14 ms·

It's getting harder to focus every day

• marginalia_nu 3mo ago
  I think it's just information overload. There's so much information everywhere now clamoring at you for attention. Our brains aren't made for processing this much information. Going on a media diet helps. Going completely offline helps even more. Something I do when I struggle to focus is to add different stripped down user accounts to my computer. I wanted to dabble in rust so I added a user called ~rs that literally only has access to two application hotkeys (via niri). super+enter opens a terminal, F1 opens the offline rust documentation. Yeah I can just log out and scroll HN, but there's a enough friction to that, that it doesn't really happen very often.
  • plastic-enjoyer 3mo ago
    > I think it's just information overload. There's so much information everywhere now clamoring at you for attention. Our brains aren't made for processing this much information. Going on a media diet helps. Going completely offline helps even more. I wonder how much is real information, i.e. information that truly is related to your life, interests and within your sphere of influence; and how much is just noise that camouflages as information.
  • wormpilled 3mo ago
    That's a really cool technique. > Yeah I can just log out and scroll HN, but there's a enough friction to that, that it doesn't really happen very often. You can make sure the friction is high by having your password be something difficult to remember, written down on a note, and keeping that note somewhere "out of reach".
    • marginalia_nu 3mo ago
      I don't think it's helpful to increase the friction more than it already is, then it just becomes annoying, which makes it more likely you'll stop working like this. You don't have to become a desert father to fix your attention. My hypothesis is that what's hurting focus and attention is context and task switching. It too easy to open a bunch of tabs and get stuck in the xkcd loop[1] whenever you get stuck or something gets a bit boring, so that becomes a thing you do without thinking about it. Having mise-en-place workspaces where things that aren't necessary for what you are doing are out of reach, and reaching for them means you have to log off and lose your state, is generally more than sufficient to fix the problem. It's not that you can't ever check your socials or scroll HN (that wouldn't work for me as part of running a business is a digital presence), you just can't do it while working on something. Makes everything just a little bit more deliberate. (Also on a practical note, chrome/chromium in app mode is great for this, if you do need to be able to go online, but in a limited sense) [1] https://xkcd.com/1411/ https://xkcd.com/1411/
  • mettamage 3mo ago
    > Yeah I can just log out and scroll HN, but there's a enough friction to that, that it doesn't really happen very often. What an awesome tip!
  • coffeefirst 3mo ago
    That's smart. It's also revealing. It was a choice to make technology that absolutely hammers you with information. It was not the right choice. I want to build and use stuff that promotes focus. I only have a vague inkling of what this means, but it's quieter, less instantaneous. And it's going to be an uphill battle because everyone else is doing the opposite.
    • marginalia_nu 3mo ago
      A lot of the choices were to be fair quite accidental. Computers didn't use to be like this, but a lot of the reasons they weren't were properties of how the technology worked. A low-DPI 15" CRT monitor simply can't display very much information at any given moment. A slow single core CPU just doesn't permit browsing the web while your code is compiling. As that changed, we simply piled on multitasking capabilities without asking if we should. But yeah, it's an interesting space to experiment in. I feel we could be doing much of this a lot better than we are now. My mise-en-place work accounts is very much a hack, and considerable work to set up.
      • projektfu 3mo ago
        Before 1992, we browsed newsgroups, watched TV, or played with swords while compiling. That is, if you weren't using Turbo Pascal, with its near-instantaneous turnaround. https://xkcd.com/303/ https://xkcd.com/303/
      • coffeefirst 3mo ago
        Oh 100%. On their own, browser tabs, notifications, and IM at work all make sense on their own and are not evil at all. Taken together, there are now 8 people trying to talk to me all day every day, constant alerts unless you go out of your way to severely restrict what and who can message you, and you find yourself with 60 tabs across 3 windows doing 7 things at once but also doing nothing because... your brain was not built for this computer.
        • idontbelonghere 3mo ago
  • Svennor 3mo ago
    Absolutely. There is no more boredom in today's world. Not a second. But boredom is important for the mind to rest.
  • willmadden 3mo ago
    It's more than information overload. It's an overabundance of distractions specifically designed to steal your attention. I block dark pattern sites during working hours. It helps immensely.
  • avgDev 3mo ago
    When I travel to EU, I completely ignore my phone. I'm doing things, driving, seeing things, and hiking. When I wake up I feel rested. I feel happy. When I am home, I am exhausted every single day. Sometimes I don't even do anything, still exhausted. Idk, if it is information overload, monotony, depression, work, brain get fried by constantly having to manage everything. I also have kid....and let me tell you....to get him anywhere on time is mission impossible. Doesn't want to brush teeth, doesn't listen AT ALL, doesn't care about losing privileges. I guess this stress doesn't exist when we travel because we can spend 2 hours getting out the door. I really need to stop using the phone as much and try to figure out what is causing it.
  • DavideNL 3mo ago
    Yep, i do the same thing. The trick is to increase the barrier to entry. For the same reason, i don't install ANY apps on my smartphone and tablet, like social apps and news apps. If you have to grab your laptop to check them, it takes way more effort. And, if you really need to access something "urgently", you can always use the web browser (which is annoying) where i always use Private Mode (no easy logging in.)
• beschizza 3mo ago
  The author doesn’t mention it, so it seems appropriate to suggest asking a doctor for attention deficit disorder screening. The cultural forces in play encouraging us to flit and switch constantly are a perfect distraction from the possibility one’s own brain is complicit.
  • RugnirViking 3mo ago
    I would caution a little against the prevailing wisdom of diagnosis-as-panacea. I've had a diagnosis for most of my life, but never seen stimulants as worth it (admittedly I've not tried them long term, but that's because after reading a whole lot about it I don't want it in my body). I don't think the diagnosis changes anything for me other than that. It's very much a case of "now what". I suppose some people find a great weight lifted from their shoulders at the idea others struggle with the same thing, or that their struggles aren't due to a personal failing. But I can't escape the next step which is that you still have to do go out and do all the same stuff anyway...
    • ruthvik947 3mo ago
      I feel similarly. I have a lot of tendencies characteristic of ADHD, but I'm undiagnosed, and I don't think I'll seek out the diagnosis either. I don't intend to take any stimulants, and the particular identity of having ADHD means little to me, so the diagnosis wouldn't change much. As you say, I'd still need to figure out how to live this life in these conditions anyway.
    • tenacious_tuna 3mo ago
      I went through a similar loop around my own diagnosis as well ("great, that'd be one more thing to deal with,") but stimulants have had a significantly positive impact on my life. > But I can't escape the next step which is that you still have to do go out and do all the same stuff anyway That's exactly what I was afraid of, but it turns out that actually getting dopamine for completing tasks goes a long way to blunting the existential dread of there being yet more tasks. Consistently now whenever I feel crappy it correlates back to either (a) crap sleep or (b) forgot to take my meds. Just my 2c, YMMV, everyone's different, etc. I had a hard time really understanding the anecdotes I got from medicated friends myself, but I'd encourage others who suspect they have ADHD to try even a very low dose of something for ~3 weeks and see how they feel after. I'm at the lowest "clinically effective" dose of my prescription and the effect is still significant.
• lardosaurusrex 3mo ago
  People often question me how I manage to focus for more than a few minutes and I'm always confused because back in the day I was constantly informed I didn't have any focus and needed to be treated (adhd). I'm not convinced attention spans themselves have changed; I think it has more to do with the fact that people's brains aren't defaulting to daydreaming anymore when bored. I think it's still an issue with people being addicted to phones because I'm sure the lack of daydreaming -- which studies have proven as beneficial and arguibly even a form of microsleep -- is likely causing a lot of the fatigue and inattention people feel; as in their brains are literally being deprived of a natural thing and so are exhausted because of it. (as an aside: whew what a run-on sentence i have no intention of fixing) My personal supposition with 0 proof is that the "gen-z stare" is the end-stage of this phenomenon where after being deprived of daydreaming for so long they are essentially "sleeping while standing up" as it were.
  • oggreen 3mo ago
    That's a very interesting perspective but now that you mention it, I can't even think of the last time I daydreamed, even when I'm not on a device. Curious if phone usage or whatever doom-scrolling we do exhausts the same part of the brain that we use to daydream.
    • embedding-shape 3mo ago
      That's interesting. What happens if you just sit there doing nothing, looking around and what not? Does your brain start to wander by itself? Personally I struggle to remember any day I haven't had at least 10-15 minutes of idle time doing nothing, just thinking idly, but I still have similar struggles as the author. Although I barely use my phone for things neither.
      • cindyllm 3mo ago
        [dead]
      • lesostep 3mo ago
        >> What happens if you just sit there doing nothing, looking around and what not? Does your brain start to wander by itself? For me it's one of the three layers. First layer, it starts to wonder to the direction offered by real world. Wonder about song lyrics I'm listening too, or the colors of buildings, or something like that. Second layer happens if you purposefully stray your thoughts away from a real world. Brain starts trying to remember whatever you wanted it to remember. For example, if I tell myself three times "don't forget to call mom", if I just sit idly, chances are my brain would surface "call mom". Sometimes it surfaces "remember you wanted to try arch 2 years ago". Also this is the layer that works badly if you tried or depressed, because it can start surfacing bad thoughts. Third layer I call time skipper because it's just a basic time fast forwarding. I have no idea whether it's true meditation or controlled dissociation or something else, but thoughts slide of your brain, so there's nothing to remember afterwards. My friend said that maybe meditation is a controlled dissociation. I prefer to say that I'm so dumb, I can just switch my brain off.
• Zealotux 3mo ago
  Yes, I feel like my brain is fried by dopamine dispensers, it's very bad and I have no clue how to get control back. At least I have some healthy routines in my days but it really does feel like being addicted to a hard drug.
  • ricardobayes 3mo ago
    Get a kindle and buy some really gripping books.
    • blue_pants 3mo ago
      That won't help. I can get engrossed in a book/film/videogame I like. Most day-to-day task are not as interesting though. The problem is being able to concentrate on an activity that doesn't get you instant gratification.
      • flogistonical 3mo ago
        Nothing will help if you don't put in the effort. You need to regain dopamine sensitivity and the way to do that is going on a dopamine diet. If you keep gorging on easy dopamine, it can only get worse.
  • simpaticoder 3mo ago
    There exist problems which cause years of suffering which can be solved in hours (sometimes minutes). Not every problem is like that, of course, but some are. Procrastination is like that, sometimes posture is like that, and mental effects of social media are like that. At least for now - this may get worse with time. But the solution is not to consume more content - books seem to be a common suggestion. It is to consume no content. Humans evolved to grind most of the time with a little excitement and entertainment now and again, but tech has inverted this. Its "what we want" in the same way a child wants sugar all the time, and its at once addictive and unhealthy. The screen is an insidious habit former and I'm not sure yet if there is any healthy level or use for some people.
• cebert 3mo ago
  I can focus at home. I have a terrible time focusing in the open office floor plan at work. I have to wear noise-canceling headphones just to cut down on some of the noise. Even then, people are constantly stopping by to chit-chat or make small talk. I hate it.
• franze 3mo ago
  Claude Code has made my computer as - or even more - addicting as social media. I created this for me https://rainbreak.franzai.com/ https://rainbreak.franzai.com/ to force myself into a break. Into breaking out of the agent loop. 7 minutes for short, 21 for a long break.
  • nusl 3mo ago
    This is really cute but also really funny.
• maguay 3mo ago
  Strangely I think it's why I like roadtrips so much. Sitting doing absolutely nothing for even 15 minutes is difficult for me, but I can drive for hours doing nothing but watching the world go by, even without music or podcasts on, and it's fine. And that feels good.
  • jrmg 3mo ago
    Plane flights. I hope the ‘free internet all the time’ era that airlines have been threatening us with for a decade now never arrives.
    • ruthvik947 3mo ago
      Unfortunately it's nearly here thanks to Starlink
    • maguay 3mo ago
      Ahhh this too. Love flights without WiFi.
• OhMeadhbh 3mo ago
  Living in Seattle saved me. In the winter months I started waking up and sitting in front of a SAD light for half an hour. I almost immediately got bored so I started reading long-form books (with the occasional short story) in front of the light for an hour each morning. I gave up on facebook in 2010 and twitter in 2020ish. I never developed the habit for other social media. I turn off slack and email for the first 45 minutes of each hour. If the server is on fire, call me. That's why I have a phone. Oh, and I have an old-school non-smart phone for phone calls and it often lives in a different room from where I work. I run a TOTP authenticator on a tablet that's not configured to receive any messages. HN and an occasional YouTube video are my only online distractions. In my advanced age I've lost the desire to tell everyone how wrong they are, which seems to be the national sport of online comments sections. (Though, HN, you're much better than most places.) I've been getting into GMRS lately and it's hard to turn off the radio during work days, but I have been able to do it. Maybe I should write a similar article saying "the net doesn't distract me, but dang if I can't go 10 minutes without thinking about people I know via GMRS." The author of this piece makes an observation about bullshit vs. attention that is probably worth looking into. My last several jobs have included less bullshit, but a lot more documentation. Which is to say, the docs I write seem to have actual applicability to a real business problem and it's solution. There's little busy work that only serves to prove that a remote VP has more people working for him. I think what I'm trying to say is a) it is possible to strengthen your attention gland. I'm happy to see the author at least trying. And... b) maybe there's a correlation between perceived bullshit and ability to focus. This needs more research.
  • chakintosh 3mo ago
    [flagged]
  • Noumenon72 3mo ago
    Do you have an automated way of turning off Slack and email for the first 45 minutes of each hour?
• d4rkp4ttern 3mo ago
  Regarding the urge to “check what’s out there”, one simple rule I follow is: spend around an hour in the morning catching up with HN, a few reddits, a couple newsletters, and Bluesky. I completely avoid Twitter/X and LinkedIn, trusting that anything significant enough bubbles up to those other places. Most important — do NOT check any of those the rest of the day.
  • iammjm 3mo ago
    So you start your day passively scrolling and dopamine front-loading which basically sets the tone for the whole day… I think the “right” way is the exact opposite which is to start the day dopamine-starved and context-free and only scroll at the end of the day
    • d4rkp4ttern 3mo ago
      Interesting take. I should try that !
    • cpt_sobel 3mo ago
      Agree with this one and can vouch for it, for a while while living closer to nature I would start my day by drinking water and taking a walk in the forest, actively avoiding screens for my first hour awake. I need to find something similar to do now, maybe water the plants...
• snitzr 3mo ago
  Dude needs a vacation.
• gorkemyildirim 3mo ago
  [flagged]
• polotics 3mo ago
  Advice that works: - Watch the Robert Sapolsky human behavior lectures. - Learn about basic neuropsychology, to at least have a working understand of the triad Default-Mode-Network, Salience-Network, Executive-Network. - Watch your ambient CO2, also at night. - Sleep so that you always wake up with no alarm.
  • douglasq 3mo ago
    Hey, about the lectures, do you mean these ones https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL848F2368C90DDC3D https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL848F2368C90DDC3D ?
    • rc5150 3mo ago
      Can't speak to the previous comment's intent, but I find that all of Sapolsky's lectures and interviews are fantastic to listen to, as well as his podcast with his daughter called Father-Offspring interviews where she poses a submitted question to him and he answers in brief (or not so brief) about the biological/psychological/sociological implications of the question. Fascinating stuff.
    • notfed 3mo ago
      (As someone who's watched them) yes. Should be required viewing for everyone.
• om8 3mo ago
  > So how can I regain my ability to focus? Getting diagnosed with ADHD and taking meds did the trick for me. Not sure how relevant this is, since inability to focus was always an issue for me.
  • mark_something 3mo ago
    I don't think that the author has ADHD, because they used to be more attentive in the past. In the case of ADHD, it was also the case as a child. I also got the diagnosis of ADHD (inattentive type) a few months ago, in the interviews they asked whether I also had these symptoms as a child. Not easy to figure out because as a child things like finishing things on time are not so important yet, and my high IQ compensated for a lack of focus. Only in secondary school it became a problem, and my grades dropped.
• piterrro 3mo ago
  This feels so familiar. Since more than a year or so Im witnessing more and more content being produced. One year ago or so it was enough to visit HN main page once a day and be up to day. These day, it needs a visit every few hours, the main page changes constantly. Not only that but also the amount of content received via newsletters. Worst is with LLMs and coding agents, I give it a task to work on then go browsing the web, the LLM finishes in 2 minutes but I come back after 10… At the end of the day, my mind feels super tired even though its the LLM that did the heavy lifting. I also barely remember what I was browsing 15 minutes ago. At this point I can honestly say - Im in trouble.
• jwr 3mo ago
  This sounds a little bit like ADHD, but the common advice of getting medication isn't always applicable. Yes, it is definitely worth finding out if you have ADHD and diagnosing it, because if you do, it will help you understand yourself much better and might prevent problems further down the road like anxiety and depression. But medication isn't always the answer. ADHD might be entirely manageable for some people if their work is interesting enough. Some things to try: - noise cancelling headphones with white noise background (Iceland White or Naturespace apps provide really good quality natural recordings) - clean desk - clear split between work and non-work environments
• cregy 3mo ago
  My 10 cents lately, pink noise. Blocks out a lot of distraction and helps focus.
• ChrisMarshallNY 3mo ago
  In my case, I'm "on the spectrum," so focus isn't a problem. In fact, too much focus can be a problem. One of the things that happens to me, is I get "in the zone," usually, when coding. Sometimes, an hour can pass, and I barely notice. But I am also aware that this is not the way most people are.
• themoose8 3mo ago
  As it happens I'm currently working on an app to help with this problem, effectively a soft habit tracker designed for daily reflection and mindful progression. It touches on some of the themes in this HN thread - helping create quiet space, time away from stimulation. It's an early stage, fully functional but I'm looking for beta users. If you're interested in helping out or simply trying the app, please complete the form on https://coghance.com https://coghance.com !
• pu_pe 3mo ago
  A lot of people here are focusing on ADHD, but I think the author is commenting on a different phenomenon, because they were able to concentrate before and now it's just much harder. I feel it and many people I talk to feel it as well. It's difficult for me to separate whether this is a result of other changes in my life over time or simply a reflex of ageing in general, though I do think it's a wider societal shift. In the same way that older people find it difficult to watch newer movies (and vice-versa), there is a certain pace associated with culture as well. We have, on average, shifted from books to TikTok in the span of a generation.
  • flogistonical 3mo ago
    I think it is becoming clear that we now have type-1 and type-2 ADHD prevalent in the population. Dopamine deficiency or insensibility are indistinguishable in terms of symptoms. We are all exposed to so much adversarial noise trying to steer us that people are loosing the ability to focus and to filter. Dieting and exercising helps. Cut down on exposure to noise from apps, streaming services, devices, etc. And exercise your brain, use it. Read long form text, take notes, write intentional arguments, use these arguments to steer yourself and those around you to create things of value.
  • LoganDark 3mo ago
    I've heard it's habit. You can have a habit of thinking long and hard or you can have a habit of jumping back and forth. You can always reach for the other, but you also have a default for most of the time. I think these days, companies want jumping back and forth because it means it's much easier to grab your attention and get something out of you, without giving you time to fully think through the consequences.
• mark_l_watson 3mo ago
  This is a real problem, a long time in the making. Over fifty years ago advertising started to affect the way people thought: I argue that they trained people to not be content with a classic simple life. Fast forward to the best tech focused on messing with people's attention. I like Center for Humane Technology for discussions of tech that is designed to help people, not control them.
• dzonga 3mo ago
  one day maybe in 30 years - research is gonna come out - on how much a hit on productivity Slack/teams was. based on my estimate it might be 60%. that's 60% of white collar gdp gone. I have noticed, the more teams use slack/teams - the teams are usually bigger more than necessary. there's more meetings & less work gets done. more 'quick chats' vs teams who are email first (async) - no immediate response required.
• Rodmine 3mo ago
  Check your diet. ADD/ADHD has been linked to histamine intolerance.
• emunova 3mo ago
  [dead]
• tapcheck123 3mo ago
  [dead]
• mistahenry 3mo ago
  I recently deleted social media from my phone. With nothing left, I found myself compulsively checking HN anytime I had a free moment. That’s shifted now after a few weeks. I’m no longer filling those moments. The wins are subtle but nice: - when I watch a movie, I don’t feel the need to start scrolling - I’m reading at night again. This is far more relaxing and gets me to bed at 9 - 10 - less doom / gloom - consumption is more intentional. I consider what I am interested in then find, rather than be sucked down the algorithmic vortex of what’s proven to engage me
• tapcheck 3mo ago
  I got a secure computer room professionally installed.
• forlorn_mammoth 3mo ago
  dopamine fracking. https://igerman.cc/blog/dopamine-fracking/ https://igerman.cc/blog/dopamine-fracking/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48440792 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48440792
  • Otterly99 3mo ago
    I completely disagree with the author. Is the goal of the "dopamine fracking" metaphor is to represent a "pure concentrated dopamine hit", I would argue it is a more apt representation of what hard stimulants do to your brain (i.e. a shortcut to massive amount of dopamine release). The perverse effect of social media addiction is more akin to a slow I.V. drip where you are always in a slightly aroused state, which then becomes your baseline and any cut from it is a net negative in your life.
    • forlorn_mammoth 3mo ago
      I read the metaphor differently. Doesn't invalidate your view, and I see that your view better captures the day to day experience. I read the author as saying that his mind is being fracked, with all the implicit destruction that operation can cause, so that others can extract something from him. Yeah, I see that the analogy breaks down, because the extractors are after attention not dopamine (we're the ones who get the dopamine).
• doginasuit 3mo ago
  It seems like I have challenges with both extremes, I can get pulled into my work and not look up again for 10 hours. But with virtually everything else, I have no energy to see it through. It is rare for me to watch a movie from start to finish. I used to be able to shut off my brain.
• rednafi 3mo ago
  Not relatable. "Internet is not real, and strangers' opinions don't mean anything" is an ethos that I have been religiously following for as long as I can remember. Also, I do a lot of things offline. Read physical books, run after work, and tend to stay out of the internet mob altogether. Oh, having no Instagram or Twitter helps a lot. The faster you realize that we have a limited time on this planet the more ruthless you become with your time. My time is expensive and my employer buys it at a premium. So I am extremely judicious about what I am reading, watching and who I am interacting with. Building the muscle takes time but it's not that hard afterwards.
• doright 3mo ago
  I regained my focus after many years and it had nothing to do with distractions for me, distractions were only a way of fighting stress that constantly appeared. The stress was the underlying issue. I worked on that in therapy (breaking away from my parents) and I can now work on what I want for hours at a time. It's because now I feel I can become my own person and do what I want while not being chained to the past anymore.
  • AndrewKemendo 3mo ago
    Hard to break that family trauma cycle so congrats on that
• Void_ 3mo ago
  I'm using an app called Focusmate (no affiliation) on a daily basis - scheduling 5-6 hour sessions per day. You talk to a stranger for a few seconds, say what you're working on, and after 50 minutes you say goodbye. They stay on the video throughout the session, but muted. It helps me focus because I always think "it's only 50 minutes". Also, I recently deleted Instagram and it made a huge impact.
  • stephenbez 3mo ago
    Yeah I’ve done nearly 3000 sessions on there and it’s been a life saver.
  • tchock23 3mo ago
    Not sure why you got downvoted. This works for a lot of people. Doesn’t work for me because I find the video aspect to be awkward, but the concept of ‘body doubling’ as a way of enabling focus is well established. [Editing to note that perhaps you were downvoted because OP lives in a place with internet issues and couldn’t use Discord to cowork with friends, so the video and bandwidth heavy approach of Focusmate isn’t a viable recommendation]
• cryptopian 3mo ago
  Something I really grew to hate over my time at various software firms were complex and flaky stacks with big test loops, and it's exactly this kind of reason why. Ideally, I have a problem, I want to put my head in the problem space and stay focused there until it's done. Every time a test suite takes five minutes to run, or I have to look up some obscure docs in my web browser, or I have to go somewhere else to rebuild a failing service, is an off-ramp to that flow state, and that's where I lose a whole hour to procrastination.
  • flogistonical 3mo ago
    Traction between intention and result is the most powerful tool in the brain's kit. We are made to spin our wheels often, it's adversarial. Gain and keep traction. Attention is our most valuable resource. If you chose what you attend to, you can achieve at the limit of your physical and mental potential. If you attend to what others wish you attend to, you will be ceding the difference to parasitic systems.
• dzink 3mo ago
  I’ve started evaluating what seem like brain “modes”. 1. Constant flow of information with disjointed context (social media, brain fracking, moving in a crowd) triggers hunter-gatherer instinct that is hard to stop. The dopamine seek in a way. Even if you stop your brain seeks it, so unless you really need this mode for work, it helps to postpone or time box these to the end of the day (kind of like some would do with drinking alcohol). 2. How you start your day after sleep creates framing of the brain and you can start iterating on frames and how you drive them depending on your needs. Maybe set a schedule of things to at need done the night before (a continuity thread) maybe boxing the activities to different types at different times. It’s all sciencing the self but the brain is definitely conditioning to things and you have to mind it. 3. ADHD meds from what i’ve read are caffeine on steroids (blocking adenosine receptors, but not really adding to executive function). From personal observation ADHD also feels like a mode one can be put into by wrong brain framing (at least for people not diagnosed).
  • kerbs 3mo ago
    There are non-stimulant ADHD meds. Strattera being a big one.
• konsalexee 3mo ago
  I feel quite the same (struggle basically) as the OP. My “stack” is self-control for blocking social and Gmail access. And now I built QuiteCode to focus on deep coding and learning on a more mindful way. https://gethopp.github.io/quite-code/ https://gethopp.github.io/quite-code/
• karlkloss 3mo ago
  "It feels like my brain finds a way to do something else and avoid painful situations like boredom or hard work." You just described ADHD.
• gcanyon 3mo ago
  The standards we set are off: I recently discovered 75 hard, and it's mind-boggling to me that the mental equivalent of "do two separate workouts, 45 minutes each" is "read 10 pages of a non-fiction book." If it's a physics textbook, sure, that balance makes sense. If it's Atomic Habits (no offense to that book) then 10 pages is just not equivalent.
• tmoertel 3mo ago
  Here's something that worked for me: put your phone in your pocket and go on a design walk. While walking, design the next step in whatever you're working on. Design walks work great with more than one person, too. Aristotle was on to something when he adopted a peripatetic approach to thinking.
  • torlok 3mo ago
    I don't think this is a solution. I do this often naturally, I walk around and "plan", and it feels like I'm just avoiding sitting down and doing the actual task. The author talks about it; when facing a difficult problem, they go get a glass of water, and get distracted. That's what this is. Anything but doing the actual task. If you're going to take a break, take an honest break and rest, but then go back to work. That's the real solution, and boy is it hard to do these days.
    • tmoertel 3mo ago
      I'm not talking about using a walk as a way to avoid doing real work. I mean doing real work, putting your focus in it, while you walk for, say, at least twenty minutes to really get the blood moving. But don't wait until you're mentally exhausted to do it. It's not a way to recharge, not a substitute for rest. It's a way to remove distractions and get your whole body into an exercise that requires your attention.
• epolanski 3mo ago
  I'm in the same boat as OP. I've learned to realize how many times it's boredom or stress triggering the distraction. I see also other people struggle as much or worse than I do.
• stevefan1999 3mo ago
  Perhaps we should learn from the ADHDs on how to resist the dopamine hacks. Oh wait, I am one and I can't resist it since day 1 on this world.
• morelandjs 3mo ago
  Unsolicited endorsement, but I bought a “Brick” device recently, and I can’t recommend it enough for cutting back on social media. Infinite scroll really destroys your ability to concentrate.
  • jorisw 3mo ago
    I wish people could just admit to themselves how irrelevant all this social media content is, lose interest, and keep the apps shut (or uninstall in case there's no DM feature that keeps it installed). I can't imagine needing to switch devices for this. I couldn't give a single shit what friends or acquaintances (much less strangers) are doing in their free time day to day. They can tell me next time I see them. I have Instagram installed, but only because certain people message me there. I never scroll even a pixel. My biggest distraction? Hacker News.
    • duskdozer 3mo ago
      >My biggest distraction? Hacker News. Don't you see it's the same thing? Why can't you just admit to yourself how irrelevant it is and lose interest? I suppose you could use it just to read an article or two, but you're in the comments as well. The apps are just their Hacker News.
      • jorisw 3mo ago
        > The apps are just their Hacker News. I like this line, but respectfully disagree that they're a 1:1. The difference being relevance and some of the dynamics of use. Hacker News pertains to my profession. It's high relevance tech news with comments from peers. I'm not following anyone just because I know them personally (or worse, because they're famous). I'm not posting photos or videos of activities that I want friends to know about. There's no infinite doomscrolling either (I view the front page a couple of times a day) nor are there notifications interrupting me.
        • donaldstuck 3mo ago
          And very important: there's no dark algorithm that shows a different view each time you go back to HN. It is sometimes boring but the good kind of boring.
• deleted 3mo ago
  [deleted]
• spacecadet 3mo ago
  idk discipline? try retraining your brain on non-digital activities. Pick a long running non-digital activity and gitrdone.
• randusername 3mo ago
  I have almost the exact opposite problem. My focus is as strong as ever, maybe stronger, but as time goes on I notice that it is harder and harder for me to gracefully respond to interruptions. It's pretty damaging to my relationships. Everyone expects you to drop everything and give people attention and empathy and be the perfect active listener. But I need a cooldown or a change of scenery to leave a task behind.
• schaefer 3mo ago
  My wireless router runs OpenWRT, one day after a particularly embarrassing YouTube binge, I turned on the adblock plugin on my router and configured it to block YouTube as an ad. It’s turned out to be the best thing I’ve done for myself in a long, long time.
• seobot_dk1289 3mo ago
  [flagged]
• swader999 3mo ago
  This week I've got all the feeds: slack, email, ticketing system, dev story board, prod system health, prod user activity, prod job queues -- all coming to one dashboard. They are distilled by a local LLM, when I get bursts it offloads to Google's low cost Flash lite so I only read the essential text, no threads, no scrolling and scanning to get to the content. It's freaking amazing, I know everything going on. I can look at it every half hour and be caught up in three minutes. I double click about one in ten messages to reply and it takes me right to the source app to reply.
• gullywhumper 3mo ago
  It seems that so many minor parts of the day don't work as expected and my attention is destroyed by a thousand annoyances. My watch only unlocks my computer 1/3 of the time. My car only recognizes my phone 1/2 of the time. 3/4 of the time I go to press/click on a song I want to hear, the data in the UI updates between the time I start to move to the song and I press/click and I end up hearing something I don't want. Annoying feature that I've disabled n times was re-enabled, and I have to disabled it again. Fighting autocorrect on my phone. I was signed out a service unexpectedly and have to re-authenticate. Programs X, Y, and Z are unresponsive. My VM says my network connection is unstable. My new car beeps because it thinks I'm distracted and then I get more annoyed and distracted.
  • mritchie712 3mo ago
    my car has an AI assistant. I don't know what the wake word is, but it will wake up and be useless with no obvious way to turn it off. I'm sure I could search for it, but it happens while I'm driving and I forget about it. It happens just infrequently enough to not remember, but often enough to be really annoying. My wife turned on a meditation feature on our very old Alexa. I guess the app was deleted or something, but every morning Alexa turns on and says "Starting your meditation times ... Sorry, this is no longer available". If I tell Alexa to turn this off, it has no idea what I'm talking about and it shows up nowhere in the iOS app. Instead of meditation, I got a nice dose of minor annoyance every morning.
  • cellu 3mo ago
    also when I remember to put by phone away not to get distracted, then the 2FA requires me to go fetch it...
  • jimbokun 3mo ago
    I like to use my iPhone to read text articles. It's amazing to me how bad it's become at this task. I get various emails with curated links to various stories, and I will click a link to go read that story. First, it often takes me to a browser re-direct that sometimes successfully redirects, sometimes doesn't. Then sometimes the redirect is to an app that I've subscribed to. Which would be great. Except for the times it opens the app but fails to redirect to the specific article. Then if the article is on a web page, it commonly fills the page with more and more ads slowing down my phone and giving me a tiny keyhole opening to read the text through. Then I often want to go back to the email and pick up where I left off. Which works >50% of the time, but fairly often will skip to a different email. I truly believe that for reading news and articles the state of software was much better 10 years ago than today.
• ed_elliott_asc 3mo ago
  I listened to the dose effect [1] and that has really helped me get my attention back. I’ve deleted TikTok and now get blocks of focused work done and I haven’t been this effective or happy in years. I genuinely believe the next generation will be defined by people who can and who cannot focus their attention and get stuff done. [1] https://open.spotify.com/show/2YCIVADHhUbpTtuCIvV7dG?si=lOiVhap3T8uyj4uDzhvb7g&utm_source=copy-link https://open.spotify.com/show/2YCIVADHhUbpTtuCIvV7dG?si=lOiV...
• gehsty 3mo ago
  I’m guess “all you need is attention” is a good reflection of ourselves as well AI. I’m off anything with an algorithmic feed. My brain can’t handle these. I turn off shorts and YouTube auto play using iOS safari extensions. I block the linked in feed. I read a handful of blogs via rss. The most regular feed I check is HN a few times a day. I’m reading books again for the first time in a decade or so. It feels good and certainly not worse than before.
• projektfu 3mo ago
  Hallowell and Ratey, who write about ADHD, suggested a new entity for the current world: VAST, the variable attention stimulus trait. It is like ADHD but it is culturally induced and not presumed to be due to an innate deficiency in executive function. "Beyond the sources of biologically based ADHD, there are a lot of people who act as if they have ADHD but on close inspection turn out not to have the diagnosable condition. These are the people who have ADHD-like symptoms caused by the conditions of modern life. Their “ADHD” is a response to the massive increase in stimuli that now bombard our brains and our world.... "Modern life has trained our brains to go faster and faster, to do more and more, to receive and transmit 24/7, and to require constant stimulation—be it from movies, TV, conversation, even news, as well as the minute-to-minute living of our lives. Most of us can go no more than a few seconds without looking for a screen." It is likely to me that different people have different breaking points, and so one person may recognize the introduction of the smartphone or debut of TikTok as the point where they lost the ability to focus, and another may date it to the rise of LLMs. Hallowell, E. M., & Ratey, J. J. (2021). ADHD 2.0: New science and essential strategies for thriving with distraction—from childhood through adulthood.
  • amelius 3mo ago
    If somebody told me 25 years ago that in the future we all would have a TV on our office desk with 100 channels I would not have believed them. Yet ... the current situation is worse! Thinking of it in terms of mental disorders, I don't think that is going to help much.
    • stronglikedan 3mo ago
      The current situation was foretold 20 years ago in the prescient documentary named Idiocracy.
      • afavour 3mo ago
        I’d argue Idiocracy is actually quite the opposite of what the OP was talking about. It has a mildly eugenics-y vibe where the world is bad because poor, stupid people have poor, stupid kids that outnumber the smart ones. OP is talking about something environmental that can affect anyone.
• eyk19 3mo ago
  As much as I love and embrace LLMs, they are clearly eliminating all flow state that was previously inevitable when coding something
• fredliu 3mo ago
  LLM: Attention is all you need. Human: Attention is all we have. We should be careful where we spend our limited attention on.
• redlewel 3mo ago
  Pretty much the reason why I reset my X password, sent that to a friend then used HN for my tech news fix instead. On HN eventually there isn't much interesting stuff on the front page, on X it pulls you in with great effectiveness
• arsome 3mo ago
  YouTube is really the thing that got me - the thing is it's not bad content, I don't watch slop, I watch quality stuff from interested, passionate individual creators and I could listen to them talk about their interests all day. It doesn't wreck my day or make me feel anxious or anything, no doom scrolling involved, but it sure can turn into a huge time sink very fast.
• returningfory2 3mo ago
  Consider turning off the internet before you go to bed and not turning it on for at least 1 hour after you wake up. I think I got this idea from Craig Mod (who I believe does no internet until after lunch). I've been doing this for a few months. The initial hour is really good (very easy to e.g. read or work calmly on some software projects without distraction) but I also find it puts me in the right mindset for the rest of the day.
  • ge96 3mo ago
    Kind of hard if you work 9-5 need to know what's gonna happen before you pull up to the office. Do I have a meeting at 9 AM kind of thing.
    • returningfory2 3mo ago
      Yes the night before you look at your calendar and figure out what time you need to be online at. In general if you want a no-internet 1 hour in the morning, organize yourself to wake up 1 hour earlier (maybe going to sleep 1 hour earlier). You sleeping until 8am, and you sleeping until 7am and having no internet for 1 hour, is equivalent to the outside world.
• misiti3780 3mo ago
  I agree with this article, but I found the easiest ways to work on my focus are the following: - Don't use social media. It's all garbage and counterproductive for your attention. Once you stop using it, you start to forget it exists. - Always carry a Kindle, and when you're bored, read instead of reaching for other apps or games. - Try to read 15 minutes before work, 30 minutes during lunch, and 15 minutes after work. That's an hour of reading a day — enough to get through a lot of books and papers. - If you use an elliptical, read while on it. It takes practice, but it can be done. You will see the biggest gains by saying bye to social media.
• deleted 3mo ago
  [deleted]
• mawadev 3mo ago
  Literally turn off your internet, within 30 seconds you will understand why you cannot focus and that you developed a severe psychological addiction
• deleted 3mo ago
  [deleted]
• moebrowne 3mo ago
  It seems to me that lots of people consider the ability to focus as some kind of innate ability which we are all born with, it's not. It's a learned skill which requires practice. Stop practising and it atrophies. We all understand this for physical exercise, I think we need to understand the same principles apply to skills.
  • Jtarii 3mo ago
    Well, some people are innately physically stronger than others. For some things its just the truth that some people have "the drive" and some people don't.
    • moebrowne 3mo ago
      I don't buy this. I think people find it easier to make excuses about lacking some magical, unobtainable, abstract property like "the drive" than to actually put in the effort to improve themselves.
      • cloverich 3mo ago
        People over diagnose themselves so it seems more common than it is, but adhd is definitely real. Its not merely attention, its a set of traits like reduced working memory (and ability to utilize it) that manifest as difficulty in sustained attention / distraction. People who have it do a lot of other funny things than simply "get distracted easily", just ask the spouse of any person with add what _their_ coping strategies are and you'll get many humorous and perhaps unexpected stories.
  • Noumenon72 3mo ago
    Working at a gig where I couldn't have my phone really put me on a painful dopamine fast, but helped me remember that I actually can focus. So I started working at the library and leaving my phone at home.
• abhaynayar 3mo ago
  In terms of solutions on an individual-level: after a lot of trial and error I feel like what works for me is an absolutist cold-turkey-approach. I've pretty much banned all consumptive screen-time except some things like Hacker News, LinkedIn, YouTube (only existing subscriptions, no recommendations or shorts etc). Things I know I won't spend more than 15-20 minutes on and are not highly stimulating and made to high-jack your brain. Initially, I used to allow myself some leeway as in screen-time i.e. should be less than X duration, but it never worked. The withdrawal-symptoms of going cold-turkey are intense but you get over them eventually and then once you've powered through a few weeks, and you try and go back and look at any type of "content" you see how much trash it all is. Even the "good ones" or things you tell yourself is "educational". Another important note is to have some replacements in place so that when you start seeing that new void of so much time on your hands, you don't feel empty/hollow but as a reminder to yourself that you had so many cool things to do.
  • jimbokun 3mo ago
    I managed to give up Reddit (still have other attention consuming vices) and temporarily checked in to see the reactions to Arsenal finally winning the Premier League...and was repulsed by just how MEAN that site is. Discussing something as innocuous as sporting events instantly devolves into cruel, personal attacks and pulls in every topic under the sun. It's not just Reddit that's like that, but it was especially striking after having been away for a while.
  • agentdev001 3mo ago
    There is clear irony in the statement "... an absolutist cold-turkey-approach." ... "except some things like Hacker News, LinkedIn, YouTube." That sounds closer to the opposite end of the extreme.
    • abhaynayar 3mo ago
      I knew someone would nitpick on that. Could've worded it better. But like I expanded later in the para, an absolute for platforms where I feel my brain hijacked. To make clearer, 0 minutes for those things (example-Reddit, IG, etc.). Instead of something like X minutes of screen time where I'm allowed anything. Because for the things I allow, like LinkedIn, I don't find myself using them much at all even though I have full freedom, but the utility at that point crosses whatever time is spent on cringe posts. And allow me to return the nitpickiness as well. "That sounds closer to the opposite end of the extreme." - I don't see how that's closer to the opposite end of the extreme? Are you saying only watching YouTube channels which you've subscribe to (despite being subscribed to dozens I only see maybe one new video pop up every few days) and spending some time on TWO work-related social-media is the opposite end of the EXTREME? How?
• ritcgab 3mo ago
  And yet people are still happily driving 10 LLM sessions concurrently.
• Brajeshwar 3mo ago
  One of the best ways I have found not to get distracted while in a task, with other more interesting or something that you do not want to forget, is NOT to use your device to do it or even add to your TODO, or note it down but to use an actual notebook (may be a small memo note) to quickly write out and continue with your current task/more. When you are done, visit and parse your sidenotes. Of course, the are the usual No Notifications, timers, etc.
• ckdarby 3mo ago
  It's really not that hard but people are addicted and don't want to admit it. Buy an Amazfit 6 watch, has alarms, clock, health stats, memos, weather, maps, and GPS workout. Turn off nearly all phone notifications. Do not allow any phone to AmaZfit notifications. Don't have your phone physically attached to you. You need your phone with you? Backpack. Never in pockets. All sudden it is incredibly easy to focus.
  • chickenimprint 3mo ago
    very true. I just bought [product placeholder] and it has [features placeholder]. I am no longer distract by phon.
    • unethical_ban 3mo ago
      Take a step back and realize what they're saying. * Monitor your health and track your time to help stay focused. * Disable as many spurious notification types on your phone as you can afford to do. My recommendation: All notifications that aren't live messages from individuals. * Keep your phone out of immediate reach so that you break the habit one likely has of instinctively reaching for it to fill in moments of boredom.
      • chickenimprint 3mo ago
        [flagged]
  • inigyou 3mo ago
    Phone in the backpack is a crazy simple hack. Every time you want to reach for it you get a slight punishment (anti-reward), this is operant conditioning.
    • cindyllm 3mo ago
      [dead]
    • Noumenon72 3mo ago
• ninjahawk1 3mo ago
  Sounds like the answer may be simpler than it seems. You could just be tired. You said you’ve been balancing a lot for years and years. Take some time to just focus on yourself. Meditate, go on walks, wake up earlier, always have breakfast, and for the love of all that is good, get enough sleep.
• thegabez 3mo ago
  Long walks with no phone help me come back with a lot of focus and less stress.
• user2722 3mo ago
  Rather ironic: I was in the process of moving all Android apps to a second user to be able to stop all apps (and just not DnD, because I'll know I may have some messages waiting for me after disabling DnD) when I got distracted by HN (just one tiny minute). Another thing I'm testing is having VPN OFF with its kill-switch ON.
• MarkLowenstein 3mo ago
  It will continue to be a mystery only solvable by the dwindling number of people clever enough to combat the problem with strategies like the many offered here. Until the real problem is identified...which IMO is that programming itself is just harder to concentrate on in 2026 than it was in 1989. There are way too many possibilities of how to do things, and way too much difference between a good choice (say getting Claude to do it) and a bad one (say, writing a linked-list traverser yourself). Humans work well with the few variables involved in creating things like that linked-list traverser. But they require tons more energy if everything is on the table. Right library? Right platform? Right coding agent? Right way to keep myself from getting distracted? In contrast, doing almost anything else seems like a relief for your brain.
• twilo 3mo ago
  I think exposure (or multiple) to SARS-CoV-2 should be taken under consideration when talking about all of this..
• sibeliuss 3mo ago
  You're just getting older and realizing something about yourself. The only way to preserve your attention is to guard it like a jewel. It is a learned behavior once you enter the real world.
• estetlinus 3mo ago
  I don’t know if this helps, as kids don’t make it easier BUT they do make you much more aware of how valuable your time is. One free hour as a parent feels like a full free day to someone without kids. TL;DR get kids.
• ChiperSoft 3mo ago
  I wonder how old the author is. Losing the ability to stay focused on tasks is a pretty common aging symptom. I have felt it now that I'm in my 40s
  • layer8 3mo ago
    I disagree that it’s a common aging symptom, unless we are talking 70+. How do you know it’s your age instead of a sign of the times?
• achenet 3mo ago
  A habit that I've taken up which makes me quite happy and I think solidly helps my focus is working offline. Some days, I'll set a timer for two hours, and then just work offline for those two hours. I have most of the documentation for tools I use available offline, I'm a bit math enjoyer so I have like 5GB of maths textbooks/papers to study, and programming offline, especially when you've got docs for everything you use, is not only still doable in the LLM age, but also quite enjoyable :) Reading the article, basically all of the distractions the author mentions are internet-based (HN, LLMs), so perhaps adopting an offline work habit might help them too :)
• Terretta 3mo ago
  > So how can I regain my ability to focus? Read. Not the zennial definition of listen to a podcast – actual books. Here's how to reboot your reading. Do this during a break, when you have a couple weeks. Or schedule a couple hours in the evenings. But make the time be a "habit" block that you require yourself to do. (Something else has to give – consider letting your streaming queue get longer for a bit. And replace your HN bookmark with https://www.daemonology.net/hn-daily/ https://www.daemonology.net/hn-daily/ … seriously!) 1. Start with trash, an "airport novel" type with giant print double spaced lines so the short story looks like a proper book. Pure story dopamine. 2. Then one with normal print and single spaced lines with enough substance to engage meta or systems thought as you read, maybe a Len Deighton or Eric Ambler if you're feeling able. Your brain relearns getting to think doesn't actually hurt. 3. Next shift into non-fiction. Something about Norway's heavy water sabotage against Nazi Germany, for instance; or preferably something field-adjacent to your field, with both narrative and knowledge. Re-priming your dopamine to hit from knowledge too. 4. Finally move into your own field, now knowledge you haven't been able to stick with to learn but wanted to. For this read something from a genuine practitioner, not the LinkedIn-fluencer TED talk transcripts in book form that top charts these days. Leveling up is its own reward. Once you've made it through that, you should (a) be able to read again, (b) be able to focus on semantic processing, (c) regain your ideas to words to ideas mapping necessary for product/platform systems analysis or software engineering. Importantly, prefer physical books or (“try this one cool trick!”) a full A4 or 8.5"x11" page e-paper tablet turned landscape, set up to read 2 pages side by side. When this is configured right (smallest margins, right font and line size) ending up same size as a paperback. The retention of two pages at a time, and the fewer page turns (fewer, larger, memory chunks) per book, is better for regaining focus and better for improving working memory. The smaller the font you can still read quickly and easily, the better, for the same reason. Set your black mirror devices out of reach during the time block, don't have the TV on, ideally no music, or (“try this one cool trick too…”) while reading the first book on your list: play music in a language you don't understand but that sounds reasonably close to your own. For English speakers, germanic or romance languages are good. This makes your language centers busy wanting to comprehend the audio channel along with your visual channel, so your brain eats up the book without your mind wandering. Using the method above, you can work to being able to sit with and absorb hardbound textbooks in just a series of 4 or 5 escalating challenges. You'll find you regained intraday focus as well. • • • PS. Did you update that bookmark? Yesterday's HN Daily happens to be relevant as is so often the case: https://resobscura.substack.com/p/quality-non-fiction-books-are-the https://resobscura.substack.com/p/quality-non-fiction-books-...
• insane_dreamer 3mo ago
  > I am waiting for something then I go browse the web and I get distracted. I firmly believe that we've gotten so used to always-at-hand phones/apps that we can no longer handle spending a few minutes doing "nothing". I see this in my teenager. The OP may or may not struggle with ADHD, but this is something that IMO isn't ADHD but rather a new pervasive trait across our modern society. Everything must be instant now. Emails and now chats must be replied to instantly. Service/delivery must be as instant as possible. No more waiting, no more "doing nothing". We're all operating at high speed, even during our "down time". And for no good reason -- we're just inflicting this on ourselves.
• Cort3z 3mo ago
  Water, fish oil, vitamin d, and food. If i forget any of these I have the same symptoms.
• imaginationra 3mo ago
  It's getting easier to focus every day for me- Why? I never used any kind of mobile phone or tablet and I use LLM's to automate away the things I don't want to do. I use a laptop(VOIP for texts and calls), desktop PC, a b6 physical notebook and a sony voice recorder- B6 notebook(graph) https://www.amazon.com/STALOGY-Editors-notebook-Black-S4104/dp/B00TYDVCWE/?th=1 https://www.amazon.com/STALOGY-Editors-notebook-Black-S4104/... B6 cover with pocket https://www.amazon.com/Raymay-Fujii-CN162B-Notebook-Multi-Cover/dp/B005JQ0ULY/?th=1 https://www.amazon.com/Raymay-Fujii-CN162B-Notebook-Multi-Co... Sony voice recorder https://www.amazon.com/Sony-ICDPX370-Digital-Recorder-Built/dp/B06XFTWCBJ/?th=1 https://www.amazon.com/Sony-ICDPX370-Digital-Recorder-Built/... *these pens are zen for drawing and writing https://www.amazon.com/uni-ball-Vision-Needle-Rollerball-Point/dp/B0017TI84I/?th=1 https://www.amazon.com/uni-ball-Vision-Needle-Rollerball-Poi... I take notes/draw constantly as I take the b6 case with me everywhere- I keep the voice recorder in the pocket of the case when I need to dictate an idea, an article, record a song idea or a comedy bit, dictate a blog entry etc- But all the actual "work" which these days is really just ideas is done on physical paper and a pen or with my speaking voice- no tapping, swiping etc- no notifications or any of that nonsense- so I work outside mostly- in various places- on planes- standing in line- all the places everyone is tapping/swiping onto a screen around me- It's 10x easier to focus when you are outside and/or in public with a pen and pad in hand and no screens/tech to destroy your attention-
  • Limeade9345 3mo ago
    I am interested in your phone setup. I need for for 2FA push notifications, public transit passes, and other random shit that I would love to be able to get rid of if it seemed sensible. Shed some light, I am here for it!
• cleandreams 3mo ago
  I really noticed this a few years ago to the point that I changed a few things and they have helped. 1. I notice the movement of my attention. I used to default to something like: sit down at my computer to look something up. But before I do that, just check the email. Then I am down some sort of rabbit hole. I did this sort of thing with no awareness or conscious choice. The change is that I notice what I'm doing. Then I can rein it back. I make a choice. (I think scrolling videos gets us into a habit of not choosing what to pay attention to.) 2. Be aware of my curiosity. Try to stay in touch with it. If I get into the space of curiosity I have a lot more juice for sustained attention. Something that helps with this is long form reading, especially fiction (!). I find myself replenished for all my work. The next thing I will try is some group support: silent reading groups where you read together. 3. I have an app on my devices that limits my access to twitter and reddit etc to small windows in the day. 4. Turn off ALL notifications except text messages.
• owlguy_11 3mo ago
  > Unfortunately it’s not possible anymore because people in Iran cannot have a stable internet connection nowadays Even the fellas in Iran are struggling with staying focused..
• amacneil 3mo ago
  For me, AI is a classic tale of maker schedule vs manager schedule, just at massive scale: https://www.paulgraham.com/makersschedule.html https://www.paulgraham.com/makersschedule.html Many individual contributors (ICs) are getting introduced to multi-tasking for the first time. When I was an IC, I was really good at getting into flow state and getting solid work done. When I first started managing, I found it really to adjust to constantly multi-tasking. After several years of managing, I found the opposite - I became really bad at getting into flow state, my brain had been rewired to constantly context switch every 30 seconds. Now with AI, we're seeing many managers get back into coding again: "Hey! This fits exactly into my mental model! Delegate 5 agents at once and then keep juggling between their responses!". We're also seeing many ICs feel the opposite - much stress from needing to multi-task and constantly context switch. I don't know if everyone's brain can be rewired for multi-tasking, but I can tell you that for me it took a couple years to adjust. Everyone is on manager schedule now.
  • bluefirebrand 3mo ago
    > Everyone is on manager schedule now I think everyone is shifting between maker schedule and manager schedule constantly depending on what is going on, and that's so much more exhausting than just being in maker schedule or manager schedule full time
• StevenNunez 3mo ago
  This is me. I hate it. I'm working though (ever so slowly) The Global Village by Marshall McLuhan and I really like the metaphor technology going from Visual to Acoustic. Put another way the past had a serial enforcement we don't have today with always-on connections and easy access to distractions. I've been trying to introduce more friction into my life to make doing harder things the right thing. 1. I have a rooted Orchid F1 flip phone with Telegram and Firefox focus. Telegram lets me TTS to an openclaw instance if I need to get something "out" but long interactions are awful with the small screen and latency. Firefox focus is also terrible in all the right ways. If I'm out and HAVE to search for something this is enough of a break glass solution but for the most part it's just calls and texts. 2. I carry an xteink x3 for books. I'm trying to read more so this being the only thing available has me reaching for it more than I'd normally do. I don't have a good solution for things at work yet. Maybe I'll start blocking all websites or doing strict pomodoros.
• hnscum 3mo ago
  [dead]
• albert_e 3mo ago
  I can attest to experiencing virtually everything the author describes here. I admire the ability to articulate these mundane-sounding challenges that greatly impact your quality of life.
• curiouskoala 3mo ago
  [dead]
• mrloopex 3mo ago
  You’re doing the engineering thing and focusing on the trees instead of the forest. It sounds to me like you have other things going on in your life that you aren’t acknowledging. Often stress and anxiety are primary sources of attention deficit. As we get older more and more stress is piled on us and it becomes even more important to manage it in a healthy way. I encourage you to reflect on your mental health because it might have some clues.
• katsudo 3mo ago
  [flagged]
• johanam 3mo ago
  It feels pretty obvious at this point that overstimulating ourselves with a multitude of different apps, social media, short form video, and so on, is hollowing out our capacity to focus. Cal Newport had a great opinion article in the NYT recently that spoke to this, and how reading might help us "train" our minds when so many media are adversely affecting our attention.'
• lrvick 3mo ago
  I gave up my smartphone 6 years ago because I concluded the conveniences it offered came at cost of too much of my attention, freedom, and privacy. My ability to focus was just gone, and this magic device was not making me happy or productive anymore. Within a year, my hyper-focus abilities I remember having as a teen starting flowing back. In the last 5 years I have done the best work of my career, including creating the first fully deterministic Linux distribution, building a community around it, helping start 3 companies, learned endless new skills. I am not reachable or able to reach the internet every second of every day, and in the modern world that sounds scary. Yet I have a family, an active social life, frequently travel, meet new people every week, co-running two companies while actively developing new tech with daily progress, etc. All of those things were -accelerated- by me being intentionally offline whenever I am not at a desk.
  • dofm 3mo ago
    > Within a year, my hyper-focus abilities I remember having as a teen starting flowing back. Mine are gone for good. But I no longer want to be able to hyperfocus, because it is invariably a sign I am losing control. For me, hyperfocus is dysregulation that benefits others and not me. I just want to be able to think straight, keep my house tidy, and not spend a couple of hours every day wishing it would turn out to be my last day.
    • lrvick 3mo ago
      I have at various points of my life been diagnosed with downs syndrome, chronic depression, anxiety, ADD, tourettes. Almost certainly undiagnosed PTSD and tests indicate maybe mild autism. I do not think anyone actually knows, and I stopped letting such fuzzy labels define me. I can say for me the drugs never fixed the root causes. They just made me care less about having control. A passenger in my own life. Once I recognized constant connectivity and internet media as mild poisons like alcohol, and regulated those, I found myself a lot happier without drug dependence. (YMMV, every brain is different) I can focus on whatever I want now. A mechanical puzzle, work, an open source project, a video game, my family, my friends, or typing this comment to a stranger on the internet I empathize with. My motivation is seemingly endless now too. Get rid of the doom scrolling poison and give your brain time to reset and recalibrate. Spend several hours a day away from the internet. I cannot promise it is the only change needed for you but I promise strategic life change experiments will provide a better chance of a positive outcome than waiting to die.
• edukite 3mo ago
  I had the same exact issue. Turns out I have depression. Currently I'm on meds, therapy and functioning on 80% my ability but it's still better than near 0
• spdionis 3mo ago
  I think placebo is a very strong effect most people underestimate.
  • WindyTree 3mo ago
    [flagged]
    • tomhow 3mo ago
      Please don't reply like this on HN. The comment you replied to was unkind and I've replied to the comment pointing that out. But this comment escalates terribly. It's not OK to infer political positions based on such little information that's available in their comment. That's unkind to the individual and disrespectful to the community. Please take a moment to read the guidelines and make an effort to observe them in future. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  • tomhow 3mo ago
    Please don't post shallow dismissals on HN, especially when someone sharing their experience of a medical condition. It's just not kind, and the guidelines ask us to be kind in comments. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49040212 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49040212 and marked it off topic.
• pojzon 3mo ago
  I do have this problem. Its not caused by my age or mental decline. Its simply too many things happening too fast, to many people asking questions and too many topics to pursue without any pause. Work, family, life, world around you, all scream „me now, my problem, do this, do that, watch this, listen to that”. Its exhausting. Humans are not built to be constantly in overdrive. I just want to sit and have peace of mind. Issue is the moment you hit the breaks - „you lose” sign pops up and well.. you fade away. Maybe its a good thing?
• epicalex 3mo ago
  I've found that the only way I can reliably create focus of late is to put music on. It's as though the music prevents my mind from wandering and/or wondering because it is already being consumed
• luskira 3mo ago
  I've tried multiple things to regain focus, the only ones that worked: - blocking social media everyday til 2pm(i like working from 5-1 everyday), i use freedom app for that - having a "distraction" tablet with 2fa on the social media I use, so I can only use distracting things there and not on my computer and iphone. - when work requires just thinking, I bring my remarkable tablet to a coffeeshop or coworking and work just off of it. - for avoiding staying behind on social media trends, etc, i built Analog Reader to read newsletters, best tweets from specific people and articles i save for later. It becomes a printed newspaper I can bring anywhere. I have a hacker news edition that runs everyday that showed this article for today and thats why im here lol.
• avaer 3mo ago
  > Sometimes I live stream what I’m doing just because with a camera I cannot escape from hard challenges by grabbing my phone. This is a great life hack, I highly recommend it if you need accountability or motivation. You don't even need an audience, and if your work is the kind that somehow benefits from one, all the better.
• mkrecny 3mo ago
  focusing is indeed so hard, couldn't even finish reading this post
• effnorwood 3mo ago
  This article is SO long.
• abalashov 3mo ago
  I don't know that this starts with LLMs, though LLMs are certainly--at least for some people--a way to take their ADHD tendencies further. It's been obvious to me even since I was a computer-addled kid, in the 90s, that the way computer interfaces and multi-modal notifications affect the nervous system, the capacity for sustained attention and patient reading, and so on is pernicious. The impact has both cognitive and moral valences that reinforce each other, because the instincts reinforced by computer use turn into technocratic, anti-humanistic worldviews, and even cosmologies. I imagine it's easy to read something Ludditic into this critique, but I mean it quite a bit more matter-of-factly, and from the vantage point of a tech professional who is as passionate about coding and computers as anyone else on HN. Still, it's sobering to consider the ways in which being so computer-bound since age 9 or 10 has altered the development of my habits of mind, my nervous system and my cognition, and speculate about might have been gained and lost.
• matthewtovbin 3mo ago
  You're not alone. You will find some answers "Stolen Focus" by Johann Hari
• udbhavs 3mo ago
  OP is definitely not alone in this. It feels like I'm constantly trying to avoid "attention capture" when trying to do a task that involves browsing the internet - even going on LinkedIn or StackExchange for a specific purpose can get sidetracked by my eyes wandering to the sidebar or being drawn by updates in the feed. It's scary to realize how little in control I am of my own stream of thought. I don't know if anyone has a solution that's not straight up quitting the internet cold turkey. My attempt so far has been meditating 50 minutes a day following "The Mind Illuminated" by Culadasa as a progress guide for increasing my mindfulness. The most recent lesson I've learned is that allowing mind wandering and daydreaming can be a good thing. As a kid I read The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, and took away a misconstrued toolkit for dealing with an active mind. The whole book was about emphasizing the importance of being present in the moment, and I tried to carry that out by trying to silence my internal monologue and being frustrated whenever I found my mind thinking about something random and not processing direct conscious experience. That felt horrible and was completely counterproductive to being able to live normally, and now I'm trying to re-establish a relationship with my mind where I can welcome random thoughts while still being able to get things done.
  • tenacious_tuna 3mo ago
    The number of news articles I start reading that interrupt the flow of the article with 'ads' for other articles I could read is driving me bananas. To say nothing of ads themselves or CTAs or cookie consent banners or... I'd frequently gripe about how much I felt my attention was fractured as an adult to my grandfather, between taxes or coordinating with service providers or whatever, and his response would frequently be "I'm retired and I can't keep up!" It does feel that there's pressure in many avenues of life to capture and fracture people's attention.
  • jfil 3mo ago
    I am in the same boat as you and OP. For me, its partly age related, partly a (normal) boredom with my profession. I find my mind intentionally trying to switch tracks/find a distraction even while working on a task without external interruptions. For now, I'm just trying to observe and note that this is happening. Recommendation for Linkedin/web distractions: use an ad blocker, add the central feed/sidebar with news and games as an element to your ad blocker. That way you can use certain parts of LI with less distractions. I keep thinking of how certain religions deal with this challenge: going through intentional fasting and periods of retreat in order to reset your "dopamine floor" by reducing stimuli.
• jacoueszzx 3mo ago
  its not bad