[romesmoke]

Great, useful article. Remember: the same principle holds in the world of the psyche. Those people walking around, seeming effortlessly happy? Unless if they're little children, a horrendous amount of effort has been invested to their inner peace. It took me years to realize that. Being envious is much easier than being humble and diligent with getting one's shit together.

My wish for 2025 is for massive, decentralized, slow yet steady psychological magic. HNY, HN.

[soulofmischief]

A good and often useful generality, however it's important to recognize how vast the difference can be in the amount of energy needed to achieve inner peace from one person to the next.

For example, I had absent drug addict parents, was instead raised by extremely abusive and restrictive guardians. I was homeless since 16 and I spent my 20's undertaking the self-actualization that I should have been doing in my teens but lacked the safety, stability, autonomy and financial requirements.

Meanwhile, my typical peer has a functioning family unit, and has enjoyed a relatively struggle-free existence. I also had to overcome disabilities such as ADHD, which has had an enormous negative impact on my life and mental health.

I'm not jealous of anyone, and I love and support my peers who were provided more opportunities and didn't waste them. But it's quite clear to me that the level of effort that I and the average US adult had to expend in order to achieve inner peace is off by magnitudes. Cognizance of this fact is important.

[romesmoke]

I see your point. I've had my fair share of trouble as well. Talking about this stuff on HN after the storm has passed, from a financially stable place, is a luxury on its own.

Nevertheless, I don't see any value on acknowledging the delta between me and peers that happened to be luckier. It'd be useful were I on the other side: for instance, if I hadn't seen my father sink into dementia, if he was still with me, I'd better keep reminding myself of the importance and blessing of growing alongside a functional, healthy dad.

But now... Thoughts like "I have struggled more than these guys" seem dangerous to me. Whenever I've taken them seriously I've ended up using them as justification for the next tiny act of self-destruction.

[toss1]

>>...the next tiny act of self-destruction

A world of truth in that phrase

It all really comes down to the tiny acts of building one's self or wasting the time... Yes a (non-wasteful) strategy & goal is key, but it comes down to how we spend our seconds...

[underlipton]

It's not about people who have already gone through it, or about yourself. It's about people who are still going through it, and how you treat them. For most people, the delta isn't (just) used to justify their own self-destruction, but to justify their cruelty to others. You never know what battles people are fighting. And while it's true that someone can do a lot of damage to themselves, that pales in comparison to what a group of others who don't understand their struggle can do to them.

[soulofmischief]

Yeah, I should have been clearer that my intent is that the delta should be used to increase empathy, not decrease it. Anyone out there could be dealing with anything.

I've lashed out at people before while under a great deal of stress. I've been the recipient of such as well. I've seen and experienced what poverty, illness and depression can do to the mind, how it warps habits and motivations. How things that some people might see as no-brainers for fixing a situation might simply not be options for others at that moment, at least not without assistance. A good support network makes all the difference in someone's life.

There is some truth to Maslow's hierarchy of needs, and in addition to not being jealous of those dealt a better hand, we should be supportive and attentive to those who weren't, and resist applying our own heuristics to their lives.

[JadeNB]

> Meanwhile, my typical peer has a functioning family unit, and has enjoyed a relatively struggle-free existence.

Are you sure about this? I know that I enjoyed a relatively struggle-free existence, and assumed that most other people did. But, whenever I have taken the time to get to know someone really well, I have found that they had struggles beyond anything I had to handle, and that do not reveal themselves at all until you know them very well.

[soulofmischief]

That's a valid question, but I don't know how to answer it without going into great depth rehashing stuff I've said on here before as well as stuff I haven't. Suffice to say that my Adverse Childhood Experiences score is quite high, and that my life has been marked by a series of unfortunate experiences which I have found myself unable to relate with the vast majority of my peers over.

And I have tried. The older I get, the more it just looks like PTSD when I do try and relate with people. That doesn't mean that each of them haven't had their share of struggles, it just seems like a magnitude or more less for the majority of folk I know.

The difference in current struggle has dropped off a bit in the last few years because life has been getting rough for everyone outside the wealthy class, but the majority of my life was absolute hell. The first time I put a gun in my mouth and sat with a finger on the trigger, I was nine years old.