71–80 of 802 posts
I wonder if the solution is simply to focus and effectively use resources so you can be effective and ambitious in a reasonable number of hours. Which is fine for 99.99%. Only if you are at the helm of discovering a revolution in physics or changing the world in some other way then go all in when you have kids. Which today is rare since team work makes the dream work way more. Of course there is greed. If you are gre…
YC reject so I bootstrapped and was thankfully able to hit profitability before my first kid showed up. I’ve now got two. I also have dreams bigger than ever. In fact, writing this while sitting on the couch with the kids watching Muppet Treasure Island while my kids are wearing pirate hats and waving foam swords. I’m still extremely productive and prolific. Probably less compared with before. But before, I had frien…
Isn’t it unhealthy to skip both breakfast and lunch? How are you getting the energy to do stuff without eating?
No, why would you think that?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would also add that, at least in my experience, those who are professionally ambitious and maximizing professional success, while being highly confident they are also succeeding at home, often have an inaccurate view of their home life. It's not until the kids are grown and openly fighting their demons that they realize the bargain that they made. It's that old adage of, anyone who thinks they're a great parent, pr…
This is a conversation that ambitious women have been having for decades. To the point where it's a cliche. Having it about men and women is valuable, having it be about them separately I think masks some of the structural problems- e.g. better childcare, more and better laid out parental leave(1), etc. Two things I've heard from different ambitious women: "To really achieve, you need a wife" is something I've heard…
In ways, it really crisped up my time working on work. My wife and I have some bottom lines, we're invovled, we have dinner as a family every day. We go to school events, all of them. We go to sports and activities, all of them (although there have been some times we had to split up and each to a different one.) I'm at the table when my kids have breakfast, every day except when I travel for work which is a week or two per quarter. It's great for the kids, it's great for the family but suddenly it feelds like your day is shorter. Personally, I have tried to find other "thought time" and that has resulted in much better execution when I get to writing code or plans or whatever. I used to sit at the blank editor and start to compose but now I am forced to think more before hand. I've built a few things I honestly don't think I could have built before kids, just out of necessity, I've had to be more efficient and effective.
There are also times of utter exhaustion but I had those before kids. I'll also went through the process of sort of cutting out extras to make time, once your kids are in that 10-11 age, they'll have friends and interests, I've added some of those extras back because they are busy on Sunday afternoons or whenever.
I'm shocked by the amount of time people who don't have kids waste. So while PG may believe that people may have their "act already together" pre-kids, I sort of look at the amount of time people without kids waste and think "if only I had that much free time..."
A somewhat unpopular opinion, but personally I don't mind being kind of absent in my kids' lives relative to others' expectations. I think there's been some expectation creep around parental involvement for high-achieving couples without much concrete evidence that it hurts long-term outcomes, assuming the child is otherwise healthy and well taken care of. There's also something to be said for leaning on grandparents…
We turned out okay, no major problems with any of us, decent careers, whatever. I guess we probably wouldn't have turned out much better. So yeah, I guess there wouldnt have been much in terms of better "outcome". Still, my siblings have voiced the same regret. I genuinely think he does too. The expectation of being more present than he was is one I give myself, not "expectation creep".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn’t it unhealthy to skip both breakfast and lunch? How are you getting the energy to do stuff without eating?
Yeah I had a schedule like that when the kids were very young but it caught up with me, frankly. Having the computer be the first and last thing I interacted with every day was not great for my mood either.
Also, the first thing I work on is usually a high leverage project that excites me. Reading news or answering emails (things that can affect my emotions) are usually avoided during that time. Usually.
thank you for this, very well written, and rings true. I will say for me this is the root contradiction: > I do not believe the quality time theory. I firmly believe in maximizing the quantity of time spent with them; there are no diminishing returns for them on that front. If you believe that to be the most true statement, then it leads to the conclusion that you should work as little as possible to spend as most ti…
Ultimately any two ambitions will compete with each other for finite time and energy. (Assuming each ambition benefits from more time and energy being spent on it, which is usually the case.) You can be reasonably successful in multiple areas, but you can't max them all, you have to compromise somehow.