I enjoy reading about other people’s approaches to motivation and creativity.
But I very much dislike when they phase it as “you need to” or “this is how it works”. Thinking everyone else’s brain operates the way yours does seems to be a frequent bias among bloggers. And managers.
I encourage those who write about their experiences to keep it in the first person.
> I encourage those who write about their experiences to keep it in the first person.
My therapist gave me this exact criticism our first few sessions. On a more charitable read, writing is as much an exercise for the author as it is for the reader. That you might be the writer talking out loud to themselves, not to you in particular.
In any case, point taken. I will keep that in mind, even though I really would like my writing to have a more assertive tone. There are times one seeks to be told what to do, what to try, rather than having to suffer the tired cliché that "this advice might apply to you, it might not, only you know best."
Not only that. My brain operate differently at different times. I may find that an approach that works for me now doesn't work in a year. It doesn't mean the approach is "wrong" or that I was wrong choosing it a year ago. Maybe it was the right approach for that time, and now I have different needs.
I strongly agree, I find it a sign of a mature writer when they write in the first person about such topics. It's based on reflection that personal truths are subjective and it's better to be more accurate (that these are the individual's experiences and learnings), rather than prescriptive (that these are Universal truths and everyone should fall in line).
> What I quickly learned is that whatever I do in the first hour after waking up will set the tone for the entire day. If I read social media, my head will fill with nonsense I truly don't give a shit about, and will develop into a thirst for quick dopamine which escalates as the day rolls by. Any action, really, will set me in a particular direction and then it's too late to do anything about it. The only thing that has been working for me is to be completely intolerant of any distractions in the morning. Until noon, my phone is silenced. My email client is closed. Social media is blocked on all my devices.
I have transitioned from a late nighter to waking up in the 3-4am zone over the last few years.
That sweet interruption free early morning slot of ~5 hours when everyone's sleeping is probably the most productive I feel before the hustle bustle of life starts.
I have yet to master how to work better in short bursts of 1-2 hours when I have errands to run or calls to take later in the day. Would love to know if anyone has found techniques that work for them to make the most of such smaller time slots where it's harder to reach flow.
I went 30+ years telling myself I am a night owl, with delayed sleep phase, unable to wake up before 11, finding my groove only in the late night.
Then one day based off someone's comment I bought blackout blinds for my bedroom, the kind you can't even see your hands in front of your face. Overnight I became a morning person. I haven't been able to sleep past 7:30am in almost a decade. My mornings are sacred now.
Unfortunately, small time slots just don't work for me. It's all about making the time weird ideas pop into my head coincide with the time I can sit down and engage with them fully. This is why I believe it's crucial not to waste that precious time with distractions.
Good question, waking up in the dark is awful, so I bought myself a silent light alarm. Now I can wake up more or less at the same time no matter how late I go to bed, alarm or not.
I have moved to quiet notifications policy on everything and turned Slack to yet another email. It is much easier to work and concentrate on task. However some colleagues are unhappy to get response in 10 minutes ~ 1 hour.
I've done this as well but the flip side for me is that I find myself probably checking various apps (etc) for new content probably more often than I would if I just had notifications on.
So ultimately, I feel like I've replaced an intolerable amount of notifications with an intolerable amount of application switching.
I acknowledge it's a me problem, of course, but it's still a problem. We are way too peppered with bits of "info" from way too many sources.
Give yourself a window to check notifications and doomscroll. It's easier to tell yourself "I can wait another hour until my lunch break when distracting apps are allowed" rather than fighting the urge with no relief in sight.
Personally I have settled on keeping social media and notifications blocked until 2pm. Much easier than wishing and failing to be a productive machine for the entire day.
Taking a break is hard work. I noticed during my three week summer vacation that it took me a good week to unwind and slow down. Work stress is a slow killer (will bite you in your fifties and beyond) and taking that long to slow down is a good sign you have it in your life.
If you take the time to slow down, the restorative effects of a good break do kick in. You sleep better. And when the break is over you have a few days/weeks where you might have more energy for stuff.
But the core issue of addressing root causes for stress in your life would make that more of a permanent thing. There are many ways. Meditation is usually singled out as a silver bullet. But there are many other things including eating well, going to bed earlier, exercising, etc. And maybe reflecting a bit on how you deal with work challenges, communication, etc. A lot of stress can result from bad work habits on that front. Those are fixable. I know people that can't deal with deadlines. They worry about them and then when they get close they are unprepared and have to scramble to get shit done. Every time. That's a great example of unnecessary stress. The issue is not that there is no time but poor planning.
Some of that stuff can be organizational. Poorly performing teams cause a lot of pain on their team members. The classic example in software development is "crunch time" which is literally poor planning resulting in some crazy push to get shit done that drives everyone to the point of exhaustion. Some teams even glorify this as the only point in time they shine. Shielding yourself from that kind of stress is hard and might involve having to call out some BS around you or taking the lead yourself. But recognizing that stress is transferable and a bit of an organizational disease is important. There are a lot of dysfunctional workplaces around where this is endemic.
Not all stress is bad. I kind of like a bit of peer pressure and I run a startup. Which is not exactly free of stress. But there's a point where you have to worry if it's worth risking a burn out or other health issues. I'm 51 and I cannot afford to get side lined with a burnout. So managing my own health is mission critical for my company. And treating your own health as such is a good thing in general.
I find that roughly regular breaks, where you have a good sense of what the next couple might involve helps.
It isn’t the frequency so much as always knowing you have a specific break coming, so when things drag it doesn’t subconsciously feel endless. More a race or push to get what you can done before the break.
Which is much healthier self-generated time-limited “pressure”.
> I noticed during my three week summer vacation that it took me a good week to unwind and slow down.
It depends a lot on what you do on your holiday.
I think it's best to start with something "mind focussing": you're not going to think about your job while skydiving, scuba-diving etc.
But I very much dislike when they phase it as “you need to” or “this is how it works”. Thinking everyone else’s brain operates the way yours does seems to be a frequent bias among bloggers. And managers.
I encourage those who write about their experiences to keep it in the first person.
My therapist gave me this exact criticism our first few sessions. On a more charitable read, writing is as much an exercise for the author as it is for the reader. That you might be the writer talking out loud to themselves, not to you in particular.
In any case, point taken. I will keep that in mind, even though I really would like my writing to have a more assertive tone. There are times one seeks to be told what to do, what to try, rather than having to suffer the tired cliché that "this advice might apply to you, it might not, only you know best."
I actually find it annoying and actively skip those parts because they can take paragraphs of text or minutes of a video.
Very true.
That sweet interruption free early morning slot of ~5 hours when everyone's sleeping is probably the most productive I feel before the hustle bustle of life starts.
I have yet to master how to work better in short bursts of 1-2 hours when I have errands to run or calls to take later in the day. Would love to know if anyone has found techniques that work for them to make the most of such smaller time slots where it's harder to reach flow.
Then one day based off someone's comment I bought blackout blinds for my bedroom, the kind you can't even see your hands in front of your face. Overnight I became a morning person. I haven't been able to sleep past 7:30am in almost a decade. My mornings are sacred now.
Unfortunately, small time slots just don't work for me. It's all about making the time weird ideas pop into my head coincide with the time I can sit down and engage with them fully. This is why I believe it's crucial not to waste that precious time with distractions.
For me waking up when it's very dark feels much worse than getting to sleep with a bit of light.
So ultimately, I feel like I've replaced an intolerable amount of notifications with an intolerable amount of application switching.
I acknowledge it's a me problem, of course, but it's still a problem. We are way too peppered with bits of "info" from way too many sources.
Personally I have settled on keeping social media and notifications blocked until 2pm. Much easier than wishing and failing to be a productive machine for the entire day.
If you take the time to slow down, the restorative effects of a good break do kick in. You sleep better. And when the break is over you have a few days/weeks where you might have more energy for stuff.
But the core issue of addressing root causes for stress in your life would make that more of a permanent thing. There are many ways. Meditation is usually singled out as a silver bullet. But there are many other things including eating well, going to bed earlier, exercising, etc. And maybe reflecting a bit on how you deal with work challenges, communication, etc. A lot of stress can result from bad work habits on that front. Those are fixable. I know people that can't deal with deadlines. They worry about them and then when they get close they are unprepared and have to scramble to get shit done. Every time. That's a great example of unnecessary stress. The issue is not that there is no time but poor planning.
Some of that stuff can be organizational. Poorly performing teams cause a lot of pain on their team members. The classic example in software development is "crunch time" which is literally poor planning resulting in some crazy push to get shit done that drives everyone to the point of exhaustion. Some teams even glorify this as the only point in time they shine. Shielding yourself from that kind of stress is hard and might involve having to call out some BS around you or taking the lead yourself. But recognizing that stress is transferable and a bit of an organizational disease is important. There are a lot of dysfunctional workplaces around where this is endemic.
Not all stress is bad. I kind of like a bit of peer pressure and I run a startup. Which is not exactly free of stress. But there's a point where you have to worry if it's worth risking a burn out or other health issues. I'm 51 and I cannot afford to get side lined with a burnout. So managing my own health is mission critical for my company. And treating your own health as such is a good thing in general.
It isn’t the frequency so much as always knowing you have a specific break coming, so when things drag it doesn’t subconsciously feel endless. More a race or push to get what you can done before the break.
Which is much healthier self-generated time-limited “pressure”.
It depends a lot on what you do on your holiday. I think it's best to start with something "mind focussing": you're not going to think about your job while skydiving, scuba-diving etc.