How Old Were You When You Realized ...

[ItsjustMe]

I Was About 25

[roamer65]

1. About 30.

Now I know that most people are lying, thieving, self-centered scumbags. If they weren’t, we wouldn’t be staring extinction in the face via climate change.

Not all are but a distinct majority seen to be so IMO.

47 percent voted for a narcissistic sociopath for president in 2020….47 percent!

[egduj]

2. Way too late in life.

[displacedtexan]

3. 31

Truly heavy sigh.

[iwillalwayswonderwhy]

4. 45

I was executive assistant to the General Counsel at a medical device company. I got in between 7 and 7:30 every day and had documents for signatures and draft agreements ready for her review. I followed the instructions on the pile she had left on my desk. Opened and sorted mail, reviewed resumes. My boss walked in between 10:30 and 11:00. She’d redline the draft agreements and return them to me. Meanwhile, everyone was filtering in to the building and they would have 45 minute impromptu conversations. Then practically all of them would disappear for lunch returning sometime between 2 and 2:30. I took an hour lunch everyday. I just can’t work at that kind of meandering pace and would rather just get it churned out. I’d leave between 5 and 5:30 and almost everybody in the building would give me this look of disbelief and ask if I was leaving already. Most of them worked until 9 or 10 at night and thought I was a slacker. But they didn’t really get started until 3. But I know I did more actual work (fortunately, my boss knew, too).

[ForgedCrank]

13. That's the

way to do it.
When you go home at the end of the day, you can say to yourself that you don't owe anyone anything.
If for some reason that isn't good enough, I'd move along.
That's always been my philosophy on the subject at least.

[Hortensis]

28. Yes. I also always felt my work was both worth doing and doing well,

even if it was “ordinary” work and aside from remuneration. A secret of happiness I suppose.

[Walleye]

5. Six years old, first grade

[meadowlander]

6. 19

I had a job I really liked getting up at 4am on weekends to start at 5. I worked my ass off, minded my own business, and got on well with my immediate supervisor.

Then I came in one morning to a letter sitting on the counter saying I was fired with no explanation. I asked the other girl working that morning and she didn't know anything about it. I called the department head (who had written the letter) and left him daily messages for three weeks wanting to discuss what it was all about. I had absolutely no clue.

Finally I wrote a letter basically threatening to sue him if he didn't meet with me to at least explain the reason why I had been fired.

That helped him "find my lost phone number" which I'd been leaving him on every one of my voicemail messages. Turns out two other girls who wanted my weekend shift made up some complete lies about me to get me fired. And the department head couldn't be bothered to come in to work that early on a weekend to fire me in person or to meet with me to hear my side of the story or to do any investigation whatsoever.

They offered me the job back after "some investigating turned up that not all the accusations were completely true". I took it so I didn't have to say at future interviews that I had been fired but then quit a few months later because my reputation had been completely trashed and everyone was ghosting me.

In retrospect, I should have sued the shit out of them for wrongful termination and defamation in the first place. You live, you learn.

Oh, and the cherry on the turd was the white male (surprise) department head who was at least 15 years old than me also wanted me to apologise to him for the emotional distress my letter threatening to sue him if he didn't meet with me caused him.

[ArnoldLayne]

40. You shouldn't have gone back. I got myself fired on purpose which I had planned out ahead of time

several years ago for various Minor Infractions I was 61 years old then. I filed for unemployment benefits. I had a telephone conference meeting with the Company Human Resource Director and the West Virginia State Unemployment Benefits Representative. She asked the Company guy a few questions about why they fired me. Then let me have my say then asked me a few questions Company HR Director didn't really fight it that hard. The Benefits Representative decided I was fired for Minor Infractions not Major Infractions which you will be denied unemployment compensation completely. Examples are fighting on the job, theft of any sort, insubordination, coming to work under the influence of alcohol or any non prescribed medication. Also performing or acting in an unsafe manor jeopardizing the safety of yourself or any other Employee at all. So the first 2 weeks I didn't collect any unemployment benefits then after those 2 weeks I collected Unemployment Compensation for 6 Months. Only 15 dollars less a week then when I was working. Plus since my Girlfriend and Myself had a 2 year old Son we got 415 dollars a month EBT ie Food Stamps for 6 months until i got another job. I also got Medicaid for 6 months, my Son got Medicaid, my Girlfriend worked and had Health Insurance. I worked for a total of 39 years without collecting any type of Government Assistance. I paid into the system for all those years. Then after about 8 months of being out of work I ran out of Unemployment benefits I turned 62 years old. I filed for Social Security for myself and received Social Security for my Son by then 3 years old since I was 62. Then I collected my Steelworkers pension at 62. I worked in a Steel Mill for 34 years then we got bought out by a group of Wall Street Investors they shut us down after 2 years and scrapped the Mill. They made more money by scrapping it instead of making Steel. But by the Rule of 85 years that was in our Steelworkers contract where your years of service 34 plus my age 62 equaled 96 I was eligible for my Steelworker's Pension. But anyway you could have collected unemployment for 6 months. I'm 65 years old now and working part-time as a Security Guard. As long as I make less than $18,524 dollars per year I don't get penalized. Anything I earn by working and earning over $18,524 dollars per year I will get penalized 1 dollar for every 3 dollars I make. So when I get around the $18,000 dollar a year mark I quit that job. Take a few months off, wait for the New Year to begin I will get another part-time Security Guard job somewhere. I plan on doing that until I'm 68 years old then I'm done working. Then if I decide to go back to work at 70 years old it doesn't matter how much you earn per year you don't get penalized at all. You can make as much money as you want then.

[JanMichael]

7. 32

[brooklynite]

8. Why would you expect to be "rewarded" for being decent?

[Leith]

11. Because every person in authority promised it

The concept isn't foreign to bosses, political elites, or anyone else in higher positions because that's what they say to us out here in the great mass of the "unwashed." It keeps us toeing the line, you see.

A better question would be why there is no reward for being decent. Or why being a complete shit to people IS what is actually rewarded. Or why somebody would be confused by such a simple concept.

[brooklynite]

21. Sorry, can't relate to the question.

Professionally, I did work that I enjoyed, and moved on to do it elsewhere if I wasn't compensated appropriately to my skills. As for personal life, I wasn't expecting rewards for being helpful and generous.

[Hortensis]

26. Boy, same here. Would I be disappointed if I had.

Whoops. Wait a second. What if it turns out we do keep being reborn and I’m constantly failing to advance because I wasn’t rewarding everybody else for their decency?

[2naSalit]

9. By the time I was five.

[marybourg]

10. Never had such a plan, nor even heard of it. Is that a thing?

[ForgedCrank]

12. Not sure

how to react to this one.
I've worked very hard and been rewarded well for it.
I just behave in a civil manner and do what I'm paid for, I don't consider it a favor that demands a reward.

[lpbk2713]

14. Early twenties.

Four years of military service was a good waker upper.

[trof]

15. About 30?

When I first learned that I could be laid off from my union job with a pregnant wife.
I naively thought that once I was "in" I was in for life.
Not so.

[rurallib]

16. kind of 2 phases

As a kid @ 13 - after priestly molestation & then again @30 to 32.

The second time it was like an epiphany.

[SouthernDem4ever]

17. I spent my working life in a union job

always made a decent wage for a decent day's work. Too bad workers didn't value unions enough and allowed morons like Reagan to weaken them. Just hurt themselves in the long run.

[mopinko]

19. 50 something. trying to break in as a painter.

went to a huge art show- art expo chgo.
everywhere i looked- huge nudes, skimpily painted, asking double any of the other prices. about 1/3 of the show.
realized sexy is what sells and my madonnas were never gonna sell. not attached to my aging face, anyway. hung up my brushes shortly thereafter.

[Hekate]

20. You guys are all pretty quick on the uptake. I must have been close to 40. I read books about...

… how to ask for advancement — and tried that out after all that hard work and being nice shit. I read books about Athena Women (which I am not and never was) and how they just seem to magnetically attract male mentors and I still don’t get it. I read books…

[cate94]

22. When my dad died

At 13, I realized I was the only one who would stand up for me. My mom became someone I never knew. My oldest brother became an abusive ass.

[Orrex]

23. Early 30s, I suppose. Way too late.

A friend--a fellow cog in my company's machine at the time--used to say "you will only be rewarded if you put in the effort."

Eventually I learned that, when you put in more effort, that level of effort quickly becomes the new expectation.


Another friend suggested that you should "make yourself indispensable to the company."

Before long I learned that if you make yourself indispensable to the company and the business, then you make it the company's business to dispense with you.


I have seen these proven many dozens of times since then, and I have never once seen them disproven.

[Hortensis]

24. Never happened. Just one or both of us working 40 hours a week

Last edited Mon Jul 25, 2022, 09:46 PM - Edit history (2)

and saving a bit each paycheck — that we weren’t too broke from underinsured medical bills to do it — over the decades accumulated to modest security, enjoyment and retirement.

Neither of us ever expected anything without working steadily for years for it. We really need appreciation for the value of work itself, that it is as necessary to life as water. Everyone lives on what others have worked to produce.

We fortunately for us were both able to provide our own appreciation for our work to keep us happy enough at it. I know I always felt my work was worth doing, needed even if “ordinary,” aside from remuneration.

Self validation may be an important secret to happiness in a real world with real people. Work in itself should be necessary and valuable, and those who believe it is so are going to be a lot happier over their long decades of contributing and providing for themselves.

[JI7]

25. Never had such a plan

[sanatanadharma]

27. Rewards without asking is called grace and I don't think the market place has any

I never played the game. I did not buy into the 'do it now' so your future will be better assured.
Circumstances and choices manifested different jobs, no savings plan, and broken marriages where I left assets behind.
I eschewed insurance and thinking I had any control. I reduced my desires.

Before retirement age, I knew I was to be screwed.
But I was wrong, thank you very much.
The time came, and I retired into an unexpectedly good life with rewards beyond my wildest dream.
Rewards far greater than any results I could have expected from my limited efforts and actions.

[Meadowoak]

29. Shortly after Reagan was elected, so about age 20.

[PJMcK]

30. Sorry, but that hasn't been my experience

Yet I recognize that I've been remarkably fortunate.

I strive to be a generous and caring man. Mostly, my conscious is clear.

[ancianita]

31. 8

Trauma opened my eyes. Suffering opened up bravery and anger, then my ability to learn the practical solace of reading, education, writing, channeling effort to adapt, prepare for new opportunities to build my own life script toward peace, fulfillment, and learning what love is.

Then I read The Road Less Travelled, and learned how to become an adult and not just a grownup.

Life isn't role formulas. Life isn't pain avoidance. Life is problems. A pretty reputable therapist, well known for research on the positivity of anger, once told me there are two kinds of people -- people who have problems and know it, and people who have problems and don't know it.

[Xipe Totec]

32. I'm working on it.

66

[Javaman]

33. When I was 16 working as a dishwasher nt

[MarineCombatEngineer]

34. FWIW, this doesn't apply to me,

I had a very successful career in the Marines by working hard, taking on assignments other's didn't want, worked my way up the NCO ladder to retire as a Master Gunnery Sargeant and now I own my own trucking business consisting of 2 trucks, not because I have to work, I want to work, so for me, except for losing my wife 4 years ago, life has worked out pretty well.

[paleotn]

35. About 30....

when I discovered hard work and results couldn't out do schmoozing and ass kissing. Hard lesson, but it is what it is.

[calimary]

36. When I got fired AFTER the ratings went up.

I was in my early 30s. Hired for the morning shift. Did well. The ratings said so. Then the PD called me into his office and fired me. Regretfully, he said.

What he didn’t say: his longtime best buddy who’d originally turned the job down because he was in love and didn’t want to leave another city where he was - suddenly found himself out of that relationship and gig, and called his pal asking whether that job might still be open.

[Chicagogrl1]

37. 27

I was told by my boss that all employees were replaceable & then he laid me off. Then he was laid off.

[reACTIONary]

38. Never. That's bullshit. Nt

[niyad]

39. 12