[HN Gopher] Root for your friends
___________________________________________________________________
Root for your friends
Author : rez0123
Score : 364 points
Date : 2025-05-23 23:28 UTC (23 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (josephthacker.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (josephthacker.com)
| aeblyve wrote:
| And here I was cynically thinking I was going to learn how to
| "get root" on my friends.
|
| Still applies I guess.
| bigiain wrote:
| As an Australian, "Root for your friends" has a hilariously
| alternate meaning.
| AStonesThrow wrote:
| I offered to give root and/or ssh to a couple of friends, and
| they all turned it down. I don't really have any friends
| anyway.
|
| Perhaps we can parlay this title into a video game. Or simply
| an alternate title for Core War.
| raddan wrote:
| Oddly I have found that nearly all of my best friends come
| from different walks of life than me, and do different things
| for work. Only one of my very good friends does the same
| things that I do. Others, like my stonemason friend, have
| very different lives, and we met by chance. I've also found
| lately that I enjoy socializing with people over a shared
| activity, like a class. I just got back (today) from taking a
| drafting (ie, architectural drawing) class. The people in it
| were very different from me: a mix of tradespeople and
| artists. Nevertheless, it was clear that all of us shared a
| love of learning a skill and doing it well, and so it really
| was a blast. I learned a lot from them.
|
| You might try just doing something different. It was an
| interesting experience spending the day with people who
| wanted to talk to me because _I_ was the odd one out--none of
| them personally knew any programmers or computer scientists
| and they all had a million questions!
| rez0123 wrote:
| inception is a form of code execution in their brain.
| temp0826 wrote:
| sudo make me a sandwich
|
| (xkcd.com/149)
| zaphodias wrote:
| Me too, reinforced by author's name :)
| photochemsyn wrote:
| It's easier to get root on your friends than it is to get root
| on your enemies, because they likely trust you. This is why a
| central tenent of John Le Carre narratives is "fear your
| friends more than your enemies."
|
| This often plays out in the blood sport of academic politics,
| incidentally.
| noahchen wrote:
| Somewhat related: I read the author's name as Joseph T Hacker
| at first instead of Joseph Thacker.
| ketzo wrote:
| For a long time, I've been this person for other people, but
| don't feel like I have anybody to do this for me. That's okay --
| I don't feel bitter about that or anything. And I don't wanna
| overstate what a good friend I am or whatever, I just do this a
| decent amount. But some part of me does wish I had someone
| celebrating my wins.
|
| This:
|
| "No one comes to mind? Maybe you haven't really trusted anyone
| with your wins yet."
|
| really, really hit me for some reason. I'm pretty averse to
| praise/congratulations -- even if I feel it's deserved! -- so I
| _don't_ really share my wins with people. How can I expect to
| have people hype me up if I don't let them in a little? It's
| obvious when I write it all out but I kinda can't believe how
| long I've been operating this way.
|
| Anyway, great post!
| rez0123 wrote:
| I'm so glad that line helped. It was a last minute addition,
| and I was thinking about how so many of my friends just don't
| share the awesome stuff they do with the world. Share more!!
| darth_avocado wrote:
| > For a long time, I've been this person for other people, but
| don't feel like I have anybody to do this for me.
|
| For the longest time I was this and unfortunately I got bitter
| over time. But then a couple of years ago I got back into the
| mindset again. A few bad years later I realized that the more
| happy you are for your friends, the more happy you are. Do it
| for yourself and nobody else.
| danielrm26 wrote:
| Why not both?
| protocolture wrote:
| Ditto.
|
| What gets me is when I have a few times found the people I am
| hyping for are actually putting me down, or selling me out to
| management.
| borski wrote:
| Fair, but the post briefly alluded to this:
|
| > Even if you root for the "wrong" friends, it's still the
| best way to live. Life is better not feeling jealous. You can
| sleep so much easier at night by genuinely being happy for
| your friends, even if they're a bit jealous of you.
| anshumankmr wrote:
| you would need to be the Buddha to feel nothing. And note
| jealousy type things, but say someone who you thought was a
| friend but was sabotaging you or bad for you... a toxic
| person. Jealousy is inane.
| te_chris wrote:
| The point is not to feel nothing, the point is not to get
| lost in the feeling. There's a big difference.
|
| Check out The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer
| datameta wrote:
| I think Buddha would feel it, sit with it, and let it go
| on its own.
| LtWorf wrote:
| Sounds very deep until it is you being in that situation.
| stavros wrote:
| Well, I'm glad you had this realization, and I'm excited for
| how this will turn out for you. Sometimes you have to show your
| friends you're excited about something for them to be excited
| in turn.
|
| Good luck!
| xattt wrote:
| How much of it is some form of a subliminal superstition where
| you feel that if you tell your success, your success will be
| jinxed?
| noduerme wrote:
| There's nothing wrong with being humble. It only takes one
| small display of pride to make most people quietly hate you.
| For example, I opened this blog post and within 20 seconds I
| loathed the person who wrote it. I find your approach to be
| much more decent.
| cootsnuck wrote:
| But now you seem miserable and bitter so what's the point?
| Don't dull your own shine and don't yuck other people's yum.
| Profan wrote:
| Damn, why not just be happy for people? We're all different,
| and I might be an outlier here but I think very few people
| actually "hate" people, unless they've wronged them in some
| very particular way, at least for me personally someone has
| to have gone very far in wronging me or my friends for me to
| "hate" anyone!
| samlinnfer wrote:
| Let's take this to the extreme, you just won the lottery, which
| one of your friends will you tell?
| nthingtohide wrote:
| I have borrowed some "wisdom" in how particles interact. They
| exchange particles back and forth which strengthen their
| interaction. That's what I do generally in real life. I sort of
| share happenings in my life as a sort of nano-influencer within
| my group of friends. I would say the advice in the blogpost
| works, sort of. Even if my "contributions" go into a blackhole,
| I think atleast the ephemeral Universe is watching what I do.
| tome wrote:
| > I have borrowed some "wisdom" in how particles interact.
| They exchange particles back and forth
|
| If particles interact by exchanging particles, how do they
| interact with the particles they exchange?
| Mofpofjis wrote:
| > "Maybe you haven't really trusted anyone with your wins yet"
|
| At the end of one of her interviews on youtbue, Kelly McGonigal
| explains that -- paraphrased -- being praised to the face
| creates an intimate context around the praiser and the praisee,
| in which it's the praiser that sets the tone and initiates the
| dynamics. In a way, they find themselves in a position where
| they evaluate you. This is why taking praise gracefully is not
| trivial; people being praised usually show bodily signs of
| stress. It takes a real effort for the praisee not to dismiss
| or belittle their own achievement, just to get out of those
| dynamics as soon as possible.
|
| At the end of said interview, the host praised Ms. McGonigal to
| her face. In response, she drew his attention to the fact that
| while he was talking, speaking those words of appreciation, she
| swallowed. The act of her swallowing was a kind of stress-
| relief (IIRC). (I'm sure we can all relate to choking up
| slightly when praised to the face.) She highlighted the
| dynamics of being praised to the face live, mid-interview,
| through her own reaction.
|
| You may be avoiding sharing your wins with others because you
| instinctively might want to avoid the situation where others
| _qualify you_. In that situation, you experience being the
| subject of an evaluation, and _that_ -- i.e., being talked
| about -- might feel like a subordinate position to be in, even
| if the judging is 100% positive. My remedy is to just yield,
| lean back, give in, permit the other person to be in control,
| allow them to have all power in that context, and just bask in
| the glorious warmth they 're sending your way. It can be an
| experience that you remember for _decades_ after, and you 're
| going to start to crave it. (Peer recognition can be a _huge_
| motivator, i.e., doing things for recognition. Whether that 's
| good or bad, is a separate topic :))
| wewewedxfgdf wrote:
| I kinda had this maybe assembled in my head in an incomplete bits
| and pieces way but this really brought together the concept I
| love it.
|
| Whoever wrote this post is really rocking with the clear human
| thinking.
| rez0123 wrote:
| Thank you
| spongebobstoes wrote:
| I largely agree, this is a great way to support your friends.
|
| I would add to bias towards praise, but still be honest and
| judicious. People know when they hear empty words, and it's
| important to be trustworthy.
| rez0123 wrote:
| Yeah i only put the one line in there that talks about that: >
| people who are honest to your face and praise you behind your
| back.
|
| I could have emphasized that more.
| huevosabio wrote:
| The way I try to do it is: if you think something nice, say it
| keybored wrote:
| Blogger says it's better to be positive than negative. _Could
| that be the case? Is it really so?_ Yes. And further. Thinking
| good thoughts is better than thinking bad thoughts about yourself
| or others. It's also better to give meaningful feedback on
| projects. Than not meaningful feedback.
|
| "This is a message that a lot of people need to hear," says
| blogger.
|
| Here's some memes from 2012 to now.
| shermantanktop wrote:
| Just had a friend leave their company. They had formed a really
| strong network of people within that company who were in constant
| contact. This helped them succeed in a lot of ways.
|
| Sounds good? It was, except...most of that bonding was based on
| lowkey negativity by a set of people who felt powerless,
| complaining about how others were terrible. Some in this network
| went down a rabbithole of resentment and are still there. The
| reality is that yes, there was lots of stuff to be grumpy about.
|
| Rooting for your friends is great. But people sometimes bond over
| wishing harm for their foes. Shared trauma does that. I
| personally try to avoid that mindset.
| zdc1 wrote:
| I've met a few people that I like to describe as "walking
| Reddit". Chat with them and they'll always have a story or
| gossip that's engaging and somewhat infuriating or rage-
| inducing. One was a colleague who would telling me all the
| questionable and unkind things the managers in other teams were
| doing.
|
| I eventually realised that these interactions weren't joyful...
| they were easy conversations, but they were also demoralising
| and lowered my energy. These days I try to "manage" my
| conversations with people like this by steering the topics and
| (gently) setting boundaries on what I don't want to talk about.
| josephg wrote:
| > Rooting for your friends is great. But people sometimes bond
| over wishing harm for their foes. Shared trauma does that.
|
| Yeah this is way too common. And it's not just trauma which
| does it. I think it's its own psychological trap. I think the
| trap is a self reinforcing cycle of a few thoughts:
|
| 1. Other people are bad at things. Look at all the things
| others do which have flaws! You must be better than all those
| dolts.
|
| 2. You tell yourself you could do something better - but if you
| try, maybe it'll have flaws too. Then you'll be just as bad as
| anyone else. Uh oh.
|
| 3. So you don't do anything creative, or take responsibility
| for anything. But you need a reason to tell yourself as to why
| you're not doing anything.
|
| 4. It must be because other, idiot people stop you. Change is
| too hard. Doing anything would be "fighting against the system"
| or something. See point 1.
|
| And the trap is closed. The only way to escape it is to do
| stuff that you're bad at. And if you do that, you'll find all
| the faults in your own work and feel terrible about yourself.
|
| I think the bottom level of almost any company is packed with
| people who have this mindset. It's a disaster on every level -
| personal and professional. And it's quite resilient and
| contagious. People like that are always a little afraid that
| somebody will call them on it. So they need others to agree
| with them that staying small is the smart move.
|
| Avoiding them is definitely a smart move. I've taken to
| sometimes needling people like that, just to rattle the cage
| and see what happens. "You're so right about those flaws! We'd
| love your help fixing some of them?" / "I think your idea is
| wonderful! So what you're saying is if we got Bob on side, you
| think we could do it? Let me help - I'll set up a meeting. With
| the two of us, I'm sure he'll come around!"
|
| I generally hate being too positive. But I make an exception
| for this kind of subtle supportive bullying. This awful mindset
| can't survive in the sunlight. It's fun to see what happens!
| anonu wrote:
| I believe in this. Just don't get onto to the corporate hype
| train.
| pram wrote:
| I'm not trying to be controversial but this behavior seems to be
| very hard for a lot of men. I've noticed it a lot in my life that
| guys are far more willing to "circle the wagons" over petty
| slights, and alienate people over it. Then their ego doesn't let
| them back down, and they just get more bitter from the (obvious)
| outcome.
|
| I'm guilty of it myself of course, but it seems like there is
| some kind of naturally adversarial behavior baked into me. It
| literally just makes things worse is the funny thing, and I
| already know this. But sometimes I cant stop it. Life would be
| easier and better if we were all collectively friendly hypemen
| but alas.
| cootsnuck wrote:
| You're probably not wrong. I'm lucky and most of my guy friends
| are happy in each other's successes. There definitely can be an
| under current of _something_ though (almost feels like
| skepticism) sometimes.
|
| But to be fair, I've felt that vague "skepticism" at my own
| successes from some of my gal pals too. But at the same time,
| my friend group that's mostly women will definitely gas each
| other up more and seemingly show more genuine interest in each
| other's successes and genuine sympathy in each other's
| setbacks.
| xphos wrote:
| I like the sentiment and appreciate when I see an OP in the
| comments taking feedback
| emptybits wrote:
| This recent episode of the Secular Buddhism podcast may be worth
| a listen. It gets into the enduring value and joy we can find in
| the good fortune of others.
|
| https://secularbuddhism.com/blog/204-beyond-happiness/
| irrational wrote:
| I forgot for a moment what website I was on and expected the link
| to be about the board game Root and getting your friends to play
| it with you.
|
| https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/237182/root
| ianburrell wrote:
| I thought it was about giving SSH and sudo to your friends.
| hughdbrown wrote:
| I thought it was a peevish Kiwi joke about how people of other
| nations do not use words as they do.
| babyent wrote:
| I'm generally happy for those around me who are achieving things
| and doing better for themselves.
|
| I love people like that!!
|
| Friends and strangers who try and aren't quitters.
| the_arun wrote:
| Root for all around you.
| foobarbecue wrote:
| In my first few years on the job, I would fill out peer
| evaluations honestly. We have peer evaluations where you rate
| people out of 5 on various performance elements like "innovative"
| and "leader" or whatever. Then I survived a couple of rounds of
| awful layoffs where really good people lost their livelihoods.
|
| Since then, I put 5 out of 5 on everyone for everything always,
| and say something nice in all the boxes.
| dejj wrote:
| I do the same. Doing HR's job is not my job. And yet, some how
| I do. If I rated any satisfaction metric below 80% my manager's
| manager would have him talk to me; there would be flogging
| until morale improves. It seems all a game of Emperor's New
| Clothes.
| 18172828286177 wrote:
| This isn't even HR's job. It's the person's manager's job.
| rjmill wrote:
| Goodness, yes. The last time I put (genuinely constructive)
| criticism in a peer evaluation, it turned out to be the only
| non-positive thing that was said about that coworker. So it
| became a focus of his yearly review.
|
| He later told me about how his review went (casually at a
| conference; he had no idea I was the source), and I fessed up
| and clarified what I actually meant. The HR process had twisted
| it to a much more extreme version of what I was getting at,
| completely undermining the utility of the feedback.
|
| Nowadays, I'm just gonna give perfect scores and if I have
| feedback that needs to be given, I'll just tell the coworker
| directly. (And if I'm not comfortable doing that, then the
| feedback probably isn't important enough.)
| zo1 wrote:
| I think a big factor of that is that usually most people just
| do the positive feedback and don't say _anything_ negative or
| constructive. So when someone does do so, it 's seen as "wow,
| this must be so bad that they just had to say something, no
| matter how delicately or toned-down it is being phrased as".
| These days I just mention the problems and concerns to the
| people making the decisions because yearly review time is the
| wrong time to do it. At best they've only been doing this
| "bad" thing for a month or so, and at worst almost a whole
| year and no one did anything.
| darkwater wrote:
| > I think a big factor of that is that usually most people
| just do the positive feedback and don't say anything
| negative or constructive.
|
| You are most certainly right. But _whose_ fault is this? HR
| and CxO.
| tough wrote:
| Theres a nice chinese saying
|
| Nail that stands, gets the hammer
| foobarbecue wrote:
| OTOH, "squeaky wheel gets the grease"
| mystifyingpoi wrote:
| For real. I have bought a car and the same day discovered a
| minor issue, I had to get it fixed next day. I rated the
| service 8/10, it was excellent otherwise. Next day I get a very
| apologetic call, begging me to change my rating, because
| anything less than 9/10 triggers some kind of investigation
| process. I said screw it and took the survey again, I'm not
| going to ruin someone else's work because of this.
| foobarbecue wrote:
| I bought a mouse on Amazon that didn't fit my hand and was
| uncomfortable to use. I gave it a 3-star review. The company
| immediately refunded me and told me I didn't need to return
| the product. I was shocked. I get "the customer is king" but
| I think it's gone too far. A review system where everything
| is expected to have a perfect rating is not a useful system!
| tough wrote:
| There's scammers gaming the amazon review system to put
| fakes in highly reviewed (previous) ad posts.
|
| so you where messing with their real-state i guess
| detaro wrote:
| Net Promoter Score
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_promoter_score) has (if it
| ever was useful) turned into madness in way too many
| contexts.
| anotherevan wrote:
| "root" means something quite different as a slang term here in
| Australia. I head to read the title several times.
| yonatan8070 wrote:
| I was thinking it was about ways to securely give friends root
| access to your home server
| pwdisswordfishz wrote:
| sudo for your friends
| marc_abonce wrote:
| For anyone else wondering:
| https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/root#Usage_notes
| blitzar wrote:
| Nothing wrong with friends that root each other too.
| twic wrote:
| Sometimes my friends are away on long business trips, naturally
| their wives get bored, the headline made perfect sense to me?
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| Hey, I see these greyscale images (the one at the top of the
| article) quite often these days. Can you please give me the
| prompt?
| rambambram wrote:
| You can get the prompt in Japan, but it costs you. There's a
| whole studio behind it. These people also need to eat, you see.
| ctxc wrote:
| Get with the times. It's just virtue signaling at this point
| :)
| pwdisswordfishz wrote:
| Because vice signalling is so much better.
| gs17 wrote:
| I opened it up to look at the metadata, and I'm surprised
| OpenAI doesn't include any information like that (I believe
| ComfyUI generated images do by default). All it says it's by
| ChatGPT.
| echan00 wrote:
| You are essentially your network. Laugh where you want to laugh.
| I think this is great advice. Anybody who is bitter of your
| success should not be part of your network.
| fancyswimtime wrote:
| legit thought this was about giving root priv to ur mates
| neom wrote:
| Someone I'm "friends" with, recently confessed to me that they
| very much enjoy watching me fail. I was genuinely surprised
| because I love watching people win, but I dug into it a bit and
| apparently it's very common, people really do love to see other
| people have setbacks, but the research I read seemed to indicate
| it was more prevalent in friendships, people seem fine with other
| people getting a head if they don't know them personally.
| Apparently it's also considerably more common than not for
| friends to want their friends to fail, or at least take pleasure
| in their failures. This was all news to me till about a week or
| so ago, and I'm old. That research actually lead me to this, that
| I learned is apparently also news to me[1] - "The researchers
| found that boredom's effects on sadism were mediated by people's
| desire for excitement and novelty-seeking - essentially, sadistic
| behavior served as a way to escape the aversive state of
| boredom." - I sense somehow these two things are somewhat linked.
|
| Some reading:
|
| https://www.researchgate.net/publication/43119265_Envy_and_S...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-evaluation_maintenance_th...
|
| https://www.scribd.com/document/796080571/Document-2
|
| [1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44068463
| e40 wrote:
| I'm curious about how this came out and what the fallout was.
| If you feel like sharing.
| neom wrote:
| I'm going through a really really difficult time right now, 3
| major areas of my life have broken down simultaneously over
| the past five months. I was ranting to this guy I've known
| for years about it (who is very successful but was once jr to
| me at work) - I would have called him a "good friend" - he
| was drunk and giggled out something along the lines of "makes
| me feel strong" - I reacted as you would expect "uh..
| really?". We got into a bit, and talked it out (he basically
| explained it was normal, hence I then went to research if
| that is true or not), I can see where it sits in his
| personality now, and I don't think he and I will be friends
| anymore.
| mierz00 wrote:
| I refuse to believe this is normal and I have happily cut
| people out of my life for this.
|
| The most painful moment was when I had a close friend
| almost enjoy the fact my wife had a miscarriage. It was
| completely insensitive and made me realise that I have no
| interest in being friends with someone who is willing to
| compete on something so ridiculous.
| neom wrote:
| I feel like I took a wrong turn somewhere such that I'm
| learning all this in my midlife. I genuinely believed the
| only place for "ruthless competition" was in sports and
| business, and in theory you know what you're signing up
| for. The past couple of years have been very eye opening
| to me, to learn people take such pleasure in such
| miserable things. (I also didn't know about this till
| recently: https://www.quora.com/What-are-fair-weather-
| friends)
| borski wrote:
| Yes. I, too, learned this the painful way. I had many
| friends, or so I thought. Then I got cut out of a
| volleyball friend group because I was too "intense" (aka
| talked about things that weren't the weather) for them.
| Okay. That hurt a lot.
|
| Lots of thinking later, and I can now tell the difference
| between acquaintances and friends. There's a simple test:
| acquaintances will be there when you want them to;
| friends will be there when you don't want them to, but
| need them to anyway. An acquaintance would never do that.
| dwaltrip wrote:
| There are a lot of hurting people out there, and often
| times people will take their pain out on others, even if
| they don't mean to.
|
| Learning to disengage or set firm boundaries in
| situations where that is happening is one of the most
| powerful and healthy things one can do.
| borski wrote:
| It can both be normal (in that it's common) and painful
| at the same time.
|
| And you can and should still absolutely cut them out of
| your life. Let them have each other.
|
| There's a reason misery loves company.
| jorvi wrote:
| It is normal in the sense of for example seeing your
| friend accidentally slap themselves in the face with a
| plank, or have forgot to flush right when they're lucky
| enough to take a girl home. It's called schadenfreude.
|
| Additionally, it is normal to accept derisive talk (=
| banter) from good friends. If a friend doesn't get a
| promotion, you can be very humoristically negative about
| it in way that would in no way be okay with a stranger.
|
| So yes, in those ways it is normal to enjoy watching your
| friends mess up, and it is normal to feel more at ease
| with it with friends rather than strangers.
|
| However, it is _not_ normal to enjoy seeing your friends
| fail in life, at all. That goes way beyond schadenfreude
| and even narcissism, straight into sociopathy.
| jpmoral wrote:
| > he basically explained it was normal
|
| I think this is just him trying to justify it.
| stavros wrote:
| I don't agree with the other commenters here. I used to be
| the same way, I'd be happy for my friends when they got a
| win, but I wouldn't be happy about it, because I saw it as
| a zero-sum game, where someone else winning meant I was
| somehow losing, or wasn't good enough.
|
| One day, a friend told me about how a founder he knew had
| raised a round, and I said something like "damn, it's
| always everyone else" and my friend went "why not just be
| happy for them? It's not like they're hurting you".
|
| That's when I realized that yes, I could just be happy for
| them, and that they indeed didn't hurt me, and that I could
| just be making this an overall happier event by being
| happy.
|
| Since then, I'm genuinely happy when anyone wins, to the
| point where I'll complain to people about something that
| happens to me, they'll say "well if it makes you feel
| better, that happened to me too", and my response is "why
| would it make me feel better that my friend also had this
| bad thing happen to them?", which gets some puzzled "you're
| right" responses.
|
| I think it _is_ widespread that people feel like this,
| hence the "if it makes you feel better" response. I think
| if your friend understands that this isn't a great way to
| feel, it'll all be OK.
| dcuthbertson wrote:
| > "why would it make me feel better that my friend also
| had this bad thing happen to them?"
|
| Sometimes people feel alone in their failures. Knowing
| that something similar has happened to others can help
| the person feel less alone.
| datameta wrote:
| I like to bring up a similar anecdote to the faux pas
| that just happened. For example, a friend taking a wrong
| turn, adding time to the ride and making the party
| somewhat late. It halted the conversation in the car, and
| to ease the tension I pointed out how I "do that at least
| once per every drive to X" to try to make the driver less
| self-conscious and so the other passengers aren't sitting
| in awkward silence.
| e40 wrote:
| I appreciate the response. Some good conversation resulted.
| I hope times are better for you now.
| darkwater wrote:
| It is normal if you are a petty person. There is a saying
| in Spanish that goes along "a thief always thinks everyone
| is a thief" that clearly depicts this kind of people.
| tough wrote:
| Cognition is a mirror
| taylorius wrote:
| It's interesting - had they acted this schadenfreude out at
| all? Or did this confession come completely out of the blue.
| From what you said, it is the latter - and if so, should this
| person be judged for this unappealing inner thought, if they
| take pains not to let that thought influence their behaviour or
| actions?
| neom wrote:
| I have thought about this a lot over the past few weeks. And
| I think I should stop thinking about it because it's becoming
| unhealthy, because I've analyzed our whole relationship back
| years and gotten into too much speculation in my head, but
| I'll say 3 things I know with certainty: This person also
| once told me that they think it's weird I champion women in
| the workforce because it's just more competition. I once
| asked them "what do you think I'm good at?" and they thought
| about it for about 70 seconds and then said "I don't know".
| We work in similar industries, never once has he tried to
| help me or do anything collaboratively, even though I've
| tried to collaborate with him extensively and sent him lots
| and lots of opportunities, in fact, he takes every
| opportunity he can get to try to convince me to get out of
| tech and into "a job more suited to me". I don't want to
| believe that he's kept me around for 10 years because I make
| him feel better for all the wrong reasons, but I can tell you
| he has never ever once tried to lift me up, not once.
| cootsnuck wrote:
| It sounds like he has a very "zero-sum" type of mindset and
| views most people around him as potential competition
| instead of potential collaborators. Scarcity mindsets taken
| to extremes make people focus only on what they can lose.
| If I'm being charitable, maybe your friend has been
| struggling with things behind the scenes? But honestly it
| sounds more like a personality thing.
|
| And all of that being said, none of us are perfect. I would
| hope your friend has at least some redeeming qualities,
| something you enjoy about him. Otherwise, it sounds like,
| at least lately, your friendship with him has been taking
| energy and peace from you and giving you...what? (And I say
| that not to mean friendships are only about "gaining"
| something, but they are meant to be mutually supportive
| with some ebbs and flows.)
| neom wrote:
| We used to enjoy drinking together, but now I'm sober, we
| don't do that anymore. I suspect that was the thing we
| had in common, we loved getting smashed together... :\
| Sammi wrote:
| Sound like you're capable of reflecting and growing,
| which is awesome. You don't need to be hard on yourself
| or your friend. You might just be becoming mindful that
| you need other friendships that have other qualities to
| them, than the friendships you've had in the past had.
| This is just growth. Also making new friends is super
| fun. It's a bit challenging to "put yourself out there"
| and all that, but all of the best things in life are
| hard. I really like cheering for my friends, and lots of
| other people do too. You can find these people now that
| you know what you're looking for.
|
| Also I've never had much luck with work friends. Work
| seems to get in the way. These days board games are my
| best strategy for maintaining friendships. You need some
| sort of "third place" for maintaining good friendships:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place
| dwaltrip wrote:
| Does this person make your life better in anyway? Why do
| you put energy into the relationship?
|
| Sounds like they kinda suck.
|
| Edit: I saw your other comment, I'm sorry to hear that you
| are doing through such a hard time. I'm coming out of a
| multi-year one myself, wiser and stronger than I was
| before. Rooting for you! :)
| Fnoord wrote:
| I wonder how this applies to the army. In the army, the people
| around you in the same situation as you become your mates, and
| seeing them suffer or die has a big effect on soldiers.
|
| I'd say spending time together forms / ends up in bonding, and
| those friends aren't _friends_ (although the English-American
| definition is more like 'peers' anyway); they're former
| friends. People you used to spend time with. If it comes to
| school and work, there's competition. Lots of it. In the army,
| not so much.
| waonderer wrote:
| In the army, competitions are not as much of an issue because
| the goal is not to make more money or mere promotion, but to
| serve the country. "Dying in the act of war" is not frowned
| upon but celebrated as a badge.
|
| Opposite to contrary belief, higher rank individuals (except
| the topmost levels) are at the front line leading the pack.
| Army personnel have families, but they kill others who also
| have families -- this is not normal for most people. They get
| desensitised after practice and war in difficult terrains.
|
| I was told by an army lad, his father had instructions to
| always move forward. If you turn, your own men can shoot you,
| mistaking you for an enemy.
| jader201 wrote:
| I think this is basic competition.
|
| For example, in board games, there are several types:
|
| - Competitive games: every person for themselves; there's one
| winner, everyone else loses
|
| - Co-op games: every human vs. "the game", often in the form
| of AI opponents, or environmental conditions; everyone wins
| or everyone loses
|
| - Team games: X vs. Y players (and sometimes more than two
| teams); one team wins, everyone else loses
|
| I feel like work is meant to be a co-op game, but just like
| co-op games, even though you're supposed to be on the same
| team, you often still want to feel like "the best". Not to
| the point of bringing the whole team down, but to the point
| you can secretly feel like you carried the team.
|
| In some hostile work environments, it can actually turn into
| a team game (inter-departmental competition), or even a
| competitive game (intra-departmental competition). I've been
| in all of these types of companies, and the co-op ones are
| obviously the best, especially the ones that care more about
| the elevation of the team over individual success.
|
| In the military, it's very much a team game. You are clearly
| on the same team, and if you don't cooperate with your team,
| you will (likely) lose. Obviously, with military --
| particularly in war -- there can be actual life and death at
| stake, which elevates this to an extreme level.
| fetzu wrote:
| I wouldn't say that there is no competition in the army, in
| fact some selection processes (special forces, who gets up
| the ladder and earns a seat on the general staff or a star)
| are probably more competitive than in civilian life. It's
| probably more about the general mindset: those extreme
| situation (and I am not necessarily talking about the
| competitive ones) create that positive feedback loop though
| shared hardships and closeness, and probably outweigh that
| competitiveness.
| madduci wrote:
| Having a partner also that roots for you makes wonders for the
| self esteem
| notarobot123 wrote:
| I have a close friend who's a huge motivator for my work. He
| deeply believes that I'm destined to fail and I'm determined to
| prove him wrong.
|
| Cheerleaders are great if you need reassurance and affirmation.
| If you want to innovate and push boundaries, I'd argue that
| competition is a more significant driver.
| neom wrote:
| I need to learn from you. Also: good for you!
| bigstrat2003 wrote:
| > If you want to innovate and push boundaries, I'd argue that
| competition is a more significant driver.
|
| Competition is great, but there's no reason it needs to be
| negatively tinged (as in your example). Two people can compete
| and push themselves hard to come out ahead, but also cheer for
| each other to do well. After all, if your rival sucks they
| don't really push you to get better, so cheering for them is in
| a way cheering for yourself too.
| morningsam wrote:
| There's a huge difference between believing someone will fail
| and hoping that they will.
| cootsnuck wrote:
| You could be right. It could also be that if your friend was
| supportive and was excited for you that you would still be
| motivated to succeed.
|
| I have a feeling that you're striving in spite of the lack of
| support, not because of it. And also that your own creativity
| and persistence is able to turn lemons into lemonade. So
| whatever your friends gave you, you'd take it and make it work.
|
| I'd say all of that is the complete opposite of what people do
| that are destined to fail.
| NetOpWibby wrote:
| I'm the hype man and motivator for all my close friends...and URL
| friends.
|
| The world (Internet) is VERY GOOD at telling you how much you
| suck and most people are susceptible to that. Having someone who
| believes in you helps you build confidence and drive.
|
| I think my friends are dope af so why wouldn't I big them up?
| Haeuserschlucht wrote:
| Lets face it once and for all: there are no true friendships
| anywhere on this planet and there have never been. That's why
| people read studies and talk about friendships like it was a
| research topic of an alien species. There is only people, who
| give more than they get, hoping to one day get a little bit back.
| Don't chase something that had never been there and won't be
| there. Thank me later.
| xlii wrote:
| Ok, so maybe instead of friendship let's call it platonic love.
|
| I get your point, but we are herd animals. Today distance is
| bigger than ever so we are more often lonely. Some believe in
| gods, religions but I rather believe in people and make it a
| hill I'll die on.
| fredrb wrote:
| I'm sorry that has been your experience. The culture you're
| brought up in is hardly representative for 8 billion people's
| experience.
| rez0123 wrote:
| I'm really sorry that someone betrayed/hurt you so much and I
| hope you are able to forgive them.
| Waterluvian wrote:
| I've found my way into a small group of incredibly supportive
| dads. And one of the ways in which we exercise rooting for our
| friends is to basically commandeer "jealousy" into a positive
| thing. "Ah man I'm so jealous that your kids sleep so well!"
|
| "Jealousy" in a non-toxic manner feels kind of right for the task
| of describing wins that we all know are largely just up to random
| chance.
|
| Being jealous of someone's hard work doesn't really feel the
| same.
| 47282847 wrote:
| This sounds beautiful. Thank you for sharing. I think Jealousy
| is a useful and important emotional state in society, and to
| wish it away and suppress it only makes it show up in violent
| ways. Like all emotions, if we allow and appreciate (and
| share!), it flows through us and does not fester.
| anshumankmr wrote:
| I root for my friends, but it's hard since the ones who mattered
| are all abroad. I haven't seen most school friends in a decade,
| and college friends since 2020--except one, who's now in
| Australia. A relationship ended badly last year, and I haven't
| had the energy to start another. I've made a few surface-level
| connections through running/cycling clubs, with one solid bond.
| Feel bummed to keep rooting for other people, but no one is there
| that way for me, besides my parents.
|
| Having a cat reall helps though.
| rez0123 wrote:
| Have you made any friends online? A ton of my friends are
| people I interact with almost exclusively on discord
| anshumankmr wrote:
| Need more time offline than online. Especially the past month
| or so where I have been at home mostly, prepping for an
| interview, doing nothing but Leetcoding, pretty much.
| pwdisswordfishz wrote:
| > You just shipped a side-project that lands on the front page of
| Hacker News. Who's the first person you want to tell?
|
| No one, I'd be embarrassed.
| diggan wrote:
| Ok, I'll bite. Why? You happen to have a sort of antagonistic
| relationship with HN?
| pwdisswordfishz wrote:
| I'm not the poster, I'm Stavros, I just wanted to see if his
| username was accurate. I wonder how many people have actually
| done this before me.
| awinter-py wrote:
| pw is a diss word, fishz?
| pwdisswordfishz wrote:
| I feel like if you don't get the password, you don't
| deserve access.
| stavros wrote:
| Well that was a fun little interaction, thanks for the
| entertainment!
| InsideOutSanta wrote:
| This is probably one of the most essential bits of advice you can
| get. Not only is it beneficial to your friends and career, but
| it's also beneficial for your mental health.
|
| It's not easy, at least initially. Jealousy is an emotion that's
| easy to come by and hard to dismiss. It's also an emotion that
| makes you unhappy, so learning to feel pride and happiness
| instead of jealousy made my life immeasurably better. I don't
| care if it's reciprocal; I do it because it's right for others
| and it's right for me.
| jesucresta wrote:
| This feels like advice for the most basic level of empathy
| (support your friends) with the cherry on top of AI slop as the
| opener. Americans sure are something else.
| gsky wrote:
| Everybody wants you to do well, but not better than them.
| Jealousy is one unavoidable thing
| miracoli wrote:
| I think this post really shows cultural differences in the term
| 'friendship'. Where I grew up (in Germany) most people I know
| would not abandon friendship because they read a blog post. a
| real friendship is something special that you maintain also in
| difficult times and sometimes people are jealous, but that can
| change and I think the understanding of friendship as a kind of
| 'success accellerator' is something that sounds quite stange for
| me. From my definition friendship is exactly the kind of
| relationship that comes without such expectations
| fragmede wrote:
| I think the contents of said blog post is material to the
| conversation at hand.
|
| The opposite of a "success accelerator" hypeman would be
| someone that's constantly tearing you down, talking bar about
| you behind your back, and constantly and actively trying to get
| you to fail. If it's the contents of blog post that helps
| someone recognize such a person isn't really their friend, why
| is it even relevant what bit if media helped them come to that
| realization?
| actuallyalys wrote:
| Personally, I wouldn't normally think of a friendship as a
| "success accelerator" because that reduces a friendship to its
| material benefits. I think you can have strong and meaningful
| relationships without this aspect at all.
|
| Still, I do want to acknowledge that if I'm in a position to
| help accelerate a friend's success, I will. I don't know
| whether I'd say I _expect_ my friends to do the same for me
| since it's so contextual. At the same time I would expect a
| certain level of reciprocity if they're in the position to
| reciprocate, although I admit I'm struggling to articulate my
| expectations clearly, since they're not simply one to one.
| imaginationra wrote:
| THIS is a great post and wonderful tips!
|
| I've always been the hype person for everyone I know and have
| subsequently been allowed to have an amazing, thriving creative
| career while I've seen countless jealous, desperate, scarcity
| minded people fall by the wayside over the years.
|
| Just released an original animated feature film musical where I
| did most everything myself with help from a few friends I hype
| https://www.imlivingmylife.com/
| cootsnuck wrote:
| That looks weird as hell. I love when people let their
| weirdness and creativity shine. Congrats on such a big project!
| deviantintegral wrote:
| I was expecting an article about giving out root accounts on
| homelab servers!
| lapcat wrote:
| The nominal subject of the article is "friends", but it appears
| that the article is best understood as about work friends.
| Perhaps "allies" would be a more appropriate term? I hope that
| the author has some work/life balance and can feel the difference
| between these two categories.
|
| I would define a friend as someone with whom you enjoy spending
| time. There doesn't need to be a goal except to "hang out". Do
| you really need a friend to "give meaningful feedback on your
| projects"? The author's conception of a friend, in the article,
| feels starkly utilitarian, where friendship is a tool for
| achieving your other ends rather than an end in itself.
|
| If we interpret friends here as work friends, then I think a
| little jealousy and zero-sumness is natural. The very first
| benefit mentioned by the author of rooting for your friends is
| that it "can improve your career". If your work friend's career
| improves, but yours doesn't, then doesn't that defeat the
| (author's) purpose?
|
| > It's deeply believing that a rising tide lifts all boats.
|
| I deeply believe that this is utterly naive.
|
| It's not _inherently_ false--we could make it true, if we really
| wanted--but it 's empirically false, for the obvious reason that
| those who are lifted tend to be greedy and want to keep all the
| gains for themselves. Whether that's because power corrupts,
| because power attracts the corrupt, or some combination of the
| two, the problem is that those at the top come to feel that they
| _deserve_ to be at top, that they 're _better_ than those who are
| not at the top and have been _rewarded_ for their superiority,
| and thus from their perspective it would almost be immoral to
| "reward" those below who aren't as "good".
| waonderer wrote:
| Relationships are of various kinds that extend in various
| dimensions. What the Author has talked about definitely sounds
| more like a "work-friend" relationship, but is not entirely
| separate from a "friend-friend" that you define.
|
| > It's deeply believing that a rising tide lifts all boats.
|
| This is true, but with context. "Growth" and "Comfort" are two
| different elements of a _good friendship_. We can replace
| "rising" with "happy", and the same quote works for comfort.
|
| Are both necessary? Depends on how you define "friendship". If
| comfort is the only thing, you dog can be a comfortable
| companion. But for a human friendship to last longer, both must
| enjoy each other company for longer time horizon, and that
| needs growth in both. This growth needs not be only in career,
| but mental too.
|
| With such growth, envy can't come in and corrode the bond.
| lapcat wrote:
| > With such growth, envy can't come in and corrode the bond.
|
| Well, if we're talking about work-friends, the classic
| conflict would be when one co-worker is promoted but the
| other isn't, and indeed the one becomes the other's boss.
| That's basically a zero-sum game, and it's difficult for a
| friendship to survive that scenario.
| actuallyalys wrote:
| It feels like it's probably most applicable to people who do
| similar work as you and who you talk shop with. I wouldn't
| consider these work friends, which to me are people at the same
| place of work that you wouldn't hang out with if not for work.
| basket_horse wrote:
| Agree. The article treats friendship as a career tool rather
| than a meaningful connection. Real friends aren't just hype men
| or professional assets -- they're people who stick around
| through ups and downs.
|
| > > It's deeply believing that a rising tide lifts all boats. >
| I deeply believe that this is utterly naive.
|
| While I don't fully disagree, I have often seen younger
| employees fall into the trap of overly chasing individual
| advantage over collective benefit. In other words, trying to be
| an all-star rather than a team player. Perhaps this is from
| schooling, where all that matters is getting an "A", but in the
| workplace it often results in being disliked and less likely to
| be promoted.
| photochemsyn wrote:
| The most dishonest fraudulent academic researcher I even
| encountered made a point of encouraging collegiality, but
| eventually I realized this was part of his scheme for not being
| exposed as a fraud. Everyone in his department knew he was
| fudging his data, but nobody called him on it because he was such
| a nice guy to everyone else.
|
| This is how you end up with systematic institutional corruption
| in academic departments along with a lot of non-reproducible
| garbage science. Thus a better strategy is to support people who
| do good work, regardless of whether they're your 'friends' or
| not.
| NickC25 wrote:
| He could have been a fraud or not, but you might have been
| missing his point.
|
| Perhaps his point was that he just genuinely liked to be a
| decent human being instead of rolling into work each day with
| an attitude of "I'm better than all of you peons, fuck you and
| your families, may (deity of your choice) condemn you all to
| death and perpetual hellfire"
|
| I've been in a position where I shouldn't have been before. I
| too was kind to everyone. Whether or not I was good at my job
| or role has no effect on basic human decency, or holding the
| door, saying good morning, or not cutting someone off
| deliberately in the company parking lot.
|
| There's two kinds of respect - earned, and given. People seem
| to not understand that, and see no reason why they shouldn't
| slam the door in the person behind them's face. You can be kind
| to everyone, it doesn't cost you anything. Give people props
| when they deserve it, but don't smash the homeless dude on the
| street's face when you walk by him - he's human too.
|
| You should support those who do good work, and call out those
| who don't. But you don't have to be an asshole to them, either.
| bastawhiz wrote:
| One of the best things I've ever done for my own career is being
| mindful of celebrating the wins of my coworkers. Call out a good
| refactor that would have gone unnoticed. Email someone's manager
| or skip level in the lead up to performance reviews and tell them
| how they made things better. Publicly thank the person that took
| notes or groomed the backlog or had a noisy on-call rotation.
|
| Everybody appreciates getting celebrated. Managers love hearing
| that their reports are being appreciated. Leadership loves to
| hear about wins that are normally invisible to them. You're
| directly benefiting the people around you, and it reflects well
| on you as someone who cares, pays attention, has empathy, and has
| a focus on career growth. Maybe it's just because it's normally a
| behavior associated with senior ICs, but people hear this stuff
| and start to look to you as an authority and example.
| floriferous wrote:
| The blinking thing after the author's name in the sidebar is
| terribly distracting, why make it impossible to scroll past it,
| or just not have this infinitely running animation? Great article
| otherwise.
| rsanek wrote:
| Agree, I blocked it with uBlock
| Electricniko wrote:
| I saw the link and was kinda hoping his name was Joseph T Hacker.
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