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The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

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Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#341

Post by grp000 »

pkghost wrote: post #304
__blockcipher__ wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And to expand on what I would like to hope your point is, comments like the GP are exactly why I and many others come here :)

And this is the great thing about threaded comments — everyone who wants to follow the pedantic branch of conversation can do so without derailing the others (though this ideal is frequently thwarted by bad UX). Of course, it's nice when the pedants are self-aware, as is the case here, and acknowledge the pedantry of their tangent. Normalize polite pedantry!

I don't think it's pedantic though. If what makes your argument powerful is tying it back to a natural phenomenon, then it should be right, otherwise you're using a bad example.

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#342

Post by actually_a_dog »

karatekidd32v wrote: post #303
actually_a_dog wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Based on my experience reading academic papers, I would suggest that you would often be better off skimming 3 papers in a week than reading one closely. I would often do this in grad school: * Go search for papers that broadly had to do with some structure or other mathematical gadget I was interested in at the time, * Read the abstracts of those papers to find the ones that looked most interesting, * Take the most i…

I mostly agree with this sentiment - with the added note that there is significant value in 'going deep' on a small subset of those papers. In my opinion, best bang for the buck there is to focus on the well known and impactful papers in that domain. I think there are big benefits to really digging into what makes a particular solution work, and how the authors really 'prove out' the full idea in the paper.

Right. That's why there are 3 steps to the process. The more interesting the paper is, the deeper you go with it.

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#343

Post by stank345 »

throwawayboise wrote: post #317
jimmaswell wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Losing weight, there's never been a day I felt perceptibly different from the day before, but looking back a year some things are certainly easier or more comfortable already after about 80lbs. Slow by most measures but that has its own benefits.

I started lifting weights two years ago. First time I've ever really succeeded in developing an exercise habit in 50+ years. Progress is slow. Every few weeks I can add maybe 5 lbs to a particular lift. Or maybe not. I have no specific goals. But the accumulated progress is remarkable to me. I have a better body now than I did in high school. It's still not "fun" but I do it every other day and rarely miss, and it do…

I also enjoy lifting weights and I recently started doing high-frequency, low/moderate intensity training throughout my workday. I'll just choose an exercise for that day and do it many times per day. It's always around 50-70% effort so pretty easy (eg. if I can do 10 pullups I'll only ever do a set of 5 max). That way I have perfect technique for each rep and set and I never get close to failure. I always feel refreshed and never beaten down and I don't have to set aside specific time to lift (I'm currently trying to just maintain while I do technique work). Yesterday I did it with front squats for 10x3 of very high quality reps. I plan to increase the reps/weight slightly once it gets super easy and repeat.

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#344

Post by Vinnl »

tryptophan wrote: post #285
d_burfoot wrote: post #276

I feel like HN should have a special flag called "survivorship bias" that we can use to tag posts like this. For every project like this one, there are 1000 others where someone spent 15 hrs/week for 5 years, built something really cool, but never got any funding or traction. Now, that time was probably better spent on a cool project than on playing video games or watching TV. But you shouldn't think that consistent…

>For every project like this one, there are 1000 others where someone spent 15 hrs/week for 5 years, built something really cool, but never got any funding or traction. You're probably right, but care to name some examples? I can't think of a single blog or article about failed companies or projects.I think they would be interesting to read and dissect. It seems that people who have that sort of persistence and choos…

Someone I follow on Mastodon just posted this interesting look back on hist first ten years as a software developers, with a couple of technically-failed (though still educational and fun) endeavours: https://noeldemartin.com/blog/10-years-as-a-software-develop...

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#345

Post by hammock »

telchar wrote: post #161
munificent wrote: post #40

I've written two books over the past decade as well as learning some other skills and hobbies and this is absolutely the most vital lesson I've learned. There is an incredible power in simply pouring a little time into something every day over a long period of time. It feels like a superpower when you see it start compounding. The Grand Canyon was created by little drops of water bouncing off rocks for millenia. Cons…

Not to take away from your point, but from what I have read, the Grand Canyon was most likely not formed by little drops of water, but instead by occasional torrents of water. There is ~70 feet of boulders and detritus at the bottom of the Colorado River. Only a flood powerful enough to get all that material moving at once will erode the bottom of the river bed and carve the canyon deeper. The slopes and walls probab…

The deeper the canyon gets, the larger its watershed and the more likely flash floods, etc. The answer is both, and it has changed over time. Trickle and torrents.

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#346

Post by denton-scratch »

kjerzyk wrote: post #84
spideymans wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. Knowledge usually works like this. When I first got into home cooking a few years ago, the learning process was painfully slow. It must've taken several attempts spread across a week just to learn how to make basic scrambled eggs the "proper" way. Now after a few years of experience, every ingredient I learn to work with seemingly unlocks a dozen more dishes that I can easily assemble. The rate of learning accel…

Would you mind sharing what you used to learn cooking? My main struggle is recipe books that teach you the recipe rather than cooking. But I'd love to learn HOW to cook, not WHAT to cook.

Delia Smith has done many series of cooking programmes; "How To Cook" addresses your question directly. It starts with the very most fundamental basics: how to boil an egg.

I'd be surprised if these programmes can't be found on e.g. Youtube.

I strongly suspect there is a book or two in print with the same title.

Delia's recipes work. She's not a purist; she does shortcuts (but always from-scratch - no tinned Cambell's Soup).

If "How To Cook" is too basic for you, her website is full of well-explained recipes for all kinds of standards.

[Aside: One of the things that pisses me off about online recipes is the fifteen paragraphs of gush that seems to be required if you want to be a paid food "influencer"; Delia doesn't do that.]

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#347

Post by mrits »

munificent wrote: post #40

I've written two books over the past decade as well as learning some other skills and hobbies and this is absolutely the most vital lesson I've learned. There is an incredible power in simply pouring a little time into something every day over a long period of time. It feels like a superpower when you see it start compounding. The Grand Canyon was created by little drops of water bouncing off rocks for millenia. Cons…

I can think of some counter examples. Golf is a big one. I have friends that play every weekend and never get better.

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#348

Post by georgewsinger »

sylens wrote: post #32

This is great advice and has made me think how I can squeeze out 30-60 minutes every day to do something similar. I think one area might be just making my setup more portable - instead of having a fully built out development environment that is on my desktop tethered to my desk, it may make sense to move to a laptop that I can move around the house, take with me on trips, etc. so as to not break the streak. Or even u…

Would a portable VR computer be useful here? https://simulavr.com/

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#349

Post by mattmanser »

denton-scratch wrote: post #346
kjerzyk wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you mind sharing what you used to learn cooking? My main struggle is recipe books that teach you the recipe rather than cooking. But I'd love to learn HOW to cook, not WHAT to cook.

Delia Smith has done many series of cooking programmes; "How To Cook" addresses your question directly. It starts with the very most fundamental basics: how to boil an egg. I'd be surprised if these programmes can't be found on e.g. Youtube. I strongly suspect there is a book or two in print with the same title. Delia's recipes work. She's not a purist; she does shortcuts (but always from-scratch - no tinned Cambell'…

There's a good chrome extension for that problem

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/recipe-filter/ahlc...

Re: The unreasonable effectiveness of just showing up everyday

#350

Post by pattrn »

d_burfoot wrote: post #276

I feel like HN should have a special flag called "survivorship bias" that we can use to tag posts like this. For every project like this one, there are 1000 others where someone spent 15 hrs/week for 5 years, built something really cool, but never got any funding or traction. Now, that time was probably better spent on a cool project than on playing video games or watching TV. But you shouldn't think that consistent…

How does survivorship bias relate to this post?

> Looking back, I cannot believe how much I’ve been able to ship over the past 6 years by just following this one rule.

This seems to be his only conclusion about the effect of working a little bit every day. And I don't think survivorship bias applies here. If you work a little bit on a product every day and don't ship a lot over six years, then you're probably in the minority.

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