incompleteness theorems suggest these tools may be insufficient. More specifically, if you try to rationally "justify" what you ought to be doing, you will always be able to - legitimately! - impugn it…

[deleted]

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#64

Post by nugget » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:27 PM UTC

alexpetralia wrote: post #44

nugget wrote: post #7

In my experience extreme workaholism can often be a way to avoid or defer major life decisions that someone doesn't want to make or even consciously recognize. High status careers are often structured, full of positive feedback loops, and well compensated, all of which can strengthen the urge to defer existential questions about meaning, purpose, community, and identity until some unspecified future date, even (perha…

To play devil's advocate, what is to come of deliberating on existential meaning at great length? Do you think you'll find an answer, rationally speaking (that is, using the tools of reason and logic)? Notably, Godel's incompleteness theorems suggest these tools may be insufficient. More specifically, if you try to rationally "justify" what you ought to be doing, you will always be able to - legitimately! - impugn it…

Ignorance may be bliss, but only if you can remain ignorant until the absolute end. I see evidence of a paradox whereby the most powerful analytical minds are able to most effectively construct defensive counter arguments to their own inherent existential needs, allowing them to defer these needs until a criticality is reached and existential crisis manifests as a state of limbic terror which is impossible to ignore. The crisis is ultimately inevitable, and thus the ignorance only temporary, because they are in fact smart enough to realize deep down that something essential is out of balance. A polish psychiatrist named Dabrowski labeled some of these experiences 'positive disintegration' and wrote prolifically about their role in psychosocial development.

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#65

Post by zackmorris » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:31 PM UTC

quotemstr wrote: post #13

This anti-work ethic you see crop up once in a while is delusion. Success comes from perseverance, not idleness or detachment. A few days ago, there was an article from some CEO claiming that you don't need to work hard to succeed. Today, we have an article from HBR cautioning about becoming too invested in one's work. This sentiment is dangerous. It's harmful to teach young people to be cynical, indifferent, and laz…

I almost downvoted your comment but decided not to, since I don't think it's good to do that just because I disagree with someone.

But I see your argument being repeated a lot, especially by successful people and the owner class, basically the people we think of as the top 10% and the 1%.

There are a couple of fallacies with your argument:

The first is that you view the unsuccessful as not hard-working enough. This goes back to the dawn of civilization and notions like republicanism (that some are endowed by the creator to be superior at handling matters of power, finance and government so their vote should take priority over the vote of the plebeian/proletariat) and continued up through feudalism and slavery. We still see it today in gerrymandering, voter suppression and the return of nationalism. It's a way to rationalize inequality by focusing on the individual instead of the system.

Which brings us to the second fallacy, which is that a person's situation is mostly dependent on individual effort. There are numerous studies indicating that upward mobility is falling in the US and around the world:

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/07/social-...

So that the primary indicators of success today are being born into wealth or living in a wealthy community.

Personally, I think we're past a tipping point where wealth inequality is now too large to contain and we're in danger of losing democracy, which could lead to violent revolution and possibly world war III. Short of that, we're looking at the decline and extinction of all threatened species by the end of the century. Concentrated wealth is IMHO the number one threat to civilization and leads to the great problems of our time like underemployment and the failure to address externalities.

That said, I do agree that it's better to persevere than to give up.

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#66

Post by leftyted » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:34 PM UTC

alexpetralia wrote: post #44

nugget wrote: post #7

In my experience extreme workaholism can often be a way to avoid or defer major life decisions that someone doesn't want to make or even consciously recognize. High status careers are often structured, full of positive feedback loops, and well compensated, all of which can strengthen the urge to defer existential questions about meaning, purpose, community, and identity until some unspecified future date, even (perha…

To play devil's advocate, what is to come of deliberating on existential meaning at great length? Do you think you'll find an answer, rationally speaking (that is, using the tools of reason and logic)? Notably, Godel's incompleteness theorems suggest these tools may be insufficient. More specifically, if you try to rationally "justify" what you ought to be doing, you will always be able to - legitimately! - impugn it…

I agree with you that being right about these things isn't possible. As you say, values are not deduced. But being in agreement with yourself is possible and that's really the whole point.

Some people may intuitively fall into agreement with themselves, but most do not.

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#67

Post by echelon » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:35 PM UTC

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #49

echelon wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just curious - what's your financially independent number? Are you factoring in cost of living into your ideal scenario, or is there wiggle room for leisure and travel and the like?

$1M, or $40k annually. My rent is about half of my expenses, but I could downsize to a cheaper place and allocate the freed money for travel and leisure. I don't think I'll stop working once I reach $1M. I'd be more open to alternative work arrangements (e.g., temp contracting gigs) closer to $1.5M, to build in wiggle room. Some costs I haven't accounted for (currently subsidized by my employer), like health care, ma…

What investments or instruments do you plan to put the $1M in to yield $40k/yr? Stocks, bonds, dividends, properties...?

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#68

Post by PopeDotNinja » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:39 PM UTC

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #49

echelon wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just curious - what's your financially independent number? Are you factoring in cost of living into your ideal scenario, or is there wiggle room for leisure and travel and the like?

$1M, or $40k annually. My rent is about half of my expenses, but I could downsize to a cheaper place and allocate the freed money for travel and leisure. I don't think I'll stop working once I reach $1M. I'd be more open to alternative work arrangements (e.g., temp contracting gigs) closer to $1.5M, to build in wiggle room. Some costs I haven't accounted for (currently subsidized by my employer), like health care, ma…

Will that cover health insurance & expenses? That stuff gets pricey fast.

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#69

Post by abj » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:40 PM UTC

Winterflow3r wrote: post #46

marnett wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How so?

Threw myself head first into 80+ hour weeks of work, career climbing etc to avoid dealing with issues (incl. some trauma) I had since childhood. Told myself I'd be "married to my work", because while people leave you, money lasts longer. Gained some modest success, but woke up after 5+ years to the realisation that no matter how much I worked, none of the success, money or appreciation from peers would ever feel what…

Thank you for sharing. If you don't mind me asking, what helped after you had the realization?

Re: What happens when your career becomes your whole identity

#70

Post by JMTQp8lwXL » Sat, Dec 28, 2019, 7:41 PM UTC

echelon wrote: post #67

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$1M, or $40k annually. My rent is about half of my expenses, but I could downsize to a cheaper place and allocate the freed money for travel and leisure. I don't think I'll stop working once I reach $1M. I'd be more open to alternative work arrangements (e.g., temp contracting gigs) closer to $1.5M, to build in wiggle room. Some costs I haven't accounted for (currently subsidized by my employer), like health care, ma…

What investments or instruments do you plan to put the $1M in to yield $40k/yr? Stocks, bonds, dividends, properties...?

U.S. large cap (S&P 500), international stocks, some individual public companies (RSUs/ESPP), some bonds. I don't own any real estate.