Not quite sure what the point is... wake up sheeple?<p>You might see me with my degrees, career, dog, child, wife and house and think I'm just another conveyor-belter, but hopefully one day you will realise that every person has a unique story to tell. Even the ones who might seem boring to you.<p>You don't have to make a grand gesture of differentness in your clothing, music taste, beliefs or lifestyle to actually be different. We are all different by our very nature.<p>In fact, proclaiming your differentness so loudly could be viewed as more oppressive than seeming to 'conform' to your perceived conveyor-belt.<p>Life without progress is stagnant. We each choose our own path. It just happens that there are some broad trends amongst the things humans value; like company and security. Marriage, kids, a stable career and a house go a long way towards satisfying those needs. And, without wishing to patronise, those needs do become more acutely felt as you get older.
One of the strange things about being 40 is meeting people my own age who have college-age children. It's amazing how little I have in common with people who chose that life track.<p>They seem "old" to me, even though they're often several years younger than me. As though they've lived a lot more life than me, but not the "good" parts of life. I can't imagine how tough it must be to raise a family on an entry-level job, and simultaneously try to progress your way out of that entry-level-ness without the ability to ever roll the dice and not have to worry about feeding anybody else but yourself if things don't work out. Or the ability to put it all on hold and piss off to backpack around Southeast Asia for a year. You can see the shadow of that still on a lot of folks like that, even 20 years on.<p>It never occurred to me back then how good a decision it was not to get married and start a family right away. Now, raising kids with 20 years worth of leveling up behind me and the resources to do it "right", I think I'm going to have it a lot easier.
Lots of things in life seem ordinary to the point of tediousness. Marriage, the birth of a child, recognition on the job etc. These things happen to most everyone at one point or another.<p>I'm here to tell you that these things can be quite extraordinary <i>when they happen to you</i>.<p>Even if everyone in the line rides the same coaster, the plunge is still a thrill.
It's regret limitation. You can always buy things whenever, but if you want to see your kids grow up and not be too old to play then you NEED to have the kid in your 30's at the latest. Once you pass that point you can never go back.<p>You're not gonna live forever and you will change your opinions regularly throughout life. Using your time wisely, and investing in a solid future is the 'safe' regret minimising strategy.
Every person I know, in their 20's, could have written the same post as OP... Myself included. Now they are all married with children... Myself included.
<i>"I would love for all of those years of school to teach kids these lessons instead: Don’t follow orders, don’t blindly copy what others are doing, and always keep your wits about you."</i><p>This, to me, is the essence of Education, or at least what it should be - equip future generations with the ability to think critically, to become more adaptable by developing themselves and their peers in the process.<p>In most of the countries I know of, School systems are self-fulfilling jokes. You have teachers sandwiched between layers upon layers of administration and the kids' parents. You have a lot of parents who've dumped all their educational responsibilities onto the schools. You have the administrations whose main purpose seems to be meeting stats. And after all that, you have the kids, awkwardly categorized by age, pushed through hoops with no clear purpose except to pass tests. This costs a tremendous amount of resources (not just talking about money here), and for what results?<p>We seem to live in an age where we think everything has to be, and is worth measuring. I believe the "Level up" system is a result of that, it makes it much easier to assess people's worth, whatever the hell that worth may be. Ironically (and sadly), the only way to get out of this is real Education, one that promotes curiosity and self-growth for the sake of it (and eventually for the greater good).
I would've expected somewhat differently inclined comments from the hackernews community.<p>Instead, everybody is just saying the same thing expressed in different wording - safety.<p>His point is not to bypass the entire family, house aspect of your life. The point is to not move along life as if you have no choice but to move to the next "stage".<p>Progress is not moving up the stages - getting a house, getting a family, a dog, a kid. Those are just arbitrary checkpoints defined to make you feel like you're making something of your life. The american dream, eh? :)<p>Progress is to construct a life not defined by limits and boundaries. Living it to the fullest - travel, do great big, inspirational things.<p>If you choose to have kids when you're 20, you are almost by definition limiting your life only to be somebody who takes care of your kids and works a stable job with a stable family(a stable car, a stable dog, a stable bed to sleep in, a stable tv and a stable view of the world). In other words, inexperienced and short-sighted.
I'm not sure how applicable the key stage point is here. Children generally have little to no exposure to the fact they are part of a key stage or how that affects them until they get to the GCSE/A Level stage where clearly it's impossible to not feel the exams looming. Key stages are more a strategy thing for DfE/Local Authorities.
I think OP should take a look at Maslow's hierarchy of needs :<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs</a>
Part of the problem with viewing life as a conveyor belt is that you build up expectations of what's ahead. I think that one of the OP's points was that you may be very disappointed (even feel a bit cheated) to learn that happiness is not inevitable, even if you follow all the required steps. So instead, don't just follow the steps. Question, think, break 'rules' if you have to. Make your own choices and don't just follow the prescribed path. You won't get a second chance.
You can't escape the conveyor belt, whether you end up with children or you end up alone or something completely different.<p>You are always part of a much bigger group than you might think. If nothing else physics will take it's toll and you as you get older.