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Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

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Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#91

Post by hackerlight »

anonymouskimmer wrote: post #31
davnicwil wrote: post #12

When you look at individuals who have achieved things you admire, it's so often true that they themselves came from outside the status system that existed at that time. They now sit within, or atop the current one, but it's often something they themselves have created to a greater or lesser degree. There's a huge lesson there, I think. Being in that position in the current status system is not and never was their goa…

Please show me a new status system. Not just different people on top of an already existing one. I could see brand new status systems existing for, say, a new video game. Everyone starts out equally as newbies and works their way up. Maybe someone could leverage their position in a current status system (such as wealth or free time) to boost their potential in this new system. Brand new industries could create new st…

There's status silos everywhere. Chess, sports, games, prisons, inside companies, inside professions, startups, inside academic disciplines. Each of these status silos shares an abstract similarity. They are groups of people battling it out for their peers' recognition and prestige in a zero-sum contest. The criteria by which prestige is bestowed will vary from silo to silo. So it's up to the players of the game to know what the criteria is in their silo of choice, and optimize for it. In a prison, it's violence. In chess, it's competence. In a company, it might be politicking.

> I suffer from the problem of not paying attention to status.

Are you sure? Maybe you just don't pay attention to conventional status markers. But you are still competing in a status silo (such as a contest here on HN for points?), just an unorthodox one.

Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#92

Post by geodel »

tqi wrote: post #55

On the one hand, sure, status probably is a trap and won't bring "true happiness." And I think this is well meaning advice. But on the other hand, I think it's possible that an Ivy League educated founder/VC partner/executive coach might not be in the best position to see the whole picture. To paraphrase the Aviator[1], you don't care about status because you've always had it. I think that for many people who have ex…

True. The way I see is one category of people who would need first hand experience to know status really matters or not. They wouldn't find this advice much useful. But there is other group who would rather take the word of someone with status to believe status doesn't matter if they are saying so. Simply because they have status so they know better about it.

I think at core most of advice from haves to have nots has different effect on smart vs average have nots. Smarts tend to see a kind of hypocrisy in these proclamations. Whereas average folks just see the real world the way it is. So these advise seems useful info coming from important people.

Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#93

Post by jgil »

atleastoptimal wrote: post #81
robotresearcher wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So while in the 50's, the advantages to being more high status seemed almost cosmetic Is this the same Fifties with white and colored water fountains, and where women had to leave office jobs when they married?

This is an interesting, fallacious take. Basically: one thing about some time in the past was bad, thus everything about it was bad. Higher wealth disparity, based on its impact on social stability, measured independently, is bad. Racism/sexism are bad. The impact of things must be measured separately, so our ideas regarding how to improve society are higher resolution and more accurate.

The widespread racism and sexism of the 50’s was not “one thing” and it’s not just in the past.

There is such a thing as missing the forest for the trees. Socioeconomic status is intersectional.

Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#94

Post by mpweiher »

> when our status is challenged, our body reacts like it's in physical danger

While it's not 100% certain, the fact that there appears to be a biological adaptation that makes us seek status and avoid losing status strongly suggests that the author is underestimating the importance of status in human society.

For example: "we find that status is significantly associated with men’s reproductive success, consistent with an evolved basis for status pursuit."

https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1606800113

Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#96

Post by glass3 »

The article feels very coherent to the point that I want to follow its advice. But will it work?

>Status, like money and power, is a form of capital. If we can learn to tolerate our feelings of “not-enoughness,” we can then use status in service of what we care about, rather than being addicted to it as an end in itself.

If we can tolerate 'not-enoughness', what would be there that needs change? As a society, don't we have to tolerate addiction because that's the loop that drives our progress?

>Casey Rosengren is a founder and executive coach based in New York. If you’d like to learn more about ACT and values-oriented coaching, drop him a note.

'founder' - Does he use the title 'in service' or is he still trapped in the status game? In the latter case, is his advice still valid?

Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#97

Post by jgil »

julianeon wrote: post #50

I think there was a historical change that has complicated our conversation about status. In the 50's, the peak of this, it seemed like many people got a 'deal' that went something like this: you & your work colleagues could afford a house, car, and the costs associated with several children, starting in your 20's. All of those things at a pretty high level actually (ie not a terrible unsafe house, not a broken down…

> it seemed like many people got a ‘deal’

> So while in the 50's, the advantages to being more high status seemed almost cosmetic, today, they're anything but.

The “deal” you are referring to was largely codified racism. [1]

And only cosmetic inasmuch as being granted pollution-free, affordable housing based on skin color would be considered “cosmetic.”

[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-09-02/how-the-f...

Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#98

Post by Barrin92 »

tqi wrote: post #55

On the one hand, sure, status probably is a trap and won't bring "true happiness." And I think this is well meaning advice. But on the other hand, I think it's possible that an Ivy League educated founder/VC partner/executive coach might not be in the best position to see the whole picture. To paraphrase the Aviator[1], you don't care about status because you've always had it. I think that for many people who have ex…

I come from a pretty precarious background but through circumstance and luck I've ended up in much higher status environments from a fairly young age. (private school, later tech jobs)

The one thing I always cared more about than a lot of kids was money but not status. People who grow up poor tend to really be aware of how much it sucks to not have money. You see it in entrepreneurs in China or former Eastern bloc countries. People who grew up in insecurity tend to be very conscious about access to resources and are very competitive.

But status is a different thing. Most people who come from precarious backgrounds in my opinion hate status games because the people who play them the most are anxious upper-middle class people afraid of falling downwards. I think I've probably harmed my career prospects by just being allergic to networking or not going to posh events because of how fake they seem.

Also important to point out that status is a complex thing in the sense that a lot of high status people are "performatively broke" because that's paradoxically the only way to flex even more if you're rich (tech CEOS living in crap houses and sleeping on old mattresses etc), so that makes advice like this even more complicated because it's difficult to tell if it's genuine.

Re: Pursuing status will never bring true happiness

#99

Post by magic_hamster »

tqi wrote: post #55

On the one hand, sure, status probably is a trap and won't bring "true happiness." And I think this is well meaning advice. But on the other hand, I think it's possible that an Ivy League educated founder/VC partner/executive coach might not be in the best position to see the whole picture. To paraphrase the Aviator[1], you don't care about status because you've always had it. I think that for many people who have ex…

Status is a completely artificial construct that completely melts away the minute you run out of money. It's an unfair advantage, but it offers no security whatsoever.
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