I deal with chronic, severe fatigue due to 2 rare immune-mediated neurological diseases affecting my peripheral nervous system. This is what generally helped me manage my fatigue:
The ultimate resource for dealing with fatigue is the book called "Energityvene" ("Energy Thieves") [1] which is only printed in Norwegian. It covers pretty much every single fathomable situation in terms of people dealing with fatigue, such as disabled people and high-performing professionals. It covers all types of fatigue, whether it be physical or mental. Most importantly, it gives actionable solutions for all of the above categories for people in various situations.
Unfortunately, this is the only source that covers it from A to Z. The book helped me tremendously and was life changing. I found it by searching across the web, using key words, and found a bunch of useful Norwegian PDFs, such as these [2][3]. Since it was mostly all related to a book in Norwegian, I found a bookstore that sold an eBook version of "Energityvene". I converted the book to a .docx file using Calibre [4], and then I uploaded it to IBM Watson Language Translator [5], and had the .docx translated to English. I then read it and it changed my life.
Also, chronobiology [6] is a big deal and makes a huge difference, if you understand it and study it. Knowing your chronotype (circadian rhythm pattern) and calibrating your life around it makes a huge difference. Here are a bunch of useful PDFs about chronobiology [7]. Interestingly, I use light therapy (different sorts of therapeutic lighting) calibrated around the time of day, for my chronotype, to manage my energy levels consistently, so my circadian rhythm stays the same. So, I use a wake-up light (to wake up in the morning), a special light at my desk (mid-day), a sundown lamp (during dusk/evening), and night-time lighting (no bright lights). I monitor the light levels I am exposed to throughout the day (lux levels) so it is a precise and prescriptive amount of light. With respect to finding your chronotype, you may need an actigraph watch to determine your chronotype. The Geneactiv actigraph watch does this, and also measures your lighting levels [8]. It costs around $200.
You also need to practice resting, just as hard as you work. Figuring out how to do that is hard if you have a strong type A personality, but you can do it. Be creative.
Sleep is critical, and is unfortunately extremely underrated. I also record my sleep every night with an OpenBCI EEG recorder [9], using 16 channels. It is effectively a home sleep lab [10]. When I wake up in the morning I run scripts (mostly from GitHub) to see how well I slept, and also to see the sleep staging patterns. This also helps me see if I am going to get out of my circadian rhythm.
I think there's a lot to learn from starting from scratch, and it's something I hope to do too.
Gladly! I'll keep the list to what I've studied so far. Here goes:
- If you ever want to explore, say, Doom (Spacemacs is likely too bloated for someone who gravitates to a vanilla config), chemacs[1] is a nifty, simple profile switcher
- I think there's a lot of value in studying what they've done with their mnemonic keybinding systems (I love being able to narrow to an org-mode subtree and widen again with =, n= and =, N=, respectively, as but one of many examples)
- Sasha Chua is a good source, as she's very knowledgeable and put out a drawn 1-pager[2] on starting Emacs - it's geared towards standard Emacs keybindings
- Personally, I'm a huge fan of Evil-mode for Vim keybindings, as they're powerful and portable and I had basic familiarity with Vim before picking up Emacs
- I haven't found a rough edge in Evil-mode yet - it seems very refined
- Dired is worth getting a handle on early since any improvement in how you can navigate Emacs translates
- Magit is pure magic, and I now have my full ~/org under version control with what feels like near-0 overhead
- Seorenn makes mostly Spacemacs videos[3] and Zaiste Programming makes Doom videos[4], but I find them useful regardless of my config - you may just want to skip to the videos on packages that interest you
- If you haven't yet, choosing either Helm or Ivy is huge
- Personally, I'm happy with helm in Spacemacs and I was happy with ivy when I used Doom - heck, even my friend is happy with Ido
- It's fun to explore more efficient ways of jumping around - the Avy package is very popular for this (check out `avy-goto-char-timer` in particular)
- Also, I'll note that I've been able to find a clean 1- or 2-pager reference card for every major package I've searched for
But, truly, the jackpot for me has been org-mode. At first, I used it as just another knowledge repo, like a more efficient (yet local and text-centric) version of Evernote. But, now, I'm working through the book _Getting Things Done_ and believe that there is no better tool on the planet than Emacs and org-mode for implementing the core and majority of that system. Regardless, having a specific implementation goal has aided my learning dramatically.
Specific to org-mode:
- I started with the Org-mode Compact Guide[5], which I'd study and practice during 20-30 minute sessions every other day or so - it moves fast and I was happy with my org-mode skill after only having worked through Chapter 2
- However, perhaps the best way to start learning org-mode is Worg[6]
- Occasionally, I've found that the Compact Guide lacks an important command for my own workflow, so I'll usually go to the Org-mode Manual[7] itself
- When learning to configure Refiling, though, I found this[8] to be the best resource
- Finally, I'm a big fan of "org indent mode" - it keeps Git diffs clean when changing indentation yet displays my contents appropriately indented
This is a lot, and I'm sure your path will be different than mine, but I hope you find some nuggets in there. Best of luck!
The ultimate resource for dealing with fatigue is the book called "Energityvene" ("Energy Thieves") [1] which is only printed in Norwegian. It covers pretty much every single fathomable situation in terms of people dealing with fatigue, such as disabled people and high-performing professionals. It covers all types of fatigue, whether it be physical or mental. Most importantly, it gives actionable solutions for all of the above categories for people in various situations.
Unfortunately, this is the only source that covers it from A to Z. The book helped me tremendously and was life changing. I found it by searching across the web, using key words, and found a bunch of useful Norwegian PDFs, such as these [2][3]. Since it was mostly all related to a book in Norwegian, I found a bookstore that sold an eBook version of "Energityvene". I converted the book to a .docx file using Calibre [4], and then I uploaded it to IBM Watson Language Translator [5], and had the .docx translated to English. I then read it and it changed my life.
Also, chronobiology [6] is a big deal and makes a huge difference, if you understand it and study it. Knowing your chronotype (circadian rhythm pattern) and calibrating your life around it makes a huge difference. Here are a bunch of useful PDFs about chronobiology [7]. Interestingly, I use light therapy (different sorts of therapeutic lighting) calibrated around the time of day, for my chronotype, to manage my energy levels consistently, so my circadian rhythm stays the same. So, I use a wake-up light (to wake up in the morning), a special light at my desk (mid-day), a sundown lamp (during dusk/evening), and night-time lighting (no bright lights). I monitor the light levels I am exposed to throughout the day (lux levels) so it is a precise and prescriptive amount of light. With respect to finding your chronotype, you may need an actigraph watch to determine your chronotype. The Geneactiv actigraph watch does this, and also measures your lighting levels [8]. It costs around $200.
You also need to practice resting, just as hard as you work. Figuring out how to do that is hard if you have a strong type A personality, but you can do it. Be creative.
Sleep is critical, and is unfortunately extremely underrated. I also record my sleep every night with an OpenBCI EEG recorder [9], using 16 channels. It is effectively a home sleep lab [10]. When I wake up in the morning I run scripts (mostly from GitHub) to see how well I slept, and also to see the sleep staging patterns. This also helps me see if I am going to get out of my circadian rhythm.
[1] Energityvene: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34138256-energityvene
[2] DuckDuckGo Search-filetype:pdf "Energityvene": https://duckduckgo.com/?q=+filetype%3Apdf+%22Energityvene%22...
[3] DuckDuckGo Search-filetype:pdf "Energityvene" site:kognitiv.no: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=filetype%3Apdf+%22Energityvene%22+...
[4] Calibre (Software): https://calibre-ebook.com/
[5] IBM Watson Language Translation, Translating Documents Information: https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/language-translator?topic=languag...
[6] Chronobiology Information: http://www.chronobiology.ch/
[7] Peer-Reviewed Chronobiology Journal Articles: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=site%3Achronobiology.ch+filetype%3...
[8] GeneActiv Actigraph: https://www.activinsights.com/technology/geneactiv/
[9] OpenBCI Information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenBCI
[10] Home Sleep Lab Information: https://www.spisop.org/openbci/