21–30 of 99 posts
However, adding a rewards/gamification system is not a bad idea at all. I like StayFocusd but I end up filling my time otherwise if I don't have a hard deadline. Having goals to reach is a great incentive, enough to keep me focused without a plugin. But the plugin provides a basic physical deterrent effect which sometimes alone can be enough
I want this but at the OS level (windows in my case) with white lists.
If you had contact info in your profile I'd send you this privately, but that's exactly what we've built with https://monotask.com . The pro version is free for another few days. Free version will be free forever. Not trying to threadjack, so if anybody has questions, etc., would love for you to e-mail me directly at charlie@monotask.com.
If you really like coding or writing, you shouldn't need to force yourself to do it.
I agree with you. I've been listening to Merlin Mann's podcast Back To Work and he talks a lot about things like this and things like "distraction-free writing environments". His philosophy (that I tend to agree with) is that if these tools work for you - great. But you might be solving the wrong problem. Procrastination might be your brain telling you something about the task you're putting off doing. http://www.43f…
The Wikipedia definition is "act of replacing high-priority actions with tasks of lower priority, or doing something from which one derives enjoyment, and thus putting off important tasks to a later time".
This clearly exists, and completely disavowing it with some (semi)feel good idea about how you aren't caring enough, implicitly linking it to low willpower is way too simplistic - and totally not insightful.
My own experience has been that even when I know that the task needs to get done, even when it is enjoyable, it can be hard to get started.
Once started, everything flows as you might expect, as the author says "How many things do I need to shed ... with extreme prejudice in order to singlemindedly focus on this one thing that I love?"
The post also neatly sidesteps the idea that even if you do not care, you may need to get things done.
The attitude probably appeals to some libertarian philosophy/Protestant work ethic, but even those people will freely admit that doing beats wanting to do something -- it's the doing that counts.
If people cannot get themselves to do something, even if they want and care to do it, telling people to care more isn't very helpful, especially when pooh-poohing the very things that work for some people to do what they want to do!
"If that sounds fancy and oversimplified, then you "care" about too many things. Period."
What if you really do not "care" about the things that you are doing while procrastinating? What if you are simply avoiding the anxiety of starting to do what you care about?
There are serious psychological questions here, and this blog post just ignores them all.
If not, then maybe you're working on the wrong thing.
Let's stop treating the effect of poor work habits and deal with the cause: find something better to work on.
[EDIT: I'd stay and reply to your great responses guys, but I'm not here anymore. As compelling as this discussion is, the real-time CRUD/robot interface I'm writing is way cooler.]
Prepare a hosts file as 127.0.0.1 news.ycombinator.com 127.0.0.1 reddit.com 127.0.0.1 twitter.com etc A shell script to rename the regular hosts file and this one at will. Add it in cron if you want it scheduled.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you had contact info in your profile I'd send you this privately, but that's exactly what we've built with https://monotask.com . The pro version is free for another few days. Free version will be free forever. Not trying to threadjack, so if anybody has questions, etc., would love for you to e-mail me directly at charlie@monotask.com.
I'm guessing 'Mac and PCs' means 'Mac and Windows', and you don't support Linux? You seem to send a windows exe to linux users.
If you really like coding or writing, you shouldn't need to force yourself to do it.
If you really like coding or writing, you shouldn't need to force yourself to do it.
Although I think you're baiting, I'll bite. I really enjoy eating, but if I'm caught up in something I don't always remember to do it. Sometimes I'll go hours past my regularly scheduled meal times. Then I'm sitting at my desk wondering (only for a short time) why my stomach hurts. Oh ya, food. While this is a extreme example, the logic still applies to coding/writing or anything else. Sometimes the tasks you should…
In the process of eating you have access to many choices. You have good food, you have junk food, and you have bad food.
Some people lack self control and discipline so they end up eating more junk food and bad food than good.
Same goes for the process of productivity. You have work, distractions, and hinderances.
If this is what you need to build up a habit of self control, then good for you. If not whatever.
But it also somewhat true. If I love music I would be playing my guitar every single day. Being a rockstar is sometimes both incidental and consequential.