I'm in the 40-45 year old range and assuming you are much younger. Apologies if we are closer in age, since this advice will carry less value.
I have often been envious of people who were more focused than I am. I feel they have been able to make more progress in a given amount of time. I worked as a mover in Boston into my mid twenties, spent a bunch of time trying to become an elite athlete, climbed big mountains, eventually learned to code, got involved in some early ecommerce businesses, eventually video gaming industry, and finally a principle engineer for the playback technology we use on Disney+.
I was complaining about my lack of focus to an old college mate, and he posed an extremely relevant question: "Do you regret your experiences?"
No, I don't. Not one bit. The experiences I've gathered are assets which build on each other, leading to more and more valuable experiences.
I have an objective of starting my own company, even at this ripe old age, and I am more confident than ever that I'll be successful at it. I have the experiences I need to pursue just about any dream.
Go out and get experiences. If your personality is such that you get a varied scope of experience, it will serve you well. Don't fight it.
I also wanna start my company. But I wonder: Will I ever stick? Will I have the grit and the passion to pursue one topic for the next 5-7 years. What's your thinking on this?
Btw, they call us "multipotentialites"...
I will say, I was able to get my company off the ground and white labeled it for a much larger company. I ended up hating the product in the end, 10 years later - because I was sole founder and every single thing I had to do myself.
I think you will be able to stick with it ( especially when there is no other choice ! ) , but you might end up hating it.
This talks about Munger’s concept of multi-disciplines and using lutiple “models” in life. https://25iq.com/2015/08/22/a-dozen-things-ive-learned-from-...
What would have he said if the answer was yes?
Experiences are not equal, you can have a series of events that not even can time can fix to make them look/feel better.
The OPs advice is excellent. You can't find out what you're good at without first going wide. Mistakes will abound but you need to pin some meta skills
1. Avoiding things that are high probability dead ends. They might not be but you should have instinct for not pulling back on a path when it doesn't seem to be worthwhile.
2. Ability to make tough calls and execute - Abandoning things that you "always wanted to do but never had the time for", fixing personality problems that you know are holding you back but you always just ignore (e.g. false pride, procrastination etc.)
3. Develop skill stacks rather than deep specialisation. My brother writes and my sister draws. I do calligraphy and I tell people that I draw better than my brother and write better than my sister. In a similar vein, if you've got experience in a certain area, learning a useful skill that others in the area don't have will make you super valuable in that area.
4. Be resilient. If you're ambitious (as I gather you are), you're going to nurture that and while the process is worthwhile, it's blood unpleasant. There's a constant feeling of dissatisfaction that sometimes borders on an almost pathologically inability to celebrate a victory. You're going to have to make these calls as you figure out what you want to do and where.
Finally, once you do figure out something that you're good at and can make a living out of, dive deep and constantly get better at it. Start saying no to other stuff and become a narrow expert. Don't let all your exploratory experience and outlook become a handicap. It served you well to find your destiny but there is a time when you have to discard it. That's easier said than done but it's a must.
Good luck!
Thank you for this. I’m closer to your age and looking back I missed the train of ultra specialization.
There is however alchemy to experience and sometimes completely unrelated experiences catalyze awareness and abilities in unimagined ways.
You "are" "good at" nothing.
You are not a block of marble with David inside, something to be chipped away at until it is apparent for all to see.
You are a ball of clay, malleable, reshapable and shapeless, fluid and formed, able to absorb new bits and grow into something wildly different, day by day if needed.
Try some growth mindset handbooks and techniques to reframe your thinking.
So Good They Can't Ignore You by Cal Newport (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13525945-so-good-they-ca...)
Also see my sibling comment above.
I thought that was an interesting observation but I'd like to suggest expanding it to physical activity in general rather than specifically powerlifting. There are many different activities (for example HIIT, martial arts, gymnastics, rock climbing just to name a few) that will make a significant physical change in your body. When you stick to one of those activities and document your progress with data, photos, etc there's something about seeing that change happen to the blob of matter that is "you" that really expands what you consider achievable for yourself.
As an armchair gymmer, this routine lacks pull exercises for back musculature. Add row pulls or pullups!
To beat the dead horse, deadlifts definitely involve pulling but it's primarily a glutes exercise. Adding in dedicated pulls like pullups and rows will give you a lot of bang for your buck.
For background I'm in my mid 50s, never did weight training in my life before 2019. I've progressed more I thought I could and my muscle tone and strength is better than it's ever been in my life.
However none of this has changed my outlook on work, or accomplishing other stuff in general. It hasn't unlocked any new drive or energy or passion. I don't feel like a different person from before. In fact I am tired earlier in the evening and sleep more now.
I don't say this to be discouraging but personally I've never found that "just do this one thing you're not doing" will make a dramatic difference aside from getting better at doing that thing. If you want to get strong, lift weights. That's good in its own right. It may or may not change anything else in your life.
Oh, I definitely agree and do not subscribe to a "just do this one thing" philosophy. I wasn't trying to suggest that this one thing will solve all problems. Only that it is something that a person who is striving to adopt more of a growth mindset might consider trying. It is fairly straightforward to get reliable success if you're a novice here, and having tangible successes is at least useful (and very arguably important) in making a substantial change in mindset. Also, my comment was specifically generalizing to more than just the Starting Strength novice lifter program.
If the complete answer to "How to find what I am good at?" would be "You are a malleable ball of clay", then what? Go for whatever seems tempting? Go for becoming a rockstar? You might answer "If that is what you really want". Then we are back to OP's question. The shiny rockstar career might seem tempting for a few months or years. And then frustration kicks in like for 90% of wannabe rockstars.
The question what path is the right one for a person is still legit.
Also, "Be a rockstar" is not a smart goal to pursue (in that it has a high probability of failure), but playing an instrument with some level of mastery is. If you base your satisfaction on goals with a strong degree of randomness or innate ability to their achievement, you will probably be unsatisfied. Better to base goals on things you can (almost) fully control.
You, meaning anyone, could probably practice hard and join the upper x% of just about anything (setting aside things like the NBA that overvalue nature). What x is, well that is subject to debate. So is the source of motivation, and that is almost the most important thing.
[1] Peak, by K. Anders Ericsson and Robert Pool [2] talent code, by Daniel Coyle
My own little anecdote. I have Cerebral Palsy. This isn’t a woah is me statement. It really only affects my left hand and slightly my left leg. Most people wouldn’t even notice besides a really slight limp.
I spent 12 years as a fitness instructor as a working hobby. No matter how much I practiced, I wouldn’t have been able to do what other instructors could do. I synthesized my own none choreography heavy, fairly simple, very athletic style. But it got to the point that I knew I was the best that I could possibly be and I once my style started going out of fashion (step, cardio kickboxing) and the industry got to be more dance focused, it was time for me to hang it up. I also start focusing more on my career and my then new marriage and step sons.
During the latter part of the period when I was teaching, I also started running. I was decent - under a 10 minute mile up to a 15K. But every time I tried to push harder - either longer or faster - my slightly favoring my left leg caused my right leg (good leg) to experience problems or my left ankle to start hurting.
Even lifting weights, something I have always had an affinity for (and my CP doesn’t affect) and at my strongest I could bench press 300 pounds at 5 foot 4 and a weight of 175 pounds, I would never be able to lift what my 6 foot 3 200 plus pound step son can get to with much less training.
Growth mindset has literally nothing to do with "top notch performance", or a guaranteed way to achieve success in any and every field of practice.
It's simply a framing exercise for how you handle failure and how you approach new topics and challenges.
And I will cheerfully disagree, many top notch musicians can't sing, and many great singers are no musicians. You could have been great - you could still be great!
But effort and persistence is a much wider gulf than talent.
But even aside from the core of the argument, I find your phraseology oddly formulaic. It's ironic you're accusing the OP of having a "fixed mindset" when so much of your contributed "opinion" is clearly copypasted from books. I'd suggest opening your own mindset to forming a worldview of your own rather than following growth gurus so blindly.
Whether you blame another, view some traits as faults, idolise some concept or are blind to some thing, all are appearant in your writing and speech.
It's true, comment boards reward the "oddly formulaic" - cliches and well-worn passages carry extra weight.
They also lead to weird leaps of illogic, like your assumption I follow any growth gurus at all!
Happy to have a longer conversation offline if you'd rather address a man instead of a strawman.
So I addressed that. I didn't intend it as ad hominem against your character - I only intended to address the specific contents of your comment, so apologies for the guru comment (I just assumed you followed them since you were recommending their handbooks).
Instead, you do what you are interested in, and initially you are not good at it, and with enough time, effort, working at learning and practicing, you will become good at it.
They're different but OP isn't asking the first question.
OP is not asking "how do I find something that grabs my attention", but rather "how do I find something I'm naturally really good at". The implication is that what grabs my attention and holds it tight is out of necessity what I am naturally talented.
Sorry for questioning such a status quo assumption but I don't see how my day 1 or week 1 experience doing anything is an indicator that I'll be enjoying it in year 1 and many years later, or that it's even worth investing time to improve it. It's a nice place to start the exploration, so I'll give it that.
No, it's follow up from the grandparent comment:
1. OP: how do I find something that I'm good at?
2. GP comment: find something that interests you and put in a lot of time, effort and practice.
The natural follow up question is to ask "how do I find something that interests me enough so I can put in effort and practice over a prolonged period of time?". And this is something that OP is struggling with:
> Changed several jobs, and in my hobbies, I am jumping from one project to another. How do you stay focused?
This is what I meant when I wrote that it boils down to the same thing - if you assume that the GP comment is giving good advice, you take that advice one step further and you end up back at a question that OP is already asking.
My buddy, literally, couldn't spell "girl" in high school ("does it end in an 'e'?") and calculating percentages? Naw. But he could rebuild an engine and transmission and could identify a plane in the sky by the engine sound and then give a mini-history lesson on the plane, especially if it was involved in war. Then he discovered geology and hydrology.
Now he had a reason to spell (pride in his reports) and aced chemistry (equations and all) and regularly does calculations in his head. I posit the difference was "interest." Once something is interesting, it is much easier to learn about it. Similarly, his dad couldn't get calculus to stick until he saw applications in finance, then the door swung open.
For me, I find most things interesting and people think I'm smarter than I am because of it. However, when it comes to medical/bio stuff, I can't keep it in my head. I superficially like knowing about how sugars are processed by the body but I never remember the pathways and differences between glucose, sucrose, and fructose. It is not of enough interest to stick.
I think the real super power is to convince yourself to actually be interested in a thing.
I would like to add though that "being good at something" is not the path to enlightenment. Try "something you enjoy" instead, and you may be happier in the end. Given an initial epsilon of talent, the above adage posits that you will get better at it, and in my experience, motivation to do a task is central predictor of how good you will become at it.
I gave up a lot of hobbies because I didn't have mentor or guidance factor to help me get past the wall. You can only learn upto a certain point on your own. After that, it requires quite a lot of attention and focus to not suck.
But the context being "something you enjoy", being passionate about something usually comes with self-motivation to improve and become better at something, and usually one finds a way to get better.
The stagnation you mentioned is usually with people who aren't that passionate about the things they are practicing, or just using it as a means to some other ends.
You can also practice with purpose and get to a peak of your ability.
There is a fundamental shift of perspective that I think is necessary for people to find work that will fulfill them. More important is to look at what things you enjoy, and then figuring out what exactly appeals to you, really understanding yourself and how you tick, and how that can be applied elsewhere.
I spent much of my childhood gaming (CS, Battlefield, Starcraft, Warcraft 3, Deus Ex, C&C RA2, Dune 2, etc.). It was fun, sure, and going by "look for something you enjoy", maybe I should've become a pro-gamer. But if I look at how I actually spent my time, there are much different conclusions to be drawn about what I like. I liked being in a team with a collective goal. I liked the communication (and arguing). I liked solving situational challenges. I liked being challenged. I liked researching strategies, techniques, and everything around metagaming (countless hours "wasted" on TeamLiquid). I liked learning new things and incrementally improving my skills. I liked documenting and explaining things. It's 100% clear how that translated in a career context, but at first glance, shooting people in CS was just "fun".
Most people don't find their "fun" activities enjoyable all the time. Running can be fun, but it also is tiring and sucks sometimes. Practicing a musical instrument isn't the most enjoyable, but playing in a band and nailing songs is. Lifting isn't "fun," but excelling at a sport is.
Point being that not liking the boring parts of an activity, but still finding the activity as a whole satisfying, is something that most people would consider to be an activity you enjoy.
Where I disagree is the claim that you don't enjoy programming. If you enjoy most of the component parts of an activity, my claim is that you actually do enjoy that activity.
Let's take hiking as an example. I can claim that I don't actually like hiking, I just like being outside, being in the forest, and walking. Hiking is therefore just one of a multitude of activities that could meet those desires. However, because my "likes" comprise the vast majority of the appeal of hiking, it is fair to say that I actually do enjoy hiking.
Ultimately, this is a semantic distinction. My claim is that by the commonly used definition of an "enjoyable activity," I would classify programming as an activity that you at least moderately enjoy.
What made it click for me is not pushing myself too hard. I used to run at an intensity I realize in retrospect I could just barely sustain. This worked, in that my fitness increased and I got faster, but it always felt horrible. This was the case when I ran alone, or with my partner - when we run together, we tend to subconsciously push each other to go a little faster.
Then, we started running with a much more extroverted friend who likes to talk a fair bit. This put a natural limit on the intensity, and apart from enjoying the socializing, I also felt physically better. It also worked fine for fitness, and I got a PR on a 10K race while training this way.
Now I find that even when I run on my own, I'm much better at finding a pace I can sustain comfortably, and I enjoy it!
As a casual runner, I'm very happy I've come to this realization, but I'm sure the experience is very different for someone who is either very unfit and finds any speed uncomfortable, or for someone who's training seriously and needs to push hard to attain their goals.
You want to find something that:
1. You enjoy, are interested in, makes you happy etc.,
2. You are naturally good at it, ie. you are talented, will be competitive,
3. Is appreciated by others, ie. they will pay you to do it.
The luckiest people get all three in abundance. Others have to find a balance and compromise on one or the other. 3 can be a deal breaker but you can do without much of either 1 or 2, but not both. However, you will always be at a disadvantage to those who have both 1 and 2.
For example, there is (currently) so much demand for programmers that IMO you really don’t need to be naturally gifted in order to have a very strong career.
However, want to be a professional violinist? That’s a different story.
Because of the imprecise way the op phrased his question, I think you've misinterpreted it. I agree with sibling comment (jstx1) that op is not asking about "good" as a skill-level change from beginner to expert.
Instead, the op is asking something like... "How do I find the one activity that really activates the dopamine reward feedback loop in my brain which in turn makes it effortless to stay focused on it because I'm magically in that flow state?"
And because most people who ask the above question are not clinical psychologists using precise scientific language... they end up expressing it in the lower-resolution form of, "How do find the thing I'm good at?"
But then language lawyers laser focus on the word "good" and think op is asking about skill... which leads to "well you can't get good at a skill unless you practice that skill" ... which isn't really what the op was asking.
>Instead, you do what you are interested in,
Yes, and that's the step the op is having difficulty with. Lots of people are trying to find that thing that really interests them to trigger more success in their professional careers.
I'm not a naturally great programmer. I mean, I'm not bad - I get the job done. But I know that there are plenty of folks out there for which it comes much more easily.
However - programming very consistently puts me into a flow state. My workdays pass quickly (in a good way), and for the most part I enjoy what I do. As a result I've found myself learning and growing at a consistent rate over the years.
Am I going to be the best programmer in the world? Absolutely not. But I found a career that I enjoy on a day to day basis, and I can well provide for my family.
I think a lot of people, including myself, waste way too much time trying to find the magic spot in the ven diagram between their genetic ability and a career in which they will end up a virtuoso rockstar. For most people, I think this is a waste of time. The key thing is: I don't think you have to be great at something in order for it to be a good conduit for focus.
Try things, if you stumble on something that engages your focus and passes the time, do that thing more. Especially if it pays.
This might be an off beat chance, but have you had a history of or ever looked into the topic of adult ADHD?
Changing several jobs, jumping between hobbies or projects is textbook ADHD, especially if you don't feel like you can get out of it and describe it as a "huge live hurdle".
That is the same for me. Got diagnosed at 30 two months ago.
If you have a suspicion you might have it, I highly recommend doing a quick online test and listening to podcasts around getting an ADHD diagnosis as well as personal tales from people who have it.
Especially the latter were a real eye opener for me and pushed me to get a diagnosis.
The point is, no amount of effort, book reading, motivational speeches or the like will get you out of this pattern.
ADHD is a neurological dysfunction, hence medication is most effective.
Edit: The above can be read as dismissive and that's not what I intended. Please see my reply further down for more context.
Are you a medical professional or do you have a scientific source backing up your suspicion?
The point why there is no objective blood test is mainly rooted in the fact that getting a true measurement of a neurotransmitter is prohibitively costly (measurement across intra- and inter-daily blood samples to establish a true baseline). Yet, scientists are doing this and there are genetic and neurotransmitter markers which are abnormal in people classified with ADHD. For further reading with a variety of medical sources I recommend [0].
It's a disorder, and presents with a large variety of expressions or comorbidities, but the symptoms (restlessness, jumping between hobbies) are shared and the consequences both in private as well professional lives are severe.
The inability to focus on single things lead to worse career outcomes and worse relationship outcomes. It is a serious suffering for those affected. Ritalin has a 60 year pharmacological history and has proven to help people. Modern stimulants are even better.
I am hugely grateful for the fact safe access exists and as someone affected badly, [I don't think it's appropriate to make fun of someone seeking access to this medication.] STRIKE that out, GP explained his intended meaning further below.
As someone who takes daily medication, I didn't read the GP's comment as making fun. It seemed to just be a statement of belief.
I might well be over sensitive to this topic, so my bad if I overstepped.
Getting the diagnosis and getting medication has been such a huge relief, it's been quite emotional.
The way I read GP's comment is that he's implying that if you have a productivity problem and cannot cut it otherwise, take the easy route, get an ADHD diagnosis (which he believes is not really a chemical imbalance) and cure your bad productivity with stimulants instead of effort.
Labelling someone not trying hard enough or not cutting it 'cause you're not smart enough, or being a loser cause you need to take meds etc. etc. is exactly the kind of stigmatization people with ADHD might face.
Again, my interpretation. I hope I am wrong.
After college, I worked in an engineering org at a big tech company you've definitely heard of. A surprisingly large number of developers that I worked with suddenly got ADHD when they realized it was going to take 60+ hour weeks plus on-call to not get stack ranked out and they saw how effective drugs were making those who were using them. I am confident that some persons were just gaming the system. I know this because they explicitly said so. Not everyone tries to be objective in their self-assessment though, so I imagine many of them actually believed they had ADHD and weren't just engaging in a cynical behavior. And I suppose it doesn't really matter: it's an ego-preserving belief that doesn't appear to have any great cost. In fact, technically speaking once they got the diagnosis from a licensed physician they did have ADHD, by definition, regardless of how cynical their motivations may have been. Edit: I also believe some legitimately had ADHD. I assumed that was obvious, but I now feel like I should be explicit.
I have no doubt whatsoever that plenty of people experience one or more symptoms that are associated with ADHD. I've known too many people of whom that is true not to. ADHD is an observational diagnosis. Medical professionals are just speculating at this point when they say it's some kind of neurological disorder rather than just part of the range of physiologically normal brain function. The brain is complicated and it could be any number of things. I have no doubt that the brain can be trained to exhibit ADHD associated characteristics for example. That is after all pretty much the business model of another one of the big tech companies that you've definitely heard of that I've worked for. We euphemistically called it "engagement."
You are spot on with regards to potential abuse by career optimizers. I've been lectured by my doc during prescription for that as well.
Again, as someone who really feels badly affected by this I am of course not a fan of the abuse.
I know there are people who really are suffering and I'm glad that help is available to them. Thanks for reminding me to not lose sight of that very real human element.
Just so you know, (depending on who you read) those with untreated ADHD may live, on average, 10 fewer years than the rest of the population. So if I had to chose between your concerns and 10 better quality years, I know what I'm picking.
> Medical professionals are just speculating at this point when they say it's some kind of neurological disorder rather than just part of the range of physiologically normal brain function.
Where are you getting this from? Any papers? If this is the consensus then I really must not have been paying attention (pun intended)
You seem to have a lot of "observational" experience in a specific setting, but little more knowledge or understanding than the tip of the iceberg "top-5 symptoms". ADHD is an incredibly complex developmental issue. Look at the issues with ADHD and gauging signals from the body, how those affect eating. Look at various issues with sensitivities sensory stimulation. Issues with inhibition and how they permeate behaviours. Reducing ADHD to "focus" is like reducing baseball to throwing a ball around.
Maybe look into some of Dr Russel Barkley's lectures. Some of them are a little dated but mostly accurate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzhbAK1pdPM&t
I don't have a problem with that.
> Where are you getting this from? Any papers? If this is the consensus then I really must not have been paying attention (pun intended)
The burden of proof is on them to show that they are not speculating. Some kind of repeatable physiological test would do nicely.
> You seem to have a lot of "observational" experience in a specific setting, but little more knowledge or understanding than the tip of the iceberg "top-5 symptoms". ADHD is an incredibly complex developmental issue. Look at the issues with ADHD and gauging signals from the body, how those affect eating. Look at various issues with sensitivities sensory stimulation. Issues with inhibition and how they permeate behaviours. Reducing ADHD to "focus" is like reducing baseball to throwing a ball around.
I may have confused you by mistakenly saying the brain is "complicated" when I should have said "complex." What I meant was mind-bogglingly unimaginably confusingly tricky and hard to understand. Also, I don't recall reducing ADHD to "focus," where did I do that? I'm quite curious, what are the top-6-through-10 symptoms that I should be made aware of so I can better understand?
> Maybe look into some of Dr Russel Barkley's lectures. Some of them are a little dated but mostly accurate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzhbAK1pdPM&t
As someone who likes to learn with a bit of an interest in the subject, I'll have a look. Thank you for the reference.
And if you can't get access to them or cannot take them for one reason or another, then you are basically screwed.
One would think if a disorder had such negative impacts, it would be taken with a little bit more seriousness, but alas, that has not been my experience in the US Healthcare system.
It seems to me that system loves to hand out stimulants, then they look for any and every reason to take one off them. But hey, that is just my experience, and I am overly cynical.
- Regarding your co-morbidity, how did you know/decide to seek ADHD treatment and diagnosis? Was it before or after your bipolar diagnosis?
- Was there any concern about med interactions?
I live with my sister, who's bipolar and we think she MAY have ADHD, hence my curiosity.
I was diagnosed ADD as a child (~6 years old) but I wasn’t correctly diagnosed with bipolar until I was 33 after voluntarily seeking treatment on the recommendation of my primary care doctor.
As far as treating the ADHD, my psychiatrist didn’t bother with a formal diagnosis. She just decided to treat the executive function issues I reported.
Medication is trickier. I can’t use the traditional stimulants (or caffeine) without risking mania and panic attacks.
So I’m taking Wellbrutin (an NDRI) which is both an antidepressant and a stimulant. It helps with ADHD, Anxiety, Depression, and sexual side effects from antipsychotics.
I don’t have any major side effects to report than increase in sexual function and keeping me awake for the next 10~12 hours. (So no afternoon naps to recharge.)
And yes, very concerned about giving her any stimulants/mania inducing things. I'm glad to hear that Wellbutrin/NDRIs don't seem to have the same impact on bipolar people as SSRIs do, we'll look into that a bit. (Ironically, I had a terrible Wellbutrin experience. Bodies are weird.)
There's a few genes that have been found to be responsible/correlate strongly i believe but I assume genotyping goes a bit far for common diagnosis.
I'm sure it's not the same for everyone that's diagnosed tho and there's a good amount of misdiagnosis too.
Until there is a more objective way to diagnose ADHD, how can one argue who really has the condition or not? It's not like we humans even remotely understand the brain in its entirety.
If you are referring to the recent Joanna Moncrieff cherry picked literature review that had a press moment, then do some checking to see what her peers said in response. Moncrieff has a well established bias against pharmaceuticals and this is confirmation-bias writ large and has damaged the layman's understanding of what's happening.
There are objective tests for ADHD. You can look at how the brain responds under MRI or ECG to show the depressed activity in the prefrontal cortex. It's not required for diagnosis but anyone who tries neurofeedback or checking/confirming dyspraxia maybe as it relates to other nervous system issues.
What most people don't realise is the way stimulants work in the ADHD brain compared to the non ADHD brain are different. Superlatives like "shockingly" really mischaracterize what's happening and perpetuate a dangerous myth. Mostly based on anecdotes of the short-term effects of high-doses on young neurotypical individuals under stress. It's not the same.
I thought I had ADHD and was frustrated as to why medication made it worse until I discovered I actually have PTSD + crippling anxiety that meant I avoided stability because I didn't trust it and 'flight'/taking on a new identity is one of my preferred 'fight, flight, freeze, fawn' responses. Basically my body only knows how to exist in chaotic environments.
What you describe in an ADHD context might be called "hyperfocus": It's a period of intense focus which you are able to maintain and enjoy cause it stimulates your brain.
But, critically, you are not able to maintain this hyperfocus for longer periods on a single topic as the stimulus of novelty flattens out and you become bored and understimulated and this quickly leads to procastination or switching to something new.
In general during diagnosis (I can attest to Germany), it must be credibly shown that multiple symptopms have been present both during child as well as adult age.
Typical patterns are several aborted apprenticeships or studies, inability to hold steady employment over several years, problems with romantic relationships or long lasting friendships.
The tl;dr is that we think ADHD traits had positive selection pressure for 90% of human history, which is why ADHD is so common. ADHD is actually believed to be dramatically under-diagnosed in certain population slices, like adult women, because the diagnostic criteria was developed based on predominantly male/child subjects.
In the context of scouting for a nomadic hunter-gatherer tribe, ADHD traits seem like a gift.
In the context of modern American society, ADHD traits can lead to strong negative experiences spanning education, career, and relationships. In some contexts (like entrepreneurship), ADHD traits can still be a gift - but I'd hazard a guess that percentage-wise, a larger % of the ADHD population winds up in prison vs. becoming an entrepreneur.
Similar to autism, ADHD is a spectrum neurological disorder. "Disease" is the wrong term to use; "disorder" is the correct medical term. ADHD traits become a disorder they have a negative impact on development (childhood) or negative impact on well-being as an adult.
I can say for short-term focus and motivation it's been life-changing.
I would frequently flip-flop between getting sucked into rabbit-holes and having too many things going on at once. I now find that I can focus on tasks much better throughout the work day. My quality of work has improved as I've been able to better focus my time on what matter.
My doc has warned that over time I likely will need dosage increases, but for now it's been a wonderful experience with very few side effects (headaches the first day or two).
To contrast the other user who replied, I have been on stimulants for 8 years now.
I will say that there is a very notable drop in efficacy. Not enough to justify stopping them all together, but I'd say I get about 50% of the benefit on my best days.
I would consider my current experiences much like that of caffeine. It worked amazingly in the beginning, but now I feel like they are necessary to achieve a baseline sense of normalcy. I could raise the dosage, I suppose, but I do not want to go down that path again because it is just a temporary fix.
Honestly, taking time off stimulants has been more effective than increasing dosages. Most people can stop stimulants with little to no issues, but since I have adapted to them over the years, the withdrawals are pretty fucking uncomfortable and debilitating. Though, according to my medical professional of questionable quality, my experiences are still unusual. Still, I try to take weekends off, and it's been helpful none the less.
Going forward, I am thinking of switching to a non-stimulant, which may be an option for you as well if you are indeed ADHD. Despite how ever effective stimulants may be, I believe I am starting to lose more from them than I am gaining from them. At least where I live, the constant drug-testing and various laws surrounding controlled-substances makes stimulants almost not worth it.
The medications can be life-changing, but in the ADHD community, it's well known that there is a honeymoon phase (it's not uncommon to experience stimulant-induced euphoria), thus the real judge of how effective they are should be determined once that period is over. However, not everyone gets that honeymoon period, but I sure did for a few weeks.
If I must be entirely honest, I think that the medications do help, but I never have thought they helped enough. They make life easier, but not easy, and that is something I think I have really struggled to come to terms with. I went in with expectations of a silver-bullet, but left with a tool. My fair warning would be to be careful what you read about ADHD medications online.
One other point that I feel I should warn others about -- something no one ever told me -- is to not let meds give you enough rope to hang yourself. What I mean is: I built a career and a life while having access to these medications. Recently, there has been a nationwide shortage in my area. Every pharmacy was out of stock -- literally none in my area had anything. Zero. Nada. I was working on a big project at work, and basically had to put the entire thing on hold for three weeks because once I ran out -- I was flat useless. I couldn't believe how much I depended on them to do my work. It caused me a lot of stress and anxiety realizing that I am basically living a variant of the plot of "Flowers for Algernon" and that without these medications, I seriously do not think I could maintain the life I was able to build on them. I am not trying to scare you away, but I feel like it would be dishonest to not include both the good and the bad.
If you have anymore questions, I'd be more than glad to try to answer them.
I've basically found some methods to cope with my weird attention issues but since my methods are so unusual and essential for me to be focused it makes it difficult to work with others or keep up my own self-motivation.
I was wondering if there was a magic pill to solve some of these problems, but you've cleared up that it's a double-edged sword.
Medications very well may alleviate your focus issues too, and you might have entirely different results than I have, but do what you think is right.
I hope my comment did not persuade you not to seek treatment, I just felt it would be dishonest to not share some of the less than favorable aspects.
I was a developer for 4 years after college, but I noticed I was struggling way more than my coworkers and friends in terms of just staying on task in a long term project for more than a few weeks at a time. In the short term I was at least as good as most, but after a while things just became impossible to keep focused on. I constantly asked my manager to be given different tasks or parts of the code to work on. This wasn't terrible because I was useful in many different parts of our code base, but eventually there weren't any parts of our project that I was interested in, and I couldn't see myself being interested in any other role where I had to code for the majority of it. I ended up switching into Software Sales Engineering.
Sales Engineering is, for me right now, the perfect role because I still get to think and work on some technical stuff, but no project is longer than 2-3 weeks which is about right for my ability to focus. There is also a huge dopamine hit at the end of a project because there's a clear endpoint. I'm not one of the Sales Engineers who needs to 'close' I just need to build out demo projects for a client until it's deemed a 'technical success'.
Some short term techniques I've learned for my own mind in just being productive (these were a lot more necessary when I was a developer but I still follow these in some way): * Change my physical working location every 2 hours (COVID has sucked for this, but going to coffee shops and libraries helps a lot) * Drink 1-3 cups of coffee in the morning, and 2-3 cups of tea the rest of the day (I've had to experiment with timings and doses a lot) * Keep a hand-written TODO list and keep my eye on it throughout the day -- For very boring topics or in difficult times, literally write down the scheduled time blocks I will spend on specific topics * Also in very difficult times, I TRY not to look at the computer unless it's to work on my required tasks. Internet to me is seriously more addictive than anything I've experienced
Many patients and providers are both afraid of "dependency." However, what seems to escape me is -- isn't that somewhat of the point?
I depend on the medications to help treat a chronic condition. I see it no different than being dependent on eye-glasses for poor vision.
What many are worried about is the potential for addiction. I do not feel addicted to the medications in the slightest. I do not "crave" them or anything like that. I just crave/am addicted to not fucking up my life any further, and losing what I have barely been able to piece together. I do not feel "high" or feel "good" from these medications. If another medication provided similar level of functionality and was not a stimulant, I'd be on it in a heartbeat (I've heard the non-stimulant options are of dubious efficacy in adults... to say the least).
To answer your questions, does taking weekends off or weeks off help? Well, in the beginning -- yes. Taking weekends off for the first few years was highly effective. I noticed a notable increase in efficacy upon resuming my treatment.
However, something changed down the road once I stopped taking weekends off. I started taking weekends off again, but once I resume treatment, it now takes me like a day or two to "get back" to normalcy while on the treatment. However, the mild side-effects seem to be stronger upon resuming (this was always true).
From what I understand, it takes longer than two days to clear the medication from your system (half-life is around 10-12 hours), so weekends might not be enough time off for me.
As for weeks, I have not taken weeks off in probably 6 years, because I have not been at a point in my life where I have been able to do such. This has more to do with my employment than the medication i.e. the longest I have had off work is 5 consecutive work days in 6 years, so that is the main reason (I need a new job).
Though from what I have discusses with others, taking weeks off here and there is far more effective than weekends off. Current research claims there is no tolerance build-up, and the only tolerance that one acquires is to the negative effects, but I call bullshit.
However, I will leave you with this. I have always felt that these medications were a gigantic help -- especially in the beginning. Though when I look back on my life, things really aren't, nor were they truly ever, "better." I did not magically turn from a struggling developer into a FAANG prodigy. I was your below average, struggling dev in a bottom-of-the-barrel job. After all the time, effort, and treatment, I am still in the same situation.
The doctors handed me a rx and I thought that'd I'd be on my merry way towards achieving the things I wanted in life, but I have come to realize over the years that it's not that simple.
1) Hyperfocus for hours at a time, often forgetting about physical needs like food/drink/bathroom.
2) Extreme trouble getting started on a task (inability to overcome inertia) and constant distraction once started.
3) Switching hobbies, jobs, roles, spouses, etc because the initial stimulation of something new is more rewarding than old interests.
ADHD's symptoms are caused by a deficiency in reward dopamine systems. The "craving" for dopamine is stronger in ADHD brains, which is why impulsive/risky behaviors are common in people with ADHD.
Talk to a medical professional if that resonates. Therapy is also helpful, since the behaviors associated with ADHD can lead to built-up shame / self-doubt.
Medication helps (for me, it was like putting on glasses for the first time), but re-modeling behavior and self-image were equally important for me.
I’ve yet to hear someone describe ADHD in the third way and this thread is the only time I’ve seen folks ever mention it.
My school grades as a kid were fine, but I was studying at least 2 different books at same time because after a single paragraph it was already "boring as hell", even being genuinely intrigued by the problem and the possible outcomes. So to study simple math, multiplication for instance, I had a science magazine open beside to constantly remember the outcomes of studying math (understand astrophysics that apparently is cool), at same time I was studying history with a history book and the cover of Red Alert 2 to remember what can happen if don't understand the outcomes of a possible domination by a authoritarian leader.
So 4 fucking things at same time. All of that to just get a C or B- grade.
I was amazed recently to be able to do just few tasks properly done and managing to rest and remember to eat. Few properly done tasks was usually a result of super/hyperfocus where the toll later was extremely high, like eating lots of garbage food to compensate the lack of food during the previous hours, sometimes as high as 20 straight hours.
Someone with a more neuro-typical brain might not be thrilled about mundane experiences, but can still tolerate the situation.
In an ADHD brain, mundane experiences over-engage areas of the brain associated with physical/emotional distress (amygdala). ADHD brains are also impacted by abnormal dopamine regulation, which affects the reward cycle for accomplishing mundane things.
Here are some comics to help contextualize: https://twitter.com/adhd_alien/status/1182670794633207813
I think one of the reasons so many people showed up to post about ADHD here is this, from the OP:
> Although, it seems quite trivial, for me this is a huge live hurdle
What is the difference between someone who has it and somebody who doesn’t? Where is the line? There is no biological line because we all have these traits.
It is only a disorder of it interferes with how you interact with modern life/society.
Being human is a condition and for some a disorder. Here, have a drug (anything that triggers dopamine)
To be more precise the cliché idea that society is insane and the individual is sane is not really helpful because dysfunction relative to the society is the entire defining aspect of what insanity is.
Go see doctors and therapists, different ones, to get different opinions
Not fitting in our crazy modern world doesn't mean you're "sick"
Amphetamines are addictive and, used as prescribed, you can find yourself with way worse attention and psychological problems. This is especially true if you take them on a daily basis as prescribed. Taken this way, they can lead to chronically depleted adrenals and long term downregulation of your dopamine receptors, which means you’ll feel like shit when you run out of medicine. The road to up-regulating your receptors is long and arduous.
Hopefully you don’t have a problem filling your medicine, as most people who take controlled substances inevitably come across righteous pharmacists who will refuse to fill them (instead, they will tell you they are out of stock).
There are also long term risks such as the development of Parkinson’s disease. Is a little bit of productivity now for your boss worth developing a debilitating disease in retirement? Only you can make that call.
Do you have references?
> There are also long term risks such as the development of Parkinson’s disease
Do you have references?
I have impulsive ADHD. It’s been a great tool but also got me into a lot of trouble.
I never thought I could change who I am. I am right but I could become aware of what I am an try to engage my bigger brain rather than the impulsive part.
Once I started investing in knowing me better rather than just allowing me to be on a seemingly uncontrollable train I could see how certain behaviors could be toxic to me and others.
And forgiving myself.
This mostly came through the enlightenment of having a son who has it and dealing with that whilst having ADHD. And that has been my greatest challenge and success.
Meta cognition. We talk with him about it in a way which isn’t blame or ‘you can’t do that!’ and while there is still a lot of support he is thriving.
Happy to chat offline too
Was based on looking back on my life with a new understanding and then working via therapy on aspects of being.
Then becoming my own therapist and taking time to retrospectively view my actions and behaviors.
Taking action on those epiphanies and acts of vulnerable faith.
Example: with my new boss ‘I have ADHD and I can be brilliant and shit. When you feel me being shit just remind me of this email’
The old reaction would be I might get defensive or try and explain things away.
New reaction or treatment is like a new data point to help me retrain my framework.
Don’t take it as I’m a robot but I catch myself more often than I ever did and if I don’t I have a way of addressing it.
Meditation and understanding the principles of what this is trying to achieve.
I masked some of my symptoms as a child, was diagnosed as an adult, etc., but the symptoms were always there despite my prior ability to function around them.
are there doors that an ADHD diagnosis opens that have a better ROI than, say, graymarket modafinil?
I suppose it depends where you live.
Here is what I can think of off the top of my head:
1. Potential legal protections and academic/workplace accommodations if necessary (US has ADA as an example).
2. Access to potentially more medications (modafinil is not commonly prescribed in the US for ADHD -- even off label)
3. Perhaps less trouble than having to use the Graymarket? Less risk of getting caught? I'm kind of grasping for straws at this moment.
If what you have works, then I guess keep going? Just please be careful. Unregulated areas of markets, healthcare, etc. make me nervous, personally.
With ADHD, it's 'the medication' that is being sold. Often, the doctor's client is actually the amphetamine derivative supplier, and the product being sold (on a commission basis) is the patient.
Amphetamine addiction results in the patient feeling bad when they run out of their powerful stimulant drugs, and the resulting feelings of malaise tend to confirm the patient's belief that they have a neurological disorder (rather than just suffering from the standard set of problems that come with regular amphetamine use).
It blows my mind that especially in American society we are so accepting of putting millions of people on amphetamines to solve attention disorders. Anyone who has gone through higher-ed in the past 10 years knows a huge number of students are on these meds, and even if they suffer some of attention disorder, they are likely at a large advantage after adding the drugs. I'd love to see the percentage of med school students on these drugs.
Talk therapy is incredibly important. People with ADHD can often suffer from rejection dysphoria and depending on how long until they realise, or how self aware they are, they end up internalising a lot of negative opinions and shame about themselves that needs to be unwound. There are a lot of issues around the pain of "never fitting in" or being understood. Some of these are a result of behaviours that aren't the social norm and so they become marginalised. Others are where differences in processing and learning information are labeled as "stupid" at a young age, when the child probably has a similar IQ to their peers.
Neurofeedback can be used with good success to help "rewire" particular issues with emotion dysregulation for instance. It can be expensive and requires a lot of time to train the brain to a different mode of operation.
Coaching, specifically around time-management and task-management. A lot of people with ADHD suffer from time-blindness. Their perception and relationship with time can be.... complicated. Calendars, specifically having a rigid system for what goes on them, regularly reviewing them, keeping them and a large easy to read clock visible at all times etc can really help.
A good water bottle with a straw. No one really knows why but there are a lot of hypotheses. - One thing that never gets mentioned is the relationship between ADHD and food. Generally the nervous system does a pretty terrible job at letting an ADHD person know, when they are hungry, when they are thirsty, when they need the bathroom. Combined with time-blindness, maybe some stress induced hyper-focus because you're falling behind on whatever you need to do, ADHDers will suddenly realise they've missed lunch and binge eat simple food that doesn't require preparation. Preparing a meal would be akin to telling someone with a deadline to just go run a quick marathon first. It'll feel like one or the other, and in some cases, depending on energy levels it will be. - but back to the water bottle. Using the straw means you don't divert your gaze from what you are doing. Your brain doesn't have to judge how full it is and tilt the glass accordingly, if it's big you don't have to get up to refill it. Frictionless hydration.
I am diagnosed with ADHD and I consume unhealthy amounts of sugar in form of chocolate, gummy bears and ice cream. I wonder if...
A) all that sugar creates a gut microbiome that facilitate ADHD symptoms or if
B) the general impulsiveness and higher-than-usual glucose demand from the brain create the sugar cravings, or if
C) it's some kind of feedback loop and bad habits get reinforced to the point of addiction
Chocolate will release serotonin but you need to binge quite a lot of it.
The large portion of people taking stimulant ADHD medication to "study" are not by and large getting the same effect as those with ADHD get. For someone with ADHD the medication balances attention dysregulation, that is curbing hyper-focus, and attention "drift" while on a task. It doesn't temporarily turn you into some superhuman memoriser or Ernest Hemingway. It's not some magical potion buff. For those using it to stay awake to cram more low quality hours of memorisation in, they most likely have good memories to begin with, that's how they got there in the first place, it doesn't enhance their abilities.
The only advantage those with ADHD get is that they finally get to play on a level playing field. That's like saying those who wear glasses are at an unfair advantage in a "spot the difference" exam. Give me a break.
My point is that we don't really know what this disorder is, or its root causes. An ECG can reveal its presence in the same way an EKG can reveal certain arrhythmia. However, in the case of EKG, you can't truly determine the cause of arrhythmia; is it cardiomyopathy, fibrosis, stenosis, a combination, etc. Now imagine trying to make the same leap of faith with the brain which is infinitely more complex, less studied, and less understood. Follow that up with a draconian treatment such as amphetamine prescription. Yikes
My prediction is that ADHD as a term will either be scrapped or used an umbrella as we learn more about the nuance and complexity of attention disorders. Making broad claims about what ADHD is and how medications can potentially treat it, at this point in time, is totally ridiculous.
Are we really going to pretend that the millions of Americans prescribed these drugs are actually suffering from ADHD to the point that pharmacology is a necessary intervention?
My point is that unfortunately these medications are still used as primary treatment.
https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/adhd/data.html
Edited for context.
Trying to make the case that ADHD is not well studied is plain wrong. It is incredibly well studied. The assumption that we can't possibly understand it because "it's the brain" is just wrong, there is a huge amount we know about the brain. I don't know what you're getting at with this ECG business but we've been doing EEGs on people to diagnose epilepsy for 60+ years.
ADHD is already understood as a incredibly nuanced and complex set of issues, the fact that so many people continually reduce ADHD to just "attention" or "focus" shows how little is known or understood about it by people who want to draw some tenuous observational links to... what ends... I don't know? Why do you care? A tiny number of people who actually suffer ADHD would agree with anything you are saying, forgetting the just plain false statements and leaving the opinions they were trying to reverse some support for. ADHD is about dysregulation of emotion, impulse and yes, attention but much more than that, it's about how those fundamental differences effect every damn facet of your life in the most pernicious way and require you to spend more effort and energy to keep up, or fit in, or look normal or to remove you and protect you.
I can't talk to the American system (remember there's a whole world with decent healthcare out there) but just because one country has an issue with misdiagnosis and overprescription, doesn't change anything. What's your point. There are also plenty of non pharmacological interventions. Many that I can claim back through my national health care.
You're conflating to many associated but not actually linked issues and it's unsubstantiated rants like these that perpetuate the stigmatisation of those living with ADHD. You're not helping anyone.
When talking to people diagnosed with ADHD, the diagnosis was accompanied by a mix of behavioral therapy, medication, lifestyle changes, and external support from teachers/friends/family.
Drug-seeking behavior is something else altogether, which I agree is a net-negative on both society AND people with ADHD. Regulations around ADHD medication make the medication ironically very difficult to obtain for anyone with an executive function disorder. People without an executive function disorder have no problem jumping through the extra regulatory hoops.
The only thing I can say for anyone reading this is to know that everyone has symptoms of ADHD from time to time. Clinical diagnosis looks over your entire life history for consistency of symptoms. So keep that in mind.
I can tell you where I am it's only just being realised how _under-diagnosed_ it is for those with primarily internal presentation. Those who are diagnosed later in life have often survived due to above average intelligence and internalising debilitating coping mechanisms their entire lives that finally buckle under the strain of large, stressful life events in adulthood (children, divorce, financial stress, change to managerial work etc.)
To the second paragraph: Maybe in the US, and that's unfortunate but a lot of places in the world they are controlled drugs requiring a psychiatric diagnosis, sometimes with an EEG maybe a drug test.
Common stimulants like Adderall, Ritalin, dexamphetamines, work on the ADHD brain differently. Running out at normal prescribed doses in line with your condition won't result in "withdrawal" or malaise as a result of stopping. Any malaise is probably comorbid depression, which is common for those who have been undiagnosed. Often the ADHD is misdiagnosed as depression when the depression is merely the symptom.
I'm not sure what you are trying to get at in your final point but by this stage it's clear you have some deep biases with little to back-up your observations and are perpetuating the views that stigmatise ADHD sufferers.
As someone who was diagnosed with ADHD in my 40s, it was a great relief and surprise at how effective stimulants work. I have struggled my entire life, and have burned myself out multiple times trying to maintain a balance in my life. There's a huge mental burden every day. Trying to remember what you need to do, remember the best strategies to stay on track, spiking anxiety, feelings of guilt and shame, which can spiral into depression.
These sorts of judgement statements, dismissive words from family or friends, and indifference from the public over mental health has kept many people from seeking treatment for a very wide range of issues.
We need more empathy towards the fact that mental health IS health. We need more insurance support for these issues (because it's expensive!). Furthermore, we need more empathy and support towards those that do get addicted to ANYTHING. Addiction is not limited to drugs.
Starting with the assumption that people are drug abusers is damaging, and is entirely faulty.
>Starting with the assumption that people are drug abusers is damaging, and is entirely faulty.
I don't think many people hold this view regarding ADHD-medicated individuals. The scrutiny, at least mine, is aimed at the doctors who readily tell parents that their child has this disorder without much testing, and then scribble a vyvanse script like it's no big deal.
I'm also wondering why you believe doctors are writing scripts for ADHD medications willy-nilly, then sending patients on their merry way. In my experience, the opposite is true:
When someone with ADHD moves across state lines in the US, their new general practitioner doctor typically needs confirmation from an in-state psychiatrist (MD) before they'll write a prescription - even if you've been taking the same medication at the same dosage for years prior. GPs sometimes require that the patient be undergoing therapy too, which is a lot to coordinate on top of a cross-state move. Therapists are also licensed at the state level.
This isn't because GPs are trying to be hard-asses, but because there are strict federal regulations on prescribing ADHD medications in the US.
I had same symptoms as above but for me it was not ADHD but bad employers. Even hobbies are stable now.
If any of those apply, that's something you're good at, even if it doesn't feel it. Sometimes being good at something just means feeling like something isn't a challenge for you, when it is a challenge for most other people around you.
If you are working on software and your interest lies in physical world, start building hardware/software for it. You will suck at it. It won't make an impact. But it will free you from your lack of focus. It is just about chasing dreams! No one is stopping you from doing that. Also, take job as job and not as passion. The whole idea, if you work on what you love, then you never have to work in your life is bullshit. Once you start working on what you love, it is still work. Only difference is motivation. You will get motivation if you follow your deep desires.
Also make promise to yourself to not abandon this one desire in middle of the way. And stick with it to the end. Whatever pops up in your head after you decide on it, add it to your someday list. And keep pursuing things slowly while you are enjoying. Never forget to enjoy what you are doing!
Use that list to double check against any opportunity you're deciding to pursue, aiming for things that primarily give you energy.
To figure out what you may want to pursue, another helpful exercise is listing 3 people you'd like to be like, and 3 companies/roles you'd like to do for work.
Lastly the Ikigai framework can be used as well to double check your decision.
With the combination of these, I think that's one of the fastest ways to discovery (for your current abilities), since it will help you find what you like and what is sustainable which usually leads to inevitable mastery
If that sounds relatable then this may help: Creative energy and motivation works like a finite resource. Instead of spending every waking minute working on your new hobby/project because a) it's fun and b) you fear that the motivation is going to fade again, you need to force yourself to only use up a little bit of that energy each day, so that you have enough time to build a habit.
It's very counterintuitive, and I had a lot of difficulties doing it. But it has worked quite well for me. Discovering a new hobby and doing nothing else for the next few days is actually one of the worst things you can do. It will almost certainly result in you losing interest.
(Also what you're describing is very common in people with ADHD. I'm not suggesting or implying anything here, but it might be a worthwhile idea to check out some of the other common symptoms and see if you heavily relate to them as well. There's a very high chance that you don't have adhd, but I thought I'd still mention it.)
Needless to say that these ideas usually didn't lead to anything and in a lot of cases where replaced by "the next great idea", leaving me with tons of projects that had received as much attention as a single day in some cases. But ostensibly, that didn't feel like a problem, because by then I had already moved on to something else that excited me... for a little while.
What never happened was actual progress, neither in any of these "project" not on my "thesis" which I was always more than happy to put on the back burner.
But then (much too late), I realized the pattern I had falled prone to. What helped me in the end to finish my thesis was the following: instead of starting any new project head of heels the day it popped into my head, I started writing new ideas down on "for later"-list. I really wanted to finish my thesis, and although I found it very hard at first, I forced myself to not implement anything new until I after I submitted.
When I was finally done with my thesis, I had probably somewhere between 20 and 30 items on my list, and I was excited to be finally "allowed" to go back to them.
Well, as you may have guessed, it turned out that none of these "great ideas" interested me any more by then. So I never actually picked any of them up. But had I started on any of them right away as it had been my earlier habit, countless hours would have been burned, and I would inevitably reached the same lack of interest.
So, my recommendation is not to jump from project to project too quickly. The problem is not dropping a stalled effort, but too eagerly starting something new. The biggest project had been my thesis all this time, and I really had to learn to stick it out.
And I'm glad I did it.
“I believe in bumbling around long enough to not give up at things. And eventually success comes your way, because you tried to fail in every possible way, the only way that’s left is the one successful way, and always, for entrepreneurs, seems to come last." - Vinod Khosla, cofounder, SUN Microsystems
Just a couple of feel good books disguised as pop science to quickly read through ..
* Cal Newport's So Good They Can't Ignore You on the value of skills over passion and identifying what makes you valuable to others (instead of what you think), he defines "competence" as "feeling that you are good at what you do." It's a good overview of skill acquisition.
* Little Bets by Peter Sims will give you the grace to reframe your "jumping around" as a series of "little bets" of "discovery" and "inquisitiveness", not based on a particular skill or talent but on problem solving and interest, a curious, restless displeasure with how things are. A great book for wandering professional souls.
So my vote is keep jumping around, find interesting problems to you and work on them, develop some methods of having your competence evaluated by others, join (or lead!) "professional communities" to find and commune with likeminded folks, stay restless and hungry.
If on the other hand you really want to focus on one thing, sign up for a modestly expensive professional exam in the not too far future and an obligation to teach or share what you have learned for that exam publicly. I find it's a great motivator to be beholden to others to understand something well enough to motivate others to learn what you have.
https://80000hours.org/articles/dont-follow-your-passion/
80,000 Hours is a nonprofit organization providing free resources to people to find best opportunities to have a positive impact on the world. I think that if one's occupation has a clear positive impact on others, it is easier to get excited about doing it (and doing it well).
One of three important aspects to life/work satisfaction (and motivation), according to the well-researched Self Determination Theory is "relatedness" - feeling like you're contributing to welfare of others (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-determination_theory ).
Agree. Work could, and mostly will, get your passion away. Work, for me is about sense. If work doesn't make sense to you, don't do it.
https://www.gallup.com/cliftonstrengths/
Edit: It's a paid service the product links are here:
https://www.gallup.com/cliftonstrengths/en/253868/popular-cl...
I've bought both, but 99% of the value for me was in the top 5.
But jokes aside I've recently found this gem of a channel - https://www.youtube.com/c/HowtoADHD I don't think I have ADHD myself, maybe "a little" whatever that means, but it has some very good advice for people that struggle with this a lot, and if it helps them, I guess it will be effective for people with less severe conditions too!
Aside from that I think the iconic essay from Paul Graham has stayed with me and helped me guide direction decisions, when I've been conscious enough to think about big picture stuff - http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html Moral of the story for me was not to "find the one true thing" as I'm sure there would be plenty in my life - its not "short" as people say. It's more "does this thing open more doors / options for me" or "does this things narrow my options" ... and choose accordingly.
I took an aptitude test administered by the Johnson O’Connor Research Foundation[0] and the results were interesting and somewhat new to me. Of the many different potential career paths it indicated I would be good at, I chose design, and a few years later graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Graphic Design/Visual Communication.
I was pretty OK as a design student, with a definite natural knack for it and learned skills that built on top of that foundation, so I tried my best to get a design job. With my web background, however, I got two contract gigs to write code instead, and then dove in after realizing I could succeed even without a CS degree. It’s been a decade now and I’m a reasonably senior software engineer who’s worked on a bunch of different stuff, and I love it.
My design background still comes in handy from time to time, especially the general problem solving skills I learned. It’s also a nice complementary set of skills for someone working on the web. And I probably wouldn’t have had that experience without the aptitude test that suggested I might be good at design.
Sure, I’m merely my own sample size of one, but that’s made me a big believer in aptitude testing results as useful information.
- Deep Work, and anything by Cal Newport (You can get a taste of most of his ideas for free on his blog and podcast)
- The Art of Learning. Note that he “jumped around“ at the peak of his original career, but ended up finding a common thread. To your dilemma, a major take away is that single domain can have nearly infinite novelty if you keep looking deeper
- moonwalking with Einstein: this will seem unrelated, but really listen for how The author ends up falling in love with this weird hobby. Can you find that love for anything in your life?
- Misbehaving (Richard Thaler): A young economist bumbles around for years until it starts to come together into a coherent research direction.
- The age of Wonder (Holmes): biographies of romantic scientists, know how different they all are, and also how many different phases of life they each have. I guarantee you you will see yourself in one of them, I just don’t know which
Though I do not have a book for it, my final piece of advice is to except that even the “right“ path will have some boring or even painful stretches. I don’t have a clear cut decision rule for when to stick with it, but it’s definitely not “quit immediately”. I think there’s a book called The Dip about that. Also like Adam Savage YouTube channel where you can see essentially endless hours of the sky who is definitely doing what he is passionate about, but also gets frustrated all the time when things break and such. He’s making physical things, even successful projects take many tedious hours. But there’s no question in his mind that he is going to power through.
I'm in a similar boat and for me the issue with switching activities/hobbies/jobs is that I feel unsatisfied with the lack of results that focused people achieve.
A couple of years ago (I'm 43 now) I found a way to balance focus with curiosity. I made a deal with myself that when I embark on a project, whatever it is, I will finish it. I will permit myself to do something else (if I feel like it) once I'm done with that thing, but I won't let my curiosity prevent me from finishing stuff.
I've found that all projects I embark on only satisfy my curiosity in the first say 30% of the project. After that it's just boring work which I have force myself to do. The interesting thing is that when I'm reaching the end of the project I get excited again. And when I finish, I honestly feel all the effort and grinding has been worth it. Understanding these phases I go through really helps me push through the grinding phase.
Seriously, stop trying to be focused and give yourself permission to enjoy life. This is key, giving yourself permission. Right now you are trying to hustle, you are trying to optimize, but you need to give yourself permission to just stop trying to optimize everything.
Explore, try new things, and don't settle on anything. Just live.
Most importantly, go out and try new things. Even things you might not otherwise have wanted to try. There are countless free classes out there where you can go spend a couple hours after work and learn something new. You don't have to stick it out, but this gets you out of the house and trying new things without any expectation. You'll meet new people, and while you might not make new friends, you might as well.
This is from personal experience. I believe you need to give yourself permission to just exist. Taking time off is pointless if you don't give yourself permission to just relax and enjoy.
Anyways, that's what helped me.
I met my wife, we fell head over heels for each other, and she's been my girlfriend or wife for 25+ years now.
Lesson: Find something you are passionate about and chase it.
In my professional career, I've worked in many places, I've been a systems programmer working in the kernel, I've been a UI guy. I've worked in React, I've been C coder.
My specialization is: Having been there and done that. Being able to do many things is a strength. You can adapt as your role changes, which is essential. Because if I've learned anything in 25+ years of software development: You job will change. You will change. Be ready to change with them.
Rather than focusing on 1 thing or a couple of things, develop skills for learning and exploring. If you aren't good at reading, do more of that. Learn to love it. Having good skills for reading and comprehension are probably the most important skills you can develop and will pay you dividends hand over fist. It may seem trivial, but I think people tend to underestimate the importance of having good reading skills! Hot on the heals of reading is developing strong problem solving skills. They will help you develop crucial critical thinking skills. Root cause analysis - conditioning yourself to immediately strip any problem/subject down to it's component parts - and being familiar enough with a subject to deconstruct it fully. Whenever there is a new subject, or especially with technology or a new thing to learn I hang out in support forums and try to answer other people's questions about said technology/subject. I have found no faster way to develop expertise in something than forcing myself to learn it inside-out than by trying to support others in answering their questions.
If you develop the skills to adapt/learn/grow then whether or not you are good at one thing is irrelevant. You can be good at adapting and rapidly learning new things, which is far more important in the long run.
Also, while it doesn't answer your question of how, this reinforces that trying to do is a very good idea. It's a podcast episode of Tim Ferris interviewing Adam Robinson (he was friends with Bobby Fischer, the chess player). The entire episode is very much worth listening to, but a key quote:
> I think the American psychologist Maslow said if your only tool is a hammer, you view every problem as a nail. I would flip that and say that the geniuses have very limited toolsets. They have a hammer and they’re geniuses in looking for nails. That’s their genius. They have a very limited skill set but they master it and apply it incredibly well. I’m reminded of the movie Karate Kid. Where it’s wax on, wax off, sand the floor and then he had that crane kicky move, and he won the California State Championship on the base of those three.
Full quote/episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSyMmleisQM&t=31m06s
Then again I also have some form of ADHD (diagnosed). I can generally hyperfocus on things like programming, but for other things (like outdoor hobbies) I become obsessive, then burned out, and then I just always return to programming. My entire life is biased through this lens so take it with a grain of salt.
Perhaps try to nail down what the underlying issue is?
From the sounds of it you have tried various things and each has failed to click for one reason or another.
From personal experience when in those situations there has usually been something lacking or that needed changing that I tried to 'fix' by constantly changing external factors which of course failed to resolve anything since the underlying cause wasn't addressed.
There's always first a phase of getting good at something - which took time and effort, regardless of whether it was conscious effort or not.
When people think they simply are good at something, that usually means, that they did NOT have to put in conscious effort to get started. But they still put in some effort, even if they didn't really notice it.
How much effort (conscious or not) any individual is going to need to get good at anything, can vary a lot. But more importantly, for most people the amount of effort does not really matter, when they enjoy something and are passionate about it.
The important thing to note here is, that there's a positive feedback loop. If you enjoy doing something, you will get better at it - and getting better at doing something makes you enjoy it more.
When it comes to work and jobs though, the whole setup surrounding the actual work (the hamster wheel of weekly work times, company politics, pressure to perform etc.) can really hurt the passion though.
Finding something you like doing and find easy to get better at is typically the easy part. Finding a work place that doesn't suck the fun out of it... that's more difficult. At least in my experience.
Maybe someone with discipline is different from me, but I can't "stay focused", I either "am focused" or not.
I don't think anyone is supposed to look for a single thing to stick with, that sounds sick..
If you happen upon a thing and you can't let it down, you've found it.. But maybe you never will, maybe your talent is not a single thing.
(1) Range: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/41795733-range
The book describes the advantages that generalists have and how they can get the most of them, and basically says that specialization is somewhat overrated. As a fellow generalist I found it uplifting and encouraging.
(2) Stolen Focus: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57933306-stolen-focus
This book is all about focus, why it's hard to maintain focus and what you can do to improve it. Candidly it's a bit discouraging, because many of the conclusions are that the problem is environmental and there's not a ton that individuals can do about it. But for me, it's still very reassuring and empowering to recognize the environmental problems around me and know how they are affecting my ability to focus.
I think you'd find reading those to be very helpful and time well-spent :)
Sometimes, we overthink stuff. It is okay to be however you approach things. You don't need to be exactly (skilled/good/whatever) like the people you see. I found that, if I stopped thinking too much, and stopped worrying about a specific version of me I have in mind, I just _be_ and end up doing something spontaneous, and leads me to a state I did not originally plan for.
Professionally, I studied computers, and I worked to find my way within the field. Tries being a consultant, software developer, people manager etc to realise that I didn't like any of them, and then stuck to caring for systems and how they work which has been the fascinating part all along. Now, I work as an SRE. Happy to come to work, and inching forward on being a good SRE everyday. I do have a big imposter thought when I listen to talks/ works of other SREs, but this is me. I know and can do things they probably can't.
Hobbies wise, I think the best ones are organic, and happen by a bit of chance + social effect. I ended up playing with a few wood working tools at a garage of my friends' when I was a teenager, and it was always a good memory. When I was away from home, living alone in the US, and had lot of time in my hand after work, I found a local community wood workshop and went there for a woodworking class. It gave me a good time, and I ended up visiting more and more often. I have now been woodworking for the last 12 years, and it is one of those hobbies that make me forget about the rest of the world, when I am focussing and working on a project. I religiously visit my woodshed for 5 hours every Saturday, and it is my time where I can build something tangible and feel the sense of accomplishment without caveats.
Just sharing my experience in case it helps you.
For the vast majority of activities (especially those considered viable work), it will not be immediately obvious to you that you love it enough to stick. You must put an unspecified quantity of time and effort into it to figure out if it has legs... Also with these things you tend to be able to keep extracting and discovering new enjoyment from the activity as you get better - that is, if it's truly a good fit. Unfortunately it's not even this simple, because what you do is affected by context, i.e what you love and hate can be easily conflated with where or why or who you are doing it with, which is something else you come to appreciate over time.
I think this is the critical detail left out of the commonly given advice "find what you love to do"... you don't really "find" it, you have to develop it by trying different things enough to see which one sticks.
I eventually made it into the software industry, but things never felt right. I would force myself to focus, changed jobs many times, and generally found it unrewarding.
I finally realized I should be doing what I already knew I was interested in and started making games. The hard part was peeling away the cultural brainwashing that prevented me from doing it in the first place.
Now I can’t believe I ever needed focus hacks. I can enter a flow state the moment I sit in front of the computer because it _matters_ (to me). There are still times when my inner dialogue starts to pester me with negativity, but I remind myself that in my heart of hearts I love what I do.
Do you have something deep down you know you want but avoid because it’s not “the proper thing”?
Perhaps someone could have helped Leonardo Da Vinci (painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, architect) with that. Maybe already you know a lot of stuff which will one day come together. Being a specialist is great if your specialisation has legs, not so otherwise.
I would think trying new things and finding one you're good at, or passionate about and can improve on, would work.
I'm not really good at anything. I'm above average in quite a few things. I'm fine with that (at least at a hobbies level). Once you get good at something, you realize that there are still many others who are better than you. It's exceedingly rare to be the best in the world at anything. So a lot is perspective.
I also struggle with the work side though. I don't feel like an expert in anything. Even though I have 10 years of experience (at the same company no less), my career feels like there's no continuity - just forget everything and start over on the new team/tech/problem. I'd like to get to a place where I'm expert enough to be comfortable or not stressed and be paid much better. I have no solution to that.
It's taking time to talk to other people and hearing that people are happy and successful doing all sorts of different things.
It's recognizing the core values that make you feel fulfilled.
An interesting exercise is to take breaks from certain areas (probably more feasible with hobbies than with career), journal regularly and think wider than you're used to. If everything you have tried career wise is in software (for example) why not pick up a book about psychology, philosophy, languages, hardware etc.
It's also worth considering that every scenario will have some form of stress attached, one of the questions to ask is what types of stress are you willing to work through to gain from.
Again this advice may or may not be relevant to you, all the best with your journey on it!
Since the thing you can control is how much time and effort you put in, the main question you should answer is: what is the thing that you enjoy very much that has a good potential for earning an income? If you love spending time on it, the probability that you spend enough time on it that you become good at it is dramatically increased, and you avoid much misery. Once you find something, you then have to take a leap of faith and stick with it, spending as much time on it as you possibly can, until you are good at it and can make a good income (or you are forced to give up). Good luck!
How to fail at nearly everything and still win big by Scott Adams. Good for reframing the jumping around you're prone to from goals that you succeed or fail at to systems that simply work.
The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. Good for sticking with a project when the going gets rough (and understanding why it will).
Cautionary tale: I am a data scientist and love working with numbers. I fell into a job that required me to create educational videos about data science. I discovered that I am very good at narrating and creating educational videos.
People loved these videos! I was even told I should offer my services as a part-time voice actor due to my narration skills. More and more requests for videos kept piling in.
Meanwhile, all I wanted to do was get back to writing code. I didn't mind creating the videos but I found them draining. Analytics is truly what makes me happy and excited to start work in the morning. A career is a marathon and if you're not optimizing for what fills your cup every day, you will quickly burn out.
Do what makes you happy!
More concretely, when you're by yourself and without external pressure, what activity do you find yourself pursuing most? Examples: writing, learning a language, reading books, programming, playing music, etc.
In terms of a book teaching this, there's a Japanese book "How to find what you want to do". I'm not aware of an English translation but this Youtube video (by Ruri Omaha) has a decent summary: "how to find out what you want to do in life - watch this if you feel lost"
There is a recent article on min-maxing and optimising life as much as we can: https://ofdollarsanddata.com/why-you-shouldnt-optimize-your-...
But life is a not a math equations. There is also a concept of wu-wei called effortless action. Something that we do that doesn't feel like work and we just pursue our energy or flow without even realising it.
That is essentially the magic.
My understanding is I don't know what I want to do. I drift by and try to grab at whatever that keeps me floating for a while, and then drift away when it is no longer interesting.
I kinda gave up fixing this and believe it has a lot to do with gene or luck. Some people (think Carmack) just know what they want to do for LIFE so they start early, have laser focus amd achieve great things. They are born to do great things.
I gave up. I will never achieve a fraction of whatever they do even in spare time. Fuck it, I gave up. And I'm 40 so there is even barely enough energy to keep daily chores float.
Keep in mind that at the beginning of a new project or hobby we all go through a "learning phase" in which the effort put does not correspond with a lot of value obtained. Process can be slow, mistakes frequent. That's normal. Look not only where you are now, but where you could end up, and ask yourself if that's where you want to be.
Naturally my feeling was that this is way to much for one individual to be good at and I felt I had to pic one.
Nearly two decades later I still haven't picked one and I am excellent in a few of these at the same time. I managed to create a freelance job in film post production and web stuff that paid well and covered many of those fields, with many of the intersection being fruitful.
When I was doing the sound editing for movies with directors, I could use my own experience as a director, as a DOP and as a student of film science to talk about certain aesthetical decisions with them, all while being the guy who knows how a preamp is structured on a circuit level. People booked me precisely because I know how to technically make it work and have the artistic experience both in picture and sound.
Then during corona it shifted more towards backend programming, electronics and media tech. But having a pool of abilities is not a bad thing.
If you are the type that can make it work of course. I have always been faster than average at learning and understanding new things. The most important thing is that the things you do go into, are things you like doing. And it is totally okay to split your money earning from that.
I know guys who lead a perfectly happy life by working in social care and make art and music in their spare time. There is a few happy ones that made their passion their profession and are happy with it, there is a lot of people who have no discernable interest at all, besides going on vacation or partying. There is people who always worked in tech only to realize they like working with people more or the other way around.
Find out who you are, what you are good at. Ask friends and family what they honestly think you are good at and figure out if there is a gap between how you see yourself and how others perceive you.
Most frontend developers have never seen Haskell, so they don't even know what programming paradigms they are missing out on.
Also, there's nothing inherently wrong with cutting your losses and quitting a project that isn't working as you had hoped.
In the end, I stuck with a project long-term because I liked the team. So maybe that's your antidote: build stuff together with others.
Hell, considering that JavaScript has some of it sprinkled on top I would say that on average they had more exposure to some of its concepts than people who never touched frontend.
Even if you are never good at something, you should enjoy the things you suck at instead of be miserable trying to be good at things you don't even like.
I was very good at biology, it was effortless and natural. But more school and messing with people's meat was all too gross.
I suppose the sweet spot is when you are tolerably competent at something and you also really enjoy that thing.
You work on being a better person everyday and you'll find exactly what you're good at through the process.
Some people might call this practicing "philosophy". It's really just about getting to "know thyself".
I wrote a whole book on this that released last month. Would love to give you a copy to see if it would help you.
1. Created 1 to 3 goals that I want to accomplish in the next 1, 5, and 10 years. 2. Evaluated all my activities. 3. Eliminated all activities that aren't actively driving me towards those goals.
Once I eliminated superfluous junk from my life, I felt a lot more focused.
I googled "what hidden skills do i have" and found other people looking into this question as well.
Getting good at something takes time. If your first discover what you like, i.e, what motivates you, inspires you, energizes you. Then, getting really good at it will come im time and be tempered by your natural talent.
Perhaps what you could potentially be the best at is not something you even like - and what’s the point in that?
What is it with these projects, hobbies, and jobs that disinterest you? What are you avoiding?
Armchair-ing: Maybe you are in the cycle of having higher expectations than what you can create? Avoiding creating a project to finish as the result is not what you had set your expectation to?
So my theory is: if you like it, do it and do it more.
Also, you don’t actually have to be good at anything. Just be good at being.
These were constructing things (first from plasticine, then from MEccano-like sets), reading, and then hacking computer. Generally, those are still things I can do for hours and even days.
The good thing is you are exploring a lot. And exploration never ends until you begin to enjoy getting tired.
I empathize with the stresses relating to short employment stints and unfinished projects; however, if you asked me if I'd rather be a lifer at IBM or a state agency, I'd run away screaming.
Maybe just go with the flow and focus on things you enjoy?
https://www.newyorker.com/sports/sporting-scene/complexity-a...
- apply it in other adjacent fields - gain more autonomy and creativity - craft the work-life you want
I recommend reading -- So Good They Can't Ignore you by Cal Newport, read it!
That's my approach, anyway!
You're probably not naturally good at anything in any meaningful sense.
You're going to have to work hard to be good (in a meaningful sense) at anything worth being good at.
So what things do you enjoy cultivating your skills?
If you don't enjoy practicing guitar - you're never going to be a guitar virtuoso - because you're never going to want to pick up your guitar and practice.
The two things I'm pretty good at are wrestling and public speaking. I'm good at wrestling because I spent 8 years doing it in high school and college. I'm good at public speaking because I spent 10 years doing it in college and after college. I was pretty bad at both of these things when I started. The only advantage I had was that I was willing to push myself and I enjoyed them enough to keep doing them.
Anything related to those two things I tend to be better than the average person at them. But anyone who has focused on some subset of those things for a significant period of time will likely be better than me.
TLDR: Dont focus on finding something you are good at. Focus on finding something you like, keep doing it, and eventually you will be really good at it.
Maybe if you stick with one thing you'll become really good at it. Most (maybe all) people aren't inherently really good at anything.
Also, and possibly a lot more painful to answer: What attachment style are you?
There is no need of focus, if something pulls you more, you will know.
Very few people are born with useful skills.
as funny and short as it is, it's absolutely spot on
Also, question your assumption that you need to find 1 thing and devote most of your time to it. Why? What's your goal?
If it's enjoyment, why 1 thing? If it's money, you only need to choose the highest paying profession that you can tolerate.
I like music. Music makes bad money. I'm not good at music. I don't look for music jobs.
I like tech stuff. Ops stuff makes decent money. I'm good at ops stuff. I do ops stuff.
I like tinkering with hardware. It can make decent money but hard to find a job in. I do it as hobby
2) what activity bores you the least ? could it be turned into a job ?
3) filling in an ikigai diagram ( https://becomingbetter.org/ikigai/ ) could help you find some professional compass
I've been hearing this a lot recently, and while I don't doubt that there are people who are affected by ADHD, it seems to me that the condition can very easily be treated as an excuse. Certainly people without ADHD can get distracted, and someone with ADHD wouldn't be indistractable if they didn't have ADHD, right? So how do you distinguish between cases where ADHD is actually the cause and where someone uses it as an excuse (e.g. there was this guy on Twitter recently who claimed he could only use Twitter and not a blog because of AHDH, which sound like an excuse for some other behaviour to me)?