6 ms·

What was your most painful realisation of 2012?

30 points by 3stripe 14y ago

melvinram 14y ago
Mine: Changing a formula (that is working somewhat well) too much at once, without a way to get back to exactly the old way, can really bite you in the behind. Earlier this year, I took on a bit too much work, hired help, took on a new marketing channel to support the new capacity, decreased prices (relatively dramatically) in hopes to increase volume and changed the service I offered so I could produce it profitably at the new price point. Any one of those changes could have been a great boost for my revenue + sanity but doing them all in the same month spelt disaster for about 3 months. Here's what happened: I had too much work and when I brought on new person, even though they were smart and competent, they still needed training. Because I was spending time training them, I didn't spend as much time on sales. (Lesson: You can't just hire someone expect them to know everything you know.) We had leads but I didn't get enough time to call them. At the same time, a really interesting opportunity presented itself where I could buy leads from a competitor and be able to double the number of leads I had each month. The price was expensive per lead but one sale would pay for a month's worth of leads so I pulled the trigger. (Lesson: Don't spend time and money on marketing unless you have the time and money to dedicate to sales.) At the same time, I had a nice chunk of change in the bank so I decided to do some experimenting with what we were offering. I lowered prices of websites we designed dramatically to focus on monthly reoccurring revenue ($300 + $30/month instead of the more $2500 + $10/month hosting) we normally charge on average. I also changed the service so it wasn't completely custom, which allowed me to deliver in a much smaller amount of time. Weirdly, sales crashed with this new price point. I can't explain it with reason but I have some theories. That's for another day. (Lesson: Don't mess with a sales formula by changing too much at once because you won't know what broke it or improved it.) So now I had 2 heavy expenses and a product offering that wasn't selling as easily and when it did sell, it made a lot less money. Wow, what a dingbat thing to do, right? Well the decisions had sound logic behind them at the time :D. Luckily I was able to restore my business model to the way it was previously after a lot of tweaking and ended up with something that worked better than before... but those 3 months were just plain bad.
- skarayan 14y ago
  I think this is one of the reasons TDD/BDD have caught on lately, small refactors are easier to manage than changing large chunks of code. Looking back at my coding workflow early on, I would often get lost in my own code because I would attempt large changes without testing or version control. Interestingly, instead of developing a better workflow, I first learned to keep more inside my head.
  - melvinram 14y ago
    Yes, it's critical in code... but it's also critical in life/business to have things very well version controlled. :)
falcolas 14y ago
That nasty code is as equally present in a 5 man development group as a 5,000 man group. Absolutely fantastic folks, but the codebase... <shudder>
- adandy 14y ago
  One more un-closed tag and I quit!
yesimahuman 14y ago
Mine was probably that I will never be more "satisfied" with my day-to-day life even if my startup is a huge success. I need to find balance and tend to the moment and the people that matter in it. Second was probably that you can make huge impacts on the health of your business by tending to your pricing and pricing model. Don't just copy from other products that might have way different usage patterns.
asanwal 14y ago
By not focusing on sales a lot earlier (and focusing on the product only), we left a lot of money on the table.
- kyle_t 14y ago
  This is a big one, and one I'm in the middle of fighting with right now. As a developer its hard to release a product with your name attached when you know its not as good as it can be. Releasing early means getting more exposure and possibly force you to realize your a writing something no-one earlier. What if though you are turning potential customer's away who are unimpressed with your first couple releases? Are those just considered write-offs and the cost of bootstrapping?
  - fleitz 14y ago
    Are you writing software or running a company? As a business person it's fiscal suicide to release a product for which there is no market. Most people see more benefit from a mediocre mechanic than a world-class buggy whip manufacture. If the people who will see your product on the first iteration are the majority of your potential customers then chances are your business is a failure anyway. How many of us think less of PG because HN uses tables?
    - kyle_t 14y ago
      Trying to do both. "How many of us think less of PG because HN uses tables?" I understand your point, but I think that is more of a implementation of features, rather than which features make it in for first release. Its a valid point that if the first few users are the majority then you are in trouble. I would hope that the first few users/adopters however would become my biggest cheerleaders thus contributing to a snowball effect of new users.
JacksonGariety 14y ago
The worst ideas are often the most well-received and the best ideas are often rejected.
bane 14y ago
Realizing that my company needed to pivot away from a rapidly failing line of business I was really interested in into a growing and profitable line of business that I wanted nothing to do with. There's a lot more to the story, but having to talk away from almost a decade and a half of work and some very dear co-workers/friends was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. But going into 2013 I think it was also one of the best decisions I've ever made.
ForrestN 14y ago
Most people, myself included, don't actually do the things they want to do most of the time. Put another way, first order desires almost never really govern anyone's behavior, and second order desires are dictated almost exclusively by psychological baggage that has little to do with their adult lives.
- k3n 14y ago
  That's a profound thought that transcends technology, thanks.
- mej10 14y ago
  I have witnessed this in myself and others, and it is painful to both see and experience. Of course the question is: what can we do about it?
  - monk_e_boy 14y ago
    Get passionate about what you want to do. Skive, make time, lie cheat and steal to do what you want. Make your hobby/free time important to you.
  - ForrestN 14y ago
    For me, the overwhelmingly best answer is therapy.
- charlieflowers 14y ago
  Could you elaborate? I'm interested. By "first order desires", do you mean complete barbarism, such as seeing someone with an ice cream cone, and killing them on the spot so you can have the ice cream? And where do you feel second-order desires come from? Are you talking about the idea that humans can acquire new goals without even being aware they have done so? [1] Or something else? [1] "We do, as shown by decades of research on operant conditioning. When a neutral potential goal is associated with a stimulus of positive affect, we acquire new goals, and we can be unaware that this has happened:" from http://lesswrong.com/lw/5sk/inferring_our_desires/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/5sk/inferring_our_desires/
gprasanth 14y ago
Everyone dies. :'(
- yen223 14y ago
  Damn man, I know how that feels. So sorry for your loss.
dinde 14y ago
Incompetent people will often take politically expedient decisions that cause more harm than good but protect their positions.
- endersshadow 14y ago
  I would be cautious on your labeling them as incompetent--perhaps they are very competent at protecting their positions, you just have a different agenda. Of course, I don't know your exact situation. But, people act according to their alignment of incentives. If one is more motivated by the work they're doing rather than the pay they're receiving, then you get one set of behaviors. Likewise, if they're motivated by power, you get another set of behaviors. It's folly to assign your values and incentives onto somebody else and call them incompetent because they're different. You may just be golfing, and they're bowling, and looking at the scoreboard, you think they have a miserable score, when in fact, they're a strike away from a perfect game. If you understand how folks like that behave, you can work with them to make decisions that will be in your best (or at least better) interests.
  - dinde 14y ago
    I agree in theory, but it's difficult to align values with someone whose strategy is to shift blame to clients and subordinates due to lack of planning and communication skills. These people create a toxic, reactive working environment and their damage needs to be managed. I don't believe that they bring good things to the table. I realize that this sounds exceptionally bitter so I am open to the possibility that I have become cynical and am unable to see from outside the lense of my own vision.
GeneRoddenberry 14y ago
The widespread evidence of the existence of extra-terrestrials.
eli_gottlieb 14y ago
Too many people are peasants, and would rather have a king to petition or blame than actually solve their own problems.
- eli_gottlieb 14y ago
  For those upvoting: please be sure you mean it. I am not alluding to libertarianism, Austrian economics, or pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. Rather the the opposite, actually. There's a whole lot of stuff that could be done collectively, even cooperatively, but isn't, because that would require a shift in mentality away from "waaaah, the king issued an evil decree!" to "our entire town has to pitch in to solve this together".
adventured 14y ago
Realizing that the US Government is getting very close to fundamentally destroying freedom on the Internet (domestically, with ramifications globally; and to the extent it still exists). It's not five or ten years away, it's now a daily battle with all the legislation they're throwing at the wall to see what they can get to stick. It was understood in the 1990s that they'd eventually seriously harm the Internet, given their unlimited thirst for power, but some part of my brain always hoped it was further out. It's clear they're never going to stop coming after it, and they have a nearly unlimited budget and apparently nothing better to do with their time.
paulwcy 14y ago
It ended
nlh 14y ago
That my mind produces ideas and features a LOT faster than my fingers can code them up. One of the great frustrations I'm finding in being a self-taught, 1-man developer. I'm learning, and it's intensely satisfying, and it's going well. But MAN does it take a long time to do things. I know I'll get faster, but things that I think should take a few minutes take a few hours. Designs I think I should be able to put together in a day take a week. So the painful realization is that I'm going to get a lot less done in 2013 than I'd like. I'll still get a lot done, but it's sobering to realize the limits of your execution.
yen223 14y ago
I am 25 years old and I don't have the $100,000 job that everyone seems to have no trouble getting =(
- truebosko 14y ago
  You're still young .. not everyone has a $100,000 per year job :-) Live within your means, learn at a pace that'll allow you to absorb, rather than simply skim, and you'll be on your way to success eventually.
  - yen223 14y ago
    Thanks for that :) I intentionally left a decent-paying job at a Fortune 500 consultancy firm, for a job that pays less but actually allowed me to learn interesting technical skills (in robotics). Honestly, I'm not sure whether I regret that decision yet.
- k3n 14y ago
  When I was your age I was making ~25k/yr. (in today's money) working in a soul-sucking callcenter. Hopefully, you're better off than I was.
  - yen223 14y ago
    I'm making less than that now, but that's mostly thanks to our shitty currency exchange rates. I would gladly work for USD$25k/year.
- exodust 14y ago
  Less late night gaming.
  - yen223 14y ago
    Hah! If only I had time for late night gaming sessions.
charonn0 14y ago
Life is precious and brief; we squander it by griefing, and we never respawn.
dave1985 14y ago
That I'm an alcoholic, that I have ADHD, depression and social anxiety. I've got a lot to fix in 2013.
- hashtree 14y ago
  I have no idea if these are true, but I like a person who can self-reflect well. I love folks who are able to attack/correct things they need to. Best of luck!
  - dave1985 14y ago
    100% true. It's actually quite empowering to discover these things- as bad as they sound, now I can work on making my life better.
- jpeg_hero 14y ago
  fist bump
- qodeninja 14y ago
  In my experience some of these things are self-reinforcing; alcoholism can lead to ADHD and Depression, which can lead to social anxiety. The problem with alcoholism is the havoc it unleashes on your body's natural chemistry and metabolism and in turn your overall energy levels, mood, and perception. Fixing your body chemistry may resolve all the other issues over time. Suggestion: Take a multivitamin, drink more water, sleep more, get outside more. Oh, and always say YES to any social invitation.
  - dave1985 14y ago
    For the most part, YUP. However, ADHD is not a chemical problem, it's a brain disorder that you're born with (there is tons of scientific research backing this up). But YES otherwise. Alcohol screws with your body/brain, and Alcoholism, ADHD, Depression and Anxiety are all tightly linked in cause and effect. > Take a multivitamin, drink more water, sleep more, get outside more. Oh, and always say YES to any social invitation. and while all of this is good general life/health advice, it has nothing to do with ADHD.
jes5199 14y ago
Working at a successful startup is no fun at all.
- monk_e_boy 14y ago
  Thanks for that :) I've read all the srtatup founder stories and they all seem to involve WAY too much work and way too many hours.
  - runawaybottle 14y ago
    But hey maaan, if you don't love it, maybe you're not cut out for it maaan.
    - monk_e_boy 14y ago
      job != life. You need balance. Maaan.
- qodeninja 14y ago
  Amen to this. I love my work-life balance, more than I like start-ups. I also hate stock options. I can't pay my rent with stock options.
Keyframe 14y ago
That I should pay taxes first and invest later, not vice versa.
monk_e_boy 14y ago
That during a double dip recession things can still get worse. A lot of my friends are now jobless. That my boss wants to hear compliments. Nothing else. Ever. Reading HN is the closest I'll ever get to seeing a start up grow any larger than 3 people struggling in a tiny office paid for by the EU. I won't ever pay off my credit cards or mortgage. I'll never own a new car or any new hobby equipment. eBay and freecycle are integral parts of my life. My performance based quarterly bonuses won't get paid. America sounds like a bonkers place to live, I hope they (you?) start to do something about climate change.
- qodeninja 14y ago
  America really is a bonkers place to live, but what can you do? My friends frequently joke that everyone in blue states should move to red states and take them over! I recycle, walk to work, and don't leave the lights on!
  - monk_e_boy 14y ago
    Gun control in the US - fixable bug in the system, or fundamental design flaw?
EvanKelly 14y ago
This is the year I learned that the longer I live, the more people close to me I will lose.
lucastheisen 14y ago
No matter how much effort and thought is put into writing quality code, looking back in a year or two I will cringe at it. Second, I recently saw the accepted answers per tag on broken down by average age on stackoverflow. Just realized I am over the hill (as far as software development goes)...
coley 14y ago
All we love we leave behind. Converge released an album with this title this year. 2012 was bleak for me. I lost my grandfather and my aunt within a week from one another. Soon after, my girlfriend left me to be with someone else. I moved out of the house that we had rented together, and left her with the first two dogs that were ever partly 'mine.' She left me with the last dog we rescued, Gatsby. Before we brought him home, she clarified he was my dog and that if anything happened between us I was to take responsibility of him. I guess I should have seen the break up coming. So now here I am. Alone in this house, with Gatsby. I mostly think about how one day I'll have to leave him behind too. It's too easy to become jaded by loss and abandonment. It's too easy to tell your friends that you have work to do, just so you don't have to go out and face them. It's too easy to stop caring, when caring is what hurt you in the first place. So is "all we love we leave behind" my most painful realization of 2012? Not quite, but close. These events took place about 5-6 months ago. From then until now, AWLWLB has been stuck in my head, but the most painful realization happened just recently. I _have_ to go on loving anyway. I have to keep trying to make relationships and friendships work. I have to put forth effort, whether I'll lose them or not. It's not about what you've lost, but what you had. Eventually all of the things you have, will be things that you once had, and that's all you will ever have. Here's to 2013.
robomartin 14y ago
How easy it is to fail. How easy it is to do it all wrong. How easy it is to make the wrong decisions. How easy it is to get really down on yourself. How easy it is to blame others for your own mistakes. How easy is is to think others are right and you are wrong. How easy it is to think it is hard to get back up and really "do it" and "do it right". How easy it is to get back up on your feet once you've made a decision to do it. How easy it is to then see others were wrong and you were right. How easy it is once you've done it. How easy it is.
- charlieflowers 14y ago
  This is almost a country song! Except that it ends on a positive note ... you'd need to reverse it to make it sad if you really want to make a hit out of it. (Not criticizing -- I think it's nicely written).
  - robomartin 14y ago
    Need to slide in a pickup truck and a dog somewhere in there. I don't think the country crowds would go wild for Cassandra and Node.js. :)
qodeninja 14y ago
One of my favorite thoughts for this year: "EVERYONE is faking it" I've read this thought a few times throughout the year and it really stuck with me. I frequently think to myself: "why is all this stuff (work, life, bills, relationships) so hard for me but not everyone else? I must be some kind of an idiot" Perception really IS everything. The truth is they don't know what they're doing any more or less than I do. We all put on fake smiles and tell big stories all just to try to give the appearance of credibility and importance. You are not an idiot. We are all in this experiment of life together.
xpose2000 14y ago
I don't know about painful, but I realized that I should focus on creating an internet company rather than a start-up. The stuff reported on techcrunch may get pageviews, but i realized it in no way relates to me or what I'm trying to achieve.
dfrankow 14y ago
We are all looking for connection, and many don't find it, don't even know how to find it. Much of the technology in our modern world (television, web sites like Facebook, mobile phones) make this problem worse. That is, there is an economic incentive to drive us apart.
runawaybottle 14y ago
That my people skills are close to horrendous.
redidas 14y ago
That a side project of mine, something that would take most here a weekend, has taken me over a year now (and it still isn't finished). To be fair I've been learning a lot of things. redoing my work. Trying different options. Taking month-long breaks here and there. A lot of the time it feels like I'm just running in place. A lot of things feel like progress, but really aren't. And then I worry, maybe I won't ever be cut out for all this stuff here on hacker news. The culture, goals, start-up life. Maybe it it won't be any more than a dream.
3stripe 14y ago
Professionally: that I'd been unhappy in my job for months, if not years, without realising it. If my brain was in denial though, my body knew it, and one day I was physically unable to goto work. That pain caused a life pivot for me, and I can't wait to find out what doors it will open next. Personally: that you can still love someone, but not be able to live with them.

30 points by 3stripe 14y ago

Mine: Changing a formula (that is working somewhat well) too much at once, without a way to get back to exactly the old way, can really bite you in the behind. Earlier this year, I took on a bit too much work, hired help, took on a new marketing channel to support the new capacity, decreased prices (relatively dramatically) in hopes to increase volume and changed the service I offered so I could produce it profitably at the new price point. Any one of those changes could have been a great boost for my revenue + sanity but doing them all in the same month spelt disaster for about 3 months. Here's what happened: I had too much work and when I brought on new person, even though they were smart and competent, they still needed training. Because I was spending time training them, I didn't spend as much time on sales. (Lesson: You can't just hire someone expect them to know everything you know.) We had leads but I didn't get enough time to call them. At the same time, a really interesting opportunity presented itself where I could buy leads from a competitor and be able to double the number of leads I had each month. The price was expensive per lead but one sale would pay for a month's worth of leads so I pulled the trigger. (Lesson: Don't spend time and money on marketing unless you have the time and money to dedicate to sales.) At the same time, I had a nice chunk of change in the bank so I decided to do some experimenting with what we were offering. I lowered prices of websites we designed dramatically to focus on monthly reoccurring revenue ($300 + $30/month instead of the more $2500 + $10/month hosting) we normally charge on average. I also changed the service so it wasn't completely custom, which allowed me to deliver in a much smaller amount of time. Weirdly, sales crashed with this new price point. I can't explain it with reason but I have some theories. That's for another day. (Lesson: Don't mess with a sales formula by changing too much at once because you won't know what broke it or improved it.) So now I had 2 heavy expenses and a product offering that wasn't selling as easily and when it did sell, it made a lot less money. Wow, what a dingbat thing to do, right? Well the decisions had sound logic behind them at the time :D. Luckily I was able to restore my business model to the way it was previously after a lot of tweaking and ended up with something that worked better than before... but those 3 months were just plain bad.

skarayan 14y ago
I think this is one of the reasons TDD/BDD have caught on lately, small refactors are easier to manage than changing large chunks of code. Looking back at my coding workflow early on, I would often get lost in my own code because I would attempt large changes without testing or version control. Interestingly, instead of developing a better workflow, I first learned to keep more inside my head.
- melvinram 14y ago
  Yes, it's critical in code... but it's also critical in life/business to have things very well version controlled. :)

falcolas 14y ago

That nasty code is as equally present in a 5 man development group as a 5,000 man group. Absolutely fantastic folks, but the codebase... <shudder>

adandy 14y ago
One more un-closed tag and I quit!

yesimahuman 14y ago

Mine was probably that I will never be more "satisfied" with my day-to-day life even if my startup is a huge success. I need to find balance and tend to the moment and the people that matter in it. Second was probably that you can make huge impacts on the health of your business by tending to your pricing and pricing model. Don't just copy from other products that might have way different usage patterns.

asanwal 14y ago

By not focusing on sales a lot earlier (and focusing on the product only), we left a lot of money on the table.

kyle_t 14y ago
This is a big one, and one I'm in the middle of fighting with right now. As a developer its hard to release a product with your name attached when you know its not as good as it can be. Releasing early means getting more exposure and possibly force you to realize your a writing something no-one earlier. What if though you are turning potential customer's away who are unimpressed with your first couple releases? Are those just considered write-offs and the cost of bootstrapping?
- fleitz 14y ago
  Are you writing software or running a company? As a business person it's fiscal suicide to release a product for which there is no market. Most people see more benefit from a mediocre mechanic than a world-class buggy whip manufacture. If the people who will see your product on the first iteration are the majority of your potential customers then chances are your business is a failure anyway. How many of us think less of PG because HN uses tables?
  - kyle_t 14y ago
    Trying to do both. "How many of us think less of PG because HN uses tables?" I understand your point, but I think that is more of a implementation of features, rather than which features make it in for first release. Its a valid point that if the first few users are the majority then you are in trouble. I would hope that the first few users/adopters however would become my biggest cheerleaders thus contributing to a snowball effect of new users.

JacksonGariety 14y ago

The worst ideas are often the most well-received and the best ideas are often rejected.

bane 14y ago

Realizing that my company needed to pivot away from a rapidly failing line of business I was really interested in into a growing and profitable line of business that I wanted nothing to do with. There's a lot more to the story, but having to talk away from almost a decade and a half of work and some very dear co-workers/friends was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. But going into 2013 I think it was also one of the best decisions I've ever made.

ForrestN 14y ago

Most people, myself included, don't actually do the things they want to do most of the time. Put another way, first order desires almost never really govern anyone's behavior, and second order desires are dictated almost exclusively by psychological baggage that has little to do with their adult lives.

k3n 14y ago
That's a profound thought that transcends technology, thanks.
mej10 14y ago
I have witnessed this in myself and others, and it is painful to both see and experience. Of course the question is: what can we do about it?
- monk_e_boy 14y ago
  Get passionate about what you want to do. Skive, make time, lie cheat and steal to do what you want. Make your hobby/free time important to you.
- ForrestN 14y ago
  For me, the overwhelmingly best answer is therapy.
charlieflowers 14y ago
Could you elaborate? I'm interested. By "first order desires", do you mean complete barbarism, such as seeing someone with an ice cream cone, and killing them on the spot so you can have the ice cream? And where do you feel second-order desires come from? Are you talking about the idea that humans can acquire new goals without even being aware they have done so? [1] Or something else? [1] "We do, as shown by decades of research on operant conditioning. When a neutral potential goal is associated with a stimulus of positive affect, we acquire new goals, and we can be unaware that this has happened:" from http://lesswrong.com/lw/5sk/inferring_our_desires/ http://lesswrong.com/lw/5sk/inferring_our_desires/

gprasanth 14y ago

Everyone dies. :'(

yen223 14y ago
Damn man, I know how that feels. So sorry for your loss.

dinde 14y ago

Incompetent people will often take politically expedient decisions that cause more harm than good but protect their positions.

endersshadow 14y ago
I would be cautious on your labeling them as incompetent--perhaps they are very competent at protecting their positions, you just have a different agenda. Of course, I don't know your exact situation. But, people act according to their alignment of incentives. If one is more motivated by the work they're doing rather than the pay they're receiving, then you get one set of behaviors. Likewise, if they're motivated by power, you get another set of behaviors. It's folly to assign your values and incentives onto somebody else and call them incompetent because they're different. You may just be golfing, and they're bowling, and looking at the scoreboard, you think they have a miserable score, when in fact, they're a strike away from a perfect game. If you understand how folks like that behave, you can work with them to make decisions that will be in your best (or at least better) interests.
- dinde 14y ago
  I agree in theory, but it's difficult to align values with someone whose strategy is to shift blame to clients and subordinates due to lack of planning and communication skills. These people create a toxic, reactive working environment and their damage needs to be managed. I don't believe that they bring good things to the table. I realize that this sounds exceptionally bitter so I am open to the possibility that I have become cynical and am unable to see from outside the lense of my own vision.

GeneRoddenberry 14y ago

The widespread evidence of the existence of extra-terrestrials.

eli_gottlieb 14y ago

Too many people are peasants, and would rather have a king to petition or blame than actually solve their own problems.

eli_gottlieb 14y ago
For those upvoting: please be sure you mean it. I am not alluding to libertarianism, Austrian economics, or pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. Rather the the opposite, actually. There's a whole lot of stuff that could be done collectively, even cooperatively, but isn't, because that would require a shift in mentality away from "waaaah, the king issued an evil decree!" to "our entire town has to pitch in to solve this together".

adventured 14y ago

Realizing that the US Government is getting very close to fundamentally destroying freedom on the Internet (domestically, with ramifications globally; and to the extent it still exists). It's not five or ten years away, it's now a daily battle with all the legislation they're throwing at the wall to see what they can get to stick. It was understood in the 1990s that they'd eventually seriously harm the Internet, given their unlimited thirst for power, but some part of my brain always hoped it was further out. It's clear they're never going to stop coming after it, and they have a nearly unlimited budget and apparently nothing better to do with their time.

paulwcy 14y ago

It ended

nlh 14y ago

That my mind produces ideas and features a LOT faster than my fingers can code them up. One of the great frustrations I'm finding in being a self-taught, 1-man developer. I'm learning, and it's intensely satisfying, and it's going well. But MAN does it take a long time to do things. I know I'll get faster, but things that I think should take a few minutes take a few hours. Designs I think I should be able to put together in a day take a week. So the painful realization is that I'm going to get a lot less done in 2013 than I'd like. I'll still get a lot done, but it's sobering to realize the limits of your execution.

yen223 14y ago

I am 25 years old and I don't have the $100,000 job that everyone seems to have no trouble getting =(

truebosko 14y ago
You're still young .. not everyone has a $100,000 per year job :-) Live within your means, learn at a pace that'll allow you to absorb, rather than simply skim, and you'll be on your way to success eventually.
- yen223 14y ago
  Thanks for that :) I intentionally left a decent-paying job at a Fortune 500 consultancy firm, for a job that pays less but actually allowed me to learn interesting technical skills (in robotics). Honestly, I'm not sure whether I regret that decision yet.
k3n 14y ago
When I was your age I was making ~25k/yr. (in today's money) working in a soul-sucking callcenter. Hopefully, you're better off than I was.
- yen223 14y ago
  I'm making less than that now, but that's mostly thanks to our shitty currency exchange rates. I would gladly work for USD$25k/year.
exodust 14y ago
Less late night gaming.
- yen223 14y ago
  Hah! If only I had time for late night gaming sessions.

charonn0 14y ago

Life is precious and brief; we squander it by griefing, and we never respawn.

dave1985 14y ago

That I'm an alcoholic, that I have ADHD, depression and social anxiety. I've got a lot to fix in 2013.

hashtree 14y ago
I have no idea if these are true, but I like a person who can self-reflect well. I love folks who are able to attack/correct things they need to. Best of luck!
- dave1985 14y ago
  100% true. It's actually quite empowering to discover these things- as bad as they sound, now I can work on making my life better.
jpeg_hero 14y ago
fist bump
qodeninja 14y ago
In my experience some of these things are self-reinforcing; alcoholism can lead to ADHD and Depression, which can lead to social anxiety. The problem with alcoholism is the havoc it unleashes on your body's natural chemistry and metabolism and in turn your overall energy levels, mood, and perception. Fixing your body chemistry may resolve all the other issues over time. Suggestion: Take a multivitamin, drink more water, sleep more, get outside more. Oh, and always say YES to any social invitation.
- dave1985 14y ago
  For the most part, YUP. However, ADHD is not a chemical problem, it's a brain disorder that you're born with (there is tons of scientific research backing this up). But YES otherwise. Alcohol screws with your body/brain, and Alcoholism, ADHD, Depression and Anxiety are all tightly linked in cause and effect. > Take a multivitamin, drink more water, sleep more, get outside more. Oh, and always say YES to any social invitation. and while all of this is good general life/health advice, it has nothing to do with ADHD.

jes5199 14y ago

Working at a successful startup is no fun at all.

monk_e_boy 14y ago
Thanks for that :) I've read all the srtatup founder stories and they all seem to involve WAY too much work and way too many hours.
- runawaybottle 14y ago
  But hey maaan, if you don't love it, maybe you're not cut out for it maaan.
  - monk_e_boy 14y ago
    job != life. You need balance. Maaan.
qodeninja 14y ago
Amen to this. I love my work-life balance, more than I like start-ups. I also hate stock options. I can't pay my rent with stock options.

Keyframe 14y ago

That I should pay taxes first and invest later, not vice versa.

monk_e_boy 14y ago

That during a double dip recession things can still get worse. A lot of my friends are now jobless. That my boss wants to hear compliments. Nothing else. Ever. Reading HN is the closest I'll ever get to seeing a start up grow any larger than 3 people struggling in a tiny office paid for by the EU. I won't ever pay off my credit cards or mortgage. I'll never own a new car or any new hobby equipment. eBay and freecycle are integral parts of my life. My performance based quarterly bonuses won't get paid. America sounds like a bonkers place to live, I hope they (you?) start to do something about climate change.

qodeninja 14y ago
America really is a bonkers place to live, but what can you do? My friends frequently joke that everyone in blue states should move to red states and take them over! I recycle, walk to work, and don't leave the lights on!
- monk_e_boy 14y ago
  Gun control in the US - fixable bug in the system, or fundamental design flaw?

EvanKelly 14y ago

This is the year I learned that the longer I live, the more people close to me I will lose.

lucastheisen 14y ago

No matter how much effort and thought is put into writing quality code, looking back in a year or two I will cringe at it. Second, I recently saw the accepted answers per tag on broken down by average age on stackoverflow. Just realized I am over the hill (as far as software development goes)...

coley 14y ago

All we love we leave behind. Converge released an album with this title this year. 2012 was bleak for me. I lost my grandfather and my aunt within a week from one another. Soon after, my girlfriend left me to be with someone else. I moved out of the house that we had rented together, and left her with the first two dogs that were ever partly 'mine.' She left me with the last dog we rescued, Gatsby. Before we brought him home, she clarified he was my dog and that if anything happened between us I was to take responsibility of him. I guess I should have seen the break up coming. So now here I am. Alone in this house, with Gatsby. I mostly think about how one day I'll have to leave him behind too. It's too easy to become jaded by loss and abandonment. It's too easy to tell your friends that you have work to do, just so you don't have to go out and face them. It's too easy to stop caring, when caring is what hurt you in the first place. So is "all we love we leave behind" my most painful realization of 2012? Not quite, but close. These events took place about 5-6 months ago. From then until now, AWLWLB has been stuck in my head, but the most painful realization happened just recently. I _have_ to go on loving anyway. I have to keep trying to make relationships and friendships work. I have to put forth effort, whether I'll lose them or not. It's not about what you've lost, but what you had. Eventually all of the things you have, will be things that you once had, and that's all you will ever have. Here's to 2013.

robomartin 14y ago

How easy it is to fail. How easy it is to do it all wrong. How easy it is to make the wrong decisions. How easy it is to get really down on yourself. How easy it is to blame others for your own mistakes. How easy is is to think others are right and you are wrong. How easy it is to think it is hard to get back up and really "do it" and "do it right". How easy it is to get back up on your feet once you've made a decision to do it. How easy it is to then see others were wrong and you were right. How easy it is once you've done it. How easy it is.

charlieflowers 14y ago
This is almost a country song! Except that it ends on a positive note ... you'd need to reverse it to make it sad if you really want to make a hit out of it. (Not criticizing -- I think it's nicely written).
- robomartin 14y ago
  Need to slide in a pickup truck and a dog somewhere in there. I don't think the country crowds would go wild for Cassandra and Node.js. :)

qodeninja 14y ago

One of my favorite thoughts for this year: "EVERYONE is faking it" I've read this thought a few times throughout the year and it really stuck with me. I frequently think to myself: "why is all this stuff (work, life, bills, relationships) so hard for me but not everyone else? I must be some kind of an idiot" Perception really IS everything. The truth is they don't know what they're doing any more or less than I do. We all put on fake smiles and tell big stories all just to try to give the appearance of credibility and importance. You are not an idiot. We are all in this experiment of life together.

xpose2000 14y ago

I don't know about painful, but I realized that I should focus on creating an internet company rather than a start-up. The stuff reported on techcrunch may get pageviews, but i realized it in no way relates to me or what I'm trying to achieve.

dfrankow 14y ago

We are all looking for connection, and many don't find it, don't even know how to find it. Much of the technology in our modern world (television, web sites like Facebook, mobile phones) make this problem worse. That is, there is an economic incentive to drive us apart.

runawaybottle 14y ago

That my people skills are close to horrendous.

redidas 14y ago

That a side project of mine, something that would take most here a weekend, has taken me over a year now (and it still isn't finished). To be fair I've been learning a lot of things. redoing my work. Trying different options. Taking month-long breaks here and there. A lot of the time it feels like I'm just running in place. A lot of things feel like progress, but really aren't. And then I worry, maybe I won't ever be cut out for all this stuff here on hacker news. The culture, goals, start-up life. Maybe it it won't be any more than a dream.

3stripe 14y ago

Professionally: that I'd been unhappy in my job for months, if not years, without realising it. If my brain was in denial though, my body knew it, and one day I was physically unable to goto work. That pain caused a life pivot for me, and I can't wait to find out what doors it will open next. Personally: that you can still love someone, but not be able to live with them.