Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#21

Post by karamanolev » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:51 AM UTC

scary-size wrote: post #10

mg wrote: post #9

When I was a little kid, I was at a department store and saw a guy doing something with a television. Or so I thought. Me: What are you doing? He: I am programming. What's your name? Me: MG He: Check this out: 10 PRINT "MG" 20 GOTO 10 Me: Woah! I picked a book from a shelf about "Basic" and started to try figuring out how this worked. And never stopped. Have been looking at these "televisions" more than anything else…

[deleted]

While I appreciate this comment is well-intentioned, can we please not turn HN into Reddit? I strongly prefer ready more pithy content.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#22

Post by sasaf5 » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:52 AM UTC

When a university buddy told me: "with VHDL you make the instructions yourself. You can make your own registers!"

He didn't need to tell me anything else. It was 2006. I am still designing chips.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#23

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:53 AM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#24

Post by shimonabi » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:53 AM UTC

euroderf wrote: post #12

I had a religious experience decades ago. Stone cold sober. I only talk about it with my closest friends, because I don't want to be perceived as another nutter. But it keeps me up when I am feeling down, and holds out the promise of living a life on a proper path. My 0,02€, YMMV.

You don't have to be drunk or high to have hallucinations.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#25

Post by MrDresden » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:54 AM UTC

Feeling no particular drive for having children for most of my adult life, that changed when me and my partner got the very shocking news that she was pregnant last november. We were there to start the process to harvest her eggs, as she was about to undergo aggressive cancer treatment that would leave her unable to conceive children afterwards.

The pregnancy turned out to not be viable, and two weeks later the treatment started.

Seeing that heartbeat changed everything. Nothing seems to matter anymore in comparison to having kids, as a life goal.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#26

Post by k_sze » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:55 AM UTC

I think learning Python changed my life.

Learning Groovy came close, but it wasn’t as popular as Python, and the Java ecosystem was still a drag.

Python actually made programming effortless and enjoyable for me.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#27

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:55 AM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#28

Post by sailorganymede » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:57 AM UTC

I got dumped by someone who I really thought could be the one. It taught me that the world has its own plans, irrespective of my own wants, and good times end. Sort of snapped me out of autopilot for the first time in my life.

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#29

Post by hit8run » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:57 AM UTC

cies wrote: post #17

When a kid (10+ years younger) at a rave told me --being a vegetarian at the time-- that I'm not "nice to animals" and not "doing enough" and if I cared to be consistent with my beliefs I should go vegan. Also: children, DMT, studying Buddhism and a not to be named hard-core socialist music festival near Berlin.

Wow. One can never satisfy these woke little know it alls hah?

Re: Ask HN: Have you ever had a changed-your-life moment?

#30

Post by docdeek » Wed, Jul 27, 2022, 8:59 AM UTC

I was traveling around north-west Australia in 2001 and hadn’t seen the news in weeks. I stopped at a cheap hotel in Broome for a couple of days as a treat and to take a warm shower after weeks of camping, switched on the TV, and saw the wall-to-wall coverage of 9/11 that had happened the day before. I didn’t understand what I was seeing and I sure didn’t understand why it had happened. I decided I should try and figure that out.

Four months later I enrolled in an undergraduate international relations program on the other side of the country in an effort to understand why these sorts of things happen. I went on to write my PhD in the field and the study and teaching of international politics became my life for probably the next 15 years.