4 ms·

Don't check your work email on the go. Quit facebook. It is actually pretty simple!

bdamm 9y ago
I don't know why you got downvoted. It's both simple and hard. I quit facebook back in March. Yep, some people don't talk to me anymore. But you know what? I talk with other people more, and I'm enjoying those relationships more. It's also hard; this is a top-of-class addiction. There's nothing easy about rewiring the reward circuit of your brain. And definitely Facebook, work email and in my case ycombinator news, are wired in to the reward circuit - for the relief of boredom, or even the relief of hard work (or the appearance of that relief anyway.)
- ShabbosGoy 9y ago
  Yeah, HN is scary because browsing it will give you a subconscious feeling that you worked on something important.
  - mulmen 9y ago
    This is true but at least HN has the noprocrast setting to fill the willpower void. Facebook could use the same thing but that means less eyeballs on ads.
    - bdamm 9y ago
      I had never noticed that noprocrast setting before. Thanks!
Hextinium 9y ago
This may work well for you but there are somethings that cause you to have to check email and Facebook for fear of external consequences which is what the OP is saying. For example Hangouts makes me lose at least half a hour of productity a day but if I uninstalled it and never checked it then I would never talk to all of my friends on Hangouts which is not a trade-off that I am willing to take. Same for email, if I stopped checking email on my phone I could lose my job because it requires prompt responses to emails and I like my job and not willing to take that trade off. But then I am stuck with this phone that also contains all of the other things a phone can do and rob me of my attention that way. It's a Catch-22 of productivity.
- mquander 9y ago
  For example Hangouts makes me lose at least half a hour of productity a day but if I uninstalled it and never checked it then I would never talk to all of my friends on Hangouts which is not a trade-off that I am willing to take. A lot of people say this one (usually about Facebook), but I don't understand it. If you want to talk to those friends, why doesn't it suffice to schedule spending time with them in the same way you would have done it in 2000?
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - mulmen 9y ago
    Exactly. And not just 2000, Hangouts was released in 2013, are these friendships less than four years old? Phones and email still exist. If your relationship is predicated on a single internet based communication service then it's probably not a relationship worth maintaining. Just use a different communication mechanism. It's really not that hard. Send a postcard, it's fun, I promise.
    - UncleSam 9y ago
      For me, it's actually about having additional communication that didn't exist before Hangouts came out. My family is spread around the country and hardly visits or calls each other. With Hangouts, we suddenly started communicating more, and that's not something I want to revert.
  - watwut 9y ago
    It is just a guess, but maybe they are not on IRC or MUD anymore. Or started families and they don't live in the same dorm anymore.
  - lovich 9y ago
    I don't know about your age but in 2000 I was in middle school and all my friends communicated by aim since we didn't have the ability to go where we wanted when we wanted. That social structure has carried over into adult life where I have several close friends that I get to see maybe twice a year due to our schedules, but can still talk to them everyday. Dropping communication through messaging apps would probably mean we just aren't friends anymore. The barriers to us meeting up more often aren't just laziness
946789987649 9y ago
I really don't understand the hate for facebook, it really is what you make it. For me, it's a glorified messaging app and nothing more. Well...Maybe also a museum of my less than attractive younger years.
- erikbye 9y ago
  From what I've seen addicts both hate and love their drug.

I don't know why you got downvoted. It's both simple and hard. I quit facebook back in March. Yep, some people don't talk to me anymore. But you know what? I talk with other people more, and I'm enjoying those relationships more. It's also hard; this is a top-of-class addiction. There's nothing easy about rewiring the reward circuit of your brain. And definitely Facebook, work email and in my case ycombinator news, are wired in to the reward circuit - for the relief of boredom, or even the relief of hard work (or the appearance of that relief anyway.)

ShabbosGoy 9y ago
Yeah, HN is scary because browsing it will give you a subconscious feeling that you worked on something important.
- mulmen 9y ago
  This is true but at least HN has the noprocrast setting to fill the willpower void. Facebook could use the same thing but that means less eyeballs on ads.
  - bdamm 9y ago
    I had never noticed that noprocrast setting before. Thanks!

Hextinium 9y ago

This may work well for you but there are somethings that cause you to have to check email and Facebook for fear of external consequences which is what the OP is saying. For example Hangouts makes me lose at least half a hour of productity a day but if I uninstalled it and never checked it then I would never talk to all of my friends on Hangouts which is not a trade-off that I am willing to take. Same for email, if I stopped checking email on my phone I could lose my job because it requires prompt responses to emails and I like my job and not willing to take that trade off. But then I am stuck with this phone that also contains all of the other things a phone can do and rob me of my attention that way. It's a Catch-22 of productivity.

mquander 9y ago
For example Hangouts makes me lose at least half a hour of productity a day but if I uninstalled it and never checked it then I would never talk to all of my friends on Hangouts which is not a trade-off that I am willing to take. A lot of people say this one (usually about Facebook), but I don't understand it. If you want to talk to those friends, why doesn't it suffice to schedule spending time with them in the same way you would have done it in 2000?
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- mulmen 9y ago
  Exactly. And not just 2000, Hangouts was released in 2013, are these friendships less than four years old? Phones and email still exist. If your relationship is predicated on a single internet based communication service then it's probably not a relationship worth maintaining. Just use a different communication mechanism. It's really not that hard. Send a postcard, it's fun, I promise.
  - UncleSam 9y ago
    For me, it's actually about having additional communication that didn't exist before Hangouts came out. My family is spread around the country and hardly visits or calls each other. With Hangouts, we suddenly started communicating more, and that's not something I want to revert.
- watwut 9y ago
  It is just a guess, but maybe they are not on IRC or MUD anymore. Or started families and they don't live in the same dorm anymore.
- lovich 9y ago
  I don't know about your age but in 2000 I was in middle school and all my friends communicated by aim since we didn't have the ability to go where we wanted when we wanted. That social structure has carried over into adult life where I have several close friends that I get to see maybe twice a year due to our schedules, but can still talk to them everyday. Dropping communication through messaging apps would probably mean we just aren't friends anymore. The barriers to us meeting up more often aren't just laziness

946789987649 9y ago

I really don't understand the hate for facebook, it really is what you make it. For me, it's a glorified messaging app and nothing more. Well...Maybe also a museum of my less than attractive younger years.

erikbye 9y ago
From what I've seen addicts both hate and love their drug.