Digital consumption keeps me from getting better at my job
sibervepunk.com
sibervepunk.com
Author sounds young .. yes, absolutely try to consume less and create more, it's way more life-affirming than the opposite configuration, but:
Getting better at your job, like everything else in life, is just a function of time. Show up, and then show up consistently. Put in the time. Be patient. Lead with an open mind and an open heart -- opportunities go to those who are present way more often than those who aren't. Willingly take on shitty jobs, do them well, and you'll find yourself being trusted with bigger and better jobs. Learn when to be the worker bee and when to be the queen bee. Say "yes" until you're truly able to say "no". Try to accept that, at the end of the day, things don't matter as much as you think they might -- I'm talking about projects, stress, deadlines, shit that floods your veins with cortisol. The only thing people will truly remember is how you made them feel during a crisis, not the minutiae of what you actually contributed -- and those personal relationships will be the gasoline in the engine of your career.
I really believe people will go far if they focus on this kind of stuff, and way less on structured self-improvement, productivity hacking, finding "secrets", shortcuts via programs, seminars, coaches, and tools, and all that shallow, nutritionless baloney.
Also, it's "Slow is smooth and smooth is fast".
I agree with most sentiments here except this. Most of what I feel towards colleagues and the ones I look back respecting the most were the ones that had great contributions, either in emergency situations or in the nick of time, or simply good day in and day out. Some of them are considered assholes by the more softly inclined, but I know proper assholes and those weren't it.
I agree with your general point about relationships being the most important, but I disagree that your contributions don't matter. You need to have at least some good contributions combined with good relationships.
Through my career I've encountered a lot of coworkers who were fun to be around but either produced very little or had poor quality output. The value of their good vibes declines as the consequences of their low output and/or poor code quality accumulate on the team's shoulders.
You also see this a lot when vetting employee referrals. A lot of people will enthusiastically refer friends and people they like being around, but who are not necessarily great contributors. These people seek referrals at a disproportional rate because, well, they tend to be laid off more frequently and might struggle to get through job interviews through normal channels.
Employees will refer this people because they want them around, but once you start communicating to people that referrals are equivalent to personally vouching for their referral's abilities, half of the time they start walking back referrals or saying that the person needs a good manager and so on.
So agree that relationships matter, but it's going to be hard to build a career on relationships alone. You need some substance and contributions to build upon.
In case the author IS young, I would also add this: Stay away from startups with capricious, absentee or already wealthy founders, find the most productive, stable environment you can.
If you work in an environment where personal production and job security are orthogonal you might find yourself getting rug pulled where effort/contribution are fully decoupled from reward.
Unless you achieve financial escape velocity or end up in an increasingly rare engineering "jobs program" at a large entity, you will get rug pulled at some point due to founder/manager proclivities or due to other macro economic issues.
You are probably screwed if this happens to you young enough as it fucks up motivation, it's why among the older programmer crowd you see some former HS dropouts that started professional work way too young (in the early days of the digital revolution) for a toxic company just completely burn out and fuck up their reward circuitry (it's also part of why 2 round leukemia kids have worse longterm outcomes than 1 round or non-leukemia kids).
You want to already have experienced patterns of good faith behavior and delay your first rug pull as long as possible.
This is a great point.
When you find yourself in a workplace where job security is based more on vibes than production it creates a false sense of security. You think your personal productivity doesn't matter and that you can vibe your way into the good graces of people making decisions.
When jobs security is decoupled from productivity, the winds of the company can and do change frequently. Other people are going to be better at playing the vibes game than you are. Vibes-based companies are overly vulnerable to politics.
It's good to work at companies where productivity is tied to personal performance, even if measuring productivty is far from perfect.
But that is always the case, and the "productivity=security" environment is artificial and unnatural.
The large forces beyond your control dominate the world, and the whole companies get hit by redundancies because the market changed, AI ate some section of the market, or the banks were too busy playing with mortgages and collapsed the whole global economy.
My experience indicates that it's more important to be working on the right thing, than to be super productive working on the wrong thing.
If they weren’t, then they would cease to significantly affect things on such a scale.
Not in my opinion. These kind of companies ask you to give 100% of yourself every single day. This may sound normal and natural to everyone, but I don’t like it. I cannot work in an environment in which they ask me to be a high performer, and anything else is “below expectations”. It’s just not worth it.
Much better to have job (in)security detached from productivity: in any case, companies are not to be trusted, and one should be ready to switch at any moment.
No, I understand can understand how someone would come away with that conclusion based on common patterns in the industry, but I think you're conflating two things.
First, companies want teams that deliver value. If evaluation is based more on vibes than actual output, that's a management failure. Its nuanced, because bad vibes can really hurt teams a lot, so it's not that vibes don't matter, but if the source of the vibes is that management is clueless and doesn't understand the pain points on the front lines, then that's the bigger issue. As a junior engineer it can be hard to distinguish, but just understand that good management exists and is out there, it's not all pointy hairs (even if the language is sometimes the same, after all pointy hairs have to cargo cult off of someone).
Second is how much a company asks of you. Once you rise up the ranks in any sizable company you'll realize an incredible amount of effort is wasted just due to the overhead of coordinating many individuals. In these types of environments it's more about focusing on the right things rather than overall effort. As Steve Jobs said, "It doesn't make sense to hire smart people and then tell them what to to , We hire smart people so they can tell us what to do". Entire teams can be net negative because no one calls out the elephant in the room. While it's true, that if you are successful in a high performance org, more will be asked of you, it's also true that good leaders value solid contributors even when they set some boundaries.
So there are really two strategies in a large org: one is to do the bare minimum and keep your head down, in that case avoiding high performing orgs is probably a good idea. But at the end of the day your entire job and career is at the mercy of the beancounters waking up one day and realizing you are dead weight. Alternatively, you can adopt a growth mentality, do your best every day, and see where it takes you. The latter path does mean you might need to set some boundaries and say no to people at times. Sure it's awkward, but in the grand scheme of things this builds a stronger network and sets you up for long-term success far better than playing defense because you see the employer-employee relationship as fundamentally adversarial. I think that worldview makes sense from a physical labor workforce, but it's really self-defeating for software engineers because at the end of the day our output is what our code does (hence every IC is "managing" the tech output), not how much time we put in creating it.
I would argue that all productivity metrics are even more vibes based than just going after vibes.
It’s best to play to your strengths. If you’re better at playing office politics than at doing the actual work, working for a company that values competence will produce subpar results for you.
I don’t think this is necessarily true. The job I learned most was one where I was the only tech person working on a product that had a more or less absent founder. I had to teach myself of course, but if you are self motivated you can learn a lot there.
Just don’t expect to get rewarded for it. See it as being paid in knowledge instead of money.
Laziness, lack of skill, poor communication, and unexplained delays are so much the norm that people who need something done are willing to pay top dollar just for the mediocre folks. I'm thinking mechanics and home repair contractors as the most obvious example but there are white collar equivalents too.
I'm trying to teach my kids that these days, if you are working for someone else, literally just showing up on time and doing exactly what is asked (and with integrity) will get you to the front of the pack easily with no other special effort, skill, or intelligence needed. It's been working unreasonably well for me, at any rate.
This is generic advice. Of course. But the "digital comsumption/doomscrolling/etc" eats away from that, even if all those other aspects are done...
Definitely varies depending on the size and structure and culture of an organization.
This does not mean "working on a book for 6 months, doing its projects". You don't need to put in that much time to progress. And when working on a book, skim. Don't spend 6 months on that book. Learning on the job, right in front of your project, can be plenty. If you want to do stuff "on idle time", doing exploratory search engine searches can be a pretty good use of time.
I'd also add mentors. It's work to cultivate a relationship with a mentor. But there is so much that they know and see, that you can't see yet. It would be a shame to ignore that option.
This is exactly the state of mind I am trying to guide myself towards. I know the things you listed are superficial and ineffective, but they also lead to the shiny object syndrome and the 'quest for productivity' that I mentioned in the post. When I reduce the frequency of falling into these traps and eventually let them go completely, I will have come a long way. Thanks for the insight.
When I was in undergrad I remember reading a lot of blogs and hoping to live up to their idealistic views (shoutout pg), because I hadn't quite yet identified what career I wanted to lead. I dropped out, and then around 24/25 the desire for those goals really shattered. I pursued a very self-directed path that has thankfully worked out (so far-still ample time for it to falter). As this post points out, the only advice that is universal on the internet is that there is no universal advice. Find what rings true to you and lean into it.
Accumulate enough expectation metrics and targets and then completely miss them. The mismatch of expectations and reality will give anyone a pause.
The solution isn't chasing more metrics and new far off targets with silver bullets on how to reach them. But that's what "thought leaders" and management think loves doing.
The lower the "loss" between your prediction for your future state and the actual state, the more content you'll be and the easier things will likely progress. Spending more time on maxing out predictions will just make the loss larger.
These days I am little better at avoiding consumption, if not worse. I think it's inevitable. And I think on net it may be a good thing. Yes you lose time and focus by dipping your toes into the zeitgeist, but you also make sure you work on things that are relevant. The open vs closed door from Hamming's You and Your Research.
The closed-door researcher produces more work, but the open-door researcher produces impactful work. Who was ultimately more productive?
The key, I find, is to do a bit of both. Work on hard things with deep focus and validate against the zeitgeist regularly.
edit: Found it. Almost the exact same post (in gist) from 2011 when I was 24, similar age as OP. https://swizec.com/blog/my-ideas-are-shitty-so-im-going-on-a...
When you are sitting at a keyboard with other people, there’s no chance you’re going to browse. You and everyone else involved will be 100% focused on the task.
They actually tested this with brainwave scans and found that concentration levels were significantly higher than working independently.
I did not have a single inkling of what the project was in detail or understood anything that was being talked about or written. But I was expected to 'contribute' in a performative way to show that I was useful to the team. It was perhaps the worst intro to a company you can have.
To this day I despise mob programming.
The intention is supposed to be "No pressure, come see how we work and meet the team. Feel free to join in if you see something."
There's no faster way to ramp somebody up than onboarding with a mobbing session. Typically you even use the new person's machine so the team can help make sure everything is setup for them to be productive and help work through any unexpected quirks rather than making you figure it out yourself.
If you were asked to jump in and lead with no knowledge, then yes that was terrible.
If you're open to seeing how beneficial the process can be, I'd recommend reading Software Teaming. Great book and establishes all the core rules about what makes a mob work. The most critical rule? Participation has to be voluntary.
I disagree that onboarding this way was the fastest, how could any reasonable person be expected to learn a project going in blind in an atmosphere like that?
When you aren’t in front of the keyboard, everything will continue with somebody else while the rest of the team continues to talk through the problem. On day 1, your only contribution is probably going to be familiarizing yourself with how things are setup and maybe asking some questions.
I think whoever set this up for you did a really poor job of explaining the intention.
The ADHD community calls this body doubling and yes it works.
similar studies on body doubling also showed participants feeling more social pressure to conform to well-established methods rather than branching out and experimenting, and similarly participants felt more judged whenever they ended up taking a risk that either didn't pan out or did so differently than imagined.
I don't want every workplace in the world to conform to whatever standards produce straight productivity; as a human, even one with adhd, I want to feel that there is room for cleverness and creativity in the world I work in.
Body doubling is good for clear tasks with clear outcomes. When you're at the "figuring out what to even do here" stage, you need a different approach. Sometimes the most productive path forward is to sit in a hammock and just think for 3 hours.
Fwiw, when it comes to mobbing, there are several cornerstone rules of engagement that Woody insists on, which in practice alleviate a lot of these concerns.
#1 - Courtesy, Kindness and Respect
Establishing how people want to be treated to feel like they can thrive in the environment is probably the absolute most critical item to success here.
#2 - When opinions differ, try each option and see what works best
You shouldn't be solving disagreements or differences in approach with social pressure or good arguments. Prototype each different idea and figure out as a team what the ideal solution really is. This encourages branching out and experimenting.
Both are really critical to healthy mobs. When those 2 rules are followed, the team typically thrives.
That's not the strict positive you seem to suggest. In creative arts, like many of us practice in software engineering, being 100% focused is not the way to get things done. Your conscious, focused attention can only take you so far, and the best work is often influenced by the weird associations and spontaneous insights that come from setting the work down and doing other things.
Now, that's not to say there isn't some extreme on the other end, where you just never actually sit down and write code or whatever because you're always so distracted, but the sweet spot you want to aim for is somewhere in the middle. For many people, pair (mob??) programming is waaaay too far to one side. Although if it works for you as part of a fuller, balanced, practice, you wouldn't be alone in that yourself.
> The closed-door researcher produces more work, but the open-door researcher produces impactful work.
These are not real dichotomies.
Without defending the shortcomings of the focused, closed-door approach, which you seem to take for granted, chasing the zeitgeist and keeping the door open seem to have little do with staying relevant or being impactful.
Relevance and impact are hard to come by altogether, and I think anyone here can think of far more (innumerable) zeitgeist-chasing, open-door-keeping peers who never stumbled upon relevance or impact than those that have. And for as many as they can identify, they could probably find just as many (few) among the focused, closed-door types.
Chasing the zeitgeist might make you feel more relevant, but it's generally deceptive. What happens more often, seemingly, is that you get caught up in the countless ephemeral fashions and distractions that blip into and out of the social consciousness, always finding yourself having just missed the opportunity to play some meaningful role in things. Maybe it's because you arrived at the party too late, or you weren't prepared, or you bet on in the wrong horse again, or somebody else stepped in your way, etc.
Be careful taking for granted that what feels rewarding is actually bringing you closer to your goals. When you keep getting that wrong in the same way, we just call it addiction.
> impactful work
these are opposites in my experience
I haven’t found a solution yet but how to find one is in a lot of my thoughts lately.
I feel similarly as OP it seems that this cycle is actively getting in the way of my job sometimes. I can go cold turkey/flip phone life and it works as in I don’t miss the content and adjust, but I work in tech it’s hard to not engage with the platforms and also do well, engaging in the platforms is like being a drug addict at free drug convention with a few helpful booths about work, and rinse/repeat.
At periods it’s been such that I put some thought into if I had undiagnosed ADHD, because some times it veered a bit too close for comfort to where I really needed to focus on adult stuff and I just couldn’t.
But, generally I speculate it’s an information diet thing first and foremost, but I’d rather sort that out first and see if it works.
Tricky topic! Interesting to see discussion on it, it’s the first I’ve ran into with similar sentiments as my experiences.
Wow. I’ve been dealing with this for a while and it never occurred to me that it may be correlated (or caused by) by my incessant hunt for information and media at all times. I’ve always thought that if I wasn’t learning, and staying up to date on the latest frameworks, I’m not growing.
I had a profound connection with this article, so much so that I’m willing to say it’s the most important information I’ve consumed in the last 5 years… but herein lies the conundrum… now I feel FOMO creeping in, perpetuating this incessant need to find others like it… sigh
this.. this is what I forgot the mention in the artice. When you find something really good, really relatable, inspiring while you're consuming content, you'll always be wondering what if there's more? and you keep consuming, you keep adding to your bookmarks, your reading list etc.. It gets bigger and bigger, overwhelming at the same time. It's hard to suppress this feeling
I watch a ridiculous amount of this type of content. As a "maker" myself, I get inspired by watching other people make stuff .. and I pick up a few tips and tricks along the way too.
But, the trap here that a lot in the comments seem in-tune with, is the trap of deluding yourself into thinking that you're being productive by consuming content ... as opposed to, well, producing stuff.
My wife and I are part time performing magicians, and when it comes to our magic act we fall into this trap a LOT. Because I make good money as a software engineer, I wanted to create for us a "library" where no matter what we want to write or create we will have resources that will empower us with method possibilities. Sounds great on paper, until we look back on what we accomplished in the past weeks and all we can come up with "Well, we read a bunch of books... and some are super expensive and hard to find out of print magic books that only have < 1,000 known copies in existence ... does that count?"
No, it doesn't. Some of the most innovative inventions and artistic creations have been borne from scarcity and limitations. An over-abundance of information is not necessarily bad it's just that we tend, as humans, to find ways to trick ourselves into thinking we're accomplishing something when we're really being passive.
To circle back to my original point, while watching "edu-tainment" content on YouTube is still being passive, at least there is the capacity to gain high-level knowledge that can give you a head's start when you're ready to actually start diving into doing something.
I feel like if you are the kind of person who builds or fixes things, there are certain topics that could be worth watching in your free time because they let you look over the shoulders of experts to grain some general understanding that you might not otherwise get exposed to.
For example, I watch a channel run by a guy who repairs cars for a living because he's entertaining to watch, not because I want to be a mechanic. Watching his channel is MOSTLY entertainment for me but after years of watching, I have learned enough about car maintenance that I'd would feel comfortable at least attempting a wide variety of repairs on my own cars that I would have never even considered attempting otherwise.
Often these videos lead ideas or projects that I have implemented in real life. I build a bandsaw out of wood, for example. https://blog.bityard.net/articles/2019/January/i-built-a-ban...
Have you ever considered:
1) Ditching social media (everything - Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn - everything. I don't mean delete the app. I mean delete all your accounts, and all the apps. No going back.)
2) Ditching your smart phone (Buy a brick phone)
I'm completely serious. I'm currently living this way, the phone was a recent addition in the last month. But social media, has been for years. I don't watch TV segments either (news etc).
I spend almost no time on my phone now. I spend my time building things, coding things, learning things (University courses/papers). I'm planning on kicking things up a notch next year.
The horizon for my learning in 2025 is:
- Game programming in TypeScript/C#/.NET/Unity
- Modding existing games (C/C++/C#)
- Low-level Graphics programming in C/C++
- Embedded programming in C
- Small amount of electronics
- Small amount of Assembly
- Diving into Backend Programming and Testing (.NET)
- Fleshing out my browser extension (React/TypeScript)
- Gaming (Fallout 4, Stardew Valley, Minecraft)
- Picking up University Papers (Probably Computer Science, Electronics, Machine Learning)
You should email me if you have any questions <hello> @ <PAPILLON><sOfTWaRe> <DOT> <dev>
If not, consider trialling, I mean REALLY trying the no social media and dumb phone thing.
Although, how do you feel about using your computer to "waste" time? Like spending too much time reading random things you find on the internet, for example.
Computer I don't waste much time, I usually only use it for HackerNews ~20 minutes a day if there is something interesting to read, other than that its a work and coding machine. Some gaming too when I want to relax.
I also use Kagi as my search engine so I basically only get small web websites, not content/advert heavy sites
However even Reddit has become a time suck and endless scroll of low value content. That’s why I keep coming back to HN - Much higher value content.
I do the same, but I don't like it. I "don't use social media", but I use reddit, and I'm commenting here too. I think I'm deluding myself, and I think you might be too.
I'd guess what you come to HN and Reddit, and what you get from them both is no different to what a daily Facebook user goes to Facebook and gets.
For some reason, because the content type here is slightly more intellectual, slightly less emotional (generally...) slightly more focused on what I'm proud to call my interests (tech), I somehow feel like it's more justified.
If it's justified for people to use sites like this and claim it's not bad social media because it's related to our tech interest, I feel like we must accept people who use Facebook daily and claim it's not bad social media, because it relates to their interest in social stuff.
Practically, they have the same features and problems: a constant stream of information on which we can passively extract and offer views on.
Sorry, I don't mean be disagreeable, I just wish people would call this (including me) out more. The more I think about it, the more ridiculous it is that there are supposedly educated people like me and you claiming they "don't use" and have "ditched" social media to each other in the comments section of a media site. What do you think?
Browsing HN for 30 minutes is probably a better investment than browsing TikTok for 30 minutes.
Browsing TikTok for 30 minutes and learning a new healthy recipe is probably a better investment than reading international news for 30 minutes.
Light use of social media can be a greater net positive than complete abstinence from all forms of social media.
Browsing HN for 30 mins is a better investment for someone who's life revolves around tech. If you're not a massive nerd, you're probably going to get more understanding and value out of 30 minutes of what TikTok serves. (I say that as a massive nerd who's never used TikTok).
It seems a pretty common trope in the comment sections of Reddit and HN on the subject of social media for people to act like they've solved the problem they had because they only use Reddit and HN. I do it too.
All that's happened is I've found a place in social media that's comfortable/familiar enough for me that I don't consider it as social media (unless it's really forced in my face). I imagine the experience is the same for a non-nerdy Facebook addict.
> Light use of social media can be a greater net positive than complete abstinence from all forms of social media.
I can't disagree with that, but it feels like a false dichotomy to justify our social media usage.
Getting info from individual sites and sources that you've personally and organically discovered and vetted feels like it would be a far far far bigger net positive overall than even light social media usage.
I keep meaning to get on mastodon, bluesky or other platforms that are meant to be more decentralised and slightly less algorithm-driven to find more interesting sources that I can just add to a local reader client or something, but HN/Reddit is more comfier/familiar/easier for me.
Though on this:
> Getting info from individual sites and sources that you've personally and organically discovered and vetted feels like it would be a far far far bigger net positive overall than even light social media usage.
I would disagree, this is exactly what it means to live in a bubble.
That's a fair disagreement. Although I guess I was thinking that my individually curated sites and sources would include sites and feeds that themselves include diverse and new info. But then I guess that's just me not recognising that that's what people in a bubble think they're doing.
Do you have any nice, foolproof ways to reliably source new info online?
The way I think about it - and I’m probably wrong about this - is that like there way there are good fats and bad fats. There is good content online and bad content. The good content like good fats feed the brain and are good for your overall wellbeing and development, bad content like bad fats are just damaging to your wellbeing and development as a person.
So if we put the actual websites aside for a minute and said that if someone consumes content from a website that makes them feel better (not a quick dopamine hit) and helps them develop as a person (like learning something new) then maybe that’s ok.
Conversely if they’re just scrolling endlessly consuming content that is just designed for a quick dopamine hit, it doesn’t actually make them feel better longer term or develop them longer term then yeh that’s not ok.
Maybe I’m rambling here but I think regardless of what platform you’re using there is content that feeds the brain in a healthy way and content that negatively affects the brain.
And for me there are certain platforms that use sophisticated algorithms that optimise for engagement regardless of how healthy the content is for the user in the long term. And then there are other platforms (like HN I believe) that have a reputation for high quality intelligent posts that, in most cases, are healthy for users
I have a url blacklisting extension and I block reddit entirely, it wont even come up in google searches etc.
I think Reddit is one of the hardest to break from though. I've been completely off it for just over a month. I replaced it with HackerNews
Your goals for 2025 seems inspiring! I recently created a reading list for myself and I'm actually really excited for all those new stuff to learn
I still use WhatsApp to connect with people overseas, so thats replaced Messenger etc for me.
It is tough being a remote worker, and I totally get the difficulty with maintaining a professional network.
All good reasons there.
How I deal with professional networking is, I use email mostly, and I tend to stay in touch with people I genuinely find interesting and connect with. One of my best friends is an older gentleman who I met at a previous job, we always catch up for meals, coffees etc. He's one of my best network references. But other than that, my professional network is small, and I do have to put in extra work to maintain it.
Thanks for the thumbs up on the goals! I really only became this way this year (ADHD diagnosis + medication) and I'm really getting in to my learning now.
Whats on your reading list currently?
- Job stability
- Commit to gym
- Save XX,XXX etc
- Buy a car
However, this is much harder and more demanding of your concentration and focus than just passively absorbing some interesting online content, particularly if the content relies on some background knowledge that you're missing, in which case it may take much, much longer to get up to speed on it.
Note that LLMs are an incredible aid to grasping new material. Ask any decent LLM "what are the necessary background prerequisites for understanding this statement: <HN comment on arcane math or tech>" and it will usually point you in the right direction.
Consumption without reflection or doing is mostly entertainment, like you would do with a novel or a movie.
Maybe you do do this and were making a sweeping claim-understandble. But if not, try inspecting the themes and topics brought up by the novels you read and movies you watch?
Almost all media has something of value to dissect and discuss if you are willing to do so.
Your last sentence reminds me of when I shat on the first Transformers movies as a teenager thinking they were nothing more than trite Hollywood cash grabs but, my professor nudged me to think about the movie again beyond my assumptions and ego.
As a software developer there’s the added pressure to, always be improving or be irrelevant. This is on top of the fear of missing out from content creators farming engagement. That’s a lot of pressure to stay engaged and keep watching.
I don’t always disconnect myself. But I am happiest when I find a better balance between what I consume and create. I feel better when I’m creating something. And some times that means I have to be more selective about what and when I consume.
Try using playlists and schedules. Allow yourself a space to explore and consume. Just be mindful and try not to go over your planned time for it. I find it helps prevent me from feeling guilty about spending too much time and alleviates the feeling that I might miss out on something neat.
Deep Work by Cal Newport focuses on these ideas pretty heavily, and he cites plenty of studies to back up his arguments. Like the author of the blogpost says, "There’s no guarantee that what works for them will work for you", but I found my productivity increased noticeably after I applied some of the advice from the book.
Thank you for putting it down into words.
After reading it, a couple of days ago, I went on a hunt for books around that topic. I am leaving one here for you if you want to check it out since you mentioned there aren't any. I picked it up from kindle unlimited and so far I am enjoying it: https://amzn.to/4ixJkwm
Best of luck on your career and again thanks for this post.
But more broadly, it comes down to where you draw the line and call content distraction, and what you do about digital distractions.
One hobby I picked up much more easily than anticipated: microcontroller programming. With the spare energy and mindspace freed up from scrolling social media, I'm now expanding my skillset and reading far more books.
I'm not claiming to have boosted my skills to an unrealistic degree, but the benefits of giving up the dumb online activity are very real, very tangible, and very valuable IMO.
https://github.com/Yoric/keep-it-focused/
We'll see whether that works.
Jane’s books
“It’s not easy”, of course it isn’t, all greatness requires sacrifice, are you going to go to the gym (learn new programming skill) or sit there eating donuts?
do not chase The Solution or that will become your gym..
Anyways - people gravitate toward the simple and assume the difficult is impossible. I’m training for a marathon with some friends and some are already making excuses to do as much as possible that _does not_ involve running (weight lifting, biking). I think humans just do the easy thing and complain about their situation because it’s.. well easy.
> You find yourself in a quest for productivity, feeling productive because of the quest, but not really doing any productive work.
Been there a million times myself, it’s such an easy trap to fall into.
preach, coach!
I still read HN stories to find those once-in-a-while posts that are both deep and relevant to my interests or work.
I say this as a person with both ADHD and depression that has a successful career as an academic scientist, and has also won as a competitive strength athlete, and been competitive bodybuilder lean at times.
Discipline and good habits are important, but are often not the full picture, especially for people that are not neurotypical. Executive function isn’t something you can just decide to have if you don’t have it… and being belittled by people that do have it and don’t understand won’t help either.
I spent a lot of my life trying to figure out why what I wanted to do in life still wasn’t happening when I felt fully committed and like I was trying 100%. Eventually I found other people struggling with the same issues and started building a toolbox of little techniques that worked for me.
Fuck that, everything in moderation. I love donuts, being fit and shying away from donuts was a miserable experience. So what, I might die earlier having eaten that donut? Worth it.
Everything in moderation. Good and bad.
At the end of the day, none of this matters. Wy put arbitrary constraints on your short life of pleasure.
That’s such an important observation. Many of us have become so fooled by the notion of fast consumption and immediate gains that we have all but stopped putting in the meaningful work.