18 ms·

I need structure in my life

270 points by memorable 4y ago

k__ 4y ago
A few years ago, I got the rid of (most) alarms. Now, I get out of bed when I'm rested and only set alarms occasionally when I have an appointment. It might not be a time-based structure, but it's one that I can follow indefinitely.
alpark3 4y ago
I feel like it's a losing game to try to force yourself into a "productivity" mindset, as if you're some type of black box that needs to be optimized for certain behavior. Structure is good and habit is key, but don't imprison yourself in it, in my opinion.
shakezula 4y ago
I resonate with this a lot and the part about not knowing if that lack of structure is what makes you unproductive is a question I’ve asked myself a lot lately. It’s hard to know the answer and I always get different feedback from different people when asked which almost always just boils down to what they do.
reciprocate 4y ago
I've been reading through "I Didn't Do the Thing Today", which is in a lot of ways a rejection of the prevailing productivity sentiment. It's about self-care and treating yourself with grace, even when things don't come out as the most profitable or productive, at least so far. And in that spirit I'll say to the author of this post: It's okay to nap in the middle of the day, or not eat breakfast, or work first thing in the morning and not do a Morning Page or Meditation or whatever aspirational-you has decided is worthwhile. We are all doing our best in the circumstances we have. In my life I've found that better is really a game of averages. Some days are going to be great. Some weeks have a severe downward trend with no real reason that I can tell. Well. Maybe it's due to bad sleep quality or lack of exercise. All I can do is try to be the person that makes the good decisions and accept the person that I am, and that keeps me pretty happy.
L0in 4y ago
I think it would be more beneficial if you examine your activities and behaviors at work hours. The wouldn't be much difference in your work output if you eat launch in the morning or spend a little time with your family. If there's a «problem» somewhere it's probably during work hours.
tenpoundhammer 4y ago
Throughout my career I've spent a lot of time stressing out about how productive I'm being. Trying many different methods. Finally I decided that if I feel stressed out about my productivity I would write down everything I've done during the day. Usually turns out I've done a lot of stuff that I it's actual work that I just discount as not work. Some days get taken over by mandatory work that doesn't feel productive but is.
ar_lan 4y ago
In general, I find myself to be someone who operates best within certain confines - for example, the time blocking from Cal Newport has been highly effective for myself. That said, I caution against too much routine. I used to get really into it but remember many days where I felt like the day was ruined because I couldn’t get a workout in, or someone scheduled an 8am meeting, or any other myriad of things I grew dependent on. Too much structure is basically a fragile crutch, in my experience. My personal morning “routine” is a quick cup of coffee and a half mile walk, and then straight to work. I time block the day first thing based on whatever my weekly goals for the week were, and try to keep about two hours of buffer time to allow some shifting throughout the day. I’ve done this about a year now and it’s helped me keep the benefits of structure, without the guilt of when something “optimal” doesn’t happen.
- TurkishPoptart 4y ago
  Is there a "lite" version of Cal Newport's time-blocking techniques? I'm super interested every time I hear him explain it but I get overwhelmed and never end up implementing anything.
  - garrickvanburen 4y ago
    I schedule almost everything (eg taking out the trash, commutes, workouts) Maybe start scheduling more of your commitments and obligations in your calendar? Or alternatively, Start by keeping a time diary of how you spend your days and how long tasks take you, then use that to inform your time blocks
  - ar_lan 4y ago
    I wouldn’t really say it’s a big implementation. I just use a piece of paper and denote a line to each 30 mins of the work day. So it might look like: 10: meeting 1030: bug fixing 11: bug fixing 1130: bug fixing 12: run 1230: run 1: lunch 130: feature work 2: feature work 230: meeting 3: feature work 330: feature work 4: plan next week The above was my entry from last Friday, where I had a late start to the day. At the start of my day I had kept the 12-2:30 block fairly empty (I knew some form of working out + lunch would show up, and I had wanted to do some feature work that day, but I didn’t know if any other meetings would pop up. They didn’t, so it worked great!) I basically fill in meetings first, then work around them to put in the work I want to focus on for the day. The main caveat is I don’t focus on anything else for this blocks, and unless I’m in incredible flow and the task is definitely important, I always make sure I stop at the end of the block time (the whole “we will fill up whatever time we allot ourselves” theory).
vehemenz 4y ago
Maybe try defining your structure in terms of the effort you put in and what you accomplish (with respect to that effort), rather than a schedule or a sequence of items on a checklist. Your coffee or teeth-brushing rituals are minor, accidental details.
dexwiz 4y ago
Structure is good, but it’s really hard to self impose. Before you had to do one thing: work within a structure. Having to self impose means you have to do two things: create structure and then do the work within it. It doesn’t help that advancing as a technical worker often removes that structure, or forces you to create it. I am given freedom as a perk of seniority, but for me it’s been a burden.
MrDrDr 4y ago
I have moved between phases of high productivity and high procrastination. IMO a system and routine are great if you have a goal you genuinely want to achieve. The more time it takes to achieve the goal (I’m thinking 5+ years) the more helpful a system/routine is. The problem occurs when you find yourself working hard to achieve a goal you have no genuine interest in - and then no system is going to help you.
kzrdude 4y ago
How much do you sleep? Cutting down as much as possible on evening internet really helps my whole life.
Ilasky 4y ago
I know this feeling extremely well. Routines are routinely broken by me, but I found that I just needed someone else there with me to do the thing. Even if it is just their presence. In the ADHD community, it’s called body doubling ( https://doubleapp.xyz/blog/how-to-body-double https://doubleapp.xyz/blog/how-to-body-double ), but it can absolutely extend to those outside of the ADHD sphere as well.
- chinchilla2020 4y ago
  Well at least you have one routine. You routinely break routines!
  - Ilasky 4y ago
    Haha! I can count on it like the sun rising in the east.
- vjk800 4y ago
  When I was a graduate student, I often participated in summer schools and conferences where there was a strict schedule that included two or three meals a day. I absolutely loved it. I would like to live all of my life so that someone else would schedule my life for me, cook meals at right times, etc. And of course part of it was that most of the other people participating the event also did the same schedule as you so you always had friends to have lunch, dinner and coffee breaks with. If someone has any suggestions on how to organize my life like a one big summer school, I'm listening. I guess joining a monastery would do it, but I don't really care for the other aspects of monastic life.
  - pipeline_peak 4y ago
    > I would like to live all of my life so that someone else would schedule my life for me, cook meals at right times, etc. > how to organize my life like a one big summer school It sounds like you don’t want to take on being an adult. Responsibility gives you independence and power, you might want a therapist to help persuade and shortly guide you that.
dainiusse 4y ago
If you can't do it alone, just you wait until you have kids...
Ruq 4y ago
I relate to this so much. I probably should build a morning routine. There's so much I want to get done.
Daunk 4y ago
I wish I had the option to have... any kind of flexibility in my life. I'm forced to go to work at a certain time, which means I have to get up at a certain time. I also eat at work, both lunch and dinner, so if I skip those then there's almost no time for me to eat. I have to do chores when I get home for about an hour or two, then I have about 2.5 hours of "free time" before I have to go to bed and repeat the process. Being able to have any kind of flexibility is an extreme luxury I think people take for granted.
- cmehdy 4y ago
  This is one of the ways income inequality and systemic discriminations can drastically alter the life of people or groups of people. No time to think, to time to breathe.. no time to dream. The mind can die (or at least enter a sort of coma) long before the body in these circumstances. And it's incredibly hard to help yourself while in there, which is why the empathy and kindness of others matters so much too.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- dijonman2 4y ago
  I live by an edict. If you don’t get what you want: it’s due to your decisions. I prioritized flexibility and that’s what I have. You can do the same!
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
    Hmm. I am taking this comment at face value and not as a sarcastic response. Even if you prioritize flexibility, if your position is at the bottom of the totem pole, you will find it exceedingly difficult to get even minute changes in it. Those employees are increasingly monitored to the point I would not have accepted as a kid, but it seems a more and more common practice today. I guess what I am saying is that what you do matters, but not nearly as much as you give it credit for. Some of it is just dumb luck.
danbrooks 4y ago
Having kids has created a very specific structure.
- Tade0 4y ago
  Yes. Also forces one to prioritize because both time and energy are precious resources.
  - euroderf 4y ago
    Yes. You will find a lot of half-hearted "interests" melting away.
- oldsklgdfth 4y ago
  Not having kids, I feel like a family clears up the optimization problem of: * what should I be doing with my time? * what is important to think about? As a software dev with a flexible schedule, my life feels arbitrary. I pick up hobbies because I need stuff to do, I try to eat better to take care of myself, I save money and live frugally for a rainy day. But there's no common thread to all these. It's just stuff I picked.
nodelessness 4y ago
It is important to listen to the body. I tried to have a spartan level of self discipline and that put me in a express route to burn out. And I burned out. Burn out is not easy to climb out of, so I would rather be less than ideally productive than be disciplined to an extent that ignores my humanity and that damages me severely.
- Tao3300 4y ago
  > I tried to have a spartan level of self discipline and that put me in a express route to burn out. That's because you didn't have a subjugated population of helots taking care of everything that isn't your core competency ;)
dboreham 4y ago
Years ago I had the idea to create an automated "task assigner" to solve this problem. Once loaded with suitable data (perhaps a hard problem), it would just feed you tasks, "Do this now", and you'd do the tasks and feel happy that you had completed its assigned tasks. Based on the theory that the trouble isn't with doing stuff but more deciding what do do and in which order. Too busy to actually write it though.
- hackerfromthefu 4y ago
  I wrote this
- wadefletch 4y ago
  https://www.usemotion.com/ https://www.usemotion.com/
weinzierl 4y ago
I have a pretty well structured life because I enjoy it that way. Does it make me more productive than people with a less structured life? Maybe a little bit, but I doubt it makes a big difference. A rigid structure always means fragmentation, waste and unnecessary overhead.
Animats 4y ago
Join the Army.
- insightcheck 4y ago
  It doesn't seem that there are many software development positions (which is relevant for many users here) in the (assuming US) army or military in general.
  - Animats 4y ago
    The Space Force is hiring devs and data scientists.[1] What they mostly do, after all, is collect huge amounts of data from various sensors and try to make sense of it. With college and engineering training, go for an officer position.[2] [1] https://fcw.com/defense/2022/05/space-force-bring-data-scientists-coders-board-summer/366523/ https://fcw.com/defense/2022/05/space-force-bring-data-scien... [2] https://www.spaceforce.com/military-careers/cyberspace-operations-officer https://www.spaceforce.com/military-careers/cyberspace-opera...
  - rcarr 4y ago
    I imagine the signals or intelligence corps will take you in a heart beat providing you don’t have a history of mental illness or some other condition that disallows entry such as autism. They were even contemplating lowering the fitness test requirements for devs because they were that desperate to recruit. At least that’s what I heard over here in the UK about our military. I thought about joining long and hard but ultimately decided it wasn’t for me.
atemerev 4y ago
I have heavy ADHD. For me, structured life is sadly impossible. Every attempt routine degrades in a week or two.
- jcpst 4y ago
  Keep trying. I know it’s a struggle. Lots of stuff will not work or last. But once in a while you may get that one tiny little habit to stick, and every little bit helps.
  - Tao3300 4y ago
    I heard great things about this book called Atomic Habits, so I bought it. Unfortunately I could never remember to read it, and I'm not sure where it is now.
    - dutchbrit 4y ago
      Ha, I finally ordered that book a few days ago, last minute before I’d set off on holiday (I procrastinated ordering it for about 2 months). It should of arrived the day before I left, but unfortunately it didn’t and now I’m on holiday without it. Was looking forward to reading it, but I guess I’ll have to wait a bit longer.
    - jcpst 4y ago
      First time hearing of it. Will definitely check it out.
jasonshen 4y ago
I spoke to a long-time Microsoft and Facebook eng leader who left his post as a nonprofit software CEO due to burnout and then spent many months languishing and spiralling into depression. He actually decided to get a job as an Amazon warehouse worker for 6 weeks for exactly the reason OP is struggling with: to get structure. > In November, I suddenly thought, "I should at least get some sort of job somewhere just to have some regularity to my schedule, to enforce some daily practices". My number one priority was just to have structured work that would force me to get up every day—work that was very different from white collar jobs, in that I did not want to be asked to make a lot of decisions everyday. > I didn't want the stress of managing people and teams. I didn't want the politics of subjective decisions being debated amongst team members. I wanted literally to be told what to do every day and I wanted that structure to be rigorous. I strongly felt that would help me get out of my depression. https://www.jasonshen.com/120/ https://www.jasonshen.com/120/ Update: posted this on HN since it seems to resonate https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33072083 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33072083
- jonasdegendt 4y ago
  I can't speak for Amazon but I had an order picking job at a Volvo warehouse in college, and despite having to hit a certain number of picked items every day it was oddly relaxing. Once you got good at it you could zoom through your day on auto pilot. Drive to aisle X, pick up N boxes at rack Y, rinse and repeat.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- localhost 4y ago
  I remember Philip! Wow. That's some story. Thanks for sharing it.
- shakezula 4y ago
  I have found myself day-dreaming about a manual labor job for many of the same reasons. I am supremely jealous of my friends who work these types of jobs and can "leave it at the door" when they come home. I can't do that as well, even when I try to enforce boundaries. Slack, emails, my home office, etc... make it impossible to shut it all out. I'm considering tearing down my home office and working solely from a coffee shop because of it.
musha68k 4y ago
Good for them to envision a structure of their own. If they end up not being able to build the habits I can only say that in case of having kids you will find structure alright. That or you‘ll simply disintegrate into the void. Pick life though and just do it (Atomic habits is probably a good start, check durmonski.com for an efficient write up).
waprin 4y ago
I recently left a 400k+ job to work full time on an app addressing this exact problem, despite having a wife, daughter, and Bay Area mortgage . Of course productivity apps are a crowded space but I have a burning need to build the right tool for myself , and I believe might help others. Remote work has pressed the need for me to improve here since I think I benefited by being in the same room as coworkers and being alone in my home the whole workday has pressed my ability to stay focused. I struggled with ADHD , but because of past health issues, medication is off the table. Even though Vyvanse was a miracle for focus it caused some serious other problems. And the more I read about psychiatry and psychology the more I’ve gotten excited by lifestyle changes. One thing I feel strongly about is that productivity tools need to be descriptive, not prescriptive . I’m not a robot, I need to work on what my gut is telling me to work on rather than what some reminder is telling me to work on. But I also need to do work and not scroll Reddit for hours so a tool helps with accountability for that. I can’t over emphasize how enamored I am with Andrew Huberman Youtube video on the topic. He’s a Stanford neuroscientist with all sorts of suggestions on managing our dopamine levels with techniques like cold water therapy and intermittent fasting. Social media, including hacker news and excessive email checking, can destroy your motivation if you don’t keep it in check. If you’re struggling with focus you simply have to monitor and moderate these things. Please email me, username at gmail if this topic is of interest to you.
- Bakary 4y ago
  What I don't understand is that with a $400K salary you should easily be able to retire altogether within a few short years, which should completely solve the productivity issue. You wouldn't even have to dial back your lifestyle too much unless you are currently burning it on Veblen goods. I'm grateful you are working on the app, however, as that sounds very helpful.
  - aleksiy123 4y ago
    Not everyone wants to retire early. Especially people who thrive in structure.
    - 4y ago
jskulski 4y ago
Rituals can be important. I recently worked on a mostly daily exercise routine and it's life changing. I'm now focusing on a monthly/weekly/daily planning. If I try to even do two habits, I have much lower results. Counterintuitively, there's requirements to have more slack time. It's has to be dedicated and active. I need time to waste. I just need that time to be intentional, timed and shamefree. One trick, I use is to set a timer, get myself a glass of water, and then turn down the bed like a hotel before a Movie.
Silverback_VII 4y ago
Repeat the following sentence 10 times in a row, 3 times a day and once before bed with the diligence of a Muslim: "He who cannot obey himself will be commanded. That is the nature of living things."
- skapadia 4y ago
  This sounds like a line from a self-help book from the 1930s - 1950s.
  - mattkrause 4y ago
    A bit older (1880s)!
- mattkrause 4y ago
  (It's from Nietzsche in Thus Spake Zarathustra, if anyone else is trying to figure out why it sounds familiar).
DerekBickerton 4y ago
My circadian rhythm is structure enough. As for morning and night routines, I have them, and it usually involves a phone. So first thing I check in the morning is my local news, and then world news (so I can have some context for the whole day and to be alerted of the fact we're not in a nuclear war). Then caffeination happens to bring me back to baseline reality. As for night, I catch up on social media, then place the phone in another room so I'm not tempted to doom-scroll. I have a dedicated non-internet iPod for listening to podcasts with the VLC app which typically sends me to sleep. If I have problems sleeping, I take notes, since my brain is buzzing with valuable ideas which I execute on the next day.
Xcelerate 4y ago
> I've come across a lot of productivity and self-help resources and all of them suggest setting up a routine. I’ve noticed that having a routine is also about the best way to accelerate the perception of the passage of time. The more routine my life is, the quicker the years go by, and I look back and say “what did I do during all that time?” My most memorable years are the ones with a lot of variety, change, and novelty.
- Bakary 4y ago
  It makes more sense to think of routines as ways to optimize your boring time to make more room for the important things.
davbryn 4y ago
Structure is important. Personally, it has been something I've found more difficult to adhere to as I've gotten older and more successful. When you start out in your career you find structure essential: I HAD to be up early or I wouldn't make the 30 mins walk to my train. I HAD to get home on time to collect my child from nursery, and I couldn't risk the train being late. As I've progressed in my career I've been able to afford cars. I don't have to get up so early because I can work remotely. My son is almost an adult and mostly looks after himself. I think it is a momentum thing and you don't realise when you are on that train. Younger me could wake at 4am to travel and start work at 8am so he could leave early, collect his son and then go to the gym. Older me is lazy. My body aches, I don't have the drive I used to have. I'm comfortable. But I'm not really comfortable; I'm drained; I'm aching and I'm struggling to enjoy things. Noone talks about the affect of the grind you have to do early on in life.
- SoftTalker 4y ago
  Yeah I'm about where you are, maybe a little past that. My kids are at university or out on their own. I don't really have rigid work hours. I can easily go to bed and sleep for 10 or 12 hours. I think I am slowly recovering from about three decades of sleep deprivation.
mcculley 4y ago
"Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work." --Gustave Flaubert
omgmajk 4y ago
I struggle a lot with structure, I find that I am the most productive when things get really chaotic and random and I get flung in to a project or work item that I have no idea what's going on with. I think I'm quite weird that way but I know some other people who like that approach too. This goes for my life outside of work as well, forced structure feels strange to me.
colordrops 4y ago
Instead of desiring and expecting structure and going limp once the structure fails, try instead to drop the crutches and strengthen the "muscle" that keeps you always dynamically evaluating what is best for you to be doing at this very moment. There's a desire to have a simple world where you just color in between the lines and everything works out while you go on autopilot, but the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry - the world does not owe you your schedule. Just stay awake and always be re-evaluating, don't get caught in sunk-cost fallacy, and don't hold onto anything too tightly.
- mannymanman 4y ago
  How do you even start doing this? I have poor self control and usually start projects/tasks right as the deadline approaches. I wish I was that productive all the time...
  - colordrops 4y ago
    Mindfulness meditation is a big help here. It works for me but there are other methods, e.g. memento mori, psychedelics, journaling, minimalism, travel, nootropics, exercise until exhaustion, new social groups, always pushing a bit out of your comfort zone. It's a bit chicken and egg, but letting that seed be planted in your head and keep at it for a while and don't get caught up in dogma or any particular method.
- johnchristopher 4y ago
  No. Don't drop crutches before you can walk with crutches. Then try not to use them less. Some people will always need crutches, that's okay. If you can fly you run, if you can't run you walk, if you can't walk you crawl, if you can't crawl you roll around. Keep moving :).
blueyes 4y ago
Sunsama did a really great job of helping me adopt new habits that brought more structure to my work day. https://www.sunsama.com/ https://www.sunsama.com/ But you need to enforce your own bedtime and waking time to make it effective.
garrickvanburen 4y ago
Something I remind myself now and again, “Tomorrow starts today.” To me, this means, look at the next day’s calendar (commitments, obligations, logistics) the night before. If you don’t have any… make some arbitrary ones up. All structure is self-imposed anyway (as evidence by those that are late for everything).
newaccount2021 4y ago
pugets 4y ago
You only need semi-structure. Walk the dog every morning. Take out the trash at night. Read for a little while before bed. Call mom every Saturday. The exact times and durations don’t matter and won’t be known beforehand. I made the mistake of trying to organize a master plan for how I would live my days. In my experience, it just doesn’t work out the way you plan it. Daily life is too chaotic. I now use a much simpler approach instead. 8am, 12pm, 4pm, 8pm. These are the times by which I need to get something done. For example, 8am: Walk the dog. By 8, it should be done. If it gets done before 7, even better. If it gets done at 8:10, start earlier tomorrow. 12pm: Fold the laundry. 4pm: Go to the store, call mom, read. 8pm: Make dinner, take out the trash. When you are comfortable with how many tasks you assign yourself, add more tasks. But don’t go crazy when you’re just starting off. Keeping one habit is better than flirting with five.
- germandiago 4y ago
  This works pretty well. A semi-routine. With certain flexibility.
- notjustanymike 4y ago
  Exactly! Flexible rituals, not rigid structures. In particular, the morning rituals should be designed to encourage some form of productivity and the evening rituals should create closure.
  - personalidea 4y ago
    What I found with my kids was that the sequence is more important than the time. Their bedtime routine has been pretty much the same for the last ten years, only the timing has changed.
- akira2501 4y ago
  I found that planning my _weeks_ was far more valuable than planning my _days_. As you point out, daily life is too chaotic, but a week is something you can actually work with. I found the same to be true with dieting. You shouldn't plan your diet around single days of eating, you should plan it around an entire week of eating.
ravenstine 4y ago
Structure can help. However, some of us simply have too many things we want to get done in the span of a human lifetime, in which case the answer is to do less, not more.
brador 4y ago
5.30am? You're not doing any brain work for the next 12 hours after waking that early.
nightpool 4y ago
This is a weird article. It has almost no content, and is just a small personal journal entry. It has the exact same sign-off as a different personal journal entry (with slightly more context) that got front-page exposure earlier today, and submitted by the exact same person: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=memorable https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=memorable, who is a developer for the blogging software these articles were authored with. Feels like a weird / non-genuine stealth marketing campaign.
artur_makly 4y ago
have a kid ;-)
amjnsx 4y ago
This is the main reason I hate the holiday season. It's obviousy nice to take a break and spend time with loved ones, but as I don't spend it at home, my structure/routine just completley falls apart and I can't wait for the week to be over by the end and I'm craving normality.
cm_silva 4y ago
It's ok to not have structure, but if you feel that the way you are leading your life is not working, then perhaps it is time to change. I found that, when I was feeling overwhelmed, it was because I was not making choices. Or, in other words, I was not saying "No" to enough things, so that I had too much on my plate. I found that choices were hard to make but, once I started simplifying my life by removing elements from it, I started to get a lot more focus. That focus allowed me to find the motivation and direction that I had needed all my life, but which I never thought I was missing. Feeling unsatisfied with one's life can really be a great blessing ;-)
didgetmaster 4y ago
I recently retired from working for other companies after a 35 year career; but I have a personal side-project that I have worked on for about a decade. During that time I would usually spend spare time on it in the evenings or on weekends. Now I can work on it anytime I like. Without some kind of structure, it is easy to let a whole week or two go by without accomplishing much of anything. So I make sure that I get up at 7am every morning and do something productive on it each day. Some days I will only spend a couple hours on it, others I will work 10+ hours on it. Since startup founders often have to wear many hats, it can be a challenge to decide what to work on each day. To prevent boredom and to spread tasks around so that progress is made in several different areas; I roll a single die every day to decide which of six areas to work on that day. 1 = Work on a new feature. 2 = Test an existing feature or run benchmarks. 3 = Fix bugs or optimize some code. 4 = Write documentation, blogs, or newsletters. 5 = Work on marketing and sales. 6 = Reach out to existing customers for feedback or help them figure out how to use it better.
- didizaja 4y ago
  I love the idea of using a dice to randomize the tasks you choose! Does using a physical object to “ground” your productivity practice make it feel more “real”/tangible-feeling than, say, running an RNG program on your computer? I’d imagine it does, but I’m curious.
Kinnard 4y ago
Maybe it's a symptom and not the actual underlying cause. You went through all the trouble to put into writing your need for structure so it's off the table that your problem is that "you aren't trying to implement structure in your life." What else could it be?
jesterswilde 4y ago
On the other side of it, I recently decided to let go of the idea of structure. I spent a large portion of my life trying to be one of those structured productive people with habits and such. I have a wide array of skills and none of them were gained from habits and structure, they were gained from following a passion. I'm happier now, my spirals are smaller, I forgive myself easier. I also think I am more productive. Not saying one shouldn't seek structure and try to make it for themselves. If that's your path, go for it. But for me, I think that ideal was harmful and hindered a lot.
foooobaba 4y ago
Two things helped me: 1. Simple organization 2. Laid back mindset Organization to get clarity, not to be prescriptive. To easily see things like what’s going on, when deadlines are, and what’s involved, and what you want in the first place. Organization not to set a schedule, routine, time management, or anything like that. It’s about making things simpler. Laid back mindset so I can take it easy and get things done at the same time. Like working smart, not hard. Instead of trying to be fast, productive, efficient, take your time, be more thoughtful. It helps to naturally avoid procrastination, because the thought of doing something you don’t feel like isn’t so repulsive. You can just take your time, relax, and get it done. If you avoid feeling pressured, it makes it easier to concentrate, and do a better job. My goal is to wake up, and not care about what day it is. I really don't want to be stressed at night. I don’t want to dread Monday or look forward to the weekend. I don’t want to be so worked up that my brain looks for distractions. I don’t want to have to hype myself up to something. Being organized helps me see what I might wanna do when I wake up, and be at peace when I want to get some rest. Being laid back helps me to actually start doing something and even have a chance to enjoy it. It helps me to take a break when I need it, and to pick it up again later. It makes it easier to be patient when something is challenging.
nashashmi 4y ago
Once had a field job where I did nothing about it after I left. And then I had a new job where I was working at a desk and still continued to work after I went home. The latter job I aged considerably. While in the former, I was in the best health. But man, there were some days that I had to fight to get up in the morning after tiring myself the previous day. Little did I know it was keeping me young. Routines are important. Even if artificial.
odd_noises 4y ago
This is literally me! Why are we like this??
odd_noises 4y ago
This is literally me! Why are like this??
posharma 4y ago
What is so special about this blog? Why is it getting so much attention?
- Apocryphon 4y ago
  People identify with the predicament.
rcarr 4y ago
One of the absolute easiest ways to add structure when unemployed is to pick a substantial exercise goal and work towards it. Endurance events are ideal but could also be something like a new Deadlift PR. For the former, if you pick a long enough distance such as Ironman or Half Ironman you’ll be training in the region of between 10 and 20 hours a week which is a part time job in itself. For the latter, you’ll be doing less but the time spent commuting to the gym, doing your workout and showering is probably still going to add up to somewhere in the 5 - 10 hour range if you’re doing it 5/6 days a week. You can pretty much find an app for every mainstream sport imaginable where you can get a full year of personalised programming for under £200. If you then combine this with a training course of some kind to learn a new skill and a creative project/side hustle, you end up with a self-structured life by default that is pretty satisfying. If anyone wants app recommendations for specific sports leave a comment and I’ll write a list of the best ones I’ve found.
ok_dad 4y ago
A local rooster waking me up everyday at 530am has done wonders for my productivity. I'm not even joking, I wake up and close the windows so my wife doesn't get bothered, make coffee, code for a few hours before work, then do my work day, play with my son, and finally I end up going to bed quite early (10am) due to being dead-ass tired. I was about to try and get rid of the rooster, but I actually love the little dude now.
agumonkey 4y ago
I'd add a favorable context to the routine. Being around people that appreciate your ideas / goals makes it a lot easier to maintain than on your own, or worse, surrounded by negative people.
nathan_f77 4y ago
I also struggle with not having enough structure, which is exascerabated by being a solo founder who works from home. I often tend towards being a night owl unless I'm very careful about going to sleep on time. Sometimes taking a melatonin tablet will help me stick to my sleep schedule, but sometimes that doesn't even work. One thing that has really helped me over the last month or so is booking regular sessions on https://www.focusmate.com https://www.focusmate.com. Even if I just book a 20 minute session every morning, this helps me stay consistent with clearing out my email inbox and answering support tickets quickly. (Although I'm actually in a session right now and I got distracted with writing up this comment. I will go back to doing my emails after this! I should probably share my screen with my session partner so that I don't get so easily distracted.) I also used to get very overwhelmed when I would see a lot of cards in my Trello todo lists. The problem is that I would dump all of my thoughts and ideas into a single Trello board, so it would turn into a bizarre mix of miscellaneous projects and ideas for things to do, like "buy some new socks", "pay an invoice", "go to an Ethiopian restaurant", "take some drum lessons", etc. I solved this by creating a new Trello board that is strictly for important tasks. So now I have an "Ideas" board which is my old dumping ground of random things, and a "Tasks" board that only contains important things that I actually need to do. I also came up with a priority system where I would prefix each title with a number from 0 to 9, and I set up some Butler automations that would automatically sort the list alphabetically in ascending order. So then I would start each day by looking at my tasks board and doing the highest priority tasks first. During a lunch break, or after I finish my important work, then I allow myself to take a look at my "Ideas" board and maybe pick a fun project to work on, or do some personal errands. It's pretty hard to maintain a work/life balance when you work and live in the same place, because everything really starts to blur together. One minute I'll be working on a bug fix for a customer, and the next minute I'm playing around with some home automation project.
sushmi 4y ago
This resonates with my situation currently I am going through. I would love to read your next writing. Thanks for sharing!
rammy1234 4y ago
Probably want to add this on why you need a structure in life. If not if gives anxiety and chaos. I wrote my thoughts here - https://lazydevstories.com/post/overwhelmed/ https://lazydevstories.com/post/overwhelmed/
slevcom 4y ago
I use beeminder
la64710 4y ago
- the_only_law 4y ago
- xoqem 4y ago
  I think it's just an indication of how many people see themselves in the words, regardless of who wrote them, and hope to find some direction in the resulting discussion.
uwagar 4y ago
u are fine just the way u are. just chill.
technovader 4y ago
This comes at an interesting time in my life. I too decided to take the chaos out of my life, but it was much simpler than I had always thought. 1. Stop watching Youtube and browsing Reddit in your free time 2. Stop playing games in your free time 3. Stop using your phone for wasting time 4. Stop watching TV when you eat 5. Stop listening to podcasts while you sleep 6. Stop eating snacks with TV What ends up happening as a result - You start to sleep earlier and better - Reading books becomes interesting again - You wake up earlier and feel more fresh - Realize you have a lot of free time - Going outside for a walk is more interesting (less boring) - Work tasks that were boring, now hold your attention more - Finishing work tasks, and house chores, feel more rewarding now A much shorter summary of this 'diet' is called the 'Dopamine Detox'. What I'm trying to say is, a lot of this chaos and burnout, is just related to our addiction of time-wasting and addictive habits like browsing youtube and reddit more and more.
- leobg 4y ago
  Shit. This was what I needed right now. Time to close HN and put away my phone. Thank you.
- Anthony-G 4y ago
  That’s a good set of rules to follow – if not the letter, then the spirit, e.g., I spend hardly any time on sites such as YouTube or Reddit so for myself, I’d replace Rule 1 with “Cut down on reading Hacker News (or other sources of interesting articles)” and I’d replace Rule 2 with “spend less time watching TV/films”. I’ve recently got into the habit of watching TV while eating and snacking and after reading Rules 4 and 6, have come to the conclusion that it’s a bad habit; eating should be intentional and purposeful, not a thoughtless activity while being mentally engaged by some other activity. I don’t know if I could go cold turkey with external stimulation so from now on, if I’m eating alone, I’ll just listen to music (instead of reading or watching TV).
jongjong 4y ago
I'm the opposite. I hate structure and predictability. I keep launching new side projects, changing jobs, changing countries because I can't stand repetition or structure. I enjoy doing nothing, going to sleep and waking up when I feel like it. It's the only time I feel happy. It's too bad people like me don't usually get rich. I'm 100% certain that money would buy me happiness. I don't even need it to buy stuff. I don't care about material things. I don't care about status. I just need enough money to do nothing whilst not having to live in a forest.
azubinski 4y ago
Guy, excuse me, but you have home, family and work. So, which especial "structure" you are dreaming of? What a magic level of "productivity" do you want to reach? Set your alarm for 7-30, have breakfast if you want, don't have breakfast if you don't want to, if you can and want to take a nap during the day, that's fine. You're doing so well, so enjoy it. Because the Teacher said life is like a zebra - there are a white stripe, a black stripe, a white ... and then, inevitably, there will be a hole in the ass under the tail. :)

270 points by memorable 4y ago

k__ 4y ago

A few years ago, I got the rid of (most) alarms. Now, I get out of bed when I'm rested and only set alarms occasionally when I have an appointment. It might not be a time-based structure, but it's one that I can follow indefinitely.

alpark3 4y ago

I feel like it's a losing game to try to force yourself into a "productivity" mindset, as if you're some type of black box that needs to be optimized for certain behavior. Structure is good and habit is key, but don't imprison yourself in it, in my opinion.

shakezula 4y ago

I resonate with this a lot and the part about not knowing if that lack of structure is what makes you unproductive is a question I’ve asked myself a lot lately. It’s hard to know the answer and I always get different feedback from different people when asked which almost always just boils down to what they do.

reciprocate 4y ago

I've been reading through "I Didn't Do the Thing Today", which is in a lot of ways a rejection of the prevailing productivity sentiment. It's about self-care and treating yourself with grace, even when things don't come out as the most profitable or productive, at least so far. And in that spirit I'll say to the author of this post: It's okay to nap in the middle of the day, or not eat breakfast, or work first thing in the morning and not do a Morning Page or Meditation or whatever aspirational-you has decided is worthwhile. We are all doing our best in the circumstances we have. In my life I've found that better is really a game of averages. Some days are going to be great. Some weeks have a severe downward trend with no real reason that I can tell. Well. Maybe it's due to bad sleep quality or lack of exercise. All I can do is try to be the person that makes the good decisions and accept the person that I am, and that keeps me pretty happy.

L0in 4y ago

I think it would be more beneficial if you examine your activities and behaviors at work hours. The wouldn't be much difference in your work output if you eat launch in the morning or spend a little time with your family. If there's a «problem» somewhere it's probably during work hours.

tenpoundhammer 4y ago

Throughout my career I've spent a lot of time stressing out about how productive I'm being. Trying many different methods. Finally I decided that if I feel stressed out about my productivity I would write down everything I've done during the day. Usually turns out I've done a lot of stuff that I it's actual work that I just discount as not work. Some days get taken over by mandatory work that doesn't feel productive but is.

ar_lan 4y ago

In general, I find myself to be someone who operates best within certain confines - for example, the time blocking from Cal Newport has been highly effective for myself. That said, I caution against too much routine. I used to get really into it but remember many days where I felt like the day was ruined because I couldn’t get a workout in, or someone scheduled an 8am meeting, or any other myriad of things I grew dependent on. Too much structure is basically a fragile crutch, in my experience. My personal morning “routine” is a quick cup of coffee and a half mile walk, and then straight to work. I time block the day first thing based on whatever my weekly goals for the week were, and try to keep about two hours of buffer time to allow some shifting throughout the day. I’ve done this about a year now and it’s helped me keep the benefits of structure, without the guilt of when something “optimal” doesn’t happen.

TurkishPoptart 4y ago
Is there a "lite" version of Cal Newport's time-blocking techniques? I'm super interested every time I hear him explain it but I get overwhelmed and never end up implementing anything.
- garrickvanburen 4y ago
  I schedule almost everything (eg taking out the trash, commutes, workouts) Maybe start scheduling more of your commitments and obligations in your calendar? Or alternatively, Start by keeping a time diary of how you spend your days and how long tasks take you, then use that to inform your time blocks
- ar_lan 4y ago
  I wouldn’t really say it’s a big implementation. I just use a piece of paper and denote a line to each 30 mins of the work day. So it might look like: 10: meeting 1030: bug fixing 11: bug fixing 1130: bug fixing 12: run 1230: run 1: lunch 130: feature work 2: feature work 230: meeting 3: feature work 330: feature work 4: plan next week The above was my entry from last Friday, where I had a late start to the day. At the start of my day I had kept the 12-2:30 block fairly empty (I knew some form of working out + lunch would show up, and I had wanted to do some feature work that day, but I didn’t know if any other meetings would pop up. They didn’t, so it worked great!) I basically fill in meetings first, then work around them to put in the work I want to focus on for the day. The main caveat is I don’t focus on anything else for this blocks, and unless I’m in incredible flow and the task is definitely important, I always make sure I stop at the end of the block time (the whole “we will fill up whatever time we allot ourselves” theory).

vehemenz 4y ago

Maybe try defining your structure in terms of the effort you put in and what you accomplish (with respect to that effort), rather than a schedule or a sequence of items on a checklist. Your coffee or teeth-brushing rituals are minor, accidental details.

dexwiz 4y ago

Structure is good, but it’s really hard to self impose. Before you had to do one thing: work within a structure. Having to self impose means you have to do two things: create structure and then do the work within it. It doesn’t help that advancing as a technical worker often removes that structure, or forces you to create it. I am given freedom as a perk of seniority, but for me it’s been a burden.

MrDrDr 4y ago

I have moved between phases of high productivity and high procrastination. IMO a system and routine are great if you have a goal you genuinely want to achieve. The more time it takes to achieve the goal (I’m thinking 5+ years) the more helpful a system/routine is. The problem occurs when you find yourself working hard to achieve a goal you have no genuine interest in - and then no system is going to help you.

kzrdude 4y ago

How much do you sleep? Cutting down as much as possible on evening internet really helps my whole life.

Ilasky 4y ago

I know this feeling extremely well. Routines are routinely broken by me, but I found that I just needed someone else there with me to do the thing. Even if it is just their presence. In the ADHD community, it’s called body doubling ( https://doubleapp.xyz/blog/how-to-body-double https://doubleapp.xyz/blog/how-to-body-double ), but it can absolutely extend to those outside of the ADHD sphere as well.

chinchilla2020 4y ago
Well at least you have one routine. You routinely break routines!
- Ilasky 4y ago
  Haha! I can count on it like the sun rising in the east.
vjk800 4y ago
When I was a graduate student, I often participated in summer schools and conferences where there was a strict schedule that included two or three meals a day. I absolutely loved it. I would like to live all of my life so that someone else would schedule my life for me, cook meals at right times, etc. And of course part of it was that most of the other people participating the event also did the same schedule as you so you always had friends to have lunch, dinner and coffee breaks with. If someone has any suggestions on how to organize my life like a one big summer school, I'm listening. I guess joining a monastery would do it, but I don't really care for the other aspects of monastic life.
- pipeline_peak 4y ago
  > I would like to live all of my life so that someone else would schedule my life for me, cook meals at right times, etc. > how to organize my life like a one big summer school It sounds like you don’t want to take on being an adult. Responsibility gives you independence and power, you might want a therapist to help persuade and shortly guide you that.

dainiusse 4y ago

If you can't do it alone, just you wait until you have kids...

Ruq 4y ago

I relate to this so much. I probably should build a morning routine. There's so much I want to get done.

Daunk 4y ago

I wish I had the option to have... any kind of flexibility in my life. I'm forced to go to work at a certain time, which means I have to get up at a certain time. I also eat at work, both lunch and dinner, so if I skip those then there's almost no time for me to eat. I have to do chores when I get home for about an hour or two, then I have about 2.5 hours of "free time" before I have to go to bed and repeat the process. Being able to have any kind of flexibility is an extreme luxury I think people take for granted.

cmehdy 4y ago
This is one of the ways income inequality and systemic discriminations can drastically alter the life of people or groups of people. No time to think, to time to breathe.. no time to dream. The mind can die (or at least enter a sort of coma) long before the body in these circumstances. And it's incredibly hard to help yourself while in there, which is why the empathy and kindness of others matters so much too.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
dijonman2 4y ago
I live by an edict. If you don’t get what you want: it’s due to your decisions. I prioritized flexibility and that’s what I have. You can do the same!
- A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
  Hmm. I am taking this comment at face value and not as a sarcastic response. Even if you prioritize flexibility, if your position is at the bottom of the totem pole, you will find it exceedingly difficult to get even minute changes in it. Those employees are increasingly monitored to the point I would not have accepted as a kid, but it seems a more and more common practice today. I guess what I am saying is that what you do matters, but not nearly as much as you give it credit for. Some of it is just dumb luck.

danbrooks 4y ago

Having kids has created a very specific structure.

Tade0 4y ago
Yes. Also forces one to prioritize because both time and energy are precious resources.
- euroderf 4y ago
  Yes. You will find a lot of half-hearted "interests" melting away.
oldsklgdfth 4y ago
Not having kids, I feel like a family clears up the optimization problem of: * what should I be doing with my time? * what is important to think about? As a software dev with a flexible schedule, my life feels arbitrary. I pick up hobbies because I need stuff to do, I try to eat better to take care of myself, I save money and live frugally for a rainy day. But there's no common thread to all these. It's just stuff I picked.

nodelessness 4y ago

It is important to listen to the body. I tried to have a spartan level of self discipline and that put me in a express route to burn out. And I burned out. Burn out is not easy to climb out of, so I would rather be less than ideally productive than be disciplined to an extent that ignores my humanity and that damages me severely.

Tao3300 4y ago
> I tried to have a spartan level of self discipline and that put me in a express route to burn out. That's because you didn't have a subjugated population of helots taking care of everything that isn't your core competency ;)

dboreham 4y ago

Years ago I had the idea to create an automated "task assigner" to solve this problem. Once loaded with suitable data (perhaps a hard problem), it would just feed you tasks, "Do this now", and you'd do the tasks and feel happy that you had completed its assigned tasks. Based on the theory that the trouble isn't with doing stuff but more deciding what do do and in which order. Too busy to actually write it though.

hackerfromthefu 4y ago
I wrote this
wadefletch 4y ago
https://www.usemotion.com/ https://www.usemotion.com/

weinzierl 4y ago

I have a pretty well structured life because I enjoy it that way. Does it make me more productive than people with a less structured life? Maybe a little bit, but I doubt it makes a big difference. A rigid structure always means fragmentation, waste and unnecessary overhead.

Animats 4y ago

Join the Army.

insightcheck 4y ago
It doesn't seem that there are many software development positions (which is relevant for many users here) in the (assuming US) army or military in general.
- Animats 4y ago
  The Space Force is hiring devs and data scientists.[1] What they mostly do, after all, is collect huge amounts of data from various sensors and try to make sense of it. With college and engineering training, go for an officer position.[2] [1] https://fcw.com/defense/2022/05/space-force-bring-data-scientists-coders-board-summer/366523/ https://fcw.com/defense/2022/05/space-force-bring-data-scien... [2] https://www.spaceforce.com/military-careers/cyberspace-operations-officer https://www.spaceforce.com/military-careers/cyberspace-opera...
- rcarr 4y ago
  I imagine the signals or intelligence corps will take you in a heart beat providing you don’t have a history of mental illness or some other condition that disallows entry such as autism. They were even contemplating lowering the fitness test requirements for devs because they were that desperate to recruit. At least that’s what I heard over here in the UK about our military. I thought about joining long and hard but ultimately decided it wasn’t for me.

atemerev 4y ago

I have heavy ADHD. For me, structured life is sadly impossible. Every attempt routine degrades in a week or two.

jcpst 4y ago
Keep trying. I know it’s a struggle. Lots of stuff will not work or last. But once in a while you may get that one tiny little habit to stick, and every little bit helps.
- Tao3300 4y ago
  I heard great things about this book called Atomic Habits, so I bought it. Unfortunately I could never remember to read it, and I'm not sure where it is now.
  - dutchbrit 4y ago
    Ha, I finally ordered that book a few days ago, last minute before I’d set off on holiday (I procrastinated ordering it for about 2 months). It should of arrived the day before I left, but unfortunately it didn’t and now I’m on holiday without it. Was looking forward to reading it, but I guess I’ll have to wait a bit longer.
  - jcpst 4y ago
    First time hearing of it. Will definitely check it out.

jasonshen 4y ago

I spoke to a long-time Microsoft and Facebook eng leader who left his post as a nonprofit software CEO due to burnout and then spent many months languishing and spiralling into depression. He actually decided to get a job as an Amazon warehouse worker for 6 weeks for exactly the reason OP is struggling with: to get structure. > In November, I suddenly thought, "I should at least get some sort of job somewhere just to have some regularity to my schedule, to enforce some daily practices". My number one priority was just to have structured work that would force me to get up every day—work that was very different from white collar jobs, in that I did not want to be asked to make a lot of decisions everyday. > I didn't want the stress of managing people and teams. I didn't want the politics of subjective decisions being debated amongst team members. I wanted literally to be told what to do every day and I wanted that structure to be rigorous. I strongly felt that would help me get out of my depression. https://www.jasonshen.com/120/ https://www.jasonshen.com/120/ Update: posted this on HN since it seems to resonate https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33072083 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33072083

jonasdegendt 4y ago
I can't speak for Amazon but I had an order picking job at a Volvo warehouse in college, and despite having to hit a certain number of picked items every day it was oddly relaxing. Once you got good at it you could zoom through your day on auto pilot. Drive to aisle X, pick up N boxes at rack Y, rinse and repeat.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
localhost 4y ago
I remember Philip! Wow. That's some story. Thanks for sharing it.
shakezula 4y ago
I have found myself day-dreaming about a manual labor job for many of the same reasons. I am supremely jealous of my friends who work these types of jobs and can "leave it at the door" when they come home. I can't do that as well, even when I try to enforce boundaries. Slack, emails, my home office, etc... make it impossible to shut it all out. I'm considering tearing down my home office and working solely from a coffee shop because of it.

musha68k 4y ago

Good for them to envision a structure of their own. If they end up not being able to build the habits I can only say that in case of having kids you will find structure alright. That or you‘ll simply disintegrate into the void. Pick life though and just do it (Atomic habits is probably a good start, check durmonski.com for an efficient write up).

waprin 4y ago

I recently left a 400k+ job to work full time on an app addressing this exact problem, despite having a wife, daughter, and Bay Area mortgage . Of course productivity apps are a crowded space but I have a burning need to build the right tool for myself , and I believe might help others. Remote work has pressed the need for me to improve here since I think I benefited by being in the same room as coworkers and being alone in my home the whole workday has pressed my ability to stay focused. I struggled with ADHD , but because of past health issues, medication is off the table. Even though Vyvanse was a miracle for focus it caused some serious other problems. And the more I read about psychiatry and psychology the more I’ve gotten excited by lifestyle changes. One thing I feel strongly about is that productivity tools need to be descriptive, not prescriptive . I’m not a robot, I need to work on what my gut is telling me to work on rather than what some reminder is telling me to work on. But I also need to do work and not scroll Reddit for hours so a tool helps with accountability for that. I can’t over emphasize how enamored I am with Andrew Huberman Youtube video on the topic. He’s a Stanford neuroscientist with all sorts of suggestions on managing our dopamine levels with techniques like cold water therapy and intermittent fasting. Social media, including hacker news and excessive email checking, can destroy your motivation if you don’t keep it in check. If you’re struggling with focus you simply have to monitor and moderate these things. Please email me, username at gmail if this topic is of interest to you.

Bakary 4y ago
What I don't understand is that with a $400K salary you should easily be able to retire altogether within a few short years, which should completely solve the productivity issue. You wouldn't even have to dial back your lifestyle too much unless you are currently burning it on Veblen goods. I'm grateful you are working on the app, however, as that sounds very helpful.
- aleksiy123 4y ago
  Not everyone wants to retire early. Especially people who thrive in structure.
  - 4y ago

jskulski 4y ago

Rituals can be important. I recently worked on a mostly daily exercise routine and it's life changing. I'm now focusing on a monthly/weekly/daily planning. If I try to even do two habits, I have much lower results. Counterintuitively, there's requirements to have more slack time. It's has to be dedicated and active. I need time to waste. I just need that time to be intentional, timed and shamefree. One trick, I use is to set a timer, get myself a glass of water, and then turn down the bed like a hotel before a Movie.

Silverback_VII 4y ago

Repeat the following sentence 10 times in a row, 3 times a day and once before bed with the diligence of a Muslim: "He who cannot obey himself will be commanded. That is the nature of living things."

skapadia 4y ago
This sounds like a line from a self-help book from the 1930s - 1950s.
- mattkrause 4y ago
  A bit older (1880s)!
mattkrause 4y ago
(It's from Nietzsche in Thus Spake Zarathustra, if anyone else is trying to figure out why it sounds familiar).

DerekBickerton 4y ago

My circadian rhythm is structure enough. As for morning and night routines, I have them, and it usually involves a phone. So first thing I check in the morning is my local news, and then world news (so I can have some context for the whole day and to be alerted of the fact we're not in a nuclear war). Then caffeination happens to bring me back to baseline reality. As for night, I catch up on social media, then place the phone in another room so I'm not tempted to doom-scroll. I have a dedicated non-internet iPod for listening to podcasts with the VLC app which typically sends me to sleep. If I have problems sleeping, I take notes, since my brain is buzzing with valuable ideas which I execute on the next day.

Xcelerate 4y ago

> I've come across a lot of productivity and self-help resources and all of them suggest setting up a routine. I’ve noticed that having a routine is also about the best way to accelerate the perception of the passage of time. The more routine my life is, the quicker the years go by, and I look back and say “what did I do during all that time?” My most memorable years are the ones with a lot of variety, change, and novelty.

Bakary 4y ago
It makes more sense to think of routines as ways to optimize your boring time to make more room for the important things.

davbryn 4y ago

Structure is important. Personally, it has been something I've found more difficult to adhere to as I've gotten older and more successful. When you start out in your career you find structure essential: I HAD to be up early or I wouldn't make the 30 mins walk to my train. I HAD to get home on time to collect my child from nursery, and I couldn't risk the train being late. As I've progressed in my career I've been able to afford cars. I don't have to get up so early because I can work remotely. My son is almost an adult and mostly looks after himself. I think it is a momentum thing and you don't realise when you are on that train. Younger me could wake at 4am to travel and start work at 8am so he could leave early, collect his son and then go to the gym. Older me is lazy. My body aches, I don't have the drive I used to have. I'm comfortable. But I'm not really comfortable; I'm drained; I'm aching and I'm struggling to enjoy things. Noone talks about the affect of the grind you have to do early on in life.

SoftTalker 4y ago
Yeah I'm about where you are, maybe a little past that. My kids are at university or out on their own. I don't really have rigid work hours. I can easily go to bed and sleep for 10 or 12 hours. I think I am slowly recovering from about three decades of sleep deprivation.

mcculley 4y ago

"Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work." --Gustave Flaubert

omgmajk 4y ago

I struggle a lot with structure, I find that I am the most productive when things get really chaotic and random and I get flung in to a project or work item that I have no idea what's going on with. I think I'm quite weird that way but I know some other people who like that approach too. This goes for my life outside of work as well, forced structure feels strange to me.

colordrops 4y ago

Instead of desiring and expecting structure and going limp once the structure fails, try instead to drop the crutches and strengthen the "muscle" that keeps you always dynamically evaluating what is best for you to be doing at this very moment. There's a desire to have a simple world where you just color in between the lines and everything works out while you go on autopilot, but the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry - the world does not owe you your schedule. Just stay awake and always be re-evaluating, don't get caught in sunk-cost fallacy, and don't hold onto anything too tightly.

mannymanman 4y ago
How do you even start doing this? I have poor self control and usually start projects/tasks right as the deadline approaches. I wish I was that productive all the time...
- colordrops 4y ago
  Mindfulness meditation is a big help here. It works for me but there are other methods, e.g. memento mori, psychedelics, journaling, minimalism, travel, nootropics, exercise until exhaustion, new social groups, always pushing a bit out of your comfort zone. It's a bit chicken and egg, but letting that seed be planted in your head and keep at it for a while and don't get caught up in dogma or any particular method.
johnchristopher 4y ago
No. Don't drop crutches before you can walk with crutches. Then try not to use them less. Some people will always need crutches, that's okay. If you can fly you run, if you can't run you walk, if you can't walk you crawl, if you can't crawl you roll around. Keep moving :).

blueyes 4y ago

Sunsama did a really great job of helping me adopt new habits that brought more structure to my work day. https://www.sunsama.com/ https://www.sunsama.com/ But you need to enforce your own bedtime and waking time to make it effective.

garrickvanburen 4y ago

Something I remind myself now and again, “Tomorrow starts today.” To me, this means, look at the next day’s calendar (commitments, obligations, logistics) the night before. If you don’t have any… make some arbitrary ones up. All structure is self-imposed anyway (as evidence by those that are late for everything).

newaccount2021 4y ago

pugets 4y ago

You only need semi-structure. Walk the dog every morning. Take out the trash at night. Read for a little while before bed. Call mom every Saturday. The exact times and durations don’t matter and won’t be known beforehand. I made the mistake of trying to organize a master plan for how I would live my days. In my experience, it just doesn’t work out the way you plan it. Daily life is too chaotic. I now use a much simpler approach instead. 8am, 12pm, 4pm, 8pm. These are the times by which I need to get something done. For example, 8am: Walk the dog. By 8, it should be done. If it gets done before 7, even better. If it gets done at 8:10, start earlier tomorrow. 12pm: Fold the laundry. 4pm: Go to the store, call mom, read. 8pm: Make dinner, take out the trash. When you are comfortable with how many tasks you assign yourself, add more tasks. But don’t go crazy when you’re just starting off. Keeping one habit is better than flirting with five.

germandiago 4y ago
This works pretty well. A semi-routine. With certain flexibility.
notjustanymike 4y ago
Exactly! Flexible rituals, not rigid structures. In particular, the morning rituals should be designed to encourage some form of productivity and the evening rituals should create closure.
- personalidea 4y ago
  What I found with my kids was that the sequence is more important than the time. Their bedtime routine has been pretty much the same for the last ten years, only the timing has changed.
akira2501 4y ago
I found that planning my _weeks_ was far more valuable than planning my _days_. As you point out, daily life is too chaotic, but a week is something you can actually work with. I found the same to be true with dieting. You shouldn't plan your diet around single days of eating, you should plan it around an entire week of eating.

ravenstine 4y ago

Structure can help. However, some of us simply have too many things we want to get done in the span of a human lifetime, in which case the answer is to do less, not more.

brador 4y ago

5.30am? You're not doing any brain work for the next 12 hours after waking that early.

nightpool 4y ago

This is a weird article. It has almost no content, and is just a small personal journal entry. It has the exact same sign-off as a different personal journal entry (with slightly more context) that got front-page exposure earlier today, and submitted by the exact same person: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=memorable https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=memorable, who is a developer for the blogging software these articles were authored with. Feels like a weird / non-genuine stealth marketing campaign.

artur_makly 4y ago

have a kid ;-)

amjnsx 4y ago

This is the main reason I hate the holiday season. It's obviousy nice to take a break and spend time with loved ones, but as I don't spend it at home, my structure/routine just completley falls apart and I can't wait for the week to be over by the end and I'm craving normality.

cm_silva 4y ago

It's ok to not have structure, but if you feel that the way you are leading your life is not working, then perhaps it is time to change. I found that, when I was feeling overwhelmed, it was because I was not making choices. Or, in other words, I was not saying "No" to enough things, so that I had too much on my plate. I found that choices were hard to make but, once I started simplifying my life by removing elements from it, I started to get a lot more focus. That focus allowed me to find the motivation and direction that I had needed all my life, but which I never thought I was missing. Feeling unsatisfied with one's life can really be a great blessing ;-)

didgetmaster 4y ago

I recently retired from working for other companies after a 35 year career; but I have a personal side-project that I have worked on for about a decade. During that time I would usually spend spare time on it in the evenings or on weekends. Now I can work on it anytime I like. Without some kind of structure, it is easy to let a whole week or two go by without accomplishing much of anything. So I make sure that I get up at 7am every morning and do something productive on it each day. Some days I will only spend a couple hours on it, others I will work 10+ hours on it. Since startup founders often have to wear many hats, it can be a challenge to decide what to work on each day. To prevent boredom and to spread tasks around so that progress is made in several different areas; I roll a single die every day to decide which of six areas to work on that day. 1 = Work on a new feature. 2 = Test an existing feature or run benchmarks. 3 = Fix bugs or optimize some code. 4 = Write documentation, blogs, or newsletters. 5 = Work on marketing and sales. 6 = Reach out to existing customers for feedback or help them figure out how to use it better.

didizaja 4y ago
I love the idea of using a dice to randomize the tasks you choose! Does using a physical object to “ground” your productivity practice make it feel more “real”/tangible-feeling than, say, running an RNG program on your computer? I’d imagine it does, but I’m curious.

Kinnard 4y ago

Maybe it's a symptom and not the actual underlying cause. You went through all the trouble to put into writing your need for structure so it's off the table that your problem is that "you aren't trying to implement structure in your life." What else could it be?

jesterswilde 4y ago

On the other side of it, I recently decided to let go of the idea of structure. I spent a large portion of my life trying to be one of those structured productive people with habits and such. I have a wide array of skills and none of them were gained from habits and structure, they were gained from following a passion. I'm happier now, my spirals are smaller, I forgive myself easier. I also think I am more productive. Not saying one shouldn't seek structure and try to make it for themselves. If that's your path, go for it. But for me, I think that ideal was harmful and hindered a lot.

foooobaba 4y ago

Two things helped me: 1. Simple organization 2. Laid back mindset Organization to get clarity, not to be prescriptive. To easily see things like what’s going on, when deadlines are, and what’s involved, and what you want in the first place. Organization not to set a schedule, routine, time management, or anything like that. It’s about making things simpler. Laid back mindset so I can take it easy and get things done at the same time. Like working smart, not hard. Instead of trying to be fast, productive, efficient, take your time, be more thoughtful. It helps to naturally avoid procrastination, because the thought of doing something you don’t feel like isn’t so repulsive. You can just take your time, relax, and get it done. If you avoid feeling pressured, it makes it easier to concentrate, and do a better job. My goal is to wake up, and not care about what day it is. I really don't want to be stressed at night. I don’t want to dread Monday or look forward to the weekend. I don’t want to be so worked up that my brain looks for distractions. I don’t want to have to hype myself up to something. Being organized helps me see what I might wanna do when I wake up, and be at peace when I want to get some rest. Being laid back helps me to actually start doing something and even have a chance to enjoy it. It helps me to take a break when I need it, and to pick it up again later. It makes it easier to be patient when something is challenging.

nashashmi 4y ago

Once had a field job where I did nothing about it after I left. And then I had a new job where I was working at a desk and still continued to work after I went home. The latter job I aged considerably. While in the former, I was in the best health. But man, there were some days that I had to fight to get up in the morning after tiring myself the previous day. Little did I know it was keeping me young. Routines are important. Even if artificial.

odd_noises 4y ago

This is literally me! Why are we like this??

odd_noises 4y ago

This is literally me! Why are like this??

posharma 4y ago

What is so special about this blog? Why is it getting so much attention?

Apocryphon 4y ago
People identify with the predicament.

rcarr 4y ago

One of the absolute easiest ways to add structure when unemployed is to pick a substantial exercise goal and work towards it. Endurance events are ideal but could also be something like a new Deadlift PR. For the former, if you pick a long enough distance such as Ironman or Half Ironman you’ll be training in the region of between 10 and 20 hours a week which is a part time job in itself. For the latter, you’ll be doing less but the time spent commuting to the gym, doing your workout and showering is probably still going to add up to somewhere in the 5 - 10 hour range if you’re doing it 5/6 days a week. You can pretty much find an app for every mainstream sport imaginable where you can get a full year of personalised programming for under £200. If you then combine this with a training course of some kind to learn a new skill and a creative project/side hustle, you end up with a self-structured life by default that is pretty satisfying. If anyone wants app recommendations for specific sports leave a comment and I’ll write a list of the best ones I’ve found.

ok_dad 4y ago

A local rooster waking me up everyday at 530am has done wonders for my productivity. I'm not even joking, I wake up and close the windows so my wife doesn't get bothered, make coffee, code for a few hours before work, then do my work day, play with my son, and finally I end up going to bed quite early (10am) due to being dead-ass tired. I was about to try and get rid of the rooster, but I actually love the little dude now.

agumonkey 4y ago

I'd add a favorable context to the routine. Being around people that appreciate your ideas / goals makes it a lot easier to maintain than on your own, or worse, surrounded by negative people.

nathan_f77 4y ago

I also struggle with not having enough structure, which is exascerabated by being a solo founder who works from home. I often tend towards being a night owl unless I'm very careful about going to sleep on time. Sometimes taking a melatonin tablet will help me stick to my sleep schedule, but sometimes that doesn't even work. One thing that has really helped me over the last month or so is booking regular sessions on https://www.focusmate.com https://www.focusmate.com. Even if I just book a 20 minute session every morning, this helps me stay consistent with clearing out my email inbox and answering support tickets quickly. (Although I'm actually in a session right now and I got distracted with writing up this comment. I will go back to doing my emails after this! I should probably share my screen with my session partner so that I don't get so easily distracted.) I also used to get very overwhelmed when I would see a lot of cards in my Trello todo lists. The problem is that I would dump all of my thoughts and ideas into a single Trello board, so it would turn into a bizarre mix of miscellaneous projects and ideas for things to do, like "buy some new socks", "pay an invoice", "go to an Ethiopian restaurant", "take some drum lessons", etc. I solved this by creating a new Trello board that is strictly for important tasks. So now I have an "Ideas" board which is my old dumping ground of random things, and a "Tasks" board that only contains important things that I actually need to do. I also came up with a priority system where I would prefix each title with a number from 0 to 9, and I set up some Butler automations that would automatically sort the list alphabetically in ascending order. So then I would start each day by looking at my tasks board and doing the highest priority tasks first. During a lunch break, or after I finish my important work, then I allow myself to take a look at my "Ideas" board and maybe pick a fun project to work on, or do some personal errands. It's pretty hard to maintain a work/life balance when you work and live in the same place, because everything really starts to blur together. One minute I'll be working on a bug fix for a customer, and the next minute I'm playing around with some home automation project.

sushmi 4y ago

This resonates with my situation currently I am going through. I would love to read your next writing. Thanks for sharing!

rammy1234 4y ago

Probably want to add this on why you need a structure in life. If not if gives anxiety and chaos. I wrote my thoughts here - https://lazydevstories.com/post/overwhelmed/ https://lazydevstories.com/post/overwhelmed/

slevcom 4y ago

I use beeminder

la64710 4y ago

the_only_law 4y ago
xoqem 4y ago
I think it's just an indication of how many people see themselves in the words, regardless of who wrote them, and hope to find some direction in the resulting discussion.

uwagar 4y ago

u are fine just the way u are. just chill.

technovader 4y ago

This comes at an interesting time in my life. I too decided to take the chaos out of my life, but it was much simpler than I had always thought. 1. Stop watching Youtube and browsing Reddit in your free time 2. Stop playing games in your free time 3. Stop using your phone for wasting time 4. Stop watching TV when you eat 5. Stop listening to podcasts while you sleep 6. Stop eating snacks with TV What ends up happening as a result - You start to sleep earlier and better - Reading books becomes interesting again - You wake up earlier and feel more fresh - Realize you have a lot of free time - Going outside for a walk is more interesting (less boring) - Work tasks that were boring, now hold your attention more - Finishing work tasks, and house chores, feel more rewarding now A much shorter summary of this 'diet' is called the 'Dopamine Detox'. What I'm trying to say is, a lot of this chaos and burnout, is just related to our addiction of time-wasting and addictive habits like browsing youtube and reddit more and more.

leobg 4y ago
Shit. This was what I needed right now. Time to close HN and put away my phone. Thank you.
Anthony-G 4y ago
That’s a good set of rules to follow – if not the letter, then the spirit, e.g., I spend hardly any time on sites such as YouTube or Reddit so for myself, I’d replace Rule 1 with “Cut down on reading Hacker News (or other sources of interesting articles)” and I’d replace Rule 2 with “spend less time watching TV/films”. I’ve recently got into the habit of watching TV while eating and snacking and after reading Rules 4 and 6, have come to the conclusion that it’s a bad habit; eating should be intentional and purposeful, not a thoughtless activity while being mentally engaged by some other activity. I don’t know if I could go cold turkey with external stimulation so from now on, if I’m eating alone, I’ll just listen to music (instead of reading or watching TV).

jongjong 4y ago

I'm the opposite. I hate structure and predictability. I keep launching new side projects, changing jobs, changing countries because I can't stand repetition or structure. I enjoy doing nothing, going to sleep and waking up when I feel like it. It's the only time I feel happy. It's too bad people like me don't usually get rich. I'm 100% certain that money would buy me happiness. I don't even need it to buy stuff. I don't care about material things. I don't care about status. I just need enough money to do nothing whilst not having to live in a forest.

azubinski 4y ago

Guy, excuse me, but you have home, family and work. So, which especial "structure" you are dreaming of? What a magic level of "productivity" do you want to reach? Set your alarm for 7-30, have breakfast if you want, don't have breakfast if you don't want to, if you can and want to take a nap during the day, that's fine. You're doing so well, so enjoy it. Because the Teacher said life is like a zebra - there are a white stripe, a black stripe, a white ... and then, inevitably, there will be a hole in the ass under the tail. :)