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Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#441

Post by lanstin »

When I was that age is when I started having babies with my then wife. All the below advice seems fine to do, but maybe it is also worth considering an inquiry into your self, some sort of psychotherapy or meditation (as a verbal sort of person, I really enjoy therapy as a way to understand my situation better; as an anxious person, I find meditation helps me act closer to how I prefer to act).

Is your life somehow ill-fitting for your values, for what you find truly admirable?

Or kids, you will see new things and not have time to worry about boredom. Your time is running out, but that is the normal nature of life. As my meditation teacher would quote from time to time, “Take heed, do not squander your time by day or by night; this very day your life is shorter by one day.”

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#442

Post by hashimotonomora »

mywaifuismeta wrote: post #246
alt227 wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thankyou for confirming my point by using the word 'most'. It is rimportant to remember the group of people (however small) who operates outside of what is percieved as 'normal'.

I believe when you read things on the internet, or anywhere, it should be common sense to assume that it does not apply to absolutely everyone/everything in all possible contexts. Use your common sense. It would be unreasonable to force people to preface all words with qualifiers like "most", "usually" and "most likely" - nothing ever applies universally. That's typical behavior you see on social media Twitter. Peopl…

Right but you should also strive to be precise in your words.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#443

Post by fimdomeio »

It looks you need to find meaningful things in your life. What it is that is meaningful is enterly up to uou. Normally it’s something that happens progressevly, it starts with “this could be interesting” and then evolves from there. Things that directly involve other people, where you feel you are important to them or feeling that you are appreciated have higher probability of feeling meaningful. I would suggest the exact opposite of travel. It’s not about finding the exotic, it’s about looking deeper on the things that are already around you.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#444

Post by lvass »

I'm in a similar position only a bit younger and richer, I've found restricting exposure to information helps a lot. Meditation is basically spending some time not worrying about anything, it's not particularly helpful if you do it for a bit just to browse social media later. What I've done is remove lightbulbs from living spaces, delete social media and timelock any timesink (my browser allows 20 minutes of HN per day), sold my TVs, use candlelights and focus REALLY hard on not even thinking about things you can't change.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#445

Post by Trasmatta »

datavirtue wrote: post #405
k8sToGo wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I am glad that you are enjoying kids, I do not think it is fair the way you paint the picture of people who choose to not have kids ("feeling sorry for them") as if it was a condition or something. Plus I think having children is not something that should be rushed. Pretty sure there are many parents out there who became a parent because of social pressure. What if I tell you I find fullfilment in travelling? S…

If you don't have kids you are missing a fundamental understanding of what is driving most people each and every day. You are clueless about most of the world because most people have kids and it profoundly affects them. You can't know this unless you experience it yourself. It's also difficult to understand what you are getting into by having kids. It brings on a profound level of anxiety about their feelings and ul…

> If you reach a certain age and are still childless just know that nearly everyone will feel sorry for you

I legitimately do not care if people "feel sorry for me". I have good reasons for choosing not to have kids, and I hate the attitude that I'm somehow selfish or missing out on the "true meaning of life". Life is ultimately meaningless with or without kids. That allows you to make your own meaning, and kids are not a requirement for that.

There's this attitude that people who don't have kids are in some way selfish, but in my experience, the act of having kids can be the selfish one, especially if you are not in the position to be a good parent, for whatever reason. Many people have kids in that attempt to find meaning for themselves, not to actually be a good parent.

As a society, we need to be much better at not pushing every single person into being a parent. It just doesn't work for many people. And that's okay.

> The world does not revolve around single people...at all

Plenty of single people have kids, though?

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#446

Post by ggpsv »

user_235711 wrote: post #420
hownottowrite wrote: post #217

Mourning the loss of one’s youth is pretty typical. You lose a step. You didn’t do what you hoped you would do. You wasted your time. So forth and so on. Don’t worry. It gets better. This is all part of the process of life. My recommendation is that you read Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. “He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” I’m 52 here. I was a prolific programmer in my 20s. A go-go ma…

I second the "Man’s Search for Meaning" recommendation. That book is great for putting one's struggles into perspective, and emphasizing the importance of a "why."

Agreed, great book. Meaning comes from within, it is in you to create it.

Status, material possessions, wealth, family, prestige - all of it can be taken away from you. But not meaning.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#448

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

35? Old?

I'm 59. I guess that makes me a fossil (geekasaur?).

I really didn't start feeling my technical oats, until I hit 45, or so. I've been an above-average geek, since I was about 21, but I lacked the experience, and the basic habits, that have made me into a much better developer. I started a system (backend tech), at 47, that has become the de facto world standard for a particular demographic, and is now being supported and extended by a highly-skilled and energetic team of younger developers. They probably could not have done the work to get the platform in place, but they have taken my work, and are running with it. They are taking it places that I couldn't go, on my own.

I worked on that system for a decade. Most of that time, it was in production, and I was applying course corrections to it, documenting it, evangelizing it, training people, and being abused.

sniff ... They grow up so fast ...

These days, I'm writing Apple apps (mostly iOS), and loving it. I really enjoy all the learning I'm doing, and finding out that I don't know squat.

I don't bother trying to surf the Jargon Wave. There's some cool stuff, coming out, but I've learned (the hard way) to give it a couple of years (at least) to shake off the fleas. It's very difficult to ship stuff, at the Quality level I prefer, using brand-new tools.

What really gets me excited, is shipping software. That's giving it a pat on the butt, and pushing it out into the world.

That involves a lot of "boring" work. On the project that I'm currently shepherding, We're in the final stages. The release is probably still a couple of months away (at least), but we can see the exit sign, from here. It's been a couple of years.

The work, from here on out, is pretty bland. Lots of work, setting up glossaries, production servers, localizations, accessibility tests, color themes, brand consistency, etc.

And, of course, lots of testing; with the very real possibility of having to put the car up on blocks, and break out the monkey wrench.

It's been my experience that my younger self was less-than-enthused by this part of the project, but I was fortunate to have older peers and bosses, that forced me to walk through this stuff.

It feels great to ship. As I've gotten older, I've come to enjoy this, a lot more.

I wish you luck. I know that one thing that helped me, was to find nonprofits and volunteer Service orgs, and lend my skills to them.

Re: Ask HN: How do you deal with getting old and feeling lost?

#450

Post by dmurray »

wrycoder wrote: post #367
baxtr wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1 on all of them. I would add reading. That has helped me a lot to calm down. Re health: I recently discovered a great blog with in-depth articles about how to lose weight: https://physiqonomics.com PS: Don't get distracted by the seemingly arrogant profile picture. His content is really good.

Well, he does actually look like that. And he’s only 25, so he’s still a bit arrogant :-) But, what he’s saying agrees with my experience, at three times his age: train with weights, have a caloric deficit emphasizing low carb, and walk for an hour on the days you aren’t lifting. https://physiqonomics.com/cardio-or-weights/

You can't have a caloric deficit as a long-term lifestyle choice: eventually you would waste away. But perhaps it's good advice anyway because most people could benefit from it in the short term.
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