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Hey everyone - thanks so much for reading! Burnout and depression is a topic that not enough of us talk about, even though that's often the best solution. If you know anyone struggling with burnout or depression, or you just enjoyed my article, I'd be forever grateful if you'd share it with them on Twitter or Facebook, to help spread the word. Thanks so much!
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Well, remember the start of this conversation: crush-n-spread: > I submit that the working person greatly benefits from having a strongly held, over-arching life goal. I believe having a strong over-arching goal is very helpful for a person (working or otherwise). Helpful in the sense that it can offset certain problems or give the person better tools for working around/through them (i.e., depression, burnout, purpos…
I would say that 'purpose' would fit better into your argument than 'goal'. Taking care of children or elderly parent gives you a purpose but is not a goal. And yes, I agree that having a purpose makes the tough parts of life more bearable.
I distinguish these things by their target of focus:
A "purpose" is concerned with one's place in the world. It's an attempt to fit in. It is also often done in a manner similar to picking your favorite color. "I want to be a star athlete".
A high-level "purpose"/"goal"/etc. is concerned with the state of the world. It's often not too concerned with where you are, it's rather concerned with results, and it can be good or bad, and it needs justification. "I want the game of soccer to be beautiful".
The latter is considerably more resilient than the former, as it is not reliant on personal performance as much, and the latter can guide the former. You might even ask whether the game of soccer needs more athletes to be beautiful, or if you did become one, you'd have a much easier time rejecting things like cheating and doping if you think they do not help, while someone concerned with being a star athlete is very inclined to cheat since that is their purpose and they don't have an overarching goal to stop them. And, in the end, if they nonetheless fail to become a star athlete, they'd have quite the crisis, while the person with the goal will be OK with it as the game of soccer will likely stay beautiful without them, and, even, consider if athletes are not really the biggest threat to soccer right now given their sheer number.
It wasn't a situation where you simply remove a stressor and everything automatically gets better. A problem was created in my brain and it took a long time before I was functioning properly again.
Fortunately, have some savings like the author and am taking a break for a while. Thanks for this timely post!
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Most high-level goals that I've seen people have amount to what I call "winning the gauntlet". Making a lot of money, founding a big company, achieving fame, finding a high-profile SO, etc. Statistically, those goals will not be achieved by a given person, and not only that, but they effectively amount to "have it better than someone else", i.e., they're zero-sum. Goals like these seem reasonable to people when they…
> Why the sense of urgency? What is it that is so important that only you personally can do it? Sometimes it isn't that only you personally can , but rather that only you personally will .
> But people find themselves in these insurmountable goals and feel like they need to do so much work, that brings other questions. Why them? What is everyone else doing?
If you find yourself in that situation, you may want to ask why this is happening, because it's strange. You should also realize that the chance of failure is very high, and if your goal is truly important to you, that should worry you.
I'm not saying this in the sense of "you should/shouldn't pursue your goal", I have no idea, I don't know what your goal is. But strangeness is often a highly valuable source of information. You really, really need to know why nobody else is pursuing your goal, and that information could help you find more people to help with your goal to address the second concern.
On a more fundamental level, answering that question could put the value of the goal in jeopardy, or, on the other hand, make it that much more important.
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Yup exhausting to have this world view isn't it? And rising depression rates suggest, to me at least, that people that think this way are becoming more common.
When you find yourself in this situation, it's a good idea to "zoom out" a little and get closer to nature and real people. I took long walks, trying to soak up the sun, trees, insects everything. I also walked all over the city and watched different people getting on with their lives; commuting, serving, sweeping, chatting ... and all the while paying attention to their facial expressions and language. And finally I…
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Yup exhausting to have this world view isn't it? And rising depression rates suggest, to me at least, that people that think this way are becoming more common.
When you find yourself in this situation, it's a good idea to "zoom out" a little and get closer to nature and real people. I took long walks, trying to soak up the sun, trees, insects everything. I also walked all over the city and watched different people getting on with their lives; commuting, serving, sweeping, chatting ... and all the while paying attention to their facial expressions and language. And finally I…
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Yup exhausting to have this world view isn't it? And rising depression rates suggest, to me at least, that people that think this way are becoming more common.
When you find yourself in this situation, it's a good idea to "zoom out" a little and get closer to nature and real people. I took long walks, trying to soak up the sun, trees, insects everything. I also walked all over the city and watched different people getting on with their lives; commuting, serving, sweeping, chatting ... and all the while paying attention to their facial expressions and language. And finally I…
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The unfortunate reality is that a lot of success boils down to IQ (and some other metrics of mental acuity,) which is mostly hereditary or imprinted, so that's depressing for a lot of people in education who started off wide-eyed and optimistic. Also, an efficient, nationwide online schooling system (CAVA in California as an example,) would be the end of something like 90% of the teachers in the country. Would that b…
Hmm my edtech aims for global literacy; so a reading programme for ESL kids who may be disadvantaged enough to only have access to a smartphone. So that at least frees me from that glum thought of IQ vs Nurture tug-o-war. While I'm at it, I might as well advertise: --------- If anyone is interested to join my adventure please feel free to contact me via my profile. --------- Someone with good tech skills will especia…
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/business-bootstrappe...
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When you find yourself in this situation, it's a good idea to "zoom out" a little and get closer to nature and real people. I took long walks, trying to soak up the sun, trees, insects everything. I also walked all over the city and watched different people getting on with their lives; commuting, serving, sweeping, chatting ... and all the while paying attention to their facial expressions and language. And finally I…
That last sentence. Seriously?
I would like to think there is a happy medium and that there are people who have their priorities straight and are also not poor. But there seems to be a dearth of evidence for this thing I would like to believe. It seems like those unwilling to sell their soul for money often have damn little of it.
So, while I understand your reaction, I can't quite manage to feel offended at what is possibly not the best framing, but possibly not inaccurate per se either.
(Edit: I am not saying everyone who has money has their priorities screwed up. I am just saying it seems to be hard to get both things right. It seems most people err on one side or the other, even if it isn't how they want to live. Those who err on the side of other priorities often seem to really struggle financially. Those who place a high priority on money often seem to do so at a personal cost that those chronically without money are loathe to make.)