Ask HN: What are your “brain hacks” that help you manage everyday situations?

If you want to understand your own brain, it's very important to study great thinkers on the subject, both modern scientists and thinkers from the past whose insights have survived the test of time. That doesn't mean you need to commit to any one of them (especially when they are often at odds with one another), but their insights are valuable.

1. Telling myself that if I don’t do it now I probably won’t get it done today, so I better do it now. The reason I say this to myself is because I have a toddler who always wants me around so when I have time, I have to use it to maximum capacity or I won’t get that chance again.

When dealing with work I don’t want to do for a client - I put myself in their position and pretend I have hired me. How would I feel knowing I’m not doing my best (probably like I’m paying for nothing). Even though a lot of my work is not tracked by the hour it helps put things in perspective by pretending to be the other person.

When facing multiple task I start with the hardest one first. The reason being is I know many developers who will work on small ticket items first to build up their momentum but stop at the hardest task. To me this is highly irritating so I try to get the hardest tasks done first just to “show them” how it’s done. Of course, I’m not actually showing anyone anything but it gives me reason to take on the hard work.

Knowing when to take a break - sometimes my work starts suffering and my instinct is to push through. From experience I know that if I don’t put things down and walk away I’m bound to make sloppy mistakes that will make me look like an amateur. Knowing that I’ll look unprofessional, I immediately put down my work and walk away. In any case, I’d rather spend time with my son and come back with a fresh mind.

I don’t know if these qualify as mind hacks but these are thought processes I go through. There are others but that’s all I can type up right now.