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Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

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Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#51

Post by biswaroop »

kevmo314 wrote: post #27
biswaroop wrote: post #11

This could be because you were told you're a smart kid. Kids who are praised for intelligence over effort have been shown in some studies to pick easier problems and give up quickly if a problem is too hard. Check out Carol Dweck's research. Here's an early article: [ https://www.nytimes.com/1998/07/14/science/praise-children-f... ]. Note that there are some criticisms of her work, and like many other studies in psyc…

Oof, I feel that. Any ideas towards improving focus on more difficult efforts? I end up with a lot of unfinished tasks and it's been notably counterproductive.

Social accountability is the best. Have someone check that you're doing them one at a time, and tell them to praise you for struggling and working hard. Also, enjoy that feeling of being a beginner, of sucking at something, and of having a hard time. The feeling of progress is so rewarding that it motivates you to seek things that are hard, just to feel that sense of improvement.

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#52

Post by perl4ever »

biswaroop wrote: post #11

This could be because you were told you're a smart kid. Kids who are praised for intelligence over effort have been shown in some studies to pick easier problems and give up quickly if a problem is too hard. Check out Carol Dweck's research. Here's an early article: [ https://www.nytimes.com/1998/07/14/science/praise-children-f... ]. Note that there are some criticisms of her work, and like many other studies in psyc…

"Kids who are praised for intelligence over effort have been shown in some studies to pick easier problems and give up quickly if a problem is too hard"

You're implying that praise for intelligence makes people lazy. But if they weren't lazy, then they would likely be praised for effort - it's at least as plausible the causality goes the other way.

Claimed evidence makes me think of the regression to the mean paradox/fallacy, where people predictably do worse after praise and better after criticism.

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#53

Post by ExactActuation »

It all comes down to mindfulness.

If you keep doing the same things, you'll keep getting the same results. Meditation can rewire you for mindfulness - and that doesn't always mean sitting and meditating - but everyone should have a practice. Get out into nature, ride a bike, learn how to play guitar. Work on something completely different than APIs/IDEs/OSes/hacking.

I also recommend THC. Weed candy in particular, when I take about 10mg, I get a constant flow of interesting ideas and correlations for hours afterwards.

When you attain that mindfulness it's easier to guide your mind where you want it (in this case, solving technical problems). Good luck.

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#54

Post by KarlKemp »

vntx wrote: post #34
axiosgunnar wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuinely curious, does playing video games really improve focus etc.? Is this anecdotal, or did you read some paper somewhere?

Sorry, don’t have any specific papers for you, but if you google around you’ll find the general consensus is if you’re forced to focus on any mentally straining task for a prolonged period, it’ll generally help your mental abilities. If the game is challenging for you, it will likely help. Check out neuroscience books if you want to be deep in this stuff.

This is the "willpower" theory by Baumeister. There's a book of the same name.

The theory is controversial. The effect likely isn't too big, or it would be harder to design experiments where it doesn't show up at all.

But even assuming the theory is correct, playing video games wouldn't be considered beneficial, at least as long as you are enjoying it.

This should be somewhat obvious: if you enjoy doing something you are obviously not training your capability to do something that you don't enjoy.

The closest you can get to have license to indulge is that Baumeister would predict not playing video games (when you would like to do so) will deplete your willpower, and make it harder to resist other urges (such as not working) for that day. Over the longer term (several weeks) however, repeatedly resisting that urge to play would train your willpower.

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#55

Post by sharkweek »

hliyan wrote: post #42

I had a similar problem where the the bigger / the more complex the task in front of me was, the more my brain resisted to getting started and the more i procrasitnated. I came up with a fundamentally "agile" solution: break the problems down into smaller tasks until the first task is too small to offer resistance. E.g. rather than "write architecture specification", start with "outline the heads for architecture spe…

I don’t know what the true source is but I always enjoyed this little intro to a song by The White Stripes:

“When problems overwhelm us, and sadness smothers us, where do we find the will and the courage to continue?

Well, the answer may come in the caring voice of a friend, a chance encounter with a book, or from a personal faith. For Janet help came from her faith, but it also came from a squirrel. Shortly after her divorce, Janet lost her father, then she lost her job. She had mounting money problems.

But Janet not only survived, she worked her way out of despondency and now she says, life is good again. How could this happen?

She told me that late one Autumn day when she was at her lowest she watched a squirrel storing up nuts for the winter, one at a time he would take them to the nest.

And she thought, if that squirrel can take care of himself with the harsh winter coming along, then so can I. Once I broke my problems into small pieces I was able to carry them, just like those acorns, one at a time.”

— “Little Acorns” by The White Stripes

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#56

Post by biswaroop »

perl4ever wrote: post #52
biswaroop wrote: post #11

This could be because you were told you're a smart kid. Kids who are praised for intelligence over effort have been shown in some studies to pick easier problems and give up quickly if a problem is too hard. Check out Carol Dweck's research. Here's an early article: [ https://www.nytimes.com/1998/07/14/science/praise-children-f... ]. Note that there are some criticisms of her work, and like many other studies in psyc…

"Kids who are praised for intelligence over effort have been shown in some studies to pick easier problems and give up quickly if a problem is too hard" You're implying that praise for intelligence makes people lazy. But if they weren't lazy, then they would likely be praised for effort - it's at least as plausible the causality goes the other way. Claimed evidence makes me think of the regression to the mean paradox…

Maybe I phrased it poorly. Did you read the article? The study involved praise no matter what. The independent variable was the nature of the praise (intelligence vs effort).

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#57

Post by ilaksh »

Staying motivated to face difficult problems can be a challenge for lots of us. Although it can also be challenging to stay motivated if the task is too easy.

First thing I will mention is that my understanding is that your brain has a finite amount of energy/processing power available over the day or within a certain period. So if you can reduce some mental or physical energy expenditure from other things (for example, commuting takes a lot out of me personally) you may have more energy available for hard problems.

Another thing is that there are specific skills/strategies that are useful for solving hard problems. The biggest one is decomposing problems into smaller tasks. And I guess that OOP is now still unpopular these days with various groups, but object-oriented design has been a big help for me in terms of breaking larger problems down into subproblems and organizing information. That is a skill that you can practice and get better at.

The most basic way to decompose things is just to start typing a list of everything you need to do at a high level. Anywhere you can think of a smaller substep, fill that in.

Then when you are having trouble getting motivated, try to find one of the subtasks that you know how to do from your outline, tackle that, and hopefully that will give you momentum for a more challenging subtask.

Another strategy is just to make sure you are taking advantage of Google and all of the existing solutions out there.

And another thing, as far as the brain's available powers, having fuel is important. So things like skipping breakfast seem very questionable if you need to do heavy mental work in the morning. Coffee can help you get started a bit sometimes.

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#58

Post by galvin »

kevmo314 wrote: post #27
biswaroop wrote: post #11

This could be because you were told you're a smart kid. Kids who are praised for intelligence over effort have been shown in some studies to pick easier problems and give up quickly if a problem is too hard. Check out Carol Dweck's research. Here's an early article: [ https://www.nytimes.com/1998/07/14/science/praise-children-f... ]. Note that there are some criticisms of her work, and like many other studies in psyc…

Oof, I feel that. Any ideas towards improving focus on more difficult efforts? I end up with a lot of unfinished tasks and it's been notably counterproductive.

Focus and practice helped me.

Cut down the number of tasks you're working on at once. If you think about it there's probably some that don't need to be done. Personal projects that you'll never see through can be dropped. Narrow down the most important and focus on them. Throwing something away isn't failure, it's a decision to prioritize.

It's an ongoing process which requires practice.

With focus you can practice finishing things, starting small. Finishing tasks feels good and leads to more things being finished.

If you feel lost or are having difficulty taking next steps it's probably a sign that you need to break up a task into smaller pieces. Try picking one small part you can do now and finish that.

Tangentially, you might also be interested in "Time Management for System Administrators" by Limoncelli. It's got a lot of good info about getting things done (in any domain).

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#59

Post by dvcrn »

hsartoris wrote: post #24
toomanybeersies wrote: post #18

There is the potential that you have ADHD, because what you're describing sounds similar to my situation. I eventually ended up on stimulant medication to help, but there's non-stimulant medication available (if you're opposed to eating amphetamines for breakfast), as well as counselling and other treatment options that don't involve medication. Even if you don't want to seek professional treatment, you could look up…

Fellow ADHD sufferer here to second this. Thinking about ADHD as a deficit of motivation, which is much more accurate than an attention-oriented view, tends to clarify this sort of situation.

Giving a third +1 here. I had (have) similar issues with motivation and got diagnosed with ADHD at age 25.

I'd describe it as "a disability of knowing how to do something, but not actually doing it unless there are external consequences involved"

Re: Ask HN: How do I overcome mental laziness?

#60

Post by trashcan_ »

activehuman wrote: post #9

you might have trauma (little t trauma), which feels weird to call trauma because its not obvious trauma (death, car accident, abuse etc) but still affects you a lot and your feelings are still just as valid and they are there and real. Try to allocate a long time, like 2 hours to focus on something that you know you have to do. Observe how it feels physically, in your body. For me, my throat tightens up and my chest…

I would definitely advocate for this approach. At a minimum this is a worthwhile experience if you can get your mind fully behind it.
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