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How to Find Focus

thesephist.com

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Re: How to Find Focus

#31

Post by TurkishPoptart »

thesephist wrote: post #16
didsomeonesay wrote: post #14

OT, but I have to remark: this is an example of a pleasantly fast and writing-focused web page.

Thanks! I take care to keep the pages minimal and fast. Everything (from the HTML to the CSS) is hand-rolled by me. [Except analytics] there's only JS for the minimal email sign up that only loads on the main homepage, and it gracefully degrades without JavaScript. Everything else is static. It's a point of pride, glad you noticed :)

Do you have any notes or advice for someone who wants to build a similar blog? Every time I try I get bogged down in the details (Wordpress is painful and buggy...how to tag these articles and make a tag cloud... how to get people to sign up using some Mailchimp code....) and I can never get it off the ground.

Re: How to Find Focus

#32

Post by blindm »

Sometimes it's okay to feel directionless. What if you're simply not motivated or inspired? It annoys me when people complain about writers block. The block is there for a reason. It means you are uninspired and need to look at things from new perspectives, or think outside the box, however cliche that phrase sounds.

Re: How to Find Focus

#33

Post by MichaelZuo »

thesephist wrote: post #12

Hey HN, OP here. I wrote this sort-of on a whim after having lots of conversations with friends/coworkers about motivation and focus. One point where I felt I've grown this year both personally and professionally was that I'm more confident that the things I'm spending time to work on are the "right" ones for me, and I spent some time musing internally about how I got to that point, and how to explain that process. G…

I think your right on with the dynamic oscillation between convergence and divergence. All real oscillatory systems exhibit precisely that behaviour, especially pronounced during step changes.

Also, it gives new meanings to the term ‘on the same wavelength’.

Re: How to Find Focus

#34

Post by thesephist »

TurkishPoptart wrote: post #31
thesephist wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks! I take care to keep the pages minimal and fast. Everything (from the HTML to the CSS) is hand-rolled by me. [Except analytics] there's only JS for the minimal email sign up that only loads on the main homepage, and it gracefully degrades without JavaScript. Everything else is static. It's a point of pride, glad you noticed :)

Do you have any notes or advice for someone who wants to build a similar blog? Every time I try I get bogged down in the details (Wordpress is painful and buggy...how to tag these articles and make a tag cloud... how to get people to sign up using some Mailchimp code....) and I can never get it off the ground.

I definitely don't have the best or ideal setup, but I keep things pretty simple. My blog's "CMS" under the hood is a single flat directory of markdown files. Each post is a markdown file, and I use Hugo (gohugo.io) to build a static site out of it and statically host it. I don't really use tags or hierarchies, even though Hugo supports it.

My site isn't open source (b/c unfinished content) but in case it's helpful, it's based on this Hugo template project - https://github.com/thesephist/carlisle

Newsletter wise, I can't be super helpful because I roll my own infra through Mailgun, but I think in general the simpler the better, especially in the beginning. Substack seems popular these days.

Re: How to Find Focus

#35

Post by molsongolden »

Beyond individual focus, the divergence -> convergence cycle also works well for getting group alignment and buy-in during project planning.

> To earn confidence (and the focus that comes with it), we need to explore our options, try things out, open all the different doors in front of us, and then say, “this is the best option for me, so I’m going to do this.”

Build team member confidence and focus by brainstorming a full list of pain points and possible projects then discuss those ideas within the context of given goals and constraints.

> Paradoxically, this means attaining focus requires us to become less focused for a little bit, exploring our options enough to develop some conviction [...]

This is the hurdle because there are usually some teammates who want to dive straight in and start "working on things".

It takes practice and effort to drive the process and avoid getting stuck in the brainstorming phase but the resulting team buy-in, ownership, conviction, etc... are worth it. People feel heard, involved in decision-making, and they understand why they are working on a specific project.

Building this alignment and confidence at the start helps to avoid the situation the author describes:

> If your choice isn’t based on the confidence you have in that decision, your focus ends up pulled apart by the worry that you’ve missed out on the roads not taken.

Re: How to Find Focus

#36

Post by molsongolden »

molsongolden wrote: post #35

Beyond individual focus, the divergence -> convergence cycle also works well for getting group alignment and buy-in during project planning. > To earn confidence (and the focus that comes with it), we need to explore our options, try things out, open all the different doors in front of us, and then say, “this is the best option for me, so I’m going to do this.” Build team member confidence and focus by brainstorming…

A team that believes it is working on the right things > a team working on the right things > a team working on things.

Re: How to Find Focus

#37

Post by gaurangagg »

How does mind stop switches hopping between ideas - each one of them have their potential but chasing them simultaneously reaches you nowhere? Any insights/ thoughts would be appreciated.

Re: How to Find Focus

#38

Post by rl3 »

EGreg wrote: post #7

For me, finding focus is a function of how much of your needs are already taken care of. When you don’t have enough money to take care of all your needs for a long time, for example, you wind up doing things others ask you to do. And you have very little control over how much of your time and attention that will take up. You are forced to multitask and your mind is distracted. Not only that, but your switching costs…

>This is why a UBI can raise the national IQ level, reduce stress, improve public health AND make us more productive and make better choices.

>A person working overtime at McDonalds to make ends meet is not benefitting society as much as a person using some of that time on things not valued immediately by the market, such as spending time raising their kids, learning science, contributing to open source software or wikipedia etc.

I've come to believe that some types of work constitute an intellectual travesty on a societal scale, precisely for those reasons.

People need way more unstructured time than what they're currently getting.

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