You should feel guilty for over-sleeping; or, my generation is full of sissies.
thejoeconwayblog.wordpress.com
thejoeconwayblog.wordpress.com
Joe Conway, you said in your post that "every single one of your actions is controllable". If you truly believe this, you should demonstrate it by controlling your impulse to be an asshole.
If you can adjust to those things, you can adjust your "normal" sleep cycle and you don't have this rare condition.
The reason you have a hard time getting up "early" is that you go to sleep too late. Just go to sleep an hour earlier than "normal". Too hard? Impossible? If that's so, how do you do it every year when we go off DST?
That said, it's not about going to bed earlier, at least for me. You can't solve it that way. What you have to do is stay up later and later, and eventually loop over to a 'normal' time. This involves several days of non-traditional sleeping hours or extreme exhaustion.
For reference, according to http://www.end-your-sleep-deprivation.com/delayed-sleep-phas... these are the official criteria for diagnosing Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome:
1. Patient has chronic difficulty falling asleep at desired time to meet their daily schedules - work, school, etc. Typically patient reports inability to sleep before 2 to 6 am.
2. The patient reports having dealt with these symptoms for at least six months, mostly for multiple years.
3 When not required to maintain their schedule--i.e. weekends, holidays, etc.--patient sleeps without difficulty, and will awaken spontaneously after a sleep period of normal length.
I don't feel guilty for over-sleeping. I've worked out a life for myself where people don't care that I sleep until 11:00. I simply don't schedule meetings or appointments for the morning, or if there's absolutely one that can't be avoided, I go to bed early and set an alarm clock to wake up for it.
It is not being a sissy to know your limitations and preferences and to work around them. If you make a commitment to another person, you should keep it. But nobody is forcing you to make that commitment in the first place. Is it really impossible to schedule that meeting in the afternoon, or to not have it at all?
It's not the OPs place to say what sort of sleep habits other people should or should not have. If he finds them annoying, fine: don't work with them.
When saying "If you make a commitment to another person, you should keep it." I see you as being in agreement with the post I just read.
If you recognize that this is a real problem, you can take steps to fix it. Things like shifting your schedule or regulating blue light. Not just "don't be lazy" or "get off Reddit", that sort of attitude doesn't help.
The original referenced material doesn't talk about making excuses. He talks about managing a real physical condition so that you don't miss meetings and don't have to make excuses. It's about understanding that having that condition doesn't make you lazy or a lesser person.
The author's point is that many people with this "disorder" continue to make commitments they cannot keep. It is Jason Freedman who says "The one who can’t seem to consistently set the alarm clock for A.M. and not P.M. I know how it feels to be the undependable one."
If you are consciously aware of this, yet continue to make these commitments - then the author I believe argues you are a "lazy", "sissy."
But in order to get there, you should understand yourself and work with who you are. If a label like "delayed sleep phase syndrome" helps you manage your life, use it. Either set good expectations with your team, or set up systems to help you out.
The ass-kicking rhetoric of this post is true, as far as it goes. For some people, this sort of wake-up call is exactly what they need. But for many people, "just do it" is not a useful message. Feeling guilty is useful if it kicks you into action - but too much and it just holds you down, preventing you from making progress.
I mean, I hate mornings as much as the next person, and have slept through a decent number of events. Yet still, when I had kids and had to get up for a crying baby or to change a diaper, I Just Did It, and didn't feel the need to blog about whether I should feel "guilty" about it.
I mean, really: don't we have more important things to argue about? Isn't there a new Javascript rendering abstraction layer or something?
I've lost jobs over it, relationships, all sorts of fairly major personal issues.
My point is that there are solutions that enable people to fix this problem, if they are so inclined. This sort of excoriating article disregards the real pain people experience, and the other sort of article disregards the real issues that 'just never do anything in the morning and don't try to adapt' causes.
Whoa, melatonin makes you dream? Sounds interesting. I can count on one hand the number of dreams I'm aware of having over the past 10 years.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/242769.php
I often wonder if similar treatment could improve empathy across the board.
I am not sick, I don't have any syndrome.
I have no trouble keeping my commitments, even if they entail being somewhere at 7am or partaking in the standardized work day. Getting up "early" and forcing my self to sleep before it's time is not optimal for my functioning, however. I fail to see how doing something sub-optimal is supposed to be a sign of heroism.
Joe Conway asserts that nobody functions well within the Standardized Sleep Cycle, which is simply wrong factually but more importantly if he actually believes this nonsense it's mind-bendingly malicious of him to advocate something that has no upside just because it's more macho.
To the douchebag author: Having a different sleep rhythm does not mean someone is a sissy. It doesn't mean they're lazy or unable to keep appointments. Your whole post is a huge straw man argument, and it's unpleasant to read due to you being so full of yourself.
Let me close this comment in my time-honored tradition of pissing off both sides equally: I think those fuzzy syndromes and disorders are bullshit. Humans are diverse, we're not as standardized as evolutionary psychologists would have everyone believe. Stop trying to be "normal", stop trying to make others "normal". Being "not normal" is not by itself a disorder or acronym-worthy.
Having a different default circadian rhythm does not mean you're sick. Nor does calling people sissies make you more manly, but that's for a different discussion.
That isn't an excuse to stop trying—there are things you can do that often help: a combination of correctly timed melatonin and light therapy can shift your circadian rhythm back towards normal. Nonetheless, it's an actual medical condition.
To everyone else: if you think you have this problem, do something about it. There's a healthy chance you can fix it.
Nope! I regularly spring out of bed feeling wide awake, well rested and ready to start the day a good hour or two before I need to get up to get to work on time, and that time immediately after waking up in the morning is often my favorite part of the day.
Of course, the flipside of this is that I'm often ready to pass out by 9 PM.
If you're in a coma, is that your fault? If you have narcolepsy, is it your fault? If you wake up having hit a snooze button that you didn't consciously push, is that your fault? If you have a medical condition that makes it harder for you to wake up than for 99.8% of the population, is that your fault? There's a line somewhere, and I don't think the author of the original article crossed it.
Note, I was in and out of specialist children's hospitals for a good year or two while doctors tried to diagnose the reason my brain works differently to theirs. I have a certain set of psychological challenges I have to overcome, but I don't sit around whining about it all day.
Even the original article didn't do that. The author lists several steps he took to improve his condition. He just wanted people to avoid useless guilt, he didn't give them a free pass.
She was so relieved simply to know that she didn’t have a problem; or more specifically, she was relieved to know that her problem was real. For she had gone all these years thinking that she was just lazy.
For all of those of you out there suffering under the weight of your inability to wake up early each morning, consider this one giant pardon.
the post comes off as one giant "it's ok to put your hand up and say 'I have a named medical condition so can I be excused from class'". That could just be my biased interpretation though as I've come across such a mindset before and tend to react very angrily to it. If that's not the message at all then consider my rant misplaced.
Possibly.. why are you in a coma?
It seems like you're pulling out all the stops to avoid the uncomfortable point: the vast, vast majority of us are normal and don't have a convenient excuse for our poor sleep habits.
>If you wake up having hit a snooze button that you didn't consciously push, is that your fault?
Absolutely. 1000%. Move your alarm. Hide it. Make it not turn off until you do math problems. Have a friend call you. Set your computer to set off such an unholy alarm that your neighbors will hear. Buy one of those alarm helicopters that flies around the room until you catch it. Do what you have to do.
It is your responsibility and yours alone to wake up early enough to meet the obligations that you made for yourself.
Period.
For myself? Sure. But why should I feel beholden to other people's schedules like the article says?
All this author is saying is that if you CHOOSE to make commitments and then fail to honor them, you're not an awful person, but yes you should feel guilty for that. On that, I agree.
Otherwise a good rant.
edit: credit also to Babbage and Lovelace (also English)
Not to invalid your point, just that its quibbles all the way down.
Turing is the Babe Ruth, Wayne Gretzky, and Michael Jordan of computer science.
Plus, attacking other people as lazy doesn't mean you yourself have to put in the work to familiarize yourself with history before making historical claims. Going to the library is too hard for my generation.
HN is actually quite good on technical issues. People disagree, but it's rarely completely idiotic. There is smart stuff, and information is exchanged, and the overall level of debate is good.
But on philosophical issues, it's frankly not very good. There is a lot of knee-jerk bigotry. I mean this post leads by calling people "sissies", a clearly homophobic term. It also has a complete disinterest in science, and is longer on trolling and provocation than reason or intelligence. It worked. Got to #1 on HN!
Simple sound-bites, strong opinions, and posts that I can only really describe as in the "lifehacking" genre on the one hand, or the "political/social provocation" genre on the other hand, are what's the worst about HN. These are usually embarrassing at best. And in the best case they get flagged off the front page. The moderators are also clearly worried, because provocative titles often get changed, which sometimes leads to the posts fizzling without being flagged. Reduces damage, at least.
Anyway, as you say, time for a break. I'm sick of Joe Conway and his ilk of arrogant, ignorant assholes. Before chiding other people for being lazy, maybe these ignorant fucks should get off their asses and visit a library. They aren't stupid, but they're ignorant. Science and intelligence is about more than blogging whatever comes to the top of your head after 10 minutes of thought. You need to read. You need to think a bit about whether the first reaction that comes to mind is correct: is this really the position you want to write a manifesto about? Do you have data to support your contention that an alleged condition is imagined and actually the people are just lazy losers, and "suck it up" is a good prescription? Or are you just expressing a reactionary, right-wing political view borne more out of politics and prejudice than rationality and evidence?
It was used when I was a kid too. But when I was a kid, people also used the words "Jewed" and "Gypped" to mean "got ripped off", and "gay" to mean "bad". In retrospect those those were all... not so good. And now I'm an adult who is capable of reading and gaining knowledge about such things.
If this post was written 40 years ago it would be directed at women telling them they actually have it pretty good. Hmm wait I actually saw that same thing just the other day.
These ignorant arrogant people need to figure out why they don't have even a smidgen of empathy and quit blaming us for being "bleeding hearts".
Says the poster who singularly fails to address any of the points made by the OP, choosing instead to engage in ad hominem attacks.
Stop posturing and heed your own advice.
sissies plural of sis·sy (Noun)
Noun
derogatory. A person regarded as effeminate or cowardly.
derogatory. An effeminate homosexual.
> We used to value hard work. It was the cornerstone of our society. We invented computing, the telephone, the automobile and modern medicine. We invaded Normandy. We traveled to the moon.
Sounds like history was invented in the US too, by Joe Conway. Computing was invented by Alan Turing (incidentally a gay man) or Chales Babbage, both of which are from Britain. The telephone was incrementally invented by many people, some of them from the US but most not [1]. In particular, Graham Bell was born in Britain, lived in Canada, then in the US, and then again in Canada. The automobile was invented by Ferdinand Verbiest from Belgium. Modern medicine was invented by (among many others) Louis Pasteur, a Frenchman. Most of the troops in the invasion of Normandy were not from the US. The first spacecraft to the moon was from the Soviet Union.
The rest of the post isn't any better.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_of_the_telephone
If trying like hell not to have to wake up early in the morning makes someone a sissy, then I'm the king of sissies.
This reminds me of a quote from Crowfoot, once a chief of the Blackfoot tribe:
"What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the winter time. It is as the little shadow that runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset."
Life's short. Enjoy it. If that means not waking up at a certain time, then don't. But, also, don't complain when you have to deal with the consequences.
* Do you actually get enough sleep? Can you show when you actually went to bed and when you got back out?
* Do you avoid bright, blue lights (e.g. florescent bulbs or monitors without Flux) close to bed time?
* Do you have a ritual of some kind that gets your mind and body ready for bed?
* Have you had an actual sleep study checking for sleep apnea?
* Does your diet or other factors give you heartburn or other physiological sleep interrupts?
If you can devote 1-3 weeks to checking one of these at a time, that can address a lot of sleep issues.
He's not saying "it's not your fault." He's saying you have a real medical condition that needs to be treated. He also points out how to treat it and manage the condition, so that people will not continue to have their oversleeping issues.
What you're saying in response amounts to telling a person with depression that they're a buzz kill and should just cheer up.
People need to understand that chemicals play a huge part of how our body functions, and that not everyone has the same chemistry going on in their bodies. These chemical abnormalities can have a huge impact on your life and show up under a wide range of different conditions - depression, anxiety, bi-polar, ADHD, etc. These are real conditions caused by real physical things and, just because you can't see them as obviously as a broken arm, doesn't mean they're not real.
Your ignorance and lack of understanding isn't a virtue. It's not something to be proud of. Educate yourself.
And I welcome this change with open arms. Hard work in itself is not a goal and shouldn't be treated as such.
Don't eat a late dinner. Eat before 7 pm. Go to bed between 9.30 and 10.30 pm. If you want, use the time before second sleep[1] to catch up on reading. Get up when your alarm rings at 6 am. Every damn day.
These are all points you certainly can control yourself.
People like the OP are the reason we can't have nice things.
If you believe that life should be hard, then you are welcome to make things hard for yourself. Personally, when something is hard, I treat that as a problem to be solved so that living a good life is as easy as possible. I think my approach will be more fruitful in the end, but hey, it's your life.
By being late, you're communicating that your job isn't the most important thing in your life. If that's true, we should be honest about it.
Every generation is full of the weak and the strong. We're all weak in some ways and strong in others. We've learned to subsidize one another.
It's not about the esoteric medical conditions that each of us might have, if we look hard enough and go the right doctors. It's about our responsibility to fulfill the obligations we have taken upon ourselves.
I'm not sure the "get over it" solution is working. It's accepted that developers will work without wearing full suits. This isn't different, maybe allowances should be made for productivity's sake.
Missing appointments is a different thing, and is unacceptable. Is day to day flexibility really that big of a problem?
So you know what I did? I stopped trying to fix it. I realized that I might never be one of those people who get to work at 8am and I shifted my schedule. I am much happier now. This was the tone of the original article, and I take offense to this article telling me I am lazy.
No one likes waking up in the morning.
I for one actually do like waking up early in the morning and have been like that as long as I can remember. I also have some friends who think like this as well, so be careful when making generalizations :)
:)
If you have obligations to other people, keep them. If you know it will be very hard to make that 8am meeting, ask if it can be rescheduled or if it is really necessary for you to attend. You should feel guilty when you make an obligation and break it.
Some people are night people (me included). If you are one of those people that can barely drag yourself out of bed before 9am, then accommodate for that when possible.
That being said, I completely see the otherside where people have so much trouble getting out of bed, even with obligations they intend to keep. I find that in this case, it's usually a matter of importance. I'll wake up at 6:30am to go catch a flight because I'm not going to lose a $500 ticket. I have a hard time waking up for some arbitrary 9am "on-time" value that my boss set at work.
I had an experiment once where I worked from 1pm to 9pm, by choice. I was significantly more productive, and having a slot for "business hours" stuff that can be done before work meant I never needed to leave except for when I caught lunch/dinner. I can't do that at my current job, but I at least don't have a "hard" time at being to work until 10am, which is when stand-up takes place.. and I've missed stand-ups before, but they're just important enough that it motivates me to almost always wake up on time
I've lost such tickets no matter how much I wanted to. I've tried both going to bed early and setting a million alarms, and deliberately staying up all night (then passing out in the early morning) even though I knew the cost to my alertness and long-term health if I pulled it off.
It must be fun to think that if afflicted people just "wanted it more" it would no longer be an issue. If we just "wanted more" to get to your arbitrarily in-person arbitrarily 10am meeting, I guess we would just do it. We must not "want" the job enough.
Not necessarily! In hotter parts of the world, they deliberately avoid conducting business during the middle part of the day. (That may come with earlier rising, offset by a siesta.)
It's biology. Giving it a moral weight is nonsense.
Listen, don't throw me inside your "generation" when you mean "lazy american SF hipster startup guys".
I live in Brazil, my life is like this: I sleep @ 11pm and wakeup @ 4am... I take 4 hours trips to work because I don't have a car. When I get to work, I have to lead a team. I go to gym, 3 times a week. I hold a bachelor in CS. I maintain good/famous projects in Github. I study regularly(currently trying to learn some erlang). I speak two languages well, my mother language and english.
I came from a fucking poor family where you wouldn't even UNDERSTAND of what's like to live there. I'm 24 and I don't have a fucking driver's license.
I earn 50% of a american shitty developer and I lead a team. Cars are at least 4x more expensive here than your country that have been winning the world by making wars and slaving people in a smart way that human rights doesn't really consider it slavery.
So, fuck you and "YOUR" generation. Stop making HN SHIT just publishing fucking damn articles and shitty blog posts. Stop fighting against the other retarded people that just wanted to make excuses.
There's actually people here like me that are desperate for doing something interesting for the humanity. So, shut the fuck up.
Thanks.
This is about how if you agree to so something, then you must do it. Thus, if you are scheduled to attend a meeting at 7:30 or 8am, then you must go to it: otherwise, the word that describes you is “irresponsible”.
If mornings are a problem for you, you need to make an arrangement _beforehand_ with your coworkers and/or employer: this is the way that you can avoid being a total self-centered dick.
As well, I don't think he (Jason) was trying to create victims; he links to his advice and ends by saying "it is on you to decide to do something about it".
But having trouble getting up in the morning is not being a sissy, not for everyone.
Cognitive distortion #8: should statements
Cognitive distortion #10: labeling (sissies)
Oh, this is the worst argument. Someone did _INCREDIBLY_HARD_THING_X, so why can't you do _THING_Y_, which almost certainly is going to be easier than X?
The entire point is, for many people "quitting reddit" is not going to help. At all. And if you don't get it, then boo-hoo, stop reading things that make you write silly rants.
Never mind that there are actual studies by experts (who this guy is not) describing the condition and never mind that the original article was all about finding ways to counteract it. OP's lazy. And I'm lazy. Not only that but we're not just lazy but maybe we have some good traits, it's a deep and overarching character flaw that means we are not even decent people.
Best that this guy come in real quick and make sure that we don't even for a second stop beating ourselves up and feeling guilt to the core of our being.
Ever since high school when I was expected to start maintaining my own schedule, I had trouble getting to sleep and trouble waking up, and not for trying. I would set alarms and try all the smug tricks and it didn't matter. Literally I would turn the alarms off and disable the alarms despite how many obstacles, passcodes, or puzzles I put in the way. It's never been a matter of waking up and then deciding I wanted more sleep.
I tried everything: exercising late, not exercising late, reading, lying awake and trying to just sleep, caffeine to wake up, avoiding caffeine, alcohol, melatonin, herbal teas, narcotics, and on and on. Hey, that effort doesn't count. I'm lazy.
I would try to make reasonable compromises at work and instead of simple (legally required) accommodations I would be reminded that I'm lazy. And then usually the manager or coworker would make a point of scheduling a brand new meeting for 08:00 or 09:00 on a regular basis. They'd either smirk or outright tell me it was to teach me a lesson. On account of my laziness.
I've tried to get involved in community events. Some unconferences were put together on Saturday at 09:00 (be there even earlier if you want a t-shirt or a chance to speak). So I'd make my best attempt to get up extra early, fail, and get there and all speaking slots were filled up and no swag. Suggested maybe we should have a way to sign up ahead of time and got told that if you cared about the community you would bother to put in the effort to come early. Because we don't want to hear from any lazy people.
I had a client project with a friend lately. I estimated the whole thing, laid out requirements and prerequisites (I thought I was being responsible but I guess that was trying to plan ahead a way to be lazy). Worked my ass off, then a series of shit happened from the client and my friend freaked out, probably because he hadn't followed through on any of his business-related responsibilities. Called me at midnight after I'd worked all day (all day) and said he needed me to write a report and then wake up to call the client first thing in the morning. I said I could work on the report the next day and we could call in the afternoon, but was rebuked because if I couldn't bother to keep traditional hours (he said, calling me at midnight) then I was going to make us fail and all was my fault and this was why I was a failure. I still talk to that person but I can never see him the same way and never trust him for business again.
It doesn't matter how much extra time you put in, how good you are at what you do, and how carefully you plan what you commit to. People will pull the rug out from under you and then blame you, and for many other things there is an out or reasonable people will disagree. But no one ever disagrees that I'm lazy.
Now I am lucky enough that I can just barely drag myself out earlier in the day now. But I can't do it sustainably and I take no credit. All I can think is it's that I've gotten a little older and my body needs slightly less sleep or the pattern shifted slightly. One thing that does often help me personally is that software that tracks your sleep vibrations on the bed to wake you at a light-sleep time. The developer of that should be chastized for enabling laziness. I don't know how long it will last. My only hope is to pull it off long enough to get into an essential role or to make it impossible for an employer to squirm out of ADA requirements.
But I should never hope for too much career success. After all, at heart, I'm lazy.
No one likes waking up in the morning.
That's not even true. That's a false-misery play: make people feel bad by presenting the view that everyone else is suffering, when it isn't true. Most people have no problem getting up at a traditionally socially acceptable time. A few people do, and a lot of it's biological.
Just because someone has conjured up a “label” for the way your brain works doesn’t give you a free pass to break your word.
I guess this guy hasn't worked a real job yet and learned that normal people don't get to choose what their meeting schedules are. I agree. If you fully voluntarily (being told you must by a boss doesn't count) agree to do something at 6:00 am, then you get the fuck up and do it no matter how tired you are. However, I don't think he understands that most people end up in meetings they didn't voluntarily agree to attend.
The problem with the typical workplace is that it's built on promises that weren't made voluntarily, and many of which don't actually exist, but that's another rant.
Boo-hoo, get off Reddit and go to bed earlier.
Actually, there is an insight here. Morning or night person, most of us lose our good judgment at a certain level of tiredness and start staying up when there isn't a good reason to do so. This is a tough call, because sometimes it's useful to stay up until 3:00am but usually it's not. The problem with sleep deprivation is that you often don't know how tired/impaired you are. You might even feel the opposite, though your objective performance is terrible.
Earning your life is supposed to be difficult.
Posturing. Bullshit. We get it, you have a big dick. Congratulations.
I work at a software company as a Sales Engineer, and part of my job is to answer questions clients may have. There is nothing more annoying than having to respond to the client's question with "I'm sorry, I was going to ask one of our developers but it seems they have gone home for the day." Note that this sometimes happens at 3pm, because the developer decided to come in at 5.30am and left at 2.30pm. Also note that similar things happened when I was working in tech support, and critical issues had to remain unresolved until the next day because the developer wanted to leave early and catch the swell for that day's surfing session.
Bottom line is that there are a lot of fields (especially customer-centric ones) where the turnaround time for inquiries has to be extremely low. There are two ways to do this:
1. Give everyone Blackberry's that they must answer at all times 2. Have everyone come in at the same time
It's one or the other. Pick one.
Scheduling adequate coverage is ultimately a concern for upper management. If they allowed "critical issues" to go unresolved on anything other than a rare occasion, the issues were probably not critical to begin with.
In my experience, customers appreciate it a lot if you get back to them in a timely manner (~30 minutes), regardless of how trivial the issue or question is. It helps you build a reputation as a reliable businessperson, and further helps you build a good relationship with that customer.
This is why I specifically mentioned that this is an upper management concern. Those in client facing roles often default to wishing to provide the best possible support to their customers at all times. It's a good instinct, but that doesn't mean it's always the pragmatic course of action.
But if the issue has been outstanding for a day, then we resort to instant message. Context-switching does occur there, but that's the price one pays for leaving at 2pm the previous day when a lot of customers were still at the office working.
In fact, in either case, I'd say something like "I don't have a great answer myself, but I'm checking with the developer in charge of that feature and I'll have all the details for you by $TIME."
If the person took a job offer knowing that there would be 7:00 meetings and then didn't show up, then I agree with you. Some job offers include hours so there are no surprises. Many trading firms start at 6:30, for example, and that's fine as long as both parties are clear about expectations ahead of time.
If the offer letter or contract specifies hours (rather than some flimsy, shifting-sands "please your boss" social expectation) then people should not commit if they can't meet the professed needs, I agree.
However, if we're talking about a typical job where hours are not specified before signing, then you are in the wrong and you should quit while you're behind.
But there is implicit assumption in a job offer that meetings ought to be attended on time. Sometimes, meeting times are decided based on mutual convenience. Sometimes, they are dictated by your boss. Nothing wrong with that.
I can't tell if you're trolling or serious, and I'm not sure I even want to know.
Well, the job offer also did not say "must wear a suit and tie everyday" or "must treat coworkers with courtesy" or any other implicit part of being a working professional in the corporate world.
I agree with your original post though.
Not true at all. I may be completely backwards, but I LOVE waking up in the morning. The original article also seemed pretty sure that NOBODY likes to wake at 3am. Are you kidding me? Nothing makes me happier and sets a better mood for my day then when I voluntarily wake up at 3am, even if my day job starts 10am.
Having said that, I might have the condition outlined in the original post. I'm a severe over-sleeper, and I'll always sleep more in the morning if allowed to. It seems contradictory, but it's a matter of determination and discipline clashing. I have the determination to wake up early and feel wonderful for it. When I wake up before 7am, if I have slept enough, I wake up excited and energized. If I sleep until 8am or later, I feel miserable, and it snowballs from there on; I get frustrated with myself for having lost my productive morning and oversleep even more. Often this enter a vicious cycle of sleeping late and waking up later, and it's hard to break out of it. And even when I get a good habit going, it takes just a couple parties to shred my following week's schedule to pieces. I'm still hitting my mid-twenties. Productivity or my social life?
Alan: My arbitrary function equality checker is taking a goddamn long time to write.
Barbara: That's because it's mathematically impossible.
Alan: Oh, thanks. I guess I won't put that feature in, then.
So? A job is a contract between you and your employer. If you don't want to honor it, choose a different contract. If your boss wants you to come at a certain time, show up at that time or change the boss.
Those who show up for meetings on time are morally superior to those who don't because they can't control their sleep.
You realize that in most firms, that also means (even if it's a large company and there's no point in it being that way) changing companies, right? And also that it takes about a month to do that, and that you'll usually be fired if you get found out for looking? And also that people who change companies "too often" get the "job hopper" label and get raped by closed-minded idiots who never grew out of thinking the way you do, right?
I am fucking sick of arguing about the real world with Internet "libertarians" who've not spent significant time in it. Go back to pretending to be a 16-year-old girl who's "soooo confused".
I couldn't agree more with this statement. There's a certain blend of inexperience and privilege that pervades some discussions on HN, and it's unfortunate.
No, there is no moral obligation to silently put up with any mistreatment your boss dreams up. You are always free to negotiate — the counteroffer may be "you are not worth this trouble and you're fired," but hey, that's business. It's not a divine judgment from on high.
For example, my boss once asked me to come in an hour earlier than I had been. By the OP's thinking, I should have just said "Yessir!" Instead, I said, "That'll be massively inconvenient for me. What is it that's prompting this?" It turned out that she just had some extra work that needed doing by a certain time each day, so I came up with a more efficient way to get this work done that wouldn't require changing my schedule around. She ended up thanking me because I saved everyone time. TL;DR: I said no and came out looking better for it.
do you think he suffers from delayed sleep-phase disorder?
Wait, maybe I should make this reply a blog post instead.
Every generation thinks that. It's nothing new really.