I'm looking for things such as: -College major -Career field -Bad life decisions -Relocation -Finances -General personal development (Not work/startup related, such as working out) -Career development
Please feel free to add anything you think is fit, even if it isn't on that list
Don't underestimate the value of repetitive processes. Automating them out of your life can be counter-productive: People bake bread, for a zen experience, sometimes, even though they've done it the same way 1000 times before.
Forgive yourself. Don't carry burdens in the past. Sure, we can all remember mortifyingly stupid, bad moments, but dwelling on them is counter productive. Of course you need to learn from them and avoid them but stewing over it at night when you should be sleeping? not helpful.
Rewards are complicated. Sometimes, the doing of it is the reward (see baking above). Sometimes, the outcome is the reward. Sometimes, the outcome is the reaction from others. Sometimes, its renumeration, sometimes it's just recognition and sometimes, there is no reward but its the BATNA. Value all of them in some way.
That said, small kids learn beneficially from SOME reward structures because before you learn to be patient to a long term goal, the short term reward builds muscle and brain memory of the task. So rewarding kids for good behaviour is not actually totally counter productive. But, contrariwise, there cannot be only winners and teaching your kid to refuse to accept second place or last is .. not helpful. If you genuinely don't win, don't pretend you won.
Habits take time. 6 weeks isn't unusual.
Don't be a dick in meetings.
Don't be contrarian for amusement value. Devil's advocating has limits.
Be kind.
At 30, I wish I was doing this stuff at 20. Health and fitness were a priority, focusing time on things that bring ROI into life including more career oriented, less booze and idiotics.
I married and we had two kids in our 20’s, probably the best thing either of us ever did. Wish I could shift this earlier a few years as well so we’ll have more years together as they grow old and have their own families.
Sorry if confusing, on mobile.
While it mainly worked out in the end, there were many stretches of years on end when I stuck it out at jobs that I didn't like or had outgrown, but were difficult to move from (or start my own company) because I was on a visa and could only move to some other company that would sponsor, or move internationally.
It makes other aspects of life harder too, e.g. starting a company, buying property - sure, you can buy, but do you really want to own somewhere if you might not be allowed to live/work there in the near future? Relationships - romantic/cultural issues, and you'll leave behind all your school friends, people you grew up with. Sure, you can make new friends... but they won't be as deep, and they'll probably kind of be other misfits in the new place, like you.
Not to say that it never works out... and maybe it's interesting for 2-3 years before going back home or settling some place permanently, but it can come at a pretty big cost. If moving from some third world place to a developed place, it's probably a no-brainer, but if you're moving from one developed country to another, it's quite possibly more paperwork and inconvenience than it's worth, and for the most part I wouldn't really recommend it, I think there is a lot to be said for just doing the best you can where you are, with your network, and with citizenship/no restrictions on anything.
I also wish I'd left the tech industry sooner. Now that I'm in a field that's a better fit for me, I just wish I could have the same length of career as some of my coworkers in it.
Focus on making your here and now the way you want. Do the things now that matter.
We can all imagine an idealized world where everything worked out perfectly...but how horrible would that be? To not experience all the pain to make the pleasure worthwhile. Sometimes it takes decades to realize that experience that scarred you can have a cause/effect on your life in a positive manner. In my case I know that if it hadn't been for every bad/adventurous decision I made in life led to where I am now...and there are parts of the here/now that I would not trade for any amount of money. The people I care about, my ethics, my attitude...everything would be different without the experiences that weathered me.
Stop thinking about the potential millions lost...start thinking about how you are going to lose the next million.
I think my upbringing focused a lot on “stick it out” and “work hard and you will get recognized exactly like you deserve.” It was a passive laborer mentality from a blue collar area.
I took a sabbatical and after some soul searching realized it was more like “sharks that stop swimming drown.” Career and compensation took off after that.
Do everything I could to buy and hold bitcoin would be another one, and get used to buying stocks back then as well, also try to max out my 401k as often as possible. I dipped my toe into stocks and retirement then, but didn't really understand it or prioritize it enough then. Now I'm playing catch up.
I think I'd also get into streaming on Twitch. Ten years ago it was still pretty early, and if I did that and stuck with it for years I bet I could have decently well with it back then, and built up an audience for the games and whatever else I worked on. Also it would have been easier to dedicate the necessary time to it. A lot harder to do that nowadays.
For startup ideas, even though it already existed (founded May 2013 apparently), I think I'd have the best chance working on a competitor to something like Patreon. They went without any real competition for a long time, and their website never seemed all that complicated (creator page, sign up for a few different subscriptions, blog with membership tiers, I did pretty much all of that except taking money for my personal homepage I made in PHP 20 years ago) and seemed to barely evolve the entire time, so I bet I could take enough of a chunk out of it to make it worth my while.
Other things I could have done to give myself a better chance with a startup:
- Embed myself in the startup scene and network
- Think of opportunities in terms of business models instead of focusing on what sounds cool or useful to me at the moment
- Don't be too skeptical. If something looks dumb but people are excited about it, maybe you're the one that is dumb.
- When you're doing business with people, be confident and always think about what you want to get out of a negotiation before going in. This could be a formal business meeting, or an informal get together. People enter into negotiations all the time. Think about what you need, who can get it for you, and if the opportunity presents itself then ask for it. There have been many times where I had the opportunity to really help myself, but I was too preoccupied with helping the other person get what they need.
- Build yourself a reputation as someone who succeeds at getting big things done, and is fun to be around. That may sound dumb and obvious, but it's the reason LinkedIn looks the way it looks.
When I was a teenager, I realized that since I was already a pretty smart and hardworking person, I was probably going to do alright in my career once it got going no matter how long it took to get there. The real risk I ran in terms of life satisfaction was ending up as one of those 80 hour a week workaholics who never carved out enough time to meet enough women to finally find the one I wanted to marry.
That was a very depressing thought, so I decided early on that I would only start taking my career seriously after I got married. Until then I'd be happy with keeping a standard 9 to 5, not trying to stand out too much in that arena, and not saving a whole lot of money (which was honestly more of a psychological thing for me than an actual reality, it turns out grabbing coffee with friends 3 times a week isn't actually that expensive).
Again, I eventually got there, but only around age 24, when I had it in me to start doing that like around age 17 or so.
Everyone wants to score big these days, but so few understand the value of slow and steady. Not saying you shouldn’t take your shots or that you should be pathologically terrified of risk or hard work, but I’ll take stability, balance, and being able to sleep at night any day of the week.
Somewhat related, be on guard for a misplaced sense of loyalty. The “old days” of you putting your life into a business and the business taking care of you, if they ever existed, started dying out a long time ago. In tech it’s virtually extinct, and in fact is actually rather risky. I’m starting to believe that sticking around for more than 5 years in this industry actually puts you at a disadvantage (unless you’re a founder or something). At any rate, don’t get too comfortable and don’t be afraid to get the hell out of there if a job is making you unhappy.
I wish I knew how important is was for me to avoid having managers who use Adderall. My most toxic work situations involved managers on that drug. I still struggle to identify them in interviews. If I go back into W2 work, I'm thinking of straight out asking prospective managers if they're on it or another similar stimulant.
I went to college with the goal of getting a job and a career, not a BS. I was in college in the 1994-1998 timeframe, and could do web development. I wish I'd gotten on the dot-com money train rather than staying in college.
But strictly in career terms, I wish that ten years ago I had taken full advantage of my legal right to work part-time, and gone to get a doctorate in a non-tech field. A couple years of living cheap would have given me career-mobility superpowers that I wish I had now that I'm older.
I had lots of free time that I spent on playing games alone at home. I should have spent more time on social activities or a part time job within technology
Career:
My first job at a smaller company was so interesting that I worked there for too long (almost 10 years). That set my career back significantly and I don't have a significant network within the industry. It did not help that my second job was for a company that lacked the opportunity for me to advance as an IC.
If I could go back, I would definitely spend more time on social activities and change jobs more often to build more professional relations. The lack of a non-technical founder is one of the reasons why I haven't started my own company yet.
I learned the wrong lessons from the ~1994-2001 dotcom bubble era (as a teenager) and I wasted a bunch of years correcting various wrong ideas about business that I had picked up.
Take care of your health, stay in good shape, not a lot of downside as far as I'm concerned. Sports or martial arts or something that gives you that + social aspects is IMO a good idea.
On the financial side saving + investing makes a big difference. I would start investing earlier. I don't think it'd make a huge difference though for me.
Learn how to play a musical instrument, learn more languages, learn how to dance, examples of things that can be fun and challenging.
Believe in yourself and "just do it". You're capable of a lot more than you think you are.
Career-wise try to be the best at what you do. Work on your people skills as well as your technical skills. Network and make and maintain connections and do great work and that combination will get you places. Also if your goal is to become lessay a CEO that requires a very different approach then becoming a principal engineer, or a CTO. You need to be pretty fixed on that target/driven, and have the right skills, to get there. Not for everyone.
There are many different paths that can all work out. Find yours. Most of us are very fortunate to have the sort of options that many don't.
- prestige and optic matter: I always maximized my interest over money; and money over prestige. Too late in life I realized once accrued, prestige can open doors, which can lead to interesting projects (and money). More concretely, I had several high-profile opportunities at FAANG and tier-1 financial institutions. Taking any of these opportunities would have made great difference in my career. Instead I worked on some random then-interesting projects. Interests come and go.
- the brain is a part of the body (duh!): people, especially those considered intellectual, often have this Cartesian division of mind and body; and they think that through sheer will, the mind can control the body. It's the opposite. the bodily state determines the operations of the mind. Caffeine and alcohol, when used consistently, do no good for the body, and thus the mind.
I think mistakes are a part of life, we should learn to accept them, and learn how to grow from them.
Other things I wish I'd done differently were:
- Getting into video creating and livestreams early on rather than writing. By the time I was posting online, the blogging world was on the way out and things like YouTube were taking off. If I'd taken it more seriously early on, I probably could have had a huge channel by now.
-Living independently in university. It seems like that's probably the best time to learn that stuff, since everyone else is in the same boat and people understand that students aren't exactly the best at healthy living.
> College major
OK so we're looking for life advice here. :D If I could go back 10 years with the knowledge I have now, I wouldn't because I'll take what I have now over something potentially infinitely worse through any number of random chances. If I did, the first thing I'd do is go back another 20 years.
Seriously though (and leaving aside 'Grays Sports Almanac' style responses):
- Never stop learning. Everything in life is a lesson, and everything in life is a test.
- Just because you behave ethically towards someone doesn't mean they'll behave ethically towards you.
- Saying no is as important as saying yes.
- Be kind to people when they make a mistake. Mistakes are how we learn, and besides, it's your turn next.
- Be kind to people you have power over.
- Until you take the plunge everyone will tell you not to gamble on a startup. The moment you do, everyone will tell you what you should be doing. Listen to their advice but think really hard before acting on it - after all, you ignored them before and so far it's working.
- Never underestimate the value of looking after people. Genuinely trying your best to help your clients/customers will be remembered and that's better marketing than any ad campaign.
- That said, don't be afraid to shut the door when someone takes advantage of you. Give everyone the benefit of the doubt, but remember how they treated you.
- The most difficult employee to manage is yourself, so you might have to cut yourself some slack, as an employee and as a manager.
Edit: Oh, also, if you're the kind of person who hangs out on HN and has a burning desire to start a business, it's worth seeing a psych. I'm not kidding, founders have a much higher than average chance of being diagnosed with a range of things, and it might turn out that some of the traits you thought were shameful character flaws are actually easily treatable.
2. Finish your degree as quickly as possible and don't obsess over which electives you should take. It seems like a big deal at the time, but a decade later, you'll barely remember most of them – and you can always pick up a book on the topic later in life.
3. Forget traveling and study abroad programs and instead try to live abroad. By live, I mean actually get a job there, make local friends, learn to speak the language, go grocery shopping. Traveling and study abroad programs are too structured and separated from real life.
4. You can skip job applications entirely if you focus on building a good network. Every good job I've ever gotten has come from knowing someone at the company, whereas open application jobs I've had have been (mostly) terrible.
5. Pick something small that you can do every day, and consistently do it for a long, long time. Learning 3 phrases a day in Spanish gets you to 10,000 words (which is borderline fluency) in a decade. The hard part is consistency.
6. As an extension of #5: understand that life is long. When you're 22, spending 5 years on something seems like an eternity. But it really isn't and even then, you're only 27. It's very possible to get really good at basically anything in a decade and still only be in your early thirties – but only if you be consistent and patient.
7. Worry more about work environments than about the actual content of the work. By this I mean: you may prefer thinking about programming to thinking about forestry, but if you don't enjoy sitting at a desk in an office, you're not going to enjoy the actual day-to-day existence of being a technology worker – and might instead prefer being outside all day as a forester, even if the subject matter is less interesting to you.
8. Think about startups in longer terms, not as a genius idea you need to find. Most successful founders have a unique angle and specialized knowledge that comes from working in an industry for years.
But I'm still not making as much money as I need. I'm still grinding to get that good-enough day job, a sinecure. I put the arts on hold while I looked for that sinecure, but still haven't found it.
I should have been pursuing the arts from the start. Had I done that, I'd still be as broke as I am now, but would have had a lot more fun.
Education wise I likely would not have done grad school right away, at the time a 5th year masters was appealing but the shiny paper didn't really end up doing anything for my career. I enjoyed the work but I would rather have had an employer pay for it. On the flip side a PhD would appealing since I do enjoy the research process, and there are some areas in the aerospace field I would love to explore more deeply. I would likely do CS instead of AE/ME, I originally picked this field because I love aviation, but career wise I've found myself enjoying CS work much more.
I would more strongly consider ROTC; I rejections from military academies and decided to go to the university route instead (aviation generally requires a degree). I still greatly enjoy aviation but I'm not in a place financially to pursue it.
As you get older you’ll realize how rare it is. I transferred schools, but I was in a good flow at the first one so I should have stayed. (The reasons I left now seem tiny in comparison to finding good people and a good learning flow). I have a trail run that I love. Exercise is easy when I do that run because I love it.
One thing I wouldn’t change is sticking with good people. I’d try to be a better friend and lover though.
I realized recently that maintaining good connections is not just about your behavior. If someone’s behavior is about to cross a line and alienate you, you have a duty to yourself to check them before it destroys your relationship. I have lost people due to their behavior that I should never have allowed to get to the point where I had to walk away. This is especially true of family, because walking away doesn’t delete the relationship. You’ll have to continue dealing with it. There are probably five important relationships I could have saved by setting firm boundaries and just putting my foot down.
But almost everything is negotiable, and you can almost always bend rules, create exceptions, etc. As Jack Sparrow says, they are more like guidelines.
Relatedly, I would encourage myself to follow my gut much more. The trends I missed I did because I ignored my gut, not because I wasn't aware of it.
Finally, I second the exercise comment. I think we are not thought well and early enough about how to keep our body in good physical form and avoid injuries.
25 years, yes. I'd probably drop out of university faster than I did, and work harder at building a web-based business rather than chasing girls.
Jokes aside, I feel like the last 10 years have largely been like that. The more you took massive nonsensical risks, the more likely you were to be handsomely rewarded. So, basically, everything I did that I considered "prudent" 10 years ago, I'd do the opposite.
Wasted a lot of time being sick for no good reason that I can’t get back.
All the risky moves that I made so far in life ended up being ok. Stressful, terrifying, but I always came out ok somehow.
Couple of examples:
- Moved to a lesser developed country at 19 to be with a girl.
- Bought two homes at the same time, was broke for a while.
- Moved back to my home country & bought a house in a crazy market.
- Joined a startup as the third employee.
All of us can write code - that's not a hard skill to find. But combining code with strong domain knowledge and a deep understanding of a specific industry is what turns the ability to code into a super power.
I'm a couple of years into this now, but if I'd began 10 years ago I would be so much further ahead.
Missing that time with my kids was so... amazingly... stupid.
Treating startup ideas as an over-achieving school project, wasted a lot of time.
Getting a clear handle on what kinds of problems I can make computers solve and what is unrealistic theory, would have saved a lot of time and angst.
Because my ideas for programs, are orthogonal to the direction of the computing industry.
Therefore it would have been better if I went into finance.
Probably should have taken better care of my health, but I’m not too mad about that one quite yet.
Every person is another world. Treat them accordingly, and meet some of them.
You can solve a surprising number of your problems by not carrying them around.
Dig one hole, if you want to find water. (Dig many, if you want to endlessly weed.)
Don't polish a turd. Work on things of true value.
Progress is the glacial fruit of long constancy. Failure is abrupt, and you rarely see it coming.
It’s ok to be comfortable absolutely, but if you’re looking to advance your career then do not get comfortable.
I'd have coded up a BitGrid and had chips done a decade ago, instead of just starting on it now
I want to go back to the 1980s, after high school, but before life wore me down. Marry the same girl, but 15 years sooner.
The 99% goal of frontend browser developers is to connect to data from some backend database and put text on screen. Yes, that is beyond stupid trivial, like conjuring the insane strength required to lift a paperclip. Nonetheless, it seems very few people can figure it out. The compile target of the browser is the DOM, which irrationally scares the shit out of most people. The DOM is just an in-memory data structure accessed via a standard API.
Imagine how much employers would be willing to pay if some application can eliminate 90% of their frontend developers and produce superior output with a lower cost of maintenance.
I would commit to things more fervently rather than trying to decide if it's good value to commit. There is a lot of value to be had in commiting that can outweigh flexibility
Opportunities to get in on something like the dot-com boom having ~all the relevant skills? Far fewer per lifetime.
Learn to love learning, earlier in life.
Less sunk cost fallacy.
Everything in moderation, law of diminishing returns.
- If you want to have kids one day, better get them early.
- In times with low tax rates, invest. Especially in property.
- Start investing ASAP (ETF). DCA.
- Don't do daytrading.
- In your 20s, feel free to do risky / hard jobs. E.g. found a startup, get into one of the large consulting companies. This takes a lot energy but opens the door to powerful social networks and high income jobs.
- Take care about your surroundings (e.g. community, relationships). Your environment has more impact on you than you think. Surround yourself with those bragging success narcissists and you will enter a questionable spiral yourself.
- Reflect about yourself to learn what really drives you. Writing your own eulogy helps.
- Stay true to your values.
- Surround yourself with people that share your values.
- Invest in social networks. It's a loot harder to make good friends later in life than e.g. in university. Most chances lie in people that don't belong to your best friends (weak ties).
- When you can have either one chocolate bar today or two bars tomorrow, better aim for those two bars tomorrow. Not always (have some fun today!) but most often. One night stands, big cars, bagging stuff... Usually cool for the moment but worthless over time.
Arts along with relationships take time to cultivate.
Smoke less
Waste less time
Explore more of the world
Arrange certain finances earlier.
I would not change a thing in my life! I am happy where I am.
2002 - went to get my math degree in Russia. Knew close to nothing about software development.
At that period of time, I was thinking about I wish I had a car, so I could work as a taxi driver, and make some money. I should have started collecting for a car a while back.
2005 - sold my first tiny program to a small factory. later got my first job as software engineer.
At that time I was pretty happy, that I did not have a car, and actually spent that time learning more than university could give me. And was able to make some money. That summer I also worked at construction.
2010 - got my first remote job for a company outside of Russia. Started making 5x times more than I used to.
At that time I was thinking, that I should have done it before. But hey, I did not have knowledge and experience. I am glad that I have spent that time not only working, but also learning, getting into community, got Microsoft MVP and MSP awards.
2011 - got a job in Microsoft, moved to USA. If you look at how many big macs I could buy in USA vs Russia, my salary probably went down maybe 2-5 times (if it matters it was $54,000USD in Russia vs $92,000USD in USA).
Was thinking every day, if moving out of Russia was a good idea or not, because Microsoft salary in Redmond was not the best at that time. But you know what? Now I am definitely glad that I moved away from Russia!
2013 - moved from Microsoft to Splunk. Best job I ever landed.
Certainly was thinking that I am so late in the game now. All those kids from college making so much money. And I am in getting close to 30, and only started working for a real company. All those smart people around me. Regretting that I invested more than 10 years in Microsoft technologies, when all the startups in Linux and cool languages like nodejs (it was very popular that year).
2017 - joined Stripe for just a year.
Definitely was thinking that I made a mistake joining them. Great company. I was on the wrong team. The manager could not explained me correctly what the team was doing - "hey you worked for Splunk, that includes Search - we doing something related to search" - turns out that was data engineering. But! Usually I would dedicate 40 hours + unlimited a week for a company I work for. But in case of Stripe my project was sooo boring for me, that I started building my own company while riding a bus everyday 40 minutes one way and 40 minutes another, and in the evening.
2017 (end of the year) - sold my first license for the software I have built.
2018 - left Stripe. I started working 80-100 hours a week. For at least two years. That was not a hobby anymore. There was a stress about starting my own company knowing nothing, and every day fighting with something new and unknown.
2024 - I am making Google Principal Engineer total salary and work for myself. I am very happy and don't want to change a thing. Because every single thing brought me to a place where I am right now.
I went thought painful divorce (happily married now, again). My dad recently died, and I could not go to Russia, because of situation right now. One of my dogs recently died. There is a lot of shit happening around me. But I am happy.
But yes, there is one thing, that I kept saying that I would change. If you want to have kids - make them in your 20. But you know? If I had a kid, I would probably be in a different place right now. Maybe I just did not want to have kids, that is the reason why I kept saying that.
My point is, do not look back. There is going to be so many people who would say, if only I was 10 year younger, or if I knew 10 years ago. Just 2 years ago we were saying that there could be nothing bigger than FFANG, but hey OpenAI came out of nowhere. Maybe OpenAI is going to die next year as a company, and sure there is going to be somebody like my mom who would say "I knew that was coming!" How the fuck did you knew?!