

Ask HN: What to expect from life? - tarikozket

Hi, I&#x27;m Tarik,<p>A young reader and contributor from your community. I always read you guys&#x27; technical opinions and actually am really curious about your view on life. Sometimes I ask following questions to myself and try to answer them. Now, as I believe you people are more experienced and older than me, I want to hear your answers if you are also okay to answer them publicly.<p>What do you expect from your life? What is your mission&#x2F;goal in your life? Do you have anything in your mind? Who do you want to be when you get old?
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gumby
My view of what I want to be when I get old has changed over time. Both
because a change in perspective at 20/30/40/50 and a changing definition of
"old".

But some things are constant: I always want to be doing stuff, and leaving the
world a better place than I found it. As much as I can be, be kind, help
others. Some things I've done have had a huge impact, some have been small
(time I spent on a telephone crisis line, or hell just picking up a piece of
litter) but all made me glad I did them. Of course I am human and don't live
up

Learn from your mistakes, especially ones that affect other people. You don't
have to dwell on regret, but just try not to do them again.

Don't forget you are (probably) starting close to the goal. My parents and
inlaws were children during terrible wars, and their respective countries (on
three continents) were bombed, people put into camps, horrible things. They
never dwelled on those things but it surely affected their outlooks on life.
Me, I was lucky enough to have been born in a wealthy country at peace
(Australia) and years ago moved to Silicon Valley. Basically by doing nothing
I have _always_ been better off than 98+% of the people who have ever lived
(including when I was a kid and my mum had to make all our clothes, and my
parents couldn't always afford to eat at the end of the week). So I figure I
shouldn't waste the opportunity that, say, some of my relatives in other
countries don't have.

And remember you get good at what you do: if you spend a lot of time playing
video games, you'll be good at playing video games; if you spend a lot of time
programming in Java you'll be good at programming in Java. Again: decide if
what you're doing is what you really want to do -- and if it is, do it without
regret.

~~~
veddox
> And remember you get good at what you do: if you spend a lot of time playing
> video games, you'll be good at playing video games; if you spend a lot of
> time programming in Java you'll be good at programming in Java.

Just added that to my personal quote collection :-) Sort of obvious, but in an
easy-to-forget kind of way...

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a3n
I expect from life the comfort and safety to contribute, and to love myself,
my family and my friends. I expect to treat people kindly, and I'm delighted
when I'm treated kindly. I don't want to discourage anyone, don't want to hurt
anyone, don't want to kill anyone.

However, the universe hates you in a non-judgemental way (entropy) and wants
you dead, so you are responsible for carving out that comfort and safety.

I've never had specific long term goals. I finished college, and I'm just
about done raising a kid who has excellent potential. Those are short term
goals that sort of assert themselves.

I don't know what I want to be when I'm old, other than to be. I'm probably
already older than the life spans of most of humanity in recorded history. I
want to remain curious about the world, contribute according to my interests
and abilities, and die in modest comfort.

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MalcolmDiggs
When I was younger I wanted to do something _huge_ and earth-shattering with
my life. Something noteworthy, that the history books would remember.

Now I just want to live a good life; to do _something_ that ensures that the
world is a little bit better for me having existed. That's all I really hope
for. Learning how to accomplish that is a journey, and that journey is what I
expect life to be; or at least that's the form I hope mine will take.

------
Taylor_OD
After graduating college and beginning to work in the real world my
expectations have changed drastically.

I feel a lot more like a cog then an individual. Even if I excell at work I'm
just a well oiled cog.

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moridin007
no regrets. you young 'un.

also eat much cake as you can in the early years.

