Basic Taoism, the way of the trickster sage. Going the roundabout way to get what was inacessible via a direct route.
Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
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Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#112a lowly position is a great boon
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#113Yeah, 33 years old, haven't accomplished much, went into school to start a degree in programming, still low status and can't find a job anywhere. I'm not sure willingness is the word for this. All I feel is bitterness. I'm not sure if this is me being reflective because it's my birthday today or what, but I'm so fucking sick of working so hard to get nowhere.
I feel the bitterness as well (31 here). A few observations/tips (that I gave myself): * I've noticed many don't appreciate the bitterness as the bitterness needs to align with their beliefs and people their beliefs are different. If it doesn't align, then all they feel are unpleasant emotions. * Being/feeling bitter is destroying my soul. Don't give into it, I know you have your justifications. I have mine, but ulti…
Similar situation here, I am interpreting (or parsing) all of this as a test to see if I really do love the grind that much.
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#114The Twitter thread explores some ideas why this may be the case. However, quickly skimming through it, they miss the most obvious one. For the people who are busy working on something they find important, most often 'status' is not even a thing. So there's no 'willingness' really to it, it's just that status doesn't really exist. The way they see themselves and how they measure their success has literally nothing to…
> For the people who are busy working on something they find important, most often 'status' is not even a thing.
I'd slightly modify that to say that what they were doing was more important to them than status - which isn't the same as saying they didn't care about status at all.
I read a number of biographies of great US presidents in the last year, and found it fascinating to see that pretty much all of them were intensely ambitious. What made the difference is that they ultimately cared more about the people they served than about serving their own ego.
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
Aren't you actually asking for a grant to be an installation artist working in the field of pretty moving machines. I don't think society should fund research into the flatness of the earth or perpetual motion, but I do think there is plenty of scope for making beautiful things. Especially if you explain it gleefully when you unveil your latest :-)
Although impossible, I wonder if striving for perpetual motion could lead to discoveries to create very efficient machines? So may be worth funding.
Working towards perpetual motion would probably lead to advancements in low-friction materials, which might make cars more efficient, for example. I think you're right that it's not an entirely pointless endeavor, although the actual goal will probably never happen.
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#116The more-correct observation is that any well-understood or easy path to becoming high status will be shut down. Most people are not high status, and want to be. It follows that the path has to be either risky, or difficult to comprehend. If hard work were enough, we'd all be in charge. Lots of hard workers out there.
> Lots of hard workers out there. I disagree with this. Never underestimate how many people just don't show up or try at all. Look at average screen time for Americans as a data point. It's a ridiculous 12 hours a day of media usage. Just think about that. People are basically staring at their phones/tvs for 12 out of the 16 waking hours. As I get older I realize more often than not most successful people are not spe…
The 11-12 hour estimates of screen time include office work, e-mail, and so on. It’s incorrect to imply that all of that time is wasted.
This idea that success comes to anyone who just shows up and puts in a little bit of effort because most people are watching TV or browsing the Internet for 12 hours a day is, to be blunt, extremely naive.
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#117Folks in the status professions (banking, law,..) often tell me they want to become an entrepreneur. I always tell them, you wont do it. They attended the right school, joined the right firm, attained that corner office. As a founder they would give up all that, and their family and friends will tell them that they've made a massive mistake, for years, while it appears that nothing is happening. Then they sheepishly…
This reminds me of the book "Excellent Sheep" that spoke to the point that much of elite schools is about chasing status. I couldn't find the exact number, but an absurd percentage of graduates go into a select few high prestige career choices, namely finance, consulting, law, and medicine. The point being students are optimizing for high status. To paraphrase an interaction from the book about entertaining different…
Anecdotally when I was in college I remember doing a lot of observing of all the kid in various programs. I distinctly remember thinking all my pre-law friends and acquaintances seemed to be really looking for something... at the time I thought they were looking for "who they are", but status actually makes a lot more sense, even if it is a bit of "who they are" as well.
That's not a judgment about them good or bad, just something that seemed to stick out to me about many of them.
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#118Folks in the status professions (banking, law,..) often tell me they want to become an entrepreneur. I always tell them, you wont do it. They attended the right school, joined the right firm, attained that corner office. As a founder they would give up all that, and their family and friends will tell them that they've made a massive mistake, for years, while it appears that nothing is happening. Then they sheepishly…
> People considered me to be quasi-unemployed
On a related note, this is a mindset that I think is probably the biggest blocker to entrepreneurial success (and perhaps happiness?)
I have a friend (you know who you are since you’ll probably read this ;) who is by ALL measures a massively successful and brilliant person. Ran his own startup for 10+ years, just had a great exit. And during his post-sale victory lap in which he took a much-needed burnout recovery break, STILL began to refer to himself as “unemployed” in the context of worry over what to do next.
“Employed” / “Unemployed” is a mindset that’s been engrained into people for hundreds of years, so I can’t blame others for applying it to entrepreneurs. But I think it’s a limiting frame of reference and holds a lot of people back.
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Lots of hard workers out there. I disagree with this. Never underestimate how many people just don't show up or try at all. Look at average screen time for Americans as a data point. It's a ridiculous 12 hours a day of media usage. Just think about that. People are basically staring at their phones/tvs for 12 out of the 16 waking hours. As I get older I realize more often than not most successful people are not spe…
This is an unfair argument if you're not acknowledging how media is designed to be addictive. Even we technical folk are susceptible. It's a convenient fantasy that the downtrodden deserve their place for being lazy.
That's just one data point. I could go on and on about how people make obviously bad decisions.
Take college major choice. Why do so many people get worthless degrees? They can do a simple google search to see how much people with X major make as salaries. It's not hidden or even a remote mystery. I won't get in to how people finance their education (not even reading the terms of their loans which are invariably awful).
As for career, I lived for a year in Minnesota and was amazed at how many people were incredibly underpaid (like 80K a year for a senior software engineer) and simply did not try to change jobs. Similarly many also refused to even consider moving to a costal city with better pay. I've also had co-workers that stuck around at obviously failing companies (and then were upset when their options were worthless).
And with investments, I've an aunt who inherited 50K about 20 years ago and just kept the money in the bank. Everyone knows you should be investing that money in the stock market or an appreciating asset, yet she is hardly unusual in just not investing the money. My mom invested it and made at least 4x on the money.
There are tons of these kinds of things - which are all simple and obvious, but literally most people don't do them for reasons that are just beyond me. I had a friend who was a semester away from graduating at UCSD and dropped out to take music lessons at community college. I tried to explain to him that was an awful decision, but he was just dead set on it. I've seen this stuff happen over and over.
Obviously, you can say that people don't have this kind literacy because they were poor, ignorant, ect. It doesn't change the fact that mostly getting by and moving up in the world is not rocket science or for special people, it's a matter of just making mostly reasonable decisions: choosing a reasonable career, saving money, showing up for work, taking good opportunities when given to you.
Re: Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status
#120Many, many more people work at things other people think are silly and insignificant only to discover that thing is silly and insignificant and then they give up. Occasionally the opposite happens and the person succeeds. If you only look at the successes it probably looks like a willingness to be low-status is a marker for success, but it really isn't. It tells you nothing of the future outcome. The only thing it pr…
I know a successful doctor who's convinced software development is an inherently unstable, unprofessional, and boring career. I really like the guy but I couldn't disagree more with him about this issue. I bring this up to say: what other people think is significant career-wise is really only a helpful opinion if it's informed. Outsiders (friends, family, etc.) may have helpful questions but they often just don't hav…
I'd stress the informed part. Career prospects may look much differently on the outside than they do from the inside.
A common example I see is wondering if and when programming will be automated away. These questions come from ingesting the hype surrounding AI. So unless you're inside the industry, or have someone from inside explain things to you, you'll have a mistaken perspective on the future of software careers, thanks to the ongoing barrage of marketer lies. I imagine it's the same for other industries.