Those people have bought into the grind culture and will probably get burnt out
If those things don’t make you happy then don’t do them.
I am the same and find that life is enough for me as it is. I’m also on the spectrum so it’s easier to not burden myself unnecessarily.
My ADHD plays a huge part in the opposite direction. I have had hundreds of different hobbies or interests. Each hold my attention for a while and then I rotate to the next.
What I have learned to do is make hobbies or projects interrelated and each supports the next. CAD work supports my 3D printing, which supports all the rest, as an example. Tools purchased need to have multiple uses and other supplies the same. Essentially, I have constructed a huge feedback loop for my natural tendency to bounce around.
While that stuff keeps me busy, I am learning to simplify the rest of my life, so that is nice.
Man, I wish I had heard this decades ago. Most of my hobbies are entirely unconnected except building guitars then playing them. I have a garage full of woodworking stuff that’s only for that, a garage full of tools for working on motorcycles that don’t overlap, a bunch of tools for cooking outdoors, a room full of entirely unconnected gear for playing pool, rock climbing, a shelf full of tabletop games, gardening equipment, fishing gear, and equipment to make a beverage that is illegal for me to make at both the federal and state level.
You have a good system.
Those sound like some pretty cool hobbies tbh.
They’re all a lot of fun. The only ones I have kept up with long term are building and playing guitars, cooking outdoors, and working on motorcycles. The rest were passing fancies.
Can you give some more examples please?
Not op, but I love making interesting furniture and light fixtures. It’s a combination of wood working, pretty lights, microcontrollers, open source projects, and stuff that normies fucking love, like epoxy desks. I always have a handful of projects at various states of completion and whenever I get bored of one I bounce to another until I finish and then just pick something from my yuge list of stuff I wanna build and keep going.
Wow. I think you just resolved some minor trauma for me. My mother used to berate (and sometimes beat) me for “never finishing things”, as in I’d be really interested in something and then lost interest. It drove her up the wall, but since I was a kid all I heard was “stop being interested in everything”.
I got dx’d with ADHD at 35. Slowly, and thanks to comments like yours, I’m making sense of my brain and learning to be kind to myself
I was diagnosed early, but didn’t start treatment until my 30’s. Basically, I had some really unfounded perceptions of the condition and how amphetamines worked. Whoo boy, was I wrong!
But yeah, it’s hard not to use the condition as a crutch or an excuse. It’s a legitimate condition, no doubt, but the trick is trying to learn ways to leverage it as a positive. (TBH, this only works in some cases, not all.)
The biggest challenge for me is trying to communicate how I think and operate to others. Processes that work for normal humans simply do not work for me. This poses some massive challenges in my career, for sure. By the same token, the way I think gives me unique advantages in problem solving. (I am in IT Security by trade where thinking differently is almost a requirement.)
Exactly! Compared to what neurotypical people are capable of, I truly do feel disabled in some ways. However, as long as I can continue to support myself and my partner until we both die, I’ll be good without all the extra bullshit and responsibilities.
I had a buddy, and we talked in great detail about this. I chase challenges, and am always looking for the next big puzzle to muddle my way through. He chased freedom. He just wanted to be who he was and spend his time how he wanted.
My point is people are motivated by different things. Find your thing and pursue it. Don’t worry what anyone else is doing. You don’t answer to them, and they’re not any happier than you.
The caveat is don’t conflate freedom/motivation with being a dick. Live the life that you want to live, but if that involves disparaging certain demographics for ethically and/or morally wrong reasons, then maybe live a better life than the one you really want to live. This doesn’t apply to most people, but there are some out there that should read it and take it to heart.
Yeah I’m a bit of both. When I’m working, I always want the next challenge. When I’m at home, I’m quite content to just cease to exist
Living your authenticity is fulfilling.
I dunno man. Would be too much hassle for me. I’m in my 30s and struggle not falling into depression every time I get friend zoned, which happens all the time. Dating sucks. I just want to be loved. Having children, being a manager (especially in my field / NGO where politics is a big part of the job) is just way too stressful.
I’m a greasy overweight diesel tech. Stop saying friend zone. That is an easy way to never get with someone. Get a hobby that you like and learn to talk about it without being a snob.
I won’t. I have hobbies. I have hobbies I’m passionate about. If it doesn’t click for other people but it does for me but they still don’t have a problem with being friends what else should it be called other than friend zone?
Maybe I’m wrong but I think the idea of “friend zone” implies romantic rejection, whereas being actual friends is just a platonic relationship with no romantic aspects. Friend zone is like emotional attachment that is getting in the way of a genuine friendship because of that disparity. It sounds immature to say it if you think of it that way. It’s reminiscent of the incels on 4chan for a lot of people too, so that doesn’t help. Maybe that will clarify why some people think it’s cringey to say ‘friend zoned’?
That actually explains it quite good. Thanks!
What you described was not what I tried to say by using the term “friend zone”.
Thanks for reading, I’ve seen this happen in different places now. Some communities use it like you intended, others use it as derogatory. Language be gettin harder by the day
IDK why people become managers, either, when the pay often isn’t reflected in the increased responsibility. Plenty of jobs I had, the managers got paid the same minimum wage as everyone below them, while having to do a lot more work. I have no problem with the responsibility, as long as I’m properly compensated for it.
Not too disagree with you, or argue, but in my field your experience is not how it is here. You have to go into management of you want to make more money, and while the work is different, I’m not sure it’s harder
In my experience, at first managing is always harder than doing it yourself, because you’re usually put in charge of managing people who do what you used to do.
Have you ever been in a situation where you’ve had to do something at work, but you were hamstrung by your tools or timelines? Like, oh man this would be way easier in Python but you are only approved for MS office, so you have to struggle through some VBA. Or man, I could whip this together super fast in Ruby but for some reason this has to be in plain JavaScript. Or maybe you could make this really well, but not in the two day turnaround they need. All that is frustrating, but you usually find a way to perform given these imperfect scenarios.
Now, imagine VBA has feelings. You can’t even really complain about VBA, because it’s not malicious. It’s just bad at its job. So now instead of quickly coding a workaround in a new language (but you learn fast so not the end of the world), you have to help someone get there and do it on their own. And you can’t just do it for them because you have 4 VBAs. Oh, and by the way, JavaScript is malicious. It’s actively trying to avoid work, or maybe trying to make VBA look bad. So now you have to convince JavaScript that it’s in its best interest to work. Sometimes its a carrot, sometimes a stick, but you’re responsible for getting functionality out, and it’s more functionality than you could possibly create on your own.
That’s what managing people is like. A deep desire to do it yourself because it will be better and faster, but you don’t have time, and also you need these people to be better. So you have to learn to teach instead of do, and support emotionally and intellectually and motivate instead of just bitching to your manager when someone else isn’t getting their work done and it’s affecting your work - now you’re responsible for getting their work to be good. It’s really hard, and some people who were amazing achievers and doers can’t hack it when they have to help other people achieve and do. It’s why you have so many bad manager stories. The skillsets are nearly completely different.
The nice part though is when you get good enough at managing that you start managing people that do things you can’t do, or do things better than you ever could. Suddenly there’s some whiz kid straight out of college who knows more about data science from their degree than you did your whole career actuallydoing it, and all they really need help with is applying it. Then you start helping with vision and the “why” of things. “Yes, you could do it that way, but remember our actual end goal is X, so that’s all we really care about.” Or you help people work together to make a cohesive whole. That’s when managing gets really rewarding. It can still be harder than doing, or it might be easier if you’re a big picture thinker, but it gets different eventually.
Here have my virtual 🏅🏅🏅🏅
In my industry, the difference between manager and new hire is double.
For other industries, it’s a big sadder. When I worked in a restaurant in college, the manager made $2 more. They also got some perks that I didn’t. And I absolutely did not want their job.
So I can totally understand that perspective.
But, being a manager for a year or two gives you that title that when you jump jobs, it’s def a salary bump.
This is only true of “team lead” type managers.
Get more skills and experience. Get promoted. Produce more value. Get paid more. Repeat.
At least for me, it’s because it was the only way to get a raise in my position.
For me I knew being a manager would be much harder, but my passion is mentoring others and watching them grow.
Some people become managers because they like having control over people.
And those are the people you need to avoid being managed by.
We’ve been tricked into thinking either that hard work pays off or this specific hard work thing will pay off. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t. But all the time it leads to more work.
My expert psychoanalysis of your entire personality based on a one sentence post is either you’re happy where you are, or you’re afraid of change.
Multiple reasons
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We are living beings driven to reproduce, some more than others obviously.
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Because that is the cultural plan we are trained to follow. You, like me, probably live in a capitalist society, everything about our existence is for the enrichment of our rulers, so that means the more you and your kids generate, the more there is for our rulers to take from us.
Never let anyone denigrate you as lazy. “Lazy” people are not the ones destroying the planet.
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I don’t like it when I don’t have some challenges or goals in life, I don’t like feeling like I’m just coasting along. I’ll try a new sport etc so I have a project, and I do a bit of volunteer work towards getting people involved in sports I do.
i consider to some degree, actively avoiding responsibility as a form of responsibility.
For instance, if you know that you can’t be a good parent, then don’t. Some people just have different priorities, and if yours are simply enjoying life, then fuck it.
Because for many people maturing into an adult means taking on and fulfilling responsibilities. It gives many people meaning and satisfaction, often not at the individual moment, but over the course of a life.
Others don’t feel that way.
A third category think they don’t feel that way, but realize too late that they do.
interesting how you only see the third category going one way
Interesting that it bothered you enough to comment on it.
I’ve worked in hospice care in the past. I’m sure there are people that regret taking on responsibility in their life, but the most desperate people I encountered were the ones that realized that they are at the end of their life and realized that they will never have the opportunity to “finally” take on challenges and/or responsibility.
Imagine a panic attack that doesn’t go away because the time you have left is measured in days, weeks, or maybe months, you know it, and there is nothing you can do to address a lifetime of regret, which intensifies the panic.
Usually the best that can be done at that point is “comfort care,” which is drugs. And I would just see them cry, fade, cry, fade, cry, fade, and then die alone. It’s horrifying to see, and it sticks with you.
Life isn’t a movie or game, and no one is the main character.
Yeah, experiencing that is a horror I wouldn’t wish on anyone. That’s a true nightmare.
I don’t think having kids of my own is in my future, I hope I can live my life with enough intent and purpose to avoid this date. Thank you both for this thread, it’s gotten me thinking.
I used to avoid extra responsibilities, and I still don’t have kids, and I don’t do charity. In the past moving to stressful positions was financially motivated. But my current job as a patient advocate is extremely rewarding to me. It’s the first time I felt I had a job that meant something and I am fulfilled by making impact in individual lives. I’ve had people call me a life-saver, and have had patients shed tears after I was able to help them. Sometimes my job is not so great, and some things are routine and go by thanklessly, but the moments I am able to be a difference motivates me.
This is the first job I’ve participated and engaged in more than just the basic requirements, because I see what I do and what my colleagues do as meaningful and valuable, beyond making a CEO their paycheck. I go as far in my job to actually reduce GDP I suppose, steering people towards options that are best for them, even if they don’t generate direct profits for my company. I feel like a real person here, and that’s why I take on more responsibilities. (it also will help me financially in the long run, but that is less of a primary factor for me now)
@humbletightband essentially it’s because more responsibility leads to more power.
Specifically, people are interested in having more power over outcomes eg avoiding hunger, discomfort, loneliness etc.
Specifically, people are interested in having more power over outcomes eg avoiding hunger, discomfort, loneliness etc.
And in many cases we need to acknowledge that this is a good thing. Everyone should be empowered to have more control and more autonomy. The problem is not everyone is afforded that luxury.
Do you think society would get to the point it is if everyone just wanted more power for selfish reasons? I think it’s more to do with the feeling of fulfillment that comes with responsabilities. Helping people feels good, even when you get nothing in return. Unless you expect something in return, then we’re playing a different game. But your outlook on life seems pretty bleak my friend.
I don’t think it’s necessarily bleak or selfish though, it might just be overly succinct. Sure, you can look at it as wanting power purely for selfish reasons, but I think they just boiled it down to the most basic aspect of “more responsibilities = more power = the ability to do more”. You can use it however you want, hopefully altruistically, but at the end of the day a pure altruist who is well connected person with unlimited financial resources can help a lot more people than if they were broke and destitute on the edge of starvation.
maybe, but i see quite a few similar reactions in this thread that make me wanna leave this place. its just slowly starting to sink in for me that lemmy is a lefty echo chamber and its basically the same 20 posts rehashed every week by people with worldviews like this. how tf can anyone expect to change anything without hope. Idk man, im just dumping my thoughts but i think im gonna get the hell off this platform and anything similar because it’s not having a positive effect on me.
@wathek I’m really bummed out that my comment made you want to leave!!
@skyspydude1 is right, I was just trying to point out to OP that the old saying “with power comes responsibility” actually cuts both ways and taking on more responsibility gives many people more agency and control over their lives.
how tf can anyone expect to change anything without hope.
I’m still kind of reeling here because I was trying to be encouraging not despairing. I think maybe the word “power” might have some negative connotation for you?
Cards on the table, I think the old Christian binary between altruism (good) and self-interest (bad) does us all a huge disservice. Helping others altruistically and making the world a better place is in our own best interests. We’re all humans together.
No i didn’t mean it like that, i’m sorry. It’s more of a reaction to the general vibe i get off lemmy while im in a period of trying to debug by brain. I probably misread what you actually meant. Most of lemmy is just frustrated and sad about things we have little control over. It’s more the general thread reminding me of healthy ways of thinking vs the rest of lemmy. your comment just happened to be where i was thinking out loud. sorry ><
That’s not just Lemmy, it’s all of social media that isn’t focused on people’s self-promotion (Instagram, LinkedIn etc). The leftist stuff is fairly accurate, but that’s not a big deal to me.
Social media algorithms have driven the content engagement, and they figured out that controversy and anger drives the most engagement, so that’s what the algorithms tend to push to drive engagement, to get more ad revenue and data from people spending more time on their platforms.
Because they get a touch of Maslows disease
What people want in life often comes from what they experienced themselves previously. You mentioned charity. I’ve put 13 years of my life into being a scouts group leader, organizimg weekly meetups, many events and multiple scout camps a year. I’m very passionate about this, since I’ve got so much out of being a scout since I was 7, growing up with a community, that was meaningful and not harsh and punishing as school. I wanted tp give these experience back to the next scout generation. And during my time as scout group leader I could grew even more, making my own life better through helping others. Soon I will shift my focus away from the scouts (currently its too much together with work; also I want kids soon).
I’m not saying, that you need to do this. I just wanted to explain where my motivation comes from. I get a sense of fulfilment and I’m proud of what I’ve done and I’m proud of the kids, that I saw growing up and now being group leaders themselves.
Finding something, that you are passionate about is very important. It doesn’t need to include external responsibilities. Taking responsibility for your own self, like putting in hard work to learn a new skill, can be as fulfilling as the above.