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I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

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Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#271

I was incredibly driven about 7 years ago... I was a founder of a startup and had really lofty aspirations. I told my wife that it was very possible that we would be millionaires by the time we hit 40. Fast forward to today and that did not happen. The startup is no more, but mainly due to burnout. We made money and did well, but not well enough. I never made my millions, but did have a substantial aqui-hire opportun…

For last few years, I have been telling myself to take it slow and do what you are doing now. I got a easy but a boring job. I figured this way I will save all my mental energy for my projects after work.

But this is slowly burning me out. The boredom of not doing any real work for 8 hours is soul killing. I do a lot of busy red tape work but it is not intelluctly stimulating.

So now I will do 180 and quit my job in a few months and go indie solo founder route.

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#272
Imagine a takeout pizza restaurant run entirely by one woman. She opens the store in the morning, receives shipments, does food prep, takes orders, makes pizzas, delivers them, closes at night, files paperwork, and cleans up. By the end of the day she only gets a few dozen pizzas to customers. And as she's going to sleep, she tosses and turns, worrying that she didn't get enough done.

Now imagine her sole task for the day was to prep ingredients. How do you think she'd sleep?

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#273

I was incredibly driven about 7 years ago... I was a founder of a startup and had really lofty aspirations. I told my wife that it was very possible that we would be millionaires by the time we hit 40. Fast forward to today and that did not happen. The startup is no more, but mainly due to burnout. We made money and did well, but not well enough. I never made my millions, but did have a substantial aqui-hire opportun…

As someone who has generally tried to take your current approach and has generally been rewarded for it, yours is a refreshing perspective. There's a persistent voice in the back of my head that questions whether I'm acting out of fear, rationality, or just following a happy stasis. It's always reassuring to see the other side of this.

Noone posts about how their startup exploded and took 5 years of savings in their prime money earning years.

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#274

I've been mentoring CS college students and new grad SWEs for a while. It's shocking to see how many of them perpetually feel like they're overwhelmed and short on time, yet they can't account for where they've actually spent their time. It's not uncommon for new grad SWEs to complain that an 8-hour work day is somehow consuming 100% of their weekday hours, leaving them without any time to do anything else. On furthe…

Thanks for reminding me to turn on screen time on my phone. I am indeed wasting a lot of time on my phone reading things that don't get me much value while procrastinating on real work or things that I consciously want to spend my time on. This problem is a lot more prevalent on my phone than on my laptop. I catch myself browsing HN without any intent and without any goal, mostly reading comments and skimming on arti…

I was on a similar situation until last month or so. I read this book called The Shallows by Nicholas Carr which references a lot of research that consuming lots of internet modifies your neural paths and makes you more distractable and harder to do deeper thinking (such as reading books, etc). I’ve since removed hn from my browser favorites and get a curated list of articles each friday from [1]. I just came here today to skim some articles as i’ve worked all day in a house project and my body hurts so I have no energy for other things.

This house project, some other mini-projects that i’ve done and the 2/3 books I read since last month is something i can now do because now I avoid HN (and the whole internet) by default..

[1] https://hackernewsletter.com/

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#275

I've been mentoring CS college students and new grad SWEs for a while. It's shocking to see how many of them perpetually feel like they're overwhelmed and short on time, yet they can't account for where they've actually spent their time. It's not uncommon for new grad SWEs to complain that an 8-hour work day is somehow consuming 100% of their weekday hours, leaving them without any time to do anything else. On furthe…

> It's not uncommon for new grad SWEs to complain that an 8-hour work day is somehow consuming 100% of their weekday hours. I don't know man, I've been struggling with this myself. Obviously it's not literally true, but the problem is that after you account for 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of work and chores/eating/hygiene/cooking/commute, every thing you want to do starts seriously cutting into the time that's left. Ne…

I hear you, but I'll tell you what I tell my mentees:

Most of it distills down to being honest about your priorities. If you value relaxed mornings, relaxed evenings, and never feeling rushed before or after work, then there's nothing wrong with that. You're not obligated to go out with friends or allocate hours to hobbies during the weekday.

The problem comes when people say they value one thing, but when decision time arrives they do something else. If you have a hobby that requires 2-3 hours per week, then you make time a few nights per week to do it. If you want to go out with friends, then you make time to go out with friends.

Going to the gym is perhaps the easiest example. If you really value going to the gym, finding one hour three times per week is only about 3% of your waking hours. Find a gym located between your house and your office and travel time falls out of the equation.

Personally, I freed up an enormous amount of time by tightening up my schedule. Learning how to get out of bed, get dressed, eat breakfast, and get out the door in under 30 minutes was a game changer for me, and it wasn't even that difficult. Likewise, learning how to consolidate my chores and meal prep into small windows of time was an enormous improvement.

If you sleep 8 hours per night, you have 112 waking hours per week. If you spend 40 hours working and have a 30-minute commute each way (5 hours commuting per week), that leaves 67 hours of your own time. Even if you allocate half of that to chores and meal prep, you're still left with 34 hours, or basically an entire work week of personal time. Realistically, you're not going to spend 33 hours on chores, though.

It's all about priorities. If you don't want to real rushed or pressured during your off time, you don't have to, but you can't have it all.

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#276
I am continually annoyed that I can’t compete with VC Funded startups with 20 to 50 employees in my spare time after work while maintaining a healthy social life.

As ridiculous as that sounds I mean that seriously. I can’t shake the feeling

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#277
post #265

I just wanted to make it to the top of Hacker News. I submitted plenty of my projects, but none hit the mark. So hopefully once before I turn 35 I have a project that makes it to the top. But if not, eh. I'll be al right. Just like the dolphins in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

[deleted]

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#278

Funny piece. It can be so easy to waste time when we have the internet. I think the most dangerous distractions are the ones that feel productive but don’t actually work toward your goals. For example, browsing hacker news. Such an activity is useful every now and then, but at least for myself I often scroll around only to realize later that it was a massive waste of time I could’ve spent working on something I care…

I have the complete opposite feeling. As long as you filter yourself fairly well on which topics you read, HN can be immensely useful. You can learn about new things that can help you a lot in your career, that you otherwise may have missed.

Yeah, I read about a fintech api recently due to hn. It can be useful.

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#279

I was incredibly driven about 7 years ago... I was a founder of a startup and had really lofty aspirations. I told my wife that it was very possible that we would be millionaires by the time we hit 40. Fast forward to today and that did not happen. The startup is no more, but mainly due to burnout. We made money and did well, but not well enough. I never made my millions, but did have a substantial aqui-hire opportun…

I’ve found the same. Thanks for sharing!

Re: I thought I would have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35

#280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have the complete opposite feeling. As long as you filter yourself fairly well on which topics you read, HN can be immensely useful. You can learn about new things that can help you a lot in your career, that you otherwise may have missed.

But usually you missed them for a reason. They just aren’t directly relevant to you. ... but I made a technical decision because of an idea on hacker news. You should have researched that decision outside of hacker news. Less aggregate time spent.

There is a lot that I know which was relevant but is not anymore. A large percentage of knowledge needs constant replacing and often I do not know with what until I‘m exposed. HN gives me exposure. It is part of my solution to staying on top of developments. It does not provide answers to questions I have but to questions I should have had.
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