Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

paulgraham.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

301–310 of 332 posts

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#301

Post by no_future »

ashark wrote: post #110
stegosaurus wrote: post #75

What if the idea of work itself is what you dislike? There are plenty of activities I can enjoy, and some, quite a few of them in fact, are profitable. Once you shoe-horn them into the power dynamic situation of a traditional job (with the bureaucracy that entails unless you're dealing with Actual People as opposed to corporations), suddenly a lot of the luster disappears. As a ridiculous example - I enjoy reading. I…

Anytime I read one of those "just do what you're passionate about!" posts, or job postings that read like "we're looking for people who are passionate about [thing that literally no-one has ever been passionate about]" I try to think whether there's anything whatsoever that I'd enjoy (let alone stay passionate about) doing (at least) 40 hours a week, 49ish weeks a year. I haven't thought of anything yet. Left to my o…

Independent contracting/consulting, anyone? I'm looking into this as a possible occupation for the near future, it seems like it would allow me the opportunity to work hard but in bursts, and then take breaks in between to enjoy/pursue my own ventures. Anyone have any luck doing this, thoughts on it?

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#302

Post by BrainInAJar »

afarrell wrote: post #60
BrainInAJar wrote: post #43

What if you don't have anything like this?

Then you are in the position of most people on earth and should pick something that has some enjoyable parts, few infuriating parts, and is reasonably financially rewarding.

And that, for me, is software engineering. I don't love tech, I like it well enough, I'm good at it, and it pays the bills.

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#304

Post by tonyedgecombe »

eru wrote: post #291
stegosaurus wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the incentives point, it seems to me that 'we' as a society focus far too much on money and expect it to paper over the gaps that employment inevitably causes. Finish after your children leave school? Money -> childcare. Can't get time off to cook for yourself more? Money -> restaurant meals. Small stuff. Office located in a stupid place like downtown, forcing _everyone_ into a silly commute. Lack of parking space…

Can't you move downtown?

Money -> housing

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#305

Post by tonyedgecombe »

stegosaurus wrote: post #171
ArkyBeagle wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So treat the drones as Actual People. You'll be surprised. It... doesn't always work, but it's worth a shot. I think the perception that it's "submission" is a framing problem. (s)He has his problems, you have yours. You probably don't want his. I have at times gotten way too close to being the boss; I don't want it unless it's a very narrow situation. If it's actual submission, then I can't help you. I just don't la…

I understand what you're saying to an extent, but personally I have only ever once had a 'boss' that I could truly consider as having enough autonomy for this to even make sense. Unfortunately this was for a casual job alongside my undergrad (i.e. not enough to pay the bills in the real world). Otherwise - 'The Boss' is not an actual person. They're not my manager, they're not the HR department. 'The Boss' is a nebul…

Small companies can be dysfunctional as well, often that is why they are still small.

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#306

Post by LouisSayers »

capex wrote: post #137

Does entrepreneurship feel like work to anyone?

No, and this is why I always scratch my head when people mention how many hours they 'worked' a day building their startup.

People always mention things like "I was working 15 hours a day", and here I am thinking - you were counting?"

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#307

Post by lectrick »

dxbydt wrote: post #38

This excerpt - "what he really liked was solving problems. The text of each chapter was just some advice about solving them. He said that as soon as he got a new textbook he'd immediately work out all the problems—to the slight annoyance of his teacher, since the class was supposed to work through the book gradually." is literally me. I did that. Every year at my school I did exactly that. Once I actually turned in m…

If you're that into math, I'm going to second the recommendation of the guy who recommended Haskell. Haskell is VERY math-y, in a way that most programming languages... aren't. ;)

> the whole enterprise - just seems so stupid & futile

Why do you think that? I'm a programmer (who enjoys the challenges of learning new languages (currently Elixir, which is sweeeeeet), coding maintainable code, as well as debugging) and don't think that. Sure, most if not all of my code "out there" is going to get thrown out before another decade passes, but what other job lets you create vast information machines using just your mind and fingertips?

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#308

Post by jodrellblank »

stegosaurus wrote: post #154
stegosaurus wrote: post #75

What if the idea of work itself is what you dislike? There are plenty of activities I can enjoy, and some, quite a few of them in fact, are profitable. Once you shoe-horn them into the power dynamic situation of a traditional job (with the bureaucracy that entails unless you're dealing with Actual People as opposed to corporations), suddenly a lot of the luster disappears. As a ridiculous example - I enjoy reading. I…

As an addition to this, I've struggled a lot with the concept of working for pay and only recently could I really begin to explain why. Some people would probably call it 'entitlement', but I'm not really sure that's an accurate description. As an employee, your role is essentially a permanent state of brown nosing. First of all you must convince a rich person/company that you are worthy. Then you must convince them…

As an employee, your role is essentially a permanent state of brown nosing. First of all you must convince a rich person/company that you are worthy. Then you must convince them that you want to work for them, that they're special, and so on. And then later, you must defer, every single day. Ill? According to policy document AED, page 5, section b, one of your eight sick days will be deducted, worker drone! It's not enough to simply perform a valuable function for society. You need to be subservient and defer to authority - you are worth less than your betters (those with wealth) and must please them in order to eat, in order to shelter.

And?

Why is that bad?

Re: What Doesn't Seem Like Work?

#309

Post by jodrellblank »

_Robbie wrote: post #233
nostrademons wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I knew some folks at Google who were very content to stay an engineer at the bottom of the org chart and watch the people they mentored get promoted above them, because they understood that what made them happy was writing code and solving tough technical problems, not managing people or playing political games. I always respected them for that. Same reason that Steve Wozniak was always far more of a hero to me than…

To this day I will stay at the bottom of the org chart being an engineer cause that's where I want to be. -Steve Wozniak https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJif4i9NRdI#t=290

- multi millionaire and Fusion IO Chief Scientist and touring speech giver, Steve Wozniak,
Post reply on HN