Tell that to my very burnt out parent friends! YMMV
Think it depends on the age of the children, right? Do you parents have very young children? Things get better once they are 5-6
Thats true, when both my children passed that bar (younger is just over 5 and older is 9) a lot of things got much better. But do not kid yourself (pun intended) if you are not sociopath You will feel that You need to care for them for the rest of your life and that always will be a blessing and burden at the same time. And the proportion may not be in your favour (my almost 40 years old brother is still living with my parents and havent had job for years).
> I lost my creativity and the sense of wonder I used to have in childhood. I am no longer curious because I am settled for the world as it is. I accept things the way they are instead of imagining how they could be. I was starting to feel this way before I had kids, but having kids completely changed everything for the more interesting. It’s funny because it’s the exact opposite of what I was told would happen: The…
When you are four years old, you lose your memories of the first years of your life. When you have kids, you live them again.
Sure and then You forget them again. When I look at my 9 year old I cannot recall at all what she used to be at 4.
Drop stuff that doesn't work. I started programming as a kid. 40 years ago. I wrote a game with a friend while we were at school. It made us a tiny amount of money for 3 years work. I dropped out of programming (several times now). I travelled, close to home, and working in return for food and accomadation (with a scheme called WWOOF). I've done farm work, forestry, woodworking, butchery, construction, blacksmithing.…
Yesterday, I went across the Florida Straits overnight and was headed directly for an electrical storm near West Palm. This beauty was shooting bolts into the water and spidering across the sky. We diverted to Ft Lauderdale to avoid going right for it.
When you go to sea, you’re all in. I always was, but sometimes I forget and the sea helps me remember.
I sympathize with the author. At the same time, reading a post like this reminds me how out of touch we in the SV/tech realm are. "Boring" here is quite relative, and folks living more average lives would find this kind of attitude to be crazy. Boring? You're healthy, get out sometimes, have hobbies, have written software, have written more than one-line drivel on the web... this is boring? I would call it an attitude or feeling borne out of tech privilege.
> I lost my creativity and the sense of wonder I used to have in childhood. I am no longer curious because I am settled for the world as it is. I accept things the way they are instead of imagining how they could be. I was starting to feel this way before I had kids, but having kids completely changed everything for the more interesting. It’s funny because it’s the exact opposite of what I was told would happen: The…
I’m a parent of two children and most of the time I’m extremely bored and struggling for motivation.
My older child is a pre-teen constantly screaming and raging about the tiniest things. It’s a tremendous energy drain. But the children are certainly not the reason for my lurking depression: it was there before I had kids, and being a parent hasn’t magically transformed my life with meaning. These things are roughly orthogonal in my anecdotal experience.
> So what went wrong? My gut feeling is that I am boring. A lot of pain seems to come from a poor vocabulary about feelings. What is boring? It's a weak and flattened word like the feelings it's used about. Do you mean avolition, acedia, irascibility, dissatisfaction, insensibility, repression, discouragement, ambivalence, anxiety? The Psychology of the Emotions by Neal Burton is a fair place to continue the introspe…
> All progress depends upon the unreasonable man. You need to stop being reasonable and yet there's an unreasonable man invading another country right now. I dont think progress depends on the unreasonable man. It depends on the reasonable man who would put in the sweat and blood, but might be inspired or paid by the unreasonable man.
> an unreasonable man invading another country right now.
I'd be more cautious equating reason with peace.
Wars are as often the conclusion of pure reason. Strategic advantage
plus opportunity, plus a little too much game-theory can be the
perfect ingredients for belligerence.
This is very true. Stressors allow you to grow. One of the weird things is seeing friends that never had kids be exactly the same 10-20 years later, doing the same things, talking about the same stuff. It always shows me how much I have grown and how much they haven't. I am in my 40s, and it's weird seeing my friends of 20 years remain static. The only ones that have changed are either people with children or a big c…
Is it growth or simply change? There's an implication with "growth" that somehow you've become greater or better in some way. Is that the case, or are you just more focused on being a parent because that's who you have changed into?
As a parent of a 2yo myself I think it's a bit of both. I definitely changed a lot, am more focused on being a parent and also feel lees existential and depressed because I have a new and almost full time project which is raising my daughter to the best of my ability. But I also noticed some changes that I can describe as growth. I no longer have trouble getting up early, and I go to bed early as well if I need to do so the next day. This is basic responsibility that I didn't have before. I also help more around the house and take time to fix things that I would've just left and procrastinated on for months before (changing a bulb, improving my office, etc).
I've got a promotion as well and am doing better at my job, even though I have less time overall. I think this is because I'm more focused than before, which is unexpected since I work from home. I have also become more motivated to work on personal projects. I've started homebrewing since my daughter was in the womb, got back into chess and even did some gardening. So a lot of positive change in my life. I cannot say if this would have happened regardless of my daughter but I am definitely in a much better place than I was before
After doing programming and being involved in startups for well over a decade, I decided I don't actually like coding nor startups anymore. I still have a company I run with my partners, and I still treat it like my 'job', but there's no passion there. Instead, I've discovered writing novels, music, and other artsy-fartsy stuff as my new passion of the last few years (it had always been a hobby, but I'm taking it muc…
> not because it'll ever make money
So .. what do you do about money? are you in a FIRE situation?
Drop stuff that doesn't work. I started programming as a kid. 40 years ago. I wrote a game with a friend while we were at school. It made us a tiny amount of money for 3 years work. I dropped out of programming (several times now). I travelled, close to home, and working in return for food and accomadation (with a scheme called WWOOF). I've done farm work, forestry, woodworking, butchery, construction, blacksmithing.…
Yesterday, I went across the Florida Straits overnight and was headed directly for an electrical storm near West Palm. This beauty was shooting bolts into the water and spidering across the sky. We diverted to Ft Lauderdale to avoid going right for it. When you go to sea, you’re all in. I always was, but sometimes I forget and the sea helps me remember.
That, man, right there. Those are the moments you remember. I had jobs where I sat at a desk for a year and nothing remarkable stands out. Then there are small memories which are just epic. For me it's moments like that which make my life feel complete.