Ask HN: What is your “I wish I did it sooner” moment? - softwareqrafter
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chollida1
I think I've said this before but its 3 things that all end up having the same
effect.

1) Meditation to get my mind in check

2) Fitness/Diet, making sure I'm at an appropriate weight and fitness level

3) Sleep, shouldn't require any explanation.

Having these 3 things in check is the equivalent of 10+ IQ points. The last
two items shouldn't require any explanation but Meditation is one that people
often have issues seeing the value of.

For me meditation does 2 things,

1) it allows you to master the art of "staying in the zone". Lots of
meditation is just accepting that you mind has many thoughts at once,
acknowledging them and continuing on with what you are doing.

Once you can master the art of acknowledging your thoughts but not letting
them disturb you, it lets you maintain a flow state in the real world.

I can now get interrupted and almost without fail immediately get back into a
productive work state.

2) I've noticed that as I get older that most of what makes a person look
smart in a conversation is that they've already had the same conversation and
thought through their opinions.

When mediating on an idea, its very similar to having these conversations
about ideas. You get to flesh out your ideas by having this conversation with
yourself. It's an invaluable took to have.

~~~
mrks_
Do you have any advice on how to build the meditation habit? I tried reading
and following Search Inside Yourself, but it didn't stick.

~~~
chollida1
Nothing that I'm sure would "Just work" for everyone. For me a few things I do
when I'm trying to build a habit, this is general to building habits and not
specific to meditation.

1) Like going to the gym you need to do it on a schedule. Even if you don't
feel like going to the gym just go for 5 minutes, if you don't feel it then
leave.

Meditation is the same. Just do it for 5 minutes, if you aren't feeling it
then stop.

2) do it every day, even if its not the same time each day, even if you get
interrupted, even if you aren't feeling it, just do it. 5 minutes each day is
better than not trying because you believe you are too busy. I do it first
thing in the morning and last thing at night.

3) Track it to make sure you are making progress. Something about what gets
measured gets done. Truer words have never been spoken.

4) Give it time, again using the gym analogy, expect it to be a good month
before you start to see results. I mean you might see results earlier, but
doing it for a week and getting frustrated that you aren't seeing any results
is, well, silly. But I think alot of people actually make this very mistake.

You wouldn't expect to run 3 times and then run a marathon on your next
outing. Meditation follows the "before you are good, you'll be very bad at it"
law that most things follow.

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Arete3141
I wish I had known when I was younger that a lot of the people who shoot down
ideas, minimize your creativity, and say "that's impossible" aren't smarter
than you. They're just more insecure.

It's easier to say no to everything and look like a genius, then to say "I
wonder...", and try, and fail, and try some more -- and perhaps (who knows?)
actually _be_ a genius. With all of the concomitant messiness and failures and
actual real life kept in the mix.

~~~
zootam
>Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around
you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you.
And you can change it, you can influence it… Once you learn that, you'll never
be the same again.

― Steve Jobs

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k4ch0w
Realizing that other people aren't way more intelligent than me and i'm
stupid. It's just a perception based on nothing more then them acting more
confidently, because they had an upbringing that gave them more self esteem.
When the time came to perform I always exceeded the expectations of those
around me because I always beat myself up and told myself I was stupid and not
good enough. The insecurity pushed me to always try harder but in the end I
was better than I realized. I just one day had to let it go and realize those
thoughts of not being good enough weren't real.

Another thing is stopping relationships with people that would belittle,
insult or use me. I instead paid close attention to who was there for me and
built me up. I gave those people 5x the attention and built a stronger
relationship with them because thats who you want in your life. Quality
friends > Quantity. If someone keeps blowing you off you aren't a priority in
their life, and you should treat them the same.

Oo last one.

Ask that cute girl out, if you're reading this, I know you are more than good
enough.

------
Schizotypy
Fucking bitcoin. I should have invested when I first learned about it, it was
$4 per btc

~~~
charlesdm
Wanted to put in $7k, at $7, so 1,000 coins. But I didn't want to send a copy
of my passport to some shady (Magic the Gathering) exchange in Japan. And it
would take 3+ weeks before I could get my coins. What an idiot I was.

~~~
adamnemecek
I could have bought 10000 btc for 50usd. I’m still crying myself to sleep some
nights.

[https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=92.0](https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=92.0)

The reason I didn’t was because back then that was like half iirc of all btc
and I was suspicious.

~~~
charlesdm
Horrible thing to say, but at least I feel a bit better now! Too bad I didn't
hear about Bitcoin in 2010. I hadn't heard about it until like 2012.

~~~
redmaple
I mined and threw away ~400 btc around 2010-2011 :(( ... twice

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kentt
i3wm. I thought it couldn't be that much better, it just a window manager. Now
it's hard to imagine using anything else.

If you want to get started the long exhaustive way, start here:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1I63wGcvU4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1I63wGcvU4).

~~~
iopuy
Definitely a technical thing... but I agree using a tiling windows manager has
brought new and improved changes to my work flow as a developer. The thing no
one ever talks about is you must also have a standard (gnome, kde, etc)
windows manager handy to use at a moments notice because there are things that
will be hidden in a tiling manager and you won't know they are gone if it is
the first time running a program. Setting up a VPN, doing heavy duty network
config, and system administration I would advocate are better suited trying
for the first time without a tiling manager. After the steps have been
mastered and the command are known is when i3wm really shines. I'm sure there
are many counterpoints speaking to how easy it is to use i3wm to configure XYZ
but after years of using it I am drawn to launching new programs without it to
get a feel for them until I learn the requisite commands and switch over to
i3wm.

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pasbesoin
Stopped believing authority figures.

Listened to myself and my own intuition -- both informed and "gut reactions".
_Acted_ on same.

Learned to defend myself. Mentally, physically, emotionally.

------
andrei_says_
Stop eating processed sugar(s), white flower and meat.

Learn to let go of opinions I am attached to and become open to alternatives
faster (it is actually a body trick).

Embrace myself fully _with_ all my “defects”.

~~~
lastofus
For the last week I've been making a conscious effort to only eat foods with
no sugar.

It turns out, this is way easier said than done. It seems like this limits
your diet only to vegetables and meats (or meat substitutes).

Things I would've never expected with sugar nutritional facts. Things like
whole wheat loaf bread, plain unflavored yogurt, and cottage cheese. One would
think they would have sugar-free options if you look hard enough, I can't seem
to find any.

~~~
ohyes
Sugar is in bread and yogurt and cheese naturally.

It's required for the fermentation process to happen. The real concern IMO is
sugar added. This should be pretty easy to find for cheese and yogurt, for
bread you might have to get into homemade / high quality sourdough (real
sourdough) to not have sugar added.

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PascLeRasc
For me it's been to stop trying to learn software development just because
it's hip and there are a lot of jobs in it. I just really could not care less
about it. It's let me spend more time on things I do care about like hardware
development and industrial design. If I can't physically touch something I
don't care about working on it.

Oh, and meditation, L-Theanine, and taking walks outside during work breaks.

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methodover
Joined an ultimate frisbee rec league, a year ago. And I'd never played a team
sport before, unless you count middle school basketball.

It's turned out to be a great community. Plus it's great exercise, of course.
And it encouraged me to improve my cardiovascular system, so I wouldn't poop
out so quickly on the field. The community is the big thing though.

------
taway_1212
I (at least partially) wish I didn’t spend so much time looking for my „true
calling” (which I didn’t find), and just ground my way to early retirement in
high paying jobs. The search made me a more interesting person, but without
it, I could be retired already.

~~~
anotheryou
I decided quite early to separate calling and job, but tried to keep a balance
between both. A part-time career is difficult too :)

I'm currently grinding an a 40h-week. My plan is to do it for a year for money
and reputation and than find something part time, which sadly is quite
difficult as a product owner/project manager. Maaaybe some start-up that
doesn't want to pay full price :).

------
blawson
The day after I figure out how to navigate modern life without a smartphone.

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cvaidya1986
Just ship and iterate

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flashman
This isn't happening for a month or two yet, but I hope moving out of an
expensive city to work remotely will be my moment.

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nhayfield
Wish I bought bitcoin when it was $12.

~~~
rabidrat
I bought BTC around that price. But I lost my wallet key. :(

~~~
naveen99
Give hashcat a shot

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cvaidya1986
Stopped explaining myself

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KGIII
Hmm... I don't really have one. Oh, I've made lots of mistakes and done lots
of things at the wrong times, but that is what has made me who I am. I kind of
like who I am, so I wouldn't want to change that.

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cvaidya1986
Work on what’s interesting to me regardless of what’s cool or perceived as
valuable

------
fairpx
For our company ([http://fairpixels.pro](http://fairpixels.pro)) it was
productisation. We used to operate like any other UI design agency,
prospecting, talking to potential clients, going to networking events etc. But
by productising our service, building a sales funnel and treating the entire
flow as that of a SaaS. It enabled us to:

* Lower prices (Since we didn't have to spend time networking, prospecting etc.)

* Create predictable sales funnels

* Spend more time working on the stuff we love, instead of wasting time with prospects that weren't interested in the first place.

