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Comment by thiago_fm | Hacker News Reader

might be good to be pg and have plenty of time to spenD with its own kid, after doing a phd in one of the most expensive colleges in the US, selling a company for tons of money, creating a extremely successful incubator

i used to enjoy his essays for a long time, til i started to see how out of the world of most people even the basic stuff he writes there -- he is able to afford to spend time doing stuff nobody can, then it's kinda of easy to be successful at whatever he does.

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I feel like this depends on your priorities. Growing up, my mom was super busy acting as a single parent much of the time - waking us up, taking us to school, going to teach, picking us up, cooking dinner, cleaning the house, etc. And yet we had a lot of good, quality time with her in the moments in between and on the weekend and summers and so on.

She didn't go to an expensive college, own a company, make tons of money, or anything of that sort. But she wanted to spend time with us and so she found ways to do that. Of course, I think she's a very strong and smart woman and I've wondered if I could do the same; but I see more and more examples of this every day from people who follow similar guidelines as what PG recommends. If you have an achievable goal (I think spending time with kids can qualify as such depending on the circumstances) and you try to cut out the bullshit along the way, it can be done.

you don't need to be a genius to discover that. your mom did, just like mine, and father, working a lot, whenever they had time left off the day(which was rare), they would spent time with me or my brother. and this is the same for a lot of middle-class or any class individual.

for really 90% of the parents I know, they would love to have more time to spend with their kids, and it is usually their top priority, it just that they can't

ofc, that's because they didn't go to stanford or sold their company. in the economy of nowadays, you can only get rich if you do this in the US(in the tech sector), or is born rich. with to me, he got actually both

this advice in the essay is as good as you can get if you talk with a random person, yet, people admire it and 'PG recommends' it just because he has plenty of money and is some kind of geek inspiration.

this is very interesting, whenever he is talking about a random subject which isn't startups for very priviledged people, you can see that his 'wisdom' goes as far as what your neighbour probably also know

yet

that's so smart

I find it rather depressing how you got downvoted. That PG is speaking from a privileged background is kind of obvious, even if there isn't necessarily anything wrong with that. But most people don't get to manage their time much.

I don't know much about PG except what's been mentioned here, but I do know that I don't come from a privileged background and yet his article still was useful to me in reevaluating my current priorities.

Additionally, I would reiterate that I think this could indeed be applicable to many people. PG's example of a time-waster, "arguing online," could easily be substituted with "watching TV" and then apply to the average household in America. For example, if my dad had done like my mom and tried to reduce bullshit, he wouldn't have been an alcoholic who was either working or watching TV and never spending time with us.

I got actually +20... but on HN, the algorithm is probably some intern deciding on which posts go first and which ones go last. There is a lot of cases of people speaking around the web how HN is manipulated.

> he is able to afford to spend time doing stuff nobody can, then it's kinda of easy to be successful at whatever he does

I don't think that's fair to say (and I know I'm "arguing on the Internet" here... bad!). After cashing out for FU money, it's much harder than before to put in 100 hours/week and "invest" your own health in order to succeed at something against the odds. Money can't replace everything, especially not dedicated founder time. It's also much harder to see a point in proving yourself again. I know it's an unpopular opinion with many people, but it's been like that for me and other successful founders I've talked to.

What's easy is to make more money from money using proven methods (strictly not "whatever he does"). VC is not rocket science and pg is simply smarter than many others in the field, so he is fairly successful at it.

Yeah this stuff does not work for most people. Still, cutting out the bullshit is great advice.

Yeah, but it's kind of bullshit advice, too. It's not specific enough. "Unnecessary meetings" - how do you know for sure it's unnecessary? Etc.

I'm guessing with experience? When you've had a dozen of the same meetings or "emergencies", you tend to know which ones are actual bullshit.

Well, then you would most likely not take them even without this advice, hence my point the advice is not very useful.

You know its unnecessary if the meeting can start without you.

You know it's unnecessary if you didn't have to say a word during the meeting.

This reminds me of Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs.[1]

It has often been described as a pyramid, with physiological needs at the bottom, and self-actualization (or maybe self-transcendence) at the top. The full heirarchy is:

  - Self-transcendence
  - Self-actualization
  - Esteem
  - Social belonging
  - Safety needs
  - Physiological needs

It's difficult for the higher needs to matter much when one hasn't fulfilled the lower ones.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_heirarchy_of_needs

I don't really think this is correct.

People who have issues getting basic needs met are just unlikely to also get their higher needs met. But I the misunderstanding of needs is also why people do things like smoke and drink and people from more healthy backgrounds don't understand why.

And people have been known to forgo comfort for causes. The basic things matter because without them you will often be in danger, but they don't necessarily matter psychologically.

I think self-actualization, i.e., some degree of mattering, some degree of respect, is important to pretty much everyone, it's just that if you are lacking food and shelter you're also probably having trouble finding a purpose, as well.

It sounds like you feel happiness only occurs when you have money. That will be true if your happiness can be purchased. Happiness is not the sole domain of billionaires (I'd almost assume the opposite). Regardless of income or financial standing, we all have the same amount of time in the present - spend it more on the things that you value most.

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