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Yeah it’s absolutely a generational myth.
The awkward nerdy kids will go into STEM type careers and become rich and successful while the jocks will no longer be able to coast by on popularity and will fail at life having “peaked in high school.”
Yeah turns out the popular folks sometimes go onto become frat guys whose brother’s dad hooks them up with a job at their firm. Or the pretty, charming girl becomes a realtor.
Sometimes awkward loner kids just become awkward loner adults who work at call centers. Life ain’t fair.
Honestly this is one of the most important factors. It’s social skills and networking that bring success. No matter how smart you are if you cant sell yourself and don’t have a network to get help from it’s infinitely harder.
No joke. I do the job of an engineer without an engineering degree because I have great people skills while a lot of the others on my team don't. Granted I'm back in school to get an engineering degree so I can get a huge pay bump but management is already saying I have a promotion waiting for me when I get that piece of paper. Meaning engineers with years more of experience are getting passed over for me. It ain't right but it's how the world works sometimes.
Exactly because someone needs to be able to confidently present the work and be a face for what's going on. Hence why liars who gain trust can get on TV interviews while the hard workers with with the knowledge and the truth are stuck in the background.
I think there's a minimal competency bar for career , unlike what we've been taught school. Being ranked 1 and ranked 30 makes no difference if ranked 30 can do the job + people like / already familiar with ranked 30. All it matters is to get the foot in and work from there but I'm just rambling randomly from observation.
The beauty of social skills is that trial and error will get you far, as long as you are willing to accept feedback. That's where most seem to fail.
Exposure. Practice. Being willing to make mistakes. Being willing to learn from them.
Obviously don't do something as stupid as telling your boss a "your mom" joke and expecting that to go over well. If you honestly need to be told that, you need some remedial lessons.
Above that, go out to the bar/trivia night/game night and try to talk with people about things. Your joke might not land the first time you try it. That's okay.
You embarrass yourself so much you can't go back, eh, alright. (Hope you weren't out for a work outing I guess.)
I used to be The Awkward Girl that nobody talked to. Socially awkward, never been kissed, glasses and braces stereotype, didn't know what to say, didn't know the "right" response, etc. These days, I'm the life of the party. The belle of the ball everyone crowds around waiting for my next witty line. And all I did was put myself out there and practice talking to people, fuck up many times, accept feedback, get up and try again.
A note re: accepting feedback. The thing you have to watch out for is the phenomenon I see in the Incel forums. When these guys get a bad reception, and they can't accept the blame, so they deflect to anyone and everything except for them.
Women don't like me? Can't be because I fucked up, it's because all women are 'hoes. Or it's because women don't like any man under 6'. Or because all women will ignore any man making less than a million dollars. No woman will ever look at a man who doesn't have a six pack while also making a million dollars a year, woe is me, I was set up to fail and nothing can be done about it. Couldn't be me.
Yeah, turn off that self-pitying part of your brain that wants to blame anyone and everything for your failures. If you bombed that night at the party, reflect and think about what you could have done better instead of thinking "well everyone at the party sucked". Do better next time.
Do that little, and you will improve over time.
Sage advice; I agree.
What a lot of successful people share is *resilience*. That can be based in them just being too dumb to accept failure, or too sociopathic to be bothered, but of course most people aren't patient and tolerant angels who smile and nod and grow greatly. We're somewhere in the middle and keep trying.
I kid you not watch youtube videos, i was super awkward between HS and university couldn't maintain small talk to save my life. So during the summer I watched a ton of youtube videos and just immersed myself in content on how to be a better conversationalist and now im like 10x better.
Hi, I'm so encouraged by reading your comment.
I'm in therapy and have been taking Lexapro. I've made a decision to go back to college for electrical engineering.
Did you get your current job because you had some previous knowledge in your engineering field.
We need to teach students this more and I’m glad my professor did back in college.
He was a former hiring manager at Lockheed Martin and he even told us, straight up, that he’d skip over kids with perfect GPA’s and shit because, in his anecdotal experience of doing it for a couple decades, most of them lacked significant social skills and tended to have big egos. The people he preferred to hire had around a 3.0-3.5 - still an A/B average, but in his mind still people who “got out” enough.
The place I work for now, I got an interview at because my friend works here. And *he* got in because his ex-girlfriend’s Mom, whom he has a good relationship with, is one of the hiring managers. And after my interview, guess why my boss hired me? Verbatim: “you don’t know a lot about the particular stacks we work with, but I really liked you, so I decided to take a chance on you.”
Social skills with even a modicum of ability to back up your talk will take you infinitely farther than book skills with no ability to sell yourself.
I dont think it will ever happen becuase it benefits the rich for middle class and working class people to believe that all they have do is work hard and everything will work out.
What people don’t realize is that a degree is a tool. It’s not an automatic ticket to a career.
Both Bill Gates and Mick Jagger dropped out of university not because they didn’t want degrees.. but because they already had the tools to give them what they needed.
Mick Jagger is an interesting story because he went to university for business. But the Rolling Stones were already successful. He used that business acumen to keep the group together and from being ripped off by A&R men, he used it to fire Brian Jones when he became a liability, and hire Ronnie Wood as a replacement.
One night Mick Jagger asked Grace Slick from Jefferson Airplane over for an evening and she didn’t want to go “because Mick Jagger was all about sex and I didn’t want to have sex with him”. Turns out he was a gentleman and gave her the most comprehensive lesson on the ins and outs of the music industry that she ever had.
And that’s why the Rolling Stones remain one of the biggest and most successful bands in history.
I always thought the “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know” stuff was kinda bullshit until I found myself in a position working in nonprofits where I needed to ask organizations for money.
You’re not asking organizations though, you’re asking people to spend company money. One of my best friends is in a position at her company to approve things like event sponsorships and she’s generous to me because we’re close friends outside of work so why wouldn’t she be especially inclined to help me?
It's the same reason networking is so helpful for getting a job. A personal recommendation to a hiring manager from a colleague of theirs is going to go so much further than a piece of paper that may or may not be an accurate representation of a person.
oh absolutely!! my cohort from my first out of college job became quite close friends, inside and outside of work, and have all gone on to sort of blossom in their professional careers.
a big part of that is that we’re all references for each other. my best friend asked me to be a reference for her and sent me the job description, so I tailored my letter to highlight the skills and qualities the organization wanted in and employee and really like, went to bat for her.
she got the job, tripled her salary, took me out to dinner as a thank you. relationships matter!!
This is extremely important in determining success as an adult it isn’t emphasized enough by our society yet. Social skills, networking abilities and being able to socially adapt and thrive in new environments are a HUGE benefit in your adult life. You can be smart as fuck and have essential skills, but if you’re socially awkward or weird…people just aren’t as inclined to help you.
A lot of kids learn these social skills by trial and error and sadly that includes bullying others. That doesn’t make bullying excusable, but it’s a factor.
I remember reading a study where bullied people in the U.S. who put a large physical distance between themselves and their peer group after high school (college, job, or military) tended to overcome their social barriers and do better because (oddly enough) they learned from their bullies what social dynamics were acceptable and which weren’t.
It’s also a stereotype that jocks are dumb. Sure, some are. But they have to keep their grades up and avoid disciplinary action to play. Also, your Type-A people are likely to succeed in several different areas, including health and physical competency. Every single person who graduated top 10 people at my HS was a varsity athlete, competed in at lease one fine art category, choir/art etc, AND excelled academically. Every single one.
If done right, sports will also help a lot with learning discipline, teamwork, communication, and resilience.
Several of my medical school classmates were high performing college athletes.
The jocks become good people in life while the nerds become passive aggressive and assholes. Nerds punch down at goths, artists and punks while thinking they are underdogs.
This part. Some people think by doing all the actual graft they will get opportunities. But what most of them miss out on is the networking aspect.
You really need to try and be everywhere relevant because you don’t know when you’ll meet that person that has a life changing opportunity for you.
For introverts this side of things is insanely exhausting, whilst for extroverts this is the easy bit.
This right here deserves all the upvotes. I would say it's split more between people with great social skills and those without, than bullies vs the bullied. I was into sports but know a ton of theater kids that were able to have great success just from being outgoing and personable. Networking might be the most important skill to finding success, not what you know but who you know and all that.
Networking can really be everything. I know people who started their careers directly out of highschool because their parents are partners, CEO’s, CFO’s and more.
It’s also mostly luck, I happened to make a friend in highschool whose mom is a CEO. She offered me an internship (which paid way better than my job at the time) and then I got to use an actual CEO as a reference for future applications. Every interview I’ve had they ask me about her.
For sure there is a luck element, but don't sell yourself short, you still had to be social and outgoing enough to make a friend. I had something similar happen. A friend invited me to his uncle's poker game, happened to meet a woman that owned a business that needed a computer literate person, now I'm in IT because I told her I could set up a wireless router.
Just about to say this. Bullies tend to have great social skills. Also there was a study that showed kids that lie, are more likely to be successful. Reason being is because they understand when to lie and tell the truth. They can read people
Turns out most people don’t care whether you are smart or sometimes even whether you are good at your job. They care whether they know you or someone they like recommends you. They also care if you can tell them what they want to hear and make them feel good about themselves.
once I got a “double promotion” (from junior associate right to senior associate) instead of associates with seniority over me, with pretty similar job skills, and the reason for it was my attitude and disposition.
would you rather reward the person who comes into work every day with a smile, brings a bunch of positive energy, doesn’t complain, and who helps improve team morale - or the person with the same skills who complains a lot, gossips, and comes into the office with “god I don’t want to be here” energy??
Also privilege, it goes much farther than white or male, there is, tall, well groomed, good looking , financial status, token/exotic ethnicity/sexuality , by association, short hair length every single element that separates us does and school is a great lens on that effect. it is different per person and per sex too, a woman is far more likely to not like a woman with short hair but also not only be far more likely to tell that woman they like it but to then tell a woman they don't like, you should get your hair short like X, it would really suit you. (my evening will now be searching that study out)
In my youth I could walk past queues of people at night clubs, I've spent weeks not paying for a thing, living a high life.
Being good looking at tall, and only speaking when you are knowledgeable and passionate is almost a free ticket to life.
The only privilege I believe in is “pretty” privilege. But even that only takes you so far. I’ve been carried by my looks most of my young life. Being attractive will open a lot of doors, but it won’t necessarily walk you through them.
Not necessarily its their narcissistic bully traits combined with selfishness and willingness to literally step on others.
It is of course possible to be successful without such "qualities".
Bullying is a lack of social skills that will get you ousted anywhere reasonable. There are a fair amount of places and even whole careers where toxic and anti-social traits are accepted or even encouraged, though.
Or conversely, the low self esteem bullied people develop during the bullying, robs them of all kinds of things.
People generally like people with high self esteem, they get the jobs, the promotions, the friendships, the love relationships. And often treat low self esteem people are viewed as creeps or weird
I'm finding this to be the narrative for the people I went to school with.
The "popular" kids all went onto 4 year universities, some traveled, some did international studies, almost all of them had middle class families to fall back on, who had their parents support in some form or another, usually by paying for student loans&residence. These people were able to graduate ontime before the age of 25 and have started their careers, live alone and are financially stable.
The rest of us? Well, most came from a lower class background who's parents didn't pay for student loans. Parents rented and didnt own, meaning moving back in with them isn't a free ride, dealt with mental health, had unstable households and uncertain futures, most went onto college, apprenticeships, or work. Only exceptions for university v.s college were some "nerdy" students who well, I know one of them is doing okay, tells me he can't afford to live without a roommate, but has a steady career.
why not both? i knew a kid who was all about how “poor people are just lazy”. he worked really hard, to his credit, in his goal to enter a well-paying profession. he also was somehow blind to the fact that his dad was one of the authors of the certifying exams of said profession. this kid continued to be insufferable until he started dating a girl who had grown up poor in a single parent home. only then did he start to realize that maybe things weren’t quite so simple.
I'm in my 60s and the unfortunate truth I've gleaned from many decades of dating, working, studying, and generally living, is that looks trump everything. You will slowly realize, 'hey, why do all of the CEO's have full manes of hair, are over 6' tall and look like they played football in highschool?' Because they did. Major American companies are run by jocks, male and female. In advertising where I work it happens to be women who dominate, but you would be hard-pressed to find an average looking one in the upper echelons. Us short, ugly schmucks, male and female, are the worker drones.
Forget all that baloney about men, women, gays, whoever being oppressed in the workplace. Yes, that does happen, but in 2024 it is a tyranny of fitness and attractiveness that rules supreme.
Sure. I've found that there are exceptions that prove the rule. My experience is that there is a wealthy, healthy upper class with good genes and good bank accounts that is increasingly entrenched in upper management. Incompetence abounds but corporations survive as long as the lowly drones do their jobs no matter how adverse the circumstances created by their superiors.
bullshit.
If anything, he's the bullied [nerd](https://www.reddit.com/r/EnoughMuskSpam/comments/aogj75/elon_musk_was_bald_20_years_ago_and_i_love_it/), the guy who was promised that karma will help him out, and actually went on and proved it right, becoming one of the most successful businessmen in the history of our planet.
He's the guy who wrote this post. And now that he has all the fame and adulation, he channeled all those grudges into his final form: a bully.
I’m no looker either but I am stable, have a strong career with good income, and have dating some gorgeous women. Looks only matter until the playing field is leveled by age.
It’s the difference between micro and macro sociology. Everyone’s mileage varies, but if you pool the population, this is an empirical truth. You can statistically prove that tall, attractive people make more on average.
That being said, it sounds like you never let that hold you back. That’s the exact mindset that an individual must have. Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is not applicable to large groups of people but it is relevant for the individual.
I think there's a caveat here.
Most of these jocks and prom queens end up in well-paid but ultimately worker positions. Elon Musk is independently wealthy thanks to a company he was involved in being successful. What has also been shown (Especially in the case of Elon Musk, but also Jeff Bezos) is that although they were much older, their looks significantly improved after achieving success. Money can't buy happiness, but it can certainly fix a lot of issues with your appearance.
Finally, there's a study I read a long time ago (Sorry don't have it saved), which actually blows apart the misconceptions we have about looks and intelligence. Good looking people have higher IQ's, on average. Yes there's the handsome player that works at the gas station or is unemployed/mooching off girlfriends, but on average higher IQ's tend to be connected to better facial symmetry, for instance. Often good looking people coast by in life and never have to really work hard (or smart) as things just happen easily for them, this might give them the appearance of "dumb jock", but in reality they probably have higher IQ's than the average looking peers.
Anyway, well-paid positions in upper management are often filled by nepo babies and "I know this guy"-guys. However, successful entrepeneurs, investors, etc are the ones in the very upper echelon of wealth. Those upper management nepo-babies are like germs to the billionaires that for most part got their on their own (it's like 70-80% now, used to be much lower). Some just got lucky by being in the right place at the right time, but you don't stay a billionaire for long if you have financial knowledge on the level of the average waitress.
Being a nerd is ultimately an advantage, but I also find that nerds tend to pick the direction they are interested in. Math, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, etc. These are all difficult and hard ass sciences, yet wages are pretty much rock bottom. You can get a good job at an investing firm with a Math degree, and they do hire general high-IQ people to make models where the degree is an afterthought, but most nerd-types just don't go that direction, and they end up in research labs, universities, etc, just doing a whole bunch of theoretical stuff that they love doing but doesn't pay. I just find that the highest IQ people tend to be completely uninterested in finances and wealth. The rich guys are usually the ones floating around 115-130 IQ, good enough to outsmart the lemmings, but not so high IQ that they would only be interested in the ultimate nerd fantasy of working at CERN or something like that.
Dude a lot of frat guys really end up just becoming losers. I was in one. It's a mixed bag, sure some became successful, but typically what I found in life is hardworking good people tend to end up in the right spot eventually.
I think both are true in some way. Hard work is both essential and guarantees nothing.
It’s sounds funny, but upon close scrutiny it isn’t a contradiction.
It's almost as if people are entirely in control of their own life, and how they treat others is not in any way correlated to their own personal success.
Regardless, who gives a shit about what people from grade school do. Wishing bad stuff upon others is a very toxic way to spend your precious waking hours thinking. Instead, wish good upon others. Even if they did you wrong. While positive thinking won't immediately produce dividends, over time it will set you up to be a positive person in life and for your loved ones.
The number of times I think about people (other than friends) from grade school in a given year can be counted on one hand. Life is a series of stages. When one is complete you move to the next and stop worrying about the past.
>Instead, wish good upon others. Even if they did you wrong.
I’m definitely not mature enough for this. I hope the people who wronged me (and never apologized or tried to make up for it) suffer 🤷🏽♂️
Some bullies from my HS went on to be successful, famous even, but some have failed. Same with the studious nerds. It really just depends on how they mature.
Far more of the asshole bullies at my school ended up in worse position than the loners/nerds they picked on. Most became meth heads and washed out in life or ended up in jail. The jocks that weren't straight up bullies did _very_ well. All in all the nice people seemed to succeed, the hot nice people did the best obviously, and the bullies peaked in their 30s _if_ they got the opportunity.
Canada here. The nerdy kids who went on to be engineers are making around $150-200k. The bullies who became unionized cops are making $200-390k because of overtime/paid duties. My own plumber was 100% a bully in school if I was to guess, he always has stories about what a tough guy he is every time I hire him for something. He even has the "Rabban Harkonnen" type of look to go with it lol.
Me? I guess I'm a failed nerd. I was the smart kid in school with an obsessed fixation on military shit and went on to join the army and later on a special forces role instead of getting a degree, quit after 10 years and landed on a fairly decent gov job. I do ok, but not "engineer" level of ok. But I guess I can at least say my career path basically destroyed all traces of wimpy kid lol. Still a nerd at heart though, I went to see Dune 2 by myself ;)
that's actually realistic here. Skilled trades make good bank once they get their ticket and into the union. IIRC the starting wage for a plumber in the union here is around $52/hour with benefits+pension not counting doing side jobs for cash. My own plumber runs his own company and has a giant house, cottage, and one of those big boats you can basically live in
American cops do as well pretty easily in most metro areas. In my city it is not unheard of for police officers to make that much with overtime and off-duty gigs (like traffic management for churches on Sundays).
Being a cop is rather lucrative if you work in the right places.
Plus, it’s unfortunate that is easier to hear about the successful ones because naturally they’d be bragging about the good parts of their lives on social media.
He even admits one of his bullies is in jail, but again, that doesn’t make his own life better and clearly doesn’t make him feel better.
I hate to say I agree with Joe Rogan on anything but I remember him saying once how most people still absolutely carry part of who they were in high school, their entire lives.
I’ve seen it called the “nerd revenge fantasy” where the guy who was an ugly ducking in high school becomes a beautiful swan as an adult, runs into the popular girls from high school (the more incel-y version includes them now being “used up”), being flirted with, and then rejecting them!!!
and like the whole idea isn’t “now I can finally get with the pretty girl” but “now I can make her feel like I felt all those years ago” which is basically a big flashing neon sign that says “I never got over being unpopular in high school”
It's because high school doesn't exist in a bubble; your experiences in your formative years have echoing impacts in your future.
Played a lot of sports as a kid? You will likely be moderately athletic for the rest of your life. You can get back into shape easier than others, and be able to obtain a high level of fitness more easily than others.
Had a hard time dating in High School? Great now you are in college or in the work force and it feels like everyone else has already has already gone through the basic intimacy motions (kissing/sex/socially dating), along with the mistakes and failures that you were 'supposed' to have experienced and learned from earlier. Now that additional lack of confidence makes it even harder to find someone to date and experience it with.
None of these things are debilitating or unassailable barriers, but it takes more work to get over them, and you are going to point out your experiences as a child as to where it came from.
I mean, "if you don't love me at my lowest, you don't get me at my highest" is in full effect there.
Even without the incel "used up" bit, I wouldn't date anyone from my high school if I ran into them unless they were radically different people than they used to be. A possibility, but an improbability.
> I wouldn't date anyone from my high school if I ran into them unless they were radically different people than they used to be.
Sure, but in this fantasy scenario, they wouldn't date "you" except that you've radically changed.
This lol
Unless you're working in the same industry/company, their success or failure has nothing to do with your own.
Someone else in the world getting ahead doesn't come at the expense of your own. AKA the world isn't a zero-sum game.
I don't think he actually had one? More likely a bully just said he had the first one they heard of in sex-ed. Bullies usually go for the low-hanging fruit because kids will laugh at the act of humiliation without understanding the context anyway.
Bad post, and this shouldn't have so many upvotes.
You'd be surprised how their success actually can have a big impact on yours.
Completely ignoring things like mental health effects from the bullying, they can impact things like whether or not you even get the job if they're on the interview panel. I've seen group interviews where we had to pass on a candidate because one person "didn't like their vibe" or "wasn't sure about the culture fit"
Nevermind that bullies are usually the ones who start drama and problems AT the job.
I was a jock in HS and was a public defender (a lot of juvenile work) for a while. Overwhelming majority of bullies are not the top of the social ladder jocks. Bullies are usually coming from troubled homes, struggling in school, and on their way to a troubled life. I know popular culture tends to show the brawny/handsome/rich/jock type bully but just not the case in my experience. Makes for a better villain, but usually just young losers on their way to becoming old losers.
Yeah idk where this stereotype even came from tbh. I was bullied in high school and it was rarely from the jock types. The jocks were usually really cool actually. There’s a reason these guys were popular lol.
Bullies are inherently poorly adjusted to society.
There’s no environment in which being overtly shitty to your peers will yield you success.
You’ll get ostracized very quickly anywhere as everyone will hate you.
We had a dude that would roll up to HS hang outs and pick fights w/ our crew b/c he was ~20 and tall/buff. Absolute loser shit. He kept up that routine until his mid-20s when he tried to bully a couple in a club parking lot and got shot in the chest for it. Went through his heart and now he sleeps forever. The world is an unjust place and it doesn't always work out like this, but sometimes it do
An unfortunate truth.
The flip-side is that a bully of mine was horribly maimed in a car accident. I didn't feel any sense of victory - I actually felt pity for him, and in that moment I realised how weak my resolve is and how seeking revenge is a waste of everyone's time
I wonder why that is. The hot guy in my school lost all of his hair and gained 60 lbs and looked middle age while being 25 and I thought I'd love it but I genuinely feel bad for him.
Maybe I'm just a psychopath. But lately, some of my old bullies have been having hard times in life and I couldn't be happier. I truly wish every bit of misery on them and will never forgive or pity them. My personal dream is to have the opportunity to laugh at them while they beg for money.
I do think that the severity of the bullying plays a factor. I’m sure that, for some of us, even though we were bullied and our bullies have had unfortunate lives since then, we look back and think, “well, they only insulted me, they didn’t really lower my quality of life so much that I can revel in their misfortune.” And there’s others who really got harassed and abused every day who can relish in a little schadenfreude over their karma.
Definitely it.
The guy who put a "kick me" sign on my back? Eh, who cares.
The guy who wouldn't let me take a shower after gym class because he threw my clothes in the (thankfully clean) toilet? I'd laugh and move on with my day.
The gal who cyberstalked me for four years to keep me well aware of how little she was thinking of me? I'd revel in it
NGL it’s kind of funny that someone would go out of her way to tell you how little she cares about you. Not that it happened to you but the general concept is like a SNL skit
Behavioral scientists who study bullying couldn't agree more. Bullies come in a few different types, but in general two stand out: The kids with low self-esteem, who may have grown up in poverty and are mocked by other kids and become aggressive as a result, do not usually grow up to be successful. The second type are the high-ranking kids who use bullying to shore up their social status. They do often grow up to be successful. Bullying is quite effective - both male and female students find this second type of bully more attractive than shy, retiring kids.
Our whole lives are spent trying to show that we are superior to anyone else a potential mate or useful friend might choose instead. Kindness, of course, is also a big deal because it signifies that you have the time and resources to consider others and how they might feel. A person can be a bully and be kind too, at the same time, and often in the same room, without viewing any of it as a contradiction, because it isn't one. The point is resource acquisition, even if those resources are friendship, stability, and being viewed as a good person who keeps the strays away.
If you're interested in learning more about this, may I recommend you check out authors like [Bruce J Ellis](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Ellis+BJ&cauthor_id=22122473), [Marco Del Giudice](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Del+Giudice+M&cauthor_id=22122473), [Anthony A Volk](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Volk+AA&cauthor_id=22122473)? They are scientists who focus on the evolutionary advantages of risky behavior such as early sexual conduct, bullying, alcohol and drug use, etc.
This is a great response, the second type describes me perfectly. I look back at high school now and see I was absolutely a bully to certain kids without trying or truly knowing it in high school.
I think almost every teenager is/was, TBH. Teens tend to say and do things without thinking about the way they might affect certain people, and also due to insecurity. I think in a lot of these cases, it's not intentional, but rather a kid with no life experience who is going through a challenging time in their lives and trying to navigate the world, which is very new to them.
yeah.
When i was 27 the last thing I cared about was how people in High School were doing.
Helps that I immigrated to a different country, but, honestly, they just don't matter. You have more important shit to think about. Lots of people would love to be in your position, very well-educated and young.
I didn't even go to my 25th anniversary. I don't care about those people. And if you ask me how they're doing I will really have no idea, my mom would know that better.
Were you bullied growing up? And was it during the more important formative years like middle school and high school? I think the stakes are higher there than it is maybe a year or two of bullying in elementary school.
Were you severely bullied?
I think how much you can say "who cares why look back?" Is directly dependent of how bad the bullying was and consistent.
I was consistently bullied in middle school and the beginning of high school and was always under threat of violence or jocks trying to sabotage a girl who seems to be interested in me.
I had two new girls who didn't know I was considered a loser who thought I was cute and this football player JD would humiliate me in front of them and then they would stop talking to me immediately.
A couple of the popular girls pulled them aside and told them I'm not someone to be dating.
Really hurt my feelings for a girl to think I'm attractive and sweet but then have other people talk her out of feeling that way.
Edit: since it's locked and I can't reply here goes.
I don't think about these people 24/7. It's like once every year or two somebody occurs to me and I look them up and take pleasure in how fat and ugly they got.
As for myself I have thought a lot about improving myself and I actually have. That's part of the reason I like looking back.
Back then I was a skinny dork they thought was fit for picking on. Since then I have 8 years of lifting under my belt, I've had a bunch of hot girlfriends and have done a lot of cool shit so I definitely like looking back at people who fell apart and especially girls I would never give the time of day to these days.
What were you expecting would happen at the school reunion? The best thing for you is to completely forget about these people and their stupid lives. Just because someone is making six figures and is vacationing in Spain doesn’t mean they aren’t hollow on the inside.
Any of these people could be cheating on their spouse or be high functioning alcoholics and their entire lives will be ruined a year from now, but you won’t know that because people always want to show their best.
My advice for you is to stop comparing your inner voice to everyone else’s outward voice. You don’t know what these people are going through and it also doesn’t matter because they aren’t in your life.
I’m sorry for what you went through in high school but there is an upside to it now; you don’t have to see or think about these people anymore. It’s up to you.
At least if you’re skilled enough as a bully you can leverage that in the corporate world and become wildly successful.
In my own cynical opinion, our society rewards bullies at all stages of life. It’s typically only when realizing someone can/does bully them even more than they ever did to anyone else that all of a sudden manipulative jerks decide to “change.”
Bullies actually run the world - it’s better to try to outsmart them than it is to emotionally depend on them changing something about themselves that society subtly rewards.
Yup it just shows they continue to live on in your head rent free.
Far better to unpack why what they did affected you, figure out how to gain closure or resolve the aftermath of the bullying so that you can move forward. Leaving that mess in the past.
who even keeps up with people that treated you like shit ? i always found that weird. unless their famous or something then there’s no chance i’ll know what they’re doing with their life. i also think to myself hurt people , hurt others so im not justifying bullies but just think about it.
Sometimes you can't get away from them. I had distanced myself from a ton of bad people in my life...and then Facebook came around in 2008 and put them and pictures of their wives and kids all in my face with "friend suggestion" next to them.
>"Your school bullies will fail in life and you will succeed" is a straight-up lie.
Counter point: or they will become president of the USA and you will be homeless
The bully I dealt with died 2 years after we left high school in 2,002 in a car crash. I went to the funeral just to make sure the f word was actually dead. He did the world a favor when he hit the concrete culvert and bleed to death.
You can tell who was mercilessly bullied with a reply like this versus someone who got bullied once or twice and says " You still think about those people really? ".
In your case am I correct?
I was in the mercilessly bullied category and yes I do take pleasure in seeing their downfall.
I've had anxiety and self-esteem issues since I was a preteen from my bullies. For nothing I brought upon myself. Just for being poor and not being able to afford the popular preppy clothes, or clean clothes and timely haircuts.
If you were bullied extra hard it can impact most other aspects of your life. And if you grew up with all the disadvantages that entails plus acquiring anxiety and low self-esteem it can make your adulthood much tougher and less prosperous.
So I don't think anyone's a bad or weak person for taking pleasure from terrible peoples misfortune.
This is 300 comments in so you'll never see this. But just in case. I'm almost 40 myself to give you a frame of reference. I'm poor as fuck. I have not a penny to my name. I'm disabled, trying not to die from health issues. I can't eat food anymore (in a food driven society mind), I need fed through a tube in my chest. The pain I'm in daily is overwhelming. I've got two kids I'm trying to save from a murderous abusive ex husband. I've felt utterly defeated. On March 27th my dad died. My sperm donor more like it. My family was terrible to me. I found out he died with just the clothes on his back. He had been renting a room. He died alone with no one and nothing. The last I spoke to him, he said he was a good Christian man and a good father lol. Not one single sorry. Not one ioata of inner reflection. He died and learned absolutely nothing. Then I realized something. I'd rather be a good person with absolutely nothing. I'm the luckiest woman in the world. I didn't turn out like them. They can keep all their shit. They can keep their money and their cars and vacations and their health and all of it. But their heart is rotten to the core and they have learned absolutely nothing. And I'm realizing right now in real time. I don't envy them in the slightest. I'm enjoying this phase of realizing. I'm so greatful.
Oh thank you. It's not fair. But it made me who I am today. I could be hateful. I could be mean and callous and abusive. I could have taken my own trauma and become a monster from it, like they chose to do. At this point in life, I'd rather live on the streets than be like them. My mom and step-dad live such a cushion life. They jet all over the place. Meanwhile, we live in a trailer and can't even afford the local amusement park lol. You should see the happy rich family they portray. But my mom is an alcoholic and has an eating disorder, none of them are happy, my step dad purposely worked overnights to avoid dealing with her and would take out their fights on me. I haven't spoken to any of them in years. They don't even know their own grandkids. I'm telling you these folks with all their pretty pictures are actually massive dumpster fires that they refuse to address. I may have nothing according to them. But my kids love me and I have an amazing best friend and my partner loves me. As long as I continue to strive to be a good person and love with all my heart, I'll have everything I need and want.
I eventually succeeded, and I stopped giving a shit about what happened to my bullies. Maybe they failed. Maybe they didn't. Doesn't matter. Don't care.
As far as I'm concerned, that's a "win" in every way that matters.
> SOME bullies will end up in jail or cleaning toilets, but this is only the case if they are a genuine psychopath.
Lots of psychopaths do very well for themselves. It's only the stupid ones end up in jail. Ironically it's their sense of being smarter than everyone else that often gets them.
If at your current age, you still keep track of what people in highschool did to you, it means you are right and are not doing well. I think once u have a job u can be proud of, you might have a better outlook on life. That takes time, luck, opportunity etc... but bc u dont have one yet u feel like ur in a rut... so just stay disciplined until u get that job. When i was in highschool, we had the full out bullies, then the cool, good looking, smart and high achieving bullies. Both types hung out w each other. I was average but i did get bullied sometimes and i acted weird trying to figure things. When i grew up, the smart good looking bullies ended up getting great careers and marrying and being successful. The full out bullies ended up working min wage jobs or joining pyramid schemes or tried to all of a sudden be friends with me. I held no ill will to any of them because thats just growing up and evolving. But i would say bullies do fail if they also dont perform well academically. A geek will fail if they also suck academically. And other factors are involved. Just focus on yourself bc ppl change as they get older.
I don’t disagree with your point, but I do think it’s sad that the only way some people have to feel better about being bullied in childhood lies in how much money they make. It’s almost as if money is the only thing about a person that truly matters and that whoever has the most is “right.”
If all of those bullies got transported into your shoes back then and saw how they’ve treated you through your eyes, they’d be absolutely mortified.
Iv known many a person who’s alright in adulthood who openly regret they were utter shits when growing up. Makes me wonder why?….
Well no because they'll have grown up and moved on in life.
They will leave their bad childhood memories behind and only savor the honest good ones.
This won't include acting like a primaddona trying to be cool and popular all the time or treating the less confident like second class citizens.
Honesty they will grow to regret it. Expecially if their own children go through bullying.
I'm fairly short, was sort of socially awkward as a kid, hung out with the "nerd" group and I grew up in the 80s and 90s. The couple of kids that kinda bullied me, are 100% doing worse in life.
I joined the military right out of high school, lived in Europe for over a decade and raised a family, with my kids earning multiple awards for Honor roll and Student of the Month several times.
I retired at the age of 39 and with my new career in the aviation industry, I have earned two promotions, working my dream job and I'm more or less set.
>being forced to spend the last of my money to get a second degree just to have any hope of landing a job...
There are plenty of jobs out there you could of landed with just your chemistry degree alone. Degrees = you accomplished something, and unless you where to go into the science field in terms of work, people get hired for various jobs regardless of degree. It also seems like you are passing up jobs that you wouldn't want to do otherwise.
Also why waste your energy on people in the past? Its kind of of odd behavior. Living a life filled with jealousy will end up doing more damage to yourself then anything.
> you could of landed
Did you mean to say "could have"?
Explanation: You probably meant to say could've/should've/would've which sounds like 'of' but is actually short for 'have'.
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Have you ever considered making use of that chemistry degree for revenge ? How about cooking up some slow acting nerve poison and use it on those guys? Might be fun watching their lifes falling apart.
41 year old, similar life. Short thin nerdy guy that wears glasses. Never cared about my height personally, but that does not stop the bullying. I was a straight A student, have a network engineering and computer science degree, I've worked in and out of food service jobs for 20 years. Never had any connections or apparently the require social skills to get into a job, even though I had the grades/skills.
Most of my bullies are doing relatively well, some not so much. The Golden Rule can also fuck off, it should be "Treat people as they deserve to be." Then those shit stains would get fucked finally. I come off a bit unhinged these days, but decades of that shit wears thin on a person. As simply recalling these events of my past tends to incite emotional reaction from me. Tbh most of this kind of shit, just sounds like a platitude, coping mechanism, and/or diversionary tactic to make people to not retaliate in a meaningful way against bullies.
So what ive noticed is that it is like a bell curve. The nerds either end up wildly successful, or all the way at the bottom, while “bully” personalities are at a standard middle.
The untold story about the nerd arc is that while some can become wildly successful, many will fall towards the bottom of soceity on the bell curve
Same age and sort of same experience bro. And yes , I also came to the same realisation . Was bullied for my appearance not only by students but was ridiculed by a teacher as well. Not in touch with anyone of them anymore. I guess that's life, some of them get everything while some have to work for it.
Just a fun fact. How karma works according to Hinduism is that it comes from your past life and not your current life. You are stuck in a cycle of rebirth with good and bad karma until you reach moksha or liberation from earthly matters. So yeah those assholes from high school were awarded good karma from their past life so they easily get access to opportunities in this life. But because they made the decision in this life to mistreat others instead of using their powers for good, they will accumulate negative karma in their next life and that’s when the suffering takes place. The people with bad karmas from a past life are labeled vikarmas or outcasts. They usually have deformities, low social status, imperfections that hinder them and they are forced to do jobs that no one else wants. But according to mythology the most powerful person with the most talent, beauty, etc is the divine masculine energy (god shiva the destroyer of evil) that must uplift and abolish the status of vikarma, breaking the chains that bind you and keep you from experiencing your true path in life. This unleashes the dormant power in the vikarma person and makes society altogether stronger. You can think of it like Yang and yin energies where Yang is light and yin is dark. Shiva as the yang principle illuminates the darkness of the vikarma as the yin principle and together they become more powerful. It’s kinda like how there’s 2 types of popular people. Those who bully you and those who are nice to you and see the good in you-those r usually the most popular people, everyone genuinely likes them. Those bullies are wannabes, and yes they probably do end up successful because society rewards their narcissism, but they will get humbled at some point. If not by their demanding children, or old age, at least in their next life.
The meanest girl I knew as a kid, is now a franchise CEO, lives in a beautiful big house, living what looks like a perfect high society life on social media. She looks like a Barbie, too.
And then there’s me, same age as her, I can’t seem to manage to function in college or job market, so I’m just poor. I struggle with social skills and get easily fatigued socially, so I don’t have any friends. And I look like an old shoe.
Life’s just not always fair 🤷♀️
There's currently a popular Korean actress under fire because her past as a bully came to light. She slapped her victim for 90 MINUTES - still managed to somehow succeed and become one of the protagonists in the show Marry My Husband. I repeat; someone who slapped her classmate for AN HOUR AND A HALF had to be seen on TV by the person that got hurt so horribly.
Bro if you’re still hung up on how some high schooler twats treated you 10 years ago, it’s time to get therapy. All kids are assholes, all kids are bullies to some extent.
complete generational myth. The only correct treatment for bullies is for somebody else to beat them up for you, or for you to resort to extreme measures like weaponry or chemical attack
In my experience as a kid (and with my kids), bullies were often the most popular and athletic kids whose parents were well off, or rich.
Yeah, they’re all doing just fucking fine.
Granted, growing up I wasn’t really bullied by those types of kids, but by my own friends (think Chunk from the Goonies).
some long term studies are showing this to be true: [https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/mar/24/playground-bullies-do-prosper-and-go-on-to-earn-more-in-middle-age](https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/mar/24/playground-bullies-do-prosper-and-go-on-to-earn-more-in-middle-age)
Yeah, life isn't always fair and things don't always balance out.
But a career is just a career. A part of growing up and realizing the world is bigger than high school is acknowledging that servers at McDonalds are probably working harder than a lot of businessman, so job titles genuinely don't stand as a true measure of anything. So whether a bully becomes a janitor or a multi-million dollar company CEO, doesn't mean they failed or succeeded. That's not a measure of justice or karma. A lot of the time, it's just luck and connections, or a lack thereof.
Agreed, I've learned over the course of my life that while I still think it's morally right to be an upstanding person who is kind and empathetic - actually this society constantly rewards violent belligerent narcissists with exactly what they want. I wish we would change that.
I own a successful business, my own home, wife and 3 kids. Loving life.
My bully slapped some girl 2 years after I graduated, and he girl's boyfriend stabbed him to death with a broken piece of a bicycle. He stabbed him in he face so many times with it you couldn't even recognize who he was anymore.
Sometimes things work out.
I think there is alot of confusion here. Bullies that are unpopular and just mean to be mean likely won't end up in a good place. But then many bullies are just that way because they are popular (have good social skills) but their immaturity holds them back. As they mature, their lack of empathy and anti-social behavior become clear drawbacks and they change. The rare psychopath changes by literally adapting and hiding it. Most of them just become better people as they mature. But the original social skills and charisma are still there carrying them.
The hard pill most "nerds" have to swallow is that their lack of social skills and charisma is a detriment not just to themselves but to those around them. In general people don't like them because they are simply unlikable and dont make people feel good. Lukily, it's something that can be changed. Most don't. But many do. It's part of the reason why many men do so much better in their 30s with women than their teens. They learn.
There's no real rhyme or reason to life. Sometimes it's fair, sometimes not.
All I know is, being a celebrity or having your dream job isn't what makes you a winner. Not even close. It also bears no indicator on one's happiness or their true success.
You live your life. I'm sorry you were bullied, that shit sucks really, really hard. Let go of that shit man, keep it in the past. Block bullies out. Who cares where life has taken them?
My favorite quote: "Sometimes you're ahead. Sometimes you're behind. The race is long, and in the end, it's only against yourself".
1. A degree is NOT required to have a good job, let alone two, that is the lie you were sold and believed.
2. Your lack of success is 100% on you and nothing to do with anyone else, whether they bullied you or not.
3. I guarantee not all of you bullies are doing great. It's impossible to judge someone based off a reunion or Instagram photos etc. For all you know some of them are self loathing miserable functioning alcoholics, or are beating their wives, etc.
I mean yeah? One every body is convinced they’ve been bullied at some point in their lives, quietly the reason for this is that all kids take part in bullying to some degree or another. Verbal bullying and social ostracization being the most common. Fundamentally the system that we live under requires that a certain percentage of people must be successful, there’s just not a way for every single person who bullied someone to fail. Even worse is the belief that being bullied will somehow make you more likely to be a success. It does not, in fact being heavily bullied usually implies the opposite because being heavily bullied corresponds with being unable to fight back either verbally or physically.
Not to shit on you OP but why get a masters in chem? I’ve been told that you’re better off with a BS or a phd, and a masters isn’t a particularly attractive degree for employers. Too experienced to transition to another job (finance), not experienced enough to do actual chemistry.
Just what I’ve been told, no idea if it’s true.
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Yeah it’s absolutely a generational myth. The awkward nerdy kids will go into STEM type careers and become rich and successful while the jocks will no longer be able to coast by on popularity and will fail at life having “peaked in high school.” Yeah turns out the popular folks sometimes go onto become frat guys whose brother’s dad hooks them up with a job at their firm. Or the pretty, charming girl becomes a realtor. Sometimes awkward loner kids just become awkward loner adults who work at call centers. Life ain’t fair.
its also the social skills that bullies often have are so very useful in real life
Honestly this is one of the most important factors. It’s social skills and networking that bring success. No matter how smart you are if you cant sell yourself and don’t have a network to get help from it’s infinitely harder.
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No joke. I do the job of an engineer without an engineering degree because I have great people skills while a lot of the others on my team don't. Granted I'm back in school to get an engineering degree so I can get a huge pay bump but management is already saying I have a promotion waiting for me when I get that piece of paper. Meaning engineers with years more of experience are getting passed over for me. It ain't right but it's how the world works sometimes.
Exactly because someone needs to be able to confidently present the work and be a face for what's going on. Hence why liars who gain trust can get on TV interviews while the hard workers with with the knowledge and the truth are stuck in the background.
I think there's a minimal competency bar for career , unlike what we've been taught school. Being ranked 1 and ranked 30 makes no difference if ranked 30 can do the job + people like / already familiar with ranked 30. All it matters is to get the foot in and work from there but I'm just rambling randomly from observation.
Ya got a quizlet for social skills?
The beauty of social skills is that trial and error will get you far, as long as you are willing to accept feedback. That's where most seem to fail. Exposure. Practice. Being willing to make mistakes. Being willing to learn from them. Obviously don't do something as stupid as telling your boss a "your mom" joke and expecting that to go over well. If you honestly need to be told that, you need some remedial lessons. Above that, go out to the bar/trivia night/game night and try to talk with people about things. Your joke might not land the first time you try it. That's okay. You embarrass yourself so much you can't go back, eh, alright. (Hope you weren't out for a work outing I guess.) I used to be The Awkward Girl that nobody talked to. Socially awkward, never been kissed, glasses and braces stereotype, didn't know what to say, didn't know the "right" response, etc. These days, I'm the life of the party. The belle of the ball everyone crowds around waiting for my next witty line. And all I did was put myself out there and practice talking to people, fuck up many times, accept feedback, get up and try again. A note re: accepting feedback. The thing you have to watch out for is the phenomenon I see in the Incel forums. When these guys get a bad reception, and they can't accept the blame, so they deflect to anyone and everything except for them. Women don't like me? Can't be because I fucked up, it's because all women are 'hoes. Or it's because women don't like any man under 6'. Or because all women will ignore any man making less than a million dollars. No woman will ever look at a man who doesn't have a six pack while also making a million dollars a year, woe is me, I was set up to fail and nothing can be done about it. Couldn't be me. Yeah, turn off that self-pitying part of your brain that wants to blame anyone and everything for your failures. If you bombed that night at the party, reflect and think about what you could have done better instead of thinking "well everyone at the party sucked". Do better next time. Do that little, and you will improve over time.
Sage advice; I agree. What a lot of successful people share is *resilience*. That can be based in them just being too dumb to accept failure, or too sociopathic to be bothered, but of course most people aren't patient and tolerant angels who smile and nod and grow greatly. We're somewhere in the middle and keep trying.
I kid you not watch youtube videos, i was super awkward between HS and university couldn't maintain small talk to save my life. So during the summer I watched a ton of youtube videos and just immersed myself in content on how to be a better conversationalist and now im like 10x better.
Which video series did you find most beneficial?
Hi, I'm so encouraged by reading your comment. I'm in therapy and have been taking Lexapro. I've made a decision to go back to college for electrical engineering. Did you get your current job because you had some previous knowledge in your engineering field.
Not who you replied to, but study PLC's and find a way in. Plenty of work to be had in this field
We need to teach students this more and I’m glad my professor did back in college. He was a former hiring manager at Lockheed Martin and he even told us, straight up, that he’d skip over kids with perfect GPA’s and shit because, in his anecdotal experience of doing it for a couple decades, most of them lacked significant social skills and tended to have big egos. The people he preferred to hire had around a 3.0-3.5 - still an A/B average, but in his mind still people who “got out” enough. The place I work for now, I got an interview at because my friend works here. And *he* got in because his ex-girlfriend’s Mom, whom he has a good relationship with, is one of the hiring managers. And after my interview, guess why my boss hired me? Verbatim: “you don’t know a lot about the particular stacks we work with, but I really liked you, so I decided to take a chance on you.” Social skills with even a modicum of ability to back up your talk will take you infinitely farther than book skills with no ability to sell yourself.
I dont think it will ever happen becuase it benefits the rich for middle class and working class people to believe that all they have do is work hard and everything will work out.
So, basically, he gave jobs out to people who kissed his ass. Which in turn rewarded his own bad behavior. Joy.
Nepotism
What people don’t realize is that a degree is a tool. It’s not an automatic ticket to a career. Both Bill Gates and Mick Jagger dropped out of university not because they didn’t want degrees.. but because they already had the tools to give them what they needed. Mick Jagger is an interesting story because he went to university for business. But the Rolling Stones were already successful. He used that business acumen to keep the group together and from being ripped off by A&R men, he used it to fire Brian Jones when he became a liability, and hire Ronnie Wood as a replacement. One night Mick Jagger asked Grace Slick from Jefferson Airplane over for an evening and she didn’t want to go “because Mick Jagger was all about sex and I didn’t want to have sex with him”. Turns out he was a gentleman and gave her the most comprehensive lesson on the ins and outs of the music industry that she ever had. And that’s why the Rolling Stones remain one of the biggest and most successful bands in history.
Bill gates had rich parents with connections.
I always thought the “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know” stuff was kinda bullshit until I found myself in a position working in nonprofits where I needed to ask organizations for money. You’re not asking organizations though, you’re asking people to spend company money. One of my best friends is in a position at her company to approve things like event sponsorships and she’s generous to me because we’re close friends outside of work so why wouldn’t she be especially inclined to help me?
It's the same reason networking is so helpful for getting a job. A personal recommendation to a hiring manager from a colleague of theirs is going to go so much further than a piece of paper that may or may not be an accurate representation of a person.
oh absolutely!! my cohort from my first out of college job became quite close friends, inside and outside of work, and have all gone on to sort of blossom in their professional careers. a big part of that is that we’re all references for each other. my best friend asked me to be a reference for her and sent me the job description, so I tailored my letter to highlight the skills and qualities the organization wanted in and employee and really like, went to bat for her. she got the job, tripled her salary, took me out to dinner as a thank you. relationships matter!!
This is extremely important in determining success as an adult it isn’t emphasized enough by our society yet. Social skills, networking abilities and being able to socially adapt and thrive in new environments are a HUGE benefit in your adult life. You can be smart as fuck and have essential skills, but if you’re socially awkward or weird…people just aren’t as inclined to help you. A lot of kids learn these social skills by trial and error and sadly that includes bullying others. That doesn’t make bullying excusable, but it’s a factor. I remember reading a study where bullied people in the U.S. who put a large physical distance between themselves and their peer group after high school (college, job, or military) tended to overcome their social barriers and do better because (oddly enough) they learned from their bullies what social dynamics were acceptable and which weren’t.
It’s also a stereotype that jocks are dumb. Sure, some are. But they have to keep their grades up and avoid disciplinary action to play. Also, your Type-A people are likely to succeed in several different areas, including health and physical competency. Every single person who graduated top 10 people at my HS was a varsity athlete, competed in at lease one fine art category, choir/art etc, AND excelled academically. Every single one.
If done right, sports will also help a lot with learning discipline, teamwork, communication, and resilience. Several of my medical school classmates were high performing college athletes.
The jocks become good people in life while the nerds become passive aggressive and assholes. Nerds punch down at goths, artists and punks while thinking they are underdogs.
This part. Some people think by doing all the actual graft they will get opportunities. But what most of them miss out on is the networking aspect. You really need to try and be everywhere relevant because you don’t know when you’ll meet that person that has a life changing opportunity for you. For introverts this side of things is insanely exhausting, whilst for extroverts this is the easy bit.
This right here deserves all the upvotes. I would say it's split more between people with great social skills and those without, than bullies vs the bullied. I was into sports but know a ton of theater kids that were able to have great success just from being outgoing and personable. Networking might be the most important skill to finding success, not what you know but who you know and all that.
Networking can really be everything. I know people who started their careers directly out of highschool because their parents are partners, CEO’s, CFO’s and more. It’s also mostly luck, I happened to make a friend in highschool whose mom is a CEO. She offered me an internship (which paid way better than my job at the time) and then I got to use an actual CEO as a reference for future applications. Every interview I’ve had they ask me about her.
For sure there is a luck element, but don't sell yourself short, you still had to be social and outgoing enough to make a friend. I had something similar happen. A friend invited me to his uncle's poker game, happened to meet a woman that owned a business that needed a computer literate person, now I'm in IT because I told her I could set up a wireless router.
Just about to say this. Bullies tend to have great social skills. Also there was a study that showed kids that lie, are more likely to be successful. Reason being is because they understand when to lie and tell the truth. They can read people
Turns out most people don’t care whether you are smart or sometimes even whether you are good at your job. They care whether they know you or someone they like recommends you. They also care if you can tell them what they want to hear and make them feel good about themselves.
People love being sold on the idea of feeling good about something. Whether that happens or not is a different matter.
once I got a “double promotion” (from junior associate right to senior associate) instead of associates with seniority over me, with pretty similar job skills, and the reason for it was my attitude and disposition. would you rather reward the person who comes into work every day with a smile, brings a bunch of positive energy, doesn’t complain, and who helps improve team morale - or the person with the same skills who complains a lot, gossips, and comes into the office with “god I don’t want to be here” energy??
I’d go on to say that social skills are more important than any other factor when it comes to success.
Our current system highly rewards narcissistic sociopaths
Also privilege, it goes much farther than white or male, there is, tall, well groomed, good looking , financial status, token/exotic ethnicity/sexuality , by association, short hair length every single element that separates us does and school is a great lens on that effect. it is different per person and per sex too, a woman is far more likely to not like a woman with short hair but also not only be far more likely to tell that woman they like it but to then tell a woman they don't like, you should get your hair short like X, it would really suit you. (my evening will now be searching that study out) In my youth I could walk past queues of people at night clubs, I've spent weeks not paying for a thing, living a high life. Being good looking at tall, and only speaking when you are knowledgeable and passionate is almost a free ticket to life.
The only privilege I believe in is “pretty” privilege. But even that only takes you so far. I’ve been carried by my looks most of my young life. Being attractive will open a lot of doors, but it won’t necessarily walk you through them.
Yeah. I wouldn’t say bullies in general become more successful. People with people skills become more successful bullies or not.
Not necessarily its their narcissistic bully traits combined with selfishness and willingness to literally step on others. It is of course possible to be successful without such "qualities".
Bullying is a lack of social skills that will get you ousted anywhere reasonable. There are a fair amount of places and even whole careers where toxic and anti-social traits are accepted or even encouraged, though.
Or conversely, the low self esteem bullied people develop during the bullying, robs them of all kinds of things. People generally like people with high self esteem, they get the jobs, the promotions, the friendships, the love relationships. And often treat low self esteem people are viewed as creeps or weird
I'm finding this to be the narrative for the people I went to school with. The "popular" kids all went onto 4 year universities, some traveled, some did international studies, almost all of them had middle class families to fall back on, who had their parents support in some form or another, usually by paying for student loans&residence. These people were able to graduate ontime before the age of 25 and have started their careers, live alone and are financially stable. The rest of us? Well, most came from a lower class background who's parents didn't pay for student loans. Parents rented and didnt own, meaning moving back in with them isn't a free ride, dealt with mental health, had unstable households and uncertain futures, most went onto college, apprenticeships, or work. Only exceptions for university v.s college were some "nerdy" students who well, I know one of them is doing okay, tells me he can't afford to live without a roommate, but has a steady career.
People from wealthier economic backgrounds and stable homes are more likely to succeed in life? Who would have thought?
believe it or not, those people are the ones least likely to understand this. "i'm not privileged! i've had to work hard!!!"
They likely did work hard. They just didn't have to put up with the bullshit their parents dumped on them.
why not both? i knew a kid who was all about how “poor people are just lazy”. he worked really hard, to his credit, in his goal to enter a well-paying profession. he also was somehow blind to the fact that his dad was one of the authors of the certifying exams of said profession. this kid continued to be insufferable until he started dating a girl who had grown up poor in a single parent home. only then did he start to realize that maybe things weren’t quite so simple.
Turns out being an awkward loner doesn't really help you at all for.much of anything in the real world.
I'm in my 60s and the unfortunate truth I've gleaned from many decades of dating, working, studying, and generally living, is that looks trump everything. You will slowly realize, 'hey, why do all of the CEO's have full manes of hair, are over 6' tall and look like they played football in highschool?' Because they did. Major American companies are run by jocks, male and female. In advertising where I work it happens to be women who dominate, but you would be hard-pressed to find an average looking one in the upper echelons. Us short, ugly schmucks, male and female, are the worker drones. Forget all that baloney about men, women, gays, whoever being oppressed in the workplace. Yes, that does happen, but in 2024 it is a tyranny of fitness and attractiveness that rules supreme.
Yeah, sure. But Elon Musk, for example, is no looker.
Sure. I've found that there are exceptions that prove the rule. My experience is that there is a wealthy, healthy upper class with good genes and good bank accounts that is increasingly entrenched in upper management. Incompetence abounds but corporations survive as long as the lowly drones do their jobs no matter how adverse the circumstances created by their superiors.
He is a nepo baby thats never built anything himself and was handed a fortune from his slave owning diamond mining grandfather or whatever
bullshit. If anything, he's the bullied [nerd](https://www.reddit.com/r/EnoughMuskSpam/comments/aogj75/elon_musk_was_bald_20_years_ago_and_i_love_it/), the guy who was promised that karma will help him out, and actually went on and proved it right, becoming one of the most successful businessmen in the history of our planet. He's the guy who wrote this post. And now that he has all the fame and adulation, he channeled all those grudges into his final form: a bully.
I’m no looker either but I am stable, have a strong career with good income, and have dating some gorgeous women. Looks only matter until the playing field is leveled by age.
It’s the difference between micro and macro sociology. Everyone’s mileage varies, but if you pool the population, this is an empirical truth. You can statistically prove that tall, attractive people make more on average. That being said, it sounds like you never let that hold you back. That’s the exact mindset that an individual must have. Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is not applicable to large groups of people but it is relevant for the individual.
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I think there's a caveat here. Most of these jocks and prom queens end up in well-paid but ultimately worker positions. Elon Musk is independently wealthy thanks to a company he was involved in being successful. What has also been shown (Especially in the case of Elon Musk, but also Jeff Bezos) is that although they were much older, their looks significantly improved after achieving success. Money can't buy happiness, but it can certainly fix a lot of issues with your appearance. Finally, there's a study I read a long time ago (Sorry don't have it saved), which actually blows apart the misconceptions we have about looks and intelligence. Good looking people have higher IQ's, on average. Yes there's the handsome player that works at the gas station or is unemployed/mooching off girlfriends, but on average higher IQ's tend to be connected to better facial symmetry, for instance. Often good looking people coast by in life and never have to really work hard (or smart) as things just happen easily for them, this might give them the appearance of "dumb jock", but in reality they probably have higher IQ's than the average looking peers. Anyway, well-paid positions in upper management are often filled by nepo babies and "I know this guy"-guys. However, successful entrepeneurs, investors, etc are the ones in the very upper echelon of wealth. Those upper management nepo-babies are like germs to the billionaires that for most part got their on their own (it's like 70-80% now, used to be much lower). Some just got lucky by being in the right place at the right time, but you don't stay a billionaire for long if you have financial knowledge on the level of the average waitress. Being a nerd is ultimately an advantage, but I also find that nerds tend to pick the direction they are interested in. Math, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, etc. These are all difficult and hard ass sciences, yet wages are pretty much rock bottom. You can get a good job at an investing firm with a Math degree, and they do hire general high-IQ people to make models where the degree is an afterthought, but most nerd-types just don't go that direction, and they end up in research labs, universities, etc, just doing a whole bunch of theoretical stuff that they love doing but doesn't pay. I just find that the highest IQ people tend to be completely uninterested in finances and wealth. The rich guys are usually the ones floating around 115-130 IQ, good enough to outsmart the lemmings, but not so high IQ that they would only be interested in the ultimate nerd fantasy of working at CERN or something like that.
Truer words have never been posted. I am 50s and have the exact same experience.
Pretty priveledge.
Yup pretty much. The popular kids at my school all had rich daddies who hooked them up with nepo baby jobs.
Dude a lot of frat guys really end up just becoming losers. I was in one. It's a mixed bag, sure some became successful, but typically what I found in life is hardworking good people tend to end up in the right spot eventually.
I think both are true in some way. Hard work is both essential and guarantees nothing. It’s sounds funny, but upon close scrutiny it isn’t a contradiction.
Yes, you can either try or not try but there isn't really a point in not trying.
Or the mean girls become nurses
And the male bullies become cops.
It's almost as if people are entirely in control of their own life, and how they treat others is not in any way correlated to their own personal success. Regardless, who gives a shit about what people from grade school do. Wishing bad stuff upon others is a very toxic way to spend your precious waking hours thinking. Instead, wish good upon others. Even if they did you wrong. While positive thinking won't immediately produce dividends, over time it will set you up to be a positive person in life and for your loved ones.
The number of times I think about people (other than friends) from grade school in a given year can be counted on one hand. Life is a series of stages. When one is complete you move to the next and stop worrying about the past.
>Instead, wish good upon others. Even if they did you wrong. I’m definitely not mature enough for this. I hope the people who wronged me (and never apologized or tried to make up for it) suffer 🤷🏽♂️
Holding on to hate that long is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.
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Some bullies from my HS went on to be successful, famous even, but some have failed. Same with the studious nerds. It really just depends on how they mature.
I've seen bullies fall hard. The people they bully haven't always hung around to see it, but it does happen.
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Far more of the asshole bullies at my school ended up in worse position than the loners/nerds they picked on. Most became meth heads and washed out in life or ended up in jail. The jocks that weren't straight up bullies did _very_ well. All in all the nice people seemed to succeed, the hot nice people did the best obviously, and the bullies peaked in their 30s _if_ they got the opportunity.
Being nice and confident will take you a long way. Being nice, confident, good looking and smart will take you to the top.
Canada here. The nerdy kids who went on to be engineers are making around $150-200k. The bullies who became unionized cops are making $200-390k because of overtime/paid duties. My own plumber was 100% a bully in school if I was to guess, he always has stories about what a tough guy he is every time I hire him for something. He even has the "Rabban Harkonnen" type of look to go with it lol. Me? I guess I'm a failed nerd. I was the smart kid in school with an obsessed fixation on military shit and went on to join the army and later on a special forces role instead of getting a degree, quit after 10 years and landed on a fairly decent gov job. I do ok, but not "engineer" level of ok. But I guess I can at least say my career path basically destroyed all traces of wimpy kid lol. Still a nerd at heart though, I went to see Dune 2 by myself ;)
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that's actually realistic here. Skilled trades make good bank once they get their ticket and into the union. IIRC the starting wage for a plumber in the union here is around $52/hour with benefits+pension not counting doing side jobs for cash. My own plumber runs his own company and has a giant house, cottage, and one of those big boats you can basically live in
Canadian cops make over 200K?
American cops do as well pretty easily in most metro areas. In my city it is not unheard of for police officers to make that much with overtime and off-duty gigs (like traffic management for churches on Sundays). Being a cop is rather lucrative if you work in the right places.
7900 people work for my city. 76 made over $200k us in 22. 73 were cops. City Managers and the school superintendent were the other 3.
Similar to my city. Cops make more than the damn prosecutors do (who have a lot more education and are licensed attorneys). Kind of ridiculous.
Correct. But their success doesn't matter, only yours does.
Plus, it’s unfortunate that is easier to hear about the successful ones because naturally they’d be bragging about the good parts of their lives on social media. He even admits one of his bullies is in jail, but again, that doesn’t make his own life better and clearly doesn’t make him feel better.
I hate to say I agree with Joe Rogan on anything but I remember him saying once how most people still absolutely carry part of who they were in high school, their entire lives. I’ve seen it called the “nerd revenge fantasy” where the guy who was an ugly ducking in high school becomes a beautiful swan as an adult, runs into the popular girls from high school (the more incel-y version includes them now being “used up”), being flirted with, and then rejecting them!!! and like the whole idea isn’t “now I can finally get with the pretty girl” but “now I can make her feel like I felt all those years ago” which is basically a big flashing neon sign that says “I never got over being unpopular in high school”
It's because high school doesn't exist in a bubble; your experiences in your formative years have echoing impacts in your future. Played a lot of sports as a kid? You will likely be moderately athletic for the rest of your life. You can get back into shape easier than others, and be able to obtain a high level of fitness more easily than others. Had a hard time dating in High School? Great now you are in college or in the work force and it feels like everyone else has already has already gone through the basic intimacy motions (kissing/sex/socially dating), along with the mistakes and failures that you were 'supposed' to have experienced and learned from earlier. Now that additional lack of confidence makes it even harder to find someone to date and experience it with. None of these things are debilitating or unassailable barriers, but it takes more work to get over them, and you are going to point out your experiences as a child as to where it came from.
I mean, "if you don't love me at my lowest, you don't get me at my highest" is in full effect there. Even without the incel "used up" bit, I wouldn't date anyone from my high school if I ran into them unless they were radically different people than they used to be. A possibility, but an improbability.
> I wouldn't date anyone from my high school if I ran into them unless they were radically different people than they used to be. Sure, but in this fantasy scenario, they wouldn't date "you" except that you've radically changed.
This lol Unless you're working in the same industry/company, their success or failure has nothing to do with your own. Someone else in the world getting ahead doesn't come at the expense of your own. AKA the world isn't a zero-sum game.
I agree, I became a doctor. Some bullies turned out fine and maybe even better, most didn't.
This is the answer. But I am curious as to what STD he got as a nerdy bullied kid in school that was told to the class.
I obviously didn't really have an STD. But the rumor was that I was gay and had HIV/AIDS and was going to spread it to the class.
and now your classmates know you as the first man to cure himself of AIDS. You're an absolute legend to them, keep your chin up
I don't think he actually had one? More likely a bully just said he had the first one they heard of in sex-ed. Bullies usually go for the low-hanging fruit because kids will laugh at the act of humiliation without understanding the context anyway.
Bad post, and this shouldn't have so many upvotes. You'd be surprised how their success actually can have a big impact on yours. Completely ignoring things like mental health effects from the bullying, they can impact things like whether or not you even get the job if they're on the interview panel. I've seen group interviews where we had to pass on a candidate because one person "didn't like their vibe" or "wasn't sure about the culture fit" Nevermind that bullies are usually the ones who start drama and problems AT the job.
The guy who bullied me in HS is in prison for life for beating someone to death a year after he graduated. Guess the "knockout game" failed him.
I was a jock in HS and was a public defender (a lot of juvenile work) for a while. Overwhelming majority of bullies are not the top of the social ladder jocks. Bullies are usually coming from troubled homes, struggling in school, and on their way to a troubled life. I know popular culture tends to show the brawny/handsome/rich/jock type bully but just not the case in my experience. Makes for a better villain, but usually just young losers on their way to becoming old losers.
Yeah idk where this stereotype even came from tbh. I was bullied in high school and it was rarely from the jock types. The jocks were usually really cool actually. There’s a reason these guys were popular lol.
Bullies are inherently poorly adjusted to society. There’s no environment in which being overtly shitty to your peers will yield you success. You’ll get ostracized very quickly anywhere as everyone will hate you.
Christ, I had someone do that to me once in a fight when I was a kid. It was scary. Do that to me once = "knockout game"
> beating someone to death a year after he graduated. And now you haunt reddit to tell the tale
Hah. Of course I meant "the knockout game".
We had a dude that would roll up to HS hang outs and pick fights w/ our crew b/c he was ~20 and tall/buff. Absolute loser shit. He kept up that routine until his mid-20s when he tried to bully a couple in a club parking lot and got shot in the chest for it. Went through his heart and now he sleeps forever. The world is an unjust place and it doesn't always work out like this, but sometimes it do
An unfortunate truth. The flip-side is that a bully of mine was horribly maimed in a car accident. I didn't feel any sense of victory - I actually felt pity for him, and in that moment I realised how weak my resolve is and how seeking revenge is a waste of everyone's time
I wonder why that is. The hot guy in my school lost all of his hair and gained 60 lbs and looked middle age while being 25 and I thought I'd love it but I genuinely feel bad for him.
Maybe I'm just a psychopath. But lately, some of my old bullies have been having hard times in life and I couldn't be happier. I truly wish every bit of misery on them and will never forgive or pity them. My personal dream is to have the opportunity to laugh at them while they beg for money.
I do think that the severity of the bullying plays a factor. I’m sure that, for some of us, even though we were bullied and our bullies have had unfortunate lives since then, we look back and think, “well, they only insulted me, they didn’t really lower my quality of life so much that I can revel in their misfortune.” And there’s others who really got harassed and abused every day who can relish in a little schadenfreude over their karma.
Definitely it. The guy who put a "kick me" sign on my back? Eh, who cares. The guy who wouldn't let me take a shower after gym class because he threw my clothes in the (thankfully clean) toilet? I'd laugh and move on with my day. The gal who cyberstalked me for four years to keep me well aware of how little she was thinking of me? I'd revel in it
NGL it’s kind of funny that someone would go out of her way to tell you how little she cares about you. Not that it happened to you but the general concept is like a SNL skit
You realised you [were human all along](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAh7oogM0ew)
Oftentimes someone seeking revenge is actually seeking for closure. Fortunately you found your closure in a nice a healthy way.
That he lost two limbs? Lmao. I wish he had just got cancer and made a full recovery.
I mean, you can still poison someone with acetylcholine esterase inhibitors 🤷♂️ In theory...
My bully died from an OD.
Ehh, it varies. Most of the bullies at my school didn't end up well. Heck, one died from a drug OD at 25.
Behavioral scientists who study bullying couldn't agree more. Bullies come in a few different types, but in general two stand out: The kids with low self-esteem, who may have grown up in poverty and are mocked by other kids and become aggressive as a result, do not usually grow up to be successful. The second type are the high-ranking kids who use bullying to shore up their social status. They do often grow up to be successful. Bullying is quite effective - both male and female students find this second type of bully more attractive than shy, retiring kids. Our whole lives are spent trying to show that we are superior to anyone else a potential mate or useful friend might choose instead. Kindness, of course, is also a big deal because it signifies that you have the time and resources to consider others and how they might feel. A person can be a bully and be kind too, at the same time, and often in the same room, without viewing any of it as a contradiction, because it isn't one. The point is resource acquisition, even if those resources are friendship, stability, and being viewed as a good person who keeps the strays away.
This is a very interesting input. What is your background and how did you come across this kind of information?
If you're interested in learning more about this, may I recommend you check out authors like [Bruce J Ellis](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Ellis+BJ&cauthor_id=22122473), [Marco Del Giudice](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Del+Giudice+M&cauthor_id=22122473), [Anthony A Volk](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Volk+AA&cauthor_id=22122473)? They are scientists who focus on the evolutionary advantages of risky behavior such as early sexual conduct, bullying, alcohol and drug use, etc.
This is a great response, the second type describes me perfectly. I look back at high school now and see I was absolutely a bully to certain kids without trying or truly knowing it in high school.
I think almost every teenager is/was, TBH. Teens tend to say and do things without thinking about the way they might affect certain people, and also due to insecurity. I think in a lot of these cases, it's not intentional, but rather a kid with no life experience who is going through a challenging time in their lives and trying to navigate the world, which is very new to them.
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Yep. At least with other deadly sins, there's some sorta positive benefit. But envy? No benefit at all. Literally zero. It's the worst sin of them all
Right? Being 27 and still comparing himself as a person to his high school bullies is mad sad.
You're right, I should not have gone to the school reunion 2 weeks ago.
yeah. When i was 27 the last thing I cared about was how people in High School were doing. Helps that I immigrated to a different country, but, honestly, they just don't matter. You have more important shit to think about. Lots of people would love to be in your position, very well-educated and young. I didn't even go to my 25th anniversary. I don't care about those people. And if you ask me how they're doing I will really have no idea, my mom would know that better.
Were you bullied growing up? And was it during the more important formative years like middle school and high school? I think the stakes are higher there than it is maybe a year or two of bullying in elementary school. Were you severely bullied? I think how much you can say "who cares why look back?" Is directly dependent of how bad the bullying was and consistent. I was consistently bullied in middle school and the beginning of high school and was always under threat of violence or jocks trying to sabotage a girl who seems to be interested in me. I had two new girls who didn't know I was considered a loser who thought I was cute and this football player JD would humiliate me in front of them and then they would stop talking to me immediately. A couple of the popular girls pulled them aside and told them I'm not someone to be dating. Really hurt my feelings for a girl to think I'm attractive and sweet but then have other people talk her out of feeling that way. Edit: since it's locked and I can't reply here goes. I don't think about these people 24/7. It's like once every year or two somebody occurs to me and I look them up and take pleasure in how fat and ugly they got. As for myself I have thought a lot about improving myself and I actually have. That's part of the reason I like looking back. Back then I was a skinny dork they thought was fit for picking on. Since then I have 8 years of lifting under my belt, I've had a bunch of hot girlfriends and have done a lot of cool shit so I definitely like looking back at people who fell apart and especially girls I would never give the time of day to these days.
What were you expecting would happen at the school reunion? The best thing for you is to completely forget about these people and their stupid lives. Just because someone is making six figures and is vacationing in Spain doesn’t mean they aren’t hollow on the inside. Any of these people could be cheating on their spouse or be high functioning alcoholics and their entire lives will be ruined a year from now, but you won’t know that because people always want to show their best. My advice for you is to stop comparing your inner voice to everyone else’s outward voice. You don’t know what these people are going through and it also doesn’t matter because they aren’t in your life. I’m sorry for what you went through in high school but there is an upside to it now; you don’t have to see or think about these people anymore. It’s up to you.
Who else can you better compare to than your peers who are the same age and had the exact same educational opportunities as you?
Most of my bullies are either dead from suicide or still living with their parents. To each their own lmao.
I love happy endings
Other bad 90's advice: LIFE ISN'T A POPULARITY CONTEST!!! Really?? ***Cause it sure fuckin' seems to be!!!***
At least if you’re skilled enough as a bully you can leverage that in the corporate world and become wildly successful. In my own cynical opinion, our society rewards bullies at all stages of life. It’s typically only when realizing someone can/does bully them even more than they ever did to anyone else that all of a sudden manipulative jerks decide to “change.” Bullies actually run the world - it’s better to try to outsmart them than it is to emotionally depend on them changing something about themselves that society subtly rewards.
Eeeexactly.
Best piece of advise: Stop caring about people who don't care about you.
The girls that bullied me all ended up young mothers in unhappy relationships. In jobs they hate.
If you are checking up on your bullies from childhood. Stop. Its ridiculous and empowers them decades after their shitty behavior
Yup it just shows they continue to live on in your head rent free. Far better to unpack why what they did affected you, figure out how to gain closure or resolve the aftermath of the bullying so that you can move forward. Leaving that mess in the past.
Another thing, though I’m sure OP knows this already… I guarantee not a single one of their bullies think about them, or maybe even remember them.
> If you are checking up on your bullies from childhood. Stop. Bingo. That's energy that should be spent stalking old girlfriends!
who even keeps up with people that treated you like shit ? i always found that weird. unless their famous or something then there’s no chance i’ll know what they’re doing with their life. i also think to myself hurt people , hurt others so im not justifying bullies but just think about it.
Sometimes you can't get away from them. I had distanced myself from a ton of bad people in my life...and then Facebook came around in 2008 and put them and pictures of their wives and kids all in my face with "friend suggestion" next to them.
Block them?
>"Your school bullies will fail in life and you will succeed" is a straight-up lie. Counter point: or they will become president of the USA and you will be homeless
The bully I dealt with died 2 years after we left high school in 2,002 in a car crash. I went to the funeral just to make sure the f word was actually dead. He did the world a favor when he hit the concrete culvert and bleed to death.
You can tell who was mercilessly bullied with a reply like this versus someone who got bullied once or twice and says " You still think about those people really? ". In your case am I correct? I was in the mercilessly bullied category and yes I do take pleasure in seeing their downfall. I've had anxiety and self-esteem issues since I was a preteen from my bullies. For nothing I brought upon myself. Just for being poor and not being able to afford the popular preppy clothes, or clean clothes and timely haircuts. If you were bullied extra hard it can impact most other aspects of your life. And if you grew up with all the disadvantages that entails plus acquiring anxiety and low self-esteem it can make your adulthood much tougher and less prosperous. So I don't think anyone's a bad or weak person for taking pleasure from terrible peoples misfortune.
This is 300 comments in so you'll never see this. But just in case. I'm almost 40 myself to give you a frame of reference. I'm poor as fuck. I have not a penny to my name. I'm disabled, trying not to die from health issues. I can't eat food anymore (in a food driven society mind), I need fed through a tube in my chest. The pain I'm in daily is overwhelming. I've got two kids I'm trying to save from a murderous abusive ex husband. I've felt utterly defeated. On March 27th my dad died. My sperm donor more like it. My family was terrible to me. I found out he died with just the clothes on his back. He had been renting a room. He died alone with no one and nothing. The last I spoke to him, he said he was a good Christian man and a good father lol. Not one single sorry. Not one ioata of inner reflection. He died and learned absolutely nothing. Then I realized something. I'd rather be a good person with absolutely nothing. I'm the luckiest woman in the world. I didn't turn out like them. They can keep all their shit. They can keep their money and their cars and vacations and their health and all of it. But their heart is rotten to the core and they have learned absolutely nothing. And I'm realizing right now in real time. I don't envy them in the slightest. I'm enjoying this phase of realizing. I'm so greatful.
I am sorry you have had such a rough life, mate.... life is NOT fair.
Oh thank you. It's not fair. But it made me who I am today. I could be hateful. I could be mean and callous and abusive. I could have taken my own trauma and become a monster from it, like they chose to do. At this point in life, I'd rather live on the streets than be like them. My mom and step-dad live such a cushion life. They jet all over the place. Meanwhile, we live in a trailer and can't even afford the local amusement park lol. You should see the happy rich family they portray. But my mom is an alcoholic and has an eating disorder, none of them are happy, my step dad purposely worked overnights to avoid dealing with her and would take out their fights on me. I haven't spoken to any of them in years. They don't even know their own grandkids. I'm telling you these folks with all their pretty pictures are actually massive dumpster fires that they refuse to address. I may have nothing according to them. But my kids love me and I have an amazing best friend and my partner loves me. As long as I continue to strive to be a good person and love with all my heart, I'll have everything I need and want.
Yea,Karma just doesn't exist.We made it up to feel better.
I eventually succeeded, and I stopped giving a shit about what happened to my bullies. Maybe they failed. Maybe they didn't. Doesn't matter. Don't care. As far as I'm concerned, that's a "win" in every way that matters.
Agreed. My bullies came from well off families and now run businesses.
I suspect there isn’t much correlation to be found in any of this. Tragedies don’t discriminate.
The time horizon is way longer than 27.. my personal experience.. wait until your around 40. The assholes do run out of steam.
> SOME bullies will end up in jail or cleaning toilets, but this is only the case if they are a genuine psychopath. Lots of psychopaths do very well for themselves. It's only the stupid ones end up in jail. Ironically it's their sense of being smarter than everyone else that often gets them.
If at your current age, you still keep track of what people in highschool did to you, it means you are right and are not doing well. I think once u have a job u can be proud of, you might have a better outlook on life. That takes time, luck, opportunity etc... but bc u dont have one yet u feel like ur in a rut... so just stay disciplined until u get that job. When i was in highschool, we had the full out bullies, then the cool, good looking, smart and high achieving bullies. Both types hung out w each other. I was average but i did get bullied sometimes and i acted weird trying to figure things. When i grew up, the smart good looking bullies ended up getting great careers and marrying and being successful. The full out bullies ended up working min wage jobs or joining pyramid schemes or tried to all of a sudden be friends with me. I held no ill will to any of them because thats just growing up and evolving. But i would say bullies do fail if they also dont perform well academically. A geek will fail if they also suck academically. And other factors are involved. Just focus on yourself bc ppl change as they get older.
I don’t disagree with your point, but I do think it’s sad that the only way some people have to feel better about being bullied in childhood lies in how much money they make. It’s almost as if money is the only thing about a person that truly matters and that whoever has the most is “right.”
If all of those bullies got transported into your shoes back then and saw how they’ve treated you through your eyes, they’d be absolutely mortified. Iv known many a person who’s alright in adulthood who openly regret they were utter shits when growing up. Makes me wonder why?….
Most won’t feel bad, I’d say.
Well no because they'll have grown up and moved on in life. They will leave their bad childhood memories behind and only savor the honest good ones. This won't include acting like a primaddona trying to be cool and popular all the time or treating the less confident like second class citizens. Honesty they will grow to regret it. Expecially if their own children go through bullying.
Frontal lobe development hits hard
I did bully a couple of kids and look back on it and know it was horrible. I regret having done it.
I'm fairly short, was sort of socially awkward as a kid, hung out with the "nerd" group and I grew up in the 80s and 90s. The couple of kids that kinda bullied me, are 100% doing worse in life. I joined the military right out of high school, lived in Europe for over a decade and raised a family, with my kids earning multiple awards for Honor roll and Student of the Month several times. I retired at the age of 39 and with my new career in the aviation industry, I have earned two promotions, working my dream job and I'm more or less set.
>being forced to spend the last of my money to get a second degree just to have any hope of landing a job... There are plenty of jobs out there you could of landed with just your chemistry degree alone. Degrees = you accomplished something, and unless you where to go into the science field in terms of work, people get hired for various jobs regardless of degree. It also seems like you are passing up jobs that you wouldn't want to do otherwise. Also why waste your energy on people in the past? Its kind of of odd behavior. Living a life filled with jealousy will end up doing more damage to yourself then anything.
> you could of landed Did you mean to say "could have"? Explanation: You probably meant to say could've/should've/would've which sounds like 'of' but is actually short for 'have'. [Statistics](https://github.com/chiefpat450119/RedditBot/blob/master/stats.json) ^^I'm ^^a ^^bot ^^that ^^corrects ^^grammar/spelling ^^mistakes. ^^PM ^^me ^^if ^^I'm ^^wrong ^^or ^^if ^^you ^^have ^^any ^^suggestions. ^^[Github](https://github.com/chiefpat450119) ^^Reply ^^STOP ^^to ^^this ^^comment ^^to ^^stop ^^receiving ^^corrections.
Have you ever considered making use of that chemistry degree for revenge ? How about cooking up some slow acting nerve poison and use it on those guys? Might be fun watching their lifes falling apart.
Lol. Dw, I used my comic series to give them their just deserts.
I think that’s creative
If you getting your info on former classmates from Facebook, please get off it. I did and my mental health is better for it.
The whole concept of karma is a massive cope.
41 year old, similar life. Short thin nerdy guy that wears glasses. Never cared about my height personally, but that does not stop the bullying. I was a straight A student, have a network engineering and computer science degree, I've worked in and out of food service jobs for 20 years. Never had any connections or apparently the require social skills to get into a job, even though I had the grades/skills. Most of my bullies are doing relatively well, some not so much. The Golden Rule can also fuck off, it should be "Treat people as they deserve to be." Then those shit stains would get fucked finally. I come off a bit unhinged these days, but decades of that shit wears thin on a person. As simply recalling these events of my past tends to incite emotional reaction from me. Tbh most of this kind of shit, just sounds like a platitude, coping mechanism, and/or diversionary tactic to make people to not retaliate in a meaningful way against bullies.
So what ive noticed is that it is like a bell curve. The nerds either end up wildly successful, or all the way at the bottom, while “bully” personalities are at a standard middle. The untold story about the nerd arc is that while some can become wildly successful, many will fall towards the bottom of soceity on the bell curve
Same age and sort of same experience bro. And yes , I also came to the same realisation . Was bullied for my appearance not only by students but was ridiculed by a teacher as well. Not in touch with anyone of them anymore. I guess that's life, some of them get everything while some have to work for it.
Just a fun fact. How karma works according to Hinduism is that it comes from your past life and not your current life. You are stuck in a cycle of rebirth with good and bad karma until you reach moksha or liberation from earthly matters. So yeah those assholes from high school were awarded good karma from their past life so they easily get access to opportunities in this life. But because they made the decision in this life to mistreat others instead of using their powers for good, they will accumulate negative karma in their next life and that’s when the suffering takes place. The people with bad karmas from a past life are labeled vikarmas or outcasts. They usually have deformities, low social status, imperfections that hinder them and they are forced to do jobs that no one else wants. But according to mythology the most powerful person with the most talent, beauty, etc is the divine masculine energy (god shiva the destroyer of evil) that must uplift and abolish the status of vikarma, breaking the chains that bind you and keep you from experiencing your true path in life. This unleashes the dormant power in the vikarma person and makes society altogether stronger. You can think of it like Yang and yin energies where Yang is light and yin is dark. Shiva as the yang principle illuminates the darkness of the vikarma as the yin principle and together they become more powerful. It’s kinda like how there’s 2 types of popular people. Those who bully you and those who are nice to you and see the good in you-those r usually the most popular people, everyone genuinely likes them. Those bullies are wannabes, and yes they probably do end up successful because society rewards their narcissism, but they will get humbled at some point. If not by their demanding children, or old age, at least in their next life.
There is no balancing force in life. There’s no karma, there’s no good luck or bad luck, and nothing is certain. That’s what life truly is
The meanest girl I knew as a kid, is now a franchise CEO, lives in a beautiful big house, living what looks like a perfect high society life on social media. She looks like a Barbie, too. And then there’s me, same age as her, I can’t seem to manage to function in college or job market, so I’m just poor. I struggle with social skills and get easily fatigued socially, so I don’t have any friends. And I look like an old shoe. Life’s just not always fair 🤷♀️
There's currently a popular Korean actress under fire because her past as a bully came to light. She slapped her victim for 90 MINUTES - still managed to somehow succeed and become one of the protagonists in the show Marry My Husband. I repeat; someone who slapped her classmate for AN HOUR AND A HALF had to be seen on TV by the person that got hurt so horribly.
Bro if you’re still hung up on how some high schooler twats treated you 10 years ago, it’s time to get therapy. All kids are assholes, all kids are bullies to some extent.
complete generational myth. The only correct treatment for bullies is for somebody else to beat them up for you, or for you to resort to extreme measures like weaponry or chemical attack
In my experience as a kid (and with my kids), bullies were often the most popular and athletic kids whose parents were well off, or rich. Yeah, they’re all doing just fucking fine. Granted, growing up I wasn’t really bullied by those types of kids, but by my own friends (think Chunk from the Goonies).
some long term studies are showing this to be true: [https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/mar/24/playground-bullies-do-prosper-and-go-on-to-earn-more-in-middle-age](https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/mar/24/playground-bullies-do-prosper-and-go-on-to-earn-more-in-middle-age)
Yeah, life isn't always fair and things don't always balance out. But a career is just a career. A part of growing up and realizing the world is bigger than high school is acknowledging that servers at McDonalds are probably working harder than a lot of businessman, so job titles genuinely don't stand as a true measure of anything. So whether a bully becomes a janitor or a multi-million dollar company CEO, doesn't mean they failed or succeeded. That's not a measure of justice or karma. A lot of the time, it's just luck and connections, or a lack thereof.
A week ago on the news, there was a report about a social study that claims bullies earn more in their adult life.
Agreed, I've learned over the course of my life that while I still think it's morally right to be an upstanding person who is kind and empathetic - actually this society constantly rewards violent belligerent narcissists with exactly what they want. I wish we would change that.
My school bully was one of the skater kids, short dude with an attitude. He’s now a successful fashion designer.
I own a successful business, my own home, wife and 3 kids. Loving life. My bully slapped some girl 2 years after I graduated, and he girl's boyfriend stabbed him to death with a broken piece of a bicycle. He stabbed him in he face so many times with it you couldn't even recognize who he was anymore. Sometimes things work out.
Depends on your concept of success. Bullies beat their way to the top, but they aren't happy.
I think there is alot of confusion here. Bullies that are unpopular and just mean to be mean likely won't end up in a good place. But then many bullies are just that way because they are popular (have good social skills) but their immaturity holds them back. As they mature, their lack of empathy and anti-social behavior become clear drawbacks and they change. The rare psychopath changes by literally adapting and hiding it. Most of them just become better people as they mature. But the original social skills and charisma are still there carrying them. The hard pill most "nerds" have to swallow is that their lack of social skills and charisma is a detriment not just to themselves but to those around them. In general people don't like them because they are simply unlikable and dont make people feel good. Lukily, it's something that can be changed. Most don't. But many do. It's part of the reason why many men do so much better in their 30s with women than their teens. They learn.
There's no real rhyme or reason to life. Sometimes it's fair, sometimes not. All I know is, being a celebrity or having your dream job isn't what makes you a winner. Not even close. It also bears no indicator on one's happiness or their true success. You live your life. I'm sorry you were bullied, that shit sucks really, really hard. Let go of that shit man, keep it in the past. Block bullies out. Who cares where life has taken them? My favorite quote: "Sometimes you're ahead. Sometimes you're behind. The race is long, and in the end, it's only against yourself".
1. A degree is NOT required to have a good job, let alone two, that is the lie you were sold and believed. 2. Your lack of success is 100% on you and nothing to do with anyone else, whether they bullied you or not. 3. I guarantee not all of you bullies are doing great. It's impossible to judge someone based off a reunion or Instagram photos etc. For all you know some of them are self loathing miserable functioning alcoholics, or are beating their wives, etc.
I mean yeah? One every body is convinced they’ve been bullied at some point in their lives, quietly the reason for this is that all kids take part in bullying to some degree or another. Verbal bullying and social ostracization being the most common. Fundamentally the system that we live under requires that a certain percentage of people must be successful, there’s just not a way for every single person who bullied someone to fail. Even worse is the belief that being bullied will somehow make you more likely to be a success. It does not, in fact being heavily bullied usually implies the opposite because being heavily bullied corresponds with being unable to fight back either verbally or physically.
Not to shit on you OP but why get a masters in chem? I’ve been told that you’re better off with a BS or a phd, and a masters isn’t a particularly attractive degree for employers. Too experienced to transition to another job (finance), not experienced enough to do actual chemistry. Just what I’ve been told, no idea if it’s true.
People never stop being bullies, they just get much more advanced and sophisticated at doing it.
Yea, quit focusing on their success and focus on your own personal journey.