[HN Gopher] Ask HN: Have you invested in self-development and do...
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Ask HN: Have you invested in self-development and done inner work?
Before realizing on what I should focus on and what my purpose was,
I was in the agency world, and close from the infoproduct world. I
came to realize that there's a lot of programs that exist for this
audience (agencies and coaches with a course). Most of these
programs are steps by steps on how to do X (often sales related) or
on how to improve their mindset to scale their business. When I
switched to focusing more on my craft of being an "optimizer"
(problem solver) by focusing on being more a maker, I noticed that
there's not much of these type of programs. I am still new to this
new "indie" and "maker" world, so maybe I simply have not been
exposed to it enough, but I am curious, how many of you have been
doing some inner work? And what have been your experience so far
as a creator regarding your personal growth?
Author : hugohamelcom
Score : 99 points
Date : 2022-04-06 13:56 UTC (9 hours ago)
| neogodless wrote:
| It might help to consider the common language of what I believe
| you're talking about.
|
| > self-development
|
| > inner work
|
| This is more commonly referred to as "self-improvement" or "self-
| help" (depending on if you think you're just improving yourself,
| or more specifically addressing something you consider to be a
| weakness or shortcoming.) It means developing your skills or
| learning new ones, and coming to a new understanding of a topic
| of interest.
|
| You also might want to start by figuring out what role you want
| to be in, whether professionally or in hobbies. It's not clear if
| you want to be a problem solver _or_ a creator. Having lots of
| aliases for what you mean isn 't giving anyone clarity. Being a
| "maker" often means you have projects you work on because you're
| interested, and you want to tinker and build things. But a
| "creator" might be slightly different, as would a "creative." A
| "problem solver" in business is more likely someone that is
| called upon when there are problems. That's vastly different from
| being a "creator", "maker" or "creative."
|
| In general, I think you're caught up in "programs" and buzz
| words. In my opinion, you need to take five steps back and think
| about what you really want to be doing and go from there.
| ashes-of-sol wrote:
| > It means developing your skills or learning new ones, and
| coming to a new understanding of a topic of interest.
|
| This feels very much like "outer" work, tacking on new skills
| or understanding about externalities. "Inner work", however you
| want to refer to it as, is more about looking within to
| understand your motivations, influences, blocks/hang ups/fears
| etc to help approach life with a more informed understanding of
| why you are the way you are
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| That's a really good point and perspective. I would say that I
| am interested in solving a specific problem or serving a
| specific use case by improving what already exists (making it
| better using) through the process of building solutions (being
| a maker). Would that be more clear?
| neogodless wrote:
| In a way, it sounds like you're looking for a way to label
| yourself, give yourself an identity.
|
| But I think you're trying to use generic high level language
| to describe your personal, specific niche. It doesn't really
| communicate anything.
|
| Looking at your submission from yesterday, and your product
| submission, it sounds like you want to make products, and
| market them so they are successful, so you are successful.
| But this focus on finding a superfluous label doesn't seem
| like it's going to help you get there.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Be careful with thinking that deep work, expanding your mind,
| culture, emotional and spiritual literacy, philosophical,
| psychological and political understanding will make you better.
|
| You will become different. Whatever measures by which you discern
| 'better' before, will be irrelevant, almost laughable to the
| person you become. And beware too that growth can itself become a
| preoccupation.
|
| If you have goals like be more productive, make more money,
| change the world, be more liked... then prepare yourself for at
| least the possibility that you will, in the course of real
| growth, end up rejecting those things as silly.
|
| edit: accidentally posted as reply to wrong comment
| plutonorm wrote:
| I discovered I don't enjoy programming at all and I was only
| ever trying to prove myself smart, because my father had hang
| ups about being stupid after getting brain damage.
|
| Programming itself is horrible, now I'm stuck in a career I
| hate (or rather I am now aware of my prison).
|
| I'm not sure knowing is better.
| v-erne wrote:
| Why do You believe that programming is itself horrible? I do
| it for almost 20 years and have love and hate relationship
| with it, but would never say its intrinsically horrible - its
| just a tool (the real hell is other people as they say :))
| [deleted]
| voiper1 wrote:
| What makes you say you are imprisoned in your career as a
| programmer?
|
| People career hop a lot.
| gigaflop wrote:
| If you don't know, then you can't act to change. That's how I
| try to think about it. Once you're aware of the problem, you
| can start work to change it, even if slowly.
|
| Somewhat related, I used to weigh 270lbs. I changed my mind
| and made some changes, and was down to 180lbs after 1.5 to 2
| years.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Programming is what you do. It's not what you are. And lot's
| of what you've learned will not be wasted on the new you, who
| I wish every happiness to in the future.
| JackFr wrote:
| This.
|
| It's nice to find meaning in your work, but doing so is a
| luxury not everyone cann afford. More importantly ones work
| should never be the only source for meaning, nor the most
| important.
|
| There are competeing schools of thought that value and life
| satisfcation can be measured by what we produce and what we
| consume. Both those schools of thought are lies, or at
| least incomplete.
| mrnotcrazy wrote:
| Programming provides enough income and ideally time outside
| of work that you should be able to slowly expand in any
| direction you want.
|
| I will say I have always wanted to be a programmer but I've
| so far ended up being a better Systems Engineer, regardless
| though it doesn't worry me since at the end of the day, I am
| exchanging labor for money.(although I wont Rule out a career
| change!)
|
| Now my job does have some added meaning in that I help to
| provide internet to rural areas and I can see myself in many
| of these end users and I can see how impactful it is to
| provide services. Real life and meaning and by extension
| happiness is beyond work, it encompasses work but is so much
| beyond work. Happiness is like gas in that it expands to fill
| the space you give it, if you look for happiness in
| programing, you might be miserable. If you look for happiness
| in being an excellent worker and craftsman then you might be
| a little bit happier but there are still probably larger
| spaces.
|
| Of course people's brains(and hearts) are different so you
| may want to see a therapist and there is nothing wrong with
| that.
| dontbeevil1992 wrote:
| in gestalt therapy this is called being at an impasse - you
| are in touch with yourself enough to know that you're not
| happy, but not yet sure how to change your life to be happy.
| long term I do believe it is better to be in touch with
| yourself even though there may be periods of discomfort or
| confusion. it's better to do that than to be humming along
| feeding your trauma until you reach the age of 50, have a
| mid-life crisis and realize you've wasted so much time not in
| touch with yourself.
| dpweb wrote:
| Mid-life crisis is a real thing - didn't really expect it.
| But can be viewed in a positive way. Out of what can be a
| pretty terrifying psychological breakdown, can also be
| considered part of a process of evolution and discovery.
|
| If you're perhaps grounded with the goal, I want to evolve
| into the person I really am, and should be. Remembering (or
| discovering) that most of what the world tells you and
| teaches you is just false. There are reasons why we want
| the particular things we want and upon deep examination
| those reasons may be found to be silly. This realization is
| heartbreaking cause then we feel we are past the mid-point
| - and have wasted our life!
|
| But is a necessary step toward our real goal. It's a tough
| road, but I believe provides one more dignity than a lot of
| people's alternatives - numbing the pain with alcohol or
| drugs or chasing money or false idols so to speak. Not
| dealing directly with one's pain and difficult questions
| about oneself.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| Absolutely!
| plutonorm wrote:
| I'm 40 and have a mortgage and a family, changing course is
| not easy. I've sent out hundreds of emails I got two
| interviews, both going nowhere. I went to do a startup with
| a friend with the hope of making something and then growing
| into a different role. But we haven't made much money and
| I'm still stuck in development.
| AyyWS wrote:
| Why not become a product owner, manager, technical sales,
| consultant, software architect, solution architect, technical
| evangelist, PM or some other dev adjacent role? I'm dev
| adjacent and 1/3 of my coworkers are ex-devs.
| lcfcjs wrote:
| Jackpillar wrote:
| blaser-waffle wrote:
| > Be careful with thinking that deep work, expanding your mind,
| culture, emotional and spiritual literacy, philosophical,
| psychological and political understanding will make you better.
|
| After watching my friends go to Peru to trip balls with shamans
| (or just go to Burning Man yearly) and "expand their mind" --
| but not really change their lives in any meaningful way -- I'm
| highly skeptical of the "deep understanding" school.
| ffhhj wrote:
| Did they drink Ayahuasca? [1] I know a person that changed
| their personality with it, and a shaman that was poisoned by
| another shaman with adulterated ayahuasca and almost lost his
| mind.
|
| [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayahuasca
| germinalphrase wrote:
| Yes - but mostly because I married a therapist.
| BatFastard wrote:
| Me too, been the strangest ride ever...
| denisrosset wrote:
| Two book recommendations, to refresh your mind if you've been too
| deep in "investing in inner growth" (can be a trap).
|
| - the Zhuangzi, translation by Burton Watson, which I've read
| many times. See the last two paragraphs of
| https://terebess.hu/english/chuangtzu.html about the useless tree
|
| - Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chogyam Trungpa, which
| I haven't read except extracts, but it could be relevant to you
| (esp. if you're looking at spiritual growth).
|
| But anyway, instead of buying new book... I'll speak of what I'm
| doing in a week.
|
| I'll go for ten days in the countryside with my dear partner and
| leave the laptop at home. I'm quite productive these last months
| (just submitted something to Show HN today), I find I'm missing
| guidance on a few areas of my life, and I'm in dear need of
| slowing down and cutting the external noise.
|
| Haven't taken real holidays in years.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| Definitively a good idea to disconnect, it's really important,
| and definitively need to do it more.
| denisrosset wrote:
| Do you mind if I email you directly at hello@...?
|
| I have a few thoughts to share and questions to ask about
| your search.
| cryptica wrote:
| IMO, people have the wrong idea about "self development" and
| "personal growth" - It sounds like some new age self-help,
| spiritual BS. This is not self development.
|
| Self development has nothing to do with positive thinking,
| visualizing success or spiritual stuff. That's a load of horse
| shit.
|
| Real self-development involves choosing difficult goals and
| focusing all your energy on attaining them; learning new skills
| and improving existing skills in the process. It's about
| mastering some useful skills in order to give yourself a sizable
| competitive advantage in the marketplace and in society - This is
| the best way to gain control of your future.
|
| The emotional, spiritual, positive thinking and visualization
| aspects of 'self improvement' are nonsense. This doesn't yield
| any improvement, all it does is it shows everyone that you're a
| gullible, delusional fool. The world doesn't give a shit about
| your positive thoughts; in fact they tend to cause people to be
| neglectful. The world cares about results.
| [deleted]
| nprateem wrote:
| Who gives a shit what the world cares about?
| codr7 wrote:
| Figuring your self out and facing your darkness is about as
| difficult and challenging as goals get from my experience,
| anything else is a Sunday walk in the park in comparison.
|
| It wont yield any improvement as long as you're too terrified
| to try and too busy judging those who are trying.
| joebeetee wrote:
| I haven't got time to write a better comment, but stopping past
| to say that I've found Vertical Development the most helpful
| conceptual framework for my own growth and for making sense of
| others.
|
| As a mental model, it has applications from very basic to
| extremely rich and complex.
|
| I've worked as an eng/manager/executive coach and keep
| discovering new insights.
|
| I always enjoy discussing it more if you're interested
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| Interesting, I'll look into it, thanks for sharing!
| epolanski wrote:
| I don't believe much into self-improvement industry, in fact I
| believe it is largely snake oil.
|
| One of the things that I find most gross about this whole
| industry is pushing the idea that you need to be "fixed".
|
| This kind of industry desperately needs to sell you there's
| something wrong with you that needs to be repaired or improved in
| order to sell you the solution.
|
| That's not to say there is no good contents out there, but in the
| end it can all be summed up to: have a purpose in life, work
| towards that purpose, be self disciplined if you want to achieve
| anything, be honest with yourself and other people.
|
| There isn't really much else to "self improvement" and
| "happiness" than understanding what you want to be and do,
| working towards that goal, having introspections and cultivating
| meaningful and healthy relationships.
|
| There's no secret sauce out there, no shortcut, if there was we
| all would've known it already after thousands of years of books,
| movies and phylosophical essays, reality is simple, but I guess
| hard work and discipline isn't as sexy and appealing like snake
| oil.
| ashes-of-sol wrote:
| tayistay wrote:
| Who else read BS terms like "self-development" and "inner work"
| and had to hold down the vomit? Who talks like that?
| ergonaught wrote:
| Inner work that actually matters (meaning it makes a genuine and
| relevant impact) isn't going to be specific to whatever you mean
| by "indie" and "maker" and such.
|
| It may align with some particular philosophy that resonates with
| you; the nature of the "work" may fit what seems "right for you"
| within your particular context (not everyone needs, wants, or
| benefits from a psychedelic meltdown, or a ten year hardcore
| meditation retreat, or three months of sensory deprivation, or
| prayer, or splitting logs, or ...); but there is an "essential"
| core underlying the things that would actually matter.
|
| "Self-development and inner work" largely amounts to
| clarity/awareness. Most of us are completely clueless regarding
| the values that drive us, and fewer of us are aware we can choose
| them. We don't examine the goals that drive our choices and
| behaviors. We don't actively monitor and adjust our physiology.
| We allow thinking errors in their wide variety to accumulate and
| distort. We over-identify with thinking/feeling/states/etc. We
| don't examine the beliefs we have about ourselves and the world,
| and again, we don't realize we can change these.
|
| There are lots of ways to examine/inspect/alter the software
| you're running, installed by you, your family, your friends, your
| teachers, your culture, your country, your experiences, your
| environment, your everything else.
|
| Find one that clicks and go for it. The idea that this will be
| somehow unique to "indie and maker world" is, ah, "not very
| helpful".
|
| Personally, I mostly use hypnosis/self-hypnosis/some forms of
| meditation/inquiry and the like, but that's what suits my
| inclinations. (And I'm a hypnotist, so of course that's what I
| prefer.) I got interested in that when I was a wee teen and it's
| been a very fine tool. But your mileage varies because you're
| driving a different vehicle.
| tashian wrote:
| I'm a lifelong engineer. I started programming when I was 12,
| studied computer engineering in college. But I've burned out a
| couple times. Most recently in 2016, burnout prompted a lot of
| inner work for me. At the time I was VP of engineering at the
| startup I founded, with a team of ten.
|
| Every day I saw how I was getting in my own way, and just how
| many opportunities I had to grow as a leader. But I couldn't
| actually do much of the work I needed to do while I was in the
| startup. It was too intense. I had to leave and reboot. So I
| left, and I started doing inner work in a completely open-ended
| way.
|
| In the end, it took about four years. I was lucky and privileged
| to be able to take so much time off.
|
| In the first year I was feeling through the darkness for clues. I
| had no idea what I was looking for. I only knew that I was burned
| out. I knew that the way I was operating wasn't serving me
| anymore. It hadn't served me for quite a while. I went to EMDR
| therapy, which was very helpful.
|
| The first big insight: Because I had focused so strongly on
| engineering as a kid and into adulthood, I realized that my
| growth was stunted in other areas. I started reparenting myself.
|
| The second big insight: I had learned to numb my emotions and was
| disconnected from my own body and my sense of intuition. I
| believe that's what led to burnout in the first place. I'd lost
| my connection with my spirit.
|
| Being used to clear career paths and life paths, the scariest
| thing to confront was the reality that there's no clear map for
| spiritual development, and it's a winding path, and signs of
| progress aren't always obvious. There's only a set of tools that
| have worked for others. You have to be willing to go into the
| unknown, and try some of those tools, especially the ones that
| may are beyond your comfort zone. For example, a five-day
| meditation retreat was a huge breakthrough for me, and it felt
| like taking a big risk for me to go at all.
|
| In order to really commit to this growth, I needed to let go of
| the idea that I'd ever return to tech. That was tough, because
| engineering has been such a big part of my identity. But I found,
| after that period, that I was able to come back to tech with a
| rediscovered sense of genuine curiosity. I returned as more of a
| whole human being. I gained a perspective that couldn't have come
| through more engineering work.
|
| It's hard to describe spiritual growth, but the entire journey
| was well worth it. I learned how to listen with my whole body. I
| learned how to get fear out of the driver's seat of my life. I
| prioritize very different things than I used to. I am more able
| to remain grounded in my body as I work. I actually enjoy working
| out now. I play basketball, I box, I meditate. I feel more of my
| emotions, and more empathy and connection with others. I learned
| how to cry. I'm so grateful for all of this, it is such a gift.
| And today, I love the engineering work that I do in infosec and
| PKI. As long as I stay connected to purpose, I'm not worried
| about burnout. I can feel that my heart is in my work. And when
| it isn't anymore, I will follow my heart to whatever is next.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| I can totally relate on your journey, I had a similar one.
| Congrats on your work!
| lcall wrote:
| I am trying to write a map. I am and it is, religious, and it
| works well for me. More at my site (in profile, nothing for
| sale... Site format comments welcome.
|
| Yes, purpose is huge to me also.
|
| My heartfelt congratulations on your growth.
| smilebot wrote:
| Maybe try checking out some maker websites? Some indie maker
| forums depending on what you're making.
|
| Inner work is super loaded and I would need more context/examples
| to understand what you're asking.
| cpach wrote:
| I have ADHD and I find meditation to be very useful for dealing
| with my challenges. I think of it as exercise for the mind. Just
| like the body, the mind needs exercise to function well.
|
| An acquaintance recommended the Headspace app and I really like
| it. Hadn't done any guided meditation before that. YMMV but I
| think mindfulness and meditation can be useful for anyone.
|
| Then there are other types of inner work, such as learning
| empathy, or studying ethics and philosophy. I don't really have
| any solid advice there. For ethics and philosophy, there are lots
| of books out there to further one's knowledge and comprehension.
| It will expand the mind.
|
| Some day I would like to acquaint myself with Nietzsche's works,
| but so far I haven't taken the time to do so.
| j4yav wrote:
| What does inner work mean in this context?
| pedro2 wrote:
| Inner work, to me, means increasing resilience by resolving or
| tuning open ended questions or behaviours to maximize our
| internal (usually unmet) needs.
| 3qz wrote:
| Changing your personality so you're better at making money
| pedro2 wrote:
| That's a weird definition....
| soledades wrote:
| you're in a weird context.
| seltzered_ wrote:
| In the poster's context of using terms like 'personal growth'
| and ' how to improve their mindset to scale their business',
| perhaps.
|
| I think for a lot of other spaces inner work means more about
| finding personal (and shared) values, and feeling through
| trauma, and finding a path for 'living and dying well'.
| narrator wrote:
| The most useful psychological technique I've found is Internal
| family systems (IFS). If you do it with a therapist, it can be
| very powerful, and mind bending, like a psychedelic trip. The way
| it helps productivity is when I can't motivate myself to do
| various tasks I use IFS to explore what's going on in my brain
| that fuels that procrastination.
|
| It takes me to memories and dusty corners of my brain that I
| rarely visit that form the foundations of my identity. The only
| bad part about it is one really needs a therapist to guide
| oneself when one goes deep and visits what IFS calls "exiles".
| prions wrote:
| IFS patient here as well. Totally agree on how powerful it can
| be, and how deep of a connection you can get with some far off
| parts of yourself. I find the whole concept a great mental
| model of how my mind works.
|
| Also as a software engineer whose always been on the
| analytical/intellectual side of reasoning, I prefer the
| psychodynamic nature IFS as opposed to modalities like CBT.
| Really helped open me up to being more emotionally intelligent
| and aware.
| dontbeevil1992 wrote:
| that's awesome. I think CBT is really reductive. Quite
| pessimistic, as well - CBT seems to hold little hope of
| actually healing many issues, but only aims for symptom
| management. I think that's because it's not a very good
| therapy for many (most?) situations so it has to rationalize
| it by saying true healing is impossible.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| Interesting, I had never heard of Internal family systems
| before, I'll definitively look it up.
| dontbeevil1992 wrote:
| IFS is amazing.
| ohCh6zos wrote:
| To put it bluntly, because we don't see value in those spaces.
| peterlk wrote:
| I'm not quite sure I follow your question, but I have to keep
| rediscovering that min-maxing life is not a great strategy.
| Trying to squeeze every bit of advantage out of what I read, how
| i work, where I travel, etc. is not the optimal strategy for me.
| Furthermore, the most successful people I've met tend to focus on
| doing things that they enjoy rather than on min-maxing.
|
| For me, this has meant studying philosophy, religion, biology,
| music, and other things that do not necessarily contribute to a
| fully optimized life.
|
| I too have found a wonderful community in the maker scene, and it
| has fed my creativity. This can certainly be a good place to
| spend time.
| [deleted]
| hypertele-Xii wrote:
| I am an evolving whole of components, each and all of them
| replaceable with parts truer to myself. My growth is most
| important to me; As I accumulate consciousness, greater
| understanding provides clearer approaches to everything else.
|
| Replacing out parts of myself can be frightening, as if I forget
| my identity or become too brittle of a whole to sustain. In
| reality, a superorganism consisting of maximally diverse
| components flourishes exactly because of, not in spite of, its
| multidimensionality.
|
| I will go towards whatever is insanely cool to me, because such
| things inspire and motivate me to grow.
|
| I exist solely in my subjective experience of the world. I
| maximize the intensity of that experience by surrounding myself
| with those things I feel in my innermost to be awesome, even
| though I don't understand why. The very fact I don't understand
| them enables me to learn something new through those experiences,
| unlike a world filled with things I already comprehend, would.
|
| I do whatever stimulates me, because I gain energy from it. Doing
| anything else drains energy, and friction slows down growth.
|
| When I reflect upon myself honestly, I see that expending effort
| into things that bore me empirically does not bear fruit. All
| such things I feel are a necessity, as opposed to a joy to
| perform, are external pressures set on me by others. I know in my
| innermost what's important to me, and I do that (and only that)
| with all my being.
|
| Limits hinder growth, so I seek awareness of and let go of
| artificial restrictions, and accept and overcome genuine ones.
|
| Every shore of my consciousness expands into an ocean of
| uncertainty where the horizon gives no clue of other continents.
| On the beach stands a sign, "swimming forbidden". I realize a
| finite, isolated island gives no room for true growth, and swim
| towards the unknown. If the sign turns out to be justified and
| the waters toxic, I will build myself a boat. Soon the
| impassibility of the sea eases to mere obstacle; eventually into
| familiar substance through which movement is as effortless as a
| vacuum.
|
| I play innocently with all things, because solutions to blocks to
| my growth are found in unexpected places only when I have the
| courage to study absolutely everything.
|
| Nothing I know of evolves faster than a child who plays. Children
| need not protection from dangerous things, other than those I
| know to be lethal. Mistakes happen during play and things break,
| but that's part of the learning process.
|
| I openly receive all information, because the world around me
| reflects myself back to me. This facilitates introspection and
| accelerates my growth.
|
| I do not limit myself artificially by ignoring any piece of data,
| but weigh each bit by its inherent value in my belief system,
| irrespective of whence it came from. Thinking about uneasy things
| develops in me precisely what is my current weakness.
|
| My evolution is an ongoing process. Every moment I'm more aware
| of my true self, and continue growing in the best manner I'm
| aware of. I am never complete, and never too incomplete to keep
| on growing.
|
| I do not conjure up excuses for why I couldn't evolve further
| right now. Every moment I integrate the world into myself and
| grow more aware.
|
| I share freely everything I know to those who want to study me,
| so that they too could grow faster towards mutual understanding.
|
| Mutual understanding, community and harmony are the ultimate
| goals of my self-development process.
|
| https://hypertele.fi/a7084542272f4c89
| omgmajk wrote:
| I have practiced intense reflection brought on by things that are
| out of my control. I have never went to a coach in this regard
| but have seen shrinks.
| lcall wrote:
| Since I got CFS (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome), it seems like that is
| mostly what I have been doing, within my limitations. I am at
| peace. I write about lessons learned, things that help me, and
| about many things that I think are important, at my web site
| (linked in profile, nothing for sale unless I get healthier then
| do consulting/programming later). Happy to discuss if someone
| looks it over and has suggestions/questions.
|
| Tip: read a page, then click a link to get more info on any
| particular part. Like one big outline, skimmable I hope. Feedback
| welcome there, too.
| artificialLimbs wrote:
| I'm not sure what you mean by 'inner work', that would need
| defining to answer the question. When I think of 'inner work', it
| means something (nearly) completely devoid of anything happening
| in 'the world outside of me'. Whatever I am doing for a
| profession or for hobbies is (nearly) completely divorced from
| what is my 'inner work', which is work done for the purpose of
| increasing consciousness. My particular flavor of inner work
| (there are many) is done in order to transmit the work to others,
| for the benefit of those who seek to do the work.
|
| I have been at this for many years and I can say that doing the
| work requires effort and the expenditure of energy. The benefits
| to personal creativity have begun to become immense in recent
| years, as creativity comes naturally as a result of being less
| attached to ones' personality and being able to more freely allow
| energy to 'flow through your being' (that's the best I can
| describe it). These benefits are side effects, though, and not
| really the purpose of the work. If this is why you seek to do the
| work, it is misguided and you are probably setting yourself up to
| simply fuck yourself up. Seek a guide for this kind of work (I am
| not a guide), and be wary of those who charge money. My guide has
| been with me for > 10 years, has never charged a cent, and has
| been instrumental in my efforts. If you do the work with genuine
| integrity, you will find a guide.
| [deleted]
| endorphine wrote:
| Can someone rephrase the question so as to make it easier to
| understand? I don't understand it.
| auslegung wrote:
| I think "inner work" would include counseling/therapy,
| meditation, prayer, etc.
| kradeelav wrote:
| There's emotional/spiritual inner work like therapy (invaluable
| for most, but not all).
|
| And then there's mentorship sessions that I see are becoming more
| and more common in the visual arts world, where the focus is
| improving on a specific kind of craft and exploring mental
| blockages. Jayd (https://www.jaydaitkaci.com/services.html) was
| instrumental in my own maturity in the art world there, and I'd
| highly recommend those sessions if you're a maker in the
| visual/drawing sense.
| [deleted]
| jackcosgrove wrote:
| I have invested a lot of time in my inner life, and evolved my
| worldview as a result. I consider it time well-spent, first
| because I am a restless person and a little bit of a
| perfectionist so it feels good to "improve" myself according to
| the latest yardstick.
|
| Practically I have put this to use and made decisions in my
| professional life, mainly about avoiding behavior I consider
| unethical. I haven't been searching for meaning through my work,
| so not doing bad stuff is about as far as I've gotten.
| swatcoder wrote:
| What might be throwing off some of the commenters here:
|
| You're using language like "personal growth" and "inner work" to
| describe what just sounds to be _professional development_.
|
| Maybe professional capacity and personal identity are all tied up
| for you. That's certainly true for a lot of people here,
| including myself sometimes. But it's also maybe just an echo of
| working so long in an industry that tried to _sell_ one as the
| other. It reads as an extraordinarily narrow perspective in world
| where we only work for a few decades and only with about 25% of
| our time during those decades.
|
| If you're genuinely interested in _personal_ growth and _inner_
| work, consider stepping back from the professional space as you
| look for programs. And if you 're just interested in
| _professional_ development in your craft, consider using language
| that 's more specifically associated with it.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| I agree and that's definitively a good point.
| verisimi wrote:
| Yes.
|
| And it says something else again when one cannot even
| distinguish different professional approaches and
| moral/ethical/spiritual development.
|
| Edit for an Orwell quote on Newspeak:
|
| The whole literature of the past will have been destroyed.
| Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Byron--they'll exist only in
| Newspeak versions, not merely changed into something different,
| but actually contradictory of what they used to be. Even the
| literature of The Party will change. Even the slogans will
| change. How could you have a slogan like Freedom is Slavery
| when the concept of freedom has been abolished?
| benjamaan wrote:
| For context I studied mechanical engineering and have been a
| founding employee at two successful tech startups one mobile
| payments another a multinational dev recruitment marketplace -
| and a few others with mediocre success or exits over the last
| eleven years.
|
| I'm currently on a career break and travelling in South America.
| It's been worrying to step away from my career and out that gap
| in my cv but it's something I did think about for pretty much all
| 11 years I was working and so I'm not going to look back when I'm
| 80 and wonder what if. And it's been deeply restful and helped me
| to build confidence in who I am as a person, without hiding
| behind a job title.
|
| Best investment I made was quitting drinking and drugs and
| getting an addictions counselor. I had taken myself to 0
| financially and health wise. Doing the AA program and exploring
| that community helped me immensely- I love communities and I can
| take from programs what I need and leave the rest. Life changing
| book in this space to grok addiction IMO is The Biology of
| Desire. Not just opinions, actual neuroscience and field
| investigation combined from a PhD.
|
| 6 years later I have 3-4 years of runway and possible 20+ years
| runway in equity (at current valuations). I'm pretty fit and
| hike, surf and rock climb regularly. I also have amazing
| friendships and family relationships that I'm deeply grateful
| for.
|
| Another great investment was getting a tennis coach who had
| broken tennis down into a cheat code of 7 rules after watching
| 1000s of hours of pros playing. I learned so much from his deep
| work making a simple "tennis principles for noobs" class. Just 7
| lessons.
|
| I have done therapy for two years recently which has felt more
| advanced and vague. In some areas of my life I've had fundamental
| changes in thinking that my therapist has really helped me to
| persevere with, without which I just wouldn't have had the energy
| to keep working on. I'm still waiting to see how impactful it is
| - but it's been quite a lot harder to navigate than quitting
| drugs because I don't have a clear problem other than I am
| looking for a new direction in life.
|
| I've read a ton of self help books and I've gleaned many
| principles to carry away with me. I only really return to a few
| of them: specifically Untethered Soul, The Courage to be Disliked
| and The Courage to be Happy - as does a close friend who is en
| route to billionaire.
|
| Finally the best self improvement you can do is to spend time
| travelling, working with, socializing with or playing games with
| smart and driven people who are also kind, mindful. We learn
| fastest through experience and mirroring others and there's no
| substitute from running alongside a master in something else -
| and sharing your experience together.
| DennisP wrote:
| Sounds like your tennis coach should write a book.
| rconti wrote:
| I read the subject and thought "yes, yes I have!" .. and then I
| read the body of the post and am not sure I have any idea what
| you're asking anymore.
| adamcharnock wrote:
| Get. A. Therapist.
|
| More importantly, get a therapist that you get on with. Get a
| therapist you can laugh and cry with. Get a therapist you can
| tell tell to fuck off when they tell you things that are hard to
| hear.
|
| Therapy can positively affect so much of your life and I wish I
| had done it sooner. I was a pretty successful person before
| therapy by most measures, but every day I would still do things
| that would actively make my life worse. I couldn't see it at the
| time, but I did.
|
| Now, every week I look forward to getting advice from someone
| who's job it is to help me and give good guidance. His job isn't
| to be my friend, or to love me, or to make me work. His job is to
| apply his expertise to encourage me, ask me important questions,
| and tell me when I'm being an idiot.
|
| I had a good childhood, I don't have much trauma. Yet even so,
| therapy has made my life much much better. Mine costs
| PS60/session (one per week), and I do it via Zoom. I am
| absolutely certain it will save me more money than it costs me.
|
| I know the above OP seems to be asking about work. But I think
| this still applies. A good therapist will help you think through
| the available choices in your work life too.
|
| And, if you'll forgive me a more emotional plea: If you are a
| man, this all goes double. The male suicide rate isn't where it
| is because we're all doing fine. It is where it is because we're
| not doing well at all but haven't really noticed.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| TBH, I'm not sure that I entirely understand the question[s].
|
| It seems that you are talking about moving from a "problem-
| solver" workflow, to a "creator/architect" workflow.
|
| You also mention self-help kind of stuff, and how it seems
| focused at problem-solvers, and not creators.
|
| So, I assume the question is that you are planning to move from a
| "problem-solver," to a "creator," and want to find out about
| support infrastructure for "creators."
|
| One reason that there's less of an infrastructure around
| creation, is that it is a lot riskier, and, for the most part, a
| lot less lucrative, than problem-solving. For every unicorn,
| prancing around SV, farting out rainbows, there's a charnel pit,
| with the rotting corpses of 10,000 jackasses with horns glued to
| their heads.
|
| Everyone has problems, though, and are often willing to pay well,
| to have these problems solved.
| beanders wrote:
| The older I get, the more I have found myself prioritizing music.
| Making money so that I can feed my family is all well and good,
| but when I ask myself what is the purpose of everything, the only
| real answer I can find is this: to create meaningful music by
| integrating past traditions with my present life experience, and
| passing on skills and experience to my children.
| lcall wrote:
| Harmony is such a good word and feeling. I want to pass on
| skills and experience too. I spend a great deal of time
| thinking about that. (more in my other comment in this page)
| softwarebeware wrote:
| I also am having trouble following exactly what you mean, but if
| you want to check out a classic books about the marriage of
| product design and technology give Alan Cooper's _The Inmates are
| Running the Asylum_ a read. It 's a short one and still has a lot
| of relevant insights today.
| wallfacer wrote:
| For professional development, I highly suggest a Kolbe A index
| assessment to better identify your natural energies for "doing
| things" (working style) and learn to harness those rather than
| force them to comply with external notions of "how it should be
| done." I have considered mine daily for 7 years.
|
| It seems you are actively exploring the type of job you direct
| your attention towards and (hopefully) derive fulfillment from,
| which is way more tractable than your conative personality.
|
| Potentially more helpful categories than "problem solver" and
| "indie/ maker," which are certainly not exclusive, might be these
| job types: producing, improving, building, or thinking (source:
| https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20130502173937-15454-there-ar...).
|
| Good luck!
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| The article was a good read, thank you for sharing. In the
| Wealth Dynamics profiling, I am a Mechanic (really close to be
| a Creator), so that would mean that I am more of an Improver,
| but my process of improving is through the process of Thinker
| and Builder. Basically, taking what already exist to create
| something that would be better down the road. Would that make
| sense?
| RobRivera wrote:
| yes
| sebastianconcpt wrote:
| I did. Massively. I like to think it helped me in being a
| generalist that can specialize in software development. Also gave
| me a good defense system against ideological contamination and
| cultural pathologies and pollution. But by no means is work done.
| It's a permanent activity. Part of the lifestyle.
| olkingcole wrote:
| "Invested" in "inner work". Indie, maker, optimizer. Maybe it is
| just a different kinds of people thing but I think we shouldn't
| use business jargon language, with all the implicit values and
| associations that come along with it, to define, of all things,
| our fundamental mindset and relationship to ourselves. Don't
| frame yourself that way. Don't become another tool or asset to be
| burned up like so much VC cash in the making of something
| ultimately trivial. That language has a purpose but is not good
| for the soul. Sorry for the rant.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| That's an interesting perspective, I simply didn't know how to
| describe it better, how would you express it, I'd love to know
| :)
| verelo wrote:
| Something i started doing which has been invaluable has been
| getting a therapist. Being a founder is freaking painful at
| times, working on yourself is a lot more than getting good at
| sales, taxes, technical skills...developing leadership skills and
| being great at it requires an upgrade not just to your IQ but
| your EQ. I've got a long way to go, but i feel this has been the
| largest improvement to me that i've ever managed to make.
|
| While you're at it, if you do anything along these lines,
| consider couples counselling too. Even if all is great. The
| closeness and generally better understanding its given my partner
| and I has been the greatest stress reducer I've ever found. It
| opens up my bandwidth to so many other things which more
| generally allows me to be more effective.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| Absolutely, both my partner and I have been doing inner child
| healing work, and it helped tremendously in our relationship.
| mountainriver wrote:
| Yup getting a therapist is the best thing you can do.
| Understanding the trauma of your childhood is the most
| impactful thing you can do in your life.
| Invictus0 wrote:
| I have a therapist but I'm thinking about stopping my sessions
| because I never felt that I needed it. I'm pretty well put
| together, not stressed or anxious, great people person, pretty
| much know exactly what I need to do all the time and good at
| getting stuff done. What are you supposed to talk about with a
| therapist if you don't really have any problems?
| grvdrm wrote:
| If you never felt you needed it, what motivated you to do it
| in the first place?
| Invictus0 wrote:
| Girlfriend suggested it.
| verelo wrote:
| Why did she suggest it? I feel like im your therapist
| now.
| hugohamelcom wrote:
| I would just add here that definitively not all therapist are
| good, and for me I've preferred some coaches, but again not
| all of them are good. But overall, usually coaches seems to
| have worked better for me.
| verelo wrote:
| I think this is a good piece of advice. Consider a) someone
| else to talk to b) maybe see them less frequently if things
| are legitimately good.
| auslegung wrote:
| Perhaps a life coach or career coach would be more helpful if
| you feel a therapist is too much.
| grvdrm wrote:
| I love the idea of couples counseling even if I don't yet feel
| comfortable suggesting it. But fundamentally, I ask, why not?
| Everything can be great, and then just talking about it with
| someone else can be a way to recharge your relationship just by
| talking about how well it's going.
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