In praise of blowing up your life • Hacker News Board

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#91

Post by prawn » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:10 AM UTC

mattficke wrote: post #24

Wonnk13 wrote: post #6

I don't entirely disagree, but the first thing that this article brought to mind is the old cliche "wherever you go, there you are". I'm 34, lots of ex girlfriends and lots of past cities. There's a fine line between breaking out of the status quo hamster wheel and running away from your baggage. Moving cities, or relationships, or jobs isn't worth as much if you aren't simultaneously working on yourself

In certain contexts this is called “doing a geographic”. Notorious trap for people who look solely for external causes of their discontent and ignore internal.

There's an equivalent in personal finance where people think that a payrise will solve their money woes. Their habits remain, their discretionary spending scales up, and they usually continue on with the same problems.

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#92

Post by amrocha » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:13 AM UTC

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #20

I guess, if you're well off, perpetually single and childless, and have the sort of connections that allow for taking a 6 month break for no reason.

Why would you need connections to take a 6 month break? All you need is a bit of money, 2-4 months of your salary at most.

Obviously if you have dependents it's harder to move physically, but not impossible, and quitting a job is totally doable.

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#93

Post by Gareth321 » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:14 AM UTC

akprasad wrote: post #83

phnofive wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Onion's take ten years on is a bit different: https://www.theonion.com/women-explain-why-they-became-tradw...

I don't follow what relationship these two stories have with each other -- the first is on living in community and putting down roots, and the latter is on far-right cultural atavism.

It depends if one interprets "trad wife" to mean "far-right cultural atavism" or "traditional wife." I try to listen to those who subscribe to the movement, and they report the latter, every time. It seems those who interpret it as "far-right cultural atavism" refuse to actually listen to the women who find meaning in the lifestyle. Inasmuch, I see these articles strongly linked, and I find the juxtaposition really interesting.

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#94

Post by PartiallyTyped » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:17 AM UTC

vsnf wrote: post #82

So much of the article and the comments are focused on "blowing up your life" as a result of negative situations. Here's a sample of some of the negative verbiage seen here: "Baggage", "socially underdeveloped", "chore", "needs improving", "psychological trauma". Sure, sometimes people are actually in a rut and want to do something drastic to reset their life. But what about people who made a change just because? Is…

Yolo and all that. To be honest… it is quite fun!

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#95

Post by amrocha » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:18 AM UTC

5350-uiop-1130 wrote: post #81

oofnik wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does race have to do with any of this?

this article does give me some privilege vibes. not everyone can just move to thailand, become bartender and write a book about. that's a very specific trajectory.

I see where you're coming from, but that doesn't match my experience. Plenty of non white people immigrate to different countries to try their luck at a better life.

Maybe the difference is what standard you compare yourself to?

- Black dude from the US: I can't move to Thailand, what would happen if I fail

- Black dude from Rwanda: I might as well move to Thailand, maybe I'll have better luck over there

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#96

Post by badpun » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:18 AM UTC

surfsvammel wrote: post #57

I spent years examining (also together with my psychologist) the question: “People always tell you to follow your dream”. But often following one’s dream comes at a cost, or at least comes with some risk. Yet, the advice to “follow your dream” is a blanket advice, it supposedly trumps everything else. I ended up deciding to not follow my dream, at that point in life, and I am happy I didn’t. I won’t be telling my kid…

> “People always tell you to follow your dream”.

Perhaps in the US. It's the privilege of living in an extremely wealthy country - the risk of following your dream is not that high, since, if you fail, you'll probably still be able to eke a relatively comfortable living. It doesn't work that way in most other countries. In most places, having a stable job that allows you to afford an apartment or (gasp) a house!, IS the dream, whereas in the US it's almost seen as failure due to lack of ambition.

However, seeing that living expenses in the US (mainly housing) are going way up, perhaps the era of following your dreams will end there (US) as well?

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#97

Post by aaron695 » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:22 AM UTC

akprasad wrote: post #83

phnofive wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Onion's take ten years on is a bit different: https://www.theonion.com/women-explain-why-they-became-tradw...

I don't follow what relationship these two stories have with each other -- the first is on living in community and putting down roots, and the latter is on far-right cultural atavism.

[dead]

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#98

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:23 AM UTC

dougmwne wrote: post #28

I agree with this post, but I don’t think he makes the most convincing argument. Risk taking is hugely important to growth and profit. All investments come with some level of risk and riskier investments, on average, provide a higher return. Continuing to do what you have been doing is the safe choice. Making incremental tweaks will result in incremental gains. When you make a big change, you take a big risk and you…

[deleted]

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#99

Post by Dalewyn » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:24 AM UTC

In lieu of all the nearly hundred comments arguing life should be carried forth this way or that way or another, here's my two cents instead:

You Only Live Once.

To the extent you don't bother or harm your fellow peers, go as calm or as wild as your heart desires. So long as you have agency in where your life takes you, you at least won't regret anything.

YOLO.

Re: In praise of blowing up your life

#100

Post by badpun » Tue, Jun 13, 2023, 7:25 AM UTC

dougmwne wrote: post #28

I agree with this post, but I don’t think he makes the most convincing argument. Risk taking is hugely important to growth and profit. All investments come with some level of risk and riskier investments, on average, provide a higher return. Continuing to do what you have been doing is the safe choice. Making incremental tweaks will result in incremental gains. When you make a big change, you take a big risk and you…

> All investments come with some level of risk and riskier investments, on average, provide a higher return.

Average outcome is computed by summing multiple potential outcomes, and diving by number of trials. It's completely meaningless in the context of big life decisions, because you don't get many trials - you get one or, at best, several.

By illustration - let's say someone offers you to either take a guaranteed $1000, or a wager where you flip a coin and, if you win, you get $502k, but if you lose, you owe $500k. That wager has a expected value (i.e. average outcome) of $2k, which is greater than the guaranteed $1k you'd otherwise be getting. And yet, it's obviously a terrible choice, due to 50% chance of giving you debt that will cripple you for life.