I was laid off six months ago from my longest tenured job. Since then, I have been rotting. And I mean really rotting. I have been staying up late, sleeping in, skipping chores, neglecting my relationships, eating too much food, neglecting hygiene, and generally just being a bum. I have a nest egg that I had saved up for this exact situation, but it appears that it has just made me even lazier. I have not been applying to many jobs, maybe one per week. My main reason has been that I am afraid of interviewing and that my skills are not up to par.
I don't know what to do anymore. I need to kick myself into gear, but I am finding it incredibly difficult. I'm not looking for pity, just some assistance from the brain trust here at HN.
Thank you for reading.
What has always kept me in that funk is trying to get back to 'normal' as a goal. It feels too big a jump, so I'd put it off for another day. And then a week has passed.
I don't want this to come across as a plug. But I made an app for myself in these situations (and to avoid them). Check my profile and you'll find it. Message me somehow and I'll give you a free subscription, in return for some honest feedback.
But small steps, and be outside more. As others are also saying. Just witnessing life is carrying on as normal really is refreshing.
Great advice.
If at all possible, I'd say favor part-time, so it gets you up in the morning, but doesn't completely fry you out by the time you come back home.
They'll promise that the love you and you'll do well, and suddenly you're flagged for low performance because someone used AI to check your work and nobody checked whether the work-checking AI is valid.
Better if there's also something you can do with other people. I play tennis and I do inline skating. It gets me out with people, and not always people I would choose, which provides some amount of grounding / self-checking.
Start a little project, remind yourself of what you can do, and what you're good at doing, and what you enjoy doing.
If you have to sit and watch TV, I've found Halt and Catch Fire to be somewhat motivational to "do something" and find the dark corners that can be probed and pushed (and HCF likely fits well into the interests of HN folks).
A couple of questions:
- Did you have to take a pay cut?
- Are you remote?
- What industry?
Yes, went from ~180k to ~150k but went back up to ~180k in a year.
> Are you remote?
No
> What industry?
Manufacturing using robotics.
Lately i have been setting a morning alarm and trying to do some workout immediately. get the body moving rather than just start the day goofing off. i also had success with setting an actual schedule with alerts, but unfortunately iOS is buggy and just stops alerting sometimes for my calendar events. the biggest thing is that you form a habit around goofing off and you need to break that habit. i would also recommend the app Cold Turkey, in fact writing this reminds me i need to install it on this mac because i keep using it to goof off on HN and reddit.
I also had the same experience as you in interviews. I was afraid of interviews, thinking that I did not have the skill. I learned that an interview is not about what is in the job. it is much about, that you Know about your job or not. They're going to test that: a simple thought process about whether you are aware of that job or the things you are going to work on. Simple as that. You can Google it or use ChatGPT. It will give better answers.
For example having dog means having to take it out regularly for walks and feed it regularly. And in the words of the immortal Calvin and Hobbes, they make for excellent fuzz therapy. Good luck and hope you start feeling better.
This suggestion only applies if you're a programmer, and assumes you were doing AI-assisted coding before you got laid off... You know how the agentic AI people say you have to get your slow human self out of the ralph loop? Well, put yourself back in the loop.
Whenever your agent harness is blocked, waiting for your input, it should periodically wake and nag you to engage with it. Once you've got this, now something is depending on you to get work done.
If you need an idea for a project to work on, how about a product/service to help people in your exact situation.
There's cognitive dissonance going on here - you are not worthy but you need the money so there's no choice but to be worthy. Your brain has both of these and it's freezing up. That's the part you need to fix.
I might not be worthy either. And possibly not even due to any kind of rot, but because all these brilliant people are competing for the same jobs and willing to do it for cheap.
Personally, I took up entrepreneurship because it's a lot easier to get funds these days and it's safer than all these layoff cycles. What's the point of a full time job if job security is a thing of the past?
Hit the gym daily.
That will snap you out of the bad habits described.
You’ll feel better (physically, and about yourself).
Feeling better about yourself should dispel any fear of interviewing.
Do one thing every day: hit the gym.
You’ll fix your schedule and be motivated to actually apply for better tech jobs.
Sometimes you just need a purpose to work towards
LLM could create a study plan, grill your with tough questions. If your are into inquiry based learning, they are fantastic (thanks to all the stolen shit).
I also realized one of my biggest problems, which adds to my anxiety: doing things without evaluation or feedback. When that's missing, the whole cycle of working toward a goal breaks down. Again, I think the main reason is that I'm afraid of challenges and afraid of failure.
I've been practicing breaking down my goals and making sure I hear outside voices and get feedback, so I can adjust my next steps in time instead of soaking in one thing for too long and "pretending" to be focused. I made a vow that I won't go out to play my favorite sport until I send out my first application this week — a small step. As of today, my actual progress is still behind the weekly goal I set at the beginning of the week. But I'm firm that I can't make any more excuses; I have to take that first small step each time, as a way of telling myself what my true priority is.
The worst case is that I fail every interview and no company wants me. But then I'll at least know where I stand and what I should improve to become a stronger candidate.
Come on, my friend — let's work it out.
You could build a nice little business around that idea.
> I have been staying up late, sleeping in, skipping chores, neglecting my relationships, eating too much food, neglecting hygiene, and generally just being a bum.
Happens with me. Something which helps me is figuring out why I sleep late. For me, it was a constant cycle of trying to do something today's night to cope up with waking up late or not doing something today.
Realize that productivity = hours put in * focus. I found myself constantly procastinating (hours go down) and when doing tasks (with less focus)
And if you continue this cycle, then the cycle continues. Over a long term, it is better for you to sleep today no matter how the day went early and then wake up early. It has been scientifically shown to improve your mental health and even from the logical standpoint of productivity, it will be better to sleep early today than not.
Your time is constant, when you sleep late you are borrowing time from tomorrow's productivity and this borrowing cycle will continue and you will feel as if you are short on time but you have ample amount of time provided you break the cycle.
Don't Neglect your relationships: Here's a comment[0] that I recently wrote about it. TLDR: try to appreciate them back and don't take them for granted. Appreciate them a lot.
There is some logic that I have found in that struggle is finite and constant and you can either take it in small doses today rather than an instant hit later. This also applies to doing chores
Regarding cleanliness: My room is a mess but the logic which can help is that I have found myself losing so so many time because I lost my keys or just lost something and then it has an insane amount of stress/time loss and struggle. I had forgotten (twice) that I had already taken my clothes back from laundry because of how messy my room is and I had to manually count all clothes I have (twice).
The amount of struggle in keeping your room clean is better than keeping it not clean.
Also, even speaking out of logical arguments, right now if I understand you, you want to be the guy who does keep his room clean, who does sleep early and who does appreciate relationships. You don't want the immediate benefits of it as much as you want it to help be part of your identity and boost its self-confidence. You want to be the guy as you want to do something, anything.
> My main reason has been that I am afraid of interviewing and that my skills are not up to par.
Happens with me as well but again the struggle is constant if not larger. You can either do interviews right now and fail them (which is okay, literally everyone fails) and failure teaches more than success. You learn from it, you improve and your fear can be taken less. Fear is because of the fact that you aren't approaching it, not that you aren't approaching it because of fear. In some sense, its a chicken and egg problem and the only way to break out of it is to not give the fear enough importance to make you change decisions but rather act on it and pass through its struggle and win through it. Do the interviews right now,don't postpone/procastinate it. Try to give as much as possible and not expect anything in return. because if so, then what is it to fear? Worst case: you don't get the job, best case: you do.
Well if you don't interview, its already the worst case plus you are giving fear its weight.
If you notice, I am saying the same thing over and over again applying more weight to it each time but I think that this overarching philosophy does help me sometimes to be more comfortable with struggling to then be a better person because I want to be a better person and I am gonna struggle. Might as well struggle (less) and then be a person I am proud of being.
Once again, I doubt that the thing stopping you is knowledge. I have tried to give knowledge but in today's world, it's not because you lack some knowledge that is causing you this but rather the lack of actions. One action can speak more and form your identity better than reading books and speaking all you want.
Your brain asks you: Talk is cheap, show me the actions. Actions start small and slowly and with some initial intrinsic/extrinsic motivation. Words can help you motivate for sometime but it won't be lasting unless you decide it upon your identity itself.
Books which can help you: Atomic Habits, How to win friends and influence people, How to measure your life, Deep work.
Hope this helps and I understand the situation that you are going through and I genuinely want you to know that you can change this very instant, and so with that in mind, have a nice day :-D
[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50271091
Objection!
What objection do you have with the book. It can make up for a good debate but I think that the book might not be perfect nothing is and it is still worth highlighting its flaws while knowing its positives. For me it helps but ofc I’d love to hear what you say about it as I’d like to learn something new!
I still might recommend it though because I think it can be a really helpful book for many provided you act on the teachings.
That's the wrong question. The answer would be much longer but since the people around me are rather easy to identify I won't be explaining the background of why I do not think this book will be of help to someone in the position of the OP. Feel free to mail me if you think it is important enough to have an answer.
Maybe the book will not help the OP, maybe it can. I apologize if it will not be of help to OP and hope that the rest of my initial comment can make up for it. Maybe I shouldn't have recommended books after suggesting them to take action (any action) and then immediately suggested them to read books (which can procastinate taking actions)
The book to me, has changed my actions and I consider it one of the action books. The question of for better or for worse is subjective and I believe it has been good for me but I concede that it could perhaps be bad for someone else or moreso that perhaps it might not be extremely relevant to OP. I can only guess.
I realized it after writing the comment but I do sincerely hope that OP takes what he wants the best from all the comments and basically does action. My whole comment is about taking actions, any actions specifically suggesting that more knowledge might not be the thing that they should necessarily want at this point but rather taking actions!
(I think it could very well be that when I suggested the books, it was me suggesting all the books which helped me conclude to the things said in my comment) but once again, it's not knowledge that's the issue but rather taking actions.
Now coming to the point about OP:
But TLDR, I once again recommend the OP to take actions and follow the advice of action.
Dear OP, the only thing you need to do is now take actions. That is worth more helpful to you than any book at this moment. I recommend reading these books later if you wish or if you don't then that's completely fine as well. I just hope that you can take actions to help your own life. You have to step up and realize the effortlessness when viewing from the bird's eyes view of a lifetime. It feels effort now but it takes more effort over a lifetime to maintain that lifestyle and coping up with the stress that it can cause than taking the struggle of fixing it once. I assume You had your job and everything going close to perfect once, have some leap of faith of confidence within yourself that you can do it again, that you have the capabilities to do so and you are capable enough and have enough strength, or more so find the ability to find strength within yourself. The strength is already within you (you are capable enough), all you need to do is look inwards and realize it again.
A lot of words which mean nothing except saying that an internet stranger wants you to succeed and to re-find the strength within you that you think has been lost. Take small steps as they go a long way. Thank you very much.
That's just an observation, do with it what you will.
My apologies. Wasn't my intention
> That's just an observation, do with it what you will.
What I will try to do is try to improve myself. Thanks for the help!
You have accomplished a great deal in your life when I am just starting. I hope I get your blessing nonetheless as I step in this brave new world.
Will try to be more mindful from here on out. Have a nice day.
To dear OP going through dark phase, I apologize for the petty arguments that I entered when the topic of discussion should be about you: all the best in your life and I wish nothing but the best for your future.
people have shared amazing advice here and I hope that you apply.
Try to act on anything small which is meaningful consistently with hopefully a community of friends that you can make.
The book specificially says not to be un-authentic, that flattery is like printing fake currency and sooner or later you are gonna get into trouble of it. It genuinely asks people to do the hard thing of giving sincere appreciation not flattery and genuinely warns against being un-authentic and sycophantic as you mention.
> It's a book that is popular for all the wrong reasons and the title alone is a turn-off.
It depends. I understand what you mean in terms of the terms like winning friends and influencing people but the title sounds more as a plead to do something for me.
To me, the book is an action book (it specifically says so), and the title is a reminder to it being a guide and that we have to implement it. It's almost like a guide (how to) to making (win/winning) friends and having good connections (influencing people).
To me, its exactly a book which you can recommend someone to get out of rust when we worry about relationships and friendships etc., thus recommending it to OP because he wants to get out of it as well. It's a book which can help in producing actions. In the start they maybe less genuine because we are none the wiser but perhaps I do think that it helps over a long term.
The book is the best selling self help book of all time[0] (if you don't consider an novella/self-help category book)
It's not as if the popularity of the book means anything but rather how much the title contributes to such a book. Suppose 1 million people read the book more because of it. I think that the book is good in its content and genuinely net positive so the cost analysis of this title is that it is catchy and it allows more people to be happier maybe.
In the end, it comes down to the content of the book itself IMO rather than the things surrounding it (the title or the group of people that you have met who have read the book, that is a very small n factor to have a judgement about and I would please suggest to reconsider that judgement.)
I sincerely recommend reading the book.
Hey, as an challenge for both of us if you wish, we both can read it together as I wished to read this book again and maybe e-mail each other about it and we can have a good discussion on the content of the book itself! I am up for the challenge as I do want my opinions challenged :-D
My mail is open if you are interested!
It is completely up to you if you wish to do so or not! (The challenge or otherwise reading the book itself). No pressures!
Though I have to be honest as well, this very well maybe a post-hoc justification as well. I was very young when I first read it and was gifted to me by my cousin. I love the book, it was maybe my first or second extra book that I genuinely read. it's close to my heart for emotional reasons and maybe I am biased out of it as I still carry the book, it has underlinings done of a 6th grade me I think.
I cannot say if the book can help you or not, it has helped me and I have my reasons (which I tried to provide here) to support it. From your experience, you have observed the connection with sycophancy so you have slight distate of the book. I may or may not be able to change the opinion about the book and it's completely okay as I understand where you are coming from :-D
It is one of the only things that I have of that age of mine. I don't know how I used to think back then to be honest. The only thing I have mostly genuinely left out of that is this book and others. It's beautiful and the book feels warm to me and Dale carnegie like an old uncle telling me stories. It feels like I re-meet with him when I read the book and re-meet with my younger self. I maybe using slight hyperbole and I am invoking emotional response to an logical argument and I am slightly sorry about that but I hope that I can convey why the book feels so warm to me!
Now applying the lessons of the book, I wish to speak less and listen more! So I am curious to hear what you think and have an nice day :-D
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_books
> Other than that I think that this book has a shadow side, and that that shadow side can manifest even if the book warns against it.
Slightly agree as I have tried to say within the comment that I can see how people reading the book can just go through it and even if the book warns against it, can take the shortcut. because taking shortcuts is so much easier than doing the actual work of giving sincere appreciation or other things.
> The fact that it is a best seller doesn't really hold much weight with me
Once again I agree.
> Note that I'm not in the USA and that financial success and 'hustle' have less value where I live
I am not from USA either though I do have to admit that financial success does have more value where I live. Hustle not so much as risk-taking is slightly not preferred.
In the end, where we have the disagreement on is that I have found the book to be helpful of me and to have not seen its shady side. I have seen the warmth of it and have good experiences with the book but I concede that everything can have two sides. Your experience within relation to the book has been with this shady side and I realize how you might feel about it and why the disagreement occurs. IMO nobody is right or wrong perhaps as much as two sides of the same coin but if there is one wrong, then it can be me, as I can be wrong and I usually am ;)
have a nice day.