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Comment by Maro | Hacker News Reader

Personally (I'm 36) I like the 'pressure' I receive all the time, from all over the place, like the ones mentioned in the article: why don't I have a six-pack, why am I not more 'perfect' with my g/f, why am I not working on my startup, why haven't I made a billion yet, why is Elon Musk so f---ing more productive, and so on. It shows me that more can be done, I could do more, it pushes me to do more. I realize it would be more comfortable to not have all these pushy signals around, but comfortable is sth I want to be when I'm 50+ or 60+, not right now.

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Sure you can ignore 'six pack' but you can't really igore is looming obsolesce in IT once you hit you 40's and 50's, you can't ignore is dwindling (biological) motivation and drive to learn and innovate. Ageism is real.

Thats what really worries me, sure I like coding and learning now but what happens to me in my late 40's and 50's when I have to care for my parents and kids at the same time while tying to not become a IT dinosaur.

I'll turn 40 next year and I've worked for about 23 years in IT. I've figured out that getting some fundamentals in place has served me well so far, and I have been fortunate to play many roles in the IT space (including some non-technical ones like sales). I intend to keep learning more fundamentals and learning new things.

It's strange, I work in engineering, and all the most talented and highest paid people are in their 40s and 50s. I guess ageism in the Valley is real, but it seems most prevelant in web-related companies. At some point in your career, working in a start-up of beer-chugging bros or in an office that looks like an elementary school loses its luster, and you find better opportunities.

Not sure why you're getting downvoted, I empathize with this notion.

I think at all ages you have to leverage what you have. When you're young, you have a lot of energy, so you learn a lot and work a lot.

When you're older, hopefully you have a lot of money and a lot of experience, so you can (i) use the money to retire or pick what to work on, or bootstrap your own startup (ii) use the experience to become an Engineering Manager, Technical Product Manager, etc. That's _if_ you don't feel safe as an individual contributor, which is imo reasonable in areas where seniority has a short half-life (eg. front-end / web tech seems to be like this).

Well, Elon Musk is so wealthy has no excuse for not being (or at least looking) productive.

at least most of the time...

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/731604873540685825

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