Comment by orthoganol | Hacker News Reader

Comment by orthoganol | Hacker News Reader

When asked what someone can do to be successful in software:

> That;s a tough one. get out of the box no1. REALLY out of the box. Abandon every social norm, esp those closest to you. Then look at the world with objective eyes. Look what is the thing to do? Every entrepreneur I know (I know Steve Jobs, and he was out of the box) went out of the box. If you can't go work for someone else.

Yeah the older I get the more it becomes clear that there's inherent conflict between following social norms (developing a cushy social life) and achieving something big. Like with being a startup founder I think almost all have to go through intense anti-social periods, admittedly I judge founders as being average or worse if they don't seem to have some anti social or obsessive streak to them.

Kobe is a cool example too, a guy who had a relatively bizarre social life for an NBA player, with a manic obsession about work and improvement. I think he even said "Friends come and go, but banners stay forever." Extreme, but hits on a deeper truth about what all it takes to make it big.

Being at the right place at the right time is also important, if not more important. There are lots of people thinking out of the box everywhere in the world but financial success in software is extremely concentrated at certain geographical locations and time ranges. (Maybe living in a small Eastern European country I feel this more than people living in let's say the Valley.)

TL/DR: out of the box, but in the appropriate (time,location) range

Part of being outside the box is determining what it is the right time for. So for example, 2015 is obviously not the right time to make it big on asteroid mining, but understanding the value, logistics etc... for it could lead you to determine what kind of events would make it the right time. Certainly not a science to this though.

Speak for yourself. I am currently putting 110% into asteroid mining

maybe living in a small Eastern European country is your personal box...

Thinking out of the box is not mutually exclusive with having a social life. I know many artists and musicians who are doing truly groundbreaking stuff. They all violate the social norms, and have unusual lifestyles. But all of them are very well connected (in art, you have to be). Their social networks are very broad, and very strong.

He's not saying to obsess or be a workaholic. He's saying be creative. The way to be creative is to relax and let your thoughts drift.

I mean this in the nicest possible way, but that kinda sounds like a justification for being a workaholic.

No need for the patronizing tone... Isn't that an ad hominem? People can abuse this information to justify anti social behavior, but I'm not sure how your point challenges its validity...

Was it patronising? And was it an ad hominem? I didn't really read that into it at all. Just another opinion on one man's opinion.

Huh, I don't know, just seemed like a patronizing way of phrasing something. People do it subconsciously a lot. It's not like it offended or bothered me, was just pointing out that it had such a tone, and noting that conversations or debates are better when people just say things directly.

About the ad hominem, saying something sounds like an excuse isn't addressing the argument made. If OP disagrees with the argument, he's welcome to make arguments that address my own.

Often, work pays off. The Lakers used to try and lock Kobe out of the gym to stop him getting shots up at all hours before dawn. But he persisted and found other ways in.

Seems like he probably could have put a hoop in his driveway or something...

Why would his team not want him to practice?

Because of injury or potential for injury. The team wants Kobe Bryant healthy and on the court, so wants to limit excessive practice to avoid reinjury or new injury.

He would go in at 2am, 4am, etc and put up hundreds of shots. They changed the locks. He would wedge open service doors, etc. Risk was burnout or injury from sheer repetition.

They might've underestimated the sort of character he is. There are some great stories out there about his training habits, the Lakers scouting him as a rookie pre-draft, etc. Contentious character, but hard to deny his focus.

There is one great story of him calling in a trainer to work with him after midnight. They take a break, the trainer understanding they were done for now and going home. Trainer came back in the morning for team training and made smalltalk with Kobe about hopefully he had had a good rest after their workout. Kobe was confused. He'd been there all night training and hadn't gone home.

It is justification for being a workaholic.

There's obsession and then there's workaholism.

The former is something that you're driven to do internally out of great desire for it. The latter is just trying to avoid problems by working.

A book that I thoroughly enjoyed, "The Sports Gene" by David Epstein, he goes into how being a workaholic has been shown to be a genetic trait. As someone who apparently doesn't have the gene, I look at people like Kobe and can just shake my head and wish them luck. I get discouraged knowing that I can bust my ass but predisposition can and will out perform me. So what do I do? I like the advice Killer Mike gives:

> "The best you can be is probably average, so learn to celebrate average more. Buy better beer"

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