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Exist

exist.io

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Re: Exist

#62
post #48

I know about my lifestyle. I'm there as it happens. I can't help but feel things like this just lead to a general sense of vexation over details of little consequence.

I'm with you - but I haven't found the alloy yet with which to form the knife that harms the "quantified self" "movement." Patience!

Fuck knives. Let's just leave planet Earth. It's done.

Re: Exist

#64

So, what is the deal with the quantified self obsession? Is it a young persons thing? Has it always been that way and I just missed out on it? Or is it a newer phenomenon that is catching on due to technology making it easier to capture data about ourselves? I'm really curious.

To each their own, but I think it's a fancy way of procrastination/avoidance/navel-gazing. The examples on the site include how many tweets you wrote (ok), tracks you listened to (erm... ok), checkins you had, and the max degrees Celsius for your location that day (what?). In general, you optimize what you measure, but eventually it becomes a parody of itself.

[deleted]

Re: Exist

#65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm I would hope it doesn't look that way. The screenshots are certainly not mockups—we actually have a tiny group of close friends using it already to help us test it out.

Sorry, it's just that these days I'm seeing a lot of places they do that kind of stuff (there was even a term for it - can't remember exactly what it was). Having cleared that, I gotta say, it does look awesome and I wish you best of luck :) !

I think the term you're looking for is "vapourware", but these guys appear to be the real deal.

Re: Exist

#66
post #56

Anyone wanna share some QS findings they've made that changed their life for the better?

I strictly measure how much weight I can lift in the gym. This helps me to know if my program is on the right track or not. If things are not progressing upwards I know I have to tweak something.

I not so strictly measure my food intake, but I know enough now to correlate certain diet choices with my effectiveness in the gym.

Things I don't measure but would like to are various hormone levels and other health markers that could probably be worked out with a blood test. I take a number of foods and supplements that are meant to maintain a decent hormone profile - high testosterone, low oestrogen, cortisol etc.. But because I don't measure these I have no idea really if I am doing it right or not.

Another thing I really should measure is my sleep. Although obvious that if I feel dog tired I won't be as effective, I really should measure how much of a sleep deficit I can tolerate so I can balance my work/project time with sleep time effectively.

Re: Exist

#67
Micro-analysing ones life in this manner is wrong and counter productive on so many levels.

Knowing how many tracks you listen to a day is interesting trivia only.

Knowing how long you sleep for each night could be useful, but only if you have a problem with sleep and know, scientifically, what you're looking for. If you're consistently missing out on sleep and feeling ill as a result, you shouldn't need exist.io to tell you this. And if you're not feeling unwell or having sleep problems, then you shouldn't need exist.io to tell you this either.

Knowing the number of steps you take is also irrelevant unless it's part of some very slow burn exercise regime you're on, in which case you'd presumably count them anyway. If you're doing normal exercise, steps and heart-rate may be of interest, but only during the exercise period.

In short, knowing all of this info about yourself is not helpful. When it lacks greater context and, unless you know how to interpret it, is just a source of confusion and anxiety. At best, it's novel trivia.

Re: Exist

#68
post #66
post #56

Anyone wanna share some QS findings they've made that changed their life for the better?

I strictly measure how much weight I can lift in the gym. This helps me to know if my program is on the right track or not. If things are not progressing upwards I know I have to tweak something. I not so strictly measure my food intake, but I know enough now to correlate certain diet choices with my effectiveness in the gym. Things I don't measure but would like to are various hormone levels and other health markers…

Measuring sleep - Lots of apps for that.

What foods and health supplements do you take to get that good hormone profile?

What foods have you found correlate to gym performance?

Re: Exist

#70

Micro-analysing ones life in this manner is wrong and counter productive on so many levels. Knowing how many tracks you listen to a day is interesting trivia only. Knowing how long you sleep for each night could be useful, but only if you have a problem with sleep and know, scientifically, what you're looking for. If you're consistently missing out on sleep and feeling ill as a result, you shouldn't need exist.io to…

A couple of years back I was working on a solution to track these kinds of things, and what you said is pretty much what I realized while at it. Tracking my sleep actually made me sleep worse because it placed more stress on sleeping. The less I think about it the better I sleep.

What I find more important is tracking what you did in terms of achieving the bigger goals you have. But tracking might not be important here if you have a good system that makes you do work on regular basis to achieve those goals.

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