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Optimizing your career for happiness

praachi.work

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Re: Optimizing your career for happiness

#51

Post by 01HNNWZ0MV43FF »

matthewsinclair wrote: post #6
purple-leafy wrote: post #3

work 4 days not 5 as money allows Then work 3 days not 4 as money allows Then work 2 days not 3 as money allows …. Then retire

I’ve never really been a fan of the concept of “retirement”. It feels very much like a Silent Generation/ Boomer idea that has run its course (for reasons both good and bad). I watched grandparents on both sides retire and their mental decline tracked their decline in active engagement with meaningful activity. The way I have always looked at it is that want to “retire from _having_ to work” and promote myself to wor…

If I retired right now in my 30s I would be doing more meaningful activity - Game development, spending time with my lovers, reconnecting with my family, taking care of my own health and my house, traveling...

Re: Optimizing your career for happiness

#52

Post by stephenson »

notepad0x90 wrote: post #46
stephenson wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is the most sad comment I have read on HN for years. Can I ask where in the world you live?

America! :) I didn't mean for it to be sad. I just don't get why the "self" is so important. Isn't it natural for a person to at least attempt to be about others?

I think it partly has to do with what level of security is around you, I don't live in a place (Denmark) where I have to solve that many other people's basic needs so I can optimize further up in the pyramid of needs.

Re: Optimizing your career for happiness

#53

Post by Bagged2347 »

sgarland wrote: post #36
RandomThoughts3 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Aligning your personal goals with your company's mission can be a game-changer in achieving both professional success and personal fulfillment. That’s a fairly dangerous way of doing thing in my experience. Unless it’s your company, you have very little say in what the company actually does. Generally speaking, I advocate keeping a sane distance between what you do for a living and the rest of your life. You are no…

> You are not defined by the company that pays you. Find a job which helps you achieve what you want to achieve, work honestly and leave work at work. I am genuinely _fascinated_ with RDBMS. I tinker with them in my free time. I watch syscalls during reads and writes to better understand what’s happening. I test theories when someone asserts “Postgres is better at X than MySQL” to see if they’re correct. The fact tha…

This is what I aspire to. Work will always be work, but if my interests could align at least somewhat with my day job, then acknowledging that I have to spend so much of my time working would be so much more tolerable. Happy to hear it's achievable.

Re: Optimizing your career for happiness

#54

Post by notepad0x90 »

01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote: post #50
notepad0x90 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

America! :) I didn't mean for it to be sad. I just don't get why the "self" is so important. Isn't it natural for a person to at least attempt to be about others?

It might be the depression talking but my self happiness is way too low in a typical month / week to begin thinking of others

I get that. But financial freedom, at least for me would go a long way in terms of not being depressed. Once you beat depression, then you can function well and take care of your health and security. then do the same for others.

Not being happy all the time is not a mental illness or a problem, nor is it synonymous with depression.

Re: Optimizing your career for happiness

#55

Post by sgarland »

Bagged2347 wrote: post #53
sgarland wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You are not defined by the company that pays you. Find a job which helps you achieve what you want to achieve, work honestly and leave work at work. I am genuinely _fascinated_ with RDBMS. I tinker with them in my free time. I watch syscalls during reads and writes to better understand what’s happening. I test theories when someone asserts “Postgres is better at X than MySQL” to see if they’re correct. The fact tha…

This is what I aspire to. Work will always be work, but if my interests could align at least somewhat with my day job, then acknowledging that I have to spend so much of my time working would be so much more tolerable. Happy to hear it's achievable.

ADHD and/or autism helps quite a bit. Devastating in other areas of life, of course, but hey, trade-offs.

Re: Optimizing your career for happiness

#56

Post by matthewsinclair »

jjav wrote: post #45
matthewsinclair wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve never really been a fan of the concept of “retirement”. It feels very much like a Silent Generation/ Boomer idea that has run its course (for reasons both good and bad). I watched grandparents on both sides retire and their mental decline tracked their decline in active engagement with meaningful activity. The way I have always looked at it is that want to “retire from _having_ to work” and promote myself to wor…

> The way I have always looked at it is that want to “retire from _having_ to work” and promote myself to working on things that I _want_ to work on. But this is exactly what retirement is!

Is it? Not the kind of retirement I have seen with grandparents (and parents). Retirement in that sense is stopping meaningful work altogether and doing “leisure”. I feel like that is a rapid pathway to senility.
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