It goes from chasing value to desperately trying to find value in the world, searching your memory for something worth anything.
Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
41–50 of 284 posts
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#42I really think we do a number on kids expecting a 100%, perfection, as a goal. And then only give them one chance to achieve it, but ask them to do it day after day for years. It creates some really unhealthy coping mechanism.
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#43The author might be struggling with people-pleasing and perfectionist tendencies. People-pleasers often do things because other people would like them more if they did these things. As such, the reward for work like writing a blog article is positive external reinforcement/approval or minimising the risk of confrontation, disapproval, or even aggression. If their work pleases few people (not enough readers), they may…
This post made me feel defensive. Which is a good time to stop and reflect.
Thanks for sharing the thoughtful advice
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#44I struggle with this myself, especially around writing. My solution, from a coding perspective:
If I had a massive new app to build, it would indeed feel overwhelming if I felt like I just had to sit down and build it. I think we get extra stuck on that with writing, as it often feels like we just need to go from an empty page to a well-reasoned and edited blog post, with a lot of ambiguous struggle in between.
With programming, I start breaking it down into pieces of functionality, and smaller ones, until I have a list of concrete things I can actually get my head around and write the code for. I keep on doing those small things, build the structure around them, and eventually I have my app.
I do the same with writing now. Not an outline really, but a list of concepts I want to get across, then smaller ideas. I write out a few of those, often a paragraph at a time. The structure starts to reveal itself, and soon enough I have a new blog post.
I think the key here is arriving at something small enough that it doesn't feel overwhelming. New app or blog post feels like way too much in the moment, and my body and mind to everything possible to avoid it (procrastination). Writing out a paragraph, coding a function - very doable.
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Anyone have any tips that worked for getting over this hurdle? Since nobody suggested this: Write for yourself, locally. This removed my writer's block. After writing for myself for about a year, I blogged consistently for two years. I've since lost the kadence and want to get back to it, but now priorities have come in the way. Now I usually write for my local tech community. I know there's a dozen people who like…
I write for myself a lot, roughly ~5000 words a day in notes, messages to self, etc. I have no problem writing and talking to myself. It's the editing process and formalizing it for public consumption. Either, the actual work of doing the cleanup feels too labor intensive, or I've already moved onto the next obsession, and am chasing that new idea. Do you have a process for turning the local writing into more public…
I think what blurs the line between local writing and public writing is that you just publish it after minimal editing with no fanfare. No RSS feeds for people to subscribe to. No posting on HN or Reddit where plenty of people are judgmental. Just make it public. If people chance upon it let them read it; just don't purposefully attract people to read it.
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#46I procrastinate about everything. But one stark exception to the theme of “not being good enough” was looking for a new job after layoffs in 2023. It wasn’t that I thought I wasn’t good enough. My experience and resume is pretty solid. I procrastinated because of how shitty the experience is dealing with companies on LinkedIn who get flooded with applications that either a real person might not read (due to software filters) or someone lacking a real understanding of tech won’t accurately asses my skills.
I ended up getting a great job that I was really happy to land. But I only applied sporadically because just the thought of having to endure the slog was mentally painful.
Fear of what others might think didn’t stop me from building effective automation at the command line. It prevented me from publishing my work on GitHub. It took being in the job market to push me past that as I wanted to let my work speak for itself for technical reviewers during the screening process.
On a different note, present-tense me is always harassing future me with ambitious plans set as reminders. The sense of failure from constantly pushing them off is demoralizing. Some of that came from depression (I’m in treatment now) and some was a byproduct of being a high-achieving alcoholic. The latter sapped my mental fortitude and turned me into a passive streaming consumer. Each time I quit drinking, projects abound as my mind clears up.
Apologies for trembling a bit. Procrastination is one of my greatest challenges, now that I’ve corrected so many other self-sabotaging behaviors. It’s one that I still haven’t really begun to figure out how to address. But hey, I’m doing pretty well otherwise, so there’s that.
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#47I procrastinate about everything. But one stark exception to the theme of “not being good enough” was looking for a new job after layoffs in 2023. It wasn’t that I thought I wasn’t good enough. My experience and resume is pretty solid. I procrastinated because of how shitty the experience is dealing with companies on LinkedIn who get flooded with applications that either a real person might not read (due to software…
Get up early on the first of the month and post on that month's "Who wants to be hired?" Hackernews thread. I got a job this way, and the experience sure beat StalkedIn.
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#48The author might be struggling with people-pleasing and perfectionist tendencies. People-pleasers often do things because other people would like them more if they did these things. As such, the reward for work like writing a blog article is positive external reinforcement/approval or minimising the risk of confrontation, disapproval, or even aggression. If their work pleases few people (not enough readers), they may…
This post made me feel defensive. Which is a good time to stop and reflect. Thanks for sharing the thoughtful advice
That's wise and quite emotionally mature. I'm only sharing some thoughts and not attacking anyone. So if it feels a bit like an attack, perhaps one of your core beliefs is being challenged. :)
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#49Worrying what others think resonates with me a lot. Every few weeks I try to motivate myself to write more online (HN, X, blogs) and consistently get “self sabotage” stuck. (Been going on for >2 years) The article just says they pushed through and “put it aside”, but that has never seemed to quite work for me. I can push through once or twice, not enough to build a daily habit/obsession like I want. Anyone have any t…
for me it's not fear of being good enough. it's that for me a blog post takes 4 to 20 hours. 4 if it's just text. Write, rewrite, proofread, etc. 20 if I need to draw diagrams or make examples.
if it's just a paragraph of thought then it might as well be on social media
Re: Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough
#50I really think we do a number on kids expecting a 100%, perfection, as a goal. And then only give them one chance to achieve it, but ask them to do it day after day for years. It creates some really unhealthy coping mechanism.
It really warped my perspective when I moved out of the USA to Europe as an adult and found out that's not how school works elsewhere in the world. Still coping with it lol.