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.
Living your authenticity is fulfilling.
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
Mate, I’d definitely prefer loose leaf tea but can’t be arsed with the extra hassle
There are dozens of us
Dozens!
I think so anyway. I haven’t checked.
As long as you feel you want to avoid responsibilities, please do so in a responsible way. Use condoms every time, and don’t get involved with a person who wants children. Be a good support-player at work so your manager doesn’t have to be a bitch (they still might, in which case support your coworkers). And contribute in low-effort ways like donating an occasional pint of blood if you’re eligible, or offering to put someone else’s cart away at the grocery store. Just being a decent person is enough.
There are a ton of negative comments on here, but i think the reality is: people value different things.
When you have certain values you will sacrifice certain things to practice those values/achieve those goals.
Some people value charity work because helping the community and people makes them feel good–even if it’s more work on their plate.
Some people sacrifice their personal lives to achieve a career goal. Sometimes that’s for financial reasons, sometimes that’s for ego reasons, sometimes it’s “meeting a challenge”.
Some people will sacrifice their career to have less stress or focus on their family. Some people value their hobbies, relationships, personal interests to the point where they’ll pick jobs that let them focus on those things–even if those jobs don’t pay as well, even if they aren’t “progressing” up the ladder.
And for what it’s worth, your values (may) shift over time. I never wanted kids for the longest time. Then I did.
I valued career progression for ego and financial reasons–and now, that’s shifted.
I sacrificed spending time with my friends when I had my kid, but now I am putting a lot of effort into those friendships because I value them and that requires work. That means I didn’t take a job offer that would have paid more, so I would have time for my family and friends.
I value those things more at this point.
I value my time playing computer games, so I sacrifice my sleep so I can do that. :)
Some people are like dogs: they want to be useful & helpful.
Some people are like cats: they want to sleep 16 hours a day & meow loudly at 3am.
Some of us like to poop in the sand box as well.
If you’re in the sand box, does it count as a blumpkin? Or is it toilet specific.
I now have a new thing to add to my bucket list.
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.
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.)
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.
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.
They aren’t thinking of it in terms of increasing responsibility. That is the cost of the decisions they are making, but it’s not the benefit. Each of the things you mentioned have clear benefits (pay raise, biological drive, altruism). They are simply making decisions about when the benefits outweigh the costs.
I became a manager because I worked with shitty managers who sit on their ass and promote their friends. I wanted to change that.
I take on harder projects than my peers because I can handle it. It’s easier for me to deal with the stress, than give it to a teammate who would absolutely struggle and lose 4 weekends trying to solve it.
I became a parent because I worked in the school system and taught kids without good families. I used to stay after school just to give these kids a positive influence before they get sent back to their shitty home.
I absolutely do not think about the stress of the added work, but instead focus on the results of my actions (or the results if I don’t do it).
I became a parent because I worked in the school system and taught kids without good families. I used to stay after school just to give these kids a positive influence before they get sent back to their shitty home.
Don’t take this as criticism, just trying to understand: What’s the logic here? As a teacher without kids (for now), I feel like I’d have more to give to help my pupils if I don’t have kids of my own.
Regardless, thank you both for the work that you do.
Thanks for doing what you do.
And I can see the confusion. I grew up in the ghetto, I also wasn’t raised in a good environment. I have children and I’m in the process of adopting as well.
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.
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An important detail from your story is how much money you started with and gained during your corporate life. Living the way you do now can absolutely be a privilege even if it is simpler. Your core message about being yourself and not what society or specific people want you to be is still good, also assuming what you want to be is ethical in nature.
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Whaaaa life is hard and you have to figure out cash flow.
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You literally did, so that wasn’t aimed at you.
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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.
Perhaps they value different things in life. Everyone is not the same, what works for you won’t work for everyone. There are people who enjoy having responsibility. Having children, being a manager and doing charity work feels fulfilling to them.
Until they say they are over their head and start complaining they have no free time in a very negative tone to all of their childless/non managerial friends and guilt tripping on how they should do the same. “When are you having kids?”
Do childless, non-managerial people have no complaints in life? Most things aren’t perfect. It doesn’t mean they’re not also fulfilling.
On the other hand, some people just like to complain. The comment you’re making just lacks some nuance.
You should talk.
You shouldn’t
I know these types. There’s nothing stopping them from having the kids babysat or to take a day off, but they’d rather be able to hit people over the head with the victim complex even though they put themselves into their position knowingly and without hesitation.
Half the people I work with have kids and, if you complain about anything at all around them, they always have some way to minimize it and one up you. Got three hours of sleep? Well, with their kids, they only sleep 30 minutes a night on a bed of nails under a running stream of volcanic temp water. Starving because work is crazy, you haven’t eaten all day, and it’s 7pm? With their kids busy schedules, they only eat once a fortnight, on the toilet, crying into they’re meal which only consists of bread crusts their kids didn’t want. Like, sorry, I forgot I’m not allowed to suffer around you people because you made a life decision that requires extra effort on a daily basis.
Because people find fulfillment in different things.
Hello, someone who went to a manager position here! I’m 100% with you, decreasing responsibility means decreasing stress and so is always a priority! However, there are a few reasons one might shoot for the moon anyway.
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Ambition. This is the obvious one, some people just want more. More money, more power, more prestige. That is a valid reason to push further but isn’t for everyone.
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Empathy. Yep you read that right! Ambition isn’t the only driving force to take on more responsibility. Empathy can lead people to see the ways to improve others’ lives, workloads, and more!
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Accidents. Especially with children but also in other areas, accidents happen and can often leave people with more on their shoulders than expected.
I personally am mostly number 2. I saw the terrible leadership that my team has had in the past and the ways I could assist my team to improve. I knew all the complaints and had ideas to fix them so I took the responsibility bullet so they don’t have to.
I hope this helps you see into the mind of someone who accepts responsibility, even if it means more stress and less freedom!
Empathy. Yep you read that right! Ambition isn’t the only driving force to take on more responsibility. Empathy can lead people to see the ways to improve others’ lives, workloads, and more!
I actually really resonate with that one. I pretty much ended up in the psudo-managment position I’m in because I kept seeing ways to improve life for those around me and it required me getting more and more involved in things outside of my specific role. It got to the point that I became the “go to” guy and ended up with a bunch of responsibilities, but at least the work is a little easier for those I work with directly on the factory floor and a few people in the office as well.
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i got a masters,tried to climb the corporate ladder only to realise,i prefer the quiet life,less responsibility and less stress.
i didn’t want to be a corporate high flyer after trying to. some people will never know until they try and some couldn’t get out because they went with the flow and got stuck.
This. I’m currently a CTO. Planning my next move to be a developer, not management of any kind.
If you find some spare time.
I would love to know how you rose to that position and what the work was like.
Sincerely, A developer who feels the upper rungs on the ladder is a good way to make meaningful change
Same boat. I’m currently a software engineer. Colleagues have joked in the past that I’ll make my way as a manager or something, but the reality is that I’m more than fine remaining in this position the rest of my career. I’m fortunate enough that I’m fine with the money I make. I’m fine with my responsibilities, including the flexibility I have with my time. Not to mention that I enjoy doing actual development type work.
It would have to be a significant amount of money for me to even think about accepting any management roles.
I would entertain a lead type role (lead software engineer or principal software engineer, etc), but management personally is off the table.
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 🏅🏅🏅🏅
This is only true of “team lead” type managers.
Get more skills and experience. Get promoted. Produce more value. Get paid more. Repeat.
Some people become managers because they like having control over people.
And those are the people you need to avoid being managed by.
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.
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.
