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The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

jamesclear.com

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Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#21

Post by MattRix »

mroll wrote: post #14
beat wrote: post #10

Useful things for those in the struggle... Deep Work , by Cal Newport. An excellent book on how to work on really big ideas/projects effectively, without losing your humanity in the process. This is a must-read for anyone serious about work. Pomodoro Technique. This is well-documented with lots of apps and tools online, but it's pretty simple. Set a 25 minute timer. Work, without interruption, for 25 minutes. When th…

Any programmers here use pomodoro? I expect 25 minute interruptions would do more harm than good for my focus when writing code, especially the continuous expectation that I will be interrupted. I don’t have a pressing interest in finding productivity tips, just curious to hear about programmers who have tried this technique

25+5 is too short but I found 48+12 worked well. With that said usually it's just about starting, once you start it's not nearly as hard to keep going.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#22

Post by Smoofer »

mroll wrote: post #14
beat wrote: post #10

Useful things for those in the struggle... Deep Work , by Cal Newport. An excellent book on how to work on really big ideas/projects effectively, without losing your humanity in the process. This is a must-read for anyone serious about work. Pomodoro Technique. This is well-documented with lots of apps and tools online, but it's pretty simple. Set a 25 minute timer. Work, without interruption, for 25 minutes. When th…

Any programmers here use pomodoro? I expect 25 minute interruptions would do more harm than good for my focus when writing code, especially the continuous expectation that I will be interrupted. I don’t have a pressing interest in finding productivity tips, just curious to hear about programmers who have tried this technique

What I've found in using the technique is that anything lost in focus is more than made up for by insights gained during the break.

Taking your eyes off of a problem for a short time can often help you return to it with a different mindset / approach.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#23

Post by bernardino »

What helped me get down to deep work was doing away with the nonessentials, i.e. a lot of physical material things, all forms of entertainment, the internet especially, inner clutter like comparing myself to others, etc. Seneca once noted in his Moral letters to Lucilius, “Until we have begun to go without them, we fail to realize how unnecessary many things are. We’ve been using them not because we needed them but because we had them.” I found this was applicable to nearly everything: my digital life (think Cal Newport's Digital Minimalism), my physical life (think Henry David Thoreau's Walden), my inner life (think Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet), etc. In short: Getting down to my bare self, helped me get down to deep work.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#24

Post by Loic »

beat wrote: post #10

Useful things for those in the struggle... Deep Work , by Cal Newport. An excellent book on how to work on really big ideas/projects effectively, without losing your humanity in the process. This is a must-read for anyone serious about work. Pomodoro Technique. This is well-documented with lots of apps and tools online, but it's pretty simple. Set a 25 minute timer. Work, without interruption, for 25 minutes. When th…

Deep Work is maybe the first book I wanted to through out of the window in a long time. The complete book can be resumed in a sentence: "Secure big chunks of time to reach and be in the flow state".

But of course you cannot write a full book out of one sentence, so it repeats itself until it achieves to contradict itself by telling you that if you are a writer/journalist you can achieve the state of flow in chunks of 10 minutes spread over the day and happily switch tasks.

So, no, really, you can save yourself this book.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#25

Post by azeirah »

40acres wrote: post #20
mroll wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any programmers here use pomodoro? I expect 25 minute interruptions would do more harm than good for my focus when writing code, especially the continuous expectation that I will be interrupted. I don’t have a pressing interest in finding productivity tips, just curious to hear about programmers who have tried this technique

I use pomodoro and find it helps my productivity more than hinder it. Mind you I show signs of ADHD (working w/ a doc to get a diagnosis now) so pomodoro might no be for everyone but I find it allows me to slice out some time to really focus and not let myself get distracted. When time is of the essence I simply skip the 5 minute breaks but continue to work using the pomodoro.

According to Russel Barkley (well known and central figure in the ADHD scientific community), you should definitely take short breaks every so many minutes.

He recommends 3 mins for every 10 minutes of work, but that's for children.

I think you'd want be interested in watching this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tpB-B8BXk0

Definitely check out his other work as well, listening to his talks is like reading my own diary... except translated to scientific language

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#26

Post by mattmanser »

mroll wrote: post #14
beat wrote: post #10

Useful things for those in the struggle... Deep Work , by Cal Newport. An excellent book on how to work on really big ideas/projects effectively, without losing your humanity in the process. This is a must-read for anyone serious about work. Pomodoro Technique. This is well-documented with lots of apps and tools online, but it's pretty simple. Set a 25 minute timer. Work, without interruption, for 25 minutes. When th…

Any programmers here use pomodoro? I expect 25 minute interruptions would do more harm than good for my focus when writing code, especially the continuous expectation that I will be interrupted. I don’t have a pressing interest in finding productivity tips, just curious to hear about programmers who have tried this technique

It's good for getting you started.

So you've become stuck. You pick something you know will be a quick job (e.g. do this one method, fix this one bug).

Then after a few podomoro you stop doing them as you get into the flow and get into the zone.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#27

Post by amorphous »

beat wrote: post #10

Useful things for those in the struggle... Deep Work , by Cal Newport. An excellent book on how to work on really big ideas/projects effectively, without losing your humanity in the process. This is a must-read for anyone serious about work. Pomodoro Technique. This is well-documented with lots of apps and tools online, but it's pretty simple. Set a 25 minute timer. Work, without interruption, for 25 minutes. When th…

My biggest problem I have with deep work is not that it makes undoubtedly sense and leads to interesting results but to find what to work on. I can't find my deep work. Finding a niche and sticking to it is much harder than performing deep work.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#28

Post by ai_ia »

mroll wrote: post #14
beat wrote: post #10

Useful things for those in the struggle... Deep Work , by Cal Newport. An excellent book on how to work on really big ideas/projects effectively, without losing your humanity in the process. This is a must-read for anyone serious about work. Pomodoro Technique. This is well-documented with lots of apps and tools online, but it's pretty simple. Set a 25 minute timer. Work, without interruption, for 25 minutes. When th…

Any programmers here use pomodoro? I expect 25 minute interruptions would do more harm than good for my focus when writing code, especially the continuous expectation that I will be interrupted. I don’t have a pressing interest in finding productivity tips, just curious to hear about programmers who have tried this technique

I use pomodoro but with 45 mins instead of 25. I am usually tuned to deep focus playlist on YouTube/Spotify. In the five minutes, I listen to my current favorites song for full five minutes. Every day I aim for 10 pomodoros. Earlier I was able to do 3-4 and was left unmotivated. Now I have been able to crush 10+ everyday for last eight days.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#29

Post by padobson »

Akrasia and Enkrateia remind me of the dual nature of humans that St. Paul describes in Romans:

We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. Romans 7:14-25

Paul is writing here about the battle between a person's moral ideals and how their desires conflict and often overrun those ideals, admitting that even he is a hypocrite who does things he otherwise condemns.

I like how procrastination is discussed in forums like HN. We can recognize it as something keeping us from our goals, but can also empathize with each other in failing to master it. This is how I see the early church's approach to sin in St. Paul's era, or at least that was the point he was making in Romans.

In the same way, we can combat procrastination as a community by sharing our stories and providing the insight to overcome it. This is my favorite part of community, be it in church or on HN or elsewhere.

Re: The Akrasia Effect: Why We Don’t Follow Through on What We Set Out to Do

#30

Post by piinbinary »

I think that one of the things that causes "starting friction" for me is the fear of getting distracted/interrupted after I start a task. To get myself to start that kind of task, it seems to be useful to hole myself up somewhere that people can't find me and turn off slack. Then starting the task becomes easy.

On the other hand, personal projects seem easy to start but hard to finish. After working on something for a few weeks it ends up on the back-burner, often never to see the light of day again. I wonder if an effect similar to Akrasia is at play, or if that is due to something different.

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