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Comment by thelettere | Hacker News Reader

The notion that one has to take care of one's "needs" before pursuing anything "higher" is a lie and an excuse. The number of great intellectuals and writers who lived at least a portion of their lives - and often more - in absolute penury is testament to this. Einstein for example nearly died of starvation, yet he kept working.

One could make an argument that it is because of real world difficulties that one is able to do great work. What did Jesus say about the rich man and the kingdom of heaven? The times in my life when I've lived on the edges are the ones that have laid the groundwork for everything worthwhile I've done in my life. Success and comfort too often bring stupor and cowardice, and not worthy ambition.

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Those people are the exceptions.

The vast majority of people, if hungry, will have their next meal as their highest priority.

How will you know which one you are - or which one you could become - if you don't try it?

Although the very idea of "trying it" like one tries on a pair of pants is absurd. Either a people has the moral fortitude to recognize and live that there are things more important than mere survival or it doesn't.

And if it doesn't, ironically we're already fucked.

Worth pointing out that Starbucks and restaurants around Hollywood are staffed by actor-wannabes hoping for a big break in the movie industry, many of whom never end up amounting to anything. On another corner of the spectrum, you get Paris Hilton, who frankly doesn't have to put effort into anything she tries.

Point being, depending on who "you" are and what "it" is, the advice of "why don't you just go for it, everything else be damned" may or may not be callous/tone deaf/etc.

Maybe being a waitress is not the worst thing in the world? Billions of people can only dream of being a waiter/waitress in LA, and the lifestyle that goes with it.

You need to look at things relative to something that makes sense in the context of the conversation. Obviously, it's better to be a barista in LA than a starving kid in a war zone, but the context here is that we're talking about people who want to be famous actors and can't, so they take on minimum wage jobs to survive until eventually bitter disillusionment hits.

These people are victims of today's culture, which glamorizes wealth and fame above all else... Before they realize that they've been duped, they waste many years of their lives.

Startup culture is similar BTW - people who take moonshots to try and become obscenely rich, only to realize (if they're in the tiny minority that succeeds) that having so much wealth is not really making much of a change in their life and they've spent important years of their lives focusing on stuff that's not important (see Notch's wailing on Twitter for an example of that realization).

Shoutout to the Slavic Homie Nikola Tesla, was one of the greatest inventors of all time but died in poverty.

> Einstein for example nearly died of starvation, yet he kept working.

Citation needed. I'm unable to find any sources that back this up.

Einstein was known as a mathematical GENIUS far beyond his years, even as a young person.

Einstein is, in fact, a counter example. He was working at the patent office as a 'technical examiner' for seven years, including throughout his 'annus mirabilis' when he released his most famous papers.

Mentioned here: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7935078/

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