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I am rich and have no idea what to do

vinay.sh

381–390 of 1001 posts

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#381
post #73

I don’t think his problem is money. I think his problem is his identity (founder of Loom) suddenly disappeared. Now he needs to develop a new identity. This is especially difficult for single founders without kids (in the sense that people with spouse/kids already derive much of their identity from those 2 things). Selling a company isn’t all that different from going through a divorce (in the sense that your identit…

It says on wiki: In 2022, according to Forbes, the firm was valued at $1.5 billion, having secured $200 million in funding from venture funds such as Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, ICONIQ, Coatue, and Kleiner Perkins.[1][2] It is remote, but is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with an office in New York. Why would such a seemingly simple product need so much money? It seems like the business was alr…

They slapped the word AI on it and took advantage of temporary market conditions (wfh due to covid and AI hype), nothing more, nothing less. Unless I'm missing something, there is nothing special about this product and probably no one will remember it in ~15 years time.

Meanwhile OP seems to think he should have expected the same sense of fulfillment one might get from an actually meaningful contribution to human society, for some reason.

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#382

Man, this thread is a bit silly. Not having to worry about finances is a fucking miracle for most people. I'd happily trade places with the OP, because there is so much I already do and would do even more with the free time. Completely un-relatable. I have come across a sum of money once before, it was stressful initially but it gave us free time. People saying money makes things harder, what a fucking stupid thing t…

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Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#383
post #69

I am really, really eager and excited to see the result when these DOGE-istas cook up whatever insanely “rational” schemes they imagine will make government not completely “dysfunctional” roll them out to the people they actually need to implement them (i.e., Congress). Surprise! Politicians only claim to care about budget and spending matters when the opposite party is in control. But I think most of us aren’t so na…

But they're all super duper smart! Surely it can't take more than a month or two to solve govt waste with that kind of brainpower.

"We cut cancer research and will replace all government vehicles with Teslas. Ez!"

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#385

Perhaps I missed something, but from what I saw none of his attempts to do something new seemed to involve any kind of genuine efforts to improve the lives of others... Bit amazing that wasn't even something he would consider.

Yeah, I was going to comment that doing volunteer work in some form could go a long way towards curing what ills him. Surprised that that wasn't even mentioned in TFA.

I get the impression his past ideology looked down on that kind of volunteering, this is someone who thinks working for DOGE (department of government efficiency) is a humanitarian action.

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#386

As a young(ish) man with retirement level wealth personally I don't understand this primarily I suppose because my main passions in life are not profitable. Great, so now I don't have to profitmax every single thing and can rely on my investments. That means I can study pottery, languages, learn about cars, guns, travel, spend time with my old mum, family, start a small business, whatever it is, without care for whet…

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Get friends?

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#387

> I should work for Elon and Vivek at DOGE and help America get off its current crash to defaulting on its own debt I’ve got an idea: take some good economics courses so that you learn how government spending actually works.

This is a facile dunk. Economics literature is filled with examples of debt destroying countries’ economies either through hyper inflation or default. Since the US controls its currency, it is very likely to take the inflation route, but if you get enough hawks they might choose to default.

This is insane. Most countries are in debt and there's nothing wrong with that unless it becomes too high. Choosing to default is a choice with no benifits that would crash the world economy for no reason and permanently hobble the country

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#388
post #3

Same situation, I truly empathise because it really does seem to take a lot of purpose out of everything. What I’ve found is that you need to replace money/salary/financial success optimisation (assuming you spent a lot of your life and energy to this point focused on these, much like I did) with something else totally unconnected with being measured in that way. For me, I am focused on proving myself as a guitarist…

People need work to be happy. That doesn't have to be, say, office work necessarily: it can be making music full time, or volunteering at a hospital, or any number of other things. But you have to have something keeping you busy that makes you feel like you have a purpose.

Totally agree. But it can be surprisingly hard to find what this is for yourself when you are used to climbing the school / corporate / startup ladder your whole life.

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#389
post #237

Probably not gonna get upvoted but I’m pretty surprised none of the the top comments mentions volunteering or philanthropy. I believe people who get lucky should land a hand in making the world a better place. We are facing huge crises (climate change to name one) and as a wealthy individual you have both the time to spend helping to fix that and the fortune to donate. Being a smart wealthy individual just makes ever…

The lesson from FTX was to burn it all down.

Re: I am rich and have no idea what to do

#390
post #118
post #106

I don't think you have to have Fuck You Money to get to this point. Most people eventually become disillusioned with work enough that they reevaluate what matters to them. Getting a very profitable exit is just one way to trigger that experience. In my experience, a lot of people who get into this state start self-sabotaging hard as a way of rejecting what feels, ironically, like losing control. Sudden freedom can fe…

In a way having money makes it harder because it makes it harder to blame your unhappiness on your circumstances.

What a load. Only someone who has always had money would say this
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