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People Who Are Obsessed with Success and Prestige

• owens99 7y ago
  Great article. The part that stands out to me: > Unfortunately, after a year of purposely trying, I was still not becoming Elon Musk nor any other “successful” person. Despite reading everyday, meditating, getting up early, taking cold showers, and many more things. There’s a ridiculous amount of bro science in Silicon Valley tech. And this stuff doesn’t matter at all. All that matters is product-market fit.
  • pjc50 7y ago
    "Bro Science" is product-market fit. The market is people obsessed with success and prestige, and bro-science is ideas (and products) marketed at helping them think they have it. People who self-define as "rational" are harder to sell to upfront, but once you're past the defenses and hooked into their identity they'll actively defend what you've marketed to them.
    • Cougher 7y ago
      I think you're redefining bro-science.
  • Zealotux 7y ago
    And opportunities, networking, sometimes ones that are out of your control like family connections, but most importantly maybe: luck. The survivorship bias is strong at the top.
• jcims 7y ago
  I think i have a modified version of this where i abhor attention, rarely state opinions (except quasi anonymously) and definitely am happy for my contributions to go unrecognized, but i man do i get an endorphine rush when people come to me because they remember i fixed some tricky stuff for them before. Also i really try to get the younger people on my team to not follow on my footsteps here, it’s not the best way to build a career. Also, Dave, given the subject matter i did sneak in a little chuckle that you were the one posting this to HN. I’m glad you did though, interesting view into the headspace.
  • soneca 7y ago
    :) good catch To be fair, he never claimed to have overcome his obsession. It was a very nice post to read, so I am glad he shared too.
• lordnacho 7y ago
  Heh this is only a very mild version of status obsession. To a degree it's actually a good thing to want, so long as you stay committed to doing the actual work of getting successful. What amuses me to no end is when I see a rich guy who wants to keep being in the news. As if to say "see, I actually deserve all this wealth". I've seen several of these people over the years. Somehow the media keep calling them to comment on all manner of things unrelated to their field of expertise. One guy I've seen has articles about how he's a great art lover. Then one about how his wife worked so hard to help him. Then commentary on how startups work. Then he buys a sports team. And another. And another. Everythings he does has to be in the news. Another guy is a little bit wiser about it, but also sticks his comments in where he really isn't an expert (economics, politics). Sprinkle in a bit of bragging about expensive wines and restuarants, and it just looks like an old child doing the "look at me" routine. I really don't get it. I suppose that external validation is a huge factor for some people, something similar to substance addiction. People can't see it, but they are swapping dignity for attention.
  • jacknews 7y ago
    "People can't see it, but they are swapping dignity for attention." Nice observation, though in rare cases not necessarily true. The thing is, as you point out, status does actually bring potentially huge benefits; People start to come to you with proposals, rather than the other way. Success/Status attracts opportunity. So to some extent we're hardwired to strive for it.
    • tonyedgecombe 7y ago
      A friend of mine who was visibly successful in his business told me he got to the point where he would say no to every proposal. Something he thought would be a benefit quickly became a burden.
    • lordnacho 7y ago
      The people I'm talking about are beyond needing proposals. The only point of getting proposals at this point is to get more flattery. This is not to say it isn't useful for society to have some guys floating around funding new projects, just the point of it for them does not seem to be to find interesting projects to help. You can help people quietly.
• esotericn 7y ago
  Isn't this basically just what happens to some number of people when they 'train' their brains to get out of the hole everyone is in to begin with (the requirement to make a living)? Status and prestige are more powerful multipliers than anything else. Even outside of business. You can be the best 'x' in the world, but winning the Olympic gold will multiply your earnings by probably an order of magnitude or more.
  • kangnkodos 7y ago
    Many things are winner-take-all. Olympic Gold. Company founder. CEO. And looking past the top one person, there are power laws too. The number 2 person in a company gets paid twice what the number 3 person gets, and so on. And it's not just money. There's power - politicians. And fame - actors, and others. They all follow the same pattern. Given that this is the world we live in, there's a huge incentive to move up one rung on the ladder relative to the people around you. Part of this drive to move ahead of other people is rational because of the geometrically increasing rewards.
• wsxcde 7y ago
  Thought-provoking article. I got over my obsession with emulating others' success when I realized that a lot of supposedly successful people were successful primarily because they were also lucky. Once you accept that a big factor in whether you'll end up "successful" is just chance, it becomes easier to accept that it may not be entirely under your control and so there's no reason to obsess about it. PG's advice, which in some ways is a restatement of the Bhagvad Gita's best-known verse, really speaks to me. Just focus on doing the best you can on the things that actually interest you. The rest will follow, and if it doesn't, that's okay. At least you'll have had fun doing your thing.
  • philbarr 7y ago
    > At least you'll have had fun doing your thing. Whilst working 40+ hours a week for someone who was lucky enough that "the rest did follow."
    • bagacrap 7y ago
      It sounds like you're bitter about working "for" someone else. This might be an ego problem and the solution is not to just be an entrepreneur because that won't solve the root issue.
      • slothtrop 7y ago
        Maybe entrepreneurs are in part driven by ego. Taking on huge risk takes motivation.
    • devdas 7y ago
      That assumes that running a business is your thing..
  • deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
• astuyvenberg 7y ago
  This post also resonated with me, especially the quote from /r/cscareerquestions > Got an awesome internship at an interesting company? Well, it wasn’t FAANG, so who cares? Got a FAANG internship? Well it wasn’t one of the good FAANGs, so if you really think about it, you really didn’t accomplish anything. Got into a “Good FAANG”? Well, the other intern works on his own startup idea when he goes home. Why aren’t you working on your startup idea? Do you even have a startup idea? Are you even trying? It's absolutely not limited to new engineers. Take a look at the replies to the "Levels.fyi Annual Report" here on HN. > You can't move to the US/SF/NYC? Good luck eeking out a living. You didn't get an offer from a FAANG? Well, you don't really belong in the bay area then. You got a FAANG offer but you didn't negotiate 400k+ total comp? Good luck ever getting a raise. You made it to the top of your salary band? Well, they'll never move you up, better plan your exit now. The tech rat race mentality is very real and very pervasive.
  • akhilcacharya 7y ago
    To be fair my calculation is if you’re not at near peak TC band when you enter top tech companies it’s hard to impossible to catch up, so the anxiety is warranted.
    • astuyvenberg 7y ago
      That's precisely my point regarding the rat race - what is one trying to catch up to? Is there economic or social anxiety at 350k/yr which evaporates at 400k/yr?
      • akhilcacharya 7y ago
        Absolutely. Purchasing real estate (or even a Tesla, etc) is out of reach for people like me, and likely will be for 10+ years from now. Say someone makes 150% or more of what I make (ergo are valued 150% superior in a fair labor market) and they can save far more and build a their net worth significantly faster even with a more luxurious lifestyle.
        • 7y ago
• akhilcacharya 7y ago
  > Got a FAANG internship? Well it wasn’t one of the good FAANGs, so if you really think about it, you really didn’t accomplish anything. This is funny because I’ve been straight up told this by multiple people. It’s not neuroticism, it’s the simple fact that hierarchies exist.
  • ThaJay 7y ago
    hierarchies are toxic by definition
    • coldtea 7y ago
      Neither the definition of toxic, nor the definition of hierarchy imply any such relation, much less require it. Hierarchies are what they are: an acknowledgement that the universe (and most subsets of it, e.g. companies, countries, etc.) is not a mere undifferentiated blob, but has qualitative and quantitative differences that we need to take into account. You wouldn't get any arbitrary surgeon if you could have the best one, just because "hierarchies are toxic", right?
  • philbarr 7y ago
    Which ones are the "bad" FAANGs?
    • deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    • deleted 7y ago
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    • barry-cotter 7y ago
      I believe Amazon has much more variable hiring standards than Google so probably Amazon. Don’t know enough to think of any other candidates though I doubt Google or Netflix are among them given the former’s ludicrous hiring process or the latter’s policy of firing fast with very generous severance for people they don’t think reach their standards once hired.
• raincom 7y ago
  People derive pleasure from success and prestige. There is also another way to derive pleasure: by criticizing others non-constructively, by thrashing others' egos.
• DoubleGlazing 7y ago
  I look at this from the opposite perspective, the person who doesn't care much for success and prestige but has to deal with the toxic side-effects of those that do. I grew up an only child in as single parent household where I was taught that it's better to quietly build a stable secure foundation for your life, rather than to put yourself "out there" and hope for the best. My mothers attitude was that it is better to have a boring stable job that provides enough for you and your family than to be rich or famous. For example she implored me to study for a fall-back manual trade in case the computing degree thing didn't work out. Recently, I decided to go self-employed and do my own thing in my own time. This was driven by the fact that having worked for a few startups I couldn't deal with the success at all costs approach of some of the founders and managers. For example being forced to push out new features before they are ready, knowing that the technical debt is mounting and that it will come back to bite me one day. Trying to explain why stuff like this was a bad idea would be met with a response implying I didn't care for the company and didn't value success. I also got frequently reprimanded for refusing to do overtime on a regular basis, preferring instead to be with my family. Plus all this was usually coupled with some horrific "Fake it till you make it" promotional activities that we'd get roped in to. One of the founders went out and got himself a Porsche 911 and put an email around the office showing it off and telling us if we worked hard to make the company a success we too could afford a similar car. Lord knows how he paid for it as the company was losing €3million a year at that point. All the while I would be acutely aware of the fact that the founders had already churned through four or five failed startups. They were trying out ideas in the hope that one was succeed and make them rich and famous. If another failed they wouldn't care for the people being let go as they would just move on to their next idea. Having ambitions is good, but I think we as a society are pressured in to setting those ambitions far too high. I am worried by the rising suicide rates in many places, are we pressuring people to chase unattainable life goals until they crack? I think that is part of it.
  • TomMarius 7y ago
    Maybe the issue is that these jobs are basically seasonal but we are trying to force them to be secure jobs in office? I can imagine there is a lot of people who like to jump project to project and not get caught in maintenance, like I do. I think these (secure job / project hopping) are very different things that shouldn't be compared, and people should not forget about the nature of the job at hand (and, IMHO, shouldn't force it to be something it is not).
• sandoooo 7y ago
  I may not be successful or prestigious but at least I'm not Obsessed With Success and Prestige. Yay for me.
• deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
• bambax 7y ago
  OT, and possibly unpopular here, but this really gets on my nerves: > In Paul Graham’s essay on, How to Do what You Love* he warns us about the prestige trap: (...) you have to like the actual work of novel-writing if you’re going to be good at it; you have to like making up elaborate lies* PG's contempt for anything literary pervades in many of his essays, which may reveal some kind of unhealthy obsession, esp. for someone who brands himself a "writer". But this quote shows a deep misunderstanding of what literature is. Literature is about the TRUTH. It may be the only way to gain an actual comprehension of human nature. A novel can be viewed as an experiment: put characters in a controlled setting of your design, and then see what happens. This is the best tool we have for this.
  • Invictus0 7y ago
    I also took issue with that line as it reminded me of a quote from Orwell: "Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout with some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand."
  • WJW 7y ago
    Surely putting imaginary characters in an imaginary setting can only result in stories limited by the authors imagination. If the author does not know all that much about human nature in the first place, only unrealistic stories will be the outcome. Worse, as a reader it is not possible to discern realistic behavior unless you already understand human nature, which makes literature somewhat useless for learning about it. I would argue that understanding of human nature is a necessary (but not sufficient) element of becoming a good writer, but writing in itself is not necessarily a good way to learn about human nature. As an aside, I'm a bit weirded out by the idea that reading books would be the best way to learn about human nature as opposed to going "out there" and interacting with people.
    • bambax 7y ago
      Events happen in fiction that can be rare and unpleasant to experience oneself IRL... Fiction is a magnifying glass, a condenser.
• bar_de 7y ago
  He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have. - Sokrates
• Amygaz 7y ago
  Who is a narcissist? (Jeopardy for 10 points)
• emsy 7y ago
  This behavior can also have bad consequences for people in unexpected ways. Want to land a job? Create a highly used npm package and put it in your portfolio. It doesn’t matter if it’s supported long after, has a ton of dependencies or is even really necessary in the first place. And shit like this is how we end up with things like left pad.
• csomar 7y ago
  > Looking back, I also feel like I was frequently compared agaisnst other children. As a reminder that life is a competition, and you don’t want to be behind. I don't know how old you are but life is a competition. At the very fundamental level, all species are competing with each other for survival. Your mother was not mislead, she knows that in order to survive in this jungle, you need to be competitive. And given how shallow the world is, these titles and awards matters, so you should get them.
  • mozey 7y ago
    > in order to survive in this jungle, you need to competitive It's funny when people use jungle as an example to make this argument. Cooperation might be even more important than competition in an actual jungle.
    • csomar 7y ago
      Except that people are going to cooperate with those who are more competitive. So...
      • germinalphrase 7y ago
        You state that as if it’s axiomatic; it’s not.
  • trevyn 7y ago
    More accurately, many overlapping competitions, not all of which are easy to see.
  • digitaltrees 7y ago
    Except individual will lose to groups that cooperate, so even if the world is competitive, there is an incentive for collaboration and equality.
    • deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
• pjc50 7y ago
  > She would say, “Dave, you only got one award this year. Remember when you won seven last year?” > If it wasn’t that, maybe it was also because I am gay. My mother was never really happy about this Ah, the absolute pinnacle of neurosis parenting. That's a solid one-two punch to the child's psyche, which gives them a drive to please while at the same time ensuring it can never be met. Well done; you ensured your child would work hard forever by guaranteeing that no matter how hard they work they won't actually be happy, because they can never meet your standard for approval.
  • LandR 7y ago
    > She would say, “Dave, you only got one award this year. Remember when you won seven last year?” I've had stuff like this from parents. Nothing is ever good enough, I have a friend who is massively more successful than me that I've been friends with since we were children. Went to same nursery, school and university. When I told my parents I got a bonus one year, instead of great, well done. I got asked how much, followed by asking what bonus did my friend get (them knowing his position, that his bonus would be a couple of orders of magnitude more), seemingly, just to put me down. I've been told by my dad, despite me having my own place and what I consider a decent job, that I failed in life as my friend has so much more money than me and a better title. I now just don't care what my parents think.
    • DanielleMolloy 7y ago
      Instilling ambition and an optimistic hard working spirit is a good thing many children don’t have, but if they are never willing to congratulate you, especially when you are happy about an accomplishment that sounds like borderline abusive behavior. I would recommend getting a lot of long-term distance and lowered communication to discover your own mental space (german word „abnabeln“).
    • acollins1331 7y ago
      You should go a step further and tell them what YOU think. They're giant assholes and need to realize it and change.
    • 7y ago
• SCHiM 7y ago
  Notice what the quote in the article, and the points made in the comments below, reveal? Humans compare with their reference group. As your status increases you'll step out of your old group and into a new one. And then the cycle starts again. Your peers are again ahead! You've traded your group of 'job seeking undergrads' for 'ladder climbing professionals'. I'm not sure if it's possible to have control over this automatic comparing, but the cure is not to keep climbing. It's to hack your mind to set your reference group to people that have lower status, aka: be gratefull for what you have, and think about the ways in which you are furtunate that others are not.
  • huffmsa 7y ago
    The cure is to not play the game and go do your own thing.
    • Bahamut 7y ago
      I was going to reply something to this effect - it's ok to climb or whatever, but do things on your own terms without caring about how other people are doing. You can still be happy for their success and should be, but as long as you give an effort you're happy with, that should be enough.
• pkhamre 7y ago
  > Should I learn to make pasta from scratch? No, that’s crazy. Nobody cares if you can make pasta from scratch and it’s not going to make any money. I think the author got it wrong here. He mixes the words "successful" with "fame". By learning a skill like making pasta from scratch, you can make yourself and other people happy. And if you go deep into the field, you can even make money on it, if that's important to you :) I started baking pizza and obsessed at making the perfect tomato sauce, the perfect dough, the perfect crust. Basically, the perfect pizza. I do know that perfect does not exist, but I got to a point where I make a pretty damn good pizza. I like my pizza better than most pizzi I can get in a restaurant. My next step is to build my own wood-fired outdoor oven, so I can reach the temperatures I need to get the pizza even better. Being able to make this amazing pizza makes me so happy. It makes people around me happy. And I learn my friends and family how to make proper pizza. I smile and laugh and dance when I make pizza. This is true success in my opinion. And after I learned the baking skills, success kind of started snowballing in other areas as well. Why are famous people successful? They do what makes them happy :) Why am I starting to be successful? I do what makes me happy :) How can you start to be successful? Do what makes you happy :) If you think going down a certain path for happiness might seem a little crazy, that's a good sign.
  • odonnellryan 7y ago
    Do you have a recipe? :)
    • pkhamre 7y ago
      Yes. Tipo OO flour (Caputo Classic), 63% hydration, 3% salt, 5% browning agent (sugar, syrup, malt, or something similar) and instant dry yeast or liquid sourdough according to how long time I got to rise the dough. I use PizzApp+ to calculate the recipe. I did obsess about making the perfect pizza, and I did spend a year to make the perfect sourdough bread. To recap it very simple, I think the recipe for success is having fun and enjoying what you do :)
      • theFeller00 7y ago
• kstenerud 7y ago
  I have the opposite problem. I have zero drive for status & prestige, but rather follow my passions no matter how unfashionable they are. And it hurts my career. I don't have twitter followers who fall over themselves to offer me a job the very second I enter the job market. I can't shame a company or other big entity for behaving badly. I have very little leverage for many important career-improving opportunities because I lack the social clout to take advantage of them. You NEED to attain some status and influence if you want the best control over your destiny. I'm trying to do this now, but it's hard because it doesn't come naturally.
  • slothtrop 7y ago
    Take comfort that extra control and maneuverability from social exposure is mostly moot if you already know and do what you want. It sounds like you're saying that better social media presence can improve job prospects, and that might be true, but a portfolio and experience is still king here. If you're fussing over a blog regularly but hate it, you've included that in the destiny in question. That experience is not divorced from it. Just a question of what you're willing to compromise.
  • collyw 7y ago
    I hate the idea that developers should have blogs. I see the advantage in using it to market yourself, but I write code for a living not blogs. There isn't that much information that I feel the need to share with the world, and for the things I do (that would be career related), I don't usually have the time and motivation to write them up properly.
    • criddell 7y ago
      I'm not a good or efficient writer, but I'm sure glad there are programmers who are. I've gotten a lot of value from developer blogs. For example, Raymond Chen's New Old Thing is a wonderful resource for Windows stuff.
    • cr0sh 7y ago
      > I hate the idea that developers should have blogs. I hate the reality that developers can't easily develop a portfolio of work because generally their work is owned lock, stock, and barrel by the companies they work for, and can't be legally shared outside of those places. So we have github, but even that is suspect and many potential employers don't look at it, unless you are some well known contributor or founder to one or more open-source projects. Even then it can be a crap shoot; I've read on more than one occasion somewhat famous developers of tools being turned down for positions at companies that use the very tools they developed. It is somewhat maddenning. You can just about forget it if your repositories are for your own personal projects, but that's better than nothing - and that's also where a blog has some influence. Basically, as a place to show something of your coding ability and knowledge, and the value you can bring as a new hire. But honestly, that can get tiring; sometimes when I go home from work, I'll do something interesting - but many times, I just want to relax and not think about coding or other projects too much. I've found myself becoming more this way as I've grown older (currently approaching 50). I've been an SWE for over 25 years now, but every time I find myself looking for a new position, it feels as though my previous experience counts for nothing. I can't show any future employer what I worked on in the past (and in many cases, that work is long gone along with the previous employer), they rarely want to look at my github or (back when it existed - I really need to restart it - sigh) my personal blogging site. It feels like every such interview and encounter I am starting fresh. It sickens me. I don't know of any other kind of career where this kind of thing is the norm, except software development and engineering. If you aren't extremely famous and known, or you don't have a deep and wide network, or whatever - you can't just drop your resume, have a decent conversation about your past work and skills, and be given a chance. Instead, you are more often than not forced to jump thru a variety of ill-conceived hoops (many of them on fire, too!), which in the end might get you the position, or more often than not, you are rejected without any explanation or reasoning that might help you to understand what you need to work on in order to be more successful the next time around. It's fairly absurd when you are on the younger end of the scale; now imagine you are old enough in some cases to be the parent of the person interviewing you, and still being questioned in such a manner, after likely being employed in the past longer than they've been alive. It's almost Kafkaesque.
• everdrive 7y ago
  "People who are excited by posthumous fame forget that the people who remember them will soon die too. And those after them in turn. Until their memory, passed from one to another like a candle flame, gutters and goes out. But suppose that those who remembered you were immortal and your memory undying. What good would it do you? And I don't just mean when you're dead, but in your own lifetime. What use is praise, except to make your lifestyle a little more comfortable?" - Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
  • sullyj3 7y ago
    Ironic that that quote comes from someone who died in the year 180. If I got 2000 years of fame, I'd be pretty satisfied.
    • ak39 7y ago
      Marcus Aurelius is asking exactly how will that be of _use_? (Even when you’re alive)
      • WilliamEdward 7y ago
        Feeling better about yourself is not useful? Influencing a large number of people is not useful?
        • everdrive 7y ago
          Feeling better about yourself must never be a primary concern. It's true that you can't help but feeling good about your actions if they do good, but your ego should be be supressed as much as possible.
        • beaconstudios 7y ago
          Marcus Aurelius being a writer on stoicism, I feel I have to point out that stoicism would suggest that you control how you feel about yourself and are only tying your feelings to external factors. You can feel good about yourself without external validation. Influencing others is only practically useful in your lifetime, so posthumous fame doesn't really do you anything.
• lm28469 7y ago
  > Unfortunately, after a year of purposely trying, I was still not becoming Elon Musk nor any other “successful” person. Despite reading everyday, meditating, getting up early, taking cold showers, and many more things. But what makes these guys successful anyway? Their fame? Money? Contribution to society? And wearing grey t-shirts won't make you Zuckerberg [0]. You don't become a 0.00000001%er by mimicking the most meaningless aspect of their life. Seems to me that this is particularly affecting people who aren't satisfied with themselves / rarely reflect on themselves and get caught in the rat race without ever pausing to look around. You can always be more successful, earn more money buy more gadgets, have a nicer car, more awards, it's an endless quest, but if you're empty inside these things won't help you. [0] https://careers.workopolis.com/advice/the-reason-mark-zuckerberg-wears-the-same-shirt-every-day/ https://careers.workopolis.com/advice/the-reason-mark-zucker...
  • Klinky 7y ago
    Let's also note that becoming a startup billionaire to then go off and fund your pet projects is a bit of an anomaly. It's very hard to "mimick" the successful parts of their lives.
    • 0x445442 7y ago
      > It's very hard to "mimick" the successful parts of their lives Given the level of luck involved I'd say it's near impossible. I've noticed a definite transition in the past 20-25 years and that's more and more difficulty for people to accept things like luck and talent exist. I also think the difficulty of acceptance has negative consequences on people's psyche. They seem to become angry and depressed if they've, by all accounts, been successful in the "mimicking" but the desired results don't follow.
      • pete762 7y ago
        Cargo cult has been around forever.
  • criddell 7y ago
    The part about reading, meditating, waking early, and so on sounded a bit like a cargo cult.
• code4tee 7y ago
  The major fallacy I often see is that people driven by “status and prestige” often fail to realize that those they are hoping to impress don’t care as much about these things. It’s a bit like LinkedIn. Lots of people are on LinkedIn trying to impress people but the people they’re trying to impress aren’t on (or barely use) LinkedIn.
  • 0x445442 7y ago
    Ah, LinkedIn... Recruiter spam central.
• ken 7y ago
  It seems so bizarre to me that there is an r/cscareerquestions at all. And the only other r/__careerquestions are computer-related (IT, UX, DS). It's not like dentists and architects haven't discovered the internet yet. Computers are the new gold rush. It seems like most people today got into this field just looking to strike it rich.
  • barry-cotter 7y ago
    Dentists and architects have laws to stop people practicing their trade. I don’t know about dentistry; it seems too boring to get people spanning the range from enthusiastic amateur to journeyman but if it was still possible to work your way up from draftsman to architect with no qualifications whatsoever there would probably be an equivalent for architects. What’s special about computers is that the associated profession hasn’t won the rent seeking race.
  • tpmx 7y ago
    (It does explain the whole webdev/javascript situation a bit, I would claim.) I don't mind people entering this field with a goal of getting rich. The problem is when that is their only motivation. There are definitely lots of other factors at play here, but I kinda look back at the late 90s/early 00s with nostalgia. It seemed like most of the people you worked with, or even interviewed back then had some basic level of sincere passion for the field. Today that's not really the case. That makes the work less fun.
• vmh1928 7y ago
  I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.
• pansa 7y ago
  > A guy who [...] wants to be known as the creator of something. I have this problem. I’m frequently distracted from doing what I want to do by ideas for things that I want to have done (and wouldn’t enjoy actually doing day-to-day). The search for prestige is about the only reason to switch paths and start working on any of these ideas, but it’s hard to ignore.
• tempy26960 7y ago
  One of the problems is HR. It's their job to lower your salary in the interview process, that's how they get paid. No matter what you do, they will always find some flaw in your resume and even though you have 10 years experience, match every single technology framework they listed in the job posting (planets aligned), and were a top engineer at all of your previous companies. The field of technology is too broad. Ideally we'd have some control to have a division of labor to specialize in certain areas like networking, security, data, backend, frontend, linux admin, etc. which already sort of exists but when you talk to companies they seem to want the rockstar programmer that does everything and look at you like you're crazy for wanting to specialize in one thing. Unlike lawyers and doctors, who have many clients, we can really only have one client at a time, our employer, and they will treat us like shit unless they know that we can find a job easily at another employer. Sadly, the only thing worth working on is being able to get a job quickly, as opposed to actually do a good job for your employer... which is not valued.
• omarhaneef 7y ago
  It is okay to be "obsessed" with success or prestige so long as you are a satisficer and not a maximizer: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/science-choice/201506/satisficing-vs-maximizing https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/science-choice/20150... If you are a satisficer, getting a better brand name company/school/accelerator etc will help you in the long run. If you are a maximizer, you may be unhappy for all the reasons stated in the article and in the comments. But we shouldn't confuse the benefits of a brand with the impossible standards.
• endorphone 7y ago
  I'm a little jaded from years of seeing posts like this, to the point that now they don't seem quite as much like "see, you don't need all that", but instead read more like "See, I've redefined the rules and evaluations -- I'm the winner now!"
  • nlh 7y ago
    I see your point but at the same time - why is redefining the rules a bad thing? Why should people be obligated to evaluate themselves against criteria that’s popular or set by other people? Why does that actually matter?
    • endorphone 7y ago
      It isn't a bad thing, and there is nothing wrong with that. Yet it isn't always conveyed at face value.
• willberman 7y ago
  About a year ago, a similar sentiment hit me very hard. I was in a situation where I had actually checked all the boxes I wanted to check. My boxes didn’t involve working at FAANG, but they weren’t insignificant. I was very confused why I wasn’t happy. There’s a very good short story by Alastair Reynolds called Understanding Space and Time. The protagonist is the last human alive. He finds his purpose in understanding the universe. Even once he completes this goal, he must go on living his life. It may sound trite, but I tell people to put themselves in that position. What would you spend your time doing if you were the last human alive? Now obviously you don’t do that verbatim, but I think it should be an influential datapoint on your choice of career path. The best news is that if you’re a half decent technical mind with a half decent network, the odds of you ever starving are quite low (not including dependents. That’s a different story). As a result, you have ample opportunity to carve out whatever corner of the universe you want for yourself :)
• cgs 7y ago
  You are trying to fill a basic human need, which is simply beeing seen by others. What could alleviate some of this pain is simple social connection. I was always reading about how important it is and kind of blew it off, but as I get older I'm understanding how important it is to our well being. Reach out and make connections. Get coffee with a friend who listens to you. Find a hobby where you are interacting with people in meatspace. This may even lead to finding deeper purpose in ways you may not have expected.
• robbrown451 7y ago
  "would not pursue anything unless he knew people cared about it" This one struck me as a bit odd. I don't see a problem with being motivated by whether you are creating value for other people. "Should I learn to make pasta from scratch?" That's fine if someone wants to do that, but I hold higher admiration for people who have some drive to make the world better, even in fairly small ways, rather than spending all their time on something so trivial. And yeah, trying to earn my admiration isn't what you should probably be doing. But doing something that is admirable? That's a good thing. To me, anyway.
• salex89 7y ago
  On a side note, didn't know about the whole Siraj Raval "controversy". I always found him shallow and more form over function, just stopped following him and didn't speak about it because everyone was raving over him. Looks like there was something after all...
  • upstandingdude 7y ago
    Yeah at first I liked him but after exery video I felt stupid and had learned exactly nothing, so I stopped. Glad its not me :D sweating
• foldr 7y ago
  Random chain of associations, but I'm reminded of this: https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%93%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%BA%D0%B0_%D0%B2%D0%B5%D0%BA%D0%B0_(%D1%84%D0%B8%D0%BB%D1%8C%D0%BC,_1986) https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%93%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%BA%D0%B0... The thesis of the movie is apparently that that Donald Crowhurst (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Crowhurst https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Crowhurst) was driven insane by the anxieties of late-stage capitalism. I'd rather have those than the anxieties of late-stage Communism, but I can see where they were coming from.
• goatinaboat 7y ago
  Should I learn to make pasta from scratch? No, that’s crazy. Nobody cares If you are single and invite your date over and make them pasta from scratch I guarantee it will work. Seriously.
• deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
• asveikau 7y ago
  > Should I learn to make pasta from scratch? No, that’s crazy. Nobody cares if you can make pasta from scratch and it’s not going to make any money. I stared at this for a long time in complete disbelief thinking "But it's so delicious!" And I guess, if you do it for friends or acquaintances it will give you prestige, you will be the prestigious person who makes totally awesome pasta. Although personally I would rank doing something nice for people above the prestige you might get from it, so I guess the article is not for me.
  • RookyNumbas 7y ago
    I feel somewhat sorry for the author. He ends the post with the realization that the search for success has not turned out like he was led to believe, and then questions how he should proceed with life. My advice would be to go make pasta and share it with a beautiful woman (or man in his case).
    • asveikau 7y ago
      Well, I do respect that part, because they are open about it and it's never too late to recognize such a thing. And we probably all get some version of this problem in differing amounts. I feel a little conflicted making fun of the pasta thing in this light. But the pasta still sounds delicious.
    • Izkata 7y ago
      > (or man in his case) Well, there is that saying, "the way to a man's heart is through his stomach".
• electriclove 7y ago
  Ling Ling practices 40 hours a day
• at_a_remove 7y ago
  This is one of those supposed character flaws I could have used a bit more of in my personal makeup.
• xivzgrev 7y ago
  I took a happiness course once. It said that instead of chasing status, we should chase flow. The idea being status is dependent on what others think, which is inherently unstable, while flow is joy for yourself. There’s a book I read, can’t remember name but basically it said instead of chasing recognition, we should chase knowing. Recognition was lots of random strangers liking some surface thing about you. For example I like band X - if I saw them in public I’d want to say “hey I love your music!”. Or conversely, I think band X sucks, and I want to say that. It’s a shallow opinion held by many. Knowing is respect by people who have the authority to actually evaluate your talents. In this case, it would be experienced musicians. What do they think of the band’s music? These people actually have the relevant experience to evaluate your work. If a group like that admires your work, it’s a deeper, more satisfying “like” than a bunch of random people. Yet we are typically wired to chase the approval of the masses. These things can be hard, I certainly don’t do them all the time, but it’s helpful direction if you can relate to this article.
• bumby 7y ago
  From David Brooks: "I’ve been thinking about the difference between the résumé virtues and the eulogy virtues. The résumé virtues are the ones you list on your résumé, the skills that you bring to the job market and that contribute to external success. The eulogy virtues are deeper. They’re the virtues that get talked about at your funeral, the ones that exist at the core of your being — whether you are kind, brave, honest or faithful; what kind of relationships you formed. Most of us would say that the eulogy virtues are more important than the résumé virtues, but I confess that for long stretches of my life I’ve spent more time thinking about the latter than the former. Our education system is certainly oriented around the résumé virtues more than the eulogy ones. Public conversation is, too — the self-help tips in magazines, the nonfiction bestsellers. Most of us have clearer strategies for how to achieve career success than we do for how to develop a profound character." Maybe we'd all do better to be focused on those 'eulogy virtues' rather than obsessing over our external success. For me at least, it's a constant battle to hold back the pull of the weasel trying to measure myself against external validation.
  • anonymousDan 7y ago
    Thanks for that. I think it's a great way to express how we should not lose sight of the bigger picture.
  • hedgedoops2 7y ago
    Cusins. By the way, have you any religion? Undershaft. Yes. Cusins. Anything out of the common? Undershaft. Only that there are two things necessary to Salvation. Cusins [disappointed, but polite] Ah, the Church Catechism. Baptism and — Undershaft. No. Money and gunpowder. Cusins [surprised, but interested] That is the general opinion of our governing classes. The novelty is in hearing any man confess it. Undershaft. Just so. Cusins. Excuse me: is there any place in your religion for honor, justice, truth, love, mercy and so forth? Undershaft. Yes: they are the graces and luxuries of a rich, strong, and safe life. Cusins. Suppose one is forced to choose between them and money or gunpowder? Undershaft. Choose money and gunpowder; for without enough of both you cannot afford the others. Cusins. That is your religion? Undershaft. Yes. (https://opentextbc.ca/englishliterature/chapter/major-barbara-act-ii/ https://opentextbc.ca/englishliterature/chapter/major-barbar...)
• gdubs 7y ago
  Something that’s perhaps only clear with time and perspective is that no matter how much success people attain, they still find plenty of ways to be miserable. Some of the happiest people I’ve met in my life aren’t necessarily the luckiest or most successful - they’re the most grateful and compassionate. For those of us lucky to find “success”, the real question is: why did we want it so bad, and what are we going to make of it?
• lordleft 7y ago
  “People who are excited by posthumous fame forget that the people who remember them will soon die too. And those after them in turn. Until their memory, passed from one to another like a candle flame, gutters and goes out.” Marcus Aurelius "19. You may be unconquerable, if you enter into no combat in which it is not in your own control to conquer. When, therefore, you see anyone eminent in honors, or power, or in high esteem on any other account, take heed not to be hurried away with the appearance, and to pronounce him happy; for, if the essence of good consists in things in our own control, there will be no room for envy or emulation. But, for your part, don't wish to be a general, or a senator, or a consul, but to be free; and the only way to this is a contempt of things not in our own control." Epictetus
  • tkjef 7y ago
    one of many great lessons in that book. happy to have finally read it after it came up on here a few times.
    • ImaCake 7y ago
      I have found it a real slog (challenge), and gave up after chapter 3. I think the lack of context made it a bit dull for me. Maybe I should try an annotated text to see if holds my attention better!
      • cptnapalm 7y ago
        It's something to dip into. It's remarkable that it survived at all, seeing as it was just his personal "notebook".
      • tkjef 7y ago
        i found the 1st chapter to be a bit of a slog as you say, but after that it picked up for me. and there were hints of what was to come in the 1st chapter. but 100%, it was a little challenging to get into initially. i also took breaks reading it as i read other books. it can definitely be digested piecemeal as it's a collection of thoughts.
  • 7y ago
• ratsimihah 7y ago
  Oof that hits the spot. Can't seem to be satisfied until I get to bootstrap a product I love, even though my day job is already perfect.
• Vysero 7y ago
  There seems to be a lot of talk in the article about what the writer wants. Also, there is talk about some life style changes. However, the author seems to be lacking a detailed plan of attack. My suggestion to the author would be to move their motivations out of the picture long enough to frame it. The biggest difference between successful people and others is action, not motivation.
• deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
• TrackerFF 7y ago
  My observation has been that the kids that fall prey for the prestige trap, tend to come from families that push that mentality very hard. Often families with relatively successful parents, i.e white-collar professionals and the likes. I think there's also an element of insecurity and lack of identity among those kids. They've been measured and held to high standards all their lives, and they have close and clear references of success. Maybe their parents, grand-parents, or other family members. They get pushed to ace their school works, they get pushed to do stuff that pads their school applications and resumes. This seems to be even worse when your parents come from cultures where there are a handful few of "correct" careers to choose between. These kids sacrifice a lot, so the obsession with clear-cut goals could be some rationalization or their sacrifices and lack of identity. But then again, we're all driven by different things. Some set their mind at 17 to be retired by 30, and will do whatever it takes to accelerate that process. Others may not need money at all (due to things like inheritance), but want to fit in with their peers - so chasing prestige becomes just another case of keeping up with the Joneses...if nothing else for the bragging rights. With that said, in my later years I've realized that chasing prestige (for my own part) was nothing more than vanity, and a need for external validation. But it turned out that I did not have passion for the things that were prestigious, and I felt miserable pouring all my focus and energy into something I did not care for. In the end, I took a stand with myself, and figured out that it's better to be happy and create something I love, and create value for others (as well as myself) - and if success comes with it, then that's a bonus. Not having a cloud of professional / career anxiety hanging over me is great.
• klik99 7y ago
  It's rare to see such honest self-reflection on a sensitive topic like this. The need for recognition in some way or another is hardwired into us, and I don't believe it's intrinsically bad - we are a communal animal and we want to provide value for our community, our brains want success and prestige as a way to motivate us to do that - like feeling hungry motivates us to nourish ourselves. It's a basic need to feel useful, and prestige is the metric our primitive brains use to measure that usefulness, hence office drones find happiness as little league coaches. Like any force, it can be both good or bad, and it turns bad when your ONLY concern is success and prestige, leading you to optimize external appearances and get some of that sweet sweet second hand prestige. But when combined with something you enjoy doing, and that can provide real value to the world, this desire can be truly world changing, and I think it's a vast oversimplification (being HN I can say it's over-fitting to a one-dimensional metric) to say that the Jobs, Musks, Gates and other folks weren't motivated to some degree by it. Side note: I remember flying out of LA a few years back and seeing FIVE gaunt bald men dressed in black turtle necks and blue jeans. Either there was a call for a Steve Jobs biopic and nobody took off their costumes, or LA is the the poster child for over-optimizing external appearances.
• melenaboija 7y ago
  I guess something that explains this is seeing this post at HN and close to it this one "How to be successful (at your career, Twitter edition)"
• cambalache 7y ago
  And yet here you are, self-posting to HN hoping to get to the frontpage.
• rb808 7y ago
  What no mention of elite colleges, Ivy League? Children get on the treadmill very early now, best feeder schools to get into Stanford/Harvard. I find it easy to ignore most of the time, but maybe that great company that I wanted to work for would interview me if I had that background...
• alexashka 7y ago
  It's just people who only think about themselves, coupled with being an idiot. The thought process goes like this: 'person on tv is getting love and attention; I want love and attention; I'm going to mindlessly try and copy everything about them, down to what underwear brand they wear'. This is how advertising works. That's usually the feminine version. The masculine version goes 'I'm going to win at all costs'. Here is how an intelligent person thinks: 'This society is a disaster, I am going to learn to distance myself and pursue my calling, while doing my best to provide a safe environment for myself and my loved ones'. Notice how there is a calling, there is coming to terms with harsh realities of mob mentality and there is an attempt at creating a mini eco-system of love for a small number of people. Idiots' calling is 'other people need to like me!' or 'I need to be better/higher up the dominance hierarchy than others!'. They need mobs because they think they can get a mob to like them and not turn on them afterwards, or they derive their self worth from comparing themselves to the mob by being 'better' than them or even worse - they need the mob to use it to achieve their psychotic visions of a better world (every war general)! They don't create ecosystems because they are fine with living in pig shit, as long as other pigs tell him/her how great he/she is or they get to 'win' (Gary Vee is a prime example of this lately). Just my thoughts on it at this point in my life of course :)
• quattrofan 7y ago
  Influencers...
• danielovichdk 7y ago
  Never underestimate low self-esteem. It's a bitch to be around and so obvious it's caused be deeper issues. My own subjective belief about male subjects around this matter - success and fame - , is circeling around father-issues and the lack of gratitude and applause from him. I have worked with so many 9f these kinds, and IT is full of them. Most of these people are boring, exactly because their goals lean towards being someone or something. Ego-centric and primadonna individuals who will run you over, if they can be successful. Decency is lost and forgotten virtue in too many people. But in the end, they will realize that being a success will not make you happy and What a waste of time. Also, What is it you want to be known for? A frame work? An app? Give me a break. Your grandkids will have forgotten you by the time they have their own kids. I don't have a lot of money, but I am so successful you can't measure it.
• joelbluminator 7y ago
  Read a research that said above a certain amount of money (75K yearly or so) you won't be any happier. What makes us happy is finding meaning in relationships and the work we do (meaning, not money). If what you do feels important to you , odds are you are happier. If you work for Google but struggle to find any meaning in your work odds are you aren't that much happier than the average cop or teacher. Marriage and kids can help but are not the only way to get there.
  • grandmczeb 7y ago
    That study is extremely misunderstood and frankly the idea that money isn’t correlated to happiness after some moderate income level (e.g. 75k) is flat out not supported by evidence. https://www.vox.com/2015/6/20/8815813/orange-is-the-new-black-piper-chapman-happiness-study https://www.vox.com/2015/6/20/8815813/orange-is-the-new-blac...
    • joelbluminator 7y ago
      Intuitively it makes sense to me. I can see how someone who makes 160K might feel a bit better about himself than someone who makes 80K, but that's not really happiness is it? It's some kind of contentment. And how much happier is he? He makes 2x as much so he's 2x happier? Obviously the correlation more money = more happiness isn't strong and declines after a certain amount.
      • joelbluminator 7y ago
        Putting that specific research aside, there's a wealth of data on what makes humans happy and money/social status isn't as high on the list as you'd expect.
• elbear 7y ago
  This sounds a lot like the defectiveness and unrelenting standards lifetraps I mentioned in another comment. I encourage the author, and anyone else who recognizes themselves in his words, to go to therapy about this. You can also read the book I mentioned in a previous comment. In the opened my eyes to the lifetraps that have been affecting me the most and how they're playing out. I wish you success with overcoming this!
• starpilot 7y ago
  Note to OP, the link for your name in the page footer is broken: https://www.bennettnotes.com/bennettnotes.com https://www.bennettnotes.com/bennettnotes.com
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