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Comment by andrewstuart | Hacker News Reader

I want my kids to be ordinary, middle of the road, happy kids.

Not famous, not super incredible, not mega successful. Just normal urban kids.

If they're happy and find their own purpose in life that's all I could hope for.

As an ordinary, middle of the road, adult, I wish my parents pushed me harder. Sure, I can do it myself now, but after 20+ years of building habits, it's very hard to change track, and so far I've been unsuccessful.

Basically I have the desire to do "more", but lack the mental and emotional skillsets to be able to execute.

Mental and emotional skill sets can be improved.

What do you want to accomplish that you aren't accomplishing? What seems to be the holdup?

I'm sure plenty of people here can point you in the right direction to dramatically up your game in relatively short order (possibly including me).

> What seems to be the holdup?

Primary issue is my lack of self-discipline to be able to override desires for short-term pleasures.

"Lack of self discipline" is very often code for one of two things:

1. Unidentified problems, such as minor health issues.

2. A signifier of being Twice Exceptional, which I highly recommend you read up on because average performance that the individual finds frustrating while longing to do greater things is a standard hallmark of being 2e.

Some resources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twice_exceptional

https://www.hoagiesgifted.org/twice_exceptional.htm

I raised and homeschooled two Twice Exceptional sons. One was a B student. The other made straight As. The B student has both a higher IQ and a lot more handicaps/other issues.

I briefly did pro bono work for The TAG Project: http://www.tagfam.org/

Thanks for the reply

> 1. Unidentified problems, such as minor health issues.

What kind of minor health issues? Physical or mental?

> 2. 2e

I really don't think I fit in this area, just one example being because it's not

> average performance

that's my problem, because when I do something when I put in any amount of "effort", I nail it. The only time my performance is average, is when I don't do any work and just throw something together last second because I spent all my time playing video games.

The problem, of course, is that I find the majority of things I do fall into that latter camp where I can't muster the drive to put in effort.

Any number of things can trip one up if they haven't been identified, so aren't being proactively managed. It could be as simple as "I have allergies and I don't know it, so I can't connect the dots that when I do X, I am exposed to something I am mildly allergic to and then I accomplish a whole fat lot of nothing."

The problem, of course, is that I find the majority of things I do fall into that latter camp where I can't muster the drive to put in effort.

Please just start reading the resources I pointed you to.

There's also this, which I am the author of, though there isn't much there currently: https://raisingfutureadults.blogspot.com/

Read Deep Work by Cal Newport. I’ve had problems my entire life up until the past year with self-discipline and bad habits. This book, among other factors, flipped a switch for me.

Other key factors were finding things in life that are worth the short term sacrifice for long term fulfillment. Surround yourself with ambitious folks. I’ve been the degenerate binge- watching Netflix till 5am, skipping college classes etc. And still have days almost that bad, but full-time employment changes people. Build good habits, adopt a growth mindset and we all can do it. Oh and sleep is extremely important. If I get less than 7 hours, I don’t have enough mental stamina and end up succumbing to all the short term desires.

How old are you? In the same way that most teenagers enjoy playing video games more than doing work, most people in their 30s enjoy doing work more than playing video games. If you're only in your 20s or early 30s then at some point your brain may just flip on its own.

Is that because they stopped playing video games or because they were part of a generation where it just wasn't as common? My brain never did that flip (though I don't mind work so much). I kind of expect to see video games start appearing in nursing homes around the time I have to go to one.

As an anecdata, I played games heavily as a kid, until my early 20s. I didn't stop completely, and I wouldn't say I enjoy working more, but I prefer many other things before I reach for a controller/mouse+kb. I don't know if the brain flip is accurate as it makes it sound sudden, but for me I just developed more interests all of which fight for ever-shrinking time.

I'm the same way; from ages ~5-21 or so, I played video games almost-daily, but now I tend to keep myself entertained by programming something...not necessarily for my employer, but also not necessarily not for my employer.

I can't quite tell if it's because I like programming more, or if it's because as I get older, I have trouble justifying stuff that I know won't help with monetary or intellectual fulfillment.

I think this is accurate. As you get older it’s more obvious that video games are kind of an artificial happiness, similar to doing mushrooms or something. It’s not that they’re not fun per se, but it’s hard to actually feel good about spending lots of time doing something that’s not going to contribute to your long term wellbeing.

Almost everything we do is technically artificial happiness, it just matters how personally satisfied you are with what you do for entertainment.

I don't think it really has anything to do with recognizing something as being artificial happiness. It just has to do with change. There are speedrunners who code for a living, come home and compete for the fastest times on any number of games, spend their time attending things like AGDQ or contributing to the various micro communities within the scene.

I think people tend to fall into either passive or proactive mindsets for their hobbies. And it's a sort of spectrum over time influenced by the communities you belong to. If you're part of a community for your hobby, then you get more out of it due to community momentum. Sort of like the person who plays games to relax after work, versus the person participating in a speedrunning community for a specific game.

Among other things, today's technology is simply not good enough to enable learning to show what wonders one may (with time and effort) achieve.

Fair, and kids have made it very difficult to play games. As have other hobbies, reading sometimes takes priority, etc. So maybe I'm similar. I still enjoy a good game every once in a while though and go through phases.

I would say that I don't get addicted like I used to when I was a teen. I've often attributed that to realizing it was a destructive behavior and learning from it though. If I had more time, I would probably play more though.

I played a lot of games as a kid, more than my peers. I still enjoy games, but I don't get much time to play them anymore. I have kids now, that takes a lot of time. As I've got older I've found other fun things that take my limited time too. It all adds up to my Xbox360 (remember those? It was last system I bought years ago) is sitting in a box in hopes that someday I can finish the games I started but never mastered.

There are already video game systems in nursing homes. They don't have much 3d shooters, but wii bowling is popular (or it was 2 years ago, since my grandma died I haven't had reason to visit).

I do enjoy my job, but I'd get burnt out doing it much more than I do.

There's a good discussion of research on this topic here [0]. My personal anecdata was: there was flip and it came when I didn't spend enough time playing to be competitive at multiplayer games.

[0] https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/01/tales-of-an-aging-gam...

I used to play games a lot as a teenager. Then I got more into creating rather than consuming, and now, I just have no desire to play any type of computer game at all.

I even try to play games occasionally because the idea is still somewhere in my brain that it would be fun and relaxing. I even usually overbuild my workstations to handle AAA games thinking I might just play one this year.

But they just don't hold my interest anymore. I don't really know why. That endorphin hit when playing just doesn't happen like it used to.

I'm 27 and so far, the older I've gotten the less desire I have to do work that needs to be done.

Interesting. I'm the same way in the first regard. 27 y/o for reference. I always wished my parents had pushed a bit harder, but now I live in Irvine (SoCal) where everyone here is busy trying to push their children to prodigy-dom. I get an intense window into this because my partner is a private piano teacher and I have to say, I'm quite thankful they never pushed me like _that_. There's definitely a middle road and as a parent of two, I can empathize with this being somewhat difficult to nail.

I spent a lot of time feeling like you, wanting more but not executing. That said, I have been pretty successful in the last two years, learning those things on my own. I learned/am learning how to be a very proficient dev, play classical guitar, snowboard, dive, and surf decently, and even now fly planes. I'm not the best but enough for some serious personal enjoyment. For me it was the catalyst of flipping my world upside down, moving far away and starting over. Drop me a line if you ever want, maybe I can offer some assistance.

I'm the same age, and I agree, I am NOT saying that I wanted to be a child prodigy, but I wish there was a bit more push than the Laissez-Faire I got.

I've thought about

> flipping my world upside down, moving far away and starting over

but I have too many good people in my life where I am to do this, even if it means sacrificing ambitions. Note that these are good people who inspire me to do better, but that inspiration fades when push actually comes to shove.

Parents don't push kids. Kids push themselves. I was an EE/CS professor at a top 20 school. The only push was the example my parents set, as far back as 2nd grade. They never asked me to do my homework, work harder in school, or get better grades.

> Parents don't push kids.

Yes, they (often) do. With positive or negative effects depending on the approach and how well it is adapted to the kid.

> Kids push themselves.

Yes, they often do. The two are not mutually exclusive.

> I was an EE/CS professor at a top 20 school. The only push was the example my parents set, as far back as 2nd grade.

Yes, parental modelling is a powerful mechanism for influencing childhood behavior and, while it's not the only tool in the kit, by itself a powerful rebuttal to your first claim.

> I wish my parents pushed me harder.

Think twice about what you wish for. Parents pushing kids hard are not a panacea, and you might not have gotten as far in life if your parents were like that.

> Basically I have the desire to do "more", but lack the mental and emotional skillsets to be able to execute.

FWIW what usually holds people back isn't what their parents did or the education they received at school. Rather, it is the importance they put on their parents' eyes and on their peers' eyes. Just move on and do.

We just had a discussion with our kids yesterday about this, when I explained that the pat answer I tend to give them when they ask "can I..." before they've earned it, of "anything is possible if you try hard enough and believe in yourself" is actually flat wrong.

Not everyone is good at everything, or even can become good at anything. Not everyone is built for every type of job or career or vocation. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses, and we must all accept both of these aspects of ourselves.

I told them that I had decided some 15 years ago that I am intelligent and capable enough to go to Harvard, so therefore I should go, and that within hours of making that decision, I realized that it was the stupidest idea that had no basis in reality, so I never even applied.

The point I was trying to teach them was that what a person will become in 5 or 10 years is opaque to them now, and that time will reveal it, so that instead they should just focus on living now correctly, practicing discerning what they should and should not do, and focus entirely on that.

They might be a CEO or POTUS, or they might be a janitor of a broken down gas station. Every role is needed in life and someone is meant to fulfill every role. Greatness doesn't lie in what career you have, what college degree you have, how much you make, how many people know you, how many books you've written, how young you learned this or that skill.

EDIT: To clarify, I'm not saying that one should settle for a vocation that wastes their natural abilities. If I were to try providing for my family by being a janitor, I would be wasting the software talents that I cultivated into skills.

Not to come off as offering parenting advice, but how old are your kids? Not everyone can become Bill Gates or Usain Bolt, but for healthy individuals above a certain level of intelligence, passion and grit determine success more so than inherent characteristics. I wanted to be a lot of things growing up, and only through pursuing those dreams did I understand that I wasn't cut out for them, or didn't find them super interesting.

I wonder passion and grit aren't also inherent characteristics. Or, at the least, wondering if a ceiling on these traits is inherent.

The ceiling on those traits could be modulated by random factors, and if so, you might never be able to tell.

And if they're rich enough to be able to retire young while buying everything they want, even better.

Why do you want them to be urban in particular?

Why did this simple, unassuming question get downvoted I wonder? Interesting to see that there is a negative connotation associated with questioning an urban life.

They are urban kids. The parent wants them to be normal.

He was not expressing a judgement about kids who are not urban. The question about an urban bias seems hyper defensive and inappropriate in response to a very personal wish.

It's just an expression of the ordinary.

What I mean is - it's up to them what they want to be.

I don't see fame or being incredible as valuable things to pursue.

Solid human relationships, kindness, satisfaction in work - these are the things that matter.

Doesn't mean that pursuing financial success isn't valuable and worthwhile - as long as that's what you want.

> Solid human relationships, kindness, satisfaction in work - these are the things that matter.

You can get all these things in rural communities as well.

Yeah, but what do they want to be?

I sense a prejudice towards the bucolic.

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