Comment by Akcium | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Akcium | Hacker News Reader

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Currently I'm in a big problem with time because of the mix of psychological problems including perfectionism.

What I mean is: I spent almost all my time thinking how to plan my life. When I think about what I should do every day, I always find excuses why it won't work.

So it turns out that everyday is spent by thinking instead of doing.

Also I understand what the author meant when talking about the difficulty of maintaining work-life balance. But this happened for me all the time, not only when there was a lockdown, but really all the time.

I'm not working on hourly basis, but I'm working on my side-product. And the thoughts in my head are "Okay, we can spend a few evenings coding and we'll have that feature. Probably it'd be enough to breakthrough and we will become millionaires!" :D I'm exaggerating but still.

Then, after I spent all the time thinkings, I accuse myself that I haven't been working.

This is a vicious circle.

And after that, the "trigger" in the behaviour formula is something I'm waiting for all my life: the secret sign to start planning.

I have the same issue and two things:

- go take a walk alone for one hour. No headphones, no device. I’m not kidding

- make a list of tasks that you must accomplish. See it like a queue that you’ll pop from and get a task to focus on. Now take your days one at a time focusing on the task in front of you. Do this until you depleted the queue. For this to work the queue should not be vague, and have items that you really want to implement now (otherwise you’ll start thinking about re-ordering the queue)

One thing I'd add to this: Get used to the idea that removing one item from the list is acceptable. For me, the only way I could trick my brain into that is set the the start date for all but one task that doesn't need to be done today for tomorrow at the start of the day. Thus when I finished the items for today, the task list is empty and I feel "done". I can still look at future tasks if I'm feeling productive, but knowing I finished my to-do list for today is refreshing.

I know it's an illusion, but it works surprisingly well for me.

Thank you

By queue you mean a set of tasks? Or a big goals or what?

I have a to-do list, a backlog in my project. The number of tasks just grow up, all I got power to do is to endlessly fill this list.

So we're talking about "small set of tasks", or a queue per project, or... could you clarify here?

And yeah, walking alone might help. Indeed. Will do

Tell me how you feel after the walk :)

By queue I mean a set of task yeah. The whole point is to take away your will to organize (or at least place it somewhere) and set a queue of tasks to work on in front of you. You can then spend your entire focus on the task in front of you, then when you're done go to the next task.

From time to time (at the end of every week) you can re-organize your task lisk, but most of the time focus on one task at a time.

What kind of benefits have you felt from long walks with no devices? I was on a good routine doing that earlier in quarantine, and kind of fell off the wagon. Could use some inspiration to get re-started :)

For some reason when I walk I get some time where I can really think, and organize my thought, and it gets me into this peaceful and calm state for weeks after. I used to do this when I was younger as well, if I'd feel really down I would just skip class and take the day off to walk endlessly in the city, always made things better for a while.

I think this idea has been echoed multiple time in history. For example, the Peripatetic school[1] (in ancient Greece) etimologic roots is in "walking" or "the pleasure of walking". Some rumors say that it is by walking that thinkers could achieve correct or deeper thinking.

Apparently, a lot more philosophers have a very deep relationship with walking. Nietzsche and Kant both spent hours walking to think[2].

I think inherently, we are not souls, we are not brains without a body. When we do something, our entirety gets to work, and sitting all day in front of a screen is no way to think or live.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peripatetic_school

[2]: https://fs.blog/2014/05/a-philosophy-of-walking/

I have a dog and have set times where I have to take it out.

The benefit is like rubber-duck debugging. For about 45 minutes I have no interesting things to distract my mind and I automatically start thrashing any meaty problems I left specifically for this. Works for me.

It sounds like you are controlled by your thoughts. I'm looking into the concept of "Mindfulness" to get more control back and find more happiness. I also found that doing one workout every morning greatly improves my well-being and reduces thoughts that limit me.

I, too, struggled with wanting to to everything as best as possible but found that it really limits me. I eventually just started with very small iterations and even though I didn't write a lot of code yet the process itself already taught me quite a few things. The great thing with code is that you can come back later and improve it, so it doesn't have to be perfect on the first try!

Yeah, I'm looking into the concept too, as well as other therapy stuff. There is a therapy method called ACT, which has similar concepts I think

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