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Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

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Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#481

Post by Viliam1234 »

satysin wrote: post #321
break_the_bank wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am far away from being a dad but curious, how do you balance "providing for your kid" and "being there for your kid"?

To follow on to my other comment (didn't want to edit it as this is a separate point)... My reason for doing what I did is that a good friend and former manager died in his early 50s and I realised that could easily be me in twenty years. It breaks my heart that he worked so damn hard only to die alone in the middle of the night in his home office with a fucking P&L still open on his screen. His wife and kids found h…

Reminds me of my father. He worked hard, spent much time away from home, and when he was home during weekends, he was usually tired, sleeping during the day on the couch in the living room -- that's exactly how I see him when I try to remember his face.

His plan was to make a lot of money, build a huge house for the family, and then probably to switch to some less stressful work and enjoy a calm family life.

But right after buying the land for the house, he died of heart attack. His money disappeared (he always handled the finances himself, my mother had no idea where any of it was, some things most likely got stolen), we struggled financially, had to sell the land, so at the end nothing remained, except for memories of a few great vacations spent together. Even there, he often brought the family to the vacation, but disappeared in the middle of it to handle some business, so I have more memories of the places than I have of him.

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#482

Post by gdubs »

I got so much closer to my young kids this year. I didn’t quite realize how many precious moments I’d already lost by having to spend time at an office every day. (I had a somewhat flexible work schedule before this, but being around them all the time was just orders of magnitude different.) We started playing nightly family games during lockdown last March: card games, board games. I watched the entire ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’ series with them over the winter. It’s been such a silver lining of all of this.

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#483

Post by gdubs »

testfoobar wrote: post #43

Such a pandemic cliche: making sourdough bread. Takes all day. Took about 3 or 4 tries until I got the hang of it. Now I make two loaves every weekend. Tastier than anything I've bought at a store. Started with Serious Eats: https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2020/07/how-to-make-sour... Settled at Tartine Country Bread: https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1016277-tartines-country... Makes me happy every time.

On the same ride. I got help from a friend over Instagram early last year, and it’s become an ingrained routine. It has become such a pandemic cliche, but I don’t care - it’s really satisfying. Calming, fulfilling, and just really nice to have good bread!

(Sourdough Pizza has been another big thing in our house.)

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#484

Post by oleander73 »

dennis_jeeves wrote: post #397
oleander73 wrote: post #303

I retired (after getting diagnosed with incurable cancer). I was a workaholic and never thought I could quit so easily, but after quiting I don't miss work and I'm a lot happier (despite the cancer thing). If you are obsessed with work and in a position to take a few months off, please consider doing this. It may change your perspective.

What cancer do you have? (Also have you been looking outside mainstream cancer treatments?)

Prostate cancer. No, I have limited faith in medical science and none whatsoever in alternatives. Like I said, I'm quite happy and don't cling to life. I'll enjoy whatever time I have left to the max, but there's no need for me to maximize my time on earth (i.e. quality over quantity).

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#485

Post by brainless »

JulianRaphael wrote: post #213
brainless wrote: post #29

Staying away from the startup hustle and city life. I have been constantly disturbed by the chase in the startup system. Building up something out of own passion is one thing, but trying to act like the investor-led founders has been driving me crazy for years. I live a village life now, do much less software work. Have dialed down my ambitions and I am actually very happy. I do feel that my skills, acquired over 15…

Just out of curiosity: whereabouts in the Himalayas are you located? We've been looking for nice places off the beaten path and are always looking for inspiration.

I live in Sikkim. Temi to be more accurate, it is a small village. It is just below a well-known tea estate. If you search for Temi Tea, Sikkim, you will get a good idea. The tea is one of the best export quality tea from India.

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#486

Post by unixhero »

padthai wrote: post #274
mettamage wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish I could do that but I only think this is possible by getting a job in the US or Switzerland. They’re both not easy to get if you’re not a citizen there. There was even this Swiss recruiter that scours HN, but after he finds out you’re a recent college grad he vanishes. At least, in my case. Maybe not in other cases.

I think I know who you are talking about. He was unfailingly polite with me, but it was very clear that he was not very interested too. I also was coming back from a semi-academic position. Do not be very hard on you (or him). Every job opening I interview candidates for we receive piles and piles of academia refugees, mostly postgrads fleeing their postdocs. They tend to know very little about software (or domain kn…

Good analysis of how recruiters ignore university refugees and recent graduates. Which is why I had to throw most of my 5 years of uni studies always and get a job in IT, which I was trying to run away from. But hey! At least I am extremely good at it.

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#488

Post by bigwavedave »

fukmbas wrote: post #123
d3nj4l wrote: post #65

Working from home. I realised being in an office - especially an open-plan office - was setting off my social anxiety all the time. Working in a place where I could choose to engage with people instead of having it forced upon me made it so much easier to work. I became a lot more productive and started enjoying what I did, even picking up more side projects and learning actively. It's a shame it's coming to an end,…

Are you not in IT? Remote is literally permanent now

> Are you not in IT? Remote is literally permanent now

Sadly, not for everyone. For the company I'm with, before covid we were allowed to spend up to three days out of the week remote as long as we came in for at least the two required days (Monday and Thursday). Then, right before covid, we were told that even this policy was going away and we had to be in the office four days out of the week and could remote on Wednesdays. That policy never took effect because covid hit right before the transition date, so now we're "remote until July 1st 2021, after which we'll reassess the threat and plan on everyone being in the office five days out of the week."

I've been so spoiled by WFH, I am not looking forward to going back to two hours of commuting per day.

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#489

Post by heavenlyblue »

tasuki wrote: post #201
heavenlyblue wrote: post #140

I’ve bought rollerblades in May and learnt how to skate having never skated in my life before. Can do 180 now and going down the stairs now. Learning a new trick every few weeks is energising - I almost forgot how easy it is to learn how do do something by just paying enough attention to the lessons.

I'm a passable ice skater, tried roller blading, but am super scared of falling down and hurting myself. I feel way less stable on roller blades, or perhaps it's the fear? On ice, one just falls on ice... on roller blades, one can fall down the stairs etc, it just seems much scarier.. any advice?

Wear guards, wrist guards, “Bumsavers” for times when you’re planning to fall on your back.

Before going down the stairs make sure you have fallen enough times to understand the physics of falling in such a way that you always end up on the guards. Learn how to never use the wrists for falls.

Guards most of the time are just like ice - while they have some cushioning, they are mainly supposed to make any surface slippery so that you could just slide your body energy away.

Re: Ask HN: What was the biggest contributor to your happiness in the past year?

#490

Post by nly »

jmfldn wrote: post #253
DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lot of companies in EU (especially D/A/CH) also have absolutely no plans to continue WFH. Despite covid restrictions going to be an issue also long term, they have (1 year later) still no strategy that incorporates or improves efficiency in WFH organization and workflows. Instead they all look forward to going back to a time that no longer exists.

So not the EU obviously but in the UK, or London at the very least, I don't know of a single white collar worker where much-increased WFH won't be the norm. I'm not just talking tech but banking, law and so on. We do indeed seem to be far ahead of our European neighbours in this regard from what I'm seeing.

I work in the London (City of), and the company I work for (many thousands of employees) will be expected back in the office this year end. WFH has never been part of the company culture and, at most, people previously WFH 1 or 2 days over a 2 week period, and even that was exceptional.
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