I switch off between things I'm passionate about to be more productive. If I'm tired of coding, I write some music.
Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
11–20 of 49 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#12This video helped me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41HYjV8IxiI
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#13Do you have any goals that you've set for yourself? I've found that having specific goals with specific actionable and measurable items in them, helps with my procrastination.
Everyone is different, but sometimes external pressure keeps me on my toes. If I feel laziness setting in, I pre-emptively make a promise to someone that I'm going to deliver X by Y date.
Another thing cuold be to meet often with your team and discuss how you guys are making progress. It can give you a sense of purpose when you discuss shared-goals with your teammates.
Or maybe your job has gotten to be too mundane and you might benefit from switching jobs (although that can obviously backfire if your new job sucks worse :P).
Basically you need to just figure out what makes you tick and apply pressure accordingly. Nobody has a internal fountain of infinite intrinsic motivation. Everyone needs a nudge/push/shove every now and then.
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#14You have a never ending set of goals. You sound like a classic goal oriented person, but you don’t derive satisfaction from discipline which is the only strategy that works for continuous goals.
Shift your strategy and aim for the simplest possible task, it’s gonna hurt your ego but you have to do this if you’re seriously asking:
Pick the easiest thing on that list (reading that book for example) and aim to read 1 paragraph every day.
In fact, start with 1 sentence every day. It sounds insulting right? You just need a framework for doing the same thing everyday and gaining satisfaction from that, even if it’s just one sentence. Your ego is totally in the way.
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#15I usually put off dealing with it.
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#16You have a never ending set of goals. You sound like a classic goal oriented person, but you don’t derive satisfaction from discipline which is the only strategy that works for continuous goals. Shift your strategy and aim for the simplest possible task, it’s gonna hurt your ego but you have to do this if you’re seriously asking: Pick the easiest thing on that list (reading that book for example) and aim to read 1 pa…
A technique I use is to use the thing I'm avoiding to make progress on the 2nd thing I'm avoiding.
It's strange, but if I'm overscheduled and REALLY don't want to work on my taxes, somehow I have a lot of energy to clean up the garage.
I've also found that if I work on something and finish it, the next day I bumble around when getting started. But if I stop right at some obvious place in the middle, the next day I immediately jump in and finish it, then use the momentum for the next thing.
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#17Today is my off day. On my off days, when I catch myself feeling guilty for not getting stuff done, I remind myself it’s my off day, and my job is to rest. This, I think, makes the other days a little easier.
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#18These are crazy times especially last week if you are in covid affected areas. What you perceive as laziness can actually be high level of anxiety or even depression.
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#19Dealt with sleep/concentration issues for over a decade. Some anecdotes: - No caffeine after 1/2/3PM (even "sleep-friendly" tea throws me off) - Melatonin / Sleep aids: See if they work for you - Don't drink before bed (because it means a bathroom break in the middle of the night) [1] - If you do wake up in the middle of the night, a snack may help. ( https://www.sleepfoundation.org/articles/food-and-drink-prom... ).…
"Simple carbs can impact me heavily!"
What effects do they have on you?
Re: Ask HN: How do you guys deal with laziness?
#20If it's just the last week, I wouldn't worry about it. The world is changing dramatically. A little escapism and an aversion to spending brain power on deep dives is perfectly normal.
You may be having a low week. I find that I cycle on about a six week cadence. At the top I absorb deep information like a sponge. At the bottom I stare blankly into space and don't do much. I'm not diagnosible as bipolar, but there's a bit of that. It's been a constant pattern of my life and I beat myself up over the lows for some years until I just accepted that this is what I am.
You also might be telling yourself that you're interested in something, but you're not (possibly not anymore). That's fine, too. You might develop interest again. You might have developed enough depth where the things you're thinking you should look at are simply not interesting anymore and you need to find deeper material.
Don't beat yourself up over it. Take the pressure off. Relax. If something comes up that you want to play with, play with it, but consciously don't make it a goal or expectation of yourself. A few nights ago I started writing a pedagogical implementation of a relational database in Python. A couple weeks ago I wrote tetris in JavaScript. It would be so easy to say, "Oh, now I have to make this project a finished thing to show I can do blah blah..." But I'm not going to. I'll pick it up again if I feel like it. Or I won't. No one was paying me. They were for my own entertainment. It didn't matter if I didn't finish.