

My Biggest Temptation - ryancarson
http://ryanleecarson.tumblr.com/post/23284176896/temptation

======
rmATinnovafy
I used to blame and complain. Every one of my failures was due to something
different. My name, my lack of capital, my poor confidence, where I lived, my
nationality, my parents, my car, even my big ears.

Then one of my brothers died.

As painful as it is to write this, his death and only his death was the only
thing that would open my eyes.

Life is way short to even complain. To pay attention to petty details. To yell
at the waiter because the soup is cold, or my steak is not cooked. To give up
when my code won't compile, even though I may not have the slightest clue why.

Its only been three years. My adventures as a re-born man have only just
begun. The future, though a bit fuzzy, looks promising. I'm not sure if any of
my ideas will take off, but I'm sure I'll enjoy each hustling for each and
every one of them.

I've already made a good bunch of friends through this community. People so
incredible that it blows my mind. People I actually look up to.

And even though browsing HN reminds me how limited my talents may be, it also
pushes me to realize that limits are just rules. And rules are meant to be
challenged.

I'm still not an optimist. Because we are all still going to die and be
forgotten. What I am is a bit more practical. I call it an active life enjoyer
(made up word).

My main goal is not to be rich (though it would be nice to have a new car, and
live in a better place), nor to be famous (but having friends is cool). I
don't even want to become the next big tech superstar. I just want my
adventure to go as long as possible. And to enjoy every second of it. So far,
so good.

To be totally honest, I founded my startup due to such attitude. What's the
worse that could happen? I'm already not rich, not famous. Money comes and
goes. But life. Life just goes. I'd rather live it in a way that when the time
comes for me to depart, I can take my last breath and say: "Would do it
again."

~~~
ryancarson
Thank you for sharing. Powerful story. Really appreciate it.

~~~
rmATinnovafy
You're welcome.

Thank you for the nice words.

------
kirse
_I need to clarify: I feel 100% happy now._

I've got to say, I still don't understand the obsession these days with
"happiness". Who sits around reflecting on (and measuring) their happiness, as
if it's some numerical, achievable end-goal? Not only that, the most important
thing in life is not what you can do, but who you daily choose to be - your
character and integrity. Money and things will fade, but character never dies.

Happiness is nice if it comes as a byproduct of life, but if happiness is
really the pinnacle of that which we are striving for -- if it's really our
greatest purpose in life -- we have a foundation softer than sand, constantly
shifting with every direction the wind blows. Martin Luther King hints at his
purpose in his "I Have Been to the Mountaintop" speech, noting that he's
willing to sacrifice a long life for his purpose:

 _Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But
I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's
allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the
Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight,
that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!_

It also surprises me that as someone who was a "devoted Christian for 25
years" who would at least have some Biblical knowledge, Ryan doesn't at least
acknowledge the inherent spiritual incompleteness of placing his hope in
worldly and material things - number six on his list being the exception.
(Ecclesiastes, Ryan? Or Job 1:21? Or Phil 4:12?)

~~~
ryancarson
I'm in an Apple store, so I don't have a ton of time to compose this, but here
goes:

You can't make much of an impact on the world if you're not happy with your
life. You'll spend most of your time trying to find happiness, instead of
moving on to help other people be happy.

Now that I don't believe in 'saving' people (in the Christian sense), there
isn't a higher purpose for me other than helping others find contentment.

Now that I've found contentment, I can start to focus on others.

Note that me finding happiness or contentment isn't because I've bought things
or have cash in the bank.

It's the state of mind that my blog post talks about (and how I'm tempted to
break out of it all the time).

~~~
kirse
_You can't make much of an impact on the world if you're not happy with your
life._

This sort of self-centered attitude (i.e. "my own happiness must come before
others") is the same line of reasoning that people use to say "you can't love
others before you love yourself", but it's just not true.

Happiness often comes when we consciously decide to take the focus off
ourselves (and all the moaning and worrying we do about our "unhappiness") and
place it squarely on the well-being and loving service of others. It's a daily
choice to lose ourselves in something far greater than our ego and its want of
fickle satisfaction.

 _Now that I've found contentment, I can start to focus on others._

I'm not going to judge your motives, but I would question if you've really
found true contentment -- you're living an extremely favorable set of
circumstances in life (a great wife, kids, a fantastic business) that make it
easy to be happy -- and yet here you are, writing a blog post about how it's
still not enough. The business has to be bigger (more barns to build!), you
want more money than 99.9999% of the world to retire early, etc. You know your
own heart though.

I struggle with the same thing too on a monthly basis, the constant pull
towards discontentment. I often find it's when I've stopped giving thanks
daily and, consciously or otherwise, allowed myself to believe that "these
material things matter and they are mine to have".

With that said, I would say true contentment is really understanding Job 1:21
and the perspective that brings.

~~~
ryancarson
It's not self-centered, it's just built into our species. I believe in
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslows_hierarchy_of_needs>

~~~
kirse
You may "believe" in Maslow's hierarchy, but whether it is truth is certainly
up for debate. Even the "Criticisms" section on the Wikipedia page you link
has plenty of legitimate debate. As with most psychology, it is a soft science
at best and pseudoscience at worst.

Through your own missions work, you must have certainly met plenty of people
(or at least heard plenty of stories) of people possessing far less on that
hierarchy than the average American who were far more content and held an
"actualized" attitude about life.

The very highest definition of love (Greek - agape), often denotes self-
sacrifice, something that certainly goes against the grain of an ego-driven
desire for personal happiness. I'm sure you know it all too well as a parent
and the many sacrifices you make for your kids =) I think we live too much of
our lives worrying with an inward focus when the real answer is to take that
energy and turn our focus outward to others. Self-centered may have been a
harsh word, but it is what it is.

------
petercooper
The way I feel happy with my lot (despite wanting to achieve goals too) is to
read and listen to history books. A large chunk of humankind has had to put up
with heartbreaking misery and torture and learning about it makes me
incredibly grateful to be living here and now, even if I'm having a bad week.
Building up some empathy for my fellow man isn't a bad side effect either(!)

I'm currently a third of the way into "Gulag: A History" by Anne Applebaum.
Good book but very hard to bear. Millions, including innocent Soviet citizens,
were tortured, massacred, or worked to death over a whole 30 years. It puts
waking up with a headache and having to drive to the office into perspective I
find.. :-)

~~~
d0mine
I don't understand the word "including". Do you mean that almost all of the
prisoners were not Soviet citizens or they were innocent?

~~~
petercooper
Well, quite a lot of the prisoners were not Soviet, for example, hundreds of
thousands from Poland or even German Jews who fled Germany and then ended up
in Russia's camps instead. I'm no historian but in this book, people from
Soviet states like Lithuania seem to not be considered 'Soviet' in some sense
- this term being limited mostly to Russians proper.

On the 'innocence' point, I'm talking by Soviet legal standards. People _were_
found guilty of all sorts of "crimes" at the time, but many were also never
found "guilty" of anything and were merely picked up at random to meet labor
requirements at the prison camps. In this book, they're split into "real
criminals" (so murderers, thieves, etc), "politicals" (people who were
targeted for their political affiliations), and then everyone else, including
the innocents or _relations_ of the aforementioned groups.

------
qznc
I assume for HN readers the basic needs (food,home,friends) are covered. After
that, happyness is mostly a decision.

Are your goals life-changing? If you sell your current startup successfully,
what would you do afterwards? Start the next one? Basically the same daily
routine? Congratulations you are already happy. Maybe you didn't know that.

~~~
middus
It's about expectations. If set your "‘comfortable’ profitability" at 50-70%
net profit margin, you are bound to be unhappy for quite some time.

~~~
camwest
Agreed. The assumption that "there is no additional cost for each new customer
once we reach profitability". Is a false one. If/when you reach profitability
that will prove the market to competitors who will try to fast follow and
drive up the cost for acquisition. There is no such thing as a stand-still net
profit. You'll always have to work for it.

------
ForrestN
I must say I feel a bit bad for the writer, especially after the update. He
reads, to me, as feeling a lot of pressure to self-identify as happy. As if a
truly brilliant entrepreneur, a real success, couldn't struggle with, for
example, anxiety.

He writes a post about experiencing anxiety despite his obvious success so
far, about "constantly fighting" his temptation to feel bad about where he is,
about his drive to dissociate from his current live in favor of an imagined
"perfect" future life that's constantly changing. He's sharing a set of
feelings I think a lot of people, especially ambitious people, can relate to.

But then he feels the need to say he's "100% happy." What does that even mean?
Why does he (probably correctly) think that his social context demands that he
be unnaturally happy, and that sharing inner struggles will be problematic for
him as a public figure? I wish he was OK admitting that sometimes he's not
happy. That inexplicably (and yet predictably), meeting one's goals often
doesn't actually help you feel any better.

------
akg
I think goals are a way to drive yourself to do something
productive/stimulating so that you don't get bored. However, the
accomplishment of goals and fulfilling your every desire, albeit important, is
not what makes a person happy.

I think happiness comes from something much more abstract. It is a visceral
reaction to your life and everything in it. I truly believe that in the end,
the thing that makes you happy in life is when you live uncompromisingly,
upholding the beliefs/principles/truths/etc. that resonate deep within your
heart; whatever they may be.

~~~
ryancarson
Good way to sum it up

------
wsc981
I've come to realize I'd be more happy whenever I have more freedom. Freedom
is quite abstract, but for me it envelopes economic freedom and freedom to
make my own decisions in work. I enjoy my work as a software developer, but I
hate the processes around it in a lot of company settings. I feel a company
like Valve gives it's employees a lot of freedom and I wish more companies
would treat their employees the same way.

For the aforementioned reasons I'll be starting a company with a friend in
June / July of this year. This friend of mine will work on acquiring the leads
(he's proven in the last few years he can get work for me) while my main focus
will be on developing the solutions for the clients and guiding our clients
through the realization process. With this company we will aim for the
following goals: \- earn much more money, I expect I can make around 2000 to
3000 EUR more a month in this setting, though I have to spend some of this
money on benefit my employer would normally pay for (holidays, retirement,
etc...). \- use my own work processes (I'm not very fond of SCRUM for example
- at least not in the way it's executed at my current employer). \- take a
leadership / guiding role in some projects, especially since we expect we'll
be able to outsource some work within a year or so. We've already worked with
an Android developer from eastern Europe recently and this worked out well for
us. We can imagine making use of more eastern European mobile developers if we
don't have the time ourselves for the projects. \- be more flexible with my
working hours. My currently employer wants me in the office from 09:00 -
17:00, while I prefer to work from say 09:00 - 13:00, followed by some
relaxation / sports and work again between 18:00 and 00:00.

The money will help me gain more economic freedom once I've payed off my
mortgage and student loan dept. I don't necessarily need to live in a giant
house, but I would like to have a second home in a southern-European country
from where I can work in the winter seasons - this is a long term goal I'll
strive for.

I believe that by constantly visualizing my goals I will get closer to
achieving them. I promised myself I will realize the above goals before I
reach the age of 40 (currently I'm 30 years old).

------
basicallydan
Man, I have this same problem. It's a real headache, but every now and then I
have a feeling of clarity, like somehow everything is actually pretty OK as it
is.

I don't make lists though - usually it's something I'm told by somebody else,
like one of my sisters or my mother. Somebody who knows me and my life well.
That usually does the trick.

But I can't independently convince myself of my own personal happiness at the
drop of a hat when that demon of looking forward to the brighter future rears
it's ugly head - I hope I can figure it out like you have!

------
edw519
Reminds me of this true story of 2 women:

Esther1 was the born to a very poor family. Her parents were killed in an
accident when she was 8 so she had to drop out of school and raise her 3
younger brothers. She worked hard and never had anything material for her
entire life. She was an old lady when I was a child. Some of the things I
clearly remember her saying:

    
    
      "I love every one of you."
      "I can't wait to see you again."
      "We had a wonderful time!"
      "Don't worry. It'll be fine."
      "If you look for trouble, you'll probably find it. So don't look so much."
      "I thank God every night of my life."
    

Esther2 came from almost identical circumstances. She was even born and died
the same week as Esther1. Some of the things I remember her saying:

    
    
      "Joe is so lucky. I could never get that lucky."
      "You can't beat city hall, so why bother."
      "Things would be different if we lived in a different neighborhood."
      "They all inherited a lot but we inherited nothing."
      "Life's not fair, sonny."
      "If only I had more money."
    

Esther1 was my grandmother. Esther2 was her neighbor. Whenever I have OP's
temptation to worry about my own happiness, I just look at the 4 letters on
the wall above my desk, "WWGT" (What would Grandma think?) That "fixes" me
every time.

~~~
brandall10
My folks are both Esther2s, and consequently I was until about 30. Then I
started getting into various self-help things, aligning myself with others of
like mind, etc... basically just doing whatever it took to cultivate PMA
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_mental_attitude>) and ridding my
emotional lexicon of victim mentality.

I can't remember what the name for it (or even if there is a name for it), but
one of the best tricks I've learned is to self identify any negative thoughts
as they stream in... when they come, just acknowledge they exist, don't beat
yourself up over it; but take a step back, imagine yourself in the 3rd person
seeing you get wound up over it, laugh it off and relax if you can. If you
can't that's okay, it's just like attaining any positive habit or trying to
quit any negative one. Persistence and time will make things come around, as
long as you want it and continue deliberately practicing to achieve it.

It was a process that took a couple years to sink in but surely will be
ongoing until the day I die - the funny thing is, for years now, only my folks
have been able to get a physical rise out of me (and perhaps rush hour
traffic, haha). It's like some weird Pavlov's response. And of course there
are times when a situation is just a little too tough, scary, or stressful,
and I catch myself falling back on old patterns. In other words, when you find
your comfort zones stretched, you also have to keep in mind that your mind
will try to deceive you to keep you out of harm's way.

~~~
pacaro
I'm reminded of this quote...

"…feelings like disappointment, embarrassment, irritation, resentment, anger,
jealousy, and fear, instead of being bad news, are actually very clear moments
that teach us where it is that we’re holding back. They teach us to perk up
and lean in when we feel we’d rather collapse and back away. They’re like
messengers that show us, with terrifying clarity, exactly where we’re stuck.
This very moment is the perfect teacher, and, lucky for us, it’s with us
wherever we are." ― Pema Chödrön

------
koide
You can also try to distance yourself from the goals. Goals do not define your
life or who you are, they are only things you want to do.

That way you can say, "Everything IS perfect or close to it now. By the way,
I'll bump up my revenues 1000% and move to Cambodia."

The really hard thing is to retain the needed passion to succeed at those
goals while remaining distant enough for them not to make you believe they are
life defining events, as they usually aren't, even significantly big ones.

------
padolsey
Great post. I would add the following to the list: films and books. To many
these may seem like escapism but I think the insight gained from such varying
perspectives gives you better insight into your own life, and I've found it
can enhance your "here and now" value system.

Paraphrasing Shawn Achor: you'll never reach happiness if it is always on the
other side of some constantly shifting horizon.

~~~
ryancarson
Great idea - thank you. I guess that's why I love film so much. I helps me
make sense out of my life.

------
xfax
Off-topic, but this really stuck out for me:

 _I’d set this bar at 50-70% net profit margin. We can aim high because there
is no additional cost for each new customer once we reach profitability._

That's a common misconception. You _are_ indeed spending money on getting each
additional customer, you are just not accounting for it correctly. It's easy
to consider all marketing/advertising/sales/customer service expenses as fixed
costs, when indeed these costs go up with each additional customer you on-
board.

Also, even if you reach the 50-70% profit margins, how sustainable would that
be? The simple law of efficient markets dictates that you will have
competitors who will be willing to undercut you. There is no relatively stable
company out there that is able to make such margins unless they have
constructed entry barriers around themselves (patents, laws etc.).

------
JonnieCache

        Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans.
    
            - John Lennon

------
freshhawk
To the commenters: Any time these off topic subjects come up they spawn some
interesting discussions and comments.

With no facts, whatsoever. For fucks sake, reddit has more research citations
than HN does in a discussion like this.

Thanks for contributing to the stereotype that technologists are the worst
group when it comes to thinking that success in one field gives license to
ignorantly spout opinions as fact in other fields.

References to the bible and self help books, no references to any actual
psychology of happiness research.

I've got some all natural homeopathic depression/disappointment/malaise
remedies to sell. I think I just found my target demo.

~~~
jarek
> I think I just found my target demo.

Startup idea! /s

------
erikb
I read once (can't find the link now) that the feeling of anticipation is
stronger then the feeling of happiness, which makes sense to me, because in
nature only the adapting species will survive long enough. So having something
to strive for might be quite important, maybe even more then feeling happy.
And I don't just mean life threatening situations, I mean that we might
actually want to "pursue happiness", not "have happiness". Ever thought about
that?

------
drumdance
I define happiness in the very short term, kind of like Steve Jobs: do I want
to get out of bed this morning and do the work on my plate?

Sometimes the answer is no, but most days it's yes. As long as I average more
yeses than noes, I don't think about it much. It's when the noes pile up for
more than a month that I think about making a change.

------
suhastech
I think ryancarson.com is down or incorrectly configured.

In case, you want to read it.

[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Aryanl...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Aryanleecarson.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F23284176896%2Ftemptation)

------
rowlandrose
I've found that by achieving some of my life goals, I haven't reached a point
where I find myself content and without any more goals, but I do notice a huge
improve in my average happiness compared to years ago. I find myself content
instead with the fact that I'll always have awesome new goals.

------
tnash
I really loved the line "It’s like I’m waiting for the movie of my life to
begin instead of realizing that I’m already living it." I feel like that a
lot. I have to remind myself to focus on now.

------
funkyboy
I prefer joy to happiness. Joy is more an attitude, whereas happiness seems to
come from something "external", like I have bought a new car, that VIP said hi
to me, etc.

------
DanielBMarkham
There's always a conflict between goal-directed, sacrifice-oriented work
patterns and life-directed, interpersonal-directed work patterns. If you're
goal-directed, you're looking at that 100MM in sales. If you're life-directed,
you're counting the days until the baby takes its first steps.

I'm unhappy with _everything_ I've read along these lines, and I've read a lot
of it on HN and elsewhere. I'm also unhappy with my own balance many times.
The problem is that both extremes are not lives I would want to have. I do not
want to be a Buddhist, sitting around in loose-fitting clothing feeling
perfect happiness. I also do not want to be a driven type-A sort that is
counting pennies the last day of his life.

My best guess so far is to start out enjoying the struggle -- go freaking do
something with yourself and the world. As you begin to gain traction, back off
and actually have a life. The trick, of course, is learning when and how to
back off, so I probably haven't added much to the discussion. :)

One thing I know for sure is I agree with this thesis: happiness cannot be
just around the corner. It must be whatever you are doing right now.

------
kamaal
Reading this made me recall and reflect on a lot of things in life.

I am 27 now, but when I was 21 I used to think that I can be happy no matter
what the situations in life. Soon I had to come to face with the reality. You
need money to solve your own and the worlds problems.

Just like the author I come to always to the point _“Everything will be
perfect when ….”_.

And you will never be free, because first you will want a college degree, then
its a home, then its a car, then clothes, and then in comparison with whatever
everybody else has. And then as you have a family it just goes on and on...

So it happened that I went with relative of mine to check out a luxury flat he
was about to buy here in Bangalore. As I was checking out the flat with him,
he asked me if I would buy if I had the money. And then he asked me to reply
with an honest opinion. I paused for a moment and replied... That I would like
to buy it now, but I would like to buy it now just because you are buying it.
And I'm comparing myself with you, but If I were you and in your shoes then
probably I would like to buy what somebody else in your peer group might be
buying it. And that might mean a super luxury flat.

I realized a simple fact. We are never free. We are always a slave to the
question that the author asks _“Everything will be perfect when ….”_

We will never be happy because we need money to solve our problems and buy all
we want to buy, no amount of it is ever sufficient. And the answer to that is
not 'stop having expectations'.

~~~
ryancarson
I don't think the answer is to "stop having expectations". The key is
realizing you need very little to be truly happy.

~~~
kamaal
>>The key is realizing you need very little to be truly happy.

Although I agree with you in principle. But so as long as we have feelings,
comparison and desires to match someone else is inevitable. I've tried a lot,
but I keep ending up with...

    
    
        Why can't I have a car like him.
        Why can't I have a home like his.
        Why can't go on a costly vacation like him.
        ...
        Why can't I have <insert anything> like him.
    

And that never goes away...

~~~
Random_Person
I live on less than $40k a year.

I have a wife and 2 little girls. We have a house, 2 cars, and a motorcycle.
All of our vehicles are paid for and we have no revolving credit.

I am HAPPY. Poor, yet HAPPY.

The secret is that I stopped thinking: "Why can't I have a car like him?"
Instead, I started thinking, "It must suck to work as much as he does," or
"I'm glad I don't have debt like him!"

I have everything I need and quite a few things that I want. I have money in
the bank to buy just about anything I'd like to own, within reason. I did not
achieve financial freedom on what is considered poverty level salary by
desiring new fancy things.

It took me 4 years of credit counseling and BARELY making it buy each month to
realize all of this. It was not an easy lesson. But now, I have friends making
over $200k that are envious of me.

I'm not right or wrong. My method isn't better than acquiring awesome stuff
with tons of money. I have found that time with my family is more valuable
than money.

------
audiodude
Can anyone comment on what happened to this link?

------
chriszabaleta
If you like who you are you will be happy.

------
yashchandra
Very well written. I have a similar feeling. We strive for happiness _in
future_ but sometimes tend to overlook our current life and how happy things
are.It just depends on how you look at it. Lately, I have been wondering what
is missing in my life even though I have a great wife, great family, great
friends, healthy life (so far:)). I guess it is just a startup itch that I am
looking to scratch. Other than that, I feel pretty good.

