Comment by meese_ | Hacker News Reader

Comment by meese_ | Hacker News Reader

Interesting essay. Kind of distracting how every sentence is followed by two spaces, though.

Should listening to music necessarily be considered "consuming"? I go running all the time while listening to instrumentals, and it helps me concentrate.

I too have a significant portion of my epiphanies while running or biking, or just walking away from what I was doing, staring at the ceiling, and thinking it over. Gazing into a computer screen seems to promote the narrowing down of ideas rather than the conception of new ones (if that).

Also, has anyone else found showers extraordinarily easy to concentrate in? I'm not sure what it is (white noise?), but I often find that when I take a shower my stresses fade away and whatever problem I was having folds out with an obvious-in-hindsight solution. (I also take notoriously long showers, for this reason.) I really wish I could replicate this experience somewhere else; the only other time I've had it is occasionally when falling asleep (which also, incidentally, causes me to take much too long to fall asleep — not exactly an ideal combination).

Is that a standard, one space after sentences? I haven't been in an English class in a while, and haven't heard someone make that comment before.

For music, good call, I listen to quite a bit of classical while working. If there are lyrics, I'll get distracted and think about those instead.

It's kind of funny, but I often find myself stepping out of the shower and not being able to remember if I had shampooed my hair or not, my mind having been somewhere far off.

Apparently, two spaces after a period was used in the typewriter days to help readability. Kerning (especially on web pages) helps obviate the need for this today.

However, there are still people who advocate its use. I do it out of habit, but can probably turn it off now that I think of it.

I, too, take notoriously long showers and find them to be one of the best places to think.

In regards to your question about listening to music being considered consumption: I think it really depends what type of music listener you are, or what your particular motivation for listening while running is. Listening to instrumentals for the purpose of increased concentration is probably not the norm. Most people who listen to music while they run do so for the reason frederickcook stated: they'd be bored otherwise.

Or at least they'd claim it was boredom. Really I think it's the complete awkwardness of the absence of some sort of distraction, and it's just easier for people to say "I'd get bored" versus "I'd feel so awkward". However, on the other side of that initial awkwardness lies a new level of clarity. For me, the 45 minute mark on a slower-paced run is the only time I have better obvious-in-hindsight solutions than in the shower.

(that being said, working a demanding day job while planning my exit strategy into a startup leaves me no time to run...at a time in my life when I need that clarity most!)

I find myself concentrating best when I’m taking a long shower or dancing to music with my earphones in (seriously). Somehow, both situations lend to focusing on the problem and coming up with a (usually) great and obvious solution.

On falling asleep: I have the opposite experience; I fall asleep fastest when I start concentrating on a particular problem.

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