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Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

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181–190 of 217 posts

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#181

I'm 27 years old and I don't have much purpose in life. am I'm kind of becoming desperate, to be honest. I have always thought about becoming a programmer but I don't know where to start. What programming language do you learn first? What languages and skills do you need to learn to become hire-able by a company?

Dude honestly I don't care much about programming but its just a way to build stuff and be useful. Grind out all the CS data structures stuff and learn Java. Get a job at a big corp.

Or learn Node and JS and stuff and be a web dev.

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#182

Ever since reading Bertrand Russell's "The Conquest of Happiness", I've thought a lot about the importance of being able to sit inside my own head. One quote that I wrote down: > A life too full of excitement is an exhausting life, in which continually stronger stimuli are needed to give the thrill that has come to be thought an essential part of pleasure. A person accustomed to too much excitement is like a person w…

Sometimes I think everyone has a set average level of happiness and as we get better at avoiding being unhappy we lose the highs as well. The only adults I know who scream in joy at Christmas presents also all have chronic depression.

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#184

I'm 27 years old and I don't have much purpose in life. am I'm kind of becoming desperate, to be honest. I have always thought about becoming a programmer but I don't know where to start. What programming language do you learn first? What languages and skills do you need to learn to become hire-able by a company?

Hope its not too late, but due warning: programming will mostly likely not give you "purpose". Its alright, the work is nice sometimes and you can learn a bit, but amongst my friends group and peers I have yet to find anyone who got "purpose" with programming.

About the actual programming language: trust me, it just doesn't matter that much. Just choose Java or Python and you can't go wrong. Pick up an algorithm's course/book and try and solve some problems. Becoming hire-able is a whole other ball game where you need to play with your social networks, make own projects or use your college credentials.

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#185
post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a profound realisation that is usually preceded by experiencing the sickness and suffering that comes with unrestrained desire. How it takes over one's discriminating faculties until one becomes blind to everyday beauty. I cannot recommend meditation enough to train the mind to stay calm when desires want to run rampant. No mantras or music, just sit in silence and boredom. Thoughts will come and go and event…

Mindfulness came to mind for me specifically. I used to jump from work to coffee meetings to fancy restaurant dinners out with both clients and friends to meet-ups at NY's Meatpacking District...to deeply enjoying the feeling of just sitting in a nature preserve, smelling sap, listening to birds, and breathing in the entire environment. (a benefit of taking a job in the burbs.) Before the lockdown, I did an experimen…

Not to be facetious but the juxtaposition of the romantic description of the value of personal time you made against the last line link to some kind of walk-sharing social media app did give me a laugh. Completely agreed on every word though.

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#186

I'm 27 years old and I don't have much purpose in life. am I'm kind of becoming desperate, to be honest. I have always thought about becoming a programmer but I don't know where to start. What programming language do you learn first? What languages and skills do you need to learn to become hire-able by a company?

Dude honestly I don't care much about programming but its just a way to build stuff and be useful. Grind out all the CS data structures stuff and learn Java. Get a job at a big corp. Or learn Node and JS and stuff and be a web dev.

Agree with everything you said, although "Get a job" is harder* than it sounds. Learning programming is straightforward, getting a job is non trivial.

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#187
post #177

The funniest part: "[The researchers] then asked, “Would they rather do an unpleasant activity than no activity at all?” ... Participants were given the same circumstances as most of the previous studies, with the added option of also administering a mild electric shock to themselves by pressing a button. Twelve of 18 men in the study gave themselves at least one electric shock during the study’s 15-minute “thinking”…

Even more amusing to me: the number of shocks men chose to give themselves had a mean value of 1.47 and a standard deviation of 1.46. This is after excluding one outlier who shocked himself 190 times [1]. [1] https://science.sciencemag.org/content/345/6192/75

> This is after excluding one outlier who shocked himself 190 times

Someone really, really hates being bored.

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#188
post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude honestly I don't care much about programming but its just a way to build stuff and be useful. Grind out all the CS data structures stuff and learn Java. Get a job at a big corp. Or learn Node and JS and stuff and be a web dev.

Agree with everything you said, although "Get a job" is harder* than it sounds. Learning programming is straightforward, getting a job is non trivial.

Assuming you mean harder than it sounds. Or, easier said than done.

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#189
post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree with everything you said, although "Get a job" is harder* than it sounds. Learning programming is straightforward, getting a job is non trivial.

Assuming you mean harder than it sounds. Or, easier said than done.

You are right, I conflated both by mistake

Re: Doing something is better than doing nothing for most people: study (2014)

#190
post #153
post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Virtually all sex acts can be done in a healthy way provided both parties are truly into it. Porn has created expectations in men as to what women normally want and as a result a lot of women do sex acts that they don't truly like. Porn has distorted the view of what is 'normal' and the expectations of what a woman should consent to.

expectations is perhaps a personality problem and lack of honest communication. normal is subjective even if it is inherited from societal norms. communication and being able to talk freely is key.

Humans have trouble communicating freely and honestly. They do better when they have fewer misleading assumptions to work through.
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