8 ms·
My entirely unscientific theory is that like other cells, we're born with a limited number of fucks in our body. When we're young, we (instinctively, subconsci
by ggambetta 5y ago
My entirely unscientific theory is that like other cells, we're born with a limited number of fucks in our body.
When we're young, we (instinctively, subconsciously) feel like our fucks reserves are plentiful, so we give a fuck about a lot of stuff.
As we get older, our reservoir of fucks gets progressively depleted. The fucks are rarer, so we give a fuck less and less often. I've recently turned 40 and I can definitely feel this in myself; just like recovery from workouts takes a little longer than when I was 20, I don't give a fuck about things so easily.
By the time you're officially old, you're almost out of fucks, so it's not like you don't give a fuck because you don't want to, but because it's more difficult physically (harvesting of the last fucks takes more energy, because biology).
Brb, submitting to Nature.
- hnlmorg 5y agoI think what you're describing is more down to desensitisation through exposure to stressful environments. When you're younger smaller problems seem larger because you've not been desensitised to larger problems. As you progress through life you generally experience greater stress and thus the smaller problems feel smaller. You could look at it like desensitisation to capsicum, salt, violence or pornography.
- ggambetta 5y agoThat's preposterous! I'm sticking to my "fucks are finite and biologically limited" theory. I'll use the TED talk to promote my upcoming self-help book around this mind-blowing new theory.
- halgir 5y agoSurprisingly relevant to my post from last year, actually titled "Fucks are finite": https://halgir.com/fucks-are-finite/ https://halgir.com/fucks-are-finite/
- randompwd 5y agoBe careful, Malcolm Gladwell may steal your comment for a book and then blame you when science debunks it.
- joombaga 5y agoExplanation for those out of the loop?
- dylan604 5y agoMore realistically a TEDx talk.
- bob33212 5y agoDisillusionment is real. Before you have achieved success you think that it is really important to succeed. Once you have succeeded, or see other people succeed, you realize that some of the happiest people are not "successful".
- dylan604 5y agoThis is a great example of why defining of one's goals is important. To be one of the "happiest people" would be a worthy goal, but the young don't think of the game of life like that.
- philwelch 5y agoBabies in particular cry so much because whatever discomfort they’re experiencing is literally the worst thing that’s ever happened to them.
- emteycz 5y agoThe thing with babies is that evolution comes in play here, and they often cry for no (internal) reason whatsoever... More crying = more parent attention = better rate of survival. I wonder when does this effect cut off.
- bigmattystyles 5y agoThere’s nothing funnier than seeing your toddler harmlessly fall, he thinks no one saw it, he goes on about his day, then a few seconds later makes eye contact with you and only then starts crying.
- hodgesrm 5y agoOr: Toddler falls and, while lying on floor, carefully searches for an audience before deciding whether to let loose with a howl.
- ggambetta 5y agoConversely, they must be in an almost constant state of wonder. When was the last time you or I saw a new color for the first time? Their threshold for amazement and "this is literally the best thing I've seen in my entire life" is also much lower!
- RHSman2 5y agoI’m 44 and still in amazement of our reality.
- alisonkisk 5y agoBabies cry because they can't speak or walk or open food bottles or take off their diapers.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 5y agoI am of the belief that when there is no conflict people will invent it. I think outrage culture sweeping the US right now is part of that.
- mordymoop 5y agoThe people who are most susceptible to this are in fact disproportionately young and inexperienced. Virtually nobody I know from meatspace behaves the way virtually everybody on Twitter seems to behave, for example.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- dredmorbius 5y agoThomas Benjamin Wild Esq. puts it eloquently: https://invidious.snopyta.org/watch?v=Vqbk9cDX0l0 https://invidious.snopyta.org/watch?v=Vqbk9cDX0l0
- chadcmulligan 5y agoReminds me of the theory I read somewhere - we all have so many words in us and when we use them up, we die. Think it might have been Vonnegut but can't find the source at the moment.
- jollybean 5y agoNo doubt there's some of that. Perspective is another other thing. Once you start to see how the world works, and how complicated things are, you're a lot less likely to fire off about some specific issue. Radicalism is the posture of those who want to externalize all the side effects of their utopianism, and when you're older it gets harder to not see second-order effects for what they are.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- emteycz 5y agoRadicalism can also be a reaction to systems that claim to be perfect but unsurprisingly fail, on the other hand.
- jollybean 5y agoYes of course, but those systems I think most people don't believe are perfect. Weirdly, it may take a kind of 'irrational populism' to nudge the needle a few points to just get 'basic change' which is a real paradox.
- emteycz 5y agoThat doesn't matter, most people don't bump into the imperfections, but some inevitably do, and you can't fault those for getting angry, especially if there was a possibility for another option if the "perfect" system didn't stand in the way.
- seriousquestion 5y agoThat, combined with the wisdom one gains from having spent many fucks on the wrong things. When you examine the fucks you gave 10 or 20 years ago, you realize how clueless you were.
- monkeybutton 5y agoCareful, your radical theory could spawn a new cottage industry of snake oils! Fuck restorative juice blends and creams, fuck focusing crystals, a Gwyneth Paltrow book on giving clean fucks so as to not overly deplete your limited reserve of fuck giving.
- floren 5y ago> Fuck restorative juice blends and creams Hey, I already get half a dozen emails about these in my spam folder every day.
- Chris2048 5y agoI don't know, under the right conditions I could give no fucks too: like financial independence. I'm sure being financially independent helps.
- 7thaccount 5y agoThis is hilarious and yet right on the money in some way. As you get older, you start to see that everything is the same and goes through cycles. The important stuff of my childhood (ex: having clothes that were sewhar fashionable), becomes irrelevant. Who cares if I'm wearing the same style of sandals for over 20 years now? You start to focus on what's more important to you. F** are reserved for important matters like arguing on HN about the superiority of Linux :). When you see a child have a meltdown over not having their favorite bath towel available, you start to see how widening your scope means less care for minor problems. I have no time to worry about those things as I have bigger problems (working on marriage, work due dates, educating my kid...etc). It makes one wonder how chill an immortal being would be after milennia.
- playingchanges 5y agoThe last thing you wrote is something I indirectly think about quite a lot. Imagine a place (call it heaven if you want) where time and death don’t exist. What could you possibly care about?
- emteycz 5y agoCaring doesn't need to be negative only. IMHO You can care about love even if you're immortal, and you care about losing it even though you went through it all bazillion times already, as each person is unique and the feelings you lose are still lost and the loss is still painful.
- 7thaccount 5y agoBabylon 5 had a neat episode (spoilers) where the first living being (in his corporeal form) has a conversation with one of the human commanders and says something about love being a remarkable gift/illusion for mortals that they should treasure. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0OI4kah6Rp4 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0OI4kah6Rp4
- rkuykendall-com 5y agoThis is addressed really interestingly in The Good Place. It starts off looking like a very by-the-book sitcom though, so you do need to wait it out a bit.
- 8ytecoder 5y agoLess about the energy to give fucks and more about having better things to give fucks about. Personally at least, I used to give a fuck about every damn thing - from the slightest perceived insult to the way rice is cooked. These days I have better/bigger things to give a fuck about. I brush off even real insults and eat two day old rice just fine.
- selimthegrim 5y agoEr, I hope it’s not at room temp otherwise you might get food poisoning.
- cossray 5y agoYou may have to reduce the amount of Fs you give.
- selimthegrim 5y agoWhile I usually keep my rice warm instead, I take it you’ll be here all week.
- tartoran 5y agoI’ve seen a lot of people age and slowly lose the ability to control their emotions as well, so Im not exactly sure what’s the ratio of bettering or worsening of emotion control. But generally I agree with the idea that that wisdom collects with time and experiences lived and so emotional expense is better controlled along with aging. From my experince, at a smillar age (41), I reserve my fucks for more important events so your take on fucks fits me quite well, I generally give a lot less of them.
- op03 5y agoThis totally depends on the type of people around you and the kinds of knocks you have taken and survived in life. It can go the other way.
- helsinkiandrew 5y agoI'm not sure it's a discrete limited number of fucks, just the novelty wears off - after so many heartbreaks, surprises good and bad - you know you've seen something similar before and they slowly loose their power.
- c22 5y agoI think you may have just defined fucks.
- decebalus1 5y agoI agree with your assessment. I believe it is an application of Spoon theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoon_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoon_theory
- Leary 5y agoI don't know if I'm getting older or the years of beer drinking have caught up on me. But emotions don't feel as raw/immediate as they used to feel when I was younger.
- elorant 5y agoThe thing about getting older is that you come with terms with the fact that you have limited control over life. You have only control on yourself, and this not absolute because you may get a decease that's pretty random, although your lifestyle heavily affects your well being. Outside of yourself everything else is kinda out of your influence. It's good to keep tabs on what's going on with the world in an attempt to better prepare for hardship, but the more you let go the happier you become.
- miguelmota 5y agoAnother way to put it is that as you get older you start prioritizing things better that are of value to you as your time in existence is being depleted. Less time means more focus, which results in less fucks.
- ddingus 5y agoI love your theory. Resonates with me.
- kingsuper20 5y ago> My entirely unscientific theory is that like other cells, we're born with a limited number of fucks in our body. lol. Well, there you have it. Perhaps the outrage component advertises breeding potential in young humans, kind of like thick hair. In the end, it's all bene caca et irrima medicos.
- namelosw 5y agoLol, that's both a hilarious and great model for sure. But I wonder, it seems to me doomers lost their fuck faster. Is it because they have fewer initial fucks? Or is it because they lose fuck overtime even if they don't a fuck about something? Or every time everybody else gives a fuck a doomer gives two?
- SpinsInCircles 5y agoI would like to think of it as a Bias term. The older I become the larger the Bias and the fewer fucks I give. I wish I could have performed some transfer learning to my younger self, his life would have been much easier. As an aside I feel this is a wonderful anthem for life: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vqbk9cDX0l0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vqbk9cDX0l0
- SMAAART 5y agoI respectfully disagree. As a reluctant member of the "older individuals" I too find myself giving a boatload less fucks than I used to, but the main reasons are (in no particular order): 1. I have got my crippling Generalized Anxiety Disorder under control 2. I have realized that I used to give way too many fucks about shit that didn't matter at all, and it was not worth it and actually detrimental Mind you, those 2 are highly correlated and of interdependent causation. What got me here: Therapy didn't help. Manson's book "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck" helped quite a bit, but was not "the thing". Articles on "Don't be a victim...." "Don't play the victim...." and similar helped. What helped immensely is to start blogging daily, and more often than daily, about the events in my life, my thinking, my reactions starting from the points of view that: A) I am accountable for what happens to me B) I am 100% wrong when something unpleasant happens to me And that, in the course of a few month, changed my life in tangible manners. While I am not a snowflake, I am a special case: I started low, very low; and - IMHO - I have come a long way in the Depression/Anxiety/Being_a_loser scale. I do believe that to some degree something similar happens to most everyone who doesn't start for the same ultra-low point as me, with time we learn that when young we were wrong to give too many fucks about too many things. But guess what? Giving way too many fucks about too many things is good for: Business: Facebook, iPhone & Co Politicians: from left to right Religions: all of them (except for The Dude) And that's why the messagings that we are bombarded with aim at reinforcing giving too many fucks about too many things (aka Anxiety) and the messagings aimed at kids/teenagers aim to create and instill Anxiety. Mic drop.
- b0rsuk 5y agoDo you have any tips for getting Generalized Anxiety Disorder under control? At least point in the right direction?
- mpfundstein 5y agoacceptance
- SMAAART 5y agoMainly this: > What helped immensely is to start blogging daily, and more often than daily, about the events in my life, my thinking, my reactions starting from the points of view that: > A) I am accountable for what happens to me > B) I am 100% wrong when something unpleasant happens to me > And that, in the course of a few month, changed my life in tangible manners. And also: I am reading about Rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT) specifically: How To Stubbornly Refuse To Make Yourself Miserable About Anything-yes, Anything! How to Keep People from Pushing Your Buttons A guide to rational Living
- ridethebike 5y agoI was going to say "Over time one just doesn't care anymore" but you did it way better. Thank you for that.