Evokes my favorite Warren Buffett quote
"Basically, when you get to my age, you'll really measure your success in life by how many of the people you want to have love you actually do love you."
Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
221–230 of 311 posts
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#222Beautiful writing. It comes at an interesting time for me. I'm in a full blown mid-life crisis where my state of mind fluctuates between full contentment and wishing I was doing more with life. This article made me think. On the one hand, I'm content because I come from an unprivileged background. My family was abusive. Me and my brothers struggled with mental health. We ran away from home as soon as we could. Where…
Check out the movie "Perfect Days"
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Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#223Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I want to do more. Launch projects, earn more money, live more experiences. The only thing you need is to stop this idea that living a richer life means earning/spending a lot of money / reaources. There's so much personal development you can do without participating in the materialistic rat race.
I would disagree. If you think only about yourself - yes, it's not about the money. But if you want make life of your children, grandchildren, etc better, the only answer is money, building generational wealth.
The obituary does not show Ray had any modern obsession with money - the article does allude to a couple of Ray's jobs.
“We’ve had a good life,” he said to me nearly every time I visited in his final year, and I knew it to be true even if it might have seemed odd from a distance. On paper, this small life above Clear Creek should have left a long list of regrets, of what ifs. But this life was the life, the very thing he and my grandmother Grace set out to make when they married in the little church up the road in 1954.
The best time of his life was when his girls were little, Ray said as he neared the end. He and Grace raised two daughters: Joy (pictured left) and Debbie.
> generational wealth.
What do your kids want that means they need your money? To go to university and join the same treadmill as you? Personally I wanted to earn my own way in life - I didn't want to live off my parents (although I probably could have). Independence is another modern goal. I have retired early, but money in itself brings many many unobvious problems. It doesn't magically give me an obviously better life than my friends (who are on a very wide range of incomes).
We are all given approximately 70 years - be very very careful how you spend yours. Perhaps listen to a few good people that have spent more of their 70 years than you have, and learn what they have learned over time.
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#224Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's the exact opposite of my experience. I grew up on a farm, and as you might imagine it involved hard physical labor daily. I would 100x rather do my current job as a systems engineer. It's so much easier than working on the farm that I feel guilty sometimes, because I know that I work 1/10 as hard as people making 1/5 of what I do.
They're not saying it's harder, just that it leaves you not wanting to do other things when you're done, and in a way that doesn't map to traditional physical fatigue, which is why it's "weirdly" taxing and not just taxing. Mental and emotional fatigue accrue and exhibit themselves differently sometimes, but often matter quite a bit in the end. Plenty of people choose to leave well paid office jobs for more physical…
I realize what they're saying. I'm saying I don't have the same experience.
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#225Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree that's a difference, I simply don't agree with your original hypothesis. The constant hunger for more and more worldly things isn't going to go away, or even get significantly better, if we erase advertising and social media from the world.
If advertising doesn't induce demand, then what does it do?
I'm of the firm opinion that advertising is snake oil. But even if you do believe that advertising causes demand, it doesn't follow that we would see a significant decrease in demand if advertising was gone. If advertising hypothetically increases demand by 5%, that's not going to make that much of a difference when it's gone.
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#226It is no bad thing to celebrate a simple life. Not actually Tolkien but it's in the movies.
It is able to bring a sense of peace and fulfillment
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#227Earlier quoted context omitted.
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That only works if you get lucky. It's all nature, no nurture. If the dice spit out a kid who hates football, that plan is a massive, painful waste of time.
A lot of footballers are only in the game for the money. I will manipulate the kid into being extremely materialistic and build his entire ego and self image around the football.
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#228Earlier quoted context omitted.
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No distractions like friends? No awareness that Max has headlines like "forged by his father's beatings and humiliation?" You should probably seek a less results driven focus on life, perhaps with a therapist, unless just trolling in which case carry on. But regardless, there's an article called "Why we stopped making Einsteins" that you may find interesting.
I'm not trolling. I have been against having children in the past, doing the whole beta bucks provider role thing for a family, basically just other people living off me , well that seemed ridiculous to me. However when I reframed the situation as being able to respawn myself and achieve my dreams through my kid it makes it very interesting. Many other men have done this. Some may disagree but it's not illegal to do it. I had a quick look at "Why we stopped making Einsteins". Some good ideas there thanks.
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#229Beautiful writing. It comes at an interesting time for me. I'm in a full blown mid-life crisis where my state of mind fluctuates between full contentment and wishing I was doing more with life. This article made me think. On the one hand, I'm content because I come from an unprivileged background. My family was abusive. Me and my brothers struggled with mental health. We ran away from home as soon as we could. Where…
If that itch might be saying "do more to shape the future", one way to scratch it is by working with young people. Mentor a robotics team or something.
Re: Obituary for a quiet life (2023)
#230I have two thoughts on this: it's important to find contentment regardless of situation, but I would caution against settling for less. I've noticed that as more and more aspects of the American dream have been stripped of us by the uber-rich in recent decades, a certain kind of fatalism has settled into our collective psyche. There's a sense now that the quiet life is out of reach, regardless of income. That wages w…
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