Don’t Quit When It Gets Hard
dariusforoux.com
dariusforoux.com
This is a very narrow view of the world. Success is not explicitly defined as spending every waking hour working. A person who is content with their lot in life, at any level, is already successful.
I'm betting in their final hour they didn't wish they were still at work, or got more hours in. Busting your ass working IS a waste of life. You can be passionate about your work, but don't be ridiculous. You're only here once.
> I'm betting in their final hour they didn't wish they were still at work, or got more hours in.
The might feel better about the work they did than the time spent on netflix or buying clothes. Or the other way around. Or wish they put more time and energy elsewhere entirely. Everyone -- me included -- would probably benefit from thinking hard about such questions and adjusting their life accordingly if needed.
Maybe, maybe not. That's your opinion because the only source of truth here is your own feelings.
> You can be passionate about your work, but don't be ridiculous.
You can be whatever you want and if you're fine with that, then great. Everybody is different. Average people/workers/earners obviously think and behave differently than those who are above average.
> You're only here once.
...as far as you know.
OP’s post is about those times when your feeling that you’re “above average” is questioned, by those times when facts strongly suggest you’re not.
What then? Quitters quit. That’s not good, right? Persistence wins, graft often beats talent.
But statistics also show the majority of investors (amateur & professional) hold their losses too long and sell their winnings too early. They failed to learn when to quit.
It’s complicated, for sure.
(“Fail fast” - is that quitting?)
Half of that equation is that I have health issues, so sometimes I am just too sick to work. The other half seems to be that I am a woman, so good luck getting taken seriously.
I spend a lot of my time wishing I were dead because being unable to get enough work is such a shitastic experience. So, you know, speak for yourself. The feminization of poverty is real. Working to benefit other people without getting paid for it is the actual definition of what slaves do. It also nicely sums up what traditional women's work is all about, which most women still do the lion's share of.
Getting taken seriously for a woman is apparently still pretty damn pathetic. I would like to get taken seriously without such qualifiers. Such qualifiers are always a huge negative. Women only awards are basically a dunce cap with a crown drawn on it to pretty it up. They are akin to the Special Olympics. The fundamental message there is that "you can't really compete."
The general cultural view seen in for example health care is that men are assumed healthy and strong. This is great if you are that, but catastrophic if you aren't. Treatments get delayed, problems worsened, and in psychology there is a recognized problem of not seeing mental illness in men. For women its not perfect either. While assumed poor health do generally lead to faster treatment and better contact with the health care for women, the doctors don't believe in actually curing problems so health care for women has disproportionation amount of only addressing symptoms. In averages, some treatment is still better than no treatment which is reflected in the statistics and increased life span.
This pattern show up all the time in gender studies. Men end up as majority at the top and bottom of the charts, women at the middle. The fact that you are a woman should in average give you an advantage at work in comparison to men with same health issues, pushing you towards the middle. Men can pretend and hide the health issue for a while (ie manning up), but its unlikely to work and carries with it some major health risks, not to mention that shitastic experience. In all its a bad situation for everyone with health issues, regardless of gender.
To my mind, this is not terribly relevant to the issue I would like to see resolved. I have done all that. It hasn't exactly resulted in accolades, so to speak. In fact, it appears to me that I am so competent that people routinely think I am just making shit up. They think I am an egomaniac, liar, deluded or something along those lines.
I don't like where this conversation is going at all. I think my time would be better spent talking to myself in a corner in the form of blogging.
Adieu.
Even though I understand what you’re saying, I’m being defensive here because every person’s case is unique and it’s not really fair to tell them to “man up”. We already know that, thanks, but most of the time it’s just not enough to improve the situation.
The best I can advocate for is shared sympathy. Not only for the physical and mental pains, but also for the massive amount of economical trouble it brings. Studies on income difference between groups with different health status is massive and dwarfs anything which gender studies generally find. That should bring people together in common cause rather than splitting us up based on gender, race, religions or other extrinsic attribute.
> No one on their death bed has wished they worked more.
Unless maybe you've personally interviewed everyone who has ever been on their death bed? I mean, if we're going to talk about things at a factual level...
The constructive point I'm trying to make is that this is shared cultural wisdom, not fact. I agree with it, actually, but we should not so quickly dismiss the alternative. I can see the appeal of living a life of singular purpose, especially if you are successful in leaving your mark on the world.
Even Apple sells more iPhone with Jobs gone.
Musk isn't doing that. He likes to talk about it but there are many decades of work before it becomes viable (if it ever does.)
Not everyone believes they are only here once, just to be devils advocate. Some of them believe they are commanded to "be joyful workers", or some paraphrase there of. There are a lot of people that work themselves to death, because they believe a divine entity commanded them to do so. Logical reasoning may be less than effective with this group of humans.
Not sure the implied condescension is justified here. Some of history's great thinkers held that position. Different axioms lead logically to different conclusions. Dismissing differing views categorically as "illogical" isn't productive. Just to be devil's advocate.
Also, the end of the blogpost is kind of disingenuous. Knowing when to quit is as important as knowing when not to quit. Hard work does not always pay off.
This is the entire subject of Seth Godin's _The Dip_. I'm not a huge fan of this breed of books, but if someone is looking for a lesson on this topic, I would having a look at that book. It's very short -- you can read it in under an hour. It provides a decent mental framework for thinking through the question of whether you should continue on your current path, or quit and switch gears.
"Winners never quit, and quitters never win. But a person who never wins and never quits is a fool."
But I guess it means that a winner knows when there is no path to a win and retreats to do something where it is actually possible to win.
Basically, when you know to "do nothing", there is an action to be taken - it just depends on "nothing really happening" to work out.
~Yoda.
There's a difference between wanting to do that, and feeling unable to do anything else. If you _want_ to go home and veg for an evening that's OK, but if you can't do anything else, that's probably not OK.
This is what I'm talking about. I can spend all day watching Netflix, but in the end I will be much happier if I go climbing, write some code, practice for my next musical performance, or read a book that will help me think better (some good fiction can fit into this category). Some games fit into this category, but not many.
All of one or the other is not sustainable. Sometimes I feel like I am doing too much of one or the other, and I try to rebalance.
The only way to equal or beat someone naturally talented is to put in many hours.
Relaxation is good (but try to combine it with activities that are good for you, like jogging, meditation, or taking a shower/doing a house chore.)
While you go out to have drinks with your friends, some stay home and work on research and side projects. One makes you happy, the other makes you more skillfull. It is a lever.
I do agree that sometimes it can be better to give up. I spend close to a decade of my life trying to understand the subtleties of a single paper. Now I see the broader picture this was definately a Pyrrhic victory.
If I was to review my career (which is by no means exceptional, but still), the times I've taken giant steps it has been either because of luck (I joined a company at a good growing point) or a mix of skill, luck and a network of people that help put me in opportunities to be exceptional. I have the skills to be great, but I need the opportunities to be great as well, and opportunities are not necessarily only created by skill.
Skill is a necessary component, but it is not the only component. There are a lot of things a lot of people can do, and the determining factor in who ends of doing them is usually not skill. There is such a thing as skilled enough, which is hard to get to, but if you're opting between getting 1% better at something and getting 20% better at something else, often taking the 20% thing will pay off more, whether that be in networking, finding more opportunities, or whatever.
I've seen it with myself and many of my colleagues that the one big chance that you thought you simply can not let go was actually one of many chances that come along quite regularly but seem to be very tempting at first. In the sense that you feel like you have to take it or there will never be such a chance again. But to be honest, if you are doing a good job there is almost always a way to grow, and if there really isn't then it's time to switch.
My best friends and roommates all think I work too much, to the point that they've started calling me a "robot." But I tried going off the advice of my therapist to be more "balanced", and I found that all it did was make me dissatisfied with my progress.
I find a lot of joy waking up early, going to the gym, working until an hour before bed, and then reading a book until I fall asleep. I allow myself time to veg with Netflix for an hour or two a couple of nights a week, but no more than that. Ultimately, I find myself a lot happier being productive. I know it doesn't work for everyone, but I know that this is the way that I'm built.
I used to work crazy hours in workdays, on weekends I felt sick and sad. I actually wished for the stress of working at a high tempo. The downside was that I knew deep inside that the constant stress was detrimental to my health.
For years I've aimed for a work/life balance. But I am yet to achieve it. Either I work super hard, or I spend all my days procrastinating.
I know I definitely used to be that way. I was super depressed and I would just be at work to avoid life. But I felt super empty inside at that point.
Right now, I lean into it because I find happiness and simplicity in it.
I totally agree with the sentiment. I work an extra 1-2 hours every day which gives me an additional 260-520 extra hours per year to outperform my peers. However, the older I get, the more I'm starting to think that being exceptional is overrated. Time is arguably the most valuable resource I have. Every extra hour you spend trying to become more skillful is one less hour to "live". The hardest part for me after college was to find this work life balance.
Wow. Out of curiosity - what paper was that?
Anyway, as a middle aged engineer, my advice is to work your ass off when you are young and save a ton of money. Then you won’t be beholden to your employer.
Having a stable home life, emotional health, and a variety of hobbies will stand you in good stead as a programmer in he long run; the end goal of our code is rarely the code itself, and being even partially familiar with the domain (via hobbies) will help improve the output of your coding.
> variety of hobbies
That's the thing though: do people really enjoy passively consuming entertainment? I can't speak for others, but it makes a world of difference when I spend my free time doing things rather than vegging out. Maybe it's just a successful coping strategy I've developed to forget about being depressed.
I also can't help but feel that becoming more passive, and getting wearied by the onslaught of information has not done us any favors as a country. It's hard to articulate, and I'm sure there are other factors, but when people can't be bothered, or are too tired, to take an interest in their civic duties, we end up with dysfunctional government.
I've tried, before, to do things, and my mental state has quickly deteriorated to a worrisome point.
Do I wish I could do things? Absolutely. But my hatred of what I do, and the fact that it's the only real thing I'm good at in a productive sense, means that I've never found another outlet that I can work on and not spend the entirety of the time dwelling on how much I hate it.
So all I do is play games and watch internet videos on my off time. Deep down it crushes me that this is my life, but thus far I've managed to keep that mostly bottled up.
Our survey (size: 1, population: me) says "Yes".
> we end up with dysfunctional government.
Assuming you mean the US, you have a dysfunctional government because it was designed that way and has been gamed quite successfully by the GOP for the last 8-12 years (cf Voting Rights act, gerrymandering, SCOTUS stuffing, etc.)
Considering how long "passive" entertainment has been about, I'm going to have to say Yes.
- Streaming - Podcasts - Television - Radio - Records - Plays - Orchestras - Circuses - Gladiatorial Fights (MMA, Boxing, sword/shields, etc) - Listening to oral stories
And I know I'm just scratching the surface.
> becoming more passive, and getting wearied by the onslaught of information has not done us any favors
The phrase "bread and circuses" didn't come about in our time.
There's an eternal fight between those who the government's policies impact, and those who it doesn't affect (along with a small fringe group who get involved regardless). The affected have always, and probably will always, lament the laziness of the unaffected.
Yes! But what kind of entertainment? And how "passively"? Is reading a hard sci-fi novel or watching Black Mirror "passive", when it makes you question the nature of reality?
I wouldn't dare diagnose anyone but I can tell you from experience this is often what it is. My father for example is a highly depressed person, if he stops for any length of time to dwell on things he falls deeply into a deep depression. As a result he's learned how to add additions to the house, do his own roofing, build decks, fix his own vehicles.
He has a 1500 sq ft barn filled to the brim with tools and tractors that he uses regularly. He was a software engineer before retirement and taught himself how to use all this stuff.
He jokes about all the money he's saved doing these things for himself but I helped him inventory all his things and he's roughly spent 2x as much on tools and toys than he would have had he just hired a contractor. That depressed him until I explained that the gain he got from doing it himself off set that. Honestly, the man isn't happy unless his hands are cut up and dirty.
The more short term effects are better work management. If you're not constantly worried about what's going on at home, because you've had time to take care of said problems or projects, then you can more readily focus on what's happening at your job.
- http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2015/09/04/the-fisherman-and-the-...
I want the simple life with the friends and the guitar around the fire ... but in this individualistic society I need to be able to feed, clothe, and house myself and those in my care until I fall over dead. Which is, incidentally, long after I'm capable of doing those things aaaaaand raise my kids to give them the best chance of doing the same.
Carpe diem alternately seems like a beautiful dream or offensively irresponsible foolishness.
I must be the ant... so that those in my care may be the grasshopper.
There's the tough part. Money buys houses in good school districts (or a spot in a private school) which buys fewer highly-disruptive peers, a much better worst-probable-outcome for available peer groups, and a safer (=less stressful) environment. It's hard to live on the cheap housing-wise with kids, since housing costs are a proxy for school/peer quality, and housing's a big percentage of one's spending. Plus it's harder to find housing in good school districts with enough space for more than ~1 kid in car-free commuting range of business districts in most cities, et c., et c. Harder to achieve that paid-off house which is so very important to early retirement. Plus, you've really got to maintain decent health insurance, which in the US means steady employment with a somewhat stable company.
Then you're both working because you need that money to cover the higher priced housing without risking rapid homelessness in the case of a layoff, but now whichever of you's lower-paid and might otherwise stay home is probably working around or below minimum wage, effectively, because child care is so damn expensive.
Whole thing seems like a trap designed to eat all your money. Having three kids took us from "will probably retire very comfortably by age 50, without even having to try that hard" to "will very likely never retire".
I think this might be a myth. This is anecdotal but my experience is that the "rich kids" have just as many problems as the poor ones. They just receive less scrutiny unless they are public figures.
I grew up in a middle class area outside SV. The supposedly rich kids were often just as messed up as the poor ones. Its like the stereotypical "Preachers Kid."
It doesn't matter how good the school is, if the home environment is a living hell.
I also question this as well "We believe there’s a straight line from where you are to where you want to be." - ultimately most of the reasons I've quit something is because of not thinking like this. Usually I'm an optimist around most endeavours in life, but giving up on something is usually because I perceive the path to be even more winding and hard than it could actually be, not because I thought it was easy and was surprised.
Quitting, in a number of instances, is the logical choice.
> Sensing skepticism from the fisherman, the businessman moves onto the next boat and finds a more receptive fisherman. The two, sensing an obvious business opportunity, decide to go into business together. They raise a venture capital round and a year later, return to the pier outfitted with a dozen high tech fishing boats.
> Immediately, the price of tuna at the pier drops threefold with increased supply, forcing the young Mexican fisherman to increase his hours at sea just to maintain his existing standard of living.
> Shortly thereafter, all of the shallow water tuna have been caught and the young Mexican fisherman discovers his tiny boat is incapable of deep water fishing. Because of his limited savings, he does not have enough capital to invest in a deep water fishing boat and he is forced to sell his tiny fishing boat for pennies on the dollar as scrap because advances in technology have made it obsolete.
> After discovering that there is limited demand for an employee whose only skills are watching ballgames, playing the guitar and taking siestas, the young Mexican fisherman finds his only option is to take a job working minimum wage on one of the businessman’s fishing vessels.
> Several years later, the fisherman’s joints are shot through from the hard manual labor of operating on a commercial fishing vessel and an ill timed lift of a 150lb pallet of tuna finally causes his back to give way, causing permanent crippling. The fisherman discovers intensive lobbying from the businessman has weakened workplace protection rules and the fisherman is summarily let go with only a paltry settlement.
> After years of expensive medical treatments and crippling bills, the fisherman is finally forced to sell his land, passed along to him from generation to generation, to a development conglomerate run by the businessman who is buying large tracts of the entire village.
> Unbeknownst to the fisherman, the businessman has lobbied for the village to turn into a protected nature reserve, allowing for the rehabilitation of the environment and the restocking of fish in it’s pristine waters. The businessman painstakingly recreates the quaint, costal charm of the village he once visited, making it a paradise where the wealthy flock to when they want to retire into a life of easy indolence.
> Finally, 15 – 20 years after the original conversation, the fisherman and his wife are found dead in a homeless shelter. Meanwhile, the businessman retires to the village having made two successive fortunes first in fisheries and then in real estate development. He spends his days sleeping late, playing with his grandchildren, watching high def ESPN ballgames on a 70″ TV, and taking siesta with his wife. He occasionally strolls down to the village in the evenings where he regales his fellow millionaires with the story of how he found an unexploited niche in the marketplace and then took full advantage of it to make the fortune that got him to the comfortable retirement he enjoys today.
There is obviously nothing wrong in leisure after work but the alternative can often be better. It can make you more skilled and more successful. It's an investment that reaps awesome benefits in the longer run.
If you read a lot you have developed "taste" for good writing. When you're starting out, just writing something you yourself don't hate can be challenging (if you're honest with yourself). Heck, I re-wrote this comment 3 times before I didn't hate it :-)
I agree that eventually, once you're at a certain level, you need someone reviewing your writing.
There are however way too many people who do this and wonder why they don’t get ahead. With few exceptions successful people spent their 20s hustling and their 30s polishing. Whether that’s lots of hours outside of the office coding, or sharpening social skills/building their network, and learning new skills of some sort.
If someone has relatively the same skillset at 32 that they had at 22, they’re going to have a rough time of it when they start building a life with a partner and have kids/parents to take care of.
Not only that, but it means that if you decide to do something else, you'll feel like it was a moral failure to stop doing what you were doing. So you'll blame yourself, and you won't examine honestly why didn't it work, what was things were out of my control. Learning from the experience is the most valuable part.
I spent close to 10 years on something that didn't succeed. The problem was it didn't fail either, so you just keep telling yourself that it's going to happen one day. Looking back on it objectively it was never going to work.
Take an honest view, don't just sing in the choir of the church of you.
In Agile this would be "fail fast". One of the few things I like about Agile personally.
Something that has worked for me is committing myself to a short amount time doing the thing I don't want to do. I'll tell myself "after 5 minutes, if I still don't want to do this then I'll stop". Nearly always once I start washing the dishes or start a run, I'm happy to finish.
For a good (motivational) read about the definition of grit, who's got it, and why it matters, I recommend Angela Duckworth [link]http://angeladuckworth.com/
The standard advice while doing anything that is that long and stressful, is to try and not quit the next 5 minutes at one time.
But even in the case of Hell week, the worst part is the first 2.5 days. If you can make it till there, you finish the week. The instructors also don't push you to the point of the falling to total exhaustion, they know, if they have seen you hold on for half the time, you will get the remaining done easily.
If I know it's a trick enough to try it, then I know it's a trick enough to see through it.
This isn't "outsmarting" yourself, its simply getting past the hardest part. It's difficult to "get off the couch" if I think I'm committing myself to running 10 miles. But I can easily get off the couch to run for 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, I can quit, or keep going. Sometimes I quit, sometimes I keep going.
It is that simple when you are, say, running an endurance race. Abide "don't quit" and you will finish.
But in real life, you're presented with a continual stream of alternative opportunities.
And these days "I quit" has subtly morphed into "I pivot."
It isn't. If things are starting to cause pain, or bleed, or you're vomiting, or ... there are many sensible reasons to cut short or abandon an endurance race.
> Abide "don't quit" and you will finish.
Or do yourself damage that will take months to recover from.
From my experience, I would say that you wouldn't have been able to continue even if you needed to.
Also, always beware of the spectrum. Some people would say running for 17 hours is impossible. Others would say they shivered uncontrollably at 17 hours and roughed out 3 more hours before dropping. Others still would hit 24 hours and wish they could keep going.
Oh, I know. I was there primarily to support a 100-miler anyway which made the decision a lot easier.
> I would say that you wouldn't have been able to continue even if you needed to.
Yeah, I spent the next couple of hours just slumped under a table trying to get warm and eat food.
My view is that if you start a race healthy, then you are unlikely to do permanent damage to your body during the race. The exceptions are primarily in the category of: "I need to immediately be taken to the ER."
Also, most finishers of a 100 mile race experience pain and vomiting. But each runner has her own experience and there are no hard rules.
(I have run several 100 mile trail races -- about 2 per year -- over the past 10 years)
Note that I didn't say "permanent damage" but "damage that will take months to recover from".
And this is largely from participating in two communities of "extreme" endurance runners (and running with them but not to the same level) who recount their experiences and advice.
It's good that you haven't had any issues but generalising to the wider world is a tricky thing - I know enough people who have attempted 100 milers (even just in 2017) and done damage that took months to recover from to know that it happens.
Well, I'll find out in March. Assuming I don't knacker myself first.
(Although it is somewhat overshadowed by the people I hang around with - one of them is currently on something like his 250th marathon in a rolling calendar year, one has done 800 under 3:30, and most of them do 10x10s as a matter of course.)
1. 100% commitment. An unexpected injury or illness is outside of your control, so don't worry about it.
2. Toe the start line fit, injury-free, and positive.
3. Know that it will hurt.
4. Enjoy the day.
From all the things related to writing I have read, this advice is present in almost every one of them. The recipe sounds simple but it's easy enough to quit with just one rejections. In writing, business, dating or anything that requires effort. If you persist, however, don't take failure personally, it doesn't take long to get better at that.
Unfortunately, most of the time the reward is that you just get to work on even more annoying problems.
But don't persist if it isn't worth it. Which decision should be made independently of personal discomfort.
(Also, in general don't take life advice from 20 something Internet marketers. Why do you clog up the interwebs people? Please quit! Not because it's hard but because volume of SEO junk to sell some coaching books is simply not needed by humanity. Lets improve the quality of the net with original ideas rather than rehashing again and again. Do something worth doing or do not do at all.)
Another collection of pseudointellectual predigested positive platitudes.
Edit: typo
Learning something really knew, means whole black map, blindness, you can only walk randomly and think you hit a white spot but it's only a gray area. Then you have more gray areas but they don't work right yet. After a while you can finely tune the walk and locate the white spots. When you have lots of white spots, you know.
And if you're fast, it's just because you don't have to walk anymore, you can jumpskip right to the appropriate white spot to evaluate a situation or phenomenon.
Its fine to quit when other peoples goals involve using your man-power for their own gain and you see less and less reason to continue being a part of it.
"Endings:The Good Cannot Begin Until the Bad Ends"
Sometimes you have to quit the bad or good so that you can start the good or better.
― Ellen Goodman
Given that imagined goal = real, it is pretty easy to not quit. Hard part is, complex goals are often just a mirage.
Know when to keep going, but more importantly, know when to quit. Not knowing when to quit is how you go bankrupt, die, and/or cause other people to do either.
Just like Darius's post, actually following up and quitting didn't make me happier. Rather, worse. There's a honeymoon period, but soon I disliked the new thing, and wanted to go back to the old thing.
Deep down, it turns out this is a symptom of not loving myself and being happy with who I am - and feelings of neglect, shame, and guilt from childhood.
I seek new jobs, experiences, friends, and relationships because I think that will make me content - but that's flawed as you will never love anything until you love yourself; and surprisingly my empty self identity is the cause of hating programming, or hating product management, or hating my work.
Other symptoms of BPD are seeing things in black and white ('splitting'), wide emotional swings, intense fears of detachment, chronic feelings of emptiness, and more. Those are usually traced to childhood abandonment; whether it's losing parents, moving countries, or a troublesome upbringing.
If any of this sounds like you, I'd suggest looking more into BPD. There's a book called "I hate you, don't leave me"; that while not perfect and critiqued in some areas, is a great explanation of BPD. But also, don't self-diagnose; don't think you have BPD just because you want to quit.