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The days are long but the decades are short

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#121

Post by lojack »

lukasm wrote: post #52

"Aim to be the best in the world at whatever you do professionally. " "Become the best at one specific thing. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. Few people will ever play in the NBA or make a platinum album. I don’t recommend anyone even try." ref http://pmarchive.com/guide_to_career_planning_part2.html

> Become the best at one specific thing.

I don't necessarily think that's even close to impossible. You can always increase the specificity of a skill to the point where it's possible to become the best at it. If you want an example, it's near impossible for most people to become the best programmer (there can only be one), but go to github and pick a random library and pick the most active contributor to that library and you've most likely found someone who is the best at that domain. Then look at the number of libraries on GitHub. Then you'll start to see how many people are the best at a very specific domain of knowledge.

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#122

Post by tiles »

kungfooey wrote: post #6

Are we really at the point where a 30 year old can offer sage advice on living life? Wow. As a counterpoint to "be the best you can be in your profession": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIJdFxYlEKE [PyCon keynote by Jacob Kaplan-Moss on 'mediocre developers'].

I feel this is a clear example of unnecessary negativity. I don't think anything constructive is offered to just write off the advice of someone based on their age without explaining why?

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#123

Post by KineticLensman »

samsolomon wrote: post #3

Those of you on HN that are past the 30+ mark. What would you add to this list?

53 year old here. When you are making really long term plans, bear in mind that your fitness will decline. Optimise out things that will make your back ache.

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#124

Post by Balgair »

johnward wrote: post #97

" On work: it’s difficult to do a great job on work you don’t care about. And it’s hard to be totally happy/fulfilled in life if you don’t like what you do for your work." How do you fix this? For the last 10 years of my life I've basically woken up each morning and wished I hadn't. I don't like what I do. I can't afford to not do it anymore. I don't even know what, if anything, I would actually enjoy waking up for.

Try a psychologist then, but before you start taking any drugs from them, just do a quick head count of the people around you. If more than 25% of them are total assholes, it's time to move.

Really though, I don't know your situation, but it sounds like you gotta grab your huevos and change something.

If there are financial issues, get rid of them as best you can. Explore other options for making money or getting out of debt or whatever you are in.

If there are family/emotional reasons, remember that other people have feet too and can walk with you to a new place.

If there are depression reasons, I hear running and weight lifting are great for it. Docs too, as I said. Also, music and dancing seem to be good too.

You gotta plan for the end of your life just as much as the next meeting. And only you can do it for you. Take baby steps though, but keep them rolling.

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#125

Post by zevyoura »

spain wrote: post #119
kcovia wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you really want to work for someone who thinks getting to the office 5 minutes earlier is more important than your child?

Does he know that's why I'm coming in 5 minutes late? Maybe he just thinks I'm a slacker who doesn't want to get out of the bed in the morning. I think I'd rather try and explain to him the situation I'm in before walking out. He's probably doing it out of ignorance, not out of malign. You can talk to him about it and explain your side and maybe understand his. Right now you're making the same kind of judgements of t…

It's a pithy story, I wouldn't take it 100% literally.

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#127

Post by bcoates »

simi_ wrote: post #94
georgemcbay wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming you were effective at your job, said boss needs to examine what is important to him, slavish respect-mah-authortai-style following of rather arbitrary rules, or having a "bird-in-the-hand" competent employee who gets shit done (perhaps 5 minutes later than the boss-man would like). It is kind of sad how many boss/manager types still fail miserably on this point, and then complain about not being able to hire…

I'm the counterexample - I like letting capable people as loose as possible, and more often than I'd like this backfires. I'd appreciate some effective pointers on how to deal with this issue.

What's backfiring?

There's two levels here: at the first level, you don't want to sweat anyone (capable or otherwise) about coming to work late because it indicates fundamentally messed up priorities: you aren't paying them to keep a seat warm. If you set them free to come in whenever they want, they will. If it gives you indigestion because you have no idea where your employees are, you need to figure out why that is and solve the real problem (and if the real problem is "my boss thinks I'm not doing my job if I'm not sweating my employees about seat-warming", my condolences, because you are totally fucked).

Don't confuse this with people who advocate self-management, where you just trust your people to do the right thing and set them loose without any structure at all. That's a much more subtle skill that requires the right relationships and the right situation and frankly is a gigantic hassle. If you've got a group of unmanageable geniuses who seem to be productive despite the chaos feel free to try but most teams who get things done do not operate this way and don't let the woo-woo peddlers tell you otherwise.

You're doing pretty well if the people who work for you feel like you have real, specific expectations of them but also have 'wiggle room' to do anything they want (just not everything they want).

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#128

Post by kungfooey »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #108
kungfooey wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clarification: I'm not saying that no 30 year old can offer sage advice. I don't think Altman is on the same level as Kirkegaard here. As others have pointed out, the list is not terribly revolutionary. It simply struck me as odd that this (not particularly revelatory list) could be passed off as worthy of note. What, other than his work with YC, makes Sam's musings worthy of our time?

There's nothing wrong with the list. It's not like the earlier pg essays that literally changed the ways I think about a lot of things. It's just a list of largely common platitudes. Nothing wrong with that in itself, though. Many of them are worth reiterating from time to time.

> There's nothing wrong with the list.

Pretty high bar you have for lists there!

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#129

Post by cafebeen »

johnward wrote: post #97

" On work: it’s difficult to do a great job on work you don’t care about. And it’s hard to be totally happy/fulfilled in life if you don’t like what you do for your work." How do you fix this? For the last 10 years of my life I've basically woken up each morning and wished I hadn't. I don't like what I do. I can't afford to not do it anymore. I don't even know what, if anything, I would actually enjoy waking up for.

Depending on happiness from a job doesn't actually seem healthy. I don't know your situation, but maybe there's some way to improve life outside work, e.g. social circle, hobbies, fitness, mental health.

Re: The days are long but the decades are short

#130

Post by untog »

runesoerensen wrote: post #31
kungfooey wrote: post #6

Are we really at the point where a 30 year old can offer sage advice on living life? Wow. As a counterpoint to "be the best you can be in your profession": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIJdFxYlEKE [PyCon keynote by Jacob Kaplan-Moss on 'mediocre developers'].

I can't say I'm surprised to see this as the top comment, but I think it's sad that you (and apparently many other upvoters) don't think 30 year olds can offer valuable advice on life. It's also wrong as proven by history. Many writers have produced some of their best works at the same age. One example is Kirkegaard who wrote "Fear and Trembling"[1] at age 30. If you think that Sam's advice is narrowminded or bad as…

I think there's a difference between providing everyday life advice and writing an influential philosophical work.

For example, having a family. I have no idea if Sam has children, but many 30 year olds (like myself) do not, so I don't consider myself able to give life advice to anyone who does, because their life and my life are dramatically different.

In general, I think, it's not that 30 year olds can't give life advice. It's that I'd bet 60 year olds can give considerably better life advice. When "the days are long but the decades are short", it's worth considering that the author has only spent one of the latter in the work force.

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