You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed • Hacker News Board

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#81

Post by lelanthran » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 10:40 AM UTC

runjake wrote: post #63

lelanthran wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I listen to white noise, on headphones, when I want to think. Might be my imagination, but I think it's made a difference.

Same, but with brown noise[1] (not to be confused with the brown note[2]). I find it less harsh and it seems to drown out office talk much more. 1. https://open.spotify.com/artist/4H1DT9A2uoT7pTVRDSolnk 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_note

The white noise I listen to sounds exactly the same as the brown noise in that playlist.

What's the difference?

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#82

Post by coldtea » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 11:16 AM UTC

yowzadave wrote: post #73

coldtea wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps it shouldn't have been done or added to our plate in the first place?

Who are the people who deserve this task? This reminds me of the Tim Ferris mentality, in which he simply hires low-wage workers to do every task he thinks is unworthy of his attention. Obviously not everyone can have this luxury— at some point somebody still has to do the grunt work.

>Who are the people who deserve this task?

Where does "deserving" enter the picture? People do work for pay, not based on whatever they deserve to do such work or not (except in the sense that they have the skills to do it).

It's not like a housecleaner or a burger flipper "deserve" to be doing what they do. A paid task is not an award or a punishment, it's something people do in exchange for money, because they have the skills for it and not for other stuff, or because they like it, or because for whatever reasons they can't find other line of work.

Besides, "it shouldn't have been done or added to our plate in the first place" doesn't necessarily mean it must be done by someone else. Perhaps it's just busywork, or we can just not do it and make do without whatever it was supposed to give us. Or find a way to achieve our existing goals without it.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#83

Post by Yizahi » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 12:42 PM UTC

spieswl wrote: post #34

catchmeifyoucan wrote: post #17

I agree with the title, but I wish the solution was less about a second brain and more about giving ourselves space. The past week I've been getting burned in meetings, and just a whole lot of "to-do". And I'm just not as creative anymore because I don't have the room to be bored and ponder (which I like)

I think the content of the article is totally orthogonal to the problem the title supposedly addresses. I was immediately excited to read this but then found no relation to what the article talks about. Content curation? Really? We're not overwhelmed with content, we're overwhelmed with noise.

With noise AND with actual content too. I have 1850 bookmarks in my browser. And that's after I basically deleted previous 2000-3000 batch a few years ago, with the intention not to do it again. I have caught myself multiple times scrolling through the My List on Netflix for minuted unable to pick anything. Same with my Steam library. And other similar examples.

All of those items are presumably not noise, because I have consciously picked them to watch or read later. I'm just like a hamster in wheel, constantly seeing new good things and storing them in an infinite cycle, never to revisit.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#84

Post by unethical_ban » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 1:51 PM UTC

agys wrote: post #62

FigurativeVoid wrote: post #13

I think that we are being overwhelmed and it hurts us in more ways than our creativity. We are moving through the world in constant distraction. Until recently, when I was doing something around the house, no matter what, I was listening to music, podcasts, or books. I found that it seemed like it was taking for ever for me to do the simplest tasks. After a while... I figured that I must be going slower because I was…

I live in an old house without a dishwater. The 5-10 minutes spent doing the dishes are moments of deep thoughts, not dissimilar of the ones under the shower; maybe it’s the water…

I recently moved out of a house without a dishwasher. I'm less depressed now, because it's so much easier to keep my smaller apartment clean with an automatic dishwasher. I feel like I can cook without it being a four or five hour affair.

If it works for you, that's great, but I don't miss doing dishes manually.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#85

Post by andrewpolidori » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 2:19 PM UTC

hprotagonist wrote: post #70

makeitdouble wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The obvious other side of that coin: of the two things we're doing at once, one of them is neither fun nor engaging. Making it the thing to 100% focus on will also mean it it's now a stronger candidate to procrastination, and just won't be done at all.

learn to find something of worth even in the mundane. they’re there.

This is good advice, if doing dishes is boring, procrastination won't help it'll only make it worse. Taking pride in a dish well washed and a clean kitchen/living space makes the task worth it.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#86

Post by ntlk » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 2:19 PM UTC

johnrob wrote: post #31

Fair question: if the world is already overloaded with compelling content, do we still need to be creative? Maybe the core issue is not (directly, at least) the creativity loss, but rather the struggle against FOMO.

Are you assuming that the goal for being creative is to produce content? Because often being creative is just a nice way to spend time while being alive, regardless of whether it produces any output.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#87

Post by yamazakiwi » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 4:12 PM UTC

jstarfish wrote: post #74

BagelGuy wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Boredom + Freedom = Creativity.

Freedom is debatable. Too much of it and you just get overwhelmed with possibilities. I'd submit that it's boredom plus constraints that equal creativity. You're forced to think around your obstacles. It's why bands and authors suck once they make it big. Once they have tons of time and money, output suffers and they stop delivering. The threat of starvation no longer forces them to make something that works on their…

I think contextually art is one thing that can be made great utilizing creative restraints, but it's less likely a person will be willing to jump around obstacles if they are too great or not specifically related to the creative pursuit. Many times a creative pursuit doesn't seem like an option BECAUSE of the constraints.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#88

Post by antifa » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 4:45 PM UTC

jstarfish wrote: post #74

BagelGuy wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Boredom + Freedom = Creativity.

Freedom is debatable. Too much of it and you just get overwhelmed with possibilities. I'd submit that it's boredom plus constraints that equal creativity. You're forced to think around your obstacles. It's why bands and authors suck once they make it big. Once they have tons of time and money, output suffers and they stop delivering. The threat of starvation no longer forces them to make something that works on their…

If starvation and bordom and constraints were the key to quality then we’d all have been annihilated by the 3rd world in less than a week.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#89

Post by antifa » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 5:05 PM UTC

spieswl wrote: post #34

catchmeifyoucan wrote: post #17

I agree with the title, but I wish the solution was less about a second brain and more about giving ourselves space. The past week I've been getting burned in meetings, and just a whole lot of "to-do". And I'm just not as creative anymore because I don't have the room to be bored and ponder (which I like)

I think the content of the article is totally orthogonal to the problem the title supposedly addresses. I was immediately excited to read this but then found no relation to what the article talks about. Content curation? Really? We're not overwhelmed with content, we're overwhelmed with noise.

It feels like most content streams have anti-curration based designs. To use HN as an example, here's no way to say "I want to see rust and python content but not JS" or "I want to see JS and rust content but not python". You write your own custom chrome/firefox extension or you just deal with it. Basically all known social media websites have orders of magnitudes worse versions of this.

Re: You're not lacking creativity, you're overwhelmed

#90

Post by t0bia_s » Thu, Oct 19, 2023, 9:21 PM UTC

- "But the single most effective thing you can do to ensure the value of your feeds, is to start blocking the content you don’t align with."

Then you risk of closing yourself into bubble. I prefer to not use any kind of feeds manipulated by algorithms. No social networks at all. Instead use RSS.