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PaperclipPerfector  13d ago (text post)   3483 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for April 21, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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What advise would you give your 16 year old self?

Kill yourself now. It never gets better, only worse; so save yourself decades of pointless misery. Be remembered as a bright spark lost too soon, rather than a pathetic loser who wasted his life and squandered his potential.

REDACTED: Just no. REDACTED: antagonistic

Whoever reported this, I'm not sure what you want the mods to do about someone's severe depression and self loathing. Like sure, I'm a psych trainee, but in my remit as a moderator, what the hell are we supposed to do? Warn someone for being mad at themselves? Ban them for uncharitable comments and antagonism towards their own person? Bruh. This isn't Reddit, we don't have a bot directing people to a suicide helpline number, for all the dubious good that does.

To you, well, you might be all of the above but you're far from a single issue posting Eeyore-maxxer like Skookum, so I'm just pointing out my exasperation at people who think this is report worthy.

To you, well, you might be all of the above but you're far from a single issue posting Eeyore-maxxer like Skookum, so I'm just pointing out my exasperation at people who think this is report worthy.

And I thank you for that, and appreciate it.

What advise would you give your 16 year old self?

You have ADHD, start saving money and reading about the condition online. When you're 18, ask your GP for a recommendation to a psychiatrist.
Don't tell any of your relatives or friends about this. Find a physically demanding job like working at a warehouse ASAP. Both for the money and for improving your health, stamina and physical appearance.

You will have ADHD for the rest of your life and you will have to fight every step of the way against a medical institution that is hellbent on keeping you away from medication which is very safe and very effective at treating your condition.

Despite this, it is possible to live a worthwhile, productive, satisfying life in accordance with your goals. ADHD merely makes things tremendously difficult, not impossible.

PS: Advice (the noun) is spelled with a "c". Advise does exist as a correct spelling but only as the verb "to give someone advice".

  1. You're not as wise as you think you are
  2. You're a better person than you think you are
  3. Chasing after truth rather than utility will not lead you where you want to go
  4. Study technology, not humanities

Don't even think about doing a PhD.

Spend literally 2 minutes a day on your hair, it's going to make a huge difference and you won't look so stupid in future photos

Tell me your secrets.

There's nothing fancy - i looked like one of those kids in those "preteen you're arguing with on the computer" memes. I let my hair just sit flat on my head, across my forehead, 0 effort.

My mom especially begged me to throw some wax or gel, or let it get cut in a more stylish way and I just thought it was dumb, but a good hairstyle can really improve confidence and how people interact with you. Took me too long to figure out.

Had the exact same problem. Still spend very little attention on my hair and I love it. The difference between no-attention and very little attention has been massive. I wonder what it would take to convince teenager me to change my attitude about this because my parents definitely tried

Don't listen to the feminists. You are not a monster for being attracted to women, It is okay for men to like women, it's okay to court women you're interested in, sex is not something men take from women but rather something men and women can share. Don't have such a stick up your ass about proper behavior. Instead, enjoy flirting with the cute girl at the supermarket, or at college, or...

Maybe then I wouldn't have missed the signals. Maybe then I wouldn't have been too scared to say something. Maybe then I wouldn't have waited for an imagined thing with the girl back home who wasn't that interested. Maybe then I wouldn't be the last one left as all my friends paired off and started families.

Maybe then I wouldn't be the last one left as all my friends paired off and started families.

How old are you?

Tell him that he is, in fact, much more capable and interested in software engineering rather than hardware. Apply to college accordingly, with a fallback in something easy in case he doesn't make the cut into the competitive majors.

That what matters in college is not the base coursework, but everything else. That is not to say the coursework should be neglected, but the opposite. Knock it out of the way first thing in the afternoon - it's easy - and look for opportunities otherwise.

Be more open to social drinking. Like it or not, you're awkward with new people except in very specific contexts. A drink will help, and if you think you don't need other people to have fun now, consider that later, you will.

Be less afraid to impose, particularly in dating. You ostracise yourself 100% of the times you keep your mouth shut.

Tell him I'm sorry I don't have a list of crypto for him to flip and get rich.

That post-secondary isn't going to work out for you, and to enlist in the military.

Learn to code, work in tech, it's a good fit for you.

The world does not owe you anything. You have to offer something that people want in order to get what you want from them.

Don’t be afraid to fail spectacularly. You will fail and the earlier it happens in life, the more time you have to incorporate the lessons gained from failure.

Hit the gym.

  • Your mother is not very nice and she does not put her ideas into practice all that often. That doesn’t change that her ideas are usually correct. Listen to her.

  • Life is a construction project, not a race. If you want something you need to put in the effort beforehand to build up to it. Yes, that often includes doing a lot of stupid and pointless things to document compliance with arbitrary milestones, but you cannot change any of it. It can only hurt you by refusing to comply.

  • Just be normal. Most people do most things the best way to do them, and you probably have not found some cool life hack- you will most of the time wind up independently rederiving the normal thing to do.

“The cavalry isn’t coming. Everything that you want out of your life, you need to make happen yourself, you’re not going to be rescued randomly”

I eventually had this realization around 20, but I’d have been spared a lot of nauseating self-pity if I’d had it earlier.

Raw hostility really is the best way to set boundaries with certain types of people.

Some problems can be brute forced with time even if you don't know what you're doing, more often than not you can figure things out as you go along.

Raw hostility really is the best way to set boundaries with certain types of people.

Do you have a few examples?

The craziest examples aren't from my own life but I learned some lessons observing friends. As far as my experience goes in school I gave people way too much charity to people when they were disrespectful, this is good attitude with good people who don't actually mean any harm but bad for the type that is testing how much they can get away with to climb the social ladder. I've had times when other people stepped in and reminded a guy "do you know he [me] could just beat you up?" and I'd defuse it and ignore the insult. It didn't cause me great trouble but I was pretty surpised at how tit-for-tat escalation quickly sets clear lines with people who would otherwise be long term problems.

I hear the real crazy stuff from a friend who has the organizational talent for making music gigs happen and getting musicians to show up on time (though the bar isn't high in the first place as he complains). There's a lot of competition for not much money and the whole scene involves some very weird people, so there's a big incentive to make accusations that would make a pub owner think twice about letting this guy be involved with anything (and given the weird people on drugs their priors are that bad things happen).

The two I can remember offhand is him being accused of shouting "nigger" in a crowded bar by some other group trying to poach a black singer he was working with and a rumour that he was homophobic because he pushed a guy trying to kiss his neck to the ground. He still gets work from both of those places, the "nigger" was actually shouted by the people accusing him and the homophobia thing was settled with the argument "what if it was me going up to a girl and grabbing her like that?". It's a good thing that his personality is suited to confrontation because you let these rumours go unanswered and you're out of work.

I'm interested in reactions here since one of my own sons will be 16 in less than a year. The world was very different in many ways when I was that age, and now certain advice I'd give ("Spend more time with your dad asking him questions. Help him more working on the car.") I couldn't give my own son without sounding like an idiot.

Life is a competition. You don't have to win, but you have to recognize that you are in it. The hardest thing to accept is that just because other people win simply by existing is not proof you can do the same.

Invest in yourself and in experiences, not things. Travel widely. Listen more than you speak.

People are terrible and great simultaneously. Don't let either one stop you from seeing the other half.

Tell them there is a life to be lived outside their smartphones.

I'm interested in reactions here since one of my own sons will be 16 in less than a year. The world was very different in many ways when I was that age, and now certain advice I'd give ("Spend more time with your dad asking him questions. Help him more working on the car.") I couldn't give my own son without sounding like an idiot.

Unfortunately, giving advice means nudging someone towards some Aristotelian golden mean. Be more social or more introspective, more self-disciplined or more self-forgiving, more cautious or more adventurous. They're mutually exclusive. Advice is not generalizable because people are different. We humans, being narcissists, spread the seeds of wisdom that worked in our alkaline soil to the acidic of others.

Perhaps the one universal good advice might be reverse any advice you hear.

I think I was directionless as a teenager. My parents were very loving, but are relaxed people and were largely happy to watch their kids make (not extremely serious) mistakes and figure out things on their own.

I followed my father into his profession because I wanted to prove, on some level, that I was smart and that I could provide for myself at a good standard of living. I think if my parents had more openly discussed possibilities for me (rather than just shrugging and saying ‘as long as you’re happy, we’re happy’ essentially) I might have picked a different path in life.

I don’t actually know if I’d be happier in that case. But I do wonder sometimes. I think with my own children I’ll be more serious about helping them figure out their strengths and interests.

Heh, I'm a decade away from 16.

This is usually the most obvious type of answer you get to these questions but it's still poignant nevertheless.. I would smash into his head the concept of time leverage and compounding interest.

Not wasting time and intently working towards getting good at things and getting good outcomes, more often than not does yield results.

The worst thing teenage me did was waste inordinate amounts of time just playing video games, I'm talking many hours a day. If he spent 30 minutes at the gym, and 30 minutes at a hobby or skill, and game for 4 hours a day instead of 5, adult me would have been a lot better off.

I'm still doing better than most of my adult peers at age 26, and doing pretty well by societal standards, but I had to sacrifice my early 20's and of course not doing as well as the counterfactual. I think I would have much rather sacrificed my teens than my early 20's, the early 20's just have a lot more scope for "fun".

I'm still doing better than most of my adult peers at age 26, and doing pretty well by societal standards

Can you elaborate?

Good career and earnings, fit, have friends, etc. Money, Friends and Health, the 3 things where more really is more, and you can never have too many.

Just could have had a lot more of these if I started working towards all of these things actively and relentlessly at a younger age.

What do you do? What's your salary?

Heh, I'm a decade away from 16.

You write very well for a 6-year-old. ;)

Don't be afraid of rejection. "No" is a just a word. How many times have you rejected something or someone?

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