To Anyone Who Thinks They're Falling Behind in Life

I wonder how many people will read this article, have a lightbulb go off in their head, feel warm and fuzzy about it all, then wake up tomorrow and do absolutely nothing about it. Probably most.<p>This article is unfortunately what it epitimizes the most -- a self-help conundrum. Advice given from the perspective of a workaholic. But alas, what tools does it actually provide to take action? Walk away from everything? Should I take up meditation or yoga? Relax by putting and put my mind at ease by playing a videogame or laying on the beach?<p>What most people won&#x27;t see is the key line of advice burried in the middle, which I believe the rest of the article counters is: &quot;We have to put in our best efforts and then give ourselves permission to let whatever happens to happen&quot;. Putting in our best efforts is what opens doors to adventures and opportunities. Putting in our best efforts is what drives us forward to find passion in what we do.<p>Sure, we all need to realize that we&#x27;re not robots with unlimited capacity, but the next step is to stop reading self-articles and start doing things that actually matter, instead of filling our time with arbitrary tasks.<p>Want to not &quot;fall behind in life&quot;? Don&#x27;t be a lemming by following other people around trying to find meaning and value in your life. Make meaning and value in your life by being creative, self-reflective, and getting outside your horse-blinders by actively trying to experience life in other people&#x27;s shoes.<p>Falling behind in life is a synonym for running the hampster wheel. Get off the damn wheel and do something that scares you even just a little bit today. Then do it again tomorrow.

Legally, &quot;permission to be where you are&quot; is a right reserved for the capital class. Even in my home my right to stay only lasts for 60 days and then I am subject to whatever forms of violence are necessary to remove me so that a pre-designated member of the capital class can be where I am.<p>From here it&#x27;s miles to a place where I have the right to urinate, and tens of miles to a place where I have a right to sleep, and to my knowledge there is nowhere in my country where I have a right to do subsistence farming, or steward any kind of ancestral resource.

Excellent. In German there is a word for this trust in yourself and that things are happening when they are happening: &quot;Gottvertrauen&quot; (literally: &quot;trust in god&quot;, although often used in a non-religious context)

This can be summarized with the serenity prayer:<p>Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,<p>Courage to change the things I can,<p>And wisdom to know the difference.<p>The author is a curious case of &#x27;got the right idea, haven&#x27;t internalized it fully&#x27;.<p>She seems to be coming from a place of trying to convince herself that she doesn&#x27;t need to try so hard, etc.<p>Maybe it&#x27;s frustration with the world she finds herself in, where everyone has a &#x27;bunsen burner up their ass&#x27; as a buddy of mine put it :)<p>Good article overall though, I&#x27;m glad to see this on HN :)

And another thing: most of us will be medicore, and it&#x27;s probably better to be ok with it :)<p>maybe being happy, not successful is all it takes

An article from an LA-based author telling you to &quot;just chill&quot;? You don&#x27;t say...<p>It&#x27;s best to be honest with yourself and come to terms with where you are in life and where you want to be. After that, unless you put action into your belief, you will be sad. Even if you fail, but put action into the belief, you&#x27;ll be happy and have grown.<p>This article has utility for over-achievers who need to learn patience, but anyone else (especially anyone who struggles with motivation) should ignore it. It aims to make you feel good &quot;you&#x27;re doing the best you can&quot; and has cute, but vapid lines like &quot;let timing do what it needs to do&quot; or &quot;it&#x27;s just not the fucking time if it&#x27;s not the time.&quot;<p>If you need help with motivation, you probably don&#x27;t need to be told you&#x27;re already doing a great job and should just succumb to some external force of &quot;timing&quot;. This is probably the thought that&#x27;s actually holding you back. If you feel like you work hard and are never satisfied, it&#x27;s true that you should just chill. The strongest people in my opinion are the ones who are able to keep a calm &amp; humble mind while steadfastly pursuing their goals.

This article doesn&#x27;t cover the cost of making horrible mistakes. A series of them actually... over a couple of decades.<p>This article was more for the rats stuck in the &quot;affluenza&quot; maze, not the chronically depressed or others struggling with more fundamental issues than &#x27;keeping up with the Joneses&#x27;<p>Yeah, I learned a whole lot about my blind spots (in being taken advantage of, ignoring issues, actively avoiding them...) and processed some really deep seated issues, but the cost right now still seems a bit too high. It is a bit disheartening. In another decade or 2, it certainly won&#x27;t matter, but in terms of &quot;falling behind&quot;, I am at the extreme of the bell curve, I&#x27;m afraid. But maybe that was my overall path, extreme self-knowledge... At least I am an exceptional special snowflake!<p>&quot;The Wisdom of Insecurity&quot; by Alan Watts is recommended reading if this article affected you in some way.

Wow, this article sounds like the perfect invite to not work too hard in life and just cruise by. Thanks! Thats just what more American&#x27;s need, a reason not to work!<p>And yes, I read the comments here about working hard, then letting the chips fall where they may. But that was not the message of the article. It was just one line smashed between a bunch of crap about accepting where you are in life. WTF is this junk?<p>If your life sucks, make it better. No one will do it for you. Period.

My own attempt to understand the complex relationship between will-power and &quot;happiness&quot; is laid out in this article which I wrote a while ago (2007): <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;thinkinghard.com&#x2F;consciousness&#x2F;advice.html" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;thinkinghard.com&#x2F;consciousness&#x2F;advice.html</a>.

This is a horrible article.<p>It seems to be emphasizing an external locus of control. Which is unuseful. Sometimes things won&#x27;t turn out the way you want. But you still have to put the effort and time in.<p>The way she&#x27;s writing she seems to dismiss effort and time as useless.

This article keeps opening the iOS App Store. It&#x27;s frustrating and I don&#x27;t know how to stop it.

<i>Transcendentalism!</i>