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Long but the meat is missing. The most important subsection is "Most moments of distraction are caused by internal triggers." But that section lacks anything a

Long but the meat is missing. The most important subsection is "Most moments of distraction are caused by internal triggers." But that section lacks anything approaching concrete advice. It just repeats already written ideas then offers this: > So if you want to deal with distraction the first thing you have to do is deal with the negative emotional triggers that lead to it. The next section, regardless of the title, is about routines rather than internal-emotional triggers and is primarily an anecdote about their writing with no larger take-aways. I think it is an article with good ideas, going down the right road, but never quite reaches a useful destination. Too bad.

tiborsaas 6y ago
> But that section lacks anything approaching concrete advice. Maybe because he wants to sell his book :) Also notice he uses distraction instead of procrastination most of the time. The core ides is solid though that it's a emotion management problem. If you can control your emotions related to a given task, you can be more productive.
- Krasnol 6y ago
  Don't forget the most important aspect of this teaser ad: > Nir is also an advisor to several Bay Area start-ups, venture capitalists, and incubators. Good it's on the front page of HN ;)
  - throwanem 6y ago
    Hey, it only took five attempts, apparently crafted with some care to bypass the dup checker, to get it there, too.
jerzyt 6y ago
I was just about to write a review along the same lines, but you did it already. The article is not going anywhere, just rambling along.
runawaybottle 6y ago
Sometimes one of the triggers is that it’s hard, and if it’s a hard thing you have to regularly do, you should be looking to find a way to do it easier. Otherwise it becomes a suck-it-up-and-just-do-it strategy, which is a fine when used reasonably, but it too can be exhausted as a strategy. But anyway, all of our tools and progress flys in the face of the author’s suggestion. We are at this point in society because we put a lot of thought into not having to work hard. The irony of working hard to not work hard.
- cseleborg 6y ago
  I think it's worth distinguishing between hard work (working long hours), rote work (doing lots of menial work) and challenging work (important work that requires attention/concentration). I agree with you that rote work should be minimized with better tools and processes. I can delegate the bookkeeping for example. Hard work seems like a matter of culture. There might be the expectation from your organisation, family, community etc. that working long hours is the only right way of working. But I don't think that's what the author is addresssing here. So that leaves challenging work, like writing, marketing, cold-calling, etc. I should be cold-calling much more for example, but I've become quite proficient in finding excuses not to do it (one of them is that it's illegal here in Germany for my product in many cases). I certainly see the author's point about avoiding the discomfort for these types of activities.
  - kd5bjo 6y ago
    Sometimes completely eliminating rote work is a mistake. If there’s a lot of challenging work to be done, doing some rote work can be used to rest some while still staying basically on-task and minimizing context-switching costs.
- ImprobableTruth 6y ago
  It's not about working hard, but about accepting that it's okay to feel challenged by work. Reducing the amount of work is, of course, great, but unless you completely automate your job it's never going to be always easy.
chenzhekl 6y ago
On the contrary, I feel pretty comfortable after reading the whole article. It's well written and examples provided by the author are really illuminating. Anyway, there's no universally applicable advice for everyone. I think we just need some patience and effort to find the right path for ourselves. Try not to make the hard work easy. :)
galoisgirl 6y ago
I wish there was more about dealing with those triggers, but maybe this kind of advice should come from therapists rather than writers.
mercules 6y ago
Maybe the response to your questions is available in the book instead of in a free 3,000 word long post that has been provided to you. I guess the widely availability of free sources has skewed perspective on what is of value.
nickbauman 6y ago
The eschewing todo lists thing seems really counterintuitive.
svat 6y ago
I got the following concrete advice from this article: - Procrastination/distractions are reactions to discomfort: “They’re not character flaws, they’re emotional regulation problems”. So: try to to develop better internal tools to manage discomfort. - Things like email or items checked off TODO lists are more pernicious, because they feel productive. Recognize this. - Set a routine (e.g. work 2 hours on writing), not targets (word count). - When you do sit down to work, expect discomfort, e.g. from boredom, frustration, anxiety, uncertainty. When it arises, instead of trying to get away from it, lean into it: approach it with curiosity, like a scientist. - When you get an itch to go look up something, instead of acting immediately, set it aside for 10 minutes (I'd say an hour) — and see if you still care at the end of it. - For urges that don't go away, “surf the urge”: sit with the sensation and examine it. - Once you have made some progress in managing your internal triggers (e.g. can deal with some discomfort), try to understand your values (the kind of person you want to be/become). Then create a schedule for tomorrow that fits it. - Remove external triggers, those that tend to distract you. - For tasks where all this still doesn't help, try some “pacts”, like the one in the article about the $100 bill. This may not seem “anything approaching concrete advice” but his defence in the article is that this is his strategy: “There isn’t going to be one tactic that works for everyone. You use the strategy to try individual tactics until you find the right formula for you.”
- guevara 6y ago
  So do "Deep Work"? Kind of what it sounds like based on what you've outlined
dwenzek 6y ago
On the contrary, I really found this article insightful. Yes, there are few concrete pieces of advice to tackle the "internal triggers" of distraction. These are to be found in ourself and any tricks, like turning off all of the notifications, will only address the surface of the problem. Any concrete advice would risk here to conceal the truth that that hard word is not easy. I like the path proposed by the article. * searching in oneself for the deep obstacles toward our goals. boredom? loneliness? fatigue? uncertainty? * clarifying our priorities into a concrete daily schedule; * imposing ourselves a routine on what matters * and even using pacts with ourselves. Looking closely at my own current habits, this helped me to better understand what I already do well and what I need to improve.

tiborsaas 6y ago

> But that section lacks anything approaching concrete advice. Maybe because he wants to sell his book :) Also notice he uses distraction instead of procrastination most of the time. The core ides is solid though that it's a emotion management problem. If you can control your emotions related to a given task, you can be more productive.

Krasnol 6y ago
Don't forget the most important aspect of this teaser ad: > Nir is also an advisor to several Bay Area start-ups, venture capitalists, and incubators. Good it's on the front page of HN ;)
- throwanem 6y ago
  Hey, it only took five attempts, apparently crafted with some care to bypass the dup checker, to get it there, too.

jerzyt 6y ago

I was just about to write a review along the same lines, but you did it already. The article is not going anywhere, just rambling along.

runawaybottle 6y ago

Sometimes one of the triggers is that it’s hard, and if it’s a hard thing you have to regularly do, you should be looking to find a way to do it easier. Otherwise it becomes a suck-it-up-and-just-do-it strategy, which is a fine when used reasonably, but it too can be exhausted as a strategy. But anyway, all of our tools and progress flys in the face of the author’s suggestion. We are at this point in society because we put a lot of thought into not having to work hard. The irony of working hard to not work hard.

cseleborg 6y ago
I think it's worth distinguishing between hard work (working long hours), rote work (doing lots of menial work) and challenging work (important work that requires attention/concentration). I agree with you that rote work should be minimized with better tools and processes. I can delegate the bookkeeping for example. Hard work seems like a matter of culture. There might be the expectation from your organisation, family, community etc. that working long hours is the only right way of working. But I don't think that's what the author is addresssing here. So that leaves challenging work, like writing, marketing, cold-calling, etc. I should be cold-calling much more for example, but I've become quite proficient in finding excuses not to do it (one of them is that it's illegal here in Germany for my product in many cases). I certainly see the author's point about avoiding the discomfort for these types of activities.
- kd5bjo 6y ago
  Sometimes completely eliminating rote work is a mistake. If there’s a lot of challenging work to be done, doing some rote work can be used to rest some while still staying basically on-task and minimizing context-switching costs.
ImprobableTruth 6y ago
It's not about working hard, but about accepting that it's okay to feel challenged by work. Reducing the amount of work is, of course, great, but unless you completely automate your job it's never going to be always easy.

chenzhekl 6y ago

On the contrary, I feel pretty comfortable after reading the whole article. It's well written and examples provided by the author are really illuminating. Anyway, there's no universally applicable advice for everyone. I think we just need some patience and effort to find the right path for ourselves. Try not to make the hard work easy. :)

galoisgirl 6y ago

I wish there was more about dealing with those triggers, but maybe this kind of advice should come from therapists rather than writers.

mercules 6y ago

Maybe the response to your questions is available in the book instead of in a free 3,000 word long post that has been provided to you. I guess the widely availability of free sources has skewed perspective on what is of value.

nickbauman 6y ago

The eschewing todo lists thing seems really counterintuitive.

svat 6y ago

I got the following concrete advice from this article: - Procrastination/distractions are reactions to discomfort: “They’re not character flaws, they’re emotional regulation problems”. So: try to to develop better internal tools to manage discomfort. - Things like email or items checked off TODO lists are more pernicious, because they feel productive. Recognize this. - Set a routine (e.g. work 2 hours on writing), not targets (word count). - When you do sit down to work, expect discomfort, e.g. from boredom, frustration, anxiety, uncertainty. When it arises, instead of trying to get away from it, lean into it: approach it with curiosity, like a scientist. - When you get an itch to go look up something, instead of acting immediately, set it aside for 10 minutes (I'd say an hour) — and see if you still care at the end of it. - For urges that don't go away, “surf the urge”: sit with the sensation and examine it. - Once you have made some progress in managing your internal triggers (e.g. can deal with some discomfort), try to understand your values (the kind of person you want to be/become). Then create a schedule for tomorrow that fits it. - Remove external triggers, those that tend to distract you. - For tasks where all this still doesn't help, try some “pacts”, like the one in the article about the $100 bill. This may not seem “anything approaching concrete advice” but his defence in the article is that this is his strategy: “There isn’t going to be one tactic that works for everyone. You use the strategy to try individual tactics until you find the right formula for you.”

guevara 6y ago
So do "Deep Work"? Kind of what it sounds like based on what you've outlined

dwenzek 6y ago

On the contrary, I really found this article insightful. Yes, there are few concrete pieces of advice to tackle the "internal triggers" of distraction. These are to be found in ourself and any tricks, like turning off all of the notifications, will only address the surface of the problem. Any concrete advice would risk here to conceal the truth that that hard word is not easy. I like the path proposed by the article. * searching in oneself for the deep obstacles toward our goals. boredom? loneliness? fatigue? uncertainty? * clarifying our priorities into a concrete daily schedule; * imposing ourselves a routine on what matters * and even using pacts with ourselves. Looking closely at my own current habits, this helped me to better understand what I already do well and what I need to improve.