Excellent!

That’s a good read, I enjoyed it.

Of course, my personal Walden Pond is completely engulfed in Forest fire smoke now, and for the foreseeable future…

quote:

Originally posted by Doug:
That’s a good read, I enjoyed it.

Of course, my personal Walden Pond is completely engulfed in Forest fire smoke now, and for the foreseeable future…

The wind shifted. Enjoying the clear air. Remind myself when its gets smokey that it could be worse.
Glad I am not closer to the big fires.

Whenever I read articles like this, I want to ask these people whether they still have student loans to pay off or children they still need to put through college. If it's in Asia, I would also ask whether they still have aging parents that they need to support.

Henry David Thoreau was, after all, single and had no dependent.

You can throw away your committee and board and executive positions, you can throw away your projects and clients, but you cannot throw away your children. And in most parts of Asia where the social safety net and social norms are very different, you cannot throw away your parents.

Interesting questions, though I have to admit it they didn't come to mind for me when reading the article. I'm not sure that people whose priorities shift in the ways described necessarily walk away from all obligations.

A ​few thoughts on the nature of perceived obligations and what constitutes successfully meeting them...
​
Support for children and aging parents comes in many flavors, some financial and some not. And what people view as their obligations in the parent/child relationship vary greatly for a lot of different reasons. Upbringing, culture, individual personalilties...

Putting a kid through college may make some parents feel that they have completed their job as a parent and they've set up them for success. But maybe a kid who has to work hard and find their own path in adulthood actually ends up in a better place, emotionally and/or financially.

In the case of aging parents, if your career takes up all of your life you may have the money to hire people to take care of them. OTOH, if you have the time but not the financial resources, you may do it yourself.

Life is full of tradeoffs. Money gives people options but is no guarantee of positive (edit: maybe a better word is "desired") outcomes.

Thoreau went home to his parents house for meals and to do laundry.

J