by a7b3fa on 3/8/20, 11:24 AM with 219 comments
by deepGem on 3/8/20, 2:23 PM
Here's how it goes - there's an idea that you think is really nice, you start talking to people then you are hit with reality - no one gives a shit about your idea. Some do, but most of them are like meh. There comes the first punch and you either think they are all dumb or ascribe some positivity to what others are saying and start talking to more people or start working on a prototype. Then you realize you have to build a front end. Welcome to front end hell. You have no fucking clue how CSS has evolved over the last 6 months. The npm package you thought was useful is now outdated or not maintained. So by now you are more or less exhausted. What started as a fabulous idea in the head has now boiled down to 'shit let me get done with this CSS crap and move on'. At this time, I don't even want to think about CSS, let alone HTML. Rinse and repeat this until you find success.
At least, this has been my experience.
by ulisesrmzroche on 3/8/20, 2:58 PM
He’s not strong enough to squeeze the orange (rails contributor life perks) so the juice must not be worth squeezing
Basically, that hard work ain’t worth it. Fun Uber Alles
But it’s like, the process of building a sexy body is not easy or fun. It’s gonna be at least a year, maybe more, till ppl start wondering what you look like shirtless. you’re telling us the Payoff isn’t worth it?
Becoming a rails contributor was a worthy goal, no one said it would be fun. plus, what about when your personal project gets bigger, you don’t like maintenance work? You can’t be a developer. Developers maintain software. Youre going to work on toy software and tutorials all your life?
You should enjoy your leisure time and you should not shy away from hard work and you should take care of your health above everything else. This guy even dropped a humblebrag about neglecting his personal life.
Some rich ppl wake up early. That had nothing to do with their success. Hard work doesn’t determine success either.
Basically what I’m trying to say is feeling productive will not guarantee success. Productivity is the new prayer
by danielvaughn on 3/8/20, 1:03 PM
This past week I've become obsessed with a video game idea. The week before I was obsessed with a design app that I'm working on.
by surfsvammel on 3/8/20, 2:46 PM
I think the opposite is true. Most things that I hated doing when I was 20, I’m today at 49 happy that I did. Workout, do the homework, even my military service. Many things I loved doing in the moment, play video games all through university, for example, I’m not so sure about.
by BossingAround on 3/8/20, 2:01 PM
> I wasn’t tired, I was excited afterwards. I've neglected my other habits because of it.
Let's see how you feel after cranking out your 10th side project after working 8-hour-or-more days. Who knows, you might absolutely love it, and decide to start a second business while working.
You might also discover that your partner is starting to feel neglected, your apartment is a mess, and you have gained 10 pounds, because exercise is not what you love.
Either way, I would not recommend the approach described in the article.
by pdimitar on 3/8/20, 2:35 PM
Whatever you might think of the author's age or number of data points or whatever other platform you choose to berate him on, he still has a very solid argument: there are things that simply exhaust you when you are doing them. That's a fact.
Haven't you all ever experienced this?
And no, I never grew to like doing the dishes or cleaning the apartment. At 40, I still need some good music and a hole in the schedule of both me and my wife for us to actually not grind our teeth while doing it. So yeah, please only talk for yourself, guys.
by Dansvidania on 3/8/20, 2:39 PM
You need to do a lot of things you do not love before you have the skills, the vision and the attitude to actually do what you love, and accomplish the goals you want to accomplish...
As a millennial, I think this kind of attitude is the problem with our generation. I mean both simplifying things into instagram-quote-sized senteces like "always do what you love" and also convincing ourselves that if you are not doing what you love, you should be doing something else.
Maybe we should focus more on how to be able to still motivate one-self to do things you do not love so much, but that are necessary.
Often, things that I really do not want to do are necessary for me to achieve things I really want to achieve.
Articles like this, and the beliefs they seems to want to propagate, are probably a big source of depression and failure in young adults (and not so young adults) these days.
by speedgoose on 3/8/20, 1:11 PM
by jotakami on 3/8/20, 1:57 PM
by jsjddbbwj on 3/8/20, 1:01 PM
by a7b3fa on 3/8/20, 4:17 PM
I have often found myself trying to start side-projects that I didn't really care about, because I had some abstract, perhaps irrational idea that I "should" be working on this particular thing. Usually it's something that will teach me a new skill.
Recently, I've gotten a lot better about evaluating whether or not something is worth doing in my free time, but I still don't really have a good criterion for when I should pick one thing over another: When should I spend my free time learning about X, and when should I learn about Y instead?
One suggestion may be to pick whatever is the most useful or the most likely to help you earn money in the future, and indeed this is more or less the rule I have been using in the past.
I posted this article because I thought it gave some remarkably actionable advice for picking between different side-projects, namely:
> The basic idea of personal energy management is that you should focus on increasing your personal energy and lifting up your mood in your leisure time, instead of working on things that drain your personal energy. Hobbies should lift your mood, not drain you. This makes you better perform all the other tasks.
This is a different outlook from what you usually hear, but it makes a lot of sense to me when presented in those terms.
by danschumann on 3/8/20, 9:10 PM
by saagarjha on 3/8/20, 1:11 PM
by dm319 on 3/8/20, 2:10 PM
by seattle_spring on 3/8/20, 3:51 PM
by deltaveedaddy on 3/8/20, 5:24 PM
Realizing your dream into reality will entail hundreds if not thousands of hours of suffering, in some form or another. It will cost you, there ain't nothing coming to just drop your dream lifestyle into your lap. Even if you have skin in the game, you will lose battles and you'll be forced to remember the war, you'll be tested boundlessly, endlessly.
That being said, whatever you are fixated on, that may be a good place to discover what direction to work in. If you dream of writing a groundbreaking video game, I can promise you that you'll spend a lot of time coding it all, but you must also consider your rent, your car note, your family, etc.
It ain't simple, but you CAN dream your dream. And if you feel, you SHOULD.
by lazyant on 3/8/20, 5:00 PM
by dorkwood on 3/8/20, 3:53 PM
Something like "find your passion" implies that you have a single passion hidden away inside you that you need to unearth. Once you find that thing -- knitting, sailing, whatever it is -- then you can do that activity for the rest of your life and be happy. This, in my experience, is wrong.
If rather than searching for your passion you instead focus on following your curiosity, you give yourself permission to play. This may end up leading you from domain to domain, but you'll find yourself energised and intrinsically motivated to do the work. This is the feeling I personally try to cultivate. It lifted me out of a depression 10 years ago and has seen me grow my skill set considerably since then.
I think the problem with this generation is not that they don't want to do hard things, but that they've lost touch with what they're even curious about.
by xwdv on 3/8/20, 2:11 PM
A mind shouldn’t be what controls your life, because really your mind isn’t you. Your mind is mostly noise and chatter and sometimes we observe that and think we must do what our mind says, but it’s not true. We must do what we must.
The way to live is to discipline yourself to do the things that must be done. This requires pulling in context from the world and people around you. You know what you have to do, so do it, and lay down whatever excuses or distractions your mind is thinking about. Let instincts and intuition guide you, not “thoughts”. They are not the same thing. Iron sharpens iron.
I didn’t think much about this post, I just posted it because I knew I had to, so I did, and now I will probably never think of it again. That’s how it is.
by coolyd on 3/8/20, 1:51 PM
This happens for me when solving hard problems. I can't stop thinking about it and work from the moment I wake up to when I go to bed. It looks like hard work, but it's energizing.
by teekert on 3/8/20, 1:28 PM
by p0nce on 3/8/20, 1:50 PM
by z3t4 on 3/8/20, 7:45 PM
by leonroy on 3/8/20, 7:36 PM
Maybe it should be do whatever you're most scared of. Obviously if it's driving across Syria might want to give that one a miss but I mean more if it's public speaking attend a Toastmasters, if it's job interviewing stick your CV up on Hired and attend at least one interview, if it's selling do some prospecting on LinkedIn or it could be that hairy bug on your backlog which you keep putting off.
by pansa2 on 3/8/20, 3:05 PM
What if the thing “you can’t stop thinking about” would lead to regret later?
In my case, the project I really want to do right now is to start a blog and write about video games. But, I worry if I look back on this time later, I will regret spending time writing about what others have built when I could have been building something myself.
So, I’m trying to balance my time between the writing, and also a programming project that isn’t as enjoyable, but which will hopefully be more fulfilling long-term.
by simonblack on 3/8/20, 11:18 PM
What if you can't stop thinking about 'that tall, slim blonde from Accounting'? The #me-too crowd will have something to say to you if you decide to go and 'do' her.
What if you can't stop thinking about how to commit the perfect murder? Same problem. The cops would soon have a few questions for you.
Note that the two examples I have given you above are also perfect examples of 'side projects' and have nothing to do with your day-to-day job. <grin>
by frfl on 3/8/20, 1:05 PM
by beamatronic on 3/8/20, 4:24 PM
by drbojingle on 3/8/20, 4:16 PM
by bravoetch on 3/8/20, 1:57 PM
by AzzieElbab on 3/8/20, 2:35 PM
by tuckerpo on 3/8/20, 5:05 PM
by mateuszf on 3/8/20, 1:08 PM
by HellDunkel on 3/8/20, 4:56 PM
by tiborsaas on 3/8/20, 2:25 PM
by agentultra on 3/8/20, 11:02 PM
However modern capitalism isn’t structured in a way that enables most people to think this way. Many people don’t have time outside of work to think of anything but their dependents and getting enough sleep. Many more have it much worse: working in Bataou or in a Foxconn factory; any hope of a life writing the next great novel or chasing proofs is not even a possibility.
If you do have the privilege though: use it as much as you can. We never know where the next breakthrough comes from. And maybe think about the layers of people, processes, and externalities that have come together to put you where you are.
by mikestew on 3/8/20, 1:23 PM
Depending on how literally one takes that, you’re going to be one sorry motherfucker when you’re old. I like taking a shit, but I don’t love it. But I gotta do it, my Yelp review on “taking a shit” notwithstanding.
Personally, I quit being so spoiled that every moment must be filled with things I “love” and have a “passion” for. Oh, I pursue those things. But I’ve also learned to love the mundane. There’s more to washing dishes than you think.
But enough shit talking the post, the take away stands: if you’re not being paid, select your activities carefully. I would add that one select from those one is willing to commit to, if only for a little bit. Keeps you from being flakey: “do not love, next!”
by HugoDaniel on 3/8/20, 2:46 PM
by spurdoman77 on 3/8/20, 2:26 PM
by omeysalvi on 3/8/20, 1:21 PM
by mlthoughts2018 on 3/8/20, 9:19 PM
Any behavior that I engage in that has productivity as a side effect that I rely on, ie to be paid money or to retrieve food or to nurture relationships, even if that productivity is not a conscious focus or stress, is inherently upsetting and painful to me.
If I had complete financial and commitment freedom, I literally would not do anything (and that sounds amazing). I know myself well and have introspected on it very much, and truly I would not do anything if I could. I would just sit there like a bump on a log and watch nature. I would not spend time with people. I would not busy my mind on any kind of puzzle or reductionist exploration of nature or myself. I would just sit there for years and years and years. That’s all I want to do.
by droithomme on 3/8/20, 7:32 PM
Hm, so that means I should live in an underground bunker with filtered air, hydroponics, and a decade long cache of provisions until the pandemic passes.
by purple-again on 3/8/20, 1:23 PM
by clouddrover on 3/8/20, 1:48 PM