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Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
31–40 of 84 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#32Get a Bose QC 35, it will change your life and also your future flights.
Many have said that noise cancellation does not work for coworkers' voices. Is that your experience or are these for another reason?
It depends on the distance from your co-workers, how loud they talk, and how much you are willing to damage your hearing to drown them out.
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#33Get a Bose QC 35, it will change your life and also your future flights.
Unfortunately headphones and noise cancellation don't help with the fight vs. flight reflex that gets automatically triggered by foot traffic near your desk or especially behind your back. This is why reaching a state of flow and getting really productive is just totally impossible in an open-plan office setting period. The most basic requirement for being able to focus is privacy. Quiet is also important, but not nearly as important as privacy.
Many people also find the physical feeling of anything covering / touching / inside their ear to be too uncomfortable to focus, ruling out all possibilities of headphones, earbuds or earplugs from consideration. And even more, lots of people have sensitivity to music that distracts them or makes them feel tired very quickly. And in severe enough cases, someone can have full-blown misophonia, and truly need the ability to completely customize their workspace in order to totally control all sounds during periods when they need to focus.
I know your advice might help some people, but I really wish there was a way en masse that developers could communicate that headphones absolutely do not solve the problems created by open-plan office layouts (one of the main destroyers of focus). It's sad that as a collection of workers, we've allowed ourselves to be put into this position by not demanding private offices and turning down jobs that won't provide such a cost-effective tool.
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#34Get a Bose QC 35, it will change your life and also your future flights.
Many have said that noise cancellation does not work for coworkers' voices. Is that your experience or are these for another reason?
The QC's don't completely wash out background noise. If you listen to your music loud enough (which is probably too loud), you literally won't hear anything around you. But normal use, I find that it muffles outside voices enough not to get distracted, but not so much to the point where if someone says my name I can respond. An added plus, is people will bother you less if you're wearing them. Sometimes I like wearing them without listening to any music, just to create a quieter environment.
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#35Addy. 5 mg. Every other day.
I know this will be down-voted, but I've been having issues focussing at work and completing projects for the last 10 years or so.
Visited a Psychiatrist (in Palo Alto). After listening to my situation, she followed it up with a detailed Q & A. She then prescribed 5 mg XR (extended release) of Adderall. Apparently "mild ADHD" is a thing with software engineers in their 30s and up...
The difference has been night and day. I'm completely focussed now, in the zone. I've even gotten side-projects that were languishing for many years, done and shipped over 2 weekends!
I take it only on days I need to focus and get something done. I also take weekends off and also take 1 week per month completely off. This keeps me from building tolerance. Also 5 mg Addy is like the LOWEST dose dispensed, so I feel ok with it.
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#36Every trick helps, but when you actually get to work and into the flow, the room might be noisy or you might be hungry and you don't even notice. So I try to achieve that state more frequently. Its hard..
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#37https://musicforprogramming.net/?two is something that my wife uses with success.
Can attest to musicforprogramming's effectivity, I literally only remember the first 5 minutes of every mix before I totally zone in.
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#38Goa trance
+1
Mostly 1996-2002 stuff.
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#39Addy. 5 mg. Every other day. I know this will be down-voted, but I've been having issues focussing at work and completing projects for the last 10 years or so. Visited a Psychiatrist (in Palo Alto). After listening to my situation, she followed it up with a detailed Q & A. She then prescribed 5 mg XR (extended release) of Adderall. Apparently "mild ADHD" is a thing with software engineers in their 30s and up... The d…
Doesn't it leave you shaky? I had similar results but the comedown and the tolerance were deal-breakers. I am completely absent minded but when I take those stimulants it allows me to focus which, I feel, finally puts me on a level playing field with everyone else. It sucks that the drugs have side-effects.
Re: Ask HN: How do you focus at work?
#40Meta: Curious how a dup of this comment is downvoted into oblivion under a different account and this is at the top.