Ok, I tried to read that, but it feels like they are about to sell me something. So much self-help writing sounds like this and it just doesn't resonate with me.
That said, I'm a born procrastinator with undiagnosed ADHD and I've managed to accomplish a few things, mostly after I turned 30. Here is all I would say helped me:
First, accepting who I am, that everybody has some mental struggles and this is mine.
Second, internalizing that mood follows motion. I can't sit around waiting to feel right before starting/doing something. You will never feel right. It's the doing of the thing that makes you feel right. Just start shit. That's the battle.
Finally, conserve momentum at all costs. When I'm really getting things done, keeping grinding, extend the streaks, fewer cold starts makes my life easier.
In my experience, even after starting, some things just remain difficult. No matter how long I manage to keep momentum, that inner voice keeps saying: "This is hard. This is boring. This is time consuming. This is boring. This is uninteresting. I want to do something else." It's like rolling a stone up a hill; there is just no momentum to gain.
Sometimes a perspective change can help, but that can be easier said than done.
When it's something like exercise, it's a bit easier to power through that inner voice. I can feel that and it might persist through the entire workout, but it's doable. I don't have to think about much, just have to perform physical tasks. It also does help "clear up" my brain in a sense, much like sitting in the shower does. This can create better results for other tasks that require more brainpower, though the effects don't really persist very long after I stop exercising, unfortunately.
Sometimes starting on tasks that require my brain to work with me can be enough momentum to push start it into whatever it is that I need to complete. But a lot of the time it is exactly as you describe; no matter how long I work at it it's extremely hard to get through or even impossible. If my brain doesn't want to retain information or process information to create something, it won't.
There are strategies and things that can help with this, but a lot of them require external resources and understanding. Having well defined tasks with good external accountability can be really helpful. Having strong incentives for completing tasks can help too. The problem is that finding people that can accommodate your needs here is pretty damn hard.
It's going to be different for everyone that has executive dysfunction, but I think essentially it comes down to people chasing dopamine. Their brain desperately wants it but doesn't produce it in amounts that a neurotypical person does, making certain tasks much harder to complete (or conversely, allows you to really focus on something that for one reason or another is providing you it.
So the strategies for making something that is difficult to complete needs to feed into your motivations.
If you find yourself procrastinating and being unable to complete a task until the deadline is very close, but somehow find the motivation to complete that task inside that short window of time, then accountability is a factor.
If you have a manager at work, for example, and they are willing to help accommodate you, frequent check ins for accountability could help. They should be nonjudgemental, but frequent enough to make the task feel urgent. They could also break a larger project into small tasks (like a kanban) and have micro-deadlines for specific tasks rather than a deadline for the entire project. For a student this might be asking the professor to have check-ins or breaking a larger project into smaller homework assignments due daily.
If you're by yourself or people supervising you are unwilling to accommodate you, then the biggest favor you can do for yourself is try to break down a task before you start doing it. A project like "clean your room" is very vague and perhaps daunting. But if you break that down into individual tasks, such as "remove all clothes off the floor," "put all cola cans in the recycle bin," "take cups to kitchen", etc. it can be more manageable. Doing this also creates a potential reward system which you may or may not respond to: checking off a to-do list. Some people find this very satisfying and watching things get crossed out or checked off or deleted might just provide the dopamine that your brain needs.
Rewards are also a very important aspect to finding ways to complete tasks you don't want to. A reward might be as simple as someone saying "I'm relying on you to get this thing done for me" or it could straight up be a tangible reward like money or food or whatever else gives you joy. If you can figure out ways to trick your brain into rewarding yourself, then all the better. Personally creating a reward like "you can play video games after finishing writing this bit of code" doesn't really work for me since I can very easily just go do that thing. Perhaps something like adding something to a shopping cart and saying you can submit the order when you've completed your task might work if you can afford it. Still, external reward functions work better in my experience, though even knowing someone else is relying on me to complete a task is a big motivator for my brain to get it done. Rewards also need to be frequent. Having a reward set up for the end of a project is not going to be useful for motivation throughout it. You need to have regular rewards built in for them to be really effective, I think.
Another strategy is to set a timer. This timer can be for whatever you want, but the thought process isn't just to do something for that long, but rather a challenge against the clock to see how much you can get done. If you're in the kitchen and you're microwaving some food for a few minutes, you could maybe use that as a timer to see how many dishes you can put away or wash. You can play a song and see how much of a function you can write in your code before the song ends.
Those are some of the ones off the top of my head, though there are probably more resources you can find online for dealing with ADHD or executive dysfunction that would help a lot.
I know it's a band-aid solution, but for me as someone with ADHD stimulants help a lot - but I don't say this to discount your recommendations which are effective. With stimulants, I'll usually find the right attitude or perspective to accomplish whatever task is at hand. If it's boring, I know I can find a way to automate or delegate its completion. If it's too exciting (too complex to be actionable), I'll redefine it to be actionable. If neither of these apply, I know it's something very novel and creative that stimulants will probably not help with its fruition.
Huh, yeah I can hugely relate to this. That ever-present sensation of dislike of what is happening, even while "getting something done". The feeling that it's basically the last thing I want to be doing, but there's also nothing else I want to do either :)
Id like to have clubs to share struggles just so others could take a look and parallelize the solution search. Very often I struggle because I don't see the simpler path.
For me, a part of it is the combination of "this is uninteresting and not fun" with "there's no guarantee this will pay off". If I know there is a definite reward at the end of a large block of work, I can stick at it. If it's entirely speculative, I find that far more challenging and that's when I procrastinate.
Examples are:
- building a side project that might never get a customer
- putting hours into a design that a client might hate for some unknown personal reason that didn't come up earlier
- responding to a tender
If 1. This is not fun, 2. There's no guarantee it will pay off, honestly you just shouldn't do it.
Some things need to get done, at least short term, sure. But if that's structural, some major chances should be done.
If a side project is neither a source of learning, nor fun, nor of opportunity (and thus "it doesn't pay off", in your words) - then just don't do it and find something else.
I'm a fierce believer in intrinsic motivation. Extrinsic motivations don't hold up. You're set to give up sooner or later.
A problem for me has been the inconsistent nature of intrinsic motivation. I start out in that "honeymoon" phase where it's fun and interesting, but after a few weeks or days (or even hours in some cases) it loses its intrigue and becomes boring work. So I either wind up forcing myself to continue or adding it to my pile of unfinished "to be continued" projects. (And knowing that this loss of intrinsic motivation may happen feeds the fear to even start new things.)
(This is to say nothing of the inherent problems with extrinsically motivated work, such as freelance work.)
I think that's really insightful. But I wonder how well it balances with us HN hordes trying to find the SaaS that will escape us from a grind. The low-hanging fruit is long gone, and not everything that starts fun stays fun. What I was trying to get at is there is no guaranteed (literal) pay off for even a good idea/strategy.
Take something like Basecamp as an example. I came up as a web developer at the same time as those guys. Could've built something like that, but didn't do it then and certainly not with the same conviction. If I had, and had early adoption, I would've stuck at it and carried through - the fun aspect wouldn't have been an issue if there was early success.
You can change that inner voice, either through meditation or quicker by one of these techniques https://www.amazon.com/Transforming-Negative-Self-Talk-Pract... . It's absolutely doable, just another skill, you can use your phone for reminders to work with some technique for one minute couple of times a day until it became habitual.
I am amazing at starting. I start so many projects. My way of procrastinating is to start something new rather than work on what I should be working on. I absolutely suck at sticking with something until it's done. I am not a "completer finisher". Suggesting someone like me should "Just start shit." is literally the worst advice. :)
„Just“ as in: I‘m still trying to figure this stuff out as a lifelong procrastinator but other ingredients than momentum conservation which was also huge for me were self-acceptance, self-forgiveness and especially „Tiny Habits“ (the book)
Establishing triggers in my life that put me back on track in autopilot mode were some of the largest game changers for me.
The biggest one being that I now have a 10 step go-to-bed routine that sets my next-morning-self up for a great mood and start into the day.
Plus, it‘s a gentle, daily reminder of caring and being gentle to myself.
Just to latch onto the undiagnosed ADHD bit: Having it diagnosed formally may help, getting medicated for it might help, but... it's not a panacea. My girlfriend (diagnosed mid-30's and on slow release medication) describes it as a mood stabilizer moreso than a magic cure. Doesn't fix procrastination.
I tried it once (trying the medication is part of the diagnosis), I found myself switching tasks with Intent and being really focused on one thing at a time, vs my usual mode of "multitasking".
> Second, internalizing that mood follows motion. I can't sit around waiting to feel right before starting/doing something. You will never feel right. It's the doing of the thing that makes you feel right. Just start shit. That's the battle.
My concern is generally that those self-help people practically never provide reasonable evidence for their claims, nor do they provide reasonably detailed accounts of how they evaluated their methodology.
In fact, the vast majority of self-help advice I've seen in my life so far was entirely based on anecdotal evidence, survivor bias, obviously inadequate generalizations ("if I can do it this way, you can do it this way, too"), and an incredible amount of aggressive immunization to critique ("if you're sceptical about anything I say, you already have the wrong mindset and will never achieve anything"). It's very off-putting to someone with a background in science.
I'm not sure I require proof as such. But I am more likely to give something a try if I think there is something that might help me. I know that nobody fits into the statistical mainstream for everything.
I got down the first one mostly. The second one is gradually improving.
But the third one is actually hard, because it is a double edged sword. My current strategy is to contain momentum so it doesn’t expand into obsession and deliberately give myself time to sleep over things.
Sleep is precious, it recovers but it also works your brain. You get perspective and connect dots.
I guess I‘m cautious because I was so bad at the first two, that I clinged on the third, which is exhausting and unhealthy.
Containing momentum is a common issue for me as well. When I start learning something, I tend to become obsessive, spend 30 hours over a weekend on it, and then burn out. Once my energy evens out I often need to work on continuing momentum, but deliberately limiting my energy spent at the beginning of a new project tends to get me further long-term.
What tricks and tips do you find help you with that? I've yet to find a silver bullet. I found forcing myself not to sit on a task for hours on end and physically moving when fatigue sets in (something incredibly difficult to notice when one is fatigued).
It helps to plan something at a certain time, even just going to dinner or on walk. Even if I'm totally engrossed in whatever new project I'm doing, I need to leave. I can keep thinking about it and stay excited, while not burning out on it.
I also try to find things I can work on a little bit every day for a longer period of time. If I want to learn a foreign language or the fancy programming framework of the month, I do much better if it's used every day for 15 minutes than all at once and then forgotten.
After years of struggle and failed attempts at fixing the problem, you evaluate evidence and notice it fits the "I have ADHD" hypothesis more than it fits the alternate explanations.
Happens more often with the Inattentive subtype of ADHD than with Hyperactive, because the former is much harder to spot, especially in adults, plus everyone around you is eager to offer you value judgements as diagnoses (suggesting you're lazy, undisciplined, don't have an actual problem), and/or prescribe you the common "go away" nonsolutions like better diet and exercise (I call them "go away" because it's just sending someone on a wild goose chase in order to have them stop bothering you).
ADHD is severely underdiagnosed in adults, and getting from undiagnosed to diagnosed stage is often just a matter of going to a psychiatrist - after first overcoming stigma, stereotype, and ADHD-induced problems. Easy peasy. Not.
I often feel like that a lot of people just decide they must have ADHD simply because they struggle with wotk they don't want to do and aren't interested in or procrastinate. That's perfectly normal human behavior though...
Yep. Similar to OCD, ADHD has just become a scapegoat for some people experiencing normal increased energy or trouble focusing. It's just sad because of the people that feel so confident they're experiencing something but never get actual treatment/help/diagnosis and then change their life around it. This post is a great example - "I read a book and decided I had ADHD and now let it dominate my life".
Sure, and much like any condition of the brain, can be lots of things and openly mischaracterized by people unqualified to make judgements on such things.
If you have ADHD, what's the value of getting it diagnosed? How much wasted time would be needed to get it diagnosed? And how much wasted time would be needed until a doctor hits on the right prescription for you?
For mild cases, very little time is wasted getting a diagnosis, low to moderate dosages of stimulants work brilliantly and with very few side-effects, and CBT bears its fruits within a few weeks.
You don't think it's kinda shitty to people that actually have a disorder, to just assume you have it because you read a book? You don't think it's possible that reading that book could be beneficial for those that don't have ADHD as well?
Well...without getting into any sort of "you don't actually know what you're struggling with", it's probably best to just say sorry you're struggling. Hopefully you seek actual help. Best of luck.
For how this thread started and progressed, I'm pleasantly surprised at how it ended. Instead of getting into flame wars, I wish people would take this route more often. "I don't think we'll be able to work this out in this medium. Nothing personal and no hard feelings. Have a nice day." Kudos to you both.
I try to provide some amount of reason, mostly just so if someone on the fence reads they can at least see some amount of argument against a bad idea, but the originator of the bad idea is only going to double down on their take.
But deciding to armchair-quarterback what somebody knows about their own mental health is frankly not a debate just an attack and a pretty silly one at that.
But you don't _know_. You're undiagnosed. You _think_. You read a book that resonated with you and decided you had ADHD without seeking a legitimate diagnosis. That's not _knowing_.
Continuing to spread the idea that any unqualified person can just decide they have a mental health disorder without seeking help from _legitimate professionals_ in that space is negligent. I'm attacking the negligent spread of harmful information about mental health, as _obviously_ people that are struggling with mental health conditions _should seek qualified help_.
I'm glad the book you read helped you find some amount of clarity or made you feel better. That's great!
> The fact that you don't realize you are being offensive is just so... chef's kiss.
I'm certain that you're offended by my statements, but only because of your aforementioned arrogance. Telling unqualified individuals to seek help from qualified individuals about matters regarding mental health isn't offensive. I'm sorry that I don't have the faith in random unqualified individuals that you do.
> Please continue your crusade against negligence elsewhere. You've added absolutely nothing here.
I ended our conversation previously and you chose to revive this discussion. You're welcome to see yourself out whenever you're ready.
I’m not offended, but you are being offensive. Your whole approach here is toxic. I’m here attached to my actual identity talking about real mental health issues, and you hide behind a pseudonym without a trace of identity and question another’s own experience based on nothing but your opinion.
Why needlessly call-out, contradict and argue? This, my comment here, was a share out, it took some courage to post it, none of it was about or impacted you. You took it upon yourself to be the critic. So to that I say, buzz off. You’re unwanted.
"My account is older than yours so you have to put up with whatever mindless nonsense I post"
No thanks. Enjoy your older account. I can't possibly care any less about your actual identity and any perceived significance you think sharing a username across websites gives you. It's also not my opinion that totally unqualified individuals cannot take the place of legitimate doctors.
Best of luck. I won't be continuing this thread. I really am glad that book helped you and really do hope that you someday seek legitimate treatment.
Tiny Habits by B.J. Fogg would likely help you further.
The key trick is to start really small to remove the hurdle of getting going and establishing the habit, and returning to small in moments of low motivation or other impediment (eg 1 pushup will keep the momentum. 0 pushups won't)
When I feel daunted by a repetitive editing task, or intimidated by something I don't know yet...
The repetitive tasks I choose a small number of steps, something I can accomplish in 5, maybe 10 minutes, and plan to stop and do something else for a bit. Read an article, stare out a window at nature, play a couple of minutes of a game. Then I do another set of changes until I start to lose focus and do a brain break. Rinse and repeat.
If I feel like I don't know where to start, I need to learn something, I listen to what the anxiety is screaming and pick out one question that will fill in the next level of knowledge, no matter how silly it sounds. ("Ok, you know <html>, and <head> and <body>... what's the next level in <body>?") Every time my knowledge hoovering starts to falter, I stop and pull out just one next question...
And equivalents for other circumstances, of course. Those are just my most common roadblocks.
Beautifully written. Thanks for your comment. It touches many of us around you.
It's a message for all of us; doesn't matter - the label, what matters - the actions.
It truly helps to hear that others think and have the same feelings.
> First, accepting who I am, that everybody has some mental struggles and this is mine.
Agreed, I think that acceptance is a great start. The next stage I think is accommodation. Organize your life in a way that compensates for the struggle.
did you ever get any mentorship? i’ve started to feel that i would really benefit from a mentor, probably someone with experience of executive function disorders etc.
For what it's worth. I am objectively a logical guy (many degrees in science, solid career in tech, rational)
But the latest game changer in my life including my ability to succeed, has been religious in nature.
It's hard to describe to someone who hasn't felt this but it went something like this - once you accept that everything that exists is the purposeful creation of G-d, including you exactly as you are and your circumstance exactly as it is, it changed my perspective.
Normally, my approach to situations has been one of anxiety - how do I steer this ship to good waters, how do I become someone who is capable of that, etc. I surely achieved a lot but also faces a lot of self doubt, procrastinated etc.
Now, it's "easier." I recognize that G-d has blessed me to know who I am and what I am like, as well as plenty of opportunities to hone those things. And the roles I am in require just that from me. So all o need to do is go where I know I need to be and be me in those situations. Don't worry about my ability to see how the thing works out, just know that I am where I am intentionally and I am meant to be there.
This has reduced my anxiety and procrastination a lot. And lest this sound hippy dippy, what I actually do for a living is steer large organizations, drive clarity, hold people empowered but accountable. I just do it now with more ease. Thank G-d.
The thing that worries me about the all powerful father figure who has a plan for you and that plan is objectively good (no matter what), is that it trivializes causation. There are plenty of people in my family that refuse to learn from life experiences or try new things because "the plan" is already set in stone, and it is good (by definition) so why change anything?
// There are plenty of people in my family that refuse to learn from life experiences or try new things because "the plan" is already set in stone
In my study of both Judaism and the yogic tradition, what you described is NOT the intention.
Free will (fundamental to religion) means our choices matter. I am equally "capable" of helping or hurting someone. I realize I can do either, but I know which one resonates with me deeply and which one is abhorrent.
All religion in its pure form is empowering people to grow and change for the better. Stagnation you are talking about is real, but those people are missing the point I fear.
That's objectively not true. The reason religion talks about virtue and sin so much is because it's understood that each person has the power to chose one or the other. That's the fundamental free will, all stems from it.
I don't think that's the (main) reason that religions focuses on virtue and sin, but that's kind of to one side.
Free will does suggest that all prophets are making educated guesses, rather than receiving divine insight into future events. In Christian mythology there's the classic Matthew 26:21 bit that atheists like to point out in any discussion about free will (or lack of).
I don't have any insight into the texts of the other two large organised religions, but I'm sure there's a some number of distant predictions in those that stretch the 'everyone has free will' claim.
I'm sorry to hear about the folks in your family who believe that way. In my experience and opinion, that's not the message that should be learned from belief in a higher power.
The best way to describe the difference is through a parable that's often told - the man who is stuck on his roof top during a flood. The man is stuck on top of his roof, praying to God that he should be saved from the rising water. A series of first responders arrive, by boat, by helicopter, etc; the man waves them all off, saying "God will save me".
After the man drowns, he meets God in anger, saying "why did you not save me?" God replies, "I sent a boat and a helicopter.. what more do you expect?"
The message I get from this parable is that your life experiences are far from pre-ordained, and that you are not hopelessly dependent on some other higher power for your welfare. Exactly the opposite! You must seize the opportunities you're given and grow to appreciate and nurture the natural abilities you have in order to live a fulfilling life.
I've always wondered what the response is to people who are in that situation, but no boats or helicopters show up, and they simply don't survive. How does that interact with god's plan?
Please don't take this as a "Gotcha" question, it's just something I've always wondered
I don’t consider that a gotcha question at all. There are so many examples of evil in the world so it is easy to question the role of God’s plan. I’m not the best person to ask as I don’t necessarily believe that there is some sort of master plan. I’m also not overly religious even though it may sound that way in this thread. I think that religion can give people a sense of meaning deeper than yourself- something that is sorely lacking in today’s society IMO.
As far as your question, I would recommend reading Viktor Frankl’s book A Mans Search for Meaning. It’s powerful as any book you’ll ever read and give you an insight to how at least one person persevered through the most horrific of circumstances.
Different religions bring different views on it. The puritans believed that their material work improving the land for elect humans, and the wealth that resulted, was a sign of divine grace. Other religions and sects of Christianity see wealth as abhorrent.
But we're not talking about causation here. Causation - or the scientific method - is just one small part of life. The source for motivation and creativity should be seen as a much grander scale than causation.
Isnt this just a way to bail out when facing too much complexity (and the universe is indeed too large for us to use logic at this scale) ?
I kinda feel like you beside the notion of God. I understand that living in anxiety (my previous way of living) is not optimal. That things are too chaotic, and often relying on paradoxically blind trust can yield better solutions. Paradoxical in the sense that trust also help you to see things calmer and clearer which is a requirement for reasoned thinking.
I guess this ties into the problem of living in chaos[0], which is how the world used to be, and probably how humans managed to go through with such high levels of uncertainty.
[0] pardon the link but trading also exemplify this.
// Isnt this just a way to bail out when facing too much complexity
I understand your point and if it was "just" that it would be valuable enough as you say.
The only thing I can say for my case, is I came to this point through religious study that was motivated by a search for truth. This calmness is an unexpected side effect, it was not the motivator.
Oh and btw my phrasing may sound a bit harsh and personal but I was asking about the general idea you mentioned, not attacking you. (Just in case it might felt that way on your side of the screen). I just failed to write it clearer.
What caused you to seek truth (even though I guess most of us have this reflex 24/7) ? Then chose to do so through religious study ?
Sorry for delayed response, it's so much easier to get sucked in arguing with the doubters than to answer someone curious like yourself.
To answer your question, part of it has always been there. Eg my parents raised me to always question and grow. Meaning, if I have a day where I just ate/played/slept with nothing to show for it, it didn't feel good. If I learned and understood something new then it's a good day. So I was kinda bootstrapped with that approach.
Then over my life (I turned 40 this year) I have been exposed to different things that I approached with open mindedness. When I got more exposure to at first yoga and then Judaism, I recognized on both of these things a tradition of people trying to push their levels of understanding, in the same way that I am compelled to. To a naive person religion comes across as dogmatic, just unquestioned answers, but I quickly recognized that religion is really about asking the biggest questions there are and then the smartest people of their generations have spent cumulative millennia contemplating the answers. So it slowly but surely resonated with me.
It's kind of like.. imagine someone never had watermelon until they were 30, but once they tasted it they loved it. The reality is that they must have always loved watermelon they just didn't know it. And luckily they were open minded enough to taste it which let them discover that they had this hunger within them to begin with.
I’m sorry you’re getting downvoted. I can certainly empathize that believing in something larger than yourself can help alleviate a lot of anxiety and provide purpose and meaning that is sorely lacking in our every day lives.
God bless and I hope your beliefs help provide inner peace.
I think you’re onto something that I’ve been practicing more and more as well… that there exists this calm, knowing but wordless, essence of mind.
I call it the Tao, Loch Kelly calls it Level 3 (of 5), and I think you call it G-d.
As someone who was raised with a light touch of Islam, defected the Atheism only to circle back to Zen and Taoism, I’m looking for the “link” between Abrahamic religions and (my Western interpretation) of Eastern practices.
I think there's a high chance that they are all linked. That perhaps the founders of each great religion were all "teachers at the same school", but that the teachings they brought to humanity were given according to humanity's state of evolution, similar to how students have to go through different grades. Each teacher would then teach only what that grade is ready to learn, though they have all the knowledge.
Very cool, as much as I love the wealth and richness of where I settled, I think the primary thing is the recognition of the fundamental principle of monotheism that there's only one supreme power/creator/etc and that all stems from that.
On the level down, as I study Judaism deeper and esoterically, I find concepts that are conceptually aligned to concepts I found deep in Yogic tradition.
I think the primary divine spark is a man waking up and going "there's more to this, I want to connect to it emotionally and intellectually" -- that's the starting point of religion. Whichever path you take to explore that will end up in a conceptually similar place I think (at least based on these experiences.) Good luck!
There's a strong link between the Eastern religious practices and the mystic aspects of Abrahamic religions; think gnosticism and hermeticism, or perhaps kabbalah and sufism (I haven't really studied these but they might be good avenues). Eastern Orthodox Christianity retains much of the mystic traditions, for example hesychasm is comparable to meditation.
I think anyone interested in religion (whether following one, debating them, or studying them) will find William James’s lecture The Will To Believe worthwhile. Here’s an excerpt from a synopsis[0], the full text is also freely available[1].
> James argues that we may be justified in adopting a belief even if we don't have enough prior evidence in support of it, and in some cases, 1) we may only have access to supporting evidence only after we have adopted the belief, or 2) our adoption of the belief may make the belief true. For James, religious beliefs are paradigm examples of such beliefs.
This essay is responsible for the term “leap of faith,” where one’s ability to follow through with something depends upon their belief that they are able to. This is applicable to part of the scientific process as well: following an insight is what gives rise to hypotheses.
Why do you need god to get to this state? Why can't you achieve the same by just recognizing nature/chance blessed you with who you are and what you can do?
The need to have an extension of consciousness is a weird phenomenon to recognize. I can't talk about religion in general because all religions are merely interpretations but the idea of a supernatural all-powerful being whom, for starters, we can delegate responsibilities and explanations to is very comforting. All roads go to our inability as humans to deal with death, the end, and the idea of nothingness. Life is easier when we believe.
I remember one time when this discussion was applied to the necessity of having a spouse or very close friend instead of the necessity of religion, and it provoked a heated response. I have to wonder if there are some people who can only live fulfilled lives during the times someone else is there for them.
Sure, then we wouldn't need the mythology around God as we have already have been trying to learn about nature and ourselves for a long time and can continue to do so without the magic bit.
I'm an atheist and I don't agree with you. I think mythology is indeed necessary, not only necessary it's proven to work since these narratives survived for thousands of years, across many countries and cultures.
So maybe it's something deeply rooted in humans, since one of our great sources of success as a species was the ability to pass on information through generations, allowing it to compound.
And it makes sense that it works, if all narratives were literal then they'd be quite boring, maybe less memorable.
Scientific literature has it's own way of conveying information, but serves a different purpose, without magic and mythology. I think very few people look at religious books as scientific material/source, maybe a very small, but loud, minority.
I have a similar idea I believe, that whether or not the concepts are true, their effects on human spirits or groups spirit is enough to use them and keep them going.
And it might not be by random chance that some narratives have similar structures, which probably some stem from, or were inspired, by other religions and cultures.
Others simply evolved in that direction, through thousands of iterations, so it seems like lot of religions might be quite "optimized" and boiled down to the essentials of human condition, so the type of narratives, frames and contexts influence our perspectives and help us thrive and propel us forward in life.
Sounds like believing in destiny and accepting that some things are out of your control. Helps to know yourself first and recognize when you can or can't make a change. Of course, one needs not to dwell on the past too much either. I don't think it takes religion to have this outlook.
The alias you created to make this post speaks to the pain and darkness that must be your life and I am sorry for whatever is going on.
On whether I am rational or not, I'll just say this: Einstein believed what I believe. Newton believed what I believe. That doesn't mean I am right but I am certainly in good company.
> On whether I am rational or not, I'll just say this: Einstein believed what I believe. Newton believed what I believe. That doesn't mean I am right but I am certainly in good company.
No, they did not [1] [2]. The two believed such diametrically opposed things that I can't believe anyone could claim to be in the company of both at the same time.
Please leave the condescension at the door. It does not reflect well on your beliefs.
I don't think that was his point. Just that neither one took such an overtly hostile position towards matters of faith, but instead recognized its role.
“For me the Jewish religion like all other religions is an incarnation of the most childish superstition… As far as my experience goes, they are in fact no better than other human groups, even if they are protected from the worst excesses by a lack of power. Otherwise I cannot perceive anything ‘chosen’ about them.”
Believing in god is not the same as believing in the will of god manifested as a religion or some rules you suppose to follow. Not that religion is all "fairy tails", tails are just one part and the rest are rules and philosophical aspects.
> what I actually do for a living is steer large organizations, drive clarity, hold people empowered but accountable
Cool, so now instead of having anxiety of how to make complicated and wide-reaching decisions, you've told yourself that a deity is guiding you so you don't have to second-guess yourself, and when shit hits the fan it wasn't your fault anyways because you were just trusting the deity.
All you've done is shift responsibility and burden off yourself, of _course_ that makes you feel better!
It's very troublesome that somebody steering large organizations, as you claim, has this irresponsible mindset.
Not at all. I still apply myself hardcore, even more so, because I can do it without the anxiety of uncertainty of the outcome. It's a strictly better way.
> because I can do it without the anxiety of uncertainty of the outcome
That's like saying you're fine driving at 90mph in the rain because Jesus is on your side. You're choosing to not feel the true weight of your responsibility because it's easier to just "have faith" that Jesus will take the wheel. That doesn't sound strictly better at all, that sounds irresponsible and immature.
You are intentionally misunderstanding but I will explain for others.
To correct your analogy: We have a destination in mind. We know it's down this dark and rainy road. I can't foresee every twist and turn on this road and I am able to be at peace with that.
This makes me a better driver because I am able to focus my heart and soul and energy on the road on front of me, without being distracted by what I don't and can't know.
I control the controllable and I know the knowable - and I do that no less well than when I was areligious. The difference is now I give no thought to the uncontrollable and unknowable - that's on G-ds hands. I focus on what's in mine.
I can't misunderstand what doesn't make any sense.
> We have a destination in mind. We know it's down this dark and rainy road. I can't foresee every twist and turn on this road and I am able to be at peace with that.
When people say "they're at peace" with things like this in the context of religion, it usually means they've replaced the importance of the here and now with valuing the beyond and the ephemeral. Things in the here and now just aren't that important because God or Jesus will take care of things. I would argue that being at peace when you're in danger, driving down a dark and rainy road, would make you a much worse hypothetical driver. To be a bit snarky, I for one wouldn't want my driver thinking in the back of his mind that if we all die in a crash, it's no big deal because it was God's plan anyways.
You're gonna say that that's not what you do, but that peace has to come from somewhere, and from what you've been saying it sure sounds an awful lot like the peace comes from absolving yourself of responsibility for things that you can't control, even if they are still your responsibility to handle.
I read this article and elaborated on the prompts while procrastinating from work and felt immediate relief which allowed me to finish up work for the day. What I’ve taken away from similar ideas is that if you treat yourself like an old friend and can break the cycle of mild to severe self hatred a lot of us procrastinators develop over the years, then it becomes easier to tackle harder tasks with more of a growth mindset which I think more productive or efficient people are able to do. In some ways it feels like the stakes are lowered and I can focus on the actual task instead of why the task won’t end.
There are many things that apparently "I should be doing" but actually those turn out be someone else's ideas that may sound great but.. they're just not for me.
So when I find myself procrastinating I quickly decide: I'm not going to do it at all. If deciding that gives me sense of relief then I take it was a sign I was right to drop it.
But if decding that feels wrong then I will contemplate on it, because maybe it was pointing towards something that I should be looking into more closely.
For example, our culture is really trying to sell the idea of "I should be going to gym" but no, I shouldn't. Instead it's probably a good idea to put my muscles into work somehow but then that doesn't have to be gym.
But I can tell that everytime I'm doing the thing that's good for me: I'm in flow and things are rolling forward very nicely. I don't need anyone telling me what I should or should not.
The approach this applies is to feed you leading questions, where the questions suppose that you're successful and ask you why this is.
The article dismisses protests of “but I'm not successful” by inviting you to write any old aspirational guff, and then points out that there's probably a nugget of truth in there somewhere.
I haven't come across this approach before, and I think it could be a neat trick to get out of a funk.
The thing is, I know what "infinite" intrinsic motivation and flow feel like; it simply disappeared at some point.
Maybe wrong environment, maybe unfortunate neural maturation, maybe I haven't found the right thing?
And all this talk about adult ADHD in the context of self-improvement feels like medicalizing normality to increase demand for stimulants. Stimulants stimulate, so of course they increase motivation (at the cost of cardiovascular and possibly other side effects). With the right (stimulating) amount of alcohol I actually get motivated too.
Not feeling motivated to do shit on your own aside from what's necessary to survive (i.e. not in the context of a greater purpose) or leisure seems pretty natural for most I know.
And what actually constitutes a pathological level of attention-deficit and hyperactivity: To me it's that loud kid running around during class with no amount of (non-abuse) punishment reigning it in; not not feeling like operating under pressure of higher demands due to increased competition or do or die mentality.
The best tool I currently have to battle procrastinating is acknowledging the nature of my personal beast - My procrastination is mostly not driven by laziness or ADHD, but actually anxiety driven.
When facing new tasks with unknowns, my fear of failure & social anxiety is what's holding me in place. (Which is pretty silly, since not doing the task is basically failure in itself, but I guess then you get to blame "laziness" and such)
Since I am a heavy procrastinator myself I just wanted to drop this here http://www.structuredprocrastination.com/ It's also been made into a short book (same author), titled "The Art of Procrastination".
There is no "one book fix all" and the self help book market is full of superficial crap, but this book has helped me reshape my thinking some. To see my own personal struggle with procrastination in a far more relaxed manner, and with that, even life itself to some degree. It has helped me a lot. Maybe the essay does not speak to you. For me it describes me perfectly, and I thrive in chaos (you should see my desk), but by embracing and admitting it, it actually can make me productive.
I think it's unlikely for people to change much beyond the age of 20 (in fundamental ways, I would even suggest _much_ earlier). If you are a sensitive introvert you just never will be a brace extrovert. If you are messy, and a procrastinator, forcing yourself into being orderly and structured, that won't solve anything and you will constantly fail.
In the end work with your weaknesses, give them a positive spin, and start being more relaxed. You are who you are, and there is always room for improvement. Huge, fundamental change just won't happen. And there is no need for it. You are who you are, and that's alright.
Accept that, and then work with it. And being more relaxed, less stressful, less apologetic for who you are, more honest about it, that makes it possible in the first place to improve yourself in meaningful and lasting ways. It won't be fundamental, but little things go a long way. The rest is acceptance and humility.
The premise of this article is strongly supported by literature. Reframing your situation and interrogating your assumptions is the basis of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Mindfulness, Stoicism. As a site that prompts you to do this, and helps you see the difference with juxtaposition, I think it is a good example of the practice.
But clearly your mileage may vary and others don't quite appreciate is like I do.
I second this. There are workbooks for Dialectical Behavior Therapy, which is a synthesis of CBT and Mindfulness. They emphasize the need to balance actual change with practicing acceptance of your situation.
This approach should resonate well for technical/methodically minded people.
My situation improved once i stopped chasing insights, blogposts and "mind-hacks" about procrastination, and focus on real, daily change. Not only reading therapy workbooks, but actually completing the exercises in them.
Since the central emotion behind procrastination seems to be anxiety for most people, i recommend getting a book, (e.g. [0]), and work on it for ~30 minutes, each day.
This alone can give a sense of accomplishment and progress, which importantly increases your Self-Efficacy.
[0] "The Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills Workbook for Anxiety: Breaking Free from Worry, Panic, PTSD, and Other Anxiety Symptoms" (New Harbinger Publications)
Does anyone else just feel a friction to committing to something because you like open options? Every choice I make for working on something is a possible opportunity cost to that better option. Doing nothing leaves me available for that better thing which might pop up. I'm the same way with relationships. Being single leaves me open for the better option.
Everybody feels this friction when committing to some decision, especially when they are life-changing decisions like moving to a new area, taking up a new job (or career), marrying somebody, having kids etc. It's natural.
Usually it's impossible to evaluate every circumstance and make a 100% rational and informed decision. And you are right that committing to something - walking down some path in life and staying responsible to your choice - closes other doors in life. This can lead to analysis paralysis, being stunned by the variety of options.
What you can gain by making up your mind and having a responsible commitment is that it can bring you to depths you have never seen or experienced before, which can lead to more happiness and self-development (spiritual development).
In many situations like choosing a life partner or a career path, you can only have a 'best guess', and the rest is actually made up by your own faith and hard work in deepening the relationship.
This seems like deeply wise advice in a forum which is mostly too rational. Thank you.
I feel like this is the sort of insight that I could use to understand why any of my friends or people I respect have been able to "settle" for a life which in the end is deeply fulfilling (vs my own approach which may always be seeking something more exciting but shallow.)
I feel like you're touching on a critical point by mentioning that by committing to something which may be not be the interesting life, you hit upon something which could be far more fulfilling. This is experiencing life on another level. This is something you aren't even aware of as you're hesitating to commit.
"and the rest is actually made up by your own faith and hard work in deepening the relationship"
And this is something I must have heard from everyone who has made a significant contribution to my cultural development (parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, community leaders.)
Maybe you should be the one to be teaching the course. Thank you! I would love to talk to you more if you read this comment.
I'm suffering from this as well to an extent. It's not a conscious rationalisation, it feels more like being unable to start something because there are too many things you'd like to start, and, in the end, you spend the week-end in front of the tv doing nothing, and hating yourself for having all these great projects you want to do but achieved nothing in the end because you couldn't choose something to start.
It's terrible for self-worth. It's a type of fear of commitment. A lack of realisation that someone done is worth more than something that is not.
It's as stupid as not being able to choose a dish from a large menu in a restaurant. You feel that committing to selecting a dish over another one might be something to regret.
The cure to this is to just start without thinking and commit to that experience. It usually turns out OK and we feel much better about ourselves afterwards.
Right, I have found that simply picking something and moving on is better than doing nothing. Even if it's the wrong thing, at least shipping that thing gets you valuable feedback which you wouldn't have had before.
I have also noticed that a greater sense of temporality has helped with making movement on projects. Working from home seems to diminish this relationship and as a result I don't feel the scarcity of time. I feel a much greater sense of this scarcity while working from an office and limiting myself to office hours. At home I feel like I have all the time I need. Working from an office, I feel the time flying by. I'm trying to figure out how to bring that office experience to my home environment.
I've been like that with everything for most of my life. One trick I use is to allow myself to begin something without committing, or deciding that my next actions are going to be exploratory, making them non-concrete and easier to start.
Giving yourself license to change your mind gets rid of a lot of anxiety behind starting. I do have to balance that with the need to actually finish stuff, but I'm better off getting started regardless. Better to be in it and involved than sitting on the sidelines. Like some of the other comments have mentioned, making any decision is better than no decision, even if you later find it was the wrong decision.
I had this feeling you describe. It waned, as i got older and more worried about achieving anything at all in life.
But the final push to change my attitude on this one came by reading a post on thelastpsychiatrist.com, with this great quote in it:
> But whatever happens, your future happiness is entirely related to your ability to impose your own limits on your freedom.
> The time has come to not be everything you want to be, but to be one thing you've wanted to be.
This resonates with me in a somewhat unexpected way - exposing a lack of self-confidence, or believing that any choice you make will automatically be worse. I have specific life circumstances that set that belief deep in my bones. I am working my way out of this lack of self-esteem, probably layered with some depression.
The most important value is in the depths of the thing once we have committed. This makes the commitment all that more important. Good or bad choice, the real value is uncovered with that further digging.
Maybe the question of what's the best thing to be doing is missing the point?
"You have to know what it feels like to be someone you're not" is a great point, making this a great question, but as a procrastinator... I really don't know. The article would be enhanced if it provided example answers from people for whom the prompt is accurate.
> Like a mental couch potato, you may have allowed your confidence and self beliefs to get ridiculously out of shape. It’s probably time that you change that.
Very deep, I know. If I had a less irritating way of writing that I would have.
A related series of articles I read about procrastination that verbalizes what exactly happens when you procrastinate and why https://waitbutwhy.com/2013/10/why-procrastinators-procrasti.... Found it quite relatable and somewhat empowering when realizing lot of people struggle through this. As someone who has been diagnosed with OCPD, persistent severe procrastination puts up huge roadblocks and gets difficult to manage.
Anyone here who believe they now belong to the dreaded "no room for growth" segment ? And why ?
In my case, I know it the hard way, because I drop from burnout for serveral months after starting and preferably completing such major projects. Since a few of them over the course of two decades, I feel I can't reach such an intense commitment state anymore. And haven't.
Travel and sleeping with beautiful women has boosted mine. I recommend both. Get busy lads. You live only once. Come to think of it, anytime I accomplish something on the edge of my abilities. Learn a new skill, or do something that challenges me. It feels like a boost.
I would say if you don't want to read the drivel, just answer the prompts. We're probably all guilty of trying to passively grow somehow, by reading or watching novel things, when the only way is to perform actions, right?
Plan the day, and plan objectives. Write it all down. It's not a silver bullet, but it works for me, it helps even more than Ritalin/Adderall. On the other hand, I have no advice for self-esteem issues. I guess I am more confident about my intelligence since I passed an officiel IQ test. It's not trendy to discuss IQ, but it was for me the most scientific way to address constant self-esteem struggles. I may be aloof and weird and stuff, but at least I guess I have something going for me, and which means I should be more assertive.
This sounds silly but it's such valuable advice (particularly wrt weights, which I find super fun, though running is my thing). Creating a somewhat disciplined approach to working out has been the only thing (except for SSRIs) that had a measurable impact on my clinical depression and ADHD.
Uggh I never thought that some version of "The Secret, but for tech bros who worship Tim Ferriss" would get so many upvotes.
"Fake it 'til you make it" is terrible advice, in any arena.
There is the case where you may undervalue your skills or misread a situation, and you actually have more efficacy in producing some outcome than you may think (e.g. applying for some job even though you feel woefully underqualified, then landing the job and having to work super hard to get up to speed, but you /do it/). In this case, you don't have to fake anything. You just have to do it.
But the common case where people advise this is terrible, i.e. to just "pretend" as though your internal thoughts were somehow that of someone whom you desire to be like.
A canonical example is telling some introverted guy to just "fake it til you make it" when it comes to dating. What ends up happening is these guys muster a ton of willpower to put themselves in extremely uncomfortable situations (e.g. going to something like salsa dancing or yoga with the intention of "meeting girls") and attempt to "be" like whatever they imagine a confident "Chad" to be. Inevitably this backfires because they have no idea what confidence is, and it usually leaves them off worse than before.
When it comes to procrastinating, you cannot attempt to change deeply ingrained feelings BEFORE you start on some epic task.
No, the only way that has ever worked for me and what I have seen work is to get started on the smallest possible thing, and be /consistent/.
For example, I want to learn more about how hash tables are constructed in C++, so I'm trying to write my own library to create code and write tests for my own edification. I can tell you that whenever I would see the initial task of "learn hash tables", my mind would just give up hope. The task is too dang big and abstract!
But the key to getting started and quitting that procrastination is to learn to /hope/ for something reasonable and doable, not /hope/ for something that would require a deus ex machina to just yeet yourself over to the other side from novice to expert.
Hoping for "becoming really dang good at hash tables" is vague and overwhelming, but I /can/ hope for "set up a hello-world application with reasonably best-practices CMake". Tomorrow, I can code up a simple interface that just proxies to =unordered_map=, then the day after I can write the internals myself, and so forth.
Hoping to "become a Chad" is a bad goal for our friend from the prior example. He can't /hope/ his way into becoming more confident "ladies' man", but he can sign up for an intro class on the weekend for a hobby he always wanted to learn (on the road to building a better more fulfilling life that will bring him into contact with great people, both men and women; "becoming a Chad" is a bad / naive goal of many boys who fail to grow up).
If anyone struggles with this, I highly recommend How We Change [0]. After spending a decade fighting anxiety and depression based on material from everything from Tim Ferriss to Jordan Peterson (neither of which were very helpful, but that's another comment...), this book finally helped me break free. It's not any overnight panacea, but I'm enjoying steady improvements in mental health that I wish I had had the knowledge to make long ago.
Yep, and the other 15% is not that different. The other day a person here showed a site he created where he aggregates all the "good" articles that dont get any traction here ( https://bengtan.com/interesting-things/) . The existence of that site combined with the multiple first-page appearance of articles like this one or even ones of lesser quality is a proof that we , the readership of this site, are not that as smart or as sophisticated as we would like it to be.
That said, I'm a born procrastinator with undiagnosed ADHD and I've managed to accomplish a few things, mostly after I turned 30. Here is all I would say helped me:
First, accepting who I am, that everybody has some mental struggles and this is mine.
Second, internalizing that mood follows motion. I can't sit around waiting to feel right before starting/doing something. You will never feel right. It's the doing of the thing that makes you feel right. Just start shit. That's the battle.
Finally, conserve momentum at all costs. When I'm really getting things done, keeping grinding, extend the streaks, fewer cold starts makes my life easier.