7 ms·

Getting Stuff Done by Not Being Mean to Yourself (2010)

215 points by herbertl 3y ago

boredemployee 3y ago
>> Once I get all my work out of the way, maybe I can do something fun or satisfying or just cuz. That's where I'm struggling recently. I barely find anything joyful lately. I tried many many "discipline" frameworks, I can commit more than 1 week.
- nicbou 3y ago
  Maybe you're tired? Too much work kills your energy for anything remotely intellectual.
dorkwood 3y ago
> Yesterday, I finally realized that this method would never, ever work. I was shocked. But it never, ever has. I’ve been after myself on this score for, what, like ten years? Had it ever worked once in that time, I asked myself. No! I had a similar realisation a few years ago. I used to try to come up with side project ideas by sitting down with a piece of paper and writing down every idea I could think of. Then, I’d decide which of these ideas seemed in the realm of possibility for me with my current skill set. Out of that whittled-down list, I’d then choose the idea that I thought would have the most chance of success. The problem? I could never remain motivated. It turned out that I had invented a formula for choosing ideas that neither extended my skills nor spoke to my inner curiosity. Things only changed when I asked myself the question “has this ever worked for me in the past? Even once?” I decided my new philosophy was to work on whatever I was most curious about — even if it seemed way too hard for me, or if everyone else thought it was stupid. I haven’t exactly made millions of dollars from this approach, but I’ve learned more in the past four years (and had more fun doing it) than I did in the previous 10. It makes me wonder what other things I might be doing out of habit that have never actually worked.
- acalzycalzy 3y ago
  In a sense this didn’t work out for you either - financially anyway
  - atoav 3y ago
    First, finances are most of the time just a roundabout way of trying to be happy. So in a way doing things that make you happy directly instead of doing things hoping to gain money for that activity and then spending that money to hope to gain happiness will never work the same (provided you are not starving). Second, many people on this platform, me included, got good at the things they do for a living, because they did it for fun (and sometimes still do). Going for the fun project helps you learn faster and better. It might be "the wrong" thing to learn, but who is even able to judge that?
    - beebmam 3y ago
      > finances are most of the time just a roundabout way of trying to be happy If you consider not dying a form of happiness, sure. Seems overly reductive to me.
      - wuiheerfoj 3y ago
        I’d suggest ‚most‘ people ‚most of the time’ are not on the brink of death due to their finances
      - atoav 3y ago
        I live in a nation where we consider it normal to not let those living around us die of starvation or illness. That includes me. Also: I made that caveat and you skipped right past it. Everything is a gradient of course. I am not suggesting you have to never follow some discipline and always go for the fun route.
- jcadam 3y ago
  I used to spend a lot of my spare time on side projects, thinking I'd hit on something successful eventually. Now, I'm in my 40s and I'm like "Done with work; I think I'll go for a walk and then take a nap."
langsoul-com 3y ago
This approach works if the stuff you want to get done also is very enjoyable. Nobody wants to wash the dishes, do maintenance or clean up, but it has to be done. The question is how does this work for things you want to get done, but it's hard. Say I want to make some form of rubber duck app, but with an AI voice. The idea is great, I talk my programming ideas and she'd respond back, giving an illusion of listening. However, it's way more work and less immediately enjoyable than a game of Dota 2.
- flangola7 3y ago
  This is polar opposite of my experience. The unenjoyable ones are precisely the tasks that I will never complete unless I am very kind and forgiving to myself. Beating myself bloody with "but it has to get done" is an exercise in hopeless futility.
  - crooked-v 3y ago
    On a similar note, I get a lot of "chore" tasks done by basically just being impulsive about them: if I have a free 15 minutes before a meeting or after breakfast or whatever and I'm feeling high-energy I'll just pick something off my long household to-do list and do it then. The results aren't all that consistent but everything gets stochastically done eventually.
- atoav 3y ago
  We are talking about enjoyable projects. Dota 2 might not be a project (unless you plan to become a pro). Doing something out of passion is a value in itself that should not be ignored. In music this is what often differenciates the true geniuses from those who are just very good: passion. If you have to sit down and practise an instruments for hours a day it totally helps if you are passionate about the instrument. It helps when you care about the music you are playing and how you are playing it. All of that can be reached via discipline as well, but there might be something lacking in the end. What is the difference between someone playing the same thing for 8 hours out of passion and another one playing the same thing for 8 hours out of discipline? It doesn't feel like work to the former, while it might drain everything out of the latter.
TheAlchemist 3y ago
That's an interesting opinion. I struggle with this a lot too. Would love to read some other methods people used and that worked out well.
the_only_law 3y ago
If I’m not mean to myself though, I get too arrogant.
jodrellblank 3y ago
> "If I’m not vigilant about making myself do stuff, I won’t do anything. And my commitment to meditate is critical on every level." Alan Watts said that meditation shouldn't be a grim duty, it should be done for the fun of it, it should be a 'grooving with the eternal now'. "Getting meditation done" makes as much sense as "getting dancing done" or "getting music listened to" - the goal isn't to hurry up and finish playing music or dancing, it's to enjoy doing it for its own sake.
- cinntaile 3y ago
  Just because somebody says something doesn't mean it's the only way. It's just an opinion, no matter who said it.
  - jodrellblank 3y ago
    That's, just, like, your opinion, maaan. - The Dude[1]. But I still disagree; meditation being to do with noticing where your thoughts arise, who watches the watcher, who is "I", it's fundamentally at odds with the hustle culture of productivity and economic return on investment and "it's critical that I meditate to keep up my image of being someone who meditates so I can maintain my suitably high status to impress my readers". It's the kind of thing Buddha stepped away from his wealthy upbringing to realise, the kind of thing Zen Monks go to monasteries to get away from, the kind of thing rich people take meditative sabatticals to observe and introspect. Desire causes suffering; I forget what book I read it in but it was a normal person asking a guru about their office job, lots of phones ringing, lots of urgency, lots of stress, how can she meditate to be at peace in that kind of environment when she's so stressed she can't get in a peaceful mood to meditate at all? And the author's answer was not to stop all the phones ringing, to get into a peaceful mood first, but to notice that her desire to be at peace was at odds with her life, said desire was where her suffering was arising - if she revelled in the activity, in feeling wanted and useful and never bored, she could end the day tired but satisfied believing she'd helped as much as she could, instead of worn out and stressed believing she'd failed the workload. Meditation might be to notice that the phones ringing is stressing her and it needn't be a judgement about her not being good enough when she can't answer all of them, rather than meditation being about going to a quiet room to get some peace. Similar to the story of the guy rowing a boat accross a river and bumps into another boat and calls out swearing at the other boater for not paying attention and being careless and then looks over his shoulder and sees the other boat is empty and drifting and there's nobody to be angry at, the answer is not to go find the boat owner to be angry at the right person, it's to wonder why you are angry at all. I'm not claiming to be an authority, but a meditative state is more "laughing at yourself for wanting to be that important" than it is "improving writing productivity and readership by 15%". Like the fat man who is desperate to keep making vegetable soup recipes for YouTube so people accept he is an authority on dieting, the recipes aren't the diet, the finger isn't the moon, the point of meditation[2] is to notice your desperate desire to be a spiritual authority and your suffering when you feel you aren't good enough, rather than to turn you into a spiritual authority. Like the people who say they want to be musicians who are mixing up "being on stage and famous with a cheering crowd" with "playing instruments eight hours a day". [1] (everything everyone says ever is their opinion! Every internet comment is someone's opinion, not a peer reviewed study - even then, peer reviewed study comments are the reviewer's opinion! Even measured experiments are someone's opinion that those are good measurements, that they were taken properly, recorded well, used in an appropriate model with appropriate assumptions! "That's just someone's opinion" - you should assume ALL internet comments, all articles, all books, have a honking great "IMO" on the front, or if you respect the author, make it "IMHO"). [2] if there is any such thing
fogzen 3y ago
Doing only what you enjoy prevents you from getting what you want, if what you want requires action you don’t enjoy. If the pain of not being where you want to be is greater than the pain of remaining where you are, you’ll take action. It’s great if you enjoy what you’re doing. But often we enjoy where we want to go more than what we have to do to get there. I want a clean house more than I want to clean it, which is why I take action to clean it every day. The problem comes when we aren’t in tune with what we really want, and we can’t make the choice about what’s required of us. It’s okay to accept that you don’t want to be someone who meditates every day. Or that you want to eat and drink more than you want six pack abs. Be honest about what you want, without influence from the expectations of other people, culture, or tradition.
- CTDOCodebases 3y ago
  > If the pain of not being where you want to be is greater than the pain of remaining where you are, you’ll take action. Not necessarily. Some people don’t feel deserving so they stay where they are. A victim of their own torturous mind. Also learned helplessness is a real thing.
dan00 3y ago
In way this shows what meditation has become in the western world, a tool to become more productive, to become a even more effective, harder worker. We don‘t get how our culture is making us sick, how we try harder and harder to get to the point of happiness and satisfaction, and never realize that this path doesn‘t work.
- leobg 3y ago
  I once made that remark to Tim Ferriss when he talked about hacking meditation. It was tongue in cheek, but he was very pissed.
a_petrov 3y ago
The way I do it is the following. I daydream sometimes and paint a picture of myself where I want to be. That picture has been heavily influenced by a challenging hobby I enjoy. Two years ago by painting that picture I realized I need a fundamental change if I want to make it happen. I said, if you're consistent in wasting your time like that, let's see what will happen if you are consistent with not wasting your time. I identified a couple of priorities for myself. One of them is "income". If I need to do a task that might take me an hour to finish, but a week to start, I say to myself: that's part of your income. You need it, cut the emotions, drop the ego and do it. Surprisingly, it works for me not that bad. On the side projects, I recently counted the folders I did in 2023 - more than 40. Nothing live, but I keep on going because the picture I painted for myself is that these projects are the beginning of something great. I can totally relate to the author. I dropped all routine and started compare how my day evolves according to my fundamental priorities right now: health, income, hobby. All is about the motivation. People talk about goals and outcomes, but rarely I see someone truly questioning what they really want and more important - what they really don't want. That for me is the driver behind motivation.
jb1991 3y ago
This person is talking about a revelation and habit changes that they did… yesterday. It’s easy to make major changes that last a day or two. The trick is finding a way to change your daily flow in the long term, something that consistently feels right, indefinitely. I’ve created new habits and approaches to my daily schedule that lasted a day many many times.
- lazide 3y ago
  In my experience, thinking there is some state where things consistently feel right and flow that is indefinite is a bit of a trap. It can lead to excessive sprinting and over work trying to get something ‘fixed’ which is fundamentally unstable. Life happens. Looking at it as a constant process of seeking balance, and getting to that state - then having it swept away - then repeating, can be healthier. Like a sand mandala, but our lives.
2-718-281-828 3y ago
> I will rise at 5. Meditate, 530-630. Journal 630-730. Breakfast 8-9, that is very ambitious if not pathologically ambitious. > Yesterday, I finally realized ... But I suggest ... s/he has been failing up until the previous day and is already giving public advice about how to do it better? that's not just questionable, it also shows a lack of self-reflection and unhealthy levels of impulsiveness. if that text wasn't 13 years old i'd suggest to the author an afternoon on /r/adhdmeme to have a good laugh before moving on with the revised plan. but back then this subreddit didn't exist yet and there was much less useful info on adhd available online or offline. so, from that angle this text might even have some historic raison d'etre.
- ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
  > s/he It's a "she": https://openheartproject.com/about/ https://openheartproject.com/about/ > has been failing Not so sure about that. Read the page at the link (It's the "About" page on the site).
  - 2-718-281-828 3y ago
    i know what you are getting at. but wrt to that article she self-assessedly has been failing up until then.
- cseleborg 3y ago
  > s/he has been failing up until the previous day and is already giving public advice about how to do it better? This was my thought exactly. The internet is full of articles along those lines: I've been doing this new routine for 2 days, here are 8 pieces of advice for you. I recognize the enthusiasm for sharing new discoveries, and it can be inspiring, I just wish those who did would be generally less prescriptive about it.
  - 2-718-281-828 3y ago
    it's my impression that a lot of life coaches sell a strategy that they themselves didn't really explore and verify and then basically use their customers and recipients to convince themselves that they know what they are talking about.
wkjagt 3y ago
There's only one of these Good Things I regret never having succeeded at starting, and that's journaling. As I'm getting older, I realize there are more and more years during which I've been alive and it's getting harder to look back at them and make sense of them, or remember when a particular thing happened. I'm 45 now, which really isn't that old, but also not that young anymore. When I was younger, say 25, I had 5 years of (somewhat) adult life behind me, and they formed a relatively coherent and linear story. I now look back at 25 years of being an adult, and that story is now five times as long, way less coherent, and no longer linear, so remembering it all is becoming almost impossible. But the longer I live, the more often I find myself wanting to remember when a certain thing happened, or what my state of mind was at a certain point. I also have a wife and have three kids, so those add more stories to remember (or more characters in my own story). I've been thinking of catching up. To start an Excel sheet, with years in the left column, and then start filling in events that I can remember or verify with certainty (marriage, births of kids, buying the house, jobs, projects, travels). Hopefully this would trigger more and more memories that I can then fit into that context, until I get to a somewhat complete and coherent story of what's been going on until now. I think this might also make starting journaling easier because I would be continuing a story, instead of starting to write one at a random point in time.
- Wronnay 3y ago
  That's one of the reasons why I started journaling back in 2018. I started trading with stocks in 2014, made some good gains but forgot how or why I initially invested in a specific stock. I mostly started journaling to analyse my own thought process in a later stage. I am now 27, started my own company last year and hope that my desendends one day can use my journal to see what things worked and which didn't - that way they may have it easier in their own life as they will know what to avoid and what can lead to success. I see it as a way to accelerate the trial-and-error process and this thought that it can be helpful for future generations of my family is something which motivates me more than anything else.
- j7ake 3y ago
  I found the https://1secondeveryday.com/ https://1secondeveryday.com/ app to be great for recording snippets of my day which I can look back on and quickly remember. There is a lot of information that can be captured in a one second video of your life every day for 25 years.
bsenftner 3y ago
People need to read about Cognitive Distortions: that's the fancy pants term for "playing yourself", which is maintaining a negative or otherwise deceptive self conversation about what you are doing, thinking, and behaving. If you're self conversation is not honest, you're capable of literally anything, because your self deception is the vector you can be emotionally manipulated by irrational desires, the hypocritical values you may have been raised, or bad actors seeking to exploit others. All this can be avoided by seeking to audit one's own self conversation. If this sounds reasonable to you, I suggest you do a web search or ask ChatGPT about Dr. David Burns, the School Of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and the checklist of common Cognitive Distortions (common self lies). In little more than a half hour of research you can begin your own self honesty revolution. It is HUGE and it is PERSONAL REVOLUTION that will remake you entirely as a significantly more rational, adept and capable individual.
kekebo 3y ago
Reminds me of "The Discipline of Do Easy" by William Burroughs. Turned into a short film by Gus van Sant: https://youtu.be/eoOUBETTyMI https://youtu.be/eoOUBETTyMI
civilized 3y ago
I have taken what feels like a strange path to more consistent productivity. Over the years, I have slowly lost interest in all my once-favored distractions. Video games went first; reading the news took much longer. Now, I keep at my goals because I no longer have any distractions that can hold my interest.
deleted 3y ago
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dkarl 3y ago
I used to hate that I could never stick to things. I'd set a schedule for myself, feel good while I was on it, and then I'd fall off and go back to hating myself. One day I was making nasty fun of myself for being really good at starting things, and something clicked. "Sticking to" something is functionally same as starting it over and over again. Which I'm good at. Am I ever going to stop starting to work out? No. My only problem is that sometimes there's a significant interval between "stopping" and "starting." What am I doing during those intervals? Hating myself on one hand and also trying to whip up irrational confidence that the next time I start will be the time I actually stick with a schedule. I could dispense with those things and reduce the interval. It turns out I can reduce the interval between starting and stopping to basically nothing. This approach isn't systematic enough to produce amazing results, but I'm happy to now be working out 3-4 times per week, and more importantly, I'm happy that if I miss a few workouts, I'm back to normal right away instead of spending weeks or months licking my wounds. Later I made a connection to how people say that great athletes have short memories, in the sense that success and failure don't leave a lasting emotional mark on them. When a great athlete completes a difficult pass or gets it slightly wrong, strikes out or hits a home run, hits a shot or misses it, they process the information, but any sense of triumph or failure has to be gone in seconds by necessity because it can't be allowed to affect the next shot they take. I apply that attitude to a lot of my daily life. I'll have time to feel proud or downcast after the game is over. Right now I have to take my next shot. For me, I feel like that's a better emotional cadence. I don't instantly drop the judgment hammer on myself for a mistake. Not only does that stop knee-jerk emotions from wrecking my subsequent decisions, but my reactions at the end of the day are usually more moderate, thoughtful, and productive.
rpastuszak 3y ago
Some related and perhaps more practical materials on the subject: https://every.to/no-small-plans/how-to-do-hard-things https://every.to/no-small-plans/how-to-do-hard-things (Incidentally a decent into to ACT) I also wrote about the subject: https://sonnet.io/posts/hummingbirds/ https://sonnet.io/posts/hummingbirds/ and https://sonnet.io/posts/sit/ https://sonnet.io/posts/sit/ I don’t think I’m “good” at dealing with these sorts of problems but with the help of therapy I’ve developed tools to get gradually better. The first link deals with reframing judgements we make in a more productive way. The second article is a concrete case study. I hate productivity porn so I’m trying to leave the reader with concrete actions and sometimes more questions rather than answers.
kren 3y ago
What the writer actually discovered is what meditation is all about. Being in the present moment. Deciding not to let your ego control your day is a major paradigm upgrade and achievement of one of many steps of enlightenment. The outcome may seem similar but it is not. The writer does mention that the effort is light, and that realization is monumental, but it also means that the writer is now infinitely flexible to spend their time effectively based on what is going on in the present moment. This opens up new possibilities and allows the subconscious to come up with ideas that the conscious mind and ego could never dream up when they focus so hard on a rigid approach to life. Concluding there is a right and wrong way of doing things crystallizes your life and not only is such an approach is limiting and restricting, but such control over a schedule is an illusion and makes you focus on the future. It constantly makes you play catch up and is never fun, leading to self inflicted misery and depression that you’re not good enough based on some non realistic ideal. It is more effective to see yourself as multiple parts, or a “We”. In this case, the conscious and the subconscious. Whether you like it or not, the subconscious is actually the one doing things and the conscious mind (ego) is the feedback loop. It is helpful to see the two as a coach and its players. The coach (ego)’s job is to be used as a focusing tool and feedback loop. The players (subconscious)’s job is to do the work and let the coach know what it notices. Such a metaphor helps you understand how your self talk should sound. Coaches are not on the playing field but guide the players towards a goal without trying to control the game or action in this case. But once the game starts, the coach is hands off. Self talk should be positive and accepting. Life is life and there are many things out of your control like interruptions and tasks taking more time and resources than originally anticipated. Simply observe and adjust your actions, put in the work, and you will eventually arrive at your goal or at least be at peace knowing you did everything you could. Such is life that it has an uncountable number of variables that are out of your control and accepting that helps ground you in reality. The problem arises when the coach (ego) wants to control the outcome of the game and be a player. I call this the ego trying to be general manager of the universe. It tries to control things it cannot control and thus is frustrated that the outcome does not go in its favor a majority of the time. It also puts in an immense amount of strain and wastes a ton of energy trying to do something it cannot. Thus the coach suffers greatly and still gets no closer to playing on the field instead of the players. Instead, run the subconscious program (complete the task) and get out of the way by keeping your self talk quiet. Don’t waste energy talking to yourself while you perform the task. Then afterwards, reflect upon what happened and let the conscious tell the subconscious how it can do better next time. To let it sink in, visualize the outcome in your minds eye, then trust that your subconscious will do better next time. This is what being in the present moment is all about.

215 points by herbertl 3y ago

>> Once I get all my work out of the way, maybe I can do something fun or satisfying or just cuz. That's where I'm struggling recently. I barely find anything joyful lately. I tried many many "discipline" frameworks, I can commit more than 1 week.

nicbou 3y ago
Maybe you're tired? Too much work kills your energy for anything remotely intellectual.

dorkwood 3y ago

> Yesterday, I finally realized that this method would never, ever work. I was shocked. But it never, ever has. I’ve been after myself on this score for, what, like ten years? Had it ever worked once in that time, I asked myself. No! I had a similar realisation a few years ago. I used to try to come up with side project ideas by sitting down with a piece of paper and writing down every idea I could think of. Then, I’d decide which of these ideas seemed in the realm of possibility for me with my current skill set. Out of that whittled-down list, I’d then choose the idea that I thought would have the most chance of success. The problem? I could never remain motivated. It turned out that I had invented a formula for choosing ideas that neither extended my skills nor spoke to my inner curiosity. Things only changed when I asked myself the question “has this ever worked for me in the past? Even once?” I decided my new philosophy was to work on whatever I was most curious about — even if it seemed way too hard for me, or if everyone else thought it was stupid. I haven’t exactly made millions of dollars from this approach, but I’ve learned more in the past four years (and had more fun doing it) than I did in the previous 10. It makes me wonder what other things I might be doing out of habit that have never actually worked.

acalzycalzy 3y ago
In a sense this didn’t work out for you either - financially anyway
- atoav 3y ago
  First, finances are most of the time just a roundabout way of trying to be happy. So in a way doing things that make you happy directly instead of doing things hoping to gain money for that activity and then spending that money to hope to gain happiness will never work the same (provided you are not starving). Second, many people on this platform, me included, got good at the things they do for a living, because they did it for fun (and sometimes still do). Going for the fun project helps you learn faster and better. It might be "the wrong" thing to learn, but who is even able to judge that?
  - beebmam 3y ago
    > finances are most of the time just a roundabout way of trying to be happy If you consider not dying a form of happiness, sure. Seems overly reductive to me.
    - wuiheerfoj 3y ago
      I’d suggest ‚most‘ people ‚most of the time’ are not on the brink of death due to their finances
    - atoav 3y ago
      I live in a nation where we consider it normal to not let those living around us die of starvation or illness. That includes me. Also: I made that caveat and you skipped right past it. Everything is a gradient of course. I am not suggesting you have to never follow some discipline and always go for the fun route.
jcadam 3y ago
I used to spend a lot of my spare time on side projects, thinking I'd hit on something successful eventually. Now, I'm in my 40s and I'm like "Done with work; I think I'll go for a walk and then take a nap."

langsoul-com 3y ago

This approach works if the stuff you want to get done also is very enjoyable. Nobody wants to wash the dishes, do maintenance or clean up, but it has to be done. The question is how does this work for things you want to get done, but it's hard. Say I want to make some form of rubber duck app, but with an AI voice. The idea is great, I talk my programming ideas and she'd respond back, giving an illusion of listening. However, it's way more work and less immediately enjoyable than a game of Dota 2.

flangola7 3y ago
This is polar opposite of my experience. The unenjoyable ones are precisely the tasks that I will never complete unless I am very kind and forgiving to myself. Beating myself bloody with "but it has to get done" is an exercise in hopeless futility.
- crooked-v 3y ago
  On a similar note, I get a lot of "chore" tasks done by basically just being impulsive about them: if I have a free 15 minutes before a meeting or after breakfast or whatever and I'm feeling high-energy I'll just pick something off my long household to-do list and do it then. The results aren't all that consistent but everything gets stochastically done eventually.
atoav 3y ago
We are talking about enjoyable projects. Dota 2 might not be a project (unless you plan to become a pro). Doing something out of passion is a value in itself that should not be ignored. In music this is what often differenciates the true geniuses from those who are just very good: passion. If you have to sit down and practise an instruments for hours a day it totally helps if you are passionate about the instrument. It helps when you care about the music you are playing and how you are playing it. All of that can be reached via discipline as well, but there might be something lacking in the end. What is the difference between someone playing the same thing for 8 hours out of passion and another one playing the same thing for 8 hours out of discipline? It doesn't feel like work to the former, while it might drain everything out of the latter.

TheAlchemist 3y ago

That's an interesting opinion. I struggle with this a lot too. Would love to read some other methods people used and that worked out well.

the_only_law 3y ago

If I’m not mean to myself though, I get too arrogant.

jodrellblank 3y ago

> "If I’m not vigilant about making myself do stuff, I won’t do anything. And my commitment to meditate is critical on every level." Alan Watts said that meditation shouldn't be a grim duty, it should be done for the fun of it, it should be a 'grooving with the eternal now'. "Getting meditation done" makes as much sense as "getting dancing done" or "getting music listened to" - the goal isn't to hurry up and finish playing music or dancing, it's to enjoy doing it for its own sake.

cinntaile 3y ago
Just because somebody says something doesn't mean it's the only way. It's just an opinion, no matter who said it.
- jodrellblank 3y ago
  That's, just, like, your opinion, maaan. - The Dude[1]. But I still disagree; meditation being to do with noticing where your thoughts arise, who watches the watcher, who is "I", it's fundamentally at odds with the hustle culture of productivity and economic return on investment and "it's critical that I meditate to keep up my image of being someone who meditates so I can maintain my suitably high status to impress my readers". It's the kind of thing Buddha stepped away from his wealthy upbringing to realise, the kind of thing Zen Monks go to monasteries to get away from, the kind of thing rich people take meditative sabatticals to observe and introspect. Desire causes suffering; I forget what book I read it in but it was a normal person asking a guru about their office job, lots of phones ringing, lots of urgency, lots of stress, how can she meditate to be at peace in that kind of environment when she's so stressed she can't get in a peaceful mood to meditate at all? And the author's answer was not to stop all the phones ringing, to get into a peaceful mood first, but to notice that her desire to be at peace was at odds with her life, said desire was where her suffering was arising - if she revelled in the activity, in feeling wanted and useful and never bored, she could end the day tired but satisfied believing she'd helped as much as she could, instead of worn out and stressed believing she'd failed the workload. Meditation might be to notice that the phones ringing is stressing her and it needn't be a judgement about her not being good enough when she can't answer all of them, rather than meditation being about going to a quiet room to get some peace. Similar to the story of the guy rowing a boat accross a river and bumps into another boat and calls out swearing at the other boater for not paying attention and being careless and then looks over his shoulder and sees the other boat is empty and drifting and there's nobody to be angry at, the answer is not to go find the boat owner to be angry at the right person, it's to wonder why you are angry at all. I'm not claiming to be an authority, but a meditative state is more "laughing at yourself for wanting to be that important" than it is "improving writing productivity and readership by 15%". Like the fat man who is desperate to keep making vegetable soup recipes for YouTube so people accept he is an authority on dieting, the recipes aren't the diet, the finger isn't the moon, the point of meditation[2] is to notice your desperate desire to be a spiritual authority and your suffering when you feel you aren't good enough, rather than to turn you into a spiritual authority. Like the people who say they want to be musicians who are mixing up "being on stage and famous with a cheering crowd" with "playing instruments eight hours a day". [1] (everything everyone says ever is their opinion! Every internet comment is someone's opinion, not a peer reviewed study - even then, peer reviewed study comments are the reviewer's opinion! Even measured experiments are someone's opinion that those are good measurements, that they were taken properly, recorded well, used in an appropriate model with appropriate assumptions! "That's just someone's opinion" - you should assume ALL internet comments, all articles, all books, have a honking great "IMO" on the front, or if you respect the author, make it "IMHO"). [2] if there is any such thing

fogzen 3y ago

Doing only what you enjoy prevents you from getting what you want, if what you want requires action you don’t enjoy. If the pain of not being where you want to be is greater than the pain of remaining where you are, you’ll take action. It’s great if you enjoy what you’re doing. But often we enjoy where we want to go more than what we have to do to get there. I want a clean house more than I want to clean it, which is why I take action to clean it every day. The problem comes when we aren’t in tune with what we really want, and we can’t make the choice about what’s required of us. It’s okay to accept that you don’t want to be someone who meditates every day. Or that you want to eat and drink more than you want six pack abs. Be honest about what you want, without influence from the expectations of other people, culture, or tradition.

CTDOCodebases 3y ago
> If the pain of not being where you want to be is greater than the pain of remaining where you are, you’ll take action. Not necessarily. Some people don’t feel deserving so they stay where they are. A victim of their own torturous mind. Also learned helplessness is a real thing.

dan00 3y ago

In way this shows what meditation has become in the western world, a tool to become more productive, to become a even more effective, harder worker. We don‘t get how our culture is making us sick, how we try harder and harder to get to the point of happiness and satisfaction, and never realize that this path doesn‘t work.

leobg 3y ago
I once made that remark to Tim Ferriss when he talked about hacking meditation. It was tongue in cheek, but he was very pissed.

a_petrov 3y ago

The way I do it is the following. I daydream sometimes and paint a picture of myself where I want to be. That picture has been heavily influenced by a challenging hobby I enjoy. Two years ago by painting that picture I realized I need a fundamental change if I want to make it happen. I said, if you're consistent in wasting your time like that, let's see what will happen if you are consistent with not wasting your time. I identified a couple of priorities for myself. One of them is "income". If I need to do a task that might take me an hour to finish, but a week to start, I say to myself: that's part of your income. You need it, cut the emotions, drop the ego and do it. Surprisingly, it works for me not that bad. On the side projects, I recently counted the folders I did in 2023 - more than 40. Nothing live, but I keep on going because the picture I painted for myself is that these projects are the beginning of something great. I can totally relate to the author. I dropped all routine and started compare how my day evolves according to my fundamental priorities right now: health, income, hobby. All is about the motivation. People talk about goals and outcomes, but rarely I see someone truly questioning what they really want and more important - what they really don't want. That for me is the driver behind motivation.

jb1991 3y ago

This person is talking about a revelation and habit changes that they did… yesterday. It’s easy to make major changes that last a day or two. The trick is finding a way to change your daily flow in the long term, something that consistently feels right, indefinitely. I’ve created new habits and approaches to my daily schedule that lasted a day many many times.

lazide 3y ago
In my experience, thinking there is some state where things consistently feel right and flow that is indefinite is a bit of a trap. It can lead to excessive sprinting and over work trying to get something ‘fixed’ which is fundamentally unstable. Life happens. Looking at it as a constant process of seeking balance, and getting to that state - then having it swept away - then repeating, can be healthier. Like a sand mandala, but our lives.

2-718-281-828 3y ago

> I will rise at 5. Meditate, 530-630. Journal 630-730. Breakfast 8-9, that is very ambitious if not pathologically ambitious. > Yesterday, I finally realized ... But I suggest ... s/he has been failing up until the previous day and is already giving public advice about how to do it better? that's not just questionable, it also shows a lack of self-reflection and unhealthy levels of impulsiveness. if that text wasn't 13 years old i'd suggest to the author an afternoon on /r/adhdmeme to have a good laugh before moving on with the revised plan. but back then this subreddit didn't exist yet and there was much less useful info on adhd available online or offline. so, from that angle this text might even have some historic raison d'etre.

ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
> s/he It's a "she": https://openheartproject.com/about/ https://openheartproject.com/about/ > has been failing Not so sure about that. Read the page at the link (It's the "About" page on the site).
- 2-718-281-828 3y ago
  i know what you are getting at. but wrt to that article she self-assessedly has been failing up until then.
cseleborg 3y ago
> s/he has been failing up until the previous day and is already giving public advice about how to do it better? This was my thought exactly. The internet is full of articles along those lines: I've been doing this new routine for 2 days, here are 8 pieces of advice for you. I recognize the enthusiasm for sharing new discoveries, and it can be inspiring, I just wish those who did would be generally less prescriptive about it.
- 2-718-281-828 3y ago
  it's my impression that a lot of life coaches sell a strategy that they themselves didn't really explore and verify and then basically use their customers and recipients to convince themselves that they know what they are talking about.

wkjagt 3y ago

There's only one of these Good Things I regret never having succeeded at starting, and that's journaling. As I'm getting older, I realize there are more and more years during which I've been alive and it's getting harder to look back at them and make sense of them, or remember when a particular thing happened. I'm 45 now, which really isn't that old, but also not that young anymore. When I was younger, say 25, I had 5 years of (somewhat) adult life behind me, and they formed a relatively coherent and linear story. I now look back at 25 years of being an adult, and that story is now five times as long, way less coherent, and no longer linear, so remembering it all is becoming almost impossible. But the longer I live, the more often I find myself wanting to remember when a certain thing happened, or what my state of mind was at a certain point. I also have a wife and have three kids, so those add more stories to remember (or more characters in my own story). I've been thinking of catching up. To start an Excel sheet, with years in the left column, and then start filling in events that I can remember or verify with certainty (marriage, births of kids, buying the house, jobs, projects, travels). Hopefully this would trigger more and more memories that I can then fit into that context, until I get to a somewhat complete and coherent story of what's been going on until now. I think this might also make starting journaling easier because I would be continuing a story, instead of starting to write one at a random point in time.

Wronnay 3y ago
That's one of the reasons why I started journaling back in 2018. I started trading with stocks in 2014, made some good gains but forgot how or why I initially invested in a specific stock. I mostly started journaling to analyse my own thought process in a later stage. I am now 27, started my own company last year and hope that my desendends one day can use my journal to see what things worked and which didn't - that way they may have it easier in their own life as they will know what to avoid and what can lead to success. I see it as a way to accelerate the trial-and-error process and this thought that it can be helpful for future generations of my family is something which motivates me more than anything else.
j7ake 3y ago
I found the https://1secondeveryday.com/ https://1secondeveryday.com/ app to be great for recording snippets of my day which I can look back on and quickly remember. There is a lot of information that can be captured in a one second video of your life every day for 25 years.

bsenftner 3y ago

People need to read about Cognitive Distortions: that's the fancy pants term for "playing yourself", which is maintaining a negative or otherwise deceptive self conversation about what you are doing, thinking, and behaving. If you're self conversation is not honest, you're capable of literally anything, because your self deception is the vector you can be emotionally manipulated by irrational desires, the hypocritical values you may have been raised, or bad actors seeking to exploit others. All this can be avoided by seeking to audit one's own self conversation. If this sounds reasonable to you, I suggest you do a web search or ask ChatGPT about Dr. David Burns, the School Of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and the checklist of common Cognitive Distortions (common self lies). In little more than a half hour of research you can begin your own self honesty revolution. It is HUGE and it is PERSONAL REVOLUTION that will remake you entirely as a significantly more rational, adept and capable individual.

kekebo 3y ago

Reminds me of "The Discipline of Do Easy" by William Burroughs. Turned into a short film by Gus van Sant: https://youtu.be/eoOUBETTyMI https://youtu.be/eoOUBETTyMI

civilized 3y ago

I have taken what feels like a strange path to more consistent productivity. Over the years, I have slowly lost interest in all my once-favored distractions. Video games went first; reading the news took much longer. Now, I keep at my goals because I no longer have any distractions that can hold my interest.

deleted 3y ago

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dkarl 3y ago

I used to hate that I could never stick to things. I'd set a schedule for myself, feel good while I was on it, and then I'd fall off and go back to hating myself. One day I was making nasty fun of myself for being really good at starting things, and something clicked. "Sticking to" something is functionally same as starting it over and over again. Which I'm good at. Am I ever going to stop starting to work out? No. My only problem is that sometimes there's a significant interval between "stopping" and "starting." What am I doing during those intervals? Hating myself on one hand and also trying to whip up irrational confidence that the next time I start will be the time I actually stick with a schedule. I could dispense with those things and reduce the interval. It turns out I can reduce the interval between starting and stopping to basically nothing. This approach isn't systematic enough to produce amazing results, but I'm happy to now be working out 3-4 times per week, and more importantly, I'm happy that if I miss a few workouts, I'm back to normal right away instead of spending weeks or months licking my wounds. Later I made a connection to how people say that great athletes have short memories, in the sense that success and failure don't leave a lasting emotional mark on them. When a great athlete completes a difficult pass or gets it slightly wrong, strikes out or hits a home run, hits a shot or misses it, they process the information, but any sense of triumph or failure has to be gone in seconds by necessity because it can't be allowed to affect the next shot they take. I apply that attitude to a lot of my daily life. I'll have time to feel proud or downcast after the game is over. Right now I have to take my next shot. For me, I feel like that's a better emotional cadence. I don't instantly drop the judgment hammer on myself for a mistake. Not only does that stop knee-jerk emotions from wrecking my subsequent decisions, but my reactions at the end of the day are usually more moderate, thoughtful, and productive.

rpastuszak 3y ago

Some related and perhaps more practical materials on the subject: https://every.to/no-small-plans/how-to-do-hard-things https://every.to/no-small-plans/how-to-do-hard-things (Incidentally a decent into to ACT) I also wrote about the subject: https://sonnet.io/posts/hummingbirds/ https://sonnet.io/posts/hummingbirds/ and https://sonnet.io/posts/sit/ https://sonnet.io/posts/sit/ I don’t think I’m “good” at dealing with these sorts of problems but with the help of therapy I’ve developed tools to get gradually better. The first link deals with reframing judgements we make in a more productive way. The second article is a concrete case study. I hate productivity porn so I’m trying to leave the reader with concrete actions and sometimes more questions rather than answers.

kren 3y ago

What the writer actually discovered is what meditation is all about. Being in the present moment. Deciding not to let your ego control your day is a major paradigm upgrade and achievement of one of many steps of enlightenment. The outcome may seem similar but it is not. The writer does mention that the effort is light, and that realization is monumental, but it also means that the writer is now infinitely flexible to spend their time effectively based on what is going on in the present moment. This opens up new possibilities and allows the subconscious to come up with ideas that the conscious mind and ego could never dream up when they focus so hard on a rigid approach to life. Concluding there is a right and wrong way of doing things crystallizes your life and not only is such an approach is limiting and restricting, but such control over a schedule is an illusion and makes you focus on the future. It constantly makes you play catch up and is never fun, leading to self inflicted misery and depression that you’re not good enough based on some non realistic ideal. It is more effective to see yourself as multiple parts, or a “We”. In this case, the conscious and the subconscious. Whether you like it or not, the subconscious is actually the one doing things and the conscious mind (ego) is the feedback loop. It is helpful to see the two as a coach and its players. The coach (ego)’s job is to be used as a focusing tool and feedback loop. The players (subconscious)’s job is to do the work and let the coach know what it notices. Such a metaphor helps you understand how your self talk should sound. Coaches are not on the playing field but guide the players towards a goal without trying to control the game or action in this case. But once the game starts, the coach is hands off. Self talk should be positive and accepting. Life is life and there are many things out of your control like interruptions and tasks taking more time and resources than originally anticipated. Simply observe and adjust your actions, put in the work, and you will eventually arrive at your goal or at least be at peace knowing you did everything you could. Such is life that it has an uncountable number of variables that are out of your control and accepting that helps ground you in reality. The problem arises when the coach (ego) wants to control the outcome of the game and be a player. I call this the ego trying to be general manager of the universe. It tries to control things it cannot control and thus is frustrated that the outcome does not go in its favor a majority of the time. It also puts in an immense amount of strain and wastes a ton of energy trying to do something it cannot. Thus the coach suffers greatly and still gets no closer to playing on the field instead of the players. Instead, run the subconscious program (complete the task) and get out of the way by keeping your self talk quiet. Don’t waste energy talking to yourself while you perform the task. Then afterwards, reflect upon what happened and let the conscious tell the subconscious how it can do better next time. To let it sink in, visualize the outcome in your minds eye, then trust that your subconscious will do better next time. This is what being in the present moment is all about.