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Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

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Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#11

Post by charlespwd »

I can't remember from whom I read/heard this from, I think it's from Rob Walling in "Start small, stay small", but what resonated with me was the following:

1. Put yourself on an information diet, and

2. Filter out any reading that you cannot turn into an actionable item.

For instance, I have pocket open right now. There's an article named "Cache is the new RAM". I just removed it. Why? Yes. It is interesting. But the information cannot be translated into something of value with respect to what I do.

Believe me, you won't miss out on the things you forgot existed.

Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#12

Post by AndyJPartridge »

I could have written that.

I'm in a (some would say privileged but it isn't) situation where money just falls into my bank with little effort by myself. (Shareholdings.)

I am at a total loss as to which of the many "hobbies" I have surrounding me that I should educate myself with each day. I'm learning about 100's of things from Lego lighting projects to basic electronics right now; I don't know where to dabble next.

The way out, I feel, is to sell many things, leave my phone at home, don't connect to WiFi after 8pm at home - and try and just Be.

Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#13

Post by smokel »

People may give you the advice to determine what is relevant to you, and then focus on that. Unfortunately, finding out what is important requires wisdom, and this will make you want to read books and papers again.

With respect to this paradoxical situation, I found reading the Tao Te Ching very interesting. It suggests that you should stop focussing on wisdom and simply accept that things will go one way or the other. This might give you some rest.

If taoism is a bridge too far, then you may want to get started in meditation or mindfulness.

Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#14

Post by ivanhoe »

I have the same problem, at some point you stop having time to read all that, you just collect the information for the sake of collecting it. It's actually a kind of hoarding disorder, and in my experience the similar measures can be applied:

- Learn to prioritize important vs useless info

- Impose yourself a limit on time/amount of data daily

- To support the above set some offline time to do something else, something useful and relaxing

- Organize your data and just delete all that you know you will never have time to read

- Learn to accept that you will never know everything, it's impossible, so it's not a big deal if you miss some info. No, really, no big deal at all. Relax :)

Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#16

Post by lolwutf »

My honest answer? I ended up dating someone who was constantly on my case about being forgetful, forgetting names, details, being scatter brained, blah blah blah.

Miraculously, that didn't drive them away and, now, just over a year of dating later, I've noticed I've developed new mental habits to train myself to remember details, in order to avoid the negative reinforcement of my S.O. nagging about my forgetfulness.

And, in practice, these days, I'm quite a bit more effective at identifying what details are relevant, reliably persisting them to memory if needed, and identifying/purging/ignoring irrelevant details, which actually end up getting in the way of storing the important ones (this, of itself, was a problem that, when solved, yielded lots of forward progress for this issue).

Sorry, I'm not sure if this is something you can very effectively optimize for (and maybe shouldn't!... 'seeking partner to help fight scatter brain'), but it's a true story, and one angle, at least. :)

Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#17

Post by w_t_payne »

I wouldn't hold myself up as an example to follow, but I tend to go in cycles ... spending some time obsessively skim-reading lots of technical writing (to the detriment of my wife and children) ... then bashing away at work and trying to calm my stress enough to be productive (also to the detriment of my wife and children) ... then spending some time in an exhausted stupor, then waking up and beginning the cycle again. It's not a very organised life, but I do manage to get some things done (although not as much as I should/could/might).

Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#18

Post by karmacondon »

I recently realized that I was taking in a large amount of information every day but retaining very little of it. Between HN and Reddit, I would "learn" dozens of things each day and end up not getting a lot of value out of it. While this is tangential to the problem that you're having, I can definitely empathize.

Two things that I'm trying out now:

1) Write down things that you learn each day and review them weekly. I find this helps me to filter out a lot of the extraneous information and focus in on things that could be useful in the future.

2) Monthly or bi-monthly focus on one specific skill or area of knowledge. Out of all the things I could read/watch/listen to, I try to concentrate on things that relate to one thing that can make me better. Bookmark or save interesting things that you come across, but limit your attention to just books or articles about one topic for the rest of December and January. The other stuff will still be there when you come back to it.

The tl;dr is to write out your goals and come up with a plan to achieve them. Focus on one and set aside time each day to make incremental progress. Everything else will take care of itself.

Re: Ask HN: How can I remedy scatter brain and information overload?

#19

Post by jib »

For me: Pick some system for dealing with stuff. I dont think it much matters which one you do as long as you have one and it isnt based on stuff actively being in your brain. Mine is inbox 0/4Ds whatever you want to call it, with me allowing myself to put tasks for me in there.

Most of those systems focus on aggressive prioritization and removing lists of tasks from your mind and moving them to paper.

Be aggressive about not storing stuff anywhere else. I used to have 10+ items that I semi-actively thought about - now I've reached a point where I have nothing at all loaded as "I must think about this/remember this/do this" - that stuff is all written down.

After that its just practice and repetition. Any time "I should do X" pops up, write it down in your system, or say "thats ok, I have it written down in the system" if you already have.

Doing this isnt all good - there are times that I miss having a long list spinning in the back of my head. It means you need to load the list actively if you're actually going to have discussions about what you are planning to do. Its weird in the start to go "Uh I have no idea, let me check" if you're asked what you're doing today/this week or asked if you have some great ideas about random topic X. But its overall a lot more effective to be focused on whatever you are actually doing rather than what you could be doing.

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