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Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

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Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#101

Post by Jd »

forgottenpaswrd wrote: post #54
maqr wrote: post #25

I'll say it: You should do drugs. You're describing a brain problem. It might be caused by poor diet, sleep, life perspective, etc. But whatever the cause, it's a problem in your brain; and it's probably fixable with drugs. If you feel you have an ADHD problem (which is what it sounds like), there's a variety of pills that can correct your symptoms. This quiz is fairly accurate in terms of diagnosis (really, self-ans…

I think this is a very bad advise. Don't use drugs EVER. Drugs never fix problems. The only hide them. if your body is telling you something, you should fix the root of the problem, not remove the symptoms. Whatever a drug does(stimulant, depressant...)the body will balance it giving the opposite effect over time(the roller coaster effect).This means instability of everything from mood to chemicals on your blood. Not…

Drugs fall into different categories regarding the reason why people use them as well as their effect. Here are some commonly appearing taxons:

(1) Drugs which are used to control a certain set of behavior or cultivate a certain desirable state of mind (caffeine, nicotine). - This group can be addictive not only because of the psychoactive properties of the drug but because the necessary state of mind for some necessary activity (i.e. certain forms of work) is amplified or facilitated by the drug

(2) Drugs which are used to open the mind to various forms of sensation that the mind is not normally able to perceive and/or process. -- Here we are on difficult epistemological ground because, although various religions and practioners attest various common experiences as the result of ingesting various substances (e.g. the merging of consciousness and "mind reading" via peyote) there is little collaborating scientific evidence, in my mind indicating the 'epimaterial' properties of the experience.

(3) Drugs which are used to induce "good feelings" -- this category is esp. prone to serious forms of addiction including absorption in the state of mind cultivated by the drug.

With these categories in mind (albeit suggestive and not definite) can one categorically dismiss drugs? My own answer is no, at the moment I make fairly extensive use of (1) and at various points have branched into (2). That said, I view (1) as undesirable since you are developing dependencies and, ideally, stimulants should be replaced with self-cultivation of the appropriate state of mind. The extent to which this is possible I am not sure, but I recognize that at various points in my life I have been much more productive than I am currently without the use of (1). As for (2) the substances can also be extraordinarily dangerous and in many related religious traditions practice with a more experienced person (usually a shaman of some sort) is mandated because of the potentially live changing nature of the experience (negative or positive, see the Datura stories on Erowid for a poignant example, most of them prompted by Castneda's highlight of Dature in his Don Juan chronicles).

So, as with most other areas of life, the answer is not yes or no, but know yourself and know exactly what you are dealing with.

Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#102

Post by lionhearted »

DeusExMachina wrote: post #85
lionhearted wrote: post #5

Questions that might illuminate if there's a problem - When's the last time you went for a walk? When's the last time you were in nature for a while? When's the last time you spent a day absolutely, completely relaxing? How's your diet? How's your sleep? How's your sleep schedule? When's the last time you had a vacation? How much inspirational media have you been through in the last week - books, movies, audio, whate…

This helps a lot. For lot of things (a walk, nature, relax, vacations) it was really long time ago. My diet is quite good, I think, but the sleep schedule needs a little fix. I lacked inspirational media in the recent period and I just talk with friends, but no one is really an authority in this field. For the environment I'm looking at the library, and the last time I visited it I managed to do something (but then I…

Alright, it's going to be fairly easy to pull out of things then - bring some positive fundamentals into your life. Go for a walk for 15 minutes, go to some nature if you're in a rural area or a park or university campus if you're in a city and just sit there a while, or go sit by a river, or lake, or harbor. A vacation would help if you can get away, even for a couple days. Some people can handle screwy sleep schedules, some can't. Etc. Try to integrate one or two positive things the next day or two - you're obviously looking for a solution so you're geared up, just go take a walk before you sit down at your computer today or tomorrow. Short walk around the neighborhood will do, and you'll probably have some clear thoughts. Remember - when you're in a hole, fundamentals are almost always the way out. Walk, nature, sleep, diet, relax, environment - things like that. Good luck, I was there a while back and it sucks, but you'll pull out of it if you focus on fundamentals.

Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#103

Post by lukifer »

Alex3917 wrote: post #23
lionhearted wrote: post #5

Questions that might illuminate if there's a problem - When's the last time you went for a walk? When's the last time you were in nature for a while? When's the last time you spent a day absolutely, completely relaxing? How's your diet? How's your sleep? How's your sleep schedule? When's the last time you had a vacation? How much inspirational media have you been through in the last week - books, movies, audio, whate…

"Beyond that - changing environment can bring you out of a funk, bringing a laptop to a cafe with no internet can be a great option if you can do some work offline." Even the best entrepreneurs have a really hard time focusing because they have so many different kinds of tasks that they can never really get into a flow state. Trying to do work as an entrepreneur while having access to the Internet is like trying to s…

I've always said that staying focused while doing web development is like staying thin while working in a candy store.

Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#105

Post by commanda »

Maybe you want yourself to be interested in this particular project, but you might really not be interested in it. Sometimes you can't force interest, and it's often tough to focus when you aren't interested. I've felt what you're feeling before. I realized that my problem was that I just was not into the project - I just could not bring myself to focus on coding because I didn't really want to. This is fine though. As an adult, hey, sometimes you don't have to do things you don't want to do. You can have ice cream and beer for dinner; you can pick some other side project, or nothing, to spend your time on.

Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#107

Post by datasink »

jacquesm wrote: post #45
datasink wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wrote a small PHP command-line tool for turning on/off these host file entries. It's fairly simple, but I've found it to be extremely useful in killing off stray checks of favorite websites, which inevitably end in larger blocks of misspent time. http://github.com/killsaw/Timeguard

Make it a command line utility only for turning those entries on, but make it as hard as it could be to remove them again.

I considered this while writing it, but figured there's a fine line one must walk with a utility like this. If it's too annoying to disable, you won't use it.

Typically once I flip it on, I forget about it, until I actually try to check a site that's been blocked. I find that being unable to load a site or loading a local webserver hosted file injects just enough time to realize I should be doing something else.

Previously I wasn't in the "trick yourself" camp, but having used this for a while, I definitely am. Used in conjunction with the Pomodoro Technique, it's a really solid way to keep oneself on track.

Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#108

Post by mahmud »

CamperBob wrote: post #95
fmora wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A whole younger generation in America seems to be more into Marijuana, and they don't see it as wrong. And these are usually middle class kids. That is probably why a lot of people here seem to be really casual about it. And now let the down voting begin.

This happened before, about 40 years ago. A whole younger generation was into marijuana. Now they're running the DEA.

That generation was creative, organized, pushed society against a wall and threatened the status-quo. This one just stares at facebook wall and does nothing more than update their status.

And I doubt the hippies actually run the DEA; more like the conservative kids, and the successor Reagan generation that had to be mobilized by mega-churches and shipped on buses from the suburbs, at the expense of the business establishment and old money.

Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#109

Post by stan_rogers »

CamperBob wrote: post #93
stan_rogers wrote: post #72

Take this seriously. Very seriously. What you're describing may be no more than acute stress, something that can be fixed with a proper vacation (as in "completely vacate your life" -- go on a camping trip, visit an ashram or monastery, spend some time wwoofing) and a subsequent lifestyle change to allow for periods of relaxation and enjoyment during your normal routine. Or it may be something much bigger. As a sober…

Not to downplay the serious symptoms you've described, but that's all a bit dramatic when the guy has described nothing more or less than Slashdot Syndrome. When you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras.

Horses' hooves will stomp you dead just as quick if you ignore the sound. The point is: get out of it for a while, since stress is the most probable culprit. If that doesn't do the trick, then look deeper. Don't minimize real symptoms if they persist; they could indicate something really serious. And don't take idiotic advice[1] from random people on the web -- it's far better to spend an unnecessary half-hour with your head stuck in an MRI scanner and feel a bit foolish later than to wait until a real problem becomes irreversible.

[1] "Don't worry, it'll be okay" coming from someone who's never had personal contact with you counts as idiotic advice. If you don't know the before-and-after, if you haven't had a chance to notice other behavioural changes, then even considering an attempt at diagnosis is irresponsible.

Re: Ask HN: My brain refuses to think, what should I do?

#110

Post by CamperBob »

stan_rogers wrote: post #109
CamperBob wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to downplay the serious symptoms you've described, but that's all a bit dramatic when the guy has described nothing more or less than Slashdot Syndrome. When you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras.

Horses' hooves will stomp you dead just as quick if you ignore the sound. The point is: get out of it for a while, since stress is the most probable culprit. If that doesn't do the trick, then look deeper. Don't minimize real symptoms if they persist; they could indicate something really serious. And don't take idiotic advice[1] from random people on the web -- it's far better to spend an unnecessary half-hour with y…

... it's far better to spend an unnecessary half-hour with your head stuck in an MRI scanner and feel a bit foolish later than to wait until a real problem becomes irreversible.

Is it? Do you have any idea what MRI sessions cost? Money for risk mitigation is limited, just as it's limited for everything else.

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