I have found that doing some physical exercise (gym or sports) in the evening helps me offset some of the mental fatigue and create bandwidth for other stuff in the evening.
That's interesting. I've never thought of this before.
Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
11–20 of 23 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#12There’s nothing wrong with listening to your body! Someone once commented something to the effect of “if you work with your mind, relax physically, and if you work with your body, relax mentally”, and I’ve been trying to implement that change. Maybe something similar for you (sports/cardio/weights/taking a walk around the neighborhood) might work. The problem with extracting the maximum amount of mental energy from e…
I should look more into physical relaxation I guess. I'm getting maybe just around 6 hours of sleep a day.
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#131. Get good quality sleep over quantity. 2. Set a schedule and stick to it as good as you can, but don't torture yourself if you blow it sometimes. 3. Wake up earlier, do some work on your side hustle in the morning hours. This helps motivate you later too, and gets some of your creative time in on the side hustle before you start the day job. 4. When you get home, chill, eat, shower, watch an hour or two of TV or wh…
Great pointers. Thanks.
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#14Work less, and use the time you save for your own purposes. Nobody will care if you are leaving a bit early. Your productivity probably will not even decrease. Most programmers work more hours than they can actually sustain productively.
Most people work until they are tired, and then go home, arriving even more tired. To arrive home with some energy, leave work well before you are tired.
Don't forget to use some of that extra time for fun.
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#15My trick is to not use any willpower. Your side project should excite you, not tire you.
My goal is to push one update a day live, whether it's small or big. That means when I have more time, I work on fixing up the infrastructure so that I can push updates without code, such as setting up a dashboard. If the updates are too big to fit in one update, I still push it to server as a matter of principle, but it might be commented out.
Instead of finding the right way to build something, you figure out how to see the results as soon as possible.
We spend most of our day building safe things; side projects are there to go crazy and have fun.
Same goes for learning. Learn new things that interest you, and not some targeted path to further your career. Pick up small, fun things, and very often they lead to bigger things.
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#16I’m most successful when I’m able to force myself into a non-brain intensive activity before attempting any additional work.
It could be a short workout or yoga session, a walk, a dance class.
Then, timeboxed (with a timer!) work session.
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#17Forming a habit
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#18Work less, and use the time you save for your own purposes. Nobody will care if you are leaving a bit early. Your productivity probably will not even decrease. Most programmers work more hours than they can actually sustain productively. Most people work until they are tired, and then go home, arriving even more tired. To arrive home with some energy, leave work well before you are tired. Don't forget to use some of…
Just leave early? Simple as that?
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#19You don't-- rest up and move slower, all good things take years regardless.
Check out https://algodaily.com/lessons/how-to-have-a-slow-and-boring-... for more on this.
Re: Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work?
#20Another idea to try is to reverse the problem : Wake up earlier, work for yourself first and go to work after.
Do nothing productive after work, reserve it for sport / family.
It does a bit of getting used to but it avoids the emotional exhaustion of the day