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Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

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Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#41

Post by glasser »

mattraibert wrote: post #4

This article got me thinking about places in my life where there's friction. My computer stands out as a huge source of friction. I already try to close unnecessary windows/tabs, but after reading this, I realized that, because I use it for so many different habits, my desktop fails as a friction free starting point for work. So I've identified a few ways I use my computer and I'm setting up a user account for each o…

At the office, I do a physical variant of this: when I'm at my desk, I'm in work mode. If I want to spend time doing personal things at the office, I'll go to another area (eg a couch). If nothing else, it's easy for me to notice when I've been there for a while. And it keeps me efficient in either mode.

Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#43

Post by gknoy »

scott_s wrote: post #28
mattraibert wrote: post #4

This article got me thinking about places in my life where there's friction. My computer stands out as a huge source of friction. I already try to close unnecessary windows/tabs, but after reading this, I realized that, because I use it for so many different habits, my desktop fails as a friction free starting point for work. So I've identified a few ways I use my computer and I'm setting up a user account for each o…

A less radical approach is to use multiple screens/desktops, but all under one account. Under OSX, they're called "Spaces," and I can't remember what the Linux term is. I'm not sure if Windows has them.

I used VirtuaWin for about five years in Windows, it works excellently. Not as perfect as the ones in Linux, but close.

Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#44

Post by wpietri »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #24
tptacek wrote: post #14

A variant (I think) of this idea that I've been using for years: when I stop coding, I jot down what I was doing, whatever problems I was dealing with, and what I felt my next steps were going to be in a little Emacs buffer. It would probably be even smarter of me to take 20 seconds to figure out exactly the right set of Emacs tabs/frames to keep open alongside them, so when it was time to start up again, I'd get suc…

A related trick I find valuable is to do the exact opposite of what the article suggests. Never finish anything at the end of your workday. Leave yourself a small mess to clean up, or some simple and finite wrapup task that you can afford to postpone. Bonus points if it's going to be fun or interesting to work on. The idea being, it'll be much easier to get back into the groove the next day if you aren't confronted w…

Yes. My coding trick for this is to clean everything up, except that I write the next test that I want to pass. Then when I come in the next day, everything is shipshape (which, as the article explains, makes it easy to start). Except that one red test, which drags me right into the red-green-refactor loop.

Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#45

Post by wpietri »

Gorgias wrote: post #35
kiba wrote: post #3

Nice hypothesis, but where's the lab result? I highly encourage people to think skeptically and scientific as well using the self quantitative approach to self improvement, even when they're certain when their theory is right. For example, I am measuring blood pressure, steps count, weight, blood sugar level, awake and sleep time everyday. I also just recently concluded that walking 10K steps have almost no effect on…

I found your article interesting. A quantitative approach to health worked very well for me. I used loseit.com to track calories, macro-nutrients, and exercise. By sticking to calorie limits, eating less than 20 net grams of carbs a day, and running three times a week with Couch to 5K I have lost 90 pounds over the last 11 months. My BMI went from 38 to 24.8. I have tried to lose weight many times before, but a quant…

Holy shit. That is very impressive. What calorie limits did you pick?

Regarding eternal counting, two things that may help:

Yoga and meditation have both made me much more aware of the experience of my body. Before I would eat long past the level that I now recognize as "full". Often because I just didn't notice. (Reading while eating made that especially easy.) Now I find it much more easy to keep stable.

The other trick is one from Carol Lay's graphic memoir The Big Skinny. She weighs herself every day. If she's within her goal range, she just eats without worrying. If she's above the limit, she goes back to counting. (Her system is simpler; she just tracks raw calorie numbers, not full food lists.)

Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#46

Post by wpietri »

mattraibert wrote: post #4

This article got me thinking about places in my life where there's friction. My computer stands out as a huge source of friction. I already try to close unnecessary windows/tabs, but after reading this, I realized that, because I use it for so many different habits, my desktop fails as a friction free starting point for work. So I've identified a few ways I use my computer and I'm setting up a user account for each o…

I recently split to two separate machines. My old laptop is my fun computer (which includes HN.) My new laptop is for being productive.

Physical separation has been great. It makes it much easier for me to remember which context I'm in, and it makes context switches obvious.

Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#47

Post by ljf »

kiba wrote: post #9
lnanek2 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just counting steps isn't very effective. You need to walk for a good long while at a time to use up your glycogen (stored sugar energy) and make your body dip into fat reserves. So if you spread out getting your steps you are less likely to do that. Similarly, there are heart rate complications. If you don't walk fast enough or throw in some interval work to get your heart rate up, you aren't getting as much exercis…

I don't have the equipment to test your hypothesis, but I think I can test an easier one: running a mile a day in addition to doing 10K steps in a certain period of time around the neighborhood. Crude, but predictable.

Buy a heart rate monitor, they are dirt cheap, or just learn to accurately take your pulse. Then ensure you get your heart rate up to a set level for a set period. Walking burns next to nothing, it's good for your body for loads of other reason, and it's great for getting mobile, but will have a nominal affect on your body weight.

You don't mention if you are tracking food, which seems to be a major metric to miss out. I simply track approx carbs, which I find insanely easy.

Lastly other cheap metrics you could track are body fat (callipers cost next to nothing) which is easy to measure ESP with a friend helping, you can also track maximum widths. So what it the biggest part of you arm, leg, stomach, chest, neck, etc. just tracking weight is misleading as you could be dropping fat and gaining small amounts of muscle from your increased mobility.

Personally, I do slowcarbs (like low carbs but with pulses and beans) while weighing myself daily and taking body size and body fat measurements once a week. I've lost 15kg like this and dropped from 19 to 12% bodyfat. To get that drop I did no additional exercise, though now I cycle daily.

Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#48

Post by xiaoma »

larsberg wrote: post #10
kiba wrote: post #3

Nice hypothesis, but where's the lab result? I highly encourage people to think skeptically and scientific as well using the self quantitative approach to self improvement, even when they're certain when their theory is right. For example, I am measuring blood pressure, steps count, weight, blood sugar level, awake and sleep time everyday. I also just recently concluded that walking 10K steps have almost no effect on…

> walking 10K steps have almost no effect on my weight If you're going to change and track something to test its correlation to weight, please consider calorie intake instead. 10k steps is really not going to burn many calories (my marathon running friends use the "1 mile = 100 calories" rule of thumb). Additionally, many people starting cardio see an increase in appetite and if they are not already used to carefully…

I did.

I once dropped 50 lbs in about three months solely from returning to my previous running habit. At least according to my calculations, I was burning closer to 1000kcal/hour (more like 100kcal/km). I wasn't doing competitive-style twice a day training, either. Just one run, six days a week, usually for 60-90 mins at a BPM of All in all it averaged out to just over an hour of exercise per day, and the mental benefits more than made up that time in productivity. I didn't change my diet at all, except to eat a bit more after the long runs and possibly to eat a bit more cereal. And I lost just about every spare bit of fat on my body.

Re: Stop Procrastinating by “Clearing to Neutral”

#49

Post by nnq »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #24
tptacek wrote: post #14

A variant (I think) of this idea that I've been using for years: when I stop coding, I jot down what I was doing, whatever problems I was dealing with, and what I felt my next steps were going to be in a little Emacs buffer. It would probably be even smarter of me to take 20 seconds to figure out exactly the right set of Emacs tabs/frames to keep open alongside them, so when it was time to start up again, I'd get suc…

A related trick I find valuable is to do the exact opposite of what the article suggests. Never finish anything at the end of your workday. Leave yourself a small mess to clean up, or some simple and finite wrapup task that you can afford to postpone. Bonus points if it's going to be fun or interesting to work on. The idea being, it'll be much easier to get back into the groove the next day if you aren't confronted w…

YUCK! ...this is one of those things that works great for a group of people bu completely sucks for another group: for me having "a blank piece of paper" in front of me is the most motivating thing ever (I always have a zillion things in my head or on my lists that I want to work on, so the only problem is ordering them and trying to do as much as I can with my limited time, physical energy and for some tasks money). Sometimes I even literally take a blank piece of paper and stare at it while meditating because it's exactly what puts me in the mood to start working on things. and I literally LOVE an almost empty desk or a completely empty desktop with no programs open.

...but I know there are the opposite kind o people, like fellow programmers that love debugging but are just "stuck" if they have to start from scratch (I'm the opposite, I hate debugging and working on projects started by other people, but I'm incredibly productive at starting from a blank whiteboard or imagining things from nothing)

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