
Now that you have turned 22 can I please give you some advice... - ecaradec
http://www.tawheedkader.com/2010/11/what-not-to-do-in-life/
======
mattmaroon
This is bullshit. Almost everything in here sounds great but is merely fluff.

I promise you that at many points, playing guitar felt like work to Jimmy
Hendrix. Painting felt like work to Picasso. Muhammad Ali tried very hard to
be the best. He also marketed the hell out of himself.

People who've never done something for a living that is a hobby for most
participants think there's some clearly-defined line between work and passion.
There's not. It's a continuum and you spend your life moving from one end to
the other and back again if you're doing the right thing. If you're not you
spend it all at one end.

Take advice, just don't view it as the gospel. Everyone here has probably been
taking advice from PG, for instance, and is better off for it.

~~~
BrandonM
Almost everything is bullshit if you take it at face value. The point of the
advice was to promote a certain mindset:

Endeavor to do things that you enjoy doing, and do them with feeling and
quality. Chasing success, money, competition, or customer whims will not lead
to happiness. Instead do things that you enjoy and do them in your own way
that no one else can compete with. This will sidestep competition and lead to
customers, money, and success. Think Apple.

Don't just absorb knowledge (reading, advice), but understand it from the
author's point of view. His last point was to not blindly take advice, but to
understand it and apply it to your own situation. To ignore and marginalize
his advice as you have done is to ignore one of his most important points.

~~~
il
Really? Your response is "everything is bullshit"? What if chasing success
makes me happy?

I'm not sure who this advice is targeted at. It's certainly not for ambitious
people who want to build things people use.

"Do not market" and "do not try hard" is a surefire way to never being
successful at anything.

This is universally bad advice, and I wonder about anyone who takes it
seriously. Do you think Apple is successful because they don't worry about
competition or marketing?

~~~
BrandonM
> Your response is "everything is bullshit"?

Nice job taking that statement out of context. I was saying that most advice
taken 100% literally can be shown to be absurd. The submission itself
reiterates that. Your (and mattmaroon's) comment reinforces it even more.

> What if chasing success makes me happy?

The point I took from the advice is to pursue your passion, as opposed to
pursuing success for the sake of success. If your passion is pursuing success
(if that's even meaningful or realistic), then chasing success would not be
contrary to the advice.

> I'm not sure who this advice is targeted at. It's certainly not for
> ambitious people who want to build things people use.

The submission says exactly who the advice is targeted at: the advisor's
daughter. The man wants his daughter to be happy; it is intended to help
someone on the path to a happy life. Ambition is not happiness, so of course
it's not advice on how to be ambitious. Then again, the advice implicitly
defines work as activity that is not "reenergizing and reinvigorating." If
making other people happy does that for you, then you can make the advice
apply to your situation.

> Do you think Apple is successful because they don't worry about competition
> or marketing?

Yes, absolutely. The context of "do not market"* was "do not cater to other
people's desires." Would you agree that the iPod was one of the biggest
factors in elevating Apple to its current level? The iPod was designed to be a
great MP3 player, with no concern for the competition or for what potential
customers thought they wanted. Apple wasn't trying to compete with SanDisk (or
whoever) by adding a few extra features or offering a lower-priced offering.
They completely changed the game. They are a perfect example of:

    
    
      Quality has no competition. Only mediocrity has
      competition. If you do what you do at the highest quality 
      you have no competition. Quality creates a moat around
      yourself.
    
      Create your own demand. People are always on the lookout
      for the good. People seek out winners. Therefore be a
      winner all the time.
    

"Do not try hard" is a follow-up to "do not ever work," and its effective
thrust is to be yourself. Make your work your own. Do things your way instead
of trying hard to fit the mold that others have created. Do things in a way
that you enjoy so that you do not have to "try hard."

    
    
      Do not take advice
      Advice is what others did not take but wish to give. Your
      mind is your best guide. Certainly keep your eyes and ears
      open. Absorb everything but add your own pinch of salt.
      Filter out what does not suit you.
    

If you take the time to actually read the advice and determine if any of it
helps you, then it is pretty easy to take most of it seriously. If you just
skim the headlines and make snap judgments, of course it will seem bad. If
you're just looking for the advice to confirm that you're doing the right
thing, and you'd rather attack it than learn from it, then it will be
worthless to you.

* A lot of people seem to conflate marketing with advertising. Marketing means to make a product to satisfy a market. Only recently (i.e. the last century or so) has its definition shifted to convincing the market to use your product. I suspect that, being from Bangladesh, the advisor is referring to the more traditional definition of marketing.

~~~
lhnn
>Then you'll never be happy. Your definition of success will keep changing,
and you'll never get there.

If chasing success is what makes him happy, then he'll alwys be happy, by your
interpretation.

~~~
BrandonM
Good point. I had realized that as I was typing it, but I was trying to wrap
it up and get back to work. I have now edited it to be more accurate and
reflect my interpretation of the advice.

What it used to say was:

 _> What if chasing success makes me happy?

Then you'll never be happy. Your definition of success will keep changing, and
you'll never get there. There's nothing inherently negative about success, but
there's nothing inherently positive either. "Success" is a meaningless metric
without a strict definition of what it means to be successful._

------
gruseom
_Let it simply flow. Jimmy Hendrix did not play guitar. He simply let his
feelings flow unabated._

Could this be intentionally evil advice designed to prevent the recipient from
ever amounting to anything? Infants let their feelings flow unabated. "Jimmy"
worked his ass off.

~~~
chrischen
Assuming he worked his ass off is speculating as much as assuming it all never
felt like work to him. I can attest that I've done what people thought was
working my ass off but really felt like nothing because it was enjoyable and
came naturally.

~~~
compay
I remember reading a few times in interviews with people that knew him, that
Hendrix basically never put the guitar down. I think in the sense the author
is trying to convey, he "never worked hard" and "it just flowed" because he
must have truly loved what he did, and he was doing something that he had a
gift for. But from what I have read, he dedicated _a lot_ of time to
practicing.

~~~
chrischen
The author is not trying to convey that he never worked hard. Believe it or
not, you can both work hard _and_ enjoy it. The author is trying to say he
enjoyed his work so it never felt like work, therefore it just flowed.

------
edw519
This post reminds me of the old joke where a young woman wants to marry a
religious man.

Her father asked him, "What will you do with your life?"

"Pray," he replied.

"And how do you intend to provide for my daughter?"

"God will provide for us."

Later, when the man's wife asked how his meeting with his prospective son-in-
law went, he replied, "Very well. He already thinks I'm God.

~~~
BrandonM
It's a funny joke to be sure, but I think it's a far cry from the advice in
the post. There's a big difference between relying on something external to
make you happy and following your passion.

~~~
Andrew_Quentin
The difference being?

~~~
preek
Happiness is a state of mind, you can't successfully induce it with external
sources.

~~~
Locke1689
That's only true if you don't think your mind is a function of input from
external sources.

~~~
preek
I concur in your assessment; this is a premise. A fundamental one, too.

I declare being cought in the notion that your mind is a (pure) function of
input to be self-deception, which will ultimately lead to a path of misery.

If this were not true, how come that many people experience a change in
themselves when they meditate? If you haven't been exposed to Buddhism yet,
for example Zen meditation (Zazen) has the ultimate goal just to sit and
breathe. Thoughts and external input are to be dismissed during Zazen.

Telling from personal experience, this practice changes people. Without any
external input whatsover. Hence: The human mind cannot be a pure function of
external sources.

------
codyguy
The "Don't try hard" + "Muhammad Ali" combination isn't accurate. He pushed
"hard" beyond limits, both in the ring and out of it.

If you read one his biographies containing details of his bouts and you'll
know what I mean.

~~~
TomOfTTB
Yeah a lot of this is terribly inaccurate and the fact that it's being used to
sell questionable advice makes it even more so. For example...

Jimmy Hendrix might have loved to play the guitar but his gimmick was playing
it competently with his teeth and I guarantee you that's something he had to
work hard to be able to do right.

Einstein did say Imagination is more important than Knowledge but he also
said...

knowledge must continually be renewed by ceaseless effort, if it is not to be
lost. It resembles a statue of marble which stands in the desert and is
continually threatened with burial by the shifting sand. The hands of service
must ever be at work, in order that the marble continue to lastingly shine in
the sun. To these serving hands mine shall also belong.

So clearly he thought it important to "read what is written" too.

~~~
cynicalkane
Hendrix also had the gimmick of leading a band that played excellent music,
which is potentially a bigger explanatory factor in his success.

~~~
TheSOB88
Was he not the songwriter? Is it not harder to lead than to follow?

Or are you just saying teeth aren't that important in the grand scheme of
things?

~~~
cynicalkane
"Gimmick" was meant to be sarcastic.

------
igrekel
I liked it but somehow I think its because this advice sounds more like things
I would like to believe to be true.

~~~
TomOfTTB
I'd argue that's what makes this type of thing insidious. Take one piece of
advice he gives...

"Create your own demand. People are always on the lookout for the good. People
seek out winners. Therefore be a winner all the time."

Now if I were giving advice on this sort of thing I'd say just the opposite.
Here would be my advice.

"It's not enough to be good at what you do. George Washington was turned down
when he requested a commission in the British army. Abraham Lincoln lost 2
elections before becoming President. Einstein was 40 before anyone recognized
him as a leading scientist. So it is not enough to be a winner you must also
work to get people to notice how good you are and that can take time."

Now if I'm right than his advice is irresponsible because he's setting people
up for disappointment. People taking his advice will expect the world to form
a line to their door. When that line doesn't form they'll have to assume they
just aren't good enough and that's not the desired result.

~~~
igrekel
Yes you picked one of the pieces that made me feel that way the most. Others
are

Do not try hard -> for things to be easy (or look effortless) you have to try
hard first for quite a while.

Do not ever work -> interest always fades at some point, some times
permanently and other times temporarily, but sticking to it is often necessary
and not doing it sounds like a recipe for a path littered with unfinished
things.

------
maxklein
I think there is one advice that is of questionable quality: the advice to
"keep pushing for quality". "Make the highest quality". That sounds really
good. But how easy that?

The problem is simply that you first have to be able to recognize what is
quality and what is not. And that's the greatest difficulty of all. If you
make something of really great quality that everyone thinks is quality, then
it will work well. But what if it's really good for you, but not for anyone
else?

Take for example all these YC companies. ALL of them are working on something
they are constantly trying to make great. But a number of them just don't end
up with something that people regard as being quality, and so they fail.

Before you can make something of great quality, you have to recognize what is
of quality to other people. And that is an extremely difficult task that, dare
I say this, _most_ people cannot do.

 _Most_ people cannot properly place themselves in another persons shoes. They
cannot look at their products from the outside. And so long they cannot do
that, they cannot guage when something is of high quality, and will forever be
unable to take that advice.

~~~
shaddi
Robert Pirsig has some words to say on this. If the idea of pursuing quality
intrigues you it might be worth your time to take a read through his books,
"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" and "Lila".

------
moshezadka
When I read this, I could not stop thinking about Harry Potter & The Methods
of Rationality, and how HP calls out Dumbledore out for "pretending to be
wise".

See <http://lesswrong.com/lw/yp/pretending_to_be_wise/> for an explanation --
the post above is a clever take on that. Instead of refusing to pass
judgement, it's giving advice that, as the people who did think of it as wise
said, "is bullshit if you take it at face value" -- it's meant to serve as a
counter-balance to the exact opposites of those, which are obviously _also_
good advice, often given.

By saying a thing, and implying you also believe its opposite, you can never
be wrong.

I don't really affiliate myself with the rationalist movement, but I think
they have developed a number of useful tools to learn to call people out on
trying to bullshit you.

------
plemer
I stopped reading at "Do not read."

~~~
arethuza
To be fair it goes on to say "Read not what is written but read into the
writer’s mind."

Not that I would pretend to know what that means!

~~~
alexgartrell
I'm pretty sure that he means that you should read something in an effort to
understand the author's thought process, so that you can formulate your own
opinion. This is opposed to reading things as gospel and believing everything
you read.

~~~
derefr
It also protects against overly-cynical literal interpretations—if you read
something and think "no one would be stupid enough to write that," then—since
you can understand that the author was clearly attempting to make a certain
argument, whether or not they succeeded—you should assume they said what they
were trying to say, instead of bailing out like a compiler. The Principle of
Charity, in other words.

------
gatsby
There are undoubtedly infinite mantras to live by that can help to produce a
successful, happy, meaningful life. If this advice worked for the author,
fantastic.

Interestingly, most people I personally know who've achieved any amount of
"success" have all worked their asses off, tried harder than everyone around
them, competed fiercely, marketed better than their competitors, read often,
chased their dreams (whether it's money, happiness, adventure, "success,"
etc.), and were always open to advice (especially at 22).

Regardless of age, status, profession, passions, goals, or anything else -
life can be a bitch and failure happens. Though I've never spoken to Picasso,
Moore, Hendrix, or Ali, I'm almost positive they had struggles. They probably
even had times when they wanted to leave it all and quit. They didn't have
beautiful, easy, careers. But they kept fighting, continued their craft, and
persevered.

This letter is a cute romanticization of life and work, but it's likely
terrible, harmful advice.

------
Kilimanjaro
Do what you love and love what you do.

To live happily, you must understand what 'love' means to you and what you
want to 'do' with your life.

Then do it with endless passion.

As a programmer, there is nothing that I like more than coding to solve a
problem. I've spent 30 years of my life doing it and it still feels like my
first love.

If I had enough money to cover all my worries I'd spend the rest of my life
coding.

As I always say, I code to make money to be free to do what I want: coding.

------
scott_s
I think all of it is terrible advice (don't try hard? don't work? good luck
with that), but others have already covered that below. I just wanted to point
out that apparently the author still opens unsolicited Word documents from
emails. Not a good idea: <http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2001/7/25/>

------
Stevenup7002
Very true post, however, I disagree with the "Do not ever work" and "Do not
ever try hard" parts. For everything you enjoy doing, there's always some work
behind it. When Picasso went to paint, he had to spend time setting up his
canvas and his palette, which I'm sure wasn't as fun as painting the picture
itself.

------
alexyoung
"Do not take advice"

OK, I won't take your advice. But you just said "do not take advice", so does
that mean I should take your advice about not taking advice? (stack error,
brain explodes)

~~~
chunkbot
My brain eliminates tail calls, so it's just an infinite loop :)

------
tsbaron
Hmm so according to Mr. Rabbani, Hacker News is a waste of time.

~~~
dmatking
One can certainly use a lot of time reading Hacker News. Whether it is wasted
or not depends on the reader I think.

------
AndyKelley
Today is my 22nd birthday... weird.

------
petermin
Great advices. Thanks for sharing.

------
askar_yu
alright, but... "no pain, no gain"

~~~
tsycho
a friend of mine used to have a funny variant of this (more a jab at me when i
would be leaving for the gym)

"no pain, no pain" :)

------
cshenoy
22 for women, 25 for men (since we don't really listen to advice until later
on, if at all).

awesome advice!

~~~
cshenoy
whoa. was totally joking! no need to downvote.

~~~
kgermino
I didn't downvote you, but jokes like that usually aren't well received here.
Particularly from relatively new users like yourself.

