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Untag Yourself - You're not what others say you are (readandgetrich.com)

10 points by cristivlad ↗ HN
Let me tell you the story of Victor Serebriakoff who as a young fellow was diagnosed as being mentally incapacitated. When he was 15, one of his professors told him that he will never be able to finish school. This made young Victor assume his imposed status and for more than 17 years he only took laboring jobs, most of them being way below his potential.

3 comments

[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 14.3 ms ] thread
mvkel
Actually, you're _exactly_ what others say you are.

Ask 10 friends what they think of John and common threads will come up. That's John.

Ask John what he thinks of himself, and you'll get a much different (and more inaccurate) picture.

Candid photos taken by someone else are much more realistic than a selfie.

cristivlad
Yes, you're what others say you are if you're a weak person and allow yourself to be negatively influenced by others.
boredprogrammer
Meh. Posting because this type of story irks me every time.

I know I am a decent programmer. I also know I am not a good sales person (why? because I'm not good with people, or lying, or gambling - in fact I'm not allowed to talk to new leads at work until they are confirmed as clients and fully on board with a project). Therefore I need to stick with programming. However my current job has me stuck doing mundane repetitive programming. I've been looking for quite some time, but there are no job prospects in my field in my locality.

So the only realistic solution to being the best I can would be to go out on my own and start my own company - but I am not a good sales person, and chances are high that I would fail and be unemployed and broke. I can't move to a different location (I'm 2 years into a mortgage which has terms saying I cannot sell the house for 5 years), but even if I did Ireland as a whole is in a huge recession with huge unemployment and very few prospects. Moving abroad is expensive and has too many unknowns.

So I guess I'm left with post negative comments to random people on the internet.

You can't just say "be the person you want to be", and snap your fingers and make it happen. You can't blame your limits on other people and what they have said to you in the past. You have to work with facts as they are presented to you, and the fact is everyones circumstances are different and not everyones situation can be improved by reading silly feel good stories.