My father-in-law mentioned something I find quite interesting to my wife: Don't look for a job that will fulfill every aspect of your life - that's what your family is for. And if you do find one, your family life might not suffer.
Not all of us are raising families, but I think it highlights a bigger points. Work is not what builds societies (certain jobs do harm society I think, mostly by destroying it's moral virtues). People relationships are what build societies and build happiness.
And you're right - there are a lucky, select few who get jobs that can also influence society.
I'm not worried about that though (anymore - I was for a time though). With my job, I can provide and care for those around me (provide for my family and generally have positive, uplifting interactions with those around me).
I have resigned myself that it's not my job to fix society, it's our job to fix society, and I'm doing my part where I am. From my perspective I have more than enough to do locally anyway: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17176036
That's definitely something I need to think through more. And what your father-in-law said sounds wise. Thanks for sharing it.
The reason I ended up in tech is in part my fascination about tech, especially as applied to uplifting ourselves and solving our problems (yes, I watched way too much Star Trek: The Next Generation in my formative years). I never thought much about family - in fact, for the most of my life, I felt it's something of a side endeavour. I still feel it shouldn't be the sole focus of a person, though I definitely believe it's more important than I believed in the past.
Same for relationships. And small communities. I feel that maybe we overdid this globalization thing. Maybe global competition and centralization of various kinds of innovative work is more efficient, but it also doesn't seem healthy. Living in a city, there's no such thing as "local community" anymore. Not even neighbours.
> I have resigned myself that it's not my job to fix society, it's our job to fix society, and I'm doing my part where I am.
Still, I'd like to feel like I'm actually doing my part beyond just participating in the economy as consumer. I have specialized skills, I'm not dumb. But I have hard time finding opportunities to do things I'd know could help meaningfully and effectively. There must be something. Maybe I'm just not looking hard enough.
Your comment you linked to is golden. I'm favouriting it. Those are definitely words I'll try to remember from now on.
I've also thought about this a lot. My last years of work life have been quite boring as well. On the other hand I realize that, as you write in your first post, are scarce and precious.
A few years ago I applied for a really interesting jobs within Telematics - one of my favorite areas. So I called them, got the CTO on the phone and he had almost no time for me. Then I wrote a mail with my formal application to them. It was appealing and they replied with some coding riddles. I guess I did well enough and was one of 2 or 3 people to get invited. Of course before the in-person interview I studied some Algorithms & Data Structures book. At the same time I did Scala programming although it wasn't expected to know that but people worked with it.
Anyway, during the interview they made me sweat for at least 3 hours. Every now and then also reminding me how good the other people working there are - the one guy having worked 8 years at a company writing DBMS in London. So yeah, after leaving the communication was difficult but the CTO said the people said they liked me and they would hire me despite my shortcomings - I would have to unlearn stuff. The offer was really bad, in fact even the most senior people got below average salary.
At the end I started working at a company that worked on a moonshoot project involving a CAD program in the browser. Even some mathematician who worked in Japan on Robotics was there. Salary was good enough but the people were borderline insane. I quit after 3 months and landed a below average paid job, but with a lot of nice people. I don't regret that. Work was mostly boring but the environment was nice.
Anyways, not living in the Bay Area, I guess things are they different again.
For me, the most rewarding work is the volunteering I do. I coach various youth sports. I have no pressure to win so I can focus on letting the kids enjoy themselves, have positive interactions, and learn a little about the sports. Seeing them gain confidence and passionately work toward something is a major reward for me.
I still enjoy trying to match a user's expectations with the software I write. But, it's balanced by other aspects like coaching and being in a family.
How do you make it work? In the experience of every condo dweller I know personally, people know their neighbours mostly to the extent they bother being involved in their HOA meetings; otherwise, everyone walks their separate paths, only greeting (and maybe briefly chatting with) the neighbours as they meet them on the stairway.
It helps that it's shaped more like townhouses than an apartment building. We have a large interior carpark/garden where the kids play, which creates a lot of incidental contact and I think the kids are a huge factor in making a neighborhood feel, it creates an easy shared experience and proximity means you can easily help people out with eg shared babysitting. There's also a few people who make a dedicated effort to encourage community, like trick or treating, and it's a place where half the residents have been there over ten years. I joined the HOA in my first year which has definitely helped me get to know others.
I haven't given it a ton of thought because I have a job I enjoy from time to time, and enough downtime to pursue a hobby or two - I guess I'm in a pretty balanced situation and am okay with it.
In reading your post, I had to stop and think for a bit.
I agree with you but want to give the thought that family can be one's top priority without looking for it fill every aspect of one's life.
You are correct - no one is above great tragedy and loss.
If my family was taken from me unexpected, I don't I'd say that I wished for more time at the office, or working on personal hobbies. I do believe in balance, but the point I'm trying to make is that family can be the number one priority.
The mindset of "I can be happy because I have x" (in this case where x = family), is indeed dangerous. And while the mindset of "I have chosen to be happy, and my top priority is my family" will bring sadness and pain if they are suddenly taken, I feel like that pain and sadness will have been worth it. Well, it is for me. That for others it might not is understandable.
Please note as well that I'm not advocating self-deprecation or letting your family take advantage or you, or throwing yourself under the bus for an uncaring family - it's a group effort and there a lot of ways to appear to put your family first in a way that's detrimental to one's self.
For me when I think of dedication in family life, I think of the story, "the gift of the magi". Nothing of true importance was sacrificed, and yet the others needs were prioritized.
I believe that the inability for business in our society to be socially aware or responsibile stems from the separation of private life and public life. I can't remember what book this was, but it looked at what war criminals were like in private life. Its main point was that, in private, war criminals were nice guys.
According to the book, the transition from being war criminals by day and family men by night, was possible through some rationalisation acrobatics or detachment from responsibility. As an example of detachment, the Nazi concentration camps didn't have an atypical ratio of psychopath to average joe. The predominant "average joes" would offload responsibility by telling themselves that this is not their decision, but that this is the _current policy of the organistation_, which is an interestingly complex statement, in the subconscious sense. It detaches the organisation participant from the organisation, and it detaches the organisation from their policy.
To come back to business v family, I think the old koan holds: separation isn't good. The rule of thumb in social situations is if detachment or separation is the easiest route, you're doing something wrong. Business is social action by necessity. So should we separate action from responsibility? What do we think of someone who is selfish and avoids responsibility?
> The predominant "average joes" would offload responsibility by telling themselves that this is not their decision, but that this is the _current policy of the organistation_, which is an interestingly complex statement, in the subconscious sense. It detaches the organisation participant from the organisation, and it detaches the organisation from their policy.
Yes, your job as the "average Joe" is to be loyal to the organization. That statement doesn't sound surprising to me, and it took me a few seconds to realize why. I've heard it before. I grew up in a religion where there was an organization, and your job was to be loyal to God by being loyal to the Organization. Only by being on the outside now I see how this is a neat way to release responsibility. See also: "Ours not to reason why, ours but to do and die.".
> The rule of thumb in social situations is if detachment or separation is the easiest route, you're doing something wrong. Business is social action by necessity. So should we separate action from responsibility?
It was easier back when you were naturally limited by geography to do business with people you also knew "after hours". These days, business and personal relationships are almost entirely non-overlapping. Hell, it's a common advice to avoid that overlap.
Not all of us are raising families, but I think it highlights a bigger points. Work is not what builds societies (certain jobs do harm society I think, mostly by destroying it's moral virtues). People relationships are what build societies and build happiness.
And you're right - there are a lucky, select few who get jobs that can also influence society.
I'm not worried about that though (anymore - I was for a time though). With my job, I can provide and care for those around me (provide for my family and generally have positive, uplifting interactions with those around me).
I have resigned myself that it's not my job to fix society, it's our job to fix society, and I'm doing my part where I am. From my perspective I have more than enough to do locally anyway: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17176036