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Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

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Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#291

Post by bitwize »

bradlys wrote: post #239
jstx1 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just rewatched that scene - he isn't saying anything meaningful. He's being rude, telling people how much money he makes and telling them to "just close".

He’s telling them the harsh truths of how the world works. He’s flaunting what they want in front of them and then showing them what they have to do in order to have it. It’s as controversial as the cracked piece in itself. And for some people in my circle - it’s a wake up call. You can’t expect to just get what he has by drifting through life aimlessly. You have to do what it takes. It’s a message to the kids who we…

Those salesmen never stood a chance -- that's the point. All the grit and perseverance in the world can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. They were selling shitty real estate, hoping to find someone clueless or out to lunch enough to buy swampland in Florida or whatever it was. Alec Baldwin's character was there as much to prevent the salespeople from catching on to the scam as to motivate them by making sure they felt that it was their own fault if they couldn't move the bad product. "The fuckin' leads are weak? YOU'RE weak."

I've noticed that multi-level marketing companies use "love bombing" tactics with new members, showering them with praise and good vibes and assuring them that it is easy to make money using their system. Once you're in, however, the "sales experts" quickly turn into the Alec Baldwin character, pressuring, mocking, and grilling you to sell more in an environment where it's near impossible to sell anything.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#292

Post by e12e »

okareaman wrote: post #131

I came of age before blogs and frankly, don't see any blog posts that could be life changing for an older person, so I'll add a life changing book and song. The Third Wave by Alvin Toffler, the sequel to Future Shock. I was a nuclear trained engineer in the Navy. This book convinced me not to pursue a career in nuclear power after the Navy, which was the standard career path for guys like me, because it was "Second W…

> I came of age before blogs and frankly, don't see any blog posts that could be life changing for an older person, so I'll add a life changing book and song.

E. B. White wrote of the essay and the essayist - and I think it goes a long way towards arguing (unintended perhaps) that a good blog post is a good essay (and vice versa) - at least that was my thoughts when I first read it:

> The essayist is a self-liberated man, sustained by the childish belief that everything he thinks about, everything that happens to him, is of general interest. He is a fellow who thoroughly enjoys his work, just as people who take bird walks enjoy theirs. Each new excursion of the essayist, each new “attempt,” differs from the last and takes him into new country. This delights him. Only a person who is congenitally self-centered has the effrontery and the stamina to write essays.

> There are as many kinds of essays as there are human attitudes or poses, as many essay flavors as there are Howard Johnson ice creams. The essayist arises in the morning and, if he has work to do, selects his garb from an unusually extensive wardrobe: he can pull on any sort of shirt, be any sort of person, according to his mood or his subject matter—philosopher, scold, jester, raconteur, confidant, pundit, devil’s advocate, enthusiast. (...)

> There is one thing the essayist cannot do, though—he cannot indulge himself in deceit or in concealment, for he will be found out in no time.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#293

Post by teknopaul »

mehphp wrote: post #248
shaneos wrote: post #20

Aphantasia: How it feels to be blind in your mind By Blake Ross https://m.facebook.com/nt/screen/?params=%7B%22note_id%22%3A... Before reading this post I had no idea I had aphantasia and thought everyone else was the same as me, unable to see anything when they closed their eyes. This helped me understand myself and my relationships so much better than ever before. Thanks Blake!

I wonder if those with aphantasia tend to hate reading novels. For me, once I get into a book I basically "see" it playing out in my head and I won't even notice that I'm reading words. I could totally understand how it would be bland if you were just reading a description and nothing was coming to you.

I guess I have this thing, I had never heard of it before but I have it based on Wikipedia's description, I also have very few memories of my life, which can be disturbing, maybe this is why.

For the record I love novels, inc fantasy fiction and descriptive sci-fi without having a minds eye to bring it into.

e.g. Big fan of starship troopers (the book) which is completely set in an invented universe none of which I have visualized. I saw the film and I can't remember its visual interpretation. (I do remember it being lame compared to the book)

Even without a minds eye I sometimes find some directors visual interpretation jarring.

How do you visualizers get on with the colour of magic? Do you have to see everything?

On the plus side I support two concurrent internal monologues or one that goes double speed & I can go full-duplex.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#294

Post by gilbetron »

beltsazar wrote: post #98
shaneos wrote: post #20

Aphantasia: How it feels to be blind in your mind By Blake Ross https://m.facebook.com/nt/screen/?params=%7B%22note_id%22%3A... Before reading this post I had no idea I had aphantasia and thought everyone else was the same as me, unable to see anything when they closed their eyes. This helped me understand myself and my relationships so much better than ever before. Thanks Blake!

What's even crazier is that not everyone has an internal monologue: https://www.insidemymind.me/blog/brain-stuff/today-i-learned... If aphantasia is "internally blind", this one is "internally mute and deaf". I wonder if anyone in the world has both conditions. That would be interesting to understand how they think.

I think I have close to opposite of not having an internal monologue, it is hard for me to turn my internal monologue into an external one. Talking takes a lot of effort and I get tired of doing it after a short while. I've conditioned myself to be able to do it well now, and I can be very articulate, but my wife and son, for instance, can just keep talking and talking and talking. I find it so bizarre.

But I can talk with myself internally for hours on end.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#295

Post by oliv__ »

ema wrote: post #128

7 years ago I had just aborted an internship, my foray into being an employed adult, because I found myself unable to deal with disagreements. Contrary to my naive hope that the confidence boost from being a Professional Software Developer(tm) would solve all my emotional problems I now knew that my limitations would follow me around anywhere I would go. But I had no idea how to change and was too stuck in my own anx…

That was quite the rabbit hole.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#296

Post by pretzell »

very much a trope now, but waitbutwhy on Elon companies back in 2015. I felt like I had to be a part of it and got me into STEM. Now I'm fully in STEM, went back to school to take a bunch of STEM fundamentals, got into CS, etc.

https://waitbutwhy.com/2017/03/elon-musk-post-series.html

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#297

Post by bradlys »

jstx1 wrote: post #272
bradlys wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He’s telling them the harsh truths of how the world works. He’s flaunting what they want in front of them and then showing them what they have to do in order to have it. It’s as controversial as the cracked piece in itself. And for some people in my circle - it’s a wake up call. You can’t expect to just get what he has by drifting through life aimlessly. You have to do what it takes. It’s a message to the kids who we…

I don't think that he's showing them what they have to do. Unless acting like he does in the scene is what they're supposed to be doing as salesmen? I don't know too much about sales so if the lesson was the all that the other salesmen need to be douchebags with their clients just like Baldwin's character was with them, then that lesson has gone completely over my head. To me it looked like he's shaking them up a lit…

> I don't think that he's showing them what they have to do. Unless acting like he does in the scene is what they're supposed to be doing as salesmen?

Limitation of the format of the media and that it's for entertainment. Do you really expect a dry presentation about sales tactics in a play/movie???

It's a wake up call speech. It's a speech that you need to either shape up or get out - and to stop expecting handouts and to stop acting entitled. And the thing about his speech is that he's actually empathetic to people - he isn't saying you're worthless as a human being, he's saying you're not fit for the job and you need to be fit for the job if you want to keep it. "Good father? Fuck you - go home and play with your kids." It's a retaliation against the "but I'm a good/nice/whatever person" mentality of entitlement. If you want to work here - you need to close. That's the whole point - that our environment needs people with skills and people who can actually use those skills in a useful matter. You can't do it? Fine - you're not a worthless person but you don't deserve the job just out of birthright.

I'd watch the full thing to the end - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrhSLf0I-HM In no way is he entrapping them or anything - he says over and over again... "Don't like it? Leave." He's tell them over and over - do the job or leave. Stop expecting a handout - stop being entitled - do the job we hired you for.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#298

Post by randcraw »

tvirosi wrote: post #38
elmalto wrote: post #34

Ok it’s a bit of a stretch as it’s a speech, but “This Is Water” by David Foster Wallace is simply amazing. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8CrOL-ydFMI

I admit that I never really understood this speech. Could you explain why it was significant to you and what it means?

https://fs.blog/2012/04/david-foster-wallace-this-is-water/

Wallace says it himself in the speech: " Twenty years after my own graduation, I have come gradually to understand that the liberal arts cliché about teaching you how to think is actually shorthand for a much deeper, more serious idea: learning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience. Because if you cannot exercise this kind of choice in adult life, you will be totally hosed. Think of the old cliché about “the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master.”

I second this nomination. This is one of the most insightful essays I've ever read. Wallace's central points of consciously choosing A) what you give your attention to and B) how you construct meaning from experience REALLY DO lie at the heart of learning how to think and live a meaningful life.

("Water" is the noise in life that surrounds us every day which we've learned to ignore. But it's still the lens through which an untrained eye sees everything, that shapes who we are and how we live, since most of us don't act deliberately so much as react to life. Being oblivious to water is about remaining clueless to this noise, just going with the flow, unquestioningly and passively allowing your view of the world and your role in life to be shaped by mostly meaningless turbulence.)

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#299

Post by tenfourwookie »

ripitrust wrote: post #46

https://blog.tjcx.me/p/consume-less-create-more This article inspired me on two things : 1) Lots of the things I do in everyday life is just to consume: buying, watching, following, etc. These things either consume my money, or my time. These things make me feel good, but it does not generate real value. In order to get rich, I need to create things. I also start to realize that great people are great because they st…

Umberto Eco once wrote that the purpose of your life is what you leave behind.

I find value in this in both creating and doing nothing.

Re: Ask HN: What's the most life-changing blog post you've ever read?

#300

Post by BeetleB »

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #103
ripitrust wrote: post #46

https://blog.tjcx.me/p/consume-less-create-more This article inspired me on two things : 1) Lots of the things I do in everyday life is just to consume: buying, watching, following, etc. These things either consume my money, or my time. These things make me feel good, but it does not generate real value. In order to get rich, I need to create things. I also start to realize that great people are great because they st…

>I realized that reading a book was really just like reading Reddit—both were consumptive activitives. I disagree on this but I love and agree with the premise of the blog post. Comparing reddit to Moby Dick could not be further off. reddit (or any similar site) is a shill/bad actor/agitator/troll cesspool full of memes and clickbait. It is important to learn to tell good shit from bad shit. Consume things produced b…

Comparing Reddit to one book is not a proper comparison. Instead, compare Reddit as a whole to books as a whole. Most books are not worth reading.

> It is important to learn to tell good shit from bad shit

That would apply within Reddit, as well. Find the good subreddits and the good comments.

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