8 ms·

Ask HN: What is one thing that improved your cognitive skills the most?

39 points by Throwawayuns 4y ago

I’m wondering what people here are doing to help with their concentration, memory, energy etc

giantg2 4y ago
Nothing. It's been a slow decline.
more_corn 4y ago
Wait, y’all are out there improving your cognitive skills?
more_corn 4y ago
Block time on your calendar for deep work. Eliminate interruptions during deep work time. Learn the pattern of common logical fallacies. Practice finding them in yourself and your interlocutors. Write down your thoughts. Writing things down forces you to structure them. Talk to people you disagree with. Actively challenge your own assumptions and conclusions. When you lose an argument you gain knowledge. When you engage in an argument in good faith (allowing that you could be wrong) you test your assumptions and conclusions.
Flatcircle 4y ago
Stop Drinking. Plenty of sleep. Relaxation away from screens. Long Walks. Pulling and pushing heavy things. Surfing.
- red-iron-pine 4y ago
  All of these here worked for me, except surfing. Way to far inland in Canada for that to be a thing. Gotta underscore sleep, though. When I started doing "no screens" 30 min before bed, and being strict about the time, I started sleeping better and feeling better. Better sleep meant less coffee, less jitters, and more focus. edit: a word
bell-cot 4y ago
Ample sleep, healthy diet, quality exercise, walking through natural areas, and a good social life.
- hungryforcodes 4y ago
  Ample sleep and a good social life are often contradictory.
markus_zhang 4y ago
I don't know about that, but I know bitterly that chronic sleep deprivation basically deatroyed the "RAM" of my brain, now it's really difficult to concentrate and go through difficult problem without rest. So instead of gritting through step 1 to 10, I have to take a rest after step 3, then make sure that step 3 was property done, then take another rest after step 6, recheck 6, and so on. I'd argue one of the edges smart people have is to have a large RAM. They can think through all 10 steps in one shot, maybe 20-30 mins, while people like me have to take triple that time, even a full day because something interrupts us in the middle. Conclusion: don't f**ing get kid(s) unless you really want them, as air and water, and are willing to sacrifice cognitive ability.
- giantg2 4y ago
  I agree that marriage, kids, and the complexities they present are a drag on cognition.
  - markus_zhang 4y ago
    Can't blame anyone except myself. I actually knew that but still decided to sink into it. Back in the day I did a calculation of how much time I can save by NOT going into marriage and getting 1+ children, that calculation grossly underestimated the time saved, even without the deduction in cognition.
Malky 4y ago
I feel that the basics like sleep, going outside before 10am and exercise were the most helpful. I also picked up tons of useful tips from Huberman Labhttps://hubermanlab.com/understand-and-improve-memory-using-science-based-tools/ https://hubermanlab.com/understand-and-improve-memory-using-...
gardenhedge 4y ago
If I had to pick one thing I would say gaming. But then I overdid it and played too much and slept too little. Now I rarely play games.
nso95 4y ago
The Pomodoro Technique is a life saver
karmakaze 4y ago
Probably explaining what I think I know/understand to someone else. You have to understand things clearer to be able to do that so it's a forcing function. The more of this you do the easier it is to categorize information and ideas leading to less cognitive load and increasing capacity.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
orange_fritter 4y ago
Hilariously my comment sounds like Radiohead's FITTER HAPPIER MORE PRODUCTIVE song but I swear I shot up 10 IQ points and work reputation by: Stop drinking alcohol, as said elsewhere. It takes about 2-3 weeks of sobriety to regain 80% of the capacity you lost. It's also extremely hard on your emotional regulation, work motivation, patience, and ability to concentrate long after you think you can't feel the effects. Stop eating carbs, namely because it makes you sleepy and unmotivated. I replaced carbs with tons of fiber and vegetables, like red cabbage, matchstick carrots, and expensive fermented foods. Don't try to imitate your old crappy diet. Stop trying to eat the best meal every night. Perfect your sleep schedule. I used 10mg EXTENDED RELEASE melatonin about 1 hour before bedtime. Fight less with your spouse, play boardgames. Meditate or stare at the wall to learn how to be bored. A lot of "intelligence" is just tolerance for boring/temporarily unrewarding things. Meditation has a lot of benefits as far as clearing out some of the crud. Exercise, even 5 minutes a day. Anything. Make sure to work in a variety of settings. If you can take your computer to a park bench and use your phone as a wifi hotspot, great. Being in nature is speculated to improve brain health.
- yura 4y ago
  > Stop drinking alcohol, as said elsewhere. It takes about 2-3 weeks of sobriety to regain 80% of the capacity you lost. Capacity of what? And have you got any source on that?
  - giantg2 4y ago
    It likely affects different people differently. Moderate alcohol consumption doesn't seem to have a long term cognitive affect for me. No difference in cognitive abilities if I had 2-3 drinks the night before or a few months before. I'd imagine heavy drinking has a different impact, but have much experience on that. Overall, it would likely be healthier to not drink.
    - more_corn 4y ago
      Hangovers and negative cognitive effects of drinking increase dramatically as people age. I’m guessing you’re 30 or under. I noticed a dramatic drop in my memory which I attribute to drinking. I stopped two years ago but I’m probably not back to where I would be if I hadn’t been drinking.
treya 4y ago
Repeated sessions of deep concentration in a particular subject or problem over a prolonged period clearly creates neural growth. I've tackled several extremely complex projects in my life, and in each case I found that I became increasingly proficient at working on them as time progressed. I started to realize epiphanies typically aren't that you suddenly discovered something, but are that your cognitive ability ultimately progressed to the point where you can fully understand something. By the way, in each of these periods I was regularly napping because of the mental fatigue. I have a sense that a lot of the neural growth happened during those naps.
rg111 4y ago
There are several things that I believe have increased my cognitive abilities. If I had to choose one, it would be 1. 1. Keeping learning and applying new things. New skills like new programming languages, new math, new strategy games, new situations in life in general. 2. Teaching. Whether a peer or a junior or anyone. I taught people since very early in life (say 6th standard). I believe this to be a knowledge multiplier. 3. Programming is a superpower that enables you to think in newer ways, solve problems in newer ways. Learned Prolog, Scheme, Haskell, Ruby, C++, Julia, APL- even if I don’t use them in my work/projects. I kept learning newer things- genetic algorithms, ML, non-linear dynamics, game programming, and coded newer things. This is great. 4. Meditation. It made me calmer, helped me make better decisions. More focused in learning, find patterns quicker and more intently. It's an anti-dote to scrollvirus infested world. 5. Exercise. Doing less is fine as long as I do it regularly. 6. Sleep. Always slept 7-9 hours since childhood. 7. I believe even small exposures to newer areas of knowledge increases your intelligence. It doesn't remotely make you an expert in those areas, but it makes you better in your field/s. 8. Art is really important and significant in my life. Performing arts and consuming them- are both great and enable different things in your life. Reading novels had made me more empathetic and exposed me to different worldviews. It has been valuable. When giving a presentation/convincing someone of a view- all the instincts I learned from performing arts kicks in. Some would call me crazy but while writing theorems, this happens, too. Also art is a great escape, using which you can turn off from the real world and heal from pains/unpleasant situations which enables you learn new things. Learning to play a piece on piano/guitar is like solving a programming problem (yourself, not memorize it). Your brain is in fire. 9. Solving problems regularly makes your brain better in the short term. Like solving Codeforces problem or automating a significant something in Factorio. Just like if you want to look in better shape for few hours, 20 push ups achieve this for you; solving 2 codeforces problems each day for 6 days will enable you to be in sharper state for the next two days. 10. Believing yourself as a force of good in the world helps you stay motivated in trying times. 11. Having a close friend/SO helps a lot. The sooner you realize that cognitive skills are tied to your mental and physical wellbeing, the better.
afarrell 4y ago
Turning off overhead lights around 9pm and getting sunlight in the morning. This gave me a consistent sleep schedule. Sleep is mental strength.
ineedausername 4y ago
The one thing? Actually caring about the activity, if I care about what I'm doing everything improves cognitively.
segmondy 4y ago
Thinking, lots of purposeful thinking. Reading, carefully choosing what to read, thinking about the lessons learned and figuring out how to put them in practice.
LisaDziuba 4y ago
[dead]
toldyouso2022 4y ago
Get bored. Omega 3. Cardio improves brain function more than weightlifting (sad). Do what you are good at and interested in, don't waste energy and don't accumulate stress with stuff that's not for you (this is huge and very underrated, although it cannot be done 100% of the time obviously).
- giantg2 4y ago
  I hear that non-fish derived omega-3 is better because it's less likely to have oxidized before/during extraction. Not sure how true that is, but wanted to throw that out for discussion.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

39 points by Throwawayuns 4y ago

I’m wondering what people here are doing to help with their concentration, memory, energy etc

giantg2 4y ago

Nothing. It's been a slow decline.

more_corn 4y ago

Wait, y’all are out there improving your cognitive skills?

more_corn 4y ago

Block time on your calendar for deep work. Eliminate interruptions during deep work time. Learn the pattern of common logical fallacies. Practice finding them in yourself and your interlocutors. Write down your thoughts. Writing things down forces you to structure them. Talk to people you disagree with. Actively challenge your own assumptions and conclusions. When you lose an argument you gain knowledge. When you engage in an argument in good faith (allowing that you could be wrong) you test your assumptions and conclusions.

Flatcircle 4y ago

Stop Drinking. Plenty of sleep. Relaxation away from screens. Long Walks. Pulling and pushing heavy things. Surfing.

red-iron-pine 4y ago
All of these here worked for me, except surfing. Way to far inland in Canada for that to be a thing. Gotta underscore sleep, though. When I started doing "no screens" 30 min before bed, and being strict about the time, I started sleeping better and feeling better. Better sleep meant less coffee, less jitters, and more focus. edit: a word

bell-cot 4y ago

Ample sleep, healthy diet, quality exercise, walking through natural areas, and a good social life.

hungryforcodes 4y ago
Ample sleep and a good social life are often contradictory.

markus_zhang 4y ago

I don't know about that, but I know bitterly that chronic sleep deprivation basically deatroyed the "RAM" of my brain, now it's really difficult to concentrate and go through difficult problem without rest. So instead of gritting through step 1 to 10, I have to take a rest after step 3, then make sure that step 3 was property done, then take another rest after step 6, recheck 6, and so on. I'd argue one of the edges smart people have is to have a large RAM. They can think through all 10 steps in one shot, maybe 20-30 mins, while people like me have to take triple that time, even a full day because something interrupts us in the middle. Conclusion: don't f**ing get kid(s) unless you really want them, as air and water, and are willing to sacrifice cognitive ability.

giantg2 4y ago
I agree that marriage, kids, and the complexities they present are a drag on cognition.
- markus_zhang 4y ago
  Can't blame anyone except myself. I actually knew that but still decided to sink into it. Back in the day I did a calculation of how much time I can save by NOT going into marriage and getting 1+ children, that calculation grossly underestimated the time saved, even without the deduction in cognition.

Malky 4y ago

I feel that the basics like sleep, going outside before 10am and exercise were the most helpful. I also picked up tons of useful tips from Huberman Labhttps://hubermanlab.com/understand-and-improve-memory-using-science-based-tools/ https://hubermanlab.com/understand-and-improve-memory-using-...

gardenhedge 4y ago

If I had to pick one thing I would say gaming. But then I overdid it and played too much and slept too little. Now I rarely play games.

nso95 4y ago

The Pomodoro Technique is a life saver

karmakaze 4y ago

Probably explaining what I think I know/understand to someone else. You have to understand things clearer to be able to do that so it's a forcing function. The more of this you do the easier it is to categorize information and ideas leading to less cognitive load and increasing capacity.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

orange_fritter 4y ago

Hilariously my comment sounds like Radiohead's FITTER HAPPIER MORE PRODUCTIVE song but I swear I shot up 10 IQ points and work reputation by: Stop drinking alcohol, as said elsewhere. It takes about 2-3 weeks of sobriety to regain 80% of the capacity you lost. It's also extremely hard on your emotional regulation, work motivation, patience, and ability to concentrate long after you think you can't feel the effects. Stop eating carbs, namely because it makes you sleepy and unmotivated. I replaced carbs with tons of fiber and vegetables, like red cabbage, matchstick carrots, and expensive fermented foods. Don't try to imitate your old crappy diet. Stop trying to eat the best meal every night. Perfect your sleep schedule. I used 10mg EXTENDED RELEASE melatonin about 1 hour before bedtime. Fight less with your spouse, play boardgames. Meditate or stare at the wall to learn how to be bored. A lot of "intelligence" is just tolerance for boring/temporarily unrewarding things. Meditation has a lot of benefits as far as clearing out some of the crud. Exercise, even 5 minutes a day. Anything. Make sure to work in a variety of settings. If you can take your computer to a park bench and use your phone as a wifi hotspot, great. Being in nature is speculated to improve brain health.

yura 4y ago
> Stop drinking alcohol, as said elsewhere. It takes about 2-3 weeks of sobriety to regain 80% of the capacity you lost. Capacity of what? And have you got any source on that?
- giantg2 4y ago
  It likely affects different people differently. Moderate alcohol consumption doesn't seem to have a long term cognitive affect for me. No difference in cognitive abilities if I had 2-3 drinks the night before or a few months before. I'd imagine heavy drinking has a different impact, but have much experience on that. Overall, it would likely be healthier to not drink.
  - more_corn 4y ago
    Hangovers and negative cognitive effects of drinking increase dramatically as people age. I’m guessing you’re 30 or under. I noticed a dramatic drop in my memory which I attribute to drinking. I stopped two years ago but I’m probably not back to where I would be if I hadn’t been drinking.

treya 4y ago

Repeated sessions of deep concentration in a particular subject or problem over a prolonged period clearly creates neural growth. I've tackled several extremely complex projects in my life, and in each case I found that I became increasingly proficient at working on them as time progressed. I started to realize epiphanies typically aren't that you suddenly discovered something, but are that your cognitive ability ultimately progressed to the point where you can fully understand something. By the way, in each of these periods I was regularly napping because of the mental fatigue. I have a sense that a lot of the neural growth happened during those naps.

rg111 4y ago

There are several things that I believe have increased my cognitive abilities. If I had to choose one, it would be 1. 1. Keeping learning and applying new things. New skills like new programming languages, new math, new strategy games, new situations in life in general. 2. Teaching. Whether a peer or a junior or anyone. I taught people since very early in life (say 6th standard). I believe this to be a knowledge multiplier. 3. Programming is a superpower that enables you to think in newer ways, solve problems in newer ways. Learned Prolog, Scheme, Haskell, Ruby, C++, Julia, APL- even if I don’t use them in my work/projects. I kept learning newer things- genetic algorithms, ML, non-linear dynamics, game programming, and coded newer things. This is great. 4. Meditation. It made me calmer, helped me make better decisions. More focused in learning, find patterns quicker and more intently. It's an anti-dote to scrollvirus infested world. 5. Exercise. Doing less is fine as long as I do it regularly. 6. Sleep. Always slept 7-9 hours since childhood. 7. I believe even small exposures to newer areas of knowledge increases your intelligence. It doesn't remotely make you an expert in those areas, but it makes you better in your field/s. 8. Art is really important and significant in my life. Performing arts and consuming them- are both great and enable different things in your life. Reading novels had made me more empathetic and exposed me to different worldviews. It has been valuable. When giving a presentation/convincing someone of a view- all the instincts I learned from performing arts kicks in. Some would call me crazy but while writing theorems, this happens, too. Also art is a great escape, using which you can turn off from the real world and heal from pains/unpleasant situations which enables you learn new things. Learning to play a piece on piano/guitar is like solving a programming problem (yourself, not memorize it). Your brain is in fire. 9. Solving problems regularly makes your brain better in the short term. Like solving Codeforces problem or automating a significant something in Factorio. Just like if you want to look in better shape for few hours, 20 push ups achieve this for you; solving 2 codeforces problems each day for 6 days will enable you to be in sharper state for the next two days. 10. Believing yourself as a force of good in the world helps you stay motivated in trying times. 11. Having a close friend/SO helps a lot. The sooner you realize that cognitive skills are tied to your mental and physical wellbeing, the better.

afarrell 4y ago

Turning off overhead lights around 9pm and getting sunlight in the morning. This gave me a consistent sleep schedule. Sleep is mental strength.

ineedausername 4y ago

The one thing? Actually caring about the activity, if I care about what I'm doing everything improves cognitively.

segmondy 4y ago

Thinking, lots of purposeful thinking. Reading, carefully choosing what to read, thinking about the lessons learned and figuring out how to put them in practice.

LisaDziuba 4y ago

[dead]

toldyouso2022 4y ago

Get bored. Omega 3. Cardio improves brain function more than weightlifting (sad). Do what you are good at and interested in, don't waste energy and don't accumulate stress with stuff that's not for you (this is huge and very underrated, although it cannot be done 100% of the time obviously).

giantg2 4y ago
I hear that non-fish derived omega-3 is better because it's less likely to have oxidized before/during extraction. Not sure how true that is, but wanted to throw that out for discussion.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]