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The Real Luxuries In Life

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Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#91

Post by eptcyka »

turzmo wrote: post #55
stackghost wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As with many things, it's easier to stay healthy if you are wealthy. You can buy personal training services, workout gear, a home in traffic-calmed neighborhoods where you aren't jogging or cycling along rural highways, a pool, etc. You can buy fresh fruit and vegetables instead of highly-processed food. If you're American you can buy imported or certified organic meat instead of the hormone-filled shit on the shelve…

Personal training services? Workout gear? Not sure you should have lead with that, these are expensive things with minimal impact.

Those services aid will power instead of health directly.

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#92

Post by jleyank »

As others have said in-thread and elsewhere: work to live, don't live for work. Yes, be professional and exceed expectations from time to time, but your in-basket will be full when you exit. Take time as the years progress to do "other things", as the physical abilities or people involved might not be there "later".

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#93

Post by Jeaye »

Slow_Hand wrote: post #84
Jeaye wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you mind sharing an example of "Working on something meaningful that pushes at the edge of my self actualization"? In my experience, work, even when meaningful, is quite separate from self actualization. I'm interested to hear how you're combining them.

I’m not OP, but I can speak to my own experience. I am approaching 40 and in two weeks I will begin clowning lessons with a Cirque du Soleil clown. I am thrilled. So why clown as a discipline? Something deeply misunderstood and that probably lowers my social status with people who don’t understand it? Something with zero career utility? Because to me it represents extreme vulnerability. I’m a pretty dignified person.…

Ah, thanks for chiming in with your inspiring anecdote. I realize that perhaps I interpreted "working on" as pertaining to career work, rather than just investment of effort.

Your example of clowning shows something that requires real work and, as you laid out, hopefully does wonders to improving confidence, humility, humor, and charm. I wish you the best with that! And happy early birthday. :)

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#94

Post by Exoristos »

jimmydddd wrote: post #87
ivolimmen wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lived a short time in my 20s with friends a few blocks from my parents. When I returned to live with my parents for a short period the entire dynamic changed. You leave the house so you don't go to your room, you visit. I started talking more and listening to music with them. I really appreciated my parents more. I hope my relationship with my children will be the same.

What do you mean by listening to music with them? Like, sitting around in the living room playing each other's favorite songs? I don't think I've ever done that with my parents, my kids, or anyone really.

Many such mutual activities are being lost. But I can't believe permanently.

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#95

Post by cm2012 »

zkmon wrote: post #64

Time, quiet mind, slow mornings, rest without guilt, calm and boring days - are all the same thing - escape from being busy. This assumes being busy is common, which is actually not that common for an age of 60+. The real luxury, for any age, in general, is in not having dependencies and needs. The need to impress someone, the need to know every ugly news from around globe, the need to read everything and be knowledg…

It's true that if you lower your expectations enormously that it's easier to hit them.

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#96

Post by mathgeek »

zkmon wrote: post #64

Time, quiet mind, slow mornings, rest without guilt, calm and boring days - are all the same thing - escape from being busy. This assumes being busy is common, which is actually not that common for an age of 60+. The real luxury, for any age, in general, is in not having dependencies and needs. The need to impress someone, the need to know every ugly news from around globe, the need to read everything and be knowledg…

> The real luxury, for any age, in general, is in not having dependencies and needs.

Fewer. Everyone will always have some dependencies and needs.

Personally, I pity anyone who sees a desire to be loved as a weakness. That’s quite literally a lesson taught as a trope about being a good person vs an evil one.

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#97

Post by mck- »

Brad Feld was the only mentor (out of ~100 we met) during our TechStars Chicago ‘15 program who had sessions with the CEOs of the cohort and told us to take a break each day to call our significant others.

He gave us perspective when all of us were focused on hustling for demo day and raising our seed round. He reminded us that amid the hustle, there’s more to life than your startup. Thank you.

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#98

Post by vkou »

zkmon wrote: post #64

Time, quiet mind, slow mornings, rest without guilt, calm and boring days - are all the same thing - escape from being busy. This assumes being busy is common, which is actually not that common for an age of 60+. The real luxury, for any age, in general, is in not having dependencies and needs. The need to impress someone, the need to know every ugly news from around globe, the need to read everything and be knowledg…

Are the need to make music, the need to read books, the need to work on and improve myself dependencies that make me weak?

Lacking those things is not a luxury. What is a luxury is time. Time is incredibly precious.

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#99

Post by zkmon »

polpenn wrote: post #88
zkmon wrote: post #64

Time, quiet mind, slow mornings, rest without guilt, calm and boring days - are all the same thing - escape from being busy. This assumes being busy is common, which is actually not that common for an age of 60+. The real luxury, for any age, in general, is in not having dependencies and needs. The need to impress someone, the need to know every ugly news from around globe, the need to read everything and be knowledg…

I agree with some of what you listed here but a few I think are critical to being human. What's the point of not having needs? Desires are what makes us human. I have kids and family and friends that love me and them in return but I don't believe that makes me weak. In fact it is the opposite, they give me the strength, confidence, and motivation to power through life. I supoose not having any needs and desires would…

Desires are OK as long as they don't make you unhappy when you can't have them. But that's not usually the case, which means they became crutches, making your happiness to depend on achieving them.

As an example, there are places where people don't see electricity as an absolute necessity. Hours of outages everyday go mostly unnoticed. That's lack of strong dependency.

Re: The Real Luxuries In Life

#100

Post by WJW »

mrec wrote: post #75
zkmon wrote: post #64

Time, quiet mind, slow mornings, rest without guilt, calm and boring days - are all the same thing - escape from being busy. This assumes being busy is common, which is actually not that common for an age of 60+. The real luxury, for any age, in general, is in not having dependencies and needs. The need to impress someone, the need to know every ugly news from around globe, the need to read everything and be knowledg…

Beautifully put, and definitely resonated with me as someone who entered mostly-contentedly-frugal retirement a few years back. One thing you didn't mention is the need to feel useful in some way; would you consider that a weakness too? Is it covered by "rest without guilt"? It's the bit I still have some trouble with.

Not OP, but there's a nuance. In general there's nothing wrong with wanting to be useful, but it is definitely possible to take it too far.

If you get sick and need care, you are typically not "useful". But that doesn't mean you instantly lose all value. I've had colleagues who would feel almost physically ill if they were somehow not able to respond to an incident somewhere, even if they weren't even on call at that point. Almost all of them burned out at some point and were no longer able to respond to anything, even if they'd wanted to. That's not healthy, and it weakens everyone in the long run.

Resting without guilt comes from the realization that you cannot keep the world running all by yourself. Let others pick up the work when you need a rest, so you can shelter them when they are down.

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