I relocated permanently back in 2021, in fact, soon after finishing up undergrad at Northwestern. I'm a dual US/EU citizen and I moved to be with my Finnish wife. I'm here now!
I don't have a blog post to share. My experience here has been largely positive, modulo the obvious financial caveat: My take home salary really is about ~30% of what it would be had I stayed back in the United States and followed a similar career trajectory. In the long run I think this is an eminently fixable problem, however :)
Personal opinion: I find funerals to be a waste of time and money.
Especially, coming from a culture where they are a big event. People spend enormous money on funerals —- money that they wouldn’t help you with while you are alive and struggling.
Maybe attending one in a less flamboyant culture will change my mind.
But I wish more people in general don’t wait for terminal events to do or say nice things.
I shared your opinion until I attended my first funeral as an adult. They are very important for the grieving process, at least to me.
That doesn't mean much money needs to be spent, I've only been to scaled down funerals where there's a short ceremony and a meal afterwards.
Eh. For children of less than stellar parents, a funeral is:
- A bad person gets celebrated in a way that is not aligned to your understanding
- A bunch of people who don't know about the less than stellar bits offering what feels like performative grief
- Others who enabled the less than stellar bits angry their applecart has been upset, looking to lash out at a scapegoat.
Obviously not everyone has this negative experience, but narcissism is in about 6.2-7.7% of the population; other "dark traits" are also around in a long tail. So it's not unreasonable to expect around 12-15%? of people risk a potential increase to trauma at an already complex time of their lives.
The funeral industry is also very predatory. They know full well they have people in grief making decisions and they end up getting pressured into buying a casket that's just going to be buried in the ground in a few days, but they will be paying for for the next 10 years. That a family can come out of a funeral tens of thousands of dollars in debt is just absurd.
I feel much the same. I hope that when I die, the people around me will remember the many times that I have asked to have my body disposed of as quietly and cheaply as possible, and to not perform a funeral for me, and if they wish to use my death as an excuse to gather, to make the event as joyful as possible and as little about me as they can.
It probably depends on one's culture. In the Philippines, it's customary for funeral visitors to give a small donation to the bereaved family members (typically, around 20-40 USD). And since funerals are considered a big social event, it's not uncommon to hear of fmilies who were able to recoup (or pay off) their funeral expenses through the donations alone.
As someone who has worked hard for years (at some point I had three con-concurrent jobs), I’m not sure working hard is the variable that causes burnout :thinking_face:
I will say tho, it gave me persistent back problems and RSI for two years :). But that again is not just “working hard”. It was bad posture, lack of stretching, breaks and exercise, I think.
Edit: Perhaps it’s the nature of the work or working hard unhealthily (physical and mental?) or the person’s characteristics.
I see. I guess different strokes for different folks.
For me, if my job or project is doomed, and my employer knows, I will rather they tell me immediately so I can start figuring out solutions ASAP.
It doesn’t matter if it’s the holidays. The last thing I will want is to come back from a holiday in Portugal, spirits high, year plans made, but only to be told I am fired.
I think it depends on the amount of severance you receive. A layoff happening in November/December with enough severance to cover what would've been the employee's wages/salary through February or beyond is kind of ideal; that way I'd get to spend the holidays as, well, holidays. Otherwise, I'd prefer it to be after the holidays, when businesses are ramping back up into normal operations and therefore I can reasonably hope for a faster turnaround time (and thus less of my own savings drained).
This time I got laid off it was the latter (last week), and while it's still stressful, I vastly prefer it over the last time I lost my job (right after Thanksgiving, with no severance).
The amount of time you have after you are fired is the same. If you are fired later, you get paid for a month or two AND are stress free with your family during the holidays.
Of course. However, the amount of time spent thinking consciously or subconsciously on a doomed project is minimized. The amount of time spent making decisions predicated on having the same job also. I can also savage any expensive holiday plans I made.
The keyword for me is the employer should let me know ASAP when something is doomed.
Again, this stress-free holiday with family is not a problem for me. I will rather be real about the situation than have my employer hide it for a month. They could give me an extra month of severance instead :).
Edit: I might be a minority on the earlier take.
I think the other argument that would affect other people is: these things always leak through gossip. When you hear of an imminent layoff and you don’t know if you will be included, it’s the worst type of stress.
I find it funny that you are discussing how to block YouTube ads —- when you can just get YouTube premium. Makes me ask the age old question: how can creators supposed to eat?
Do you worry how the actors eat in the shows you watch? If at any point a "content creator" can't sustain their video production, they can do what every other failed entrepreneur does and move on to another job, or re-assess the business model and adapt.
So far, nothing's been put on the table for me to feel compelled to buy video access, or videos themselves, for. If Youtube paywalls tomorrow, I'll go somewhere else. I got by on the Web before Youtube and I'll get by after them, too.
> Our culture needs to confront the fact that people are tired of their attention being diverted from their goals every day just so some dumb companies can remind us they exist.
This seems like an argument against non-targeted/contextual ads only? Because goals and ads can align.
I have had back pain and RSI for almost two years. My situation only got better after I started doing my physio exercises consistently.
I also learned things from physios on YouTube (e.g. Bob and Brad) that made a difference especially with the RSI in my hands.
My anecdotal experience doesn’t scaling with your claim. Of course, each pain is different and some just require good ol rest like you said. But that’s why you should spend the money to hire the professionals at the top of their game to tell you what is what.
Bob and Brad ("the two most famous physical therapists on the internet") are an absolute treasure. Always good to see them get some appreciation online.
Of course, if you, as a dictator, ban the word "sad" and the adjacent synonyms, people won't stop feeling sad. However, it's likely that they won't be able to reflect on what they feel, which in turn will change the way they think. And it's likely that the psychologists of this country will have a much harder time healing their patients or writing papers about depression.
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