Live data from Hacker News

Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

fs.blog

51–60 of 171 posts

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#51
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What effort and cost? They're so cheap and easy to take care of. Maybe I'm being too generous since I am using dogs as a reference point.

Travel becomes a lot harder if you have a cat.

Travel becomes almost impossible when you have a cat. Can't leave decent amount of time to anywhere, sometimes just possibilities of what may happen is enough.

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#52

I see this all around me. People are fixated on careers, hobbies (FOMO), spread thin by family obligations and errands. The truth is, happiness does not derive from these things. This "busyness" is an invention. Life is simple, and happiness actually derives from having cats.

And chickens!

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm allergic to cats. Pets also add complexity to life, e.g. when you want to go away for any length of time.

You can leave cats alone for a weekend without an supervision, just a bowl of food and some water.

We do up to about 6 or 7 days. I often joke I'm not responsible enough to own a dog, and if I was going to get a dog, I might as well just have kids. The idea of having to find a way to take care of the dog when you want to go out of town is definitely a little anxiety-producing.

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#54

I see this all around me. People are fixated on careers, hobbies (FOMO), spread thin by family obligations and errands. The truth is, happiness does not derive from these things. This "busyness" is an invention. Life is simple, and happiness actually derives from having cats.

This is funny because the most unhappy and anxious people I know are cat owners.

Not true from my experience. All cat owners I know are relaxed go with the flow type of people. Few dog owners I know are as you describe but the rest don’t make the pattern significat to notice. Maybe the anxious people you know attempt to rid their anxiety by soothing themselves with cats and it is not working properly for them. I personally love cats and their presence gives me a relaxed attitude but would never have one in my apparent, the smell is too much to bear. And hair everywhere...

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can leave cats alone for a weekend without an supervision, just a bowl of food and some water.

My friend did that. His cat ate all the food in a single sitting and was both fat and almost dead from not eating for two days.

Cat don't become fat from single large meal.

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#56
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can leave cats alone for a weekend without an supervision, just a bowl of food and some water.

We do up to about 6 or 7 days. I often joke I'm not responsible enough to own a dog, and if I was going to get a dog, I might as well just have kids. The idea of having to find a way to take care of the dog when you want to go out of town is definitely a little anxiety-producing.

How do you deal with litter boxes?

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#57
post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can leave cats alone for a weekend without an supervision, just a bowl of food and some water.

We do up to about 6 or 7 days. I often joke I'm not responsible enough to own a dog, and if I was going to get a dog, I might as well just have kids. The idea of having to find a way to take care of the dog when you want to go out of town is definitely a little anxiety-producing.

I guess the other side of that is you can often take a dog or kids with you in the car or train but with a cat it’s a bit trickier. That being said my mum used to throw (kinda literally) the cat in the back of the car when I was a kid and we’d drive 2 hours to my grandmas place. The cat didn’t seem to care much and went to sleep.

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#58

I see this all around me. People are fixated on careers, hobbies (FOMO), spread thin by family obligations and errands. The truth is, happiness does not derive from these things. This "busyness" is an invention. Life is simple, and happiness actually derives from having cats.

This is funny because the most unhappy and anxious people I know are cat owners.

I remember talking to a coworker friend of mine who was a cat owner. She said that she didn't understand dogs. They just loved you unconditionally all the time no matter what. So I guess she liked the life with the cat where it was just randomly mean or not interested in her sometimes. Kind of illustrated things to me.

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#59
Life is simple..

If you aim lower.

There was a psychology research on how people even billionaire form a baseline similar to a homeless dude. All the stress, pressure you have is the same as everybody else and it will never change.

So the goal should be do whatever you enjoy while doing the minimum effort..

Of course this type of thinking would immediately hamper progress everywhere.

Re: Why Life Can’t Be Simpler

#60

I see this all around me. People are fixated on careers, hobbies (FOMO), spread thin by family obligations and errands. The truth is, happiness does not derive from these things. This "busyness" is an invention. Life is simple, and happiness actually derives from having cats.

Happiness has been debunked by the replication crisis.
Post reply on HN