Ask HN: Are ICs at tech companies usually so concerned about job performance?
Try to take solace in the fact that no one cares about your anxiety. In fact, no one cares about you at all.<p>A lot of people in tech are just massive losers, I wouldn&#x27;t want to be around the work version of their soul (usually they are much more normal outside of that context). They come from half assed bootcamps or self learning or non relevant majors, and have intense inferiority complexes. This manifests in this type of behavior. A lot also come from more &quot;legit&quot; backgrounds and have intense superiority complexes. It&#x27;s a shit show from top to bottom. Couple all this with the 10x engineer mantra and stuff, and the general male dominant&#x2F;new age yuppy lifestyles, it&#x27;s like the last type of person you&#x27;d ever want to be around.<p>I&#x27;ve been all of these things and more, and I&#x27;m disgusted with myself. Here&#x27;s my tip:<p>They say one form of meditation is to be cognizant of meandering thoughts. Watch as they show up in your head, acknowledge it, and let it pass by you. Don&#x27;t react. Do this at work. When you see the system you hate, and the cosigners of the system (your coworkers) dancing to the tune, just go &quot;heh, oh, you are doing <i>that</i> thing&quot;, and let it pass without reacting.<p>And a follow up to that tip addressing the solution you proposed of finding a smaller company:<p>It&#x27;s the same shit at smaller companies. It can be even worse. You&#x27;ll just run into another egomaniac that thinks they are king shit of that small company, or will find you threatening, or whatever. Again, it happens from top to bottom, so you will see the inferiority&#x2F;superiority complexes in the devs down to the fucking office secretary.<p>You won&#x27;t be able to run from any of it.<p><i>“Where would I find enough leather To cover the entire surface of the earth? But with leather soles beneath my feet, It’s as if the whole world has been covered.”</i> ― Shantideva<p>Cover your feet with foam, there isn&#x27;t a company that has nice soft carpet. But, be honest with yourself. If you embark on this new attitude, you must first acknowledge all the ways you were a shithead yourself that did much of the same things.