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There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

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161–170 of 198 posts

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#161

Something people forget is that we have a finite learning capacity and learning just for the sake of learning can wreck your mental health. I can read hundreds of pages a day but if I do this on a sustained basis it overcharges my brain and I have problems with anxiety and can't sleep. A modest dose of video games helps me chill out since I am working with the same patterns over and over again and not needing to sort…

I have the same issue as OP, but where it concerns even learning the programming language. I've started I don't know how many times. I've made minimal progress. I'm disheartened.

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#162

Forget what most here are saying about Adult ADHD, ADD or whatever fancy schmancy TLA is this era's Mental Illness Du Jour. You, my friend, are suffering from Procrastination. You have the idea - but you're putting SO MANY barriers in front of implementing that idea. You're finding excuses NOT to just sit down and write code. You're procrastinating. I know this because I too am guilty of it - been guilty of it all th…

Procrastination banished:

* What EXACTLY would success look like?

* What needs to be done NOW?

Do the hard bits first! Then, the closer to the goal you get, the more ground you will cover faster.

If the best time to do something was five years ago, the second best time to do it, is often now.

ref: http://youtu.be/g9zWLDfysis

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#163
post #82

Forget what most here are saying about Adult ADHD, ADD or whatever fancy schmancy TLA is this era's Mental Illness Du Jour. You, my friend, are suffering from Procrastination. You have the idea - but you're putting SO MANY barriers in front of implementing that idea. You're finding excuses NOT to just sit down and write code. You're procrastinating. I know this because I too am guilty of it - been guilty of it all th…

Ctrl-f procrast > You, my friend, are suffering from Procrastination. 1000X this. I recognized this immediately because I see the same pattern in my own behavior. OP starts out doing a bunch of things that will need to be done eventually for the project to succeed, but that are essentially a waste of time and other resources at the initial stage. OP does this (I do too!) because those steps are familiar, easy, and ve…

Also try grabbing what you think you'll need then taking your laptop if you have one and go and work somewhere without internet. If your laptop has a 3g modem leave the sim at home, leave your smartphone at home. You don't need the internet all the time.

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#164

You sound exactly like me, except that your problems developed later in life. I have ADHD and have never had much success in managing it. I've spent years trying to figure out why that is and I've got a theory/solution that I'm working on. The theory: I've developed a cycle of habits involving research and I have few ways to disrupt that cycle. The cycle's usually entered through wondering if something exists (I have…

I have forked your project and I will contact you gladly.

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#165

Forget what most here are saying about Adult ADHD, ADD or whatever fancy schmancy TLA is this era's Mental Illness Du Jour. You, my friend, are suffering from Procrastination. You have the idea - but you're putting SO MANY barriers in front of implementing that idea. You're finding excuses NOT to just sit down and write code. You're procrastinating. I know this because I too am guilty of it - been guilty of it all th…

Scarygliders is totally right! Indeed, forget about that fancy shmancy ADD, or all that bullshit the big pharma wants you to believe in like diabetes, heart disease, thyroid-affecting diseases, schizophrenia and cancer! No such thing! Just try harder and stop procrastinating and if you can't just go and off yourself, you loser. Works for me!!!

Let's see now...

Passive-aggressive rant? Yup!

Knocking down your own Straw Men? Yup!

Added nothing to the conversation? Yup!

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#166

Sounds all to familiar. I discussed and still discuss this problem with my peers offline a lot, and thought about creating (haha, new project there) a platform where people with this exact problem can pair up and in a way play supervisor for someone else. The point is that my procrastination immediately stops if i make a commitment to someone else: if i promise a friend to deliver xy, I do. Social pressure seems to b…

I think his might be very helpful.

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#167

What do you all think of this: Https://getmadprops.com this is a project that I started, stopped, started, stopped, started and have committed to seeing it through. Just last night I stashed a bunch of changes I was working on because, you know, they were more important than getting customers. I have to force myself to just keep shipping and iterating. Once I'm in a rut and haven't shipped in awhile, I have to do it…

You built this? I have actually used this, which means you are doing something right, because normally I don't register, I go off and build my own version. So kudos!

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#168
post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last year I only had 2 projects on Elance. One has been running for 14 months now, the other for 7 months. The projects I do for local businesses are also LOB applications that run for 9 months using a full agile workflow, complete with scrum/ I wonder why everybody assumes I'm only doing small projects.

Thats interesting! I only know Elance and Odesk from having a short look, and got the impression that is not worth the time to compete in a race to the bottom for small projects. Good to know, that there are also good projects. I guess naming Elance as an income caused this "small project" trigger. I also assumed that you are not coding for 20 years, as I read now by your above postings.

I don't blame you :) It is the exact same assumption I made when I registered for an account. I just got lucky finding long-term projects.

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#169
post #129

It sounds like you are a right brain dominant person[1] with a Myers-Briggs personality of INTJ [2], same as me. Once I understood this about myself I was able to start bringing my life into balance. Part of it was by doing left-brained exercises that Dianne Craft teaches in her videos, also a large part was using essential oils to wake up my left brain which was pretty much in the deep freeze, and finally a few esse…

Are people still doing Myers-Briggs?[1] I had a job interview for a CTO job for a large multinational once, and when I got to the final 3 candidates round, had to take one of these. I had a very good idea what they were looking for, and aced it. The lady doing the testing told me I was a perfect match and would advise as such. I let her know these tests are easily fooled, something she seriously disagreed with. So I…

Yep. I once did the same to avoid having to avoid having to turn down a job I had been offered. These only work when the person is either dumb (basically acting as a crude intelligence test) or they have no idea what is required for the job which almost never occurs.

Re: There are too many shiny objects and it is killing me

#170
Interesting and funny. Good to see I'm not the only one in a similar situation.

You're not sick, you're just a human being in a very competitive world which changes very fast. You're bombarded by an unlimited amount of information, entertainment, advertisement, scary news and adrenaline.

No wonder we all have ADHD and OCD and whatnot.

Some tips:

You need to force a little discipline upon yourself, limit your addictions, eat healthy and excersise. Socialize.

Make an imperfect thing, just a prototype, no database, no beautiful graphics, messy code.

Show it to the world and see what the world thinks of it. If they get as excited as you are, then find some money and focus on doing it right: TDD the shit out of it.

It's the only way, just do it badly and see how it feels. It might not be as cool as you thought or it might actually be your Thing!

I'd write a longer comment, but I feel like I'm taking time away from my next insane project that's going to change the world - and I need to write some code. Good luck.

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