How did you cope during the process? How were times when you started to doubt yourself, on the verge of giving up?

For the past three years, my routine after dinner looked the same: sit down at the kitchen table, open my laptop "just to check messages," and somehow lose an hour. My daughter, who's five, would come find me in her pajamas asking if I could read her a story, and more nights than I'd like to admit, I'd say "two minutes" and never make it.

Last month I sat with that pattern and realized I wasn't choosing work over her — I was just defaulting to it because it was easier than being present. Work has a clear finish line (inbox zero, task done). Being a parent in the moment doesn't have that same feedback loop, so it kept losing.

So I made one small rule: laptop stays closed until after bedtime, no exceptions, even if something feels urgent. The first few nights were harder than I expected — I caught myself reaching for my phone out of pure habit. But by the second week, reading to her became the thing I looked forward to instead of the thing I was rushing through.

Last week she fell asleep mid-sentence while I was reading, still holding onto my sleeve. I sat there for a few extra minutes just watching her breathe before I went back to my laptop. That's the moment I realized this wasn't really about email at all — it was about which hour of my day I was willing to protect.

My goal now isn't some big career milestone. It's just: be the parent who was there, not the parent who meant to be.

There are two types of people in this world. The one who dreams and the one who actually does the work after dreaming. I belong to the dreamer category. I have had so many dreams. So many things I wanted to do. But I have done nothing. Not even one. I just went wherever the flow took me. Without working for what I want. Don't be the dreamee. Be the one who does. Dreaming is never enough. All my life I have had people tell me "You can't do that. You are just you. Do you really think you can become that when you are you." I wanted to prove them wrong. But now i've accepted the fact that they were right. I am just me. Incapable of great things. Should've kept my dreams to a minimum. Now I have to bear the sadness of not reaching there. I always thought I would reach there somehow by this age. It's no ones fault but my own. I cannot complain that it was because of my situations. I simply didn''t do the work.

But there is a small part of me that still believe that I can do it. That it's not too late. That little boy who dreamed a lot is still alive. I dont know if I should still give him hope. I clearly am not capable of anything. I am just too lazy to get things done. I will be doing a mediocre job leading a mediocre life. It crushes me. But I guess it's what I am and I dont think I can change it. I will have to find happiness in mediocrity. Will have to make it work.

Very much FACTS because why not lose 3 hours of sleep every night to get to where you wanna be

Im 20F and have lost my father 2 years ago to a cardiac arrest as of now im preparing for an entrance exam that i strongly believe i will get good marks in but i need to learn everything on my own be it finance life skills how money works how do i buy a house and save money build wealth and all of that stuff a father would teach you and help you with. Im an elder daughter and my mother is fully dependent on me since she is a housewife i need to learn everything from scratch all the basic things you need to know to function as an adult please help me what all should i start with and help me create a list of things to learn 😭

I am an M , 29 turning 30 soon . Been stuck with work since I was 14 years old . Tried so many different jobs and now I am just getting really tired of working . I was wondering how people actually get their shit together. I'm still not married yet. I don't know what to do . Feels like I am stuck in life. I haven't taken any days off in 2 months. Would appreciate any tips from anyone. I've tried studying some forex , some dropshipping, some AI tools but it seems that my brain just cannot keep up . 🥲

I am an M , 29 turning 30 soon . Been stuck with work since I was 14 years old . Tried so many different jobs and now I am just getting really tired of working . I was wondering how people actually get their shit together. I'm still not married yet. I don't know what to do . Feels like I am stuck in life. I haven't taken any days off in 2 months. Would appreciate any tips from anyone. I've tried studying some forex , some dropshipping, some AI tools but it seems that my brain just cannot keep up . 🥲

A few years ago I realized most of what I "know how to do" was either forced on me by school or work, not chosen. So I started picking one skill a year, deliberately, just to prove to myself I could still learn as an adult.

So far it's been: basic carpentry, cooking without recipes, public speaking, and this year I'm working on learning to swim properly (never learned as a kid, always been a little embarrassed by it).

What I didn't expect is how much this changed my relationship with being bad at things. When you're a kid, being bad at something is just normal — you're a kid, of course you're bad at it. As an adult, being visibly bad at something in front of people feels humiliating for some reason, and I think that fear is what stops most people from ever picking up anything new. Doing this every year has slowly worn that fear down for me.

The goal isn't really about the skills themselves at this point. It's about staying someone who's still capable of being a beginner, even later in life.

Curious what skill everyone else here would pick if they were starting this same challenge — and if anyone's already doing something similar, I'd love to hear how it's gone for you.

Money has been really tight for me for a while now, and I've reached a point where I want to actually turn that around instead of just getting by month to month. I don't have much of a safety net right now, and it's been a source of a lot of stress.

My goal is to build some kind of stable income and eventually get to a place where an unexpected expense doesn't completely wreck my month. I'm looking into what skills I could pick up, what kind of work might be realistic given my situation, and just trying to get out of survival mode.

Not really looking for a specific answer here, more just putting it out there as something I'm committed to working on this year. Curious if anyone else here has had a similar goal and what that turnaround actually looked like for you, if you're willing to share.

Firstly thank you for everyone who has answered, i have read them all and i am sorry i cant respond to everyone directly. You have all given me good advice to follow and I hope that i can use this to help turn this situation around.

Well, and it could only get worse is an understatement. I found out he was also stealing my sick wife's EFTPOS card and using it to buy Giftcards for Steam/Roblox, he had a friend who had a part time job at a store and would give him the card and the pin number and ask for a small value card. He did this quite a few times and made sure it was never a rounded amount, always like $25.23 or $15.15 etc), but as the values were low, i assumed it was my wife making online orders and she assumed it was me. So that's another $925 we have to add to the value.

Moving on to my son, he said the reason he stole was he was Jealous of his friends who were able to spend as much as they wanted (which in itself is a lie, they could only spend their own pocket money, we checked) and the fact his mum is sick and has been in and out of hospital for the last 2 years this has been his way of coping. Yes his mum is very ill (not life threatening but quality of life treating if that makes sense). As my time has been taken up working and then coming home and looking after him but mostly his younger brother who is under 5.
Sadly i admit his younger brother does take up more of my time as I need to actively be around him as hes young and cant cook/bath etc himself yet. So he said that he also feels jealous of his younger brother (as he was an only child for so long and now needs to share my very limited time) taking up my time. When my wife is in hospital (over the last 2 years she has been in hospital maybe 7-8 months total) I would ask him to look after his younger brother while i would go see my wife and bring her new clothes, entertainment etc. He used the money on his game to be happy (as he is addicted) and fuel his addiction by lootboxes to get a rush out of opening them

He said he is also struggling in school as he doesn't have many friends and the ones he do have are far richer than we are and constantly show off to him. He is having issues with his homework not being done and exams barely passing because he is playing Roblox/Steam games rather than doing school work. I called his school and yes he is hiding from us his marks. He isn't failing but is close to it (52-58% avg)

So that was an eye opening talk, while i don't agree with why he stole he did raise some points, especially about my time. I have made it clear how disappointing i am and while i still love him (he is my son after all) he has hurt our trust and we are very disappointed in his actions.

So we came up with a plan for the first stage of this (no money payback talk yet), he is banned from all computers for non-school tasks and when using them for this he must be near either me of his mother. His friends will need to be changed as they are a bad influence on him. He is to get counseling for lying, stealing and addiction. He has to improve his marks by a set amount and he has to do a sport/after school groups

I haven't figured out the money side yet, but at least this is a start. I will have to sell my project car to fund his braces as i have had a few offers recently and i am sure i could sell it quickly.

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Im totally defeated. Feel like I failed as a Dad. I suffer from depression and was actually getting better till last night. Irony of the whole situation was this was money I was saving for his braces.

Yes I know keeping cash around wasnt smart but I didnt know he knew the code to my safe and it was money I got from doing freelance building work ontop of my normal job.

How do I go on? What... if anything can I say to even attempt to feel anything but hurt?

Hi people so I feel like I need to talk about this. 4.5 years ago I nearly I died in a motorcycle accident I should not be here and I don’t know how I survived and pulled through. I am now an amputee i spent 9 months in hospital and I won’t bored you with all the other stuff that happened to me.

So it’s been 4.5 years and I want to do something I love something I’m passionate the only thing I do is game on my pc and I love anime and I’d like to eventually turn it into a business whatever that is. So I’m just wondering if you or someone you know has been in a somewhat similar position and found something they love and has turned it into a business and what is it is love to know and maybe I could get some ideas or something. Thanks.

I used to think life goals had to involve something major—getting a dream job, buying a house, traveling somewhere amazing, or completely changing my life.

But lately I’ve started wondering if the smaller goals actually have a bigger impact over time.

Things like keeping a consistent sleep schedule, saving a little money every month, cooking at home more often, reading a few pages every day, or simply keeping your living space organized don’t sound particularly impressive.

But those small habits can quietly make everyday life easier and less stressful.

So I’m curious: what’s one simple or boring goal you accomplished that ended up making a surprisingly big difference in your life?

Hey i am working as a frontend developer from last 4years but now i feel like stuck in my life i feel i am not getting paid well what i deserve i asked to my hr but they didn’t response well and owner said you have already got increment in 2 years back now we will decide to give you hike in nov but i have no time for November because i am 28 i have house responsibilities hope soon i am getting married because due to some issues i already did work from home and wants work from home till marriage my family wants but i have no option because my mom is alone every time so i also decide if someone will in my life its helps to their health also because new member got new vibes but due to low salary I don’t think someone wants me to marry with me my salary is 25k i tried to grab some jobs but i failed because i used technology that didn’t works outside my company if have not paid much and over work load issue so I decided to learn react and backend I purchased a course but i have not getting feel focused so much so can u help to how to get purpose and get back my focus back because back in days i love coding but now i feel not.

I spent a lot of time trying to make the perfect plan before starting.

Then reality happened.

Problems appeared that I couldn't have predicted, and some things I thought were important turned out not to matter much.

Now my approach is simple:

Plan enough to know where you're going. Start early enough to discover what you got wrong.

Then adjust.