"If something is hard to do, it's just not worth doing" Homer Simpson

[Synchro]

In my hometown of Appleton, WI, the main drag is College Ave. Friday and Saturday nights the street is saturated with teenagers and young adult ne'er-do-wells lining the sidewalks and preening while cars slowly driving from one end to the other with occupants scoping out those of the opposite sex and showing off their wheels. I remember in high school a teacher reading us an op-ed in the Appleton Post-Crescent that was a rant about the degenerate youth making College Ave. inhospitable to respectable adults. The twist at the end was that it had been written a hundred years before. I guess some things never change.

It is amusing, but absolutely true. There’s good and bad right now, as there was 100, 200, or 2000 years ago.

What gets me is that with a smartphone in one's hand, one has nearly immediate access to a significant percentage of the entire amassed knowledge of all of humankind. Rather than using this amazing tool for the betterment of everyone, we squander it by spending our time looking at silly memes and cat videos, all the while responding to things that appeal to both our base instincts and a "Lord of the Flies" mentality.

G-T excepted, of course!

True, but we need some repose from serious subject matter. Most of our fatigue, these days, is mental, and our fatigued minds need silly memes and cat videos.

The sad thing is you can see the truth of OPs post every single day in the manufacturing plants I visit. I have to warn all the managers do not hire someone for a specific location in tue shop it immediately becomes the only the they will let you grow best them into doing half assed and everything else, it not my job! I tell everyone this is where you will start it is not where you will be forever you will work elsewhere in tue facility and some of it you just won’t like.

One palce hired a new manager. Did his physicals in tue morning spent the afternoon meeting people getting familiar with the shop. Next morning put him ona. Computer for some initial online training. I dont know how long he tried but he was discovered MIA an hour or so later. 65000$ to start and walks off the job because, “It’s not for me”

Sawa lot of people wanting the managers job shouw up in tennis shoes, shorts or jeans and tshirts who how to a managers interview dressed like that. I looked right at one and told the store manager if he’s here for a managers job dressed like that send him home. He interviewed him anyway but now he is no longer a manager as well.

I’ve seen some examples of this sort of thing, as well. Sadly, a lot of workers think that they just have to show and they don’t need to put forth any other effort.

I will push back a bit. My son is 26 and very hard working. Admittedly he has been treated well as an only child but he appreciates that. He has said that we didn't let him get away with stuff his friends did, although we were hardly mean parents. I think it was more by example, like I learned from my Mom & Dad.

I know enough about your character that I have no doubt in my mind that you gave your son a lot of positive guidance, perhaps by example, and very likely by the things you said as part of everyday life. The attitudes of parents have a huge effect on what a child learns about life.

If you had raised your son believing that the world was taking unfair advantage of him, it’s quite likely that he would not have a positive work ethic. Contemplating the guys I grew up with, it is obvious that work ethic is passed on from parent to child. I can think of a coup,e of guys whose fathers were very directly involved in getting them to work, over summer break and as soon as they entered the job market, they were expected to succeed at what they did. I don’t know what your son does for work, but I’d bet my bottom dollar that you helped him to get there, by example, and probably by the expectations you set.

There are also successful people that have only succeeded because they realized that their parent’s attitudes were counterproductive, and they resolved to do better. This is effective as well, but it doesn’t make it easier to succeed.

 

[stevo]

I’m more than sort of serious about this. The really hard work is the work done by your brain. Your brain burns more calories per hour per gram than any other organ in your body. That’s your real heavy lifting. You can pay others to lift the buckets and carry the physical load. Don’t pay anyone to do your thinking for you. I’m retired now and made a great life for myself and my family thinking things up that others couldn’t even imagine.

So you’re advocating for…?

 

[Emergence]

So you’re advocating for…?

Not settling for the easy way through life. Rise to the challenge, master the discipline, and make a contribution that benefits more than just yourself. That’s an obvious course to someone who would never choose to slide by.

 

[Emergence]

So you’re advocating for…?

I deleted my original reply. It’s obvious to me that I was misunderstood.

 

[stevo]

Not settling for the easy way through life. Rise to the challenge, master the discipline, and make a contribution that benefits more than just yourself. That’s an obvious course to someone who would never choose to slide by.

No argument from me although I'm not sure what sliding by looks like. The older I get, the more I realize that most people who don't achieve much are either timid, don't really want more, or have concluded they aren't capable of more. And a lot of people really aren't capable of more.

 

[stevo]

No, we chose to go to the moon because we wanted to compare private parts with the USSR. Among real scientists it is accepted as a colossal waste of money with little to no scientific value.

To your first point, absolutely. To your second point, I half agree. When I think about it, the space race did force us to develop things so we could get there and that brought a number of things that have been extremely valuable. But that's more of a knock on effect than anything. The act of going to the moon? Not sure it was useful in and of itself.

 

[juks]

I don't know, I kind of agree. No need to stress out over hard things unless they're actually worth doing. And even then, pay other people to do it.

(Sorry, just inserting a contrary opinion for the fun of it although I'm sort of serious...)

Oh so I should pay you to play guitar for me?

 

[stevo]

Oh so I should pay you to play guitar for me?

You'd regret it. You'd never feel like you got your money's worth.

 

[filtersweep]

Saying rap isn't "hardly" music might be a bit more generous than many are inclined to be.

I've heard that there was a time when people used to drink water right out of a garden hose. I'm told it was a simpler, more wholesome time.

No kidding.

Now I read that you can die from a brain-eating bacteria caused by garden slugs if you drink out of a hose.

It is a miracle any of us survived.

When I played HS football- are drinking system was a garden hose strung out to the practice field.

 

[stevo]

No kidding.

Now I read that you can die from a brain-eating bacteria caused by garden slugs if you drink out of a hose.

It is a miracle any of us survived.

When I played HS football- are drinking system was a garden hose strung out to the practice field.

We never wore helmets when riding our bicycles either. But there are wards filled with people my age who are invalids because of it.

 

[Synchro]

We never wore helmets when riding our bicycles either. But there are wards filled with people my age who are invalids because of it.

Then there is my bike accident, where I high-sided at walking speed, and landed on my cheekbone, never so much as putting a scratch on my helmet. Don’t get me wrong, I advocate helmets, but nothing is 100%.

 

[stevo]

Then there is my bike accident, where I high-sided at walking speed, and landed on my cheekbone, never so much as putting a scratch on my helmet. Don’t get me wrong, I advocate helmets, but nothing is 100%.

I have a dozen like that myself - been there many times. The ironic thing was that after my neighbor hit the pavement at full downhill speed and had to spend a month in the hospital with a head injury (and was never the same), we still didn’t wear helmets. You couldn’t find a bike helmet in the stores! Geez.

 

[Jim Krause]

George Carlin once said that the baby boomer generation could be summed up by the mantra “GIMME IT!! IT’S MINE!!”

Gosh....I'm a boomer, and I thought it was "All we are saying/Is give peace a chance." At least I bought all that love, peace, & granola stuff. Still do, too.

 

[calebaaron666]

Gosh....I'm a boomer, and I thought it was "All we are saying/Is give peace a chance." At least I bought all that love, peace, & granola stuff. Still do, too.

Ol’ George wasn’t referring to the boomers in their youth, rather what they became in 80s and 90s.

 

[MadKaw]

If something is easy to do, pay somebody to do it. Then you have time to do the things others can't.

 

[blueruins]

I myself am not a boomer but I chafe at these arrogant youth who have little respect for the blessings they’ve inherited or depth of reflection to consider the context of history.
The barbarism of humanity is always on full display and the folly and fashion of one’s time is a poor lens with which to regard others.
This generation like the others before will be Ill-judged for the sins they’ve committed against their fellows.

 

[Back in Black]

It is amusing, but absolutely true. There’s good and bad right now, as there was 100, 200, or 2000 years ago.

True, but we need some repose from serious subject matter. Most of our fatigue, these days, is mental, and our fatigued minds need silly memes and cat videos.

I’ve seen some examples of this sort of thing, as well. Sadly, a lot of workers think that they just have to show and they don’t need to put forth any other effort.

I know enough about your character that I have no doubt in my mind that you gave your son a lot of positive guidance, perhaps by example, and very likely by the things you said as part of everyday life. The attitudes of parents have a huge effect on what a child learns about life.

If you had raised your son believing that the world was taking unfair advantage of him, it’s quite likely that he would not have a positive work ethic. Contemplating the guys I grew up with, it is obvious that work ethic is passed on from parent to child. I can think of a coup,e of guys whose fathers were very directly involved in getting them to work, over summer break and as soon as they entered the job market, they were expected to succeed at what they did. I don’t know what your son does for work, but I’d bet my bottom dollar that you helped him to get there, by example, and probably by the expectations you set.

There are also successful people that have only succeeded because they realized that their parent’s attitudes were counterproductive, and they resolved to do better. This is effective as well, but it doesn’t make it easier to succeed.

Syncro,

I was born in 1949, have lived my entire life under the threat of ''nuclear annihilation''. I can still remember going out with my Dad in the fifties to look at a display of ''bomb shelters'' The air raid alert sirens in my home town weren't dismantled until the seventies.

Sometimes it gets a little better, sometimes, it seems to get a whole lot worse.

Someone once said ''one generation giveth over to the next, but the earth abideth forever.

I'd like to look into my Chrystal Ball, but I traded it for a guitar! My Magic ''8'' Ball said...''Ask again Later''!

Best,

BIB.

 

[AZBrahma]

No argument from me although I'm not sure what sliding by looks like. The older I get, the more I realize that most people who don't achieve much are either timid, don't really want more, or have concluded they aren't capable of more. And a lot of people really aren't capable of more.

For some reason this reminds me of someone to whom I listen on a podcast or video. He says there are three kinds of people. Stupid-stupid people, smart-stupid people, and smart-smart people. He puts it like this: stupid-stupid people know they are stupid, understand their limitations, and work within their boundaries while causing little trouble. Smart-smart people are the same way - they are smart but are also aware of their limitations, i.e. he may be a fantastic doctor and a scholar but he knows he can't fix your transmission. The dangerous ones, he contends, are smart-stupid people. These people tend to have reasonable intelligence but are too stupid to realize not to engage out of their depth and cannot understand their own limitations in skill or knowledge, leading them to have a loud voice and little substantive content. Those are the ones you have to watch out for, and there a LOT of them around these days. Social media is breeding them at a breakneck pace.

 

[afire]

No argument from me although I'm not sure what sliding by looks like. The older I get, the more I realize that most people who don't achieve much are either timid, don't really want more, or have concluded they aren't capable of more. And a lot of people really aren't capable of more.

When I was an arrogant and privileged youth, I actually believed that those less fortunate were less fortunate by their own doing. When I got into the real world, I learned a couple of things quickly. One is that even with every advantage, head start, and what I'd like to believe is a relatively sharp mind, it's still hard as hell to get ahead, stay ahead, and build a life that can keep you relatively content. The other is that the world is chock full of people who work themselves to the bone and never catch a break. Sure, there are lazy bums out there, but by my reckoning, the overwhelming majority of people who struggle, are quite literally struggling, not simply failing to "try harder".

 

[blueruins]

one thing my parents never prepared me for was that even if you’re not ‘successful’, a modest life of minding your own business and being grateful for your friends and family is enough to inspire others to hatred and subterfuge.