Anki or space repetition, exercise every day, natural low-sulfer wines books: thinking fast and slow, black swan/antifragile, why we sleep, the organize mind
>natural low-sulfer wines
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Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
51–60 of 253 posts
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#52Awareness that periods of high performance are not 'free'. How to leverage that balance. Curiosity and aptitude for math. I've found this about 25 years too late for it to make much of a difference.
Can you elaborate more on the first sentence?
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#53I wish i had learned that going to the gym is the thing to do when your brain is full. My undergrad GPA would’ve been higher and i’d have gotten fit earlier in life.
I especially like the exact moment during the workout when you feel that "blood starts flowing in the head again" and you gain some sort of clarity. Especially if I've been working really hard that day.
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#54I dearly wish I had used something like Anki throughout college instead of many years later. And actually focusing on understanding and long term recall rather than passing tests. It would have been difficult though, since having multiple difficult classes simultaneously often requires cramming at the end followed by focusing on the next course. But if I went back to school now that's what I would have done.
I’ve used Anki to learn foreign languages and it has been amazing so I tried to use it in grad school but it backfired because all my courses expected understanding a few big deep ideas and not memorization of hundreds of small facts. I think it really depends on the domain, like medschool its commonly used but I’m not sure about other areas.
Do you have any examples? I'm genuinely curious. I'm using it for languages but also math etc. I've found that medium/big picture ideas come with some kind of "insight" that has to fit into short term memory, or consciousness, so it must be possible to construct some cue that reminds me of this insight. I've also learned over time that even though it feels like I could never forget an insight I just had, over time they fade as well unless I revisit them.
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#55I wish I had discovered interval training and olympic lifting earlier.
Crossfit?
That works, as long as you have a decent coach good with body mechanics. Kinda few and far between in my experience. But in general, lifting heavy things is healthy and I wish I had been doing it sooner. For cardio, intervals ftw.
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#56No amount of telling yourself you're happy will make you happy. You can't just "make yourself happy", it's a side effect of other things you do in your life.
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#57- Setting 3 daily goals every morning.
- Budget/money planning.
- The power of writing things done to make them happen.
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#58Learning How To Learn ( https://www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn ) and Barbara Oakley's book A Mind For Numbers . Completely changed my approach to studying and learning, and my academic efforts after taking it were tremendously better than before. Also related: highly recommend Anki. It feels like magic when the spaced repetition works!
If there's one thing in life you want to know before anything else, it's how to get better at things! :)
We have a whole field of science that deals with human behavior, wouldn't it be useful if we had that as a basic part of school?
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#59The absurdity of taking student loans for education
I second this (U.S.). I came from a middle class family but college came straight from my pocket. I sunk nearly $75,000 into college and struggled to get a comfortable paycheck for a long time. I'm now 32 and feel that I can make ends meet but it came at the cost of destroyed credit, inability to purchase a home/car, etc. Slowly things have recovered and I now own a home, married, kids.. but I had never felt more depressed than when I realized the true cost of college. Teenage me didn't quite understand what I was signing up for, adult me regrets the decisions I made. (I went to school for Graphic Arts, I shifted to Software Development in my late 20s).
Re: Ask HN: What things do you wish you discovered earlier?
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Paid to be diagnosed by a neuro-psych and neurologist (which my insurance didn't cover). Worked to find the right stimulants and antidepressants (fortunately I no longer take antidepressants) and most importantly focus on what I really valued in life which oddly made understanding how to learn more effectively much easier. I understand there are arguments against ADD / ADHD being "real" ailments, but I can personally…
> I can personally attest to being at least 50-70% more creative / productive as an engineer when I'm using stimulants in low-doses and eating right. I'm not saying that ADD/ADHD aren't a thing (as it happens, I'm pretty on the fence about that), but I just wanted to point out that pretty much everyone will be more productive/creative when using stimulants and eating right.
Sometimes I wonder if low-dose stimulants should be available without a diagnosis.
Most people don't know this, in the US, a doctor can only prescribe medication for therapeutic use. A doctor can't prescribe someone a low dose of stimulants because that person genuinely enjoys using them, but has no medical need.
Thus, I suspect that some doctors will just write down ADD as a diagnosis because someone wants legal access to amphetamines.