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I've encountered something similar to your "invoices" situation many times. I'm actually blocked on something now, but I know my mind is hard at work to get th
by dabent 16y ago
I've encountered something similar to your "invoices" situation many times. I'm actually blocked on something now, but I know my mind is hard at work to get things straight in some background process. Once my block is cleared, I know I'll just dive in and get things done in the same amount of time it would have originally taken, only with better results. I know that, because that's how it's worked for me so many times before. Every once in a while I forget what I was working on, but it's usually in favor of a better project or solution.
Fortunately, my blocks are usually short and resolved by letting my background processes chew on a problem during a night of sleep.
I think the real trick is to actually attack problems that cause me to block. If I stick with simple things I can process in real time, I'm not thinking hard enough.
Of course, this sort of discussion here wouldn't be complete without a reference to good and bad procrastination:
http://www.paulgraham.com/procrastination.html http://www.paulgraham.com/procrastination.html
- robeastham 16y agoThe Pragmatic Bookshelf has a fantastic book that goes into some detail about how your brain might be working in these situations. Often sleeping on a problem and letting your subconscious do some of the work is the best policy. Check the book out here: http://pragprog.com/titles/ahptl/pragmatic-thinking-and-learning http://pragprog.com/titles/ahptl/pragmatic-thinking-and-lear...
- vyrotek 16y agoI had a logic teacher in college who would force us to exercise this concept. He would have us look at the very last problem on an exam on test days and make us just stare at it (no working on it allowed) for 5 minutes. Then we had to start the test from the beginning. The theory being that your subconscious is working out the problem and you'll have a better chance of figuring it out. I felt like it really did work.
- khafra 16y agoSeems like he should've had half the class do the staring, the other half take the test normally, and give as many points as appropriate. One could get a lot of data after doing that for several classes.
- vyrotek 16y agoI'm sure he had done that at some point. He also liked to show off his many other amazing 'mind hacks' such as memorizing everyone's name within the first few minutes of the first day of class. There were almost 100 students in his class and after he said he was done 'doing his thing' he would ask the students to change seats and never sit in the same seat twice for the first week to test him.