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Ask HN: What have the past 12 months taught you?

by chauhankiran on 7/19/19, 8:50 AM with 227 comments

• by news_hacker on 7/20/19, 12:03 PM

  - We need to apply the same principles of consumption that we do to food to information. Consume responsibly. Be aware of the sourcing. Don't binge. Know what's junk and what's nourishing. Give back to positive sources to nourish and grow them (sustainability).

  - Income inequality is huge. Slavery still exists but in a misdirected, slight-of-hand way. Work or the system will abandon you and it's "your fault".

  - Learn the macro-game that you are a part of and the micro-game that you are a part of. You can only ever play/influence the micro-game so focus on that, but the macro-game can give useful context.

  - Look where the sun doesn't shine. When everyone's looking one way, see what they're missing.

  - Virtues are important. Virtues conflict. Meekness is a virtue, but don't make it your only one.

  - Wealth has three portions: financials, relationships, and intelligence. Nurture all three.

  - It's difficult to break out of the middle-class. It's even harder to break out of the middle-class mentality.

  - There are many loopholes to fast-track you to your goals. Live your life by the orthodox narratives, and you may miss out on something fortuitous that crosses your path.

• by periram on 7/19/19, 10:35 PM

  Anyone can run, you just need to reset your expectations.

  Backstory. I used to not like running at all. Every time I ran, my mind would count down either time left or distance left. It always felt easy in the beginning but very soon would be unattainable. But now I can run decent distances without getting mentally or physically exhausted.

  So here are the lessons:

  1. The first 1 mile is the hardest.

  2. Second mile is hard but not nearly as hard as the first mile.

  3. For the first few weeks do not run more than 1- 3 miles (based on your history) even if you can. There is no need to. The habit is more important than what you achieve on any given day.

  4. Run slowly, lean forward and really reduce the impact on your knees. I started running one mile in 12 - 14 minutes, that is really slow.

  5. Breathing. If you run slowly and let your body do it's thing, then your breathing will become rhythmic and in-sync with how much energy your body needs.

  6. After a few weeks magic happens. You can run 8 miles in about one hour, not get bored, not think about it. You mind zones out and focuses on something productive.

  I learnt more things, but wanted to share this.

• by AwesomeFaic on 7/19/19, 1:24 PM

  I took a seemingly dull job for good, reliable pay and long-term prospects. I thought I was sacrificing personal interests for the sake of being a responsible adult, but in fact the income and generous work-life balance has given me more freedom to pursue outside interests than ever before. And the work isn't as dull as I expected.

• by ethnologica on 7/20/19, 1:26 AM

  •You are what you consume - People, music, news, etc. If you mostly consume the “positive” side of life, your mindset will follow. •Moving upwards in society is not as easy as I thought. “Classes” reproduce themselves in the dress of habitus. •You can only rely on yourself. “Friends” are stage of life companions. •Finding a partner in crime seems like a tough task - don’t settle with someone, who you are only with to not feel lonely. •Your phone won’t make you happy. Risk a glance to the left and right. •Politics will make you depressed. If you are not going to be a politician let things be.

• by Humdeee on 7/19/19, 7:56 PM

  The past year I've changed quite a bit about myself due to self-reflection. My SO and I were having some issues and I told her outright I wished she put as much effort and time into our relationship as she did her career.

  But that got me thinking about how I'm perceived professionally versus how I'm perceived personally. How am I regarded to everyone in my life outside of work? Around the office, I've worked hard to be seen and described as a calm, level headed guy who is well rounded with both hard dev skills and soft skills. Am I that outside of work? The truth is I can be impatient, I can be fierce, and my standards can certainly feel unachievable from others. I consciously draw a hard line showing that in any workplace setting. I get it from my father and upbringing. He was a hardened road cop for work and a loving, yet strict father at home. I was living his work-life temperament in reverse. I didn't want to reverse it, just carry over the good. I'm now in my early thirties, about the time he had me.

  Easier said than done, but simply put, I've stopped giving a shit about the little things that ultimately add up to so little importance in life. The ingraining of this took a while, but I'm (nearly) unphaseable now. I live life with better temperament. I'm a warmer person. It's led to less stress and and a happier personality. I've also striven to see my parents more and to be the catalyst to spending time with friends. It feels better to give out to others than take in. I still live a perpetually busy schedule, but days are relatively easy and fulfilling, rather than a grind like before.

  Point is I believe this thread is targeted to the workplace, but don't ignore everything outside of it. It took me long enough to realize it's much more important.

• by kup0 on 7/19/19, 2:23 PM

  I now know what true loss feels like. Lost my grandmother (who raised me and was a mother to me) about six months ago. Things have felt weird ever since, but I'm handling it better than I expected. It might be a different story once I feel comfortable starting to go through her things (I lived with and helped take care of her). I've gotten closer to some other family members since.

  I realized that I can handle more than I thought, even though it is a pain I haven't felt before. Just trying to make the best of every day since then and keep moving forward.

• by surds on 7/19/19, 12:00 PM

  I believe I am an optimist. Last several months made me a realist.

  Toned down my habit of almost compulsorily seeing the good in people. I am less trusting of new people now. Made me more aware of my own characteristics that I had not given much thought to. My patience levels have gone down the drain, compassion out the window and I have more of a GTFO attitude for anything that, in my opinion, is bullshit.

  Several traits have changed. I don’t like some of the changes that I see in myself - but I suppose that happens when someone slowly shreds your life and emotional and mental well-being over several months.

  The lowest point in my life was probably over last few months. Most of what I built over last 5-6 years is gone, but that’s okay.

  I am at peace, with occasional bouts of depression over past events. Perhaps I will be able to learn my lessons and avoid making the same personal mistakes in the future.

  I am rebuilding. Let’s see how that goes. Hope I see this question next year. :)

• by alexk307 on 7/19/19, 2:42 PM

  1. Work-life balance is more important than money.

  2. Don't trust your company to do right by you even if you really believe that they will. Only you can look out for you.

  3. Cannabis is medicine.

• by tcmb on 7/19/19, 8:10 PM

  I have a flight reflex which makes me run away when things get tough. I quit a number of jobs because of that and then rationalized it to myself by blaming it on whatever wasn't perfect at these companies.

  I like to feel I'm the victim of circumstances, blaming hardships on some abstract entity (like fate), subconsciously hoping that 'fate' will prove me wrong by making something good happen to me.

  I am using substances (nicotine, sweets) and certain activities (web browsing, video streaming, podcasts) as distractions so that I don't have to face emptiness, loneliness, and boredom.

  I am constantly looking for short-term rewards and expect instant gratification for pretty mundane things.

  I am very judgmental towards other people and think I can see through their little lies to themselves, but don't dare to look at my own.

  I crave recognition and care way too much about what other people think of me. I cannot take it when other people think I'm stupid, didn't get something, acted carelessly, wasn't on top of things etc

  I am afraid of facing uncomfortable truths about myself, my history and my current situation.

  I focus too much on where I'm not entirely the way I would like to be and have a hard time accepting myself the way I am.

  And yes, I realized almost all of that only in the last 12 months.

• by throwaway8879 on 7/19/19, 6:45 PM

  I'd forgotten how much I loved Megadeth, having not listened to them for well over a decade. I realize that Peace Sells and Rust In Peace are phenomenally written, in whatever musical context you'd want to judge them by. There are some amazingly iconic riffs on these two records. I also realise how I got sucked into playing/learning all this other music as I got older, when all I ever really wanted to do was play some Megadeth riffs in my bedroom.

• by maerF0x0 on 7/19/19, 9:13 PM

  I've learned that despite earning in the 98th %ile, working a job will likely not make me rich. I define rich as ~5M in assets including primary residence. Thus taking a "career" is a non-starter and I would advise everyone considering working for someone else to either 1) resign themselves to a distinctly middle class life or 2) reconsider and start a business.

  Careers that reliably earn > 500k could be considered equivalently good. Notably this excludes most STEM careers.

• by 0kl on 7/19/19, 10:15 PM

  1) when getting things done: the connective tissue of human relationships is at least of equal importance as the technical merits of a solution

  2) in relationships: over and explicit communicating is never bad

  3) always be an optimist - the world has always had problems, and not every problem will be solved in my lifetime - so push the needle, and live happily.

  *spacing

• by dmilicevic on 7/19/19, 9:57 AM

  life, existence, other people are endlessly complicated. Spending too much time observing and figuring them out, prevents you from living and enjoying it. Something like Heisenberg uncertainty principle in quantum physics.

  All my emotions are there with a reason, it's important to figure out what is it.

  self-discipline and pursuit of your goals is a road to healthy, stable self-confidence and self-esteem.

  Everyone around you seem to know how you should lead your life, listen to only those whose life is similar to what you aspire, filter out the rest.

  Surround yourself with people that make you feel good. Cut out the toxic relationships and habits.

  Practise gratitude for the people in your life, your health etc...

  Do things that matter to you.

• by badpun on 7/19/19, 11:05 AM

  What I thought I wanted was not really what I wanted. My mind just concoted those goals, so that I could go towards them and escape current unpleasant situation. Once I did that, I learned that the grass was not greener on the other side.

• by lapnitnelav on 7/20/19, 6:40 AM

  I learned I do have a case of mild autism (thanks to someone here posting a relevant link) and maybe ADHD-ish.

  While this isn't a great news in itself, I'm grateful that I've been able to benchmark my oddness. Now that I know, it's easier for me to be more self aware and prevent my weird half to do stupid things.

  I still trip and fall, and probably will keep doing that forever, but I'me better at falling without hurting myself too much. Sometimes it does drive me to a light paranoia but still working on the tuning of the feedback loop.

  I haven't fully digested this yet, a bit tough to swallow at nearly 30 yo but hey that's life.

  Also, as a result, I don't fit too well into corporate environments and therefore, for the sake of my own baseline happiness, should keep them at bay.

• by justsomeguy3591 on 7/19/19, 7:35 PM

  - Following your curiosity and passion often leads to amazing things

  - Sometimes you simply don't have enough information to make a super calculated decision and you have to trust your gut and just go for it

  - Performing stack traces on my beliefs and following them down to the people & things I originally got them from has allowed me to clear some real garbage out of my mind

• by git-pull on 7/19/19, 9:04 PM

  In the last 12 months, I begun understanding:

  - what attachment theory was, as a tool/framework analyze myself, others, and the world around me

  - about western philosophy (Plato, Socrates, Marcus Aurelius)

  - about eastern Europe or it's history (e.g. Alexander the Great, Siege of Constantinople, the Crusades, Subutai)

  - TypeScript

  - how to say hi in Polish or Ukrainian

  - how powerful desktop PC's are compared to laptops, esp. at compilation (that includes webpack)

• by gocartStatue on 7/19/19, 7:32 PM

  All companies look better from the outside.

• by MattLeBlanc001 on 7/19/19, 10:10 AM

  1) Health start becoming your nr1 priority around the age 40.

  I wish I exercised more, did more yearly blood tests checks and was more considerate around my diet.

  2) That one should be thankful for what they have

• by Kluny on 7/19/19, 7:35 PM

  I quit the highest-paying job I've ever had to work for peanuts on a political campaign. It didn't lead to the new job opportunities I was hoping for and the job I got after the election does pay anywhere close to what the previous one did, but I have no regrets. It was the coolest thing I've ever been part of, and the new job, though less well paid, is more fun, more fulfilling and less stressful.

• by tinytrader on 7/19/19, 12:29 PM

  1. Bad situations will pass. 2. Family will always be by your side. 3. Money does not equal happiness. 4. Make decisions you're happy to live by. 5. Don't take yourself too seriously.

• by kd5bjo on 7/19/19, 2:51 PM

  Moving to another country means life will be both completely different and entirely the same at the same time.

• by InvaderFizz on 7/19/19, 7:40 PM

  Do you have lower back problems and digestive problems? They might be related, even if you have a MRI showing degenerative disc disease.

  Every time I "forget" that I'm lactose intolerant, I pay for it in the bathroom and in my lower back for the next few days, even if I use lactase enzyme pills.

  Keep away from all lactose for a week? Back is generally fine.

• by ozzmotik on 7/20/19, 1:46 AM

  maybe I was wrong about considering other avenues of seeking income. for the longest time I mostly just focused on web dev, tech support, and just general tech oriented stuff because that's where my aptitudes lie, and never considered trying anything in the service industry for instance. however I managed to acquire a job working as a busser at a restaurant, and for the first time in my life, I felt like what I was doing at work actually mattered and that I was actually part of a team that cared about my existence and needed me there instead of just being another nameless face among droves of others.

  granted I just got fired yesterday because i guess i just wasn't good enough at it and too slow. what a wonderful birthday present! but that transitions to my next point: just because something happens that society would generally deem as bad or undesirable, doesn't mean you have to get caught up in depression or anxiety over it. what happens, happens. sure it sucks i lost my job especially given my situation currently, but hey, I'm still alive and still have the chance to find something else. the problem is never unsolvable no matter how much your mind tries to tell you that it is. all that you need to do is simply just choose to act. not doing so is what contributes to being trapped in the depression and anxiety that have driven my life for longer than I can remember.

• by astrodev on 7/19/19, 9:02 PM

  That despite being physically fit, at the very least decently looking, earning well, having interesting interests (such as doing a cool PhD and being a competitive dancer), despite having a decent social network and meeting lots of women, I will likely die a loveless virgin.

  It's unspeakably depressing.

• by alimw on 7/19/19, 8:49 PM

  That awful people I'll never meet, in countries far from mine, can have a negative impact on my mental health.

• by suchoudh on 7/20/19, 4:34 PM

  Last 12 months

  1) Took a mini-retirement.

  2) Spent a lot of time with my son (who is 12 now).Shared with him passion for reading books. Knowing languages.

  3) Found out that I am not as tough as I thought myself to be.

  4) Learned to understand a lot of layers in the ongoing conversations. (Earlier I only heard what was told on surface. I may be overdoing layers now)

  5) I strongly believed that I will exercise once I have enough time on my hand. Guess what? Even after having all the time in the world I wasted most of it without working on reduing my weight. (obesity)

  6) I wanted to taste the theory that you will not die of starvation (not in todays world). This is true. Even if you do not earn money you still can manage to have twice a day meal. (I am well educated MBA Engg et al)

  7) When I saw the UNDP SDG Goals #1 Noone will be left behind. I constantly wondered if the opposite can be the case. Now I think its the government which is getting left behind. (They are so slow to adopt anything new)

  8)I did a 1-year diploma in Disaster Management from Disaster management Institute. (I was in Bhopal when the worst Industrial disaster took place of Union Carbide). I learnt very little of value from classes but a lot more from educational MOOC courses.

  9) Social life goes for a topsy-turn when you do not have an answer to question "What do you do for a living ?" I told them I just live, Most people did not believe me.Eventually they started distancing from me and then I found a totally new set of friends who lived nearby but had totally different value system. ( I kept my living extremely frugal)

  10) These days I work with young minds and try to ignite the spark of innovation by telling them stories and work with them on the small time projects.

• by thrifter on 7/19/19, 12:25 PM

  Charity never fails. If you resolve to love and accept people above all else, then the rest will take care of itself.

  This is not easy to do some days, but it is failproof. Try it and see for yourself.

  For more information, research "charity, pure love of Christ" and Lojong, which is Buddhist mind training for compassion. Effectiviology also has an excellent article on how charity can be used in arguments: https://effectiviology.com/principle-of-charity/

• by eldavido on 7/20/19, 3:05 AM

  In all honesty, when to keep my mouth shut. This is really hard for me. I still see tons of bullshit, posturing, and nonsense, I'm just better at censoring myself.

  It's useful but surprisingly stress-inducing.

• by sergiotapia on 7/19/19, 3:25 PM

  It never hurts to ask, never say no yourself. Let other people do that for you. Opens so many doors!

• by mruts on 7/19/19, 11:48 PM

  I seem to be an alcoholic, I guess? I dunno, I now drink like maybe 80oz of beer a night? Is this a problem? I'm not sure. I don't know if it's affecting me in anyway (I'm primarily concerned about my brain). I never feel drunk, but maybe that's also a problem?

  I'm trying to reconcile with how I feel (only mildly buzzed at the end of the night) with how much it sounds. Hell, in college, I would have considered that a moderate amount/alot depending on the night.

  Maybe other people have some similar (or different) experiences? I guess it's not a problem if I don't think it's one (according to the DSM), but maybe it will become a problem?

  There's a lot of question marks in this post, because I'm unsure about how to feel about my own alcohol consumption. But I wouldn't want someone who doesn't have an alcohol tolerance to get the impression that I'm going crazy hard every night.

  Anyways, I just finished my 7th 16oz beer (man 112oz sure seems like a lot), but I feel pretty normal... (a year ago I probably would have felt this way after 3 beers)

  Also I work super long hours (12+) per day, and used to have bigger problems. Heroin, cocaine, etc...

  I feel like I deserve alcohol as long as I don't touch the other stuff...?

• by EllipticCurve on 7/19/19, 7:10 PM

  I learned, that working in a cutting edge field in a huge well known/respected company (europe) is most of the time really not that exciting and the actual work not that cutting edge.

  My feeling is, that we were doing more complex problem solving at university and my personal projects are much more challenging than most things we do at work.

  It's honestly quite a bit frustrating. And makes me want to build something up myself. Problem is, I am just not an idea-person...

• by knightofmars on 7/19/19, 5:59 PM

  Sometimes, the grass really is greener on the other side.

• by Aaronstotle on 7/19/19, 6:24 PM

  Graduated from school last May, had a week before I started a full-time job (did that for 2 months then landed where I am now). I learned it's difficult to have a good social life when work + commute takes ~50 hours a week (and that office politics isn't just a meme). Learned that I need to create my own meaning in life, and that friends and family are more important than anything.

• by wincy on 7/19/19, 9:26 PM

  In the last year I've learned about the worth of a man, how big a burden a family can bear, and the extraordinary lengths a mother will go to save her dying child.

  Last July, I was fired from my dev job. This was a shock to me as I had been seen as a high performer at my last job. Well, my last job before my last job at least. I was scared, confused, and really down on myself after this happened. I'd quit the job before because it seemed like a toxic environment. My wife was pregnant, I applied for unemployment which was embarrassing and felt pretty bad. Honestly the place was pretty bad but I tried to hold on because of my wife's pregnancy and I knew it would look bad to lose/quit two jobs back to back like that. In retrospect I would just leave randomly at 3pm, "work from home" (take naps), and was overall a pretty terrible worker during my tenure there. After losing that job, I didn't just "bounce back". I got depressed. I thought about what was different compared to my jobs before, and came to the obvious conclusion it's the adderall, stupid. Taking adderall turns me into a super performer. It makes me really, really good. It also makes me feel like I'm "broken" in some way that has to be fixed by a drug. I'm simply not a great developer and can't achieve the intellectual goals I have for myself without taking it paired with a mild anti-anxiety medication. Eventually I decided to start taking it again after a year and a half without it. I just got my performance review at work and got glowing praise from my manager. It makes me feel good. It makes me get rewarded financially. It's also interesting because there's two groups of developers that have very, very different opinions about who I am and what I'm like to work with. The first class has worked with me drug-free. These people don't much care for me. I'm forgetful, get distracted easily, will constantly be away from my desk walking around, if I'm even in the office. The other group have worked with me and see me as someone who can solve any problem they throw at me. I'm getting the reputation as the one to give complex and difficult problems to. People think that other people are immutable and can't change, too. Both groups have fixed about me. If I stopped adderall tomorrow my coworkers give me the benefit of the doubt, feel that if I'm stuck on a problem for a long time it must be because it's complicated, not because I'm astutely avoiding solving the problem. The other group just thought I was a total loser. I hated it, because they were right. I know what I'm worth, and what makes me worth that. It's not all me.

  Last October, bleary-eyed and exhausted at five in the morning, my wife gave birth to a beautiful baby girl via c-section. The labor had not gone well. Her water had broke and there was meconium (baby feces) in the water, which is a sign that the baby is in distress. We rushed to the hospital and my wife labored for eighteen hours, screaming "just cut her out of me, something is WRONG!!!". The doctor ignored her and encouraged her to keep pushing. Finally, he relented and a Cesarean section was performed. The nurses took her away. Someone told us "Your daughter has myelomeningocele. Listen to me. Don't Google it. Just get some sleep.". So I did. I remember waking up to the children's hospital ambulance crew asking my wife to sign the documents to transport Lucy to the hospital. She had been born on the same day as her namesake, her great-great-grandmother. We didn't have Thanksgiving last year. We didn't have Christmas last year. There was only the endless march of days at the hospital. I accepted my new job the day my wife went into labor. I just had to deal with it. What else could I do? Throwing myself into the work certainly helped me forget that my daughter might never walk, that she probably won't be able to control her bowels, that she'll need to catheter herself whens she's older to prevent her kidneys giving out. At a happy hour, I mentioned to some coworkers about her condition. A gray-beard developer took me into a back room and got really serious. For a second I thought he was going to fire me, honestly. He said "I want you to know I have spina bifida. Everything is going to be okay." That's one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me.

  In January, they told us Lucy was going to die. There's a malformation of her brain stem, the part that controls unconscious breathing. When she got upset, she held her breath. It's a horrific thing to see, your child turn blue. Then they turn white. She looks dead. As a gentle snow fell outside, my wife performed CPR on our four month old while I frantically called 911 from my wife's phone because mine had just died. I'm a dumbass. Our four year old is twirling in circles as the paramedics arrive. She asks the cop if he can open her milk, she's thirsty. Lucy had started breathing again. We told the paramedics the doctors had said this might happen, but that we should call the paramedics "just in case she doesn't recover on her own". The paramedic looks at me and asks "what's her prognosis"? I didn't really understand, but she was asking "is your child going to die?". They took her and my wife away to the hospital. The doctors read some research and told my wife that the majority of kids with this complication, called PEAC, die. They don't ever "get over it", even kids as old as 12 have died. We ask if there's anything we can do. The doctors shrug and the palliative care psychologist wants to talk to us. My wife spends the next few days glued to the computer. She asked the doctor for the print outs of the medical research he's referencing. She finds more. She finds a doctor at the Mayo clinic who had done some research prescribing a specific anti-anxiety medicine and found that the mortality of these children had gone to zero. Admittedly it was a small sample size but initially the doctor brushed off the suggestion of the medicine. My wife wrote a long email with citations describing Lucy's symptoms, and the treatments outlined in the medical literature. She emailed it to the hospital's social worker since you can't communicate directly with the doctors. The next day the doctors had the bright idea of prescribing the anti-anxiety medication. Lucy's breath holding spells stopped. There's a surgery that's also suggested in the literature. My wife asks for that. The head of neurosurgery says he won't do it. We call a doctor who is an expert in her condition and he says she should get the surgery. We say we want to transfer to that hospital, hundreds of miles away. Once he hears that, the head of neurosurgery says he'll do it. My wife sighs in both exasperation and relief. The doctors have fought us every step of the way.

  Lucy came home two weeks ago. She's actually a pretty normal baby. Cognitively she's right on track, even though she doesn't wiggle her toes. We're provided with a night nurse twelve hours a day because her breathing can be irregular sometime. But her breath holding spells, the thing that was most likely to kill her, have completely stopped. Things are starting to feel normal, the nurses are kind to us and to our daughter. My wife seems to be relaxing for the first time in eight months. It looks like she has a future. Life is no longer paused until further notice.

  I've learned I'm worthwhile. I'm more worthwhile if I take stimulant drugs. I've learned that a family can endure far more than you might think it can. I've learned that my wife will move mountains if she has to for our kids.

• by trykondev on 7/21/19, 4:04 AM

  1. Working 100% remotely has led to a massive increase in my quality of life.

  2. Make the time for exercise, no matter what.

• by dadahackernews on 7/19/19, 11:43 PM

  I learned that we change, prevails the life we were a minute ago. Minute by minute, we progress a whit farther with each cycle. Considering the assets of one's beginning are irrelevant; how and what one does with the aptitudes of life are what ascertain who you are. I learned that it's okay not to know what you are doing with your life. It's a misprint to select your paths based on the sins you bear. Seriously. Whatsoever happens, happens man. I'll add this too, heard this from somewhere, but couldn't recall precisely where 'The fake is of far ample worth. In its ruminate efforts to be real, it's more real, more than the real thing. Let's just say I become totally WOKE and sympathize with that from the experiences of the past 12 months.

• by n8henry on 7/19/19, 9:54 PM

  Never take your health for granted. Be grateful for every day that you have.

• by JimBrimble35 on 7/19/19, 8:20 PM

  Patience isn't about waiting for something to take a little bit of extra time. It's about working on something and being willing to wait for _years_ if necessary to see it happen. To know that what your waiting for is out there on the horizon, is visible to you at all times, yet there is no way of speeding up your journey toward it. Ultimately, it's about how we live in the space between the moments we anticipate.

  It's been a very frustrating, but important 12 months.

• by tmaly on 7/20/19, 1:23 PM

  The amount of effort to raise 2 kids verse 1 kid is not linear.

  Curse of knowledge is real when it comes to teaching younger kids. Pace yourself and learn to simplify you explanations with good stories.

  Breathing and mindfulness are very simple but helpful concepts. Stay present.

  You have to keep reminding yourself of the most important things and you have to make a concerted effort to work towards those bigger goals.

  Time keeps passing at a faster rate, this is mainly a function of how much responsibility you take on.

• by tmilard on 7/20/19, 3:14 AM

  I learnt something most youg developers all ready know. When having a program in Java and want to feed gui in Web, Spring Boot api is so simple, fast and nice to use.

• by lazyjones on 7/19/19, 9:01 PM

  It's always too late (and harder as you get older) to work towards current needs, so plan ahead and work for things you expect to want/need in 5 years.

• by Mordreas on 7/19/19, 8:45 PM

  Only apply design patterns when they are solving a problem

• by baud147258 on 7/19/19, 12:00 PM

  The past few months have taught me that I suck at my job. But I've gotten better at bullshitting my way out of a tight spot.

  Also learned that running can feel good.

• by sevilo on 7/20/19, 4:54 AM

  1. You don’t have to be some programming celebrity to be qualified to speak at conferences

  2. If you have the intention, you can achieve what you want

  3. Don’t skip steps in business

• by 8bitsrule on 7/19/19, 10:12 PM

  1) Either life in the modern world has become more and more unpredictable, and/or it was always less predictable than I used to be aware of.

  2) The trouble with 'living in the now' is that eventually tomorrow will become now. Sufficient preparation for -that- now is not a strong suit for many of us. Consequently, humanity has built an existential debt which mere bankruptcy cannot erase. GOTO 1).

• by rewgs on 7/20/19, 4:29 PM

  Few things are as important as consistently getting quality sleep. Not doing so slowly, slowly ruins your life. So slowly that you’ll think it’s other things, or that the side effects of your sleep deprivation are the causes themselves.

  Don’t trade sleep for anything. Just don’t.

• by tempsy on 7/19/19, 5:48 PM

  Coming into a significant amount of "paper" money didn't really make me any happier.

• by wnkrshm on 7/22/19, 7:53 AM

  That I need help and need to seek treatment for adult ADHD. I know all of my tasks and my deadlines, they're on paper but avoidance always makes me do things on the last day.

• by BigHatLogan on 7/19/19, 10:58 PM

  The main thing I learned is that there's no such thing as a perfect day. If you sit around and wait for it to come, you'll be waiting until they haul your corpse away. The truth is that things always come up, especially as you get older. You have to plan around uncertain events instead of planning for your day to go a certain way.

  Over the past few months both of my parents have been in and out of the hospital repeatedly. I live closeby, so I've been taking a lot of days off work or working remotely to help them get to and from the hospital, and then to help them get situated afterwards. I had to carry my mother up the stairs in her home a few weeks ago because her knees are giving out. I didn't think I would have to do something like that at this age--I'm in my late 20's--but, as the phrase goes, "shit happens."

  The reason I brought that up is because I've also been thinking about making a job change to a different company. It'll probably require a few weeks of preparation, and then another few weeks to interview with various companies. I'm also a little scared about the whole situation because I'm woefully underprepared, so I don't know how I'll perform.

  So I keep telling myself, "tomorrow, when I'm fresh in the morning, I'll come up with a study guide!" Then something comes up, and "tomorrow" becomes "this weekend." Then something else comes up, and "this weekend" becomes "next week." The something's aren't always bad things--I've been attending a lot of weddings recently, and also some of my friends and family are having kids, so it's been an overall positive thing--but distractions are still distractions, and I haven't been able to plan out any of those.

  So I think what I have to do is just carve out time when and where I can. I might not get the six hours of uninterrupted study that I could get when I was 19, but I could certainly have done a far better job of studying than I actually did.

  I have some more thoughts on all of this, but I really liked this question because it made me think about how these past few months really went.

  EDIT:

  I just wanted to edit this post and say that there are some outstanding responses in this thread. I'm never less than amazed at how reflective and thoughtful people can be. There's probably enough life advice and experience in this thread to fill a few books.

  I have this habit of checking how "great" people have responded to certain situations, but now I'm realizing that "ordinary" people (whatever that means) might have just as thoughtful, reflective, and wise approaches to things. Instead of looking up the 18th article of how entrepreneurs respond to stress, I could probably sit down with my grandmother and ask her what it was like moving to a foreign country by herself where she didn't know a single person or speak the native tongue.

  I'm rambling now, but I just wanted to say that the advice in here is pretty spectacular. I usually regret the time I spend on Reddit and YouTube, but I seldom regret the time I spend on HN (unless I find myself in a political thread).

• by cwbrandsma on 7/19/19, 7:33 PM

  That it is good to go back and review the basics of programming, like SOLID, from time to time -- and not to get too caught up in it.

  Also: tribalism rules the day in politics.

• by wolco on 7/20/19, 9:32 PM

  Finding remote work is nothing like finding a local job

• by oyebenny on 7/21/19, 4:23 AM

  Not to trust business partners that are eager to invest in you but not follow your instructions.

• by raghavkukreti on 7/19/19, 6:42 PM

  I've failed, I'm not as smart as I think and in the end, I know I'm useless.

• by Rainymood on 7/21/19, 7:29 AM

  - Man is a social animal

  - Don't make me think

  - You can bear anything for 10 seconds

  - Everything can be modeled as a system

• by ryanmercer on 7/19/19, 12:19 PM

  Not taught:

  - Just a reminder I could die one second from now. Tuesday a friend of 21 years, had his heart stop. CPR was performed all the way to the hospital where they found a blockage that they cleared, however his brain had been without oxygen for quite some time and there was no brain activity. 72 hour protocol was started (arctic sun) but he died Wednesday evening leaving his girl, 1 kid and 4 step kids.

  Taught:

  - The general population is extremely ignorant to climate change and the rather serious consequences it brings. I've had many people tell me it's fake, it's just something politicians use in debates, it's a conspiracy, that we aren't experiencing global warming but in fact are headed for a mini ice age, that they don't care because they can't stop it so they're going to keep on living their life how they want, etc.

  - That without a college degree, you are effectively a second class citizen in the workplace. I've had company after company reject me in the past 18 months for not having a degree, including one company doing the exact same job I do now that wouldn't even interview me citing "we require a BA/BS degree as well as previous experience" while at the time I had 12 years of experience and their company was 5-6 years old... my own employer does not promote without a degree, they will flat out tell you to get at a minimum a BA/BS and then preferably immediately start an Masters. Oh if I could go back 16 years and tell myself to get a degree.

  - I've learned that tech is largely elitist. Founders only want to deal with other founders once they've had a taste of mild success. Those in power can be college dropouts but they require BA/BS at a minimum for entry-level, non-technical, roles in their companies. They will tell you things like "the best way to stand out is to complete a major project or produce an important result" for entry-level work in their form rejection email.

  - I've learned that most of the current people at the helm will admit they were extremely lucky to have a mentor, that helped them without hesitation, when they had no experience or accomplishments behind their belt and were effectively still naive children, but they will only help those people that are well qualified on paper and stand a good chance of making them bank. They would rather bet on a likely win by throwing investment money for a cut at someone and introductions instead of helping someone by actually giving them work, creating something in their empire that the person can prove themselves on, and then give them more responsibility, and more, to let them learn by doing and building a reputation. Instead it is "come to me when you have a sure-fire idea, I'll buy a ridiculous amount of your company for a small sum, and you can make a little while I do little and get richer".

  - That Silicon Valley is comical. I'd always pictured it as these brilliant people doing neat stuff, making breakthroughs and driving future technology. Last year I had a lot of introductions made and had the opportunity to talk to a lot of people in the Bay Area that I never would have without the introductions, being a non-STEM, no-degree, no billion dollar idea guy in Indianapolis. While some of these people were truly brilliant, I realized nearly all of them are extremely myopic on one thing that interests them, they mostly don't care about anything else and they will pursue their idea at all costs even when it's something ridiculous or so fantastically unlikely to ever pan out. You'll ask for an introduction "I'd love to help, but I'm really busy" you'll ask if they need a janitor so you can get your foot in the door somewhere to try and build out your CV because you lack a degree "I'd love to help, but I'm really busy", they're friends with umpteen Giving Pledge members and you ask if they could introduce you to someone at one of the dozen philanthropic entities because you'd just like to ask them some questions and see what drives the organization and what they are doing so you can have insight to a different world "I'd love to help, but I'm really busy" you look at their project as an outsider, with an entirely different set of world experiences, and point out that only their friends know what a continuum transfunctioner is and that 99% of people don't and maybe it would benefit them to bring a few popular science YouTube influencers around and show them some of the public stuff on tape and "I'd love to do that but first I want to get this continuum transfunctioner fully operational even though experts in the field think it may never work, so maybe in 4-5 years when I'm not busy I can have the team think about actually explaining what we are doing to 99.9999999% of the world".

• by bigred100 on 7/19/19, 11:02 PM

  St Thomas Aquinas is a genius of humanity

• by logari on 7/21/19, 5:55 AM

  A good question! Although I wonder why the timeline is set at 12 months....

  This is what I learned:

  1- amateurs try to hard sell and persuade with much energy. That is how you know they are amateurs. They make up for competence by inflating their confidence.

  2- true experts are those who can explain things patiently and completely (and sometimes enigmatically and paradoxically so that it makes sense on a lower level that we understand even though its seems like there is more to it than our understanding allows) and dont feel threatened by your learning them, too. All the rest "experts" are bozos.

  3- I learned that the limit of my achievement is the limit of what I don't know that I don't know. Which in turn can be expanded by directionless search in random directions, kinda like how probabilistic methods solve deterministic equations in higher math.

  4- I learned that the ancient saying "women lack reasoning" is false, because women have a different kind of reasoning machinery. And it works on a different wavelength than is normally assumed. It is not important to know exactly what wavelength a woman's reasoning systems operate (you won't ever find out) but you gain some advantage knowing that it is DIFFERENT and always CHANGING.

  5- Body language is approximately 10 times more powerful than verbal communication. It includes tone of voice, the way your eyes look on to the world, silence, and even how you socialize. It is the ultimate tool to prevent people from getting fresh with you. Ignore the nasty ones, and it hurts them way more than engaging them.

  6- I learned that small differences (and issues and squabbles) dont smoothen out with time. They become bigger and worse. Prevention is 100 times more effective than cure.

  7- I learned that the most intelligent and wisest writer born in UK is Robert Burton, not the moronic Shakespeare.

  8- I found out that all the smart cats (and some wannabes like me) hang out on news.ycombinator.

  9- I learned that deadlines are necessary but they should be quantity-based, not temporal. "I have to finish reading two chapters today" sounds like an ideal deadline than, saying "I must finish this book in 2 months".

  10- I learned the best way to learn something is by reading books, not watching lectures or videos. They put me to sleep, videos do.

  11- I finally managed to create a site such that the buttons turn on like a light bulb. Www.jans.surge.sh

  12- I realized that optimism wins even when failure is guaranteed. Better to lose a game you enjoyed than to win one you didn't.

  I could go on. I will stop because I have more things to learn!

  :)

• by bobbydreamer on 7/20/19, 6:32 PM

  1. Worked on a idea it's sort personal project. Stack is Google cloud(Firebase RTDB & hosting, cloud functions, Storage, app engine, crowns, pubsub), JS, NodeJS, CSS, mySQL, Java. My day job is Db2 DBA z/OS Mainframe, so cloud is but new to me. I would say i good when compared to others on what I did. Focus was the key here, day job 8-5 all be at home 6:30 & start my programming or learning from 7 till midnight 1 or 2. This I did continuously for over a year. Before that I used to have normal life like gym or running(used to be a half marathon runner), I stopped everything to focus on the idea. To help me focus, I had to stop certain things like exercise as it takes time but I walked weekly two times for 1hr, Watching movies or TV series, getting into heated arguments with people as it takes my focus off Ruins ideas I was working on and giving unnecessary thoughts, stopped seeing people faces sometimes like walking mostly look at the ground. I decided to have two notebooks one for office and one for my project all the ideas I get I dump into these to notebooks and work on them. I like my current work as salary is ok but what's awesome is work-life balance due to that I can work on my personal project. Almost completed 80% of the project now only thing remaining shifting the batch workload from my system to Compute engine.

  2. In the meantime, everybody around me is finishing cloud certs mostly AWS/Azure and me who is talking about cloud has no certs but working in them. It's sort makes me look like a guy who talks but nothing to show. So when I was confident that ok only thing remaining in my PP is shifting to compute engine. I started to prepare for Google cloud associate data Engineer certification from March 2019 and took the exam two weeks back and got certified. Yeah, I am the only Google certified person in my building there's a lot of Azure and aws. This certification wasn't an easy one, I had to study lots of products which I wasn't using, what good about it was, each time I study, I was thinking how I could this for my project. So definitely bigquery & cloudSQL I will have to check it out on migrating data from local to cloud. QWIKLABS is sort of must to get hands on GCP. Take sample tests from Google cert site itself it's free mostly you get the same questions if you take multiple times but gives you an idea of what will come in the exam.

  3. Being a workaholic, I had lost focus on my personal life. Single and 33, soon 34. There is this girl who has been working in team next to me for over two years, if I had kept my head up and looked at people or tried to hear their conversations or discussions happening next to me. I could have seen this girl, but me nooo focus on the work & Personal projects. Just about time I took a break PP and started to focus on cert exam, this girl caught my eye and I was staring at her for almost a month. I had to stop it as I thought it was rude to stare. So I approached and told her that 'i like her' in May. Now July, I sort of have an idea she likes me but she didn't tell so far. No idea what's going to happen as well. So I am currently working on this project.

  4. I am more of a dreamer. The guy who is 80% of the time caught up in the head or lives there. So I had to bring myself to focus on things before me, reality. So started to listening to Ted talks on mindfulness, imapct theory, Power of Now(audible), Dandapani, Earl nightingale. And in a video I was hearing about this smart drug that top University students were taking to improve their intelligence. I was a bit curious is it something like limitless. Adderall is banned in my country but modafinil was available. Tried one tablet, 4th hour heart beat increases a bit which sort of makes you to focus on what before you and you will be in that mode for 3-4hours. Side-effects if you are diabetes you are fucked. In accucheck I get normally 130 after this it was 230. Now started dieting & started walking to get it lower a week after now I am at 185. Curiosity has its price. I am going to throw away the remaining tablets. I am going to revisit power of now first 5 chapters, that's the phase I am in.

  So at the moment focus will be in that GIRL, focusing on what's before me(being present), Db2(work), GCP(bigquery, kubernetes, compute engine, cloudSQL), possibly check if there is good paying job in GCP with work life balance, gradually start exercising again as I have lost all muscle and weight in last two years.

• by Anti-fascist on 7/20/19, 12:51 AM

  I learnt that my family de-classed the last couple of years and that now everyone is scarred by unemployment. I am scarred too, and it's just sad to watch as time goes bye. Optimism helps to stay afloat, psychologically, but this kind of optimism can only take me that far. All the ways I could have ever been are far beyond reach like stars, and if I stare enough I only get watery eyes. Precious future memories. Very precious.

  I learnt that my location in the world as an individual determines my life chances. Some places just have too much bad stuff: too much religion, too much sexism, too much unemployment, too much propaganda, too much ignorance, too much loneliness. There's laughter about all this in society, but I used to laugh about intelligent things and it feels sad to know I haven't had that laughter in a long time. All laughter is cynical, impractical, and at times even manipulated by the gov. Laughter is not laughter. But it makes me smile to at least remember how it used to feel. Very precious.

  I learnt that South-North divide is all about borders. Logic dictates (at least according to neoclassical economics) that if people freely flow around the world then the unequal global parts, like connected vessels, will adjust. North countries building more borders is one major way the world keeps going poorer, not to say that inequalities within North countries are decreasing; inequalities everywhere are rising.

  I learnt that academia is just another throat-cutting business. If your projects do not sync with the trend, nobody will fund them. I also learnt that most universities in Europe are opaque: you're most likely to never know why you are rejected. In Oslo, though, there's a law that obliges the university to share with you the feedback of the selection committee. You learn and get better from transparency. From opaqueness you learn not to learn, and may even get a bit paranoid or demotivated if you're "not that strong" (probably meaning you haven't read enough good novels, and if you have maybe you haven’t taken them deeply; in the latter case, maybe find something you like and care about? There are novels about everything).

  I learnt that being on my own is always better as I get half-Oblomovian and half-creative. But most of the time poverty makes me share things—space and time— with people of all sorts and I find myself driven in all directions and businesses. All lives will know this in time, when AI (if you believe so) will take over most jobs. A room of one's own and some money, the right to housing plus a universal basic income, is what should... yeah.

  I learnt that Moroccan politics is inexistent and I avoid it like the plague (how can journalists interview the king if as a matter of protocol they have to kiss his hands or shoulders before asking a question? Who can question these people? The king is so many people, of course.) but if Trump is to be re-elected it'll scar me forever. I'm not an American citizen, but we all know the US elections spill over borders like nothing. I’m literally asking my American friends to vote for a democrat like Warren or Bernie or Cortez or whomever they like. Nothing less than fascism is on the rise and we all have to mobilise for these eletions, even if we’re not US citizens.

  I learnt that my relationship with my gf can survive everything. She's doing better financially and sometimes for a split second I think that she should be with someone her equal financially. But these ideas never get hold of me. I was in a better position so love never came, or came dramatically (useless). Now that I am unemployed for a year, “love” (for lack of a better word, but undramatic and with good communication and good sex and good humanity) is around—and it helps. I won't let it go just because she spends more. She will have my money if I get a proper job. Or we can live on so little. Consuming much, after all, is a sing of carelessness towards the climate crisis. If she ever decides to leave, that will be totally fine. In the end we all end up with the people we end up with. But for now she’s in and that’s sweet, and even when problematic it’s problematically sweet.

  I learnt not to buy any new clothes/equipment/perfumes (I learnt that my sweat is better than Coco Chanel, the perfume) etc. I strictly buy second-hand stuff, trunks included. Probably not many people think about this, but poor people should be proud. We don't get to kill as much life as the better off—the West evidently— has been doing for the last couple centuries. But today's world is stuck in consumerism and is old-fashioned; status, be it symbolic or social, is exclusively distributed according to material criteria, instagramability and the likes. In fact, fashionable people are more like the jailbreak/rooting/open-sourcing developers, the voluntary human extinction movement, or followers of the philosophy "make kin, not babies," or so I think. I am fashionably stingy, although poverty is a disgrace.

  I learnt that some friendships reach their expiry time; instead of artificially prolonging them in order to keep the stock of social capital intact, it's best to burn the bridge. Maintaining social capital long after the emotions are gone is a business approach to friendship. I'm not gonna sell the rest of my soul to capitalism. But speaking up is unnecessary. Our friends understand us. And, maybe there’ll be new encounters and new bridges to build, or not. Language is overrated and underrated at the same time. As I grow, I try to understand it and use it just as necessary.

  I learnt that friends are the only practical capital I have left. Family and nation rest in peace in this regard.

  I learnt that swimming is the balm of my life. I like to swim in a swimming pool-like beach, and without people I know around. Incognito is such an experience. It’s a new feeling or experience. I feel even my best of friends can encroach if they go with me. I don’t even use my smartphone there. I literally connect with the things—I sync and only the fish know it.