So why smoke at all? Don’t you want to operate in life at your cognitive best?
I'm over 40 and have worked crap jobs most of my life. It isn't like my increasing my cognitive abilities being "best" - whatever the heck that actually means - is going to make a huge difference in my life. To tell you the truth, I'm much more worried about cognitive decline as a side effect of MS than I am the effects of getting high.
It isn't like it makes me stupid. I simply think differently and that isn't all bad. Cleaning house and other mundane chores are less bothersome, and my life is full of this mundane crap. It also isn't like being drunk and I can still participate in society (I personally don't drive and just use public transport, sober or not)
Few of the ideas are later dismissed as unrealistic or overly optimistic, but most of the best long term decisions in my life have been 'found' in Inception movie style while high, and expanded later. The perspective is really different, and I literally get a second, different opinion on my life and all the choices/duties.
I've handled tough breakups with this - the emotions were not suppressed or ignored or twisted to get out easily, rather I've got full exposure to all their sides which allowed me to process them remarkably quickly. The result was I got over it all and properly closed things for good in a rather speedy way.
The thing is, that's me - the next person might get a very different effect, sometimes rather negative and not helpful. Drugs don't work uniformly on everybody, even on alcohol some get cozy and some aggressive.
Its not about dumbing down at all - that's alcohol domain. Just shifting mindset to something alternative, in more than one way my mind is expanded. The next morning I am dumbed down, but in 1000x more pleasant manner than after alcohol, rather too-laid-back for some stressful annoying tasks.
No. Especially at bedtime, I want to be cognitively stopped. The fact that the cognitive is keeping me awake even though I'm physically exhausted sucks.
Sober, I’d be coding and a notification would pop up on my phone, taking great attention away from the work. My child would be crying in the next room over and my brain would be formulating thoughts to discern what the fuss is all about.
My washer is leaking and now I have to set up an appointment for someone to come look at it and due to my busy schedule, I’d have to find time.
Distractions takes away the drive and motivations to code.
On Cannabis, the answers are there in my head and what to do.
Phone notification? Not important, ignore it.
Child crying? She has her mom.
Washer broke? Handle it after work.
Easily said but I think like many on here has stated, any stress reducing solution can make a difference.
Ymmv.
For all you know, GP is Einstein and he's working in the patent office, but with no chance of being recognized. Does he really have to be deprived of even one small joy in life so he can be at peak cognitive performance for shuffling patent applications around tomorrow? Who is he supposed to be performing for?
Totally off topic but this sentence of yours perfectly sums up my mental state currently. Being a technologist, I believed tech could solve everything and thing and dedicated my life to it. This was when I was a teenager teaching myself to code 10-12 years ago. Back then tech wasn’t mainstream and geeks weren’t cool.
But now, tech is the new wallstreet and a tsunami of people are hitting its shores every year. I’m not sure what I can bring to the table. I’ve learnt a lot of computer science just for the fun of it. I don’t think I’ll ever use most of that knowledge.
I’m in this weird state where I know how amazing technology can be but at the same time I don’t really have much to contribute to it. Sure, I could set myself up for some big moonshots. But for what? I haven’t found happiness or satisfaction in all this while. I’m not sure if it’ll ever come. I can certainly distract myself with a lot of challenges to keep me from contemplating suicide. Or I could smoke weed. No difference really. No reason to squeeze out all you’ve got just to hit some random performance metrics or criteria.
Good lord no, I want my cognitive best to be when I'm getting shit done. When I'm doing non-cognitive tasks I want my cognitive best to get back in its box and shut up for a bit so I can enjoy life without constantly over-analysing everything. I'm certainly in that category, though I suspect something like a meditation practice would probably be more useful as a long-term strategy than having a drink after work.
Some occasional drug use reminds me that my body doesn't exist solely to hurt me, that I can still experience pleasure, and that it's still worth trying to find things I might like/be able to enjoy since many of my previous physical pleasures aren't possible or are less enjoyable than they used to be. Without them, my physical existence is only pain, and that's depressing. Being depressed is way worse on my cognitive abilities than doing drugs once in a while.
This is true for most people who use regularly: The drugs are a harm-reduction measure. If weed fucks you up (-10 cognitive ability) but also gets rid of your anxiety (-20 cognitive ability), it's still a net win.
All that said, I think it is a good thing to not make anything that affects(increase or decrease) cognitive performance a habit.
smoking sativa strains increase work performance for me and i know a lot of other dev how performing well while smoking cannabis in the office!
- sorry they smoked at the rooftop terrace not in the office
“No. Resistance training is good for me long term.”
Exactly.