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Ask HN: I am delivering mediocre work and feel awful about it. Should I commit seppuku?

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Re: Ask HN: I am delivering mediocre work and feel awful about it. Should I commit seppuku?

#51
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That's a fantastic essay. Somehow I always thought that no-one else had this problem. Seriously. I hope I can finally give up my youthful arrogance. I always believed that when people spoke about getting experience they meant learning more about writing software (and how I scoffed at that). But it's just as much, if not more, about learning how not to turn around and run away.

I have this problem every so often; you're not alone. A few weeks ago I don't think I did any meaningful work for an entire week straight. I just screwed around each day, telling myself that the next day would be "super hardcore work day" and every following day would have to follow suit. I eventually snapped out of it, but it took that whole week of just recharging my batteries to get back into it. I even managed to…

So that's what you did that week. ;p

I think everyone goes through those phases, but honestly I haven't since I left my "real job". Whenever I find myself in a small rut, I just switch to another task or take a nap. There's always so much stuff to do at a startup - it's never ending work - that I always can find something else to work on in the intermediary. Being able to say that your website/blog/product literally gets better every day feels euphoric especially when talking to your investors, friends, family, cofounders.

Re: Ask HN: I am delivering mediocre work and feel awful about it. Should I commit seppuku?

#52
post #50
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds exactly like "intensity cycling". You work hard, progressively improving, til you stop getting gains. Then you take a week off where you do virtually no work, to recover. Then, you start again at 70% of your previous peak, and work up again. It's from weight training. I just heard of it a couple of days ago, but it's eerily similar. Also, plain common sense (but I needed to hear it). http://www.reddit.com/r/pr…

I've had to do that with regard to weight training before, I didn't think it was something that could be generally applied though! Thanks for the tips, kaens. I will certainly keep them in mind in the future.

I think that's what Wufoo does - vaca every 2 months. Granted I doubt they did it their first year out.
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