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I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

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Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#381

Post by rootusrootus »

Draiken wrote: post #235
matthewdgreen wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This happens to everyone in their 30s. You realize that "dying someday" -- which seemed like a big distant hypothetical when you were a kid -- is actually a thing that will happen on a timescale you can reason about. Your career gets hard and you don't really know the point of it. It takes a while to get over it. Then you hit your 40s and you realize that since you're going to die anyway, why waste the time and die b…

So is this the famous mid-life crisis everyone talks about? I never assumed this was it because I don't explicitly think about mortality all that much. I don't particularly mind that I'm going to die. I also haven't bought a Harley or have the will to do anything of the sorts. Guess I just have to figure out how to come out of it. It's been a slog and right now I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel, hehe.

I speak only for myself, but the closest thing I've felt to a 'mid-life crisis' (I'm 48 now) is more of a realization that there are a number of life choices that I can no longer make because they simply aren't available to someone at my stage in life. If I dwell on them, I feel a bit sad. I suspect some people try to grab something that serves as a talisman of those lost opportunities and cling to it for a bit, and this is the manifestation of their mid-life crisis.

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#382

Post by supertofu »

Tcepsa wrote: post #341
matthewdgreen wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This happens to everyone in their 30s. You realize that "dying someday" -- which seemed like a big distant hypothetical when you were a kid -- is actually a thing that will happen on a timescale you can reason about. Your career gets hard and you don't really know the point of it. It takes a while to get over it. Then you hit your 40s and you realize that since you're going to die anyway, why waste the time and die b…

Definitely have been struggling with stuff along these lines since my late 20s or so. It's been kind of like a revelation-onion, slowly peeling back the layers of expectations from myself and from others and realizing "Hey maybe I don't have to try to keep up with the media that everyone else is watching," and "Oh, if I want I really can pursue !" and developing into "You know, maybe this managerial track really isn'…

My only life's goal is to become a hermit in the woods.

Hopefully by the time I hit 45 I'll have saved enough to retire, uninstall VS Code forever, and enjoy the woods for the rest of my life :)

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#383

Post by moviewise »

cl42 wrote: post #271

The young man, who does not know the future, sees life as a kind of epic adventure, an Odyssey through strange seas and unknown islands, where he will test and prove his powers, and thereby discover his immortality. The man of middle years, who has lived the future that he once dreamed, sees life as a tragedy; for he has learned that his power, however great, will not prevail against those forces of accident and natu…

> But the man of age, if he plays his assigned role properly, must see life as a comedy

I think this is the secret to living well. Find the humor, find the positives, be jolly even in difficult circumstances because life is short, so why not laugh as much as possible? https://moviewise.substack.com/p/facing-lifes-difficulties

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#384

Post by SubuSS »

deckard1 wrote: post #314
stocknoob wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for writing this. There’s an insidious motivation that you have kids for what they can give you (“solve my meaning problem!”) vs what you can offer them. If you gamble on kids giving you meaning and they don’t, now what?

If you go out searching for meaning, you're not going to find it. "Is this meaning?" you might ask, for every choice or circumstance you face. The answer will always be "no". Because you can analyze anything to death. Poke holes in any situation and find some reason it's not full of "meaning". Finish a big project at work before the deadline? "Is this meaning?" Obviously no. The big project won't impact the mega-cong…

Really - you haven’t seen a more miserable group on REDDIT than fatfire? Come on.

It seems you’re saying there’s no meaning to life if I understand that text right.

I don’t know about you - but am a regular reader on fatfire fwiw and I do find my life immensely meaningful. I like finding goals, working towards them and possibly achieving them even (sometimes) or refocusing again. I look at the human experience as the meaning. Money definitely allows for varied experiences while I can pawn away the grunt work of living. Take it for what you will!

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#385

Post by shard »

dgfitz wrote: post #374
robbedpeter wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And there's always Tony Robbins, Jordan Peterson, and a wealth of other self-help types. Picking any system is better than nothing, and gives you context for selecting good ones once you're familiar. Coast on other people's wisdom until you earn your own.

I would hesitate to endorse Robbins. He’s had a litany of sexual abuse claims against him, among other legal problems

I despair at the modern trope of dismissing something of worth due to a person's thoughts/actions in an unrelated area (in modern parlance, "cancelling" someone). It seems like an ad hominem attack to me. How will this trend evolve in the future? Will the works of people like Beethoven, da Vinci, Einstein be cancelled due to them being meat eaters? (Substitute someone of equal stature if the people listed are actually vegetarians)

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#386

Post by qwerpy »

fowkswe wrote: post #323
otikik wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I could try to focus on my hobbies, but you realize very quickly that to get good at anything, you need hundreds/thousands of hours. The point of hobbies is not "getting good at them". It's enjoying them for their own sake. Otherwise they turn into ... work. > I'm just a blip in the universe and when I'm gone it will be unchanged, the same as if I had never existed. Yes. The Universe doesn't expect or have any spec…

> And now what? If you haven't already, I highly suggest making a child if you can. It seems to snap all of this into focus - it did for me anyway. I mean I still have a ton of existential dread and still often wonder what the point is but I do find purpose in providing for my family and trying to raise a human that can do good - maybe better than me and the author of that NYer piece :D.

It's sad that this comment got downvoted. There's hundreds of millions of years of evolution that codifies "you should have children" into our genes, and it's not hard to see that this has something to do with how middle age can feel meaningless if you don't. Just because it's difficult and/or not fashionable to have kids these days, doesn't mean those biological imperatives aren't still there, subtly affecting your thoughts.

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#387

Post by vikingerik »

Draiken wrote: post #135

This is always a tough subject for me because everyone seems to have at least an idea of what they want to achieve. When I was younger I had these silly dreams of moving to another country, getting married, becoming a programmer to make games, have my own company and get rich (haha). I did become a programmer and got married, but never left the country or became rich. Now on my 30s I know how limited my options are.…

Your story sounds a lot like mine. I earn good enough money at a laid-back employer, and don't have the drive to job-hop or leetcode into a FAANG, or to do some big open-source software project or anything else like that.

I focus on hobbies. What works for me is to keep the hobbies to myself - don't let it become competitive relative to others. That's a trap you'll never win, as you'll always be comparing to the best and not to any kind of average or typical performance.

Here's a number of concrete examples. I like Rubik's cube puzzles, but what I do with them is get new puzzles of different shapes and figure out ways to solve them. I deliberately don't get involved in speed-cubing or such competitions.

I like juggling, but I don't try to do any shows or competitions or anything; what I do is invent and learning new patterns and tricks for myself.

I learned to sew, to make costumes for conventions; but what I do is walk around to interact with and entertain people; I don't try to compete in shows or for prizes or anything.

I play board games, pinball, sports like bowling and ultimate frisbee; but always on a very casual recreational level and not in any kind of organized league or competition. What's important with these isn't the activity itself, it's the human interaction.

You can find a lot of value in hobbies like these in a range of 20 to 200 hours invested rather than 2000. The key is to find self-satisfaction in bettering your own skills; don't try to compare to the self-selected best lifelong obsessives.

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#388

Post by guynamedloren »

greyhair wrote: post #302
Draiken wrote: post #135

This is always a tough subject for me because everyone seems to have at least an idea of what they want to achieve. When I was younger I had these silly dreams of moving to another country, getting married, becoming a programmer to make games, have my own company and get rich (haha). I did become a programmer and got married, but never left the country or became rich. Now on my 30s I know how limited my options are.…

I have had a pretty good life all along, but it was blips, and spits and starts. And stumbles all along. I just rode through them. I had the advantage of having no vision, no plans, when I graduated high school. All my friends headed off to college, but I had no money, had no idea what I would even study, even though I scored just shy of 1500 on the SAT. Learning always came easy for me, it still does. So having no p…

Thank you for sharing. Beautifully said.

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#389

Post by LeftHandPath »

cik wrote: post #28

There's something cross cultural here that just doesn't cross. I can't relate. I'm responsible for me - my success, my failures. I also sure as hell better check on my neighbour and lend a hand. Fulfilment comes from within, not externally. Results driven fulfilment comes from the gradual achievement of small goals, slowly combining into larger goals. They can be as small, as simple as reading a book. The best advice…

I think I need to take up this practice. I've largely given up multitasking and this seems like a good next step on the way to healthier life and higher productivity.

Re: I thought I’d have accomplished a lot more today and also before I was 35 (2020)

#390

Post by volume »

cl42 wrote: post #271

The young man, who does not know the future, sees life as a kind of epic adventure, an Odyssey through strange seas and unknown islands, where he will test and prove his powers, and thereby discover his immortality. The man of middle years, who has lived the future that he once dreamed, sees life as a tragedy; for he has learned that his power, however great, will not prevail against those forces of accident and natu…

in poker tournaments the winner (and all the other loser) can't win (lose) without the collective choices of all other opponents.
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