This is a pretty sad post and touches on something I read on Cal Newport’s blog today where he referred to a similar piece written by another ambitious and established 22-year-old in the WSJ titled, “‘Work-Life Balance’ Will Keep You Mediocre"
I’ve come across tropes about how Millennial discontent is based on figuring out that the idea of grinding through your 20s like it’s twenty years ago is a trap. Or something like that.
Seems like the idea is rearing its head again.
But the last paragraph of this post tells me that he’s aware that his optimism and will has its limits. “COVID came and went,” ta-huh!
The length of a minute depends on which side of the bathroom door you are on. Maybe it is not so much about learning, but about the brain having enough free cpu cycles to keep track of time.
Anyway, it sounds attractive the idea of the brain is somewhat younger if you kept learning all the way. But it may not be about “age” but flexibility or other things that we may not associate with older people.
When I go travelling time slows down. Days and weeks become significant, a month feels like three. Whereas the past two months have felt like one. I much prefer when time slows down and I'd love to figure out how to make that happen when I'm home.
I try to seek novelty as much as I can. It's not about trying a new ice cream flavour, it's novel experiences. I might have to go into work for 8 hours, but there's at least 8 more hours where I don't need to always do the same things as before. And if you get a chance to work remotely and have no strong ties, you can pack up and go live elsewhere for a while.
Meh, "only 22" doesn't mean they have to be hesitant about making pronouncements about the whole human life. You're living a life, I'm living a life, the 22-year-old author is living a life. Why would any of us need to be "very hesitant" when it comes to discussing the whole human life? It's our life, anyone can talk about it.
I'm just a few years shy of being 24 years older than 24, but I have to say my lived-experience does not agree with this observation. The time from 24-today seems much longer than the time from 0-24.
I do remember a period in my early 30s where time seemed to move fast, but hasn't felt that way in over a decade.
Though I suspect, agreeing with much of the article, this is because my life has had a fair amount of novelty in it, even as I age. I often marvel at how impossible to predict my life has been even a year out. Even a year ago I would not have imagined doing the job I'm currently doing, traveling to the places for work I currently need to, meeting the new people I have, solving problems in a space I had no understanding of.
As contrast I've often been shocked to talk with former coworkers to find that have had nothing change, not even what they're working on during the day, in the span of time that has resulted in my making multiple moves, changing multiple jobs (arguably even careers), learning new skills, etc. The most extreme was a college roommate I hadn't talked to in 20 years, and barring his marriage a few months after we last spoke, his day-to-day routine was identical to what it was 20 years ago. We only had a chance to meet up because I had briefly moved back near the area we went to school.
The more responsibilities you take on the harder it is to make big changes.
I moved to a new country when I was 29 and it wasn't too hard. Doing it again, at 40, with 2 kids, was probably 50 times as hard (if anything I am understating it)
My mom, at least, tells me that life can get more interesting once the kids are 10 or so, apparently.
It’s seems bizarre and alien to me as a relatively new parent that you don’t seem to consider that a big change but instead an impediment to your travel plans.
> A study asked different age groups to mentally count 120 seconds. People under 30 averaged 115 seconds; those over 50 just 87. That's a 24% reduction in perceived time.
This seems bogus to me. I’m 51; I set a timer on my phone for 2 minutes, put it aside and counted to about 128 before it went off.
Why would your ability to count seconds change over time? A second has always felt a little slow to me, probably because my resting pulse is above 60.
(I think it’s also ambiguously described? Maybe they meant the opposite, in which case it took me about 114 seconds to count to 120.)
There is a quote from the show Ted Lasso which I love: "Be curious, not judgemental".
Rather than proudly declare that "this seems bogus", I think it's more productive to ask why your perceived experience may not match with the study. FWIW it only took a few seconds of googling to find the study in question, likely much less time than it took you to write your comment, and then you're free to examine the methods and outcomes of that study:
Let's define curiosity as seeking knowledge. What is the mechanism that allows for observation if not some minimal amount of judgement? How else does one encode the senses into a coherent thought?
What is the distinction between curiosity and judgement? Is it the amount of judgement? Is the quote asking to dismiss reason and avoid integrating new knowledge with other existing knowledge?
Meh, move to a lower CoL country, reduce your expenses, work four days a week, get an easier job. There are many alternatives, unfortunately nobody wants to hear that they should spend less money.
Do you really need all the stuff? Yes, stuff is nice, but is it as nice as more time with friends and family? That's the choice.
If you feel that way, you might want to find something else?
I also don't understand why having more money would change how you spend most of your time. It tends to be the other way around. What you do is what you make.
Interesting with the role of dopamine and how we perceive time. I've been having anhedonia for a while and damn time fly by fast. I do however have one routine and it's working out almost every day, so I'm in decent shape at least.
My computer presents way less fps in same games as when i bought it 10 years ago. I myself am not as fast neither in games nor catching fast balls as when I was 20 instead of my almost 40 years now.
Surely the degrading hardware gotto play a role aswell.
I see your point. Im at my lifes best health tho. Single food ingredients and got 12 pullups from deadhang to chest at 92kg, got some pistal squats in me and I can hang with one arm for 22 sex. I used to be real fat but real quick competing in dota. Also, im way more flexy now. I even worked on the wrists.
My computer has gotten some proper dusting however the ram needs and electrical engineer. Cpu has been well cooled and i even got a new gpu.
Ive got bunch of variety and novelty in my life aswell.
Im just pretty sure in getting less FPS by the years none the less.
If the years feel like they fly by, shouldn't the older group give responses of greater than 120s for the 120s timer?
I say this in threads whenever this concept comes up, but I doubt the feeling has anything to do with something intrinsic in the brain, but is just representative of the variety of novel activities you do, and for most people their novel activity seeking wanes as they get older. Giving your brain more time to go on "auto pilot" and lose track of time.
The year I spent at a desk when I was 24 feels significantly shorter than the 3 months I spent at 39 traveling in strange lands.
The less new activities are performed the faster time is perceived when looking back. During the events it might be the opposite and actually feel longer.
> The less new activities are performed the faster time is perceived when looking back. During the events it might be the opposite and actually feel longer.
There is another side to this: So much novelty that you have no time to consolidate memories and everything feels like it’s zooming by. I’m in that situation right now and it’s shocking to look back 1 year. It feels both like 10 years have passed and like it was yesterday.
Well a couple of points as a senior techie over 50 now - considering the youth culture of the tech world, first of all this “hacking youth, hacking life” is all mostly ineffective in my opinion, it’s not so much a metric based existence that helps counter life’s speed but living better and learning the common wisdom of past generations that is more useful in my opinion :
1. Youth is wasted on the young - people in their twenties generally have not found their identities and this means they will often ‘discover’ and change their outlook into their 30s, 40s etc- things well known to older generations and why so many hippies become square, why so liberals become conservative, why so many skeptics take on religion. It’s human nature to rebel and discover the same lessons that past generations did and then pretend like their generation is the first to gain wisdom..
2. A substantial amount of life is not planned for, do not make the mistake of assuming your plans will bear fruition -life is what happens while you are making other plans -
3. Older age often means the things
That gave you pleasure in your 20/30s will not as you age- that is part of your journey
4. Again life is a journey not a destination- live your life with optimism and instead of crazy ambitious year by year plans focused on achievement instead focus on the moment and your own personal health: I often see young people afraid to be adventurous, and young men in particular, fail to take care of their bodies, fail to take care of their mental needs and instead take on the road of overwork, stress, isolation and bad health (especially with the sedentary and isolating nature of programming)
5. As you really grow old (I’m not talking about you kids in your 20/30s here, you will find your tolerance for learning new things will lower, as will your skepticism of the new stuff,
, it’s natural but it’s the antithesis of this industry- you will be yesterdays news and ageism in this industry is not something I see ending anytime soon. So find a way to stay relevant, maybe that means a career change, location change etc.. honestly the tech world as it today is not the insular but friendly optmistic and often artistic place of the 70s, 80s and 90s - when programming was as much an art as a corporate discipline, now it’s vastly larger industrialized and corporatized and corrupted by endless metrics, VC capitalism and social media doomscrolling and hype. (And Who really knows, how fast AI will change these modalities either negatively or positively)
5. A spiritual life of some kind is worthwhile- this article was about how fast life moves: IT DOES, I cannot believe how old I am, for example. The only counter to how fast life moves is savoring the moment - I think that an inward view is important in that regard, especially if you are an agnostic/atheist. That doesn’t mean to go out and adopt a dogma wholesale, but don’t be close minded and exclusionary and willfully obtuse, be willing to open yourself to others, be willing to forgive yourself too, above all Know Thyself… that takes decades
I don't understand. If I feel like two minutes passed when only one has passed, am I not actually experiencing time as twice as slow?
I thought two minutes have passed, yet I have a whole other minute to live. I thought time passed quickly, but I get to experience twice as much time. By that logic, we think we're 80 when we're 40, and we have another subjective 80 years to live.
How is that "time flies by"? Time would fly by if it went by so slowly for me that ten hours had passed when I thought it had only been a minute.
If you imagine a hypothetical person with a 2 year lifespan. During the first year the perceive time 1:1. But during the 2nd year they perceive 9 years passing during 1 year.
At 50% of their lifespan they will have 90% of their total perceived experience of time remaining.
https://calnewport.com/does-work-life-balance-make-you-medio...
https://archive.is/VCAih
I’ve come across tropes about how Millennial discontent is based on figuring out that the idea of grinding through your 20s like it’s twenty years ago is a trap. Or something like that.
Seems like the idea is rearing its head again.
But the last paragraph of this post tells me that he’s aware that his optimism and will has its limits. “COVID came and went,” ta-huh!
Anyway, it sounds attractive the idea of the brain is somewhat younger if you kept learning all the way. But it may not be about “age” but flexibility or other things that we may not associate with older people.
I try to seek novelty as much as I can. It's not about trying a new ice cream flavour, it's novel experiences. I might have to go into work for 8 hours, but there's at least 8 more hours where I don't need to always do the same things as before. And if you get a chance to work remotely and have no strong ties, you can pack up and go live elsewhere for a while.
I'm just a few years shy of being 24 years older than 24, but I have to say my lived-experience does not agree with this observation. The time from 24-today seems much longer than the time from 0-24.
I do remember a period in my early 30s where time seemed to move fast, but hasn't felt that way in over a decade.
Though I suspect, agreeing with much of the article, this is because my life has had a fair amount of novelty in it, even as I age. I often marvel at how impossible to predict my life has been even a year out. Even a year ago I would not have imagined doing the job I'm currently doing, traveling to the places for work I currently need to, meeting the new people I have, solving problems in a space I had no understanding of.
As contrast I've often been shocked to talk with former coworkers to find that have had nothing change, not even what they're working on during the day, in the span of time that has resulted in my making multiple moves, changing multiple jobs (arguably even careers), learning new skills, etc. The most extreme was a college roommate I hadn't talked to in 20 years, and barring his marriage a few months after we last spoke, his day-to-day routine was identical to what it was 20 years ago. We only had a chance to meet up because I had briefly moved back near the area we went to school.
I moved to a new country when I was 29 and it wasn't too hard. Doing it again, at 40, with 2 kids, was probably 50 times as hard (if anything I am understating it)
My mom, at least, tells me that life can get more interesting once the kids are 10 or so, apparently.
This seems bogus to me. I’m 51; I set a timer on my phone for 2 minutes, put it aside and counted to about 128 before it went off.
Why would your ability to count seconds change over time? A second has always felt a little slow to me, probably because my resting pulse is above 60.
(I think it’s also ambiguously described? Maybe they meant the opposite, in which case it took me about 114 seconds to count to 120.)
There is a quote from the show Ted Lasso which I love: "Be curious, not judgemental".
Rather than proudly declare that "this seems bogus", I think it's more productive to ask why your perceived experience may not match with the study. FWIW it only took a few seconds of googling to find the study in question, likely much less time than it took you to write your comment, and then you're free to examine the methods and outcomes of that study:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27097002/
Let's define curiosity as seeking knowledge. What is the mechanism that allows for observation if not some minimal amount of judgement? How else does one encode the senses into a coherent thought?
What is the distinction between curiosity and judgement? Is it the amount of judgement? Is the quote asking to dismiss reason and avoid integrating new knowledge with other existing knowledge?
It's tragic, and I don't want to suffer that fate. Alas, there's no escape for common trash without at least 3 million in assets.
Do you really need all the stuff? Yes, stuff is nice, but is it as nice as more time with friends and family? That's the choice.
I also don't understand why having more money would change how you spend most of your time. It tends to be the other way around. What you do is what you make.
Like if you practice counting everyday a few times, each time trying to correct when you’re over or under
Beyond that though, more importantly, I wonder if this would have a noticeable effect in your life - if so I wonder what that would be
Surely the degrading hardware gotto play a role aswell.
My computer has gotten some proper dusting however the ram needs and electrical engineer. Cpu has been well cooled and i even got a new gpu.
Ive got bunch of variety and novelty in my life aswell.
Im just pretty sure in getting less FPS by the years none the less.
I say this in threads whenever this concept comes up, but I doubt the feeling has anything to do with something intrinsic in the brain, but is just representative of the variety of novel activities you do, and for most people their novel activity seeking wanes as they get older. Giving your brain more time to go on "auto pilot" and lose track of time.
The year I spent at a desk when I was 24 feels significantly shorter than the 3 months I spent at 39 traveling in strange lands.
There is another side to this: So much novelty that you have no time to consolidate memories and everything feels like it’s zooming by. I’m in that situation right now and it’s shocking to look back 1 year. It feels both like 10 years have passed and like it was yesterday.
1. Youth is wasted on the young - people in their twenties generally have not found their identities and this means they will often ‘discover’ and change their outlook into their 30s, 40s etc- things well known to older generations and why so many hippies become square, why so liberals become conservative, why so many skeptics take on religion. It’s human nature to rebel and discover the same lessons that past generations did and then pretend like their generation is the first to gain wisdom..
2. A substantial amount of life is not planned for, do not make the mistake of assuming your plans will bear fruition -life is what happens while you are making other plans -
3. Older age often means the things That gave you pleasure in your 20/30s will not as you age- that is part of your journey
4. Again life is a journey not a destination- live your life with optimism and instead of crazy ambitious year by year plans focused on achievement instead focus on the moment and your own personal health: I often see young people afraid to be adventurous, and young men in particular, fail to take care of their bodies, fail to take care of their mental needs and instead take on the road of overwork, stress, isolation and bad health (especially with the sedentary and isolating nature of programming)
5. As you really grow old (I’m not talking about you kids in your 20/30s here, you will find your tolerance for learning new things will lower, as will your skepticism of the new stuff, , it’s natural but it’s the antithesis of this industry- you will be yesterdays news and ageism in this industry is not something I see ending anytime soon. So find a way to stay relevant, maybe that means a career change, location change etc.. honestly the tech world as it today is not the insular but friendly optmistic and often artistic place of the 70s, 80s and 90s - when programming was as much an art as a corporate discipline, now it’s vastly larger industrialized and corporatized and corrupted by endless metrics, VC capitalism and social media doomscrolling and hype. (And Who really knows, how fast AI will change these modalities either negatively or positively)
5. A spiritual life of some kind is worthwhile- this article was about how fast life moves: IT DOES, I cannot believe how old I am, for example. The only counter to how fast life moves is savoring the moment - I think that an inward view is important in that regard, especially if you are an agnostic/atheist. That doesn’t mean to go out and adopt a dogma wholesale, but don’t be close minded and exclusionary and willfully obtuse, be willing to open yourself to others, be willing to forgive yourself too, above all Know Thyself… that takes decades
never had that. or worked a job. or lived away
sounds cool!
I thought two minutes have passed, yet I have a whole other minute to live. I thought time passed quickly, but I get to experience twice as much time. By that logic, we think we're 80 when we're 40, and we have another subjective 80 years to live.
How is that "time flies by"? Time would fly by if it went by so slowly for me that ten hours had passed when I thought it had only been a minute.
If you imagine a hypothetical person with a 2 year lifespan. During the first year the perceive time 1:1. But during the 2nd year they perceive 9 years passing during 1 year.
At 50% of their lifespan they will have 90% of their total perceived experience of time remaining.