71–80 of 91 posts
Pick a topic, servant to your employer or servant to pretty things?
Studies show people who are employed are happier than ones who are not. I'm sure the grass is greener on the other side right now, but there's a lot of evidence employment gives people more meaning than not having it, it's why lotto winners don't do as awesome as one would think.
It's the supreme luxury to be able to reject society. It's a luxury that's only available to those who are either born to wealth or put a lot of effort into obtaining it. There are also the "I just don't use money, man" people who are actually just living off the charity of friends.
Completely rejecting society is one of the most self-centered and egotistical things you can do. Only two classes of people obtain it: the very wealthy (basically, FU money) and vow-of-sileince monks (basically, "I'm never going to interact with humanity again").
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monastic_silence#Practice_of_s...
Everyone is a servant to the government, too which you pay taxes.
Even those that don't pay taxes are a servant to their friends, family, it takes work to maintain those relationships.
Even those that don't care about friends or family, or a servant to god(or "the universe" if you prefer).
At the end of the day there is always something that tells us or guides us in what to do or how to act, wether it be nature, a boss, friends, or often times just our own conscience. It's the nature of life... which isn't to say that seeking freedom and greater power, control and independence over our own lives isn't a laudable goal, but it's a balance, and everyone has different priorities that make them decide where to strike that balance.
Rah rah. So you are sitting in your economical abode eating your economical food with a pleased non-servant grin. And there you sit. And sit. The urge to build or do will come. Building is better with others. And soon you are back to having to make trade offs to build something you want or people want. To me, I'm always going to build. So yeah, all I can do is either pick the best masters available to me, figure out…
More like there you toil in the hot sun so that the crop on which your future survival depends doesn't become choked by weeds, devoured by pests, or withered from heat. People forget that agriculture was a back breaking affair and an often unreliable source of sustenance before mechanization and large factory farms came around. It remains back-breaking and unreliable for those in poorer nations not fortunate enough t…
I recently cut out a lot of unnecessary spending: Coffee drinks, restaurants, nearly all alcohol. My furniture is patio furniture from someone's curb. I stopped paying people to fix my appliances, preferring to order parts online and spend the hard time tearing them down (and yes, making mistakes). My main remaining expenses are housing and groceries (and since we've learned to fish, we don't buy so much protein). None of this is strictly necessary, I'm very gainfully employed, but it sure makes me feel a lot better about the value of my own work.
And now, the point of all this: I have a 6-month glide path in the bank, to protect against a job loss or other catastrophe. I also have a small sailboat and a small powerboat, which would be even more unnecessary objects, except that this is the one thing that that my wife and I do: We explore the sea as often as possible. In my honest opinion, this is one of the nicer definitions of having the world by the balls, and it doesn't involve being rich.
Sure, you have to serve others, and whether you choose (it really is a choice, and I fail as often as the next guy) to enjoy it is up to you. But you can still win, as long as you're damn certain of why you're doing it, and you do not waver.
I hated my last job, but I didn't feel the need to have a public existential crisis about it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the rest of the country being homeless is usually a crime.
What do you mean? While there are places that may look down on homeless people more than San Francisco, I don't think there is any place in the US were being homeless is a crime. That would be unconstitutional. Maybe you are saying that homeless people are more likely to be criminals, which may or may not be true. But I can't imagine a place in the US where just the act of being homeless is a crime. Do you have a sou…
I avoid that situation at all costs. My advice to anyone asking themselves this question is to simply stop working for, or around, people you don't care about. Solving that doesn't require a change in your economics, either.
No, we want to be servants for a large portion of our lives, apparently. We grovel at the foot of a master so that we can try to paint over the deadness we feel inside with bullshit...
There's a difference between being a miserable servant, and feeling enriched when put in a position of service. It really does have to do w/the type of person you are, and the type of people you surround yourself with. There are some people I truly enjoy working for, whether that be due to friendship or respect, or both, and I'll gladly devote hours of my life to their cause if they ask it.
At no time, however, have I drawn the conclusion that OP did. In cases when I've worked around people I'd rather not be around, I simply looked for better people or teams to work with. I didn't change my purchasing or other economic habits.
If you're older or wiser, you might want to consider a more positive-oriented way to address a midlife crisis - focusing more on what you want instead of what you don't want, and considering how to get the most value out of your time instead of how to get more time that's not as valuable as you'd like for it to be.
