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Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

guzey.com

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Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#31

Post by tomlong »

toxik wrote: post #10

I would definitely recommend against having an hour’s commute to work. It is a really strong predictor for life dissatisfaction. Fifteen minutes is the number I heard to be a good balance.

I currently have an hours commute, which I find works quite well for me. It is a little bit unusual though - it is a train journey with no changes, I always get a seat, and I live about a 2 minute walk from the train station, and work about a 2 minute walk from the train station at the other side. The train journey is about 50 minutes.

It's a good period of time to slowly engage and disengage - I do the things that might affect my productivity in the day - read HN, catch up on personal (and sometimes work) email. I sometimes read a book, or message friends.

Everyone's different but this works nicely for me - when I get in from work I tend not to feel the draw of the screen, so my leisure time is less at risk from being sucked into for example reddit, and when I get to work, the period of the day that in the past I have previously lost a lot of productivity to - a 'few minutes' on catching up with the world, 'relevent' tech news etc I've already scratched that itch.

I think it just sort of works with my fairly ill-disciplined personality traits in a way that helps me be productive.

I think much longer though and I would feel I was losing too much of my day. (I'm typically out of the house 07:00-18:00).

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#32

Post by thomas »

pleasecalllater wrote: post #5
thomas wrote: post #2

Serious question: Is anything less productive than reading other people's productivity thoughts? It's a combination of procrastination and finding out what works for someone who is presumably more productive than you (ie: guilt).

One less productive thing I can think about is reading a comment about how unproductive reading thoughts about productivity is :)

For the commenter, but think about the time saving for the readers of the comment!

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#33

Post by guzey »

bobowzki wrote: post #7

Whenever I read one of these posts I'm always very curious about the age of the writer. I find my thoughts on this topic has changed a lot from mid twenties to mid thirties.

Hi! I'm the author of this post. I'm 22. I wrote most of this post when I was 20. I still agree with basically all of it. Also, I spent like 6 months writing it because most of the productivity advice is bs and wears off quickly and I wanted to make sure I only include things that stick.

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#34

Post by OedipusRex »

pleasecalllater wrote: post #5
thomas wrote: post #2

Serious question: Is anything less productive than reading other people's productivity thoughts? It's a combination of procrastination and finding out what works for someone who is presumably more productive than you (ie: guilt).

One less productive thing I can think about is reading a comment about how unproductive reading thoughts about productivity is :)

It's turtles all the way down.

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#35

Post by Scarblac »

timerol wrote: post #11

> If you aren’t working from home, your workplace should be at least a couple of minutes away (better: an hour away) The notion of a commute being beneficial is weird to me. If it takes more than 5 minutes to get to work, I end up spending the time engaged in something else, which leads to me being significantly distracted when I arrive. Thinking for an hour about what to do when you arrive seems like the opposite of…

I travel about an hour, but I can read or work in the train. It's not that bad.

I need the ~10 minutes it takes me to talk home from the train station to switch between work mode and be-nice-to-excited-kids mode.

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#36

Post by Scarblac »

guzey wrote: post #33
bobowzki wrote: post #7

Whenever I read one of these posts I'm always very curious about the age of the writer. I find my thoughts on this topic has changed a lot from mid twenties to mid thirties.

Hi! I'm the author of this post. I'm 22. I wrote most of this post when I was 20. I still agree with basically all of it. Also, I spent like 6 months writing it because most of the productivity advice is bs and wears off quickly and I wanted to make sure I only include things that stick.

That explains a lot. I'm 45, and while all of this is very recognizable, it's also very incompatible with my life.

But the reasons for procrastinating, those are spot on.

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#37

Post by freediver »

CPLX wrote: post #27
freediver wrote: post #12

The simplest productivity hack is finding passion. I never seen a windsurfer procrastinate. If you are truly enjoying your work and can't wait to do it, there is nothing going to stop you.

Find someone who has to windsurf for a living and you'll find one who procrastinates.

If you know one that procrastinates ask them if they still have passion for it?

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#38

Post by vadansky »

hackerbabz wrote: post #4
vadansky wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was procrastinating and read about the Pomedoro technique and it worked pretty well for me. Sometimes you need a trick I guess.

Pomodoro worked great for me until I just stopped wanting to do my job.

Same, but it's good as a stop gap until I clear up enough stuff to be comfortable to take at least 3 weeks off.

Re: Every productivity thought I've ever had, as concisely as possible

#40

Post by phito »

tomlong wrote: post #31
toxik wrote: post #10

I would definitely recommend against having an hour’s commute to work. It is a really strong predictor for life dissatisfaction. Fifteen minutes is the number I heard to be a good balance.

I currently have an hours commute, which I find works quite well for me. It is a little bit unusual though - it is a train journey with no changes, I always get a seat, and I live about a 2 minute walk from the train station, and work about a 2 minute walk from the train station at the other side. The train journey is about 50 minutes. It's a good period of time to slowly engage and disengage - I do the things that m…

I always look forward to my 50 minutes long commute. It's my podcast/audiobook time that I would never have otherwise.
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