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Comment by FreeHugs | Hacker News Reader

I find the idea of a "family life" nothing but boring.

When you're young you might feel the tedium of taking care of a kiddo...drudgery of the daily regime. But as you get older you realize that the effort or lack thereof you put into those tasks can give life great meaning or be your biggest regret.

It's a nice theory, but the concept of "men overworking to avoid going home" didn't become a trope by chance. Not everyone feels the meaning given by those tasks.

There should be a balance I suppose. I'm sorry but playing pretend-grocery-store with my 3yo girl can't compete with the challenge and satisfaction of cracking a really hard algorithm or a similar problem. But having a family in general gives life way more meaning than creating some app or website.

Please don't take this the wrong way and this is just one man's opinion. When that 3 year old girl is older and naturally becomes independent and moves on from you to the next steps in her life, that pretend grocery store experience will be orders of magnitude more meaningful to you than solving ANY hard algorithm. Not judging, not preaching, just giving you thoughts based upon experience.

I don't think I disagree with that, I'm just saying that being with my children is not always fun or interesting. Louis CK has some excellent bits about this stuff.

Oh, thank god Louis CK has covered this. Case closed, then.

Louis CK has pretty amazing insight...I'll check it out.

For me is isn't either or but rather both - algorithms, startups and family.

I'm not saying that everyone feels the meaning given by those tasks. IMHO, if you asked those same men "overworking to avoid going home" what they regret later in life, not being with their kids will rank very high.

> Not everyone feels the meaning given by those tasks.

OK. Do meaningful things with your kids then. Make art. Volunteer at a food bank. Learn how to grow tomatoes. Build a robot.

There are more options than "fold socks" and "put cover letters on the TPS reports".

Not everyone wants a kid. It is not a failure at life, it is not their greatest regret.

Nowhere in my comment did I say that everyone wants a kid nor that they are a failure at life if they don't have one. What I said was in response to the comment about family life being boring.

Well, you didn't qualify your sweeping general statement at all. You seem to be implying that nobody should find family life boring and not want it.

First, I didn't intend making a "statement". I made an innocent, if not necessarily crystal clear, comment which attempted to give one person's experience to those that have already chosen to have a child. NOT a comment about the merits of having a child or not.

I agree with you, but I wouldn't presume to tell someone else how to give their lives meaning, just because I'm "older", or to tell someone they will later regret not taking the same path in live as me.

Some people just aren't cut out for the family life.

I didn't tell anyone to do anything because I'm older. I shared that if you do choose to have a family one person's experience is that you will cherish the moments you are serving your children.

And I share this as someone who has gone through it in the hope that sharing might in some small way assist those that have not gone through it yet.

Would be interesting to find out how old you are? I'm 31, all my friends are married and popping out babies and while I'm in a very happy long term relationship, I honestly don't see the appeal (thankfully my partner agrees).

I'm just wondering if something will prompt us to wake up one day and change our minds, but it certainly hasn't happened yet.

I'm not the OP, but I'm 33, and also don't see the appeal of having children.

45yo here, no ex's, kids or even pets. It is a completely different life from my families', friends' and peers' lives. Many envy my choices, some feel sorry for me* but most are indifferent. Mom has come to appreciate my stance only recently: *alone is not necessarily lonely. I have respect & admiration for those who commit to marriage/parentage, and I empathise with the many who fail... most empathy reserved for the innocents who grow up amidst, and as a direct result of, such failures. I was the parentless, feral kid amidst a dysfunctional divorce, went to 9 different schools from k-12 and used my own monies & a fake ID to get snipped when I was 17. I won't be repeating that mistake. I am an idealist, I have refused to curtail or abandon my lofty goals for an enlightened humankind and my finances/quality of life have suffered for it. I do not HAVE to do anything, nobody is reliant on me beyond my reponsibilities as a service provider and I can afford such luxuries as true independence.

I'm 40. My son was born when I was 34. I didn't see the appeal until pretty much when he was born and I held him for the first time. What happened was that my resistance had softened to the point where I was willing to have a child because my wife badly wanted one. The moment I held him for the first time that all changed, and I couldn't imagine it any other way.

I'm a cynic, and very conscious that it's down to my brain getting flooded with drugs. But they're oh, so very efficient drugs.

That depends on what you find meaningful. Some like to build model houses, other like to report from dangerous places, some or out to help people and some just have children.

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