12 ms·

You Don't Need a Mentor–Find a Nemesis Instead

196 points by jger15 5y ago

stevefan1999 5y ago
nemesis is a strong word, competitor sounds much better
meatsauce 5y ago
Wonderful antithetical headline aside, this is a bad idea on its face. Your nemesis goes in trying to limit and destroy you, while a mentor tries to support and build you up.
shard 5y ago
In the case of the musicians being more productive, I would have guessed that it's because their creativity fed off of each other, with sharing of ideas and helping each other out of slumps, rather than any urge to outcompete their nemesis.
- agumonkey 5y ago
  Is it like the other person attempts show you it's possible to push the boundaries, so it unlocks your creativity a bit more ?
- fullshark 5y ago
  There's lots of stories of competitive rivalries within bands, and between bands (especially between rap artists in modern age), and between composers/artists. I think there may be something to this desire to one up someone in a creative field when you consider yourselves better than them producing great works.
jawns 5y ago
> Your nemesis is not your enemy. Or, put differently, your nemesis is more than just an enemy. Rather, the nemesis is an adversary is who is like your dark twin. Even as you battle with the nemesis, you share a kind of DNA. The gaze at your nemesis is like looking into a mirror, but one of those fun house mirrors at the carnival, where everything is both recognizable and distorted. In every way, this relationship is more powerful and volatile than a battle between enemies. I have worked with people who fit this description, and I have certainly felt as if my desire to beat them, or at least not be beaten by them, has pushed me to do my best work. But it's fundamentally an adversarial relationship, and it reminds me a bit of my kids' favorite movie, "Monsters, Inc." You can become so convinced that you need fear to excel that you fail to realize there's a better way. The people who have TRULY led me to be my best have not been adversaries. They have been supportive mentors. They do everything that the nemeses do, in terms of bringing out the best work in me, but they do it through building up rather than tearing down. And when I say they do everything the nemeses do, I really mean that. I can't think of any way that a nemesis has led me to grow that couldn't have been also achieved by a strong, encouraging mentor or manager.
- TravHatesMe 5y ago
  > You can become so convinced that you need fear to excel that you fail to realize there's a better way. But this is such an effective way of excelling. My fear of failure influences my output. Abstractly, perhaps we each need different kinds of stress that will push us in different ways. I embrace fear because it is exciting and uncomfortable and challenging. Without it I would be lethargic and lazy.
  - wins32767 5y ago
    > I embrace fear because it is exciting and uncomfortable and challenging. Without it I would be lethargic and lazy. I thought that for a while, but I found that really caring about the goal of what I was trying to achieve was enough to push me to do well. Not into the frenzied state that I had with a fear of failure, but a much more healthy (and surprisingly more effective) sustained push that lets me be clear headed enough to see where to put emphasis and focus. Now I'm more focused on winning versus not losing and that makes a big difference.
    - TravHatesMe 5y ago
      Interesting. Maybe I will change my ways in the future. Thanks for sharing
- Vetch 5y ago
  I think you're right, and I think what the author is actually trying to get at is what's known as a rival in anime (which is a bit more nuanced than the typical sense of rival) and roughly translates to friendly rivalry. Unlike the case for mentors, rivals need not have loads more experience. They can also be mutually beneficial in a largely positive sense and without antagonism, unlike the case for nemeses. But you can't be friendly if foundation is strewn with fear and insecurity. It's also important to be able to recognize if rivalry is causing too much stress and revisit your goals and priorities. Sometimes it's fine to explore and go at your own pace.
- andrewflnr 5y ago
  I bet a nemesis is a lot easier to find than a really good mentor, though. Like, orders of magnitude.
deleted 5y ago
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mordymoop 5y ago
I prefer the word “rival” because you can even be good friends with a rival, while the connotations of “nemesis” don’t quite work for that.
- AmericanChopper 5y ago
  It’s also just a more accurately descriptive word. Nemesis was the Greek god who punished hubris. A Nemesis is somebody who delivers (a usually unavoidable or inevitable) retribution to you. An archetypal nemesis is somebody you have wronged, and somebody who successfully manages to enact a retribution. I get that it’s come to mean basically any serious rival, but that’s dumb imo, and the original definition of the word is better.
- bee_rider 5y ago
  For some reason, which is not quite clear to me, the author explicitly brings up the term rival and rejects it without any clear explanation. > It has to do with what sportswriters and fans call rivalries. But I view it as something different—I refer to this same phenomenon as the Concept of the Nemesis. Then he goes on to use the term rivalry a bunch.
  - andrewflnr 5y ago
    He seems to be trying to name a more specific concept than "rivalry", an especially intense one with that mirror aspect.
- grouphugs 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
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agumonkey 5y ago
In a way Lennon/McCartney were a ambivalent nemesis pair. They would respond to each other's hits. In recent years JDilla also fed off Pete Rock's sampling ideas, creating new strange rhythms when trying to understand his predecessor. The there's the Allan Holdsworthses, whose nemesis seems the universe.
- zck 5y ago
  > In a way Lennon/McCartney were a ambivalent nemesis pair. They would respond to each other's hits. Also, the Beatles and Beach Boys. One article about that is here: https://mathewstreet.co.uk/the-beatles-vs-beach-boys/ https://mathewstreet.co.uk/the-beatles-vs-beach-boys/. A pull quote: > Brian Wilson was quoted as saying: “Rubber Soul blew my mind. I liked the way it all went together, the way it was all one thing. It was a challenge to me to do something similar. That made me want to make Pet Sounds, I didn’t want to do the same kind of music, but on the same level.” Then > However, it was Paul McCartney who was possibly the biggest fan of ‘Pet Sounds’. He was even quoted as saying: “It was Pet Sounds that blew me out of the water. I played it to John so much that it would be difficult for him to escape the influence.” And further: > At the time, Brian Wilson was working on the The Beach Boys’ Smile album and was struggling to complete it. One day, whilst driving in his car under the influence of drugs, the newly released ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ was played on the radio. His passenger at the time, Michael Vosse, recounts “he just shook his head and said ‘They did it already – what I wanted to do with Smile. Maybe it’s too late.’”
emptybottle 5y ago
Hard pass for me. I’m happy being an individual and supporting others. Trying to one up people is ego/anger driven behavior and while maybe a person works faster in that mode, isn’t better in the long run. Think about it. Can you count on your nemesis for a work reference?
eatonphil 5y ago
Ah, the pokemon approach.
- riskneutral 5y ago
  Thanks for the TLDR, I wasn't going to read that whole novel.
  - fellellor 5y ago
    Relationship design patterns for effective communication.
challenger-derp 5y ago
Just basing off the title alone: Having a nemesis works if you can figure out / already know the directions to bridge the gap between where you're at and where your nemesis is at. Knowing what you'd like to accomplish != knowing the directions to reach the destination.
pavlov 5y ago
Cryptocurrency is my nemesis because it’s like a mirror universe where software destroys value instead of creating it, and smart engineers spend their best years pretending to believe in nonsense so they could retire early and try to forget it ever happened. Somewhere in crypto, Mirror Me is stroking his pointy beard and wondering if the rumors about transporter accidents on HN are true.
- nefitty 5y ago
  I imagine that how I feel about crypto developers, good lawyers feel about ambulance chasers.
  - Melting_Harps 5y ago
    > I imagine that how I feel about crypto developers, good lawyers feel about ambulance chasers. Former Corpo Bitcoin Developer and Consultant: We don't even think about you, or how you slave for a project you probably detest for money that barely covers rent in the Bay Area; all in order to one day have a chance to be able to escape the crime-ridden, woke-dystopia you've helped create and prop up in the last 20 years and maybe focus on what you probably care about much later on in life. You're more of a cautionary tale rather than an actual entity, despite being so pervasive in tech--and often a big selling point. Which is why there has been a brain-drain in the banking and tech sector for nearly 7 years now into this ecosystem. Maybe you should ask yourself why you weren't ever invited to join a project (despite deeming yourself one of the good devs) rather than pontificate about how you look down on others?
- RC_ITR 5y ago
  I think one of the most interesting concepts about crypto is: "The Internet succeeded because it skewed capitalism - the first or richest project didn't necessarily win, the most user friendly project usually did." Compare that to crypto: The largest project by far is the first, companies like crypto.com can just spend billions of dollars on marketing to become a leading exchange, and users still don't really reap tangible benefits from crypto (other than asset appreciation and edge use-cases). It's like everyone looked to the early internet and ignored everything good about it other than the equity appreciation (probably b/c that is exactly what crypto is right now)
readthenotes1 5y ago
Maybe the author could read Bertrand Russell's thoughts on motivation. Rivalry is a good, but not the best, motivator...
angry_octet 5y ago
I could say that these substack blowhard types are my nemesis, but that would be giving their pontificating too much significance.
- yesenadam 5y ago
  I've read a few of Ted Gioia's books about jazz and 20th C music, and they're uniformly excellent - very well-researched and very well written. I think The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire was my favourite - fascinating investigations into the stories behind 250+ jazz standards. Music: A Subversive History is also a great read. Also The History of Jazz etc. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Gioia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Gioia
  - angry_octet 5y ago
    That's a good point, and I'd be happy to read his works on jazz. People can be great in their niche, and rambling when riffing on another topic.
dblbaguette 5y ago
I kinda disagree. Sure, having a nemesis will drive up your wish to learn more stuffs & outperform him, but at the end of the day, you must hate each other's guts to become each other's nemesis. Which is very unhealthy if you are needed to work in the same working environment, since each of you'll have to deal with the other one all day long.
scrozier 5y ago
Having recently moved to New York City, that part of the article hit home for me. NYC is so loaded with talented, successful people—living sometimes literally on top of one another—that it really makes you push yourself. For example, I attended a jazz show one night that included performers on "classical" instruments. After the show, I was chatting with the violinist (discussing whether, and how, improvisation was taught to "classical" performance majors). After a nice chat, I Googled her at home and discovered she has a PhD, two Grammys, she's been on the Tonight Show several times, she plays with Yo-Yo Ma's Silk Road ensemble, and toured with Stevie Wonder. And she was far from the featured performer; she was just a "hired gun" for that evening's gig. I doubled down on my musical pursuits immediately.
- whatshisface 5y ago
  I am honestly curious how you don't instinctively see it as a "dog chasing car" kind of competition. I think it has to be evenly matched to be a rivalry, although I admit that I'm assuming you're an average hacker news user and not someone who has, say one Grammy and a few (not yet several) tonight show appearances. I don't find people who are way better than me very inspiring because when the difference is that big, it's probably up to what proteins our bodies are folding moreso than anything conscious we're choosing to do. What I'd like to see, honestly, is someone really successful that was about as dull as I am. Now that would be inspiring.
  - scrozier 5y ago
    Interesting point. I guess I don't tend to look at the world that way, for a couple of reasons. First off, hard work often trumps innate talent. Secondly, life is a mosaic of niches, and I don't have to compete in her niche to be challenged and inspired by her. And I'm probably not the average HN reader, as I am (also) a professional musician with years of training. Lastly, I bet you're not really dull.
johnsimer 5y ago
I think each person should learn what motivates them best, and the pros and cons of different motivational strategies. Pre-burnout, dark motivation strategies such as stress and having a chip on my shoulder motivated me. Now post-burnout, I still get stressed out easily, and a darker motivation strategy would probably lead me to collapsing from stress again. Gratitude, pride, self-compassion, and lovingkindness meditation motivate me better, without negative side effects. cf. Emotional Success — David DeSteno
- salt-thrower 5y ago
  I needed to read this. I grew up on dark motivation and physically cringed at the idea of being motivated by happiness and positivity (I was quite an edgy teenager as I'm sure you can guess!) Now in my late 20's, the pandemic plus all the years of accumulated negative energy seem to have broken the camel's back. I burned out hard over the last two years and I've had trouble picking up the pieces. But the motivational techniques you mentioned ring quite differently now than when I was younger and I think that's the path I'll want to pursue from here on out. Appreciate the thoughts.
  - johnsimer 5y ago
    Very similar life story and timeline here. Going from being a very motivated worker to burnt out can be psychologically challenging, and people around you often don’t seem to understand that your burn out can last for longer than a few weeks. Some other books helping me in my journey are Upward Spiral by Alex Korb and Feeling Great by David Burns
  - SuoDuanDao 5y ago
    I'm quite interested in this exchange, because I've noticed that a lot of very successful people saying they had strong dark motivations early in their career, but are now very glad to have much healthier sources of motivation. The pattern is so consistent I can't think of many high achievers that I know for a fact weren't driven by dark motivations in some early stages of life. I've developed the theory that explicit preponderance of dark motivations might have knock-on effects in shadow integration that are hard to get elsewhere - any thoughts from those who recognise this pattern?
youfkingidiots 5y ago
black_13 5y ago
gunfighthacksaw 5y ago
I’m an autodidact and I hate myself, I’m laughing!
_8j50 5y ago
Like Gary to Ash!
imchillyb 5y ago
Nemesis learning is good, but can also lead to taking shortcuts and sloppy and lazy processes and procedures. These are behaviors and patterns a good mentor will recognize and curtail.
- grouphugs 5y ago
shostack 5y ago
I've been pushed to grow by various nemesis in the past. I don't enjoy it. It is often a painful process because of they are truly a nemesis, it isn't just friendly competition. You have to watch your back and not assume the best in someone. I hate that, it is against who I am and what I stand for. That out of the way, some of the biggest personal and professional growth I've undergone with my communication skills, playing politics (a necessary evil at times), and even organization and documentation can be traced back to being burned hard and at times by a given nemesis. I'm better at my job and a better person as a result of trying to be the opposite of them and leading by example. If you're going to have a nemesis, at least try to get some value out of it.
fellellor 5y ago
Top 10 anime tropes of all time.
grouphugs 5y ago
fellellor 5y ago
I guess what they mean by nemesis is someone who is basically your peer, but sincerely trying to be much better than you. It works when they aren’t just your rival out to crush you, but someone much more “honourable” who wants to beat you the right way, maybe even share what they learn along the way. Rather than a nemesis, this is commonly known as a “great friend” and isn’t that much easier relationship to find than a mentor. In fact depending on the culture and industry, a mentor who isn’t all knowing but much more experienced and wiser than yourself is a more common occurrence. I feel that people just bikeshed too much about these things when really all you need to do is be helpful where you can and don’t be an asshole.
officehero 5y ago
This reminds me of self-play AI: one of the concepts behind the huge advances in AI performance in games like go and chess. You start with 2 agents that are initially braindead, then record game(s) and then set the agent which lost to train on the game history db, then see if that agent performs better. The cool thing about self-play is that it converges on optimal play w.r.g. to the game history db.
tasty_freeze 5y ago
Jonathan Coulton has a really appealing song that gets at this. song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unjGuvJIePs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unjGuvJIePs lyrics: https://wiki.jonathancoulton.com/Nemeses/Lyrics https://wiki.jonathancoulton.com/Nemeses/Lyrics Here is the chorus: Could it be that you need me To keep you out, to run you faster Promise me you'll let me be The one, the worst of all your enemies Pretending you're a friend to me Say that we'll be nemeses
- killjohncoulton 5y ago
bryanrasmussen 5y ago
That von Cramm anecdote is also perhaps complicated by the fact that he was playing for a Germany ruled by the Nazis. I don't think I've ever really had a nemesis though, at least in programming, although I do get the feeling I might have been other people's nemesis. on edit: Thinking more about von Cramm, he was called a traitor for the admitting his error and thus losing, and I guess the person calling him a traitor was really working as a Nazi official at that time. In reading about him https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gottfried_von_Cramm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gottfried_von_Cramm I can't help but wonder if he didn't admit the error as a form of protest against Nazism.
- suction 5y ago
  It's substack - authors expressing veiled admiration for Nazis is par for the course on there.
  - bryanrasmussen 5y ago
    He expressed admiration for the sportsmanship of von Cramm, who had lots of problems with the Nazi regime it would seem.
killjohncoulton 5y ago
mlatu 5y ago
started to read and he claims sportsmanship is the most neglected thing in athletics. I say, sportsmanship is the most neglected concept in ANY field. I really despise the us american culture of FPS games: "take that you cunt teabaging an enemies corpse" how about just playing the game? do you guys (specifically those who act like that) HAVE to be assholes or can you play like decent people too?
idoubtit 5y ago
The author never defines "nemesis". "Nemesis" was a goddess that punished hubris (extreme pride and arrogance). In British English, the traditional meaning of "a nemesis" was someone with a greater power that inflexibly punished the lower-rank person. A recent meaning has emerged, where "a nemesis" is simply a long term rival. In American English, the Oxford dictionary defines a nemesis as "a person or a thing that is very difficult to defeat". Across the post, the word seems to variate significantly. In many cases (e.g. Nadal-Federer) it's pompous word for "rival" or "strong opponent". Overall, so many words for so little content.
hwers 5y ago
Very related (if not inspired by) https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZN-9RlGfRg https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZN-9RlGfRg
rrherr 5y ago
> I will always prefer watching Magic-versus-Bird over those Michael Jordan highlight films—even though I realize the sheer superiority in athleticism of the latter. Without a nemesis, Jordan could win championships, but he couldn’t create the kind of Greek tragic drama of the encounter with the other. Michael Jordan did have a nemesis 1988-1991: Isiah Thomas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulls–Pistons_rivalry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulls–Pistons_rivalry
onlyfortoday2 5y ago
daviddumenil 5y ago
Related: Have an Enemy https://basecamp.com/gettingreal/02.5-have-an-enemy https://basecamp.com/gettingreal/02.5-have-an-enemy
jabagonuts 5y ago
What! An entire post on nemeses and no mention of Mario vs Wario?
grouphugs 5y ago

196 points by jger15 5y ago

stevefan1999 5y ago

nemesis is a strong word, competitor sounds much better

Wonderful antithetical headline aside, this is a bad idea on its face. Your nemesis goes in trying to limit and destroy you, while a mentor tries to support and build you up.

shard 5y ago

In the case of the musicians being more productive, I would have guessed that it's because their creativity fed off of each other, with sharing of ideas and helping each other out of slumps, rather than any urge to outcompete their nemesis.

agumonkey 5y ago
Is it like the other person attempts show you it's possible to push the boundaries, so it unlocks your creativity a bit more ?
fullshark 5y ago
There's lots of stories of competitive rivalries within bands, and between bands (especially between rap artists in modern age), and between composers/artists. I think there may be something to this desire to one up someone in a creative field when you consider yourselves better than them producing great works.

jawns 5y ago

> Your nemesis is not your enemy. Or, put differently, your nemesis is more than just an enemy. Rather, the nemesis is an adversary is who is like your dark twin. Even as you battle with the nemesis, you share a kind of DNA. The gaze at your nemesis is like looking into a mirror, but one of those fun house mirrors at the carnival, where everything is both recognizable and distorted. In every way, this relationship is more powerful and volatile than a battle between enemies. I have worked with people who fit this description, and I have certainly felt as if my desire to beat them, or at least not be beaten by them, has pushed me to do my best work. But it's fundamentally an adversarial relationship, and it reminds me a bit of my kids' favorite movie, "Monsters, Inc." You can become so convinced that you need fear to excel that you fail to realize there's a better way. The people who have TRULY led me to be my best have not been adversaries. They have been supportive mentors. They do everything that the nemeses do, in terms of bringing out the best work in me, but they do it through building up rather than tearing down. And when I say they do everything the nemeses do, I really mean that. I can't think of any way that a nemesis has led me to grow that couldn't have been also achieved by a strong, encouraging mentor or manager.

TravHatesMe 5y ago
> You can become so convinced that you need fear to excel that you fail to realize there's a better way. But this is such an effective way of excelling. My fear of failure influences my output. Abstractly, perhaps we each need different kinds of stress that will push us in different ways. I embrace fear because it is exciting and uncomfortable and challenging. Without it I would be lethargic and lazy.
- wins32767 5y ago
  > I embrace fear because it is exciting and uncomfortable and challenging. Without it I would be lethargic and lazy. I thought that for a while, but I found that really caring about the goal of what I was trying to achieve was enough to push me to do well. Not into the frenzied state that I had with a fear of failure, but a much more healthy (and surprisingly more effective) sustained push that lets me be clear headed enough to see where to put emphasis and focus. Now I'm more focused on winning versus not losing and that makes a big difference.
  - TravHatesMe 5y ago
    Interesting. Maybe I will change my ways in the future. Thanks for sharing
Vetch 5y ago
I think you're right, and I think what the author is actually trying to get at is what's known as a rival in anime (which is a bit more nuanced than the typical sense of rival) and roughly translates to friendly rivalry. Unlike the case for mentors, rivals need not have loads more experience. They can also be mutually beneficial in a largely positive sense and without antagonism, unlike the case for nemeses. But you can't be friendly if foundation is strewn with fear and insecurity. It's also important to be able to recognize if rivalry is causing too much stress and revisit your goals and priorities. Sometimes it's fine to explore and go at your own pace.
andrewflnr 5y ago
I bet a nemesis is a lot easier to find than a really good mentor, though. Like, orders of magnitude.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

mordymoop 5y ago

I prefer the word “rival” because you can even be good friends with a rival, while the connotations of “nemesis” don’t quite work for that.

AmericanChopper 5y ago
It’s also just a more accurately descriptive word. Nemesis was the Greek god who punished hubris. A Nemesis is somebody who delivers (a usually unavoidable or inevitable) retribution to you. An archetypal nemesis is somebody you have wronged, and somebody who successfully manages to enact a retribution. I get that it’s come to mean basically any serious rival, but that’s dumb imo, and the original definition of the word is better.
bee_rider 5y ago
For some reason, which is not quite clear to me, the author explicitly brings up the term rival and rejects it without any clear explanation. > It has to do with what sportswriters and fans call rivalries. But I view it as something different—I refer to this same phenomenon as the Concept of the Nemesis. Then he goes on to use the term rivalry a bunch.
- andrewflnr 5y ago
  He seems to be trying to name a more specific concept than "rivalry", an especially intense one with that mirror aspect.
grouphugs 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

agumonkey 5y ago

In a way Lennon/McCartney were a ambivalent nemesis pair. They would respond to each other's hits. In recent years JDilla also fed off Pete Rock's sampling ideas, creating new strange rhythms when trying to understand his predecessor. The there's the Allan Holdsworthses, whose nemesis seems the universe.

zck 5y ago
> In a way Lennon/McCartney were a ambivalent nemesis pair. They would respond to each other's hits. Also, the Beatles and Beach Boys. One article about that is here: https://mathewstreet.co.uk/the-beatles-vs-beach-boys/ https://mathewstreet.co.uk/the-beatles-vs-beach-boys/. A pull quote: > Brian Wilson was quoted as saying: “Rubber Soul blew my mind. I liked the way it all went together, the way it was all one thing. It was a challenge to me to do something similar. That made me want to make Pet Sounds, I didn’t want to do the same kind of music, but on the same level.” Then > However, it was Paul McCartney who was possibly the biggest fan of ‘Pet Sounds’. He was even quoted as saying: “It was Pet Sounds that blew me out of the water. I played it to John so much that it would be difficult for him to escape the influence.” And further: > At the time, Brian Wilson was working on the The Beach Boys’ Smile album and was struggling to complete it. One day, whilst driving in his car under the influence of drugs, the newly released ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ was played on the radio. His passenger at the time, Michael Vosse, recounts “he just shook his head and said ‘They did it already – what I wanted to do with Smile. Maybe it’s too late.’”

emptybottle 5y ago

Hard pass for me. I’m happy being an individual and supporting others. Trying to one up people is ego/anger driven behavior and while maybe a person works faster in that mode, isn’t better in the long run. Think about it. Can you count on your nemesis for a work reference?

eatonphil 5y ago

Ah, the pokemon approach.

riskneutral 5y ago
Thanks for the TLDR, I wasn't going to read that whole novel.
- fellellor 5y ago
  Relationship design patterns for effective communication.

challenger-derp 5y ago

Just basing off the title alone: Having a nemesis works if you can figure out / already know the directions to bridge the gap between where you're at and where your nemesis is at. Knowing what you'd like to accomplish != knowing the directions to reach the destination.

pavlov 5y ago

Cryptocurrency is my nemesis because it’s like a mirror universe where software destroys value instead of creating it, and smart engineers spend their best years pretending to believe in nonsense so they could retire early and try to forget it ever happened. Somewhere in crypto, Mirror Me is stroking his pointy beard and wondering if the rumors about transporter accidents on HN are true.

nefitty 5y ago
I imagine that how I feel about crypto developers, good lawyers feel about ambulance chasers.
- Melting_Harps 5y ago
  > I imagine that how I feel about crypto developers, good lawyers feel about ambulance chasers. Former Corpo Bitcoin Developer and Consultant: We don't even think about you, or how you slave for a project you probably detest for money that barely covers rent in the Bay Area; all in order to one day have a chance to be able to escape the crime-ridden, woke-dystopia you've helped create and prop up in the last 20 years and maybe focus on what you probably care about much later on in life. You're more of a cautionary tale rather than an actual entity, despite being so pervasive in tech--and often a big selling point. Which is why there has been a brain-drain in the banking and tech sector for nearly 7 years now into this ecosystem. Maybe you should ask yourself why you weren't ever invited to join a project (despite deeming yourself one of the good devs) rather than pontificate about how you look down on others?
RC_ITR 5y ago
I think one of the most interesting concepts about crypto is: "The Internet succeeded because it skewed capitalism - the first or richest project didn't necessarily win, the most user friendly project usually did." Compare that to crypto: The largest project by far is the first, companies like crypto.com can just spend billions of dollars on marketing to become a leading exchange, and users still don't really reap tangible benefits from crypto (other than asset appreciation and edge use-cases). It's like everyone looked to the early internet and ignored everything good about it other than the equity appreciation (probably b/c that is exactly what crypto is right now)

readthenotes1 5y ago

Maybe the author could read Bertrand Russell's thoughts on motivation. Rivalry is a good, but not the best, motivator...

angry_octet 5y ago

I could say that these substack blowhard types are my nemesis, but that would be giving their pontificating too much significance.

yesenadam 5y ago
I've read a few of Ted Gioia's books about jazz and 20th C music, and they're uniformly excellent - very well-researched and very well written. I think The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire was my favourite - fascinating investigations into the stories behind 250+ jazz standards. Music: A Subversive History is also a great read. Also The History of Jazz etc. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Gioia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Gioia
- angry_octet 5y ago
  That's a good point, and I'd be happy to read his works on jazz. People can be great in their niche, and rambling when riffing on another topic.

dblbaguette 5y ago

I kinda disagree. Sure, having a nemesis will drive up your wish to learn more stuffs & outperform him, but at the end of the day, you must hate each other's guts to become each other's nemesis. Which is very unhealthy if you are needed to work in the same working environment, since each of you'll have to deal with the other one all day long.

scrozier 5y ago

Having recently moved to New York City, that part of the article hit home for me. NYC is so loaded with talented, successful people—living sometimes literally on top of one another—that it really makes you push yourself. For example, I attended a jazz show one night that included performers on "classical" instruments. After the show, I was chatting with the violinist (discussing whether, and how, improvisation was taught to "classical" performance majors). After a nice chat, I Googled her at home and discovered she has a PhD, two Grammys, she's been on the Tonight Show several times, she plays with Yo-Yo Ma's Silk Road ensemble, and toured with Stevie Wonder. And she was far from the featured performer; she was just a "hired gun" for that evening's gig. I doubled down on my musical pursuits immediately.

whatshisface 5y ago
I am honestly curious how you don't instinctively see it as a "dog chasing car" kind of competition. I think it has to be evenly matched to be a rivalry, although I admit that I'm assuming you're an average hacker news user and not someone who has, say one Grammy and a few (not yet several) tonight show appearances. I don't find people who are way better than me very inspiring because when the difference is that big, it's probably up to what proteins our bodies are folding moreso than anything conscious we're choosing to do. What I'd like to see, honestly, is someone really successful that was about as dull as I am. Now that would be inspiring.
- scrozier 5y ago
  Interesting point. I guess I don't tend to look at the world that way, for a couple of reasons. First off, hard work often trumps innate talent. Secondly, life is a mosaic of niches, and I don't have to compete in her niche to be challenged and inspired by her. And I'm probably not the average HN reader, as I am (also) a professional musician with years of training. Lastly, I bet you're not really dull.

johnsimer 5y ago

I think each person should learn what motivates them best, and the pros and cons of different motivational strategies. Pre-burnout, dark motivation strategies such as stress and having a chip on my shoulder motivated me. Now post-burnout, I still get stressed out easily, and a darker motivation strategy would probably lead me to collapsing from stress again. Gratitude, pride, self-compassion, and lovingkindness meditation motivate me better, without negative side effects. cf. Emotional Success — David DeSteno

salt-thrower 5y ago
I needed to read this. I grew up on dark motivation and physically cringed at the idea of being motivated by happiness and positivity (I was quite an edgy teenager as I'm sure you can guess!) Now in my late 20's, the pandemic plus all the years of accumulated negative energy seem to have broken the camel's back. I burned out hard over the last two years and I've had trouble picking up the pieces. But the motivational techniques you mentioned ring quite differently now than when I was younger and I think that's the path I'll want to pursue from here on out. Appreciate the thoughts.
- johnsimer 5y ago
  Very similar life story and timeline here. Going from being a very motivated worker to burnt out can be psychologically challenging, and people around you often don’t seem to understand that your burn out can last for longer than a few weeks. Some other books helping me in my journey are Upward Spiral by Alex Korb and Feeling Great by David Burns
- SuoDuanDao 5y ago
  I'm quite interested in this exchange, because I've noticed that a lot of very successful people saying they had strong dark motivations early in their career, but are now very glad to have much healthier sources of motivation. The pattern is so consistent I can't think of many high achievers that I know for a fact weren't driven by dark motivations in some early stages of life. I've developed the theory that explicit preponderance of dark motivations might have knock-on effects in shadow integration that are hard to get elsewhere - any thoughts from those who recognise this pattern?

youfkingidiots 5y ago

black_13 5y ago

gunfighthacksaw 5y ago

I’m an autodidact and I hate myself, I’m laughing!

_8j50 5y ago

Like Gary to Ash!

imchillyb 5y ago

Nemesis learning is good, but can also lead to taking shortcuts and sloppy and lazy processes and procedures. These are behaviors and patterns a good mentor will recognize and curtail.

grouphugs 5y ago

shostack 5y ago

I've been pushed to grow by various nemesis in the past. I don't enjoy it. It is often a painful process because of they are truly a nemesis, it isn't just friendly competition. You have to watch your back and not assume the best in someone. I hate that, it is against who I am and what I stand for. That out of the way, some of the biggest personal and professional growth I've undergone with my communication skills, playing politics (a necessary evil at times), and even organization and documentation can be traced back to being burned hard and at times by a given nemesis. I'm better at my job and a better person as a result of trying to be the opposite of them and leading by example. If you're going to have a nemesis, at least try to get some value out of it.

fellellor 5y ago

Top 10 anime tropes of all time.

grouphugs 5y ago

fellellor 5y ago

I guess what they mean by nemesis is someone who is basically your peer, but sincerely trying to be much better than you. It works when they aren’t just your rival out to crush you, but someone much more “honourable” who wants to beat you the right way, maybe even share what they learn along the way. Rather than a nemesis, this is commonly known as a “great friend” and isn’t that much easier relationship to find than a mentor. In fact depending on the culture and industry, a mentor who isn’t all knowing but much more experienced and wiser than yourself is a more common occurrence. I feel that people just bikeshed too much about these things when really all you need to do is be helpful where you can and don’t be an asshole.

officehero 5y ago

This reminds me of self-play AI: one of the concepts behind the huge advances in AI performance in games like go and chess. You start with 2 agents that are initially braindead, then record game(s) and then set the agent which lost to train on the game history db, then see if that agent performs better. The cool thing about self-play is that it converges on optimal play w.r.g. to the game history db.

tasty_freeze 5y ago

Jonathan Coulton has a really appealing song that gets at this. song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unjGuvJIePs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unjGuvJIePs lyrics: https://wiki.jonathancoulton.com/Nemeses/Lyrics https://wiki.jonathancoulton.com/Nemeses/Lyrics Here is the chorus: Could it be that you need me To keep you out, to run you faster Promise me you'll let me be The one, the worst of all your enemies Pretending you're a friend to me Say that we'll be nemeses

killjohncoulton 5y ago

bryanrasmussen 5y ago

That von Cramm anecdote is also perhaps complicated by the fact that he was playing for a Germany ruled by the Nazis. I don't think I've ever really had a nemesis though, at least in programming, although I do get the feeling I might have been other people's nemesis. on edit: Thinking more about von Cramm, he was called a traitor for the admitting his error and thus losing, and I guess the person calling him a traitor was really working as a Nazi official at that time. In reading about him https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gottfried_von_Cramm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gottfried_von_Cramm I can't help but wonder if he didn't admit the error as a form of protest against Nazism.

suction 5y ago
It's substack - authors expressing veiled admiration for Nazis is par for the course on there.
- bryanrasmussen 5y ago
  He expressed admiration for the sportsmanship of von Cramm, who had lots of problems with the Nazi regime it would seem.

killjohncoulton 5y ago

mlatu 5y ago

started to read and he claims sportsmanship is the most neglected thing in athletics. I say, sportsmanship is the most neglected concept in ANY field. I really despise the us american culture of FPS games: "take that you cunt teabaging an enemies corpse" how about just playing the game? do you guys (specifically those who act like that) HAVE to be assholes or can you play like decent people too?

idoubtit 5y ago

The author never defines "nemesis". "Nemesis" was a goddess that punished hubris (extreme pride and arrogance). In British English, the traditional meaning of "a nemesis" was someone with a greater power that inflexibly punished the lower-rank person. A recent meaning has emerged, where "a nemesis" is simply a long term rival. In American English, the Oxford dictionary defines a nemesis as "a person or a thing that is very difficult to defeat". Across the post, the word seems to variate significantly. In many cases (e.g. Nadal-Federer) it's pompous word for "rival" or "strong opponent". Overall, so many words for so little content.

hwers 5y ago

Very related (if not inspired by) https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZN-9RlGfRg https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZN-9RlGfRg

rrherr 5y ago

> I will always prefer watching Magic-versus-Bird over those Michael Jordan highlight films—even though I realize the sheer superiority in athleticism of the latter. Without a nemesis, Jordan could win championships, but he couldn’t create the kind of Greek tragic drama of the encounter with the other. Michael Jordan did have a nemesis 1988-1991: Isiah Thomas. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulls–Pistons_rivalry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulls–Pistons_rivalry

onlyfortoday2 5y ago

daviddumenil 5y ago

Related: Have an Enemy https://basecamp.com/gettingreal/02.5-have-an-enemy https://basecamp.com/gettingreal/02.5-have-an-enemy

jabagonuts 5y ago

What! An entire post on nemeses and no mention of Mario vs Wario?

grouphugs 5y ago