How are you discerning issues v. details from this post? I feel it's quite clearly about drawing/enforcing boundaries, being able to say 'no', and the like. In my experience, there are a lot of people in SV (men, mostly -- partly because SV is male-dominated) who can learn a lot from this lesson.

First, the author refrains from blaming those who were taking advantage of his "kindness" (loose boundaries, really, but he framed it to himself as kindness for so long). Instead, he takes full responsibility for his own misapprehensions about how the world works -- not his father, not his college-friend-turned-boss, not anyone else. Today, when I read posts about people who undergo this specific epiphany -- "nice guy syndrome" if I can call it something -- it inevitably is accompanied by resentment: other people are cruel and manipulative, women are bitches who don't want nice guys, investors are sociopaths who just follow trends, etc.

Second, and related to the first -- this man did not act simply in reaction to his epiphany. He didn't simply swing the other way, as if to say "well now I'll be a jerk to everyone else to punish them." Instead, he continued to be generous and magnanimous, but he took responsibility for drawing and enforcing his own boundaries. And those boundaries still included room to be generous and charitable, but what he gained was the facility to choose those traits.

Previously, he felt compelled to oblige and unable to resist the impositions of others. Now, he has the power to choose not to oblige, and he still chooses to oblige when he feels drawn to do it. And when he doesn't, he now can turn down the request.

As I said earlier, I have seen a lot of men arrive at the particular revelation that what they perceive as a kind and generous nature is actually compliance and subservience -- and then simply shut off that valve in reaction. I greatly admire this author's example of maintaining the choice to be generous, while gaining the capacity to choose the direction of his generosity.

> Second, and related to the first -- this man did not act simply in reaction to his epiphany. He didn't simply swing the other way, as if to say "well now I'll be a jerk to everyone else to punish them." Instead, he continued to be generous and magnanimous, but he took responsibility for drawing and enforcing his own boundaries.

For a humorous example of the wrong way to act after this epiphany, see the 1942 Joe McDoakes short film "So You Think You're a Nervous Wreck".

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038960/

or sheckley's short story "cordle to onion to carrot" [http://arthursclassicnovels.com/sheckley/conion10.html]

Those are good points. I thought there's something different about the article, but was not sure how to state it, but you did it perfectly. Thank you for that.