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"If you lose everything you own, you generally still have your network and skills" I get the general call to action that those who have excess resources should

"If you lose everything you own, you generally still have your network and skills" I get the general call to action that those who have excess resources should leverage that to take big risks, but this really undersells the possible consequences of losing everything you own. No, you don't always keep your network and skills. Sometimes, you lose everything. You lose friends from fallout or you belatedly realize that your network isn't as resilient to you becoming a penniless loser as you thought. Sometimes you go into debt and make enemies. Sometimes you become homeless and then develop a mental illness or a drug addiction. Sometimes you skip the homeless part and just commit suicide [1]. How many people can stomach that kind of outcome? I do like the general message which I think should be said more often but I feel like people who charge ahead on this call to action should also triple check that they can truly accept the actual risk they might incur. I also think the amount of risk you take has diminishing returns. Making "fatal leaps of faith" doesn't seem to be as necessary or pragmatic as it's presented here. [1] (heads up: this is a link to a suicide note) https://archive.fo/QaLIw https://archive.fo/QaLIw

agumonkey 5y ago
Also skills are highly relative. You could be great in some workplace but in another you'd get confused. And the things you were home with are now disregarded.
JimboOmega 5y ago
It smells like privilege. That isn't to say that the OP was protected regardless. But the mindset that lets you do this is a mindset that comes from a background of abundance. Where you can always get another job if you want one, where you always have friends or parents who will bail you out or give you what you need. A background where things just always seem to work out.
- Blackstone4 5y ago
  Yeah it can come from a background of abundance but does not mean it is not a good attitude to have. I have spent most of my life with an attitude of scarcity and I was jealous of others. It held me back in so many ways and made me unhappy. Now I try to live with positive outlook on the future and try to make things happen with a belief that things will work out some how in the end. Impoverised people could benefit from some of this thinking (balanced with realism) since it could help improve their circumstance.
- datavirtue 5y ago
  I "retired" for about ten years. I chose to be poor and just focus on raising my kids and being home with them. I discovered what it is this guy is talking about. I was able to focus on personal projects and learning about the world. I applied all of that and reentered the corporate world like a beast. It is now ten years later and cannot wait to "retire" again. I miss being able to think about things and live life without the narrowing constraints imposed by wage slavery. You can't understand how liberating it is until you try it but it takes a lot of faith in yourself.
- vmception 5y ago
  Another way to look at it (especially for those allergic to the idea that privilege may apply to their own outcome) is that ambition, risk taking, and entrepreneurship are evenly distributed across all socioeconomic classes, or close to it. It's just that some distinct socioeconomic classes have the capability of failing and retrying very quickly, due to moneyed resources. Contrast that to the person without assets or access to capital, they save up, take a chance, fail, and now have to wait maybe 10 years or more to get to the same place with jobs. And with time, there is error introduced, divergent paths, life changing events, or simply competing priorities as the years keep going by. Alternatively, everyone else in their similar situation rationally decides not to bother, a good network for them is one that exposes them to basic personal finance gurus on odd forums and youtube, who give them generic advice that works for a broad population. On the concept of privilege, there is no parade and red carpet that gets rolled out, you just wake up one day and realize that you don't have to apply for jobs to maintain food and shelter, and that your bank account also has enough to make that seed investment or hire developers. So, if you're willing to play your cards, you play them. Enough people are willing to and their successes wind up outnumbering the poorer people that want to play tech entreprenuer.
  - mlatu 5y ago
    i liked your comment until the last sentence. > outnumbering the poorer people that want to play tech entreprenuer. PLAY? why the belittlement?
    - vmception 5y ago
      The richer people are playing too. Its an even distribution of the same behaviors.
    - kzrdude 5y ago
      > So, if you're willing to play your cards, you play them. Enough people are willing to and their successes wind up outnumbering the poorer people that want to play tech entreprenuer. Writing, literature. The word play is used in reference to the use of play in a previous sentence. I think it's a common colorful writing technique.
- bawolff 5y ago
  I mean maybe, but hn has a primary tech audience. I bet 70% of us here could quit our job, take some risks,go bankrupt, get a new job, all with only mild consequences. Yes that's privilege and it doesn't apply to everyone but its not an obscure level of privilege. You don't need to be a multimillionaire to have it.
  - prawn 5y ago
    Just an extra thought - what would you guess is the overlap between the remaining 30% and the set that need or heed advice like this?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- meheleventyone 5y ago
  The author goes on to talk about how there should be a leisure class (basically an aristocracy) and that should be “people of means”. So it’s not even hidden really, it’s just a cementing of the increasing wealth divide more throughly into the political sphere. Neo-Victorianism or something. The working class, literally called “wage-slaves” seemingly unironically in the article and their betters.
  - datavirtue 5y ago
    The poor have plenty of government support. You can live the liesure lifestyle if you choose to. I used to work 30 hours a week @$9 per hr and pay for an apartment, vehicle, and all of my expenses. The work (cook) was fun and I had a lot of free time to explore tech. Right after that I got a job as a mechanic and then was laid off. I spent two years on unemployment. I have actual real memories from living a good life during that time. Developing software, hanging out with friends and family, fishing tributaries (walking for hours through a creek or river), tinkering with cars, and reading everything I could get my hands on about world events. I barely have any memories from when I was trudging through 50 hours a week in a job. Except for those times where I was at a startup trying to change the world (80 hrs a week). But that was an event where I could see the beginning and the end.
    - meheleventyone 5y ago
      Did you reply to the right comment I’m not sure this has anything to do with mine?
      - datavirtue 5y ago
        Probably not.
  - kirso 5y ago
    Not sure if this was the intention to say it like that. For me, the interpretation is that when you have time to pursue your own interests, you discover something that is worth fighting for. I had 2 months off a job and it was the happiest I have ever been because I spend it on researching and discovering problems that I care about. But it was due to the accessibility to "leisure"
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- thelettere 5y ago
  The idea that only the rich are able to take risks - or even think about it - is a bias, and an ugly one at that. It doesn't match history - the only reason we have many good things is because poor people took major risks - and it's part of the tyranny of low expectations that is seeping deeper every day into the fabric of our culture. It's a remarkably effective way of keeping the pours in their place in the name of "empathy" and "awareness". It's akin to a humblebrag where that the rich can talk bad about themselves while shoring up their position. And it's a kind of talk that I as one of those pours have zero patience with.
  - vmception 5y ago
    What part of history are you referring to? What kind of examples are really coming to your mind here?
  - chousuke 5y ago
    It's not that the ability to take risks is fundamentally different, it's just that if you're rich, the consequences of failure will be easier to deal with, allowing more risk-taking and thus more chances at success.
  - usrbinbash 5y ago
    Of course everyone can take risks, but the consequences of these risks backfiring, are vastly different based on available monetary resources. A wealthy person may well sink years and piles of money into a dream. If it doesn't work out, meh, that's life. Back to some well paid job and preparing the next try. Person in strained financial position doing the same and it backfires: May well take years to get back on ones feet, and may even end up in a homeless shelter.
    - thelettere 5y ago
      The person who I responded to said "the mindset that lets you do this is a mindset that comes from a background of abundance" - implying that pours have a mindset which doesn't "let them" take risks. And it goes without saying that the rich have it easier. That doesn't make it their exclusive province, nor indeed should it. It's not exactly as if the risk-free pour life is exactly paradise anyways. When I fell from working class to vagabond in fact it was a significant step up.
- ycombinete 5y ago
  Don’t know about privilege, but it certainly smells like “doesn’t have children”
  - dnissley 5y ago
    Just based on his twitter profile pic it appears he does indeed have at least one child
  - anotheryou 5y ago
    and friends with money, nobody financially depended on him, probably savings to live not just from unemployment benefits (that would even make networking challenging financially I guess)
- Juliate 5y ago
  It is privilege. That one may have or attempt. It doesn't make it less valid a path to consider.
- BlackjackCF 5y ago
  100%. I don't think this person is considering the single mom who has to work multiple minimum wage jobs just to make ends meet; the people who have never had any opportunity to have any sort of "network" to magically get another job. When you're in that position, you're constantly exhausted because of how much you're working. You have no savings. You absolutely cannot afford to just "quit" and have things work out.
  - xtlyths 5y ago
    The author is explicit about who this is for. There is never a suggestion that the single mom working multiple minimum wage jobs to make ends meet is the target. > If you have the resources to spend some time exploring, if you are on to interesting threads of novelty that few other people have, and if you have the spirit to tighten your belt, throw out your map, and explore off-road, then your real job is to do so.
    - maxduckworth 5y ago
      Yes, I see the piece as a call to action if you have the means. Like it's almost a moral obligation to yourself or society.
- xtlyths 5y ago
  > If you have the resources to spend some time exploring, if you are on to interesting threads of novelty that few other people have, and if you have the spirit to tighten your belt, throw out your map, and explore off-road, then your real job is to do so. The essay is calling out people of means directly and telling them to stop wasting their time. If you have the means, it is your real job to do so. The entire article is a call to build a leisure class. Not whisky and xbox leisure. Newton and Seneca leisure. This doesn't smell like privilege, it is privilege. But it is highlighting not only the opportunity of that life, but the duty.
bvm 5y ago
Nobody knows you when you're down and out.
jaltekruse 5y ago
For those that read the note the blog is gone but I searched HN for the author and found the discussion the day this was posted. He did end up making it because people called the police. This isn't to undercut the message of this comment, it is clear from the blog that Dennis was very close to dying because of the financial situation he was in and how hopeless it made him feel. I just had to know what happened after reading the note. https://archive.fo/U4X6S https://archive.fo/U4X6S

agumonkey 5y ago

Also skills are highly relative. You could be great in some workplace but in another you'd get confused. And the things you were home with are now disregarded.

JimboOmega 5y ago

It smells like privilege. That isn't to say that the OP was protected regardless. But the mindset that lets you do this is a mindset that comes from a background of abundance. Where you can always get another job if you want one, where you always have friends or parents who will bail you out or give you what you need. A background where things just always seem to work out.

Blackstone4 5y ago
Yeah it can come from a background of abundance but does not mean it is not a good attitude to have. I have spent most of my life with an attitude of scarcity and I was jealous of others. It held me back in so many ways and made me unhappy. Now I try to live with positive outlook on the future and try to make things happen with a belief that things will work out some how in the end. Impoverised people could benefit from some of this thinking (balanced with realism) since it could help improve their circumstance.
datavirtue 5y ago
I "retired" for about ten years. I chose to be poor and just focus on raising my kids and being home with them. I discovered what it is this guy is talking about. I was able to focus on personal projects and learning about the world. I applied all of that and reentered the corporate world like a beast. It is now ten years later and cannot wait to "retire" again. I miss being able to think about things and live life without the narrowing constraints imposed by wage slavery. You can't understand how liberating it is until you try it but it takes a lot of faith in yourself.
vmception 5y ago
Another way to look at it (especially for those allergic to the idea that privilege may apply to their own outcome) is that ambition, risk taking, and entrepreneurship are evenly distributed across all socioeconomic classes, or close to it. It's just that some distinct socioeconomic classes have the capability of failing and retrying very quickly, due to moneyed resources. Contrast that to the person without assets or access to capital, they save up, take a chance, fail, and now have to wait maybe 10 years or more to get to the same place with jobs. And with time, there is error introduced, divergent paths, life changing events, or simply competing priorities as the years keep going by. Alternatively, everyone else in their similar situation rationally decides not to bother, a good network for them is one that exposes them to basic personal finance gurus on odd forums and youtube, who give them generic advice that works for a broad population. On the concept of privilege, there is no parade and red carpet that gets rolled out, you just wake up one day and realize that you don't have to apply for jobs to maintain food and shelter, and that your bank account also has enough to make that seed investment or hire developers. So, if you're willing to play your cards, you play them. Enough people are willing to and their successes wind up outnumbering the poorer people that want to play tech entreprenuer.
- mlatu 5y ago
  i liked your comment until the last sentence. > outnumbering the poorer people that want to play tech entreprenuer. PLAY? why the belittlement?
  - vmception 5y ago
    The richer people are playing too. Its an even distribution of the same behaviors.
  - kzrdude 5y ago
    > So, if you're willing to play your cards, you play them. Enough people are willing to and their successes wind up outnumbering the poorer people that want to play tech entreprenuer. Writing, literature. The word play is used in reference to the use of play in a previous sentence. I think it's a common colorful writing technique.
bawolff 5y ago
I mean maybe, but hn has a primary tech audience. I bet 70% of us here could quit our job, take some risks,go bankrupt, get a new job, all with only mild consequences. Yes that's privilege and it doesn't apply to everyone but its not an obscure level of privilege. You don't need to be a multimillionaire to have it.
- prawn 5y ago
  Just an extra thought - what would you guess is the overlap between the remaining 30% and the set that need or heed advice like this?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
meheleventyone 5y ago
The author goes on to talk about how there should be a leisure class (basically an aristocracy) and that should be “people of means”. So it’s not even hidden really, it’s just a cementing of the increasing wealth divide more throughly into the political sphere. Neo-Victorianism or something. The working class, literally called “wage-slaves” seemingly unironically in the article and their betters.
- datavirtue 5y ago
  The poor have plenty of government support. You can live the liesure lifestyle if you choose to. I used to work 30 hours a week @$9 per hr and pay for an apartment, vehicle, and all of my expenses. The work (cook) was fun and I had a lot of free time to explore tech. Right after that I got a job as a mechanic and then was laid off. I spent two years on unemployment. I have actual real memories from living a good life during that time. Developing software, hanging out with friends and family, fishing tributaries (walking for hours through a creek or river), tinkering with cars, and reading everything I could get my hands on about world events. I barely have any memories from when I was trudging through 50 hours a week in a job. Except for those times where I was at a startup trying to change the world (80 hrs a week). But that was an event where I could see the beginning and the end.
  - meheleventyone 5y ago
    Did you reply to the right comment I’m not sure this has anything to do with mine?
    - datavirtue 5y ago
      Probably not.
- kirso 5y ago
  Not sure if this was the intention to say it like that. For me, the interpretation is that when you have time to pursue your own interests, you discover something that is worth fighting for. I had 2 months off a job and it was the happiest I have ever been because I spend it on researching and discovering problems that I care about. But it was due to the accessibility to "leisure"
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
thelettere 5y ago
The idea that only the rich are able to take risks - or even think about it - is a bias, and an ugly one at that. It doesn't match history - the only reason we have many good things is because poor people took major risks - and it's part of the tyranny of low expectations that is seeping deeper every day into the fabric of our culture. It's a remarkably effective way of keeping the pours in their place in the name of "empathy" and "awareness". It's akin to a humblebrag where that the rich can talk bad about themselves while shoring up their position. And it's a kind of talk that I as one of those pours have zero patience with.
- vmception 5y ago
  What part of history are you referring to? What kind of examples are really coming to your mind here?
- chousuke 5y ago
  It's not that the ability to take risks is fundamentally different, it's just that if you're rich, the consequences of failure will be easier to deal with, allowing more risk-taking and thus more chances at success.
- usrbinbash 5y ago
  Of course everyone can take risks, but the consequences of these risks backfiring, are vastly different based on available monetary resources. A wealthy person may well sink years and piles of money into a dream. If it doesn't work out, meh, that's life. Back to some well paid job and preparing the next try. Person in strained financial position doing the same and it backfires: May well take years to get back on ones feet, and may even end up in a homeless shelter.
  - thelettere 5y ago
    The person who I responded to said "the mindset that lets you do this is a mindset that comes from a background of abundance" - implying that pours have a mindset which doesn't "let them" take risks. And it goes without saying that the rich have it easier. That doesn't make it their exclusive province, nor indeed should it. It's not exactly as if the risk-free pour life is exactly paradise anyways. When I fell from working class to vagabond in fact it was a significant step up.
ycombinete 5y ago
Don’t know about privilege, but it certainly smells like “doesn’t have children”
- dnissley 5y ago
  Just based on his twitter profile pic it appears he does indeed have at least one child
- anotheryou 5y ago
  and friends with money, nobody financially depended on him, probably savings to live not just from unemployment benefits (that would even make networking challenging financially I guess)
Juliate 5y ago
It is privilege. That one may have or attempt. It doesn't make it less valid a path to consider.
BlackjackCF 5y ago
100%. I don't think this person is considering the single mom who has to work multiple minimum wage jobs just to make ends meet; the people who have never had any opportunity to have any sort of "network" to magically get another job. When you're in that position, you're constantly exhausted because of how much you're working. You have no savings. You absolutely cannot afford to just "quit" and have things work out.
- xtlyths 5y ago
  The author is explicit about who this is for. There is never a suggestion that the single mom working multiple minimum wage jobs to make ends meet is the target. > If you have the resources to spend some time exploring, if you are on to interesting threads of novelty that few other people have, and if you have the spirit to tighten your belt, throw out your map, and explore off-road, then your real job is to do so.
  - maxduckworth 5y ago
    Yes, I see the piece as a call to action if you have the means. Like it's almost a moral obligation to yourself or society.
xtlyths 5y ago
> If you have the resources to spend some time exploring, if you are on to interesting threads of novelty that few other people have, and if you have the spirit to tighten your belt, throw out your map, and explore off-road, then your real job is to do so. The essay is calling out people of means directly and telling them to stop wasting their time. If you have the means, it is your real job to do so. The entire article is a call to build a leisure class. Not whisky and xbox leisure. Newton and Seneca leisure. This doesn't smell like privilege, it is privilege. But it is highlighting not only the opportunity of that life, but the duty.

bvm 5y ago

Nobody knows you when you're down and out.

jaltekruse 5y ago

For those that read the note the blog is gone but I searched HN for the author and found the discussion the day this was posted. He did end up making it because people called the police. This isn't to undercut the message of this comment, it is clear from the blog that Dennis was very close to dying because of the financial situation he was in and how hopeless it made him feel. I just had to know what happened after reading the note. https://archive.fo/U4X6S https://archive.fo/U4X6S