In academic or research work this can be tricky because sometimes you put something down and can’t come back to it for a week/month. At that point, this trick is more of a hindrance than anything…
A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
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Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#112If I need to stop in the middle of something, I’ll often write directly in the source code, at the point where I stopped, exactly what I was working on and what to do next. I don’t comment out these instructions to my future self so when I sit down next, the project won’t even compile.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#113I thought the consensus was that "flow" isn't actually all that great. If you're writing code while juggling multiple difficult concepts in your mind at once, your code will be difficult to follow. While in flow, you tend not to take the holistic, bird's eye view and so work harder, not smarter.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#114This is a variation of the Zeigarnik Effect for anyone interested in the why behind it.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#115I thought the consensus was that "flow" isn't actually all that great. If you're writing code while juggling multiple difficult concepts in your mind at once, your code will be difficult to follow. While in flow, you tend not to take the holistic, bird's eye view and so work harder, not smarter.
I haven’t considered this but it makes perfect sense. If time is critical or if you are understaffed, it becomes required, however. I’ve prided myself on my ability to get so much done in a solid 8 hour flow state in the past, when it was necessary, but now that I have a baby and work at a larger company, perhaps I can take some solace in the concept you shared.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#116This is what I do with writing most of the time. There is a tool[1] I've used on occasion that (in a certain mode) forces you to write non-stop without being able to look at what you've already written, for a certain amount of time. Whenever I need to knock out a rough draft for something and am feeling a bit stuck, I reach for this.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#117The way I do it is I try to stand up as soon as my pomodoro timer is done. I do finish the sentence / line of code or write a comment how to continue, and then I get up and take a break.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#118If I need to stop in the middle of something, I’ll often write directly in the source code, at the point where I stopped, exactly what I was working on and what to do next. I don’t comment out these instructions to my future self so when I sit down next, the project won’t even compile.
This is the way. The only way I can stop coding and stay comfortable when it’s getting late, especially if it’s something even mildly interesting, is to do a borderline incoherent mind dump and break the linter/formatter. Just all my thoughts, what I was working on, other places I may need to change code. I usually end up closing the laptop before I describe the why, but the act of writing it all down usually makes that come back before I’ve finished reading the first few words the next time I revisit it. I’ve found this remarkably effective to the point I often just do a mind dump the moment I feel tired at all, and end up in a better place than if I kept pushing.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
On the other hand it can be helpful, in my experience, to stop right in the middle of a very hard problem, where you are still searching for a good solution. Come the next morning I often know at least a possible solution, without having worked on it consciously.
It’s crazy the degree to which the subconscious mind chews on problems it’s been given. I never even dream about the problem in question but pretty consistently sleeping on friction points like that will clear them in short order the next morning. It’s almost kind of spooky, like there’s a second person in my head burning the midnight oil.
I wonder how much of it is also about getting out of a local maxima... you are pursuing a specific solution, and are exploring the end of a long chain of choices you made on how to approach it... and starting over again the next day clears out all those choices, letting you maybe discover a better solution that was on a different branch of the decision tree.
Re: A trick to reaching flow: Leave your work broken
#120I can follow OP's argument, but it doesn't work precisely that way for me. I like to start in the morning with a clean build. Then I can set off to make major changes, knowing that everything that goes wrong, what I just did had something to do with it. The work will inspire new ideas (which I jot down to not forget, but stay on track) and I work till I get back to a clean build again. I want the complex flow-state in my head to be related to what I'm working on in as short a time-span as possible. New ideas can wait for a new day.