[HN Gopher] How I regained concentration and focus
___________________________________________________________________
How I regained concentration and focus
Author : aiobe
Score : 451 points
Date : 2022-08-01 11:22 UTC (11 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.innoq.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.innoq.com)
| thenerdhead wrote:
| This is very surface level. These tips can help for periods of
| time, but they won't last forever.
|
| I think the things that do change your perspective forever though
| are philosophy and even other's philosophies on attention in
| general.
|
| Reading books like "Four arguments for the elimination of
| television" and "Amusing ourselves to death" changed how I view
| our attention.
|
| Reading older books like "tao te ching" or "meditations" gave me
| perspective into how much my attention matters.
| smm11 wrote:
| Duh.
| davidkuennen wrote:
| Hard for me since I'm addicted to my own app that I'd have to be
| productive for.
| adverbly wrote:
| It always seems odd to me when it is literally writers or other
| online content creators who are complaining about being
| distracted by other writers or online content creators.
|
| I'd love to see someone write a blog post about why they think
| their own content is good for others to consume while the content
| that they were willfully consuming was not.
| giantg2 wrote:
| My distraction is from all the family stuff I have to deal with.
| My lack of concentration is because I lack motivation - I don't
| see any reason to try hard at work since it's all politics and
| BS.
| BLKNSLVR wrote:
| Hi friend!
|
| My family stuff is what keeps me going though. My work is a
| basket case at the moment, 12-month contract ends in 4 weeks,
| and it's almost a full time job applying for jobs.
|
| I've had three managers in my not-quite 12 months, none that
| I've worked with very closely, one that thinks I'm no good
| because I unwittingly stepped on the toes of a couple of
| institutionalized colleagues by "doing my job", who complained
| to this guy who'd been my boss a total of less than a week at
| the time.
|
| "Just do what you're told" was his advice. So, what you're
| saying is coast until the contract is over? Done and done.
|
| Makes it hard to get a good recent reference though, lucky the
| market is thirsting for warm bodies.
| Tade0 wrote:
| > My family stuff is what keeps me going though. My work is a
| basket case at the moment, 12-month contract ends in 4 weeks,
| and it's almost a full time job applying for jobs.
|
| Unsolicited advice: if you can, wait for September to really
| start looking for employment. August is slow season in
| recruitment because people are still on vacation while
| September is the last month of the quarter, so recruiters
| have targets to reach for the projects scheduled to start in
| Q4.
| giantg2 wrote:
| Sounds all too familiar.
|
| I had 7 or 8 managers over the past 2.5 years. I picked up
| and completed several extra stories over the previous couple
| sprints only to recieve negative feedback that it wasn't what
| they wanted me to work on, even though I asked them if there
| was anything specific they wanted me to do next and had
| recieved no response. Oh, and my company will not allow
| managers to give employees recommendations/references at all.
| tenebrisalietum wrote:
| Work for money.
| woweoe wrote:
| Many cultures even in the West look down on that kind of
| attitude.
| giantg2 wrote:
| What money? There's no way to get a raise at my company
| without a promotion and they won't promote me. I have no
| motivation to work hard if it won't be rewarded. I do the
| minimum to get paid my shitty salary.
| TameAntelope wrote:
| Who said anything about your current company?
| giantg2 wrote:
| I don't have the skills to switch to a different company,
| tech jobs are limited in my area, I don't perform well
| remotely, and my wife won't consider relocating. My
| current shitty job is the best job I can get.
| TameAntelope wrote:
| Get the skills, limited doesn't mean none, get better at
| performing remotely, drop the wife...
|
| You are in complete control over your life, but you have
| to accept that responsibility. Stop blaming externalities
| and start owning your choices.
| giantg2 wrote:
| Everything is a tradeoff. Just because someone view the
| weight of the choices differently doesn't mean they are
| wrong. Check your ego.
| bumby wrote:
| It's okay to say tech jobs aren't the right fit as well.
| giantg2 wrote:
| They might not be. I'm hesitant to admit that because 1)
| They used to be and I was a high performer at a mediocre
| non-tech company 2) There's nothing else I can do to earn
| enough to support my family.
| bumby wrote:
| > _There 's nothing else I can do to earn enough to
| support my family._
|
| Honest question that I know won't be well-received on HN:
| I don't know your personal details, but do you think
| there is not anyone else in a lower paid job who has
| figured out a way to support their family?
|
| Frustration stems from when reality doesn't meet our
| expectations. You can choose to try and bend reality to
| your will or change your expectations. One is
| significantly easier than the other.
| frostwarrior wrote:
| > I don't have the skills to switch to a different
| company
|
| Go and learn. Skills are not set in stone.
|
| > I don't perform well remotely, and my wife won't
| consider relocating
|
| I understand that. I don't know you, but maybe a nicer
| setup with more (not too direct) sunlight can make it
| better?
| giantg2 wrote:
| "Go and learn. Skills are not set in stone."
|
| Sure, but learning takes time, which I have little of.
| It's also much easier for some than others (getting
| significantly more difficult as I age).
|
| The main remote issue is that my wife interrupts me to do
| stuff or answer questions throughout the day. I also feel
| I'm slower to learn remotely. I think that if I'm an
| expert in the tech already, then remote could work.
| frostwarrior wrote:
| I get it, but you already have a job. I assume you are be
| pretty busy, but at least you already have a secure
| source of money and you're not against the clock or
| anything like that.
|
| You don't need to spend all day in a class like a
| university student. An hour a day dedicated to lectures,
| practice and taking some notes with pencil and paper* can
| do wonders on the long term.
|
| As for your wife, maybe you can talk to her and ask her
| to leave you alone for some specific times, unless it's
| urgent. Or ask her to send you a message instead of
| talking so it doesn't interrupt your focus so much.
|
| * Some research on learning has proven that taking notes
| like that is way more effective than typing on a
| keyboard.
| giantg2 wrote:
| Thanks. I have tried talking to her, but the results
| weren't great. I do try to learn things outside of work.
| The main problem is if you don't use it, you lose it.
| Without constant practice it's hard to build and retain
| skills. I don't even have an hour a day free for that due
| to work and home responsibilities.
| frostwarrior wrote:
| You don't lose it completely, though. And it's easier to
| relearn and get back on track than to learn it the first
| time.
|
| I learned C like ten years ago and then I moved on to PHP
| and then to JavaScript. I'm sure I forgot most of it. But
| thanks to that, I'm now learning Golang and when it came
| to pointers it clicked almost instantly.
| giantg2 wrote:
| True, the concepts transfer. But for me the concepts are
| always easy. The implementation/syntax/libraries are
| harder for me. I know at least I can go back and use
| prior projects as a guide... if I ever return to that
| tech. That's probably a big one for me, that I feel like
| the work ends up being thrown away if i never use it
| again. Although things like Android development has
| changed significantly with things like apk to aab, Java
| in Eclipse to Kotlin in Studio (Jet Brains), etc.
| frostwarrior wrote:
| If your current job can't motivate you, work on a side
| project or look for another job.
|
| And don't be the weakest link in the (faulty) chain. It's
| leaves a better impression by notifying external
| inefficiency and quitting because lack of change, rather
| than being fired because your motivation and productiveness
| withered in silence.
| giantg2 wrote:
| Yeah, I have side projects. They aren't anything that I
| could make money on though. If I had a better option I
| would leave.
| frostwarrior wrote:
| Personally, I wish I could have more side projects to
| post them on my Github and use them as a developer
| portfolio.
|
| I have a few years of experience as a Web Dev, but sadly
| my GitHub is barren from code.
| giantg2 wrote:
| I have an Angular site, a Python project, and a couple of
| Android apps. I don't think it matters. The Android apps
| helped me get a job out of college. But I feel like now
| that I've been in the industry, nobody cares about dev
| portfolios. It's all about the current/prior job.
| VyseofArcadia wrote:
| My experience is that the more politics and BS and
| organization has, the more you can coast. Individual
| performance can get lost in the noise.
|
| Even in orgs that have their stuff together, I see a
| preference for internal transfer over termination. I think
| it's some sort of HR sunk cost fallacy.
| ge96 wrote:
| I'm kind of coasting myself (not being a leader/taking
| anything big on). What I like it about it is, I can leave
| work at work after work and focus on my own things that are
| more challenging.
|
| At the moment I burned money/got into a lot of debt trying
| to get a start up going. When that failed I just grabbed
| the first job/company that gave me an offer. I'm not that
| pumped about what I do but I can deal with it for now. Pay
| is still good for my level (low six figs) and it's 100%
| remote.
| giantg2 wrote:
| My experience is that the politics and BS lead to BS
| ratings that go against the written policies because there
| are contradictory backroom policies.
|
| In this market, we can't seem to hire anyone (we aren't
| competitive on salary). So I guess it makes sense that they
| want to keep the low performers since they wouldn't be able
| to backfill. This still sucks since there's a lot of stress
| dealing with poor ratings and not know if you will get
| fired. And then even if you do work hard and perform well,
| there'd no guarantee that will increase your rating or
| comp.
| bumby wrote:
| While I think it's healthy to not tie your identity and well-
| being to your job, I think it might be a bad habit to view
| everything through the lens of a financial transaction.
|
| We've all probably worked with people who will only lift a
| finger if it benefits them. Create an organization of people
| with this mindset and much of the necessary but un-glorious
| work never gets done. I suppose you could say people can play
| the long game and do that stuff in hopes of getting noticed,
| but if it doesn't and you have a transactional mindset, it's
| a recipe to be miserable. (We've probably all worked with
| those people too - the ones who feel slighted because they
| believe they've done all the hard work without getting
| rewarded).
| BLKNSLVR wrote:
| > I think it might be a bad habit to view everything
| through the lens of a financial transaction
|
| Unless you want to get promoted into management...
|
| Hire new people to do the inglourious work.
| bumby wrote:
| > _Hire new people to do the inglourious work._
|
| But I'm assuming this means hiring people without the
| same transactional mindset? Otherwise, there will just be
| endless employee churn as they realize there's nothing in
| it for them.
|
| It's hard for me to get on-board with a management
| approach that effectively says, "I don't want to do this
| stuff because I want to get paid but it's okay for you to
| do it because I don't care whether you get paid or not."
| Either you think the work is worth doing or you don't,
| but it's a weak leadership style to say it's only worth
| doing if someone else is doing it. (That's different that
| strategically assigning duties to get the most out of the
| team.)
| giantg2 wrote:
| "But I'm assuming this means hiring people without the
| same transactional mindset?"
|
| Our company tries to outsource the more boring/routine
| stuff to overseas contractors. The results vary.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "Create an organization of people with this mindset and
| much of the necessary but un-glorious work never gets
| done."
|
| I've done a lot of the work that nobody else wants to do.
| It wasn't any harder than the work others do. So it's not
| like I want to be rewarded more than them, but just not
| penalized for it. People who joined the company around the
| same time as me are managers and leads. I'm a midlevel.
| I've even filled the role of a lead for a year, but
| politics made it so my manager couldn't give me a high
| rating. After 10 years you'd think I'd at least be a senior
| and have a salary of $100k. I don't think I'm asking for
| the world here, and certainly many of the other 10 year
| employees are farther along because they're better than me.
| brokenkebab2 wrote:
| I don't think it's fair: it's absolutely possible to be
| motivated by the recognized fact that you provide for your
| family, and still have healthy friendly relations with
| colleagues, and be interested in a long-term success of
| your employer.
|
| It's also absolutely possible to create an ugly monster of
| organization while cheering up your team with whatever we-
| change-the-world mission.
| bumby wrote:
| I agree with you that it's possible. It's just been my
| experience that the people who take that mindset tend to
| slack off once they realize they can get the same
| paycheck to provide for their family while also doing
| less work. If your internal utility function is to
| maximize money and minimize effort, that's going to occur
| more often than not. To buffer that, management needs to
| hold them accountable, but that's easier said than done,
| especially in large organizations.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "It's just been my experience that the people who take
| that mindset tend to slack off once they realize they can
| get the same paycheck to provide for their family while
| also doing less work."
|
| I think it's mostly the people who realized the company
| has deceived them, either in the company values/mission
| or the "pay for performance" scheme being BS.
|
| There shouldn't be anything wrong with someone just doing
| their job for the salary. If their performance falls
| below what's expected (and clearly defined) for their
| level, then that's a problem. They shouldn't be penalized
| for not doing extra work when they aren't being rewarded.
|
| Employers need to have compensation models that make
| sense too. I was once told I could get a promotion if I
| consistently worked 1 hour longer everyday. That's a 13%
| increase in hours for a 7% pay raise, for a position with
| more responsibility and expectations. These managers are
| either idiots or predators - anyone with an MBA should
| understand that's a shitty value proposition. Either way,
| they lost my respect.
| bumby wrote:
| I think you hit on some very important points, but
| there's a couple issues. For one, not every singular duty
| can clearly defined. That's why many job descriptions
| will have a clause like "and other duties as assigned."
| Ultimately, we're hiring teammates in order to solve
| problems. I want to work with people who try to solve
| those problems irrespective if it adds to their personal
| identity or was meticulously defined in their job
| posting. If people are actively seeking out and solving
| problems, that's not the same as the transactional
| mindset I'm talking about. That mindset tends to actively
| avoid problems because they are work or "not their job".
| That's also not the same as framing the issue of "if you
| work X more, you'll get paid Y more".
|
| That time-transaction mindset leads to exactly what you
| alluded to. "If I spend 13% more time here, I should get
| 13% more pay." What that doesn't say is if those 13% more
| hours were spend solving previously unsolved issues for
| the organization.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "If people are actively seeking out and solving problems,
| that's not the same as the transactional mindset I'm
| talking about."
|
| At least at my company, there's no differentiation. I do
| look for problems to solve. I have volunteered for extra
| roles and responsibilities that others didn't want. So
| why do the the people that are too smart to take on the
| role of application security champion for the team get
| promoted, while those security champions are passed over?
|
| It seems you're describing that engagement is better than
| transactional mindset. That's true from the employer's
| perspective. That's only true from the employee's
| perspective if the employer is rewarding that.
|
| The promotion I was talking about was brought up because
| I was already performing at the next level and was
| engaged- filling the lead role for the team the prior
| year and volunteering for additional projects. So yeah,
| the problems and work that I did would have gone undone
| or the team's work would be uncoordinated.
|
| 'That time-transaction mindset leads to exactly what you
| alluded to. "If I spend 13% more time here, I should get
| 13% more pay."'
|
| To be real, that's the _company 's_ mindset that they
| should require you to work an extra 13% for a 7% raise, a
| rate decrease. The _defined_ expectations for that next
| level are demonstratably higher. Arguably those higher
| expectations should be matched with a higher _rate_ not a
| lower one. This concept is critical to understand
| bumby wrote:
| > _So why do the the people that are too smart to take on
| the role of application security champion for the team
| get promoted, while those security champions are passed
| over?_
|
| To put it bluntly, it's likely because the company
| doesn't value solving security as much as you may think
| they should. Solving problems is the same as solving
| valuable problems. If your goal is to be promotable, the
| problems you should solve should be as close as possible
| to the items your company values the most. Unfortunately,
| things like quality and security are not often valued
| until after things go wrong.
|
| > _The defined expectations for that next level are
| demonstratably higher._
|
| Maybe I'm misreading this, but it sure seems like you're
| saying the performance for the higher pay is above and
| beyond what you're currently doing. Now whether those
| expectations are above what you're willing to do for the
| pay is a personal decision.
|
| > _That 's only true from the employee's perspective if
| the employer is rewarding that._
|
| This is probably where we fundamentally disagree. I think
| employees also benefit from being engaged. I've worked
| with people on assembly lines who were engaged with work
| that most would find monotonous. Instead of finding the
| work some tedium to be put up with, they actually found
| ways of getting personal fulfillment out of it. Same goes
| for low-status jobs elsewhere I've worked. I think your
| sentiment here is really what underlies unhappiness with
| work and you'd eventually find the same regardless of how
| handsomely you'd get paid.
|
| Everything you've outlined at this point seems to
| indicate you work at a company that has a culture that is
| misaligned with what you're after. But you also aren't
| willing to take a risk of changing that. I doubt there
| are any silver bullets here that will make some magic
| happen without professional or personal risk.
| ilikehurdles wrote:
| > Install a swipe keyboard app
|
| iPhone keyboards have built-in swipe typing now.
| rwoerz wrote:
| Oh irony, a post about overcoming distraction gets 232+ comments.
| leobg wrote:
| Isn't it funny how much attention these anti-procrastination
| posts are getting on essentially a procrastination site?
|
| (Tongue in cheek! I love HN. I just know that I sometimes do
| abuse it as a procrastination device.)
| vosper wrote:
| Just in case people don't realise: HN has a built-in anti-
| procrastination feature. You can set it in your profile. I have
| mine setup so that I can spend 10 minutes on HN every 2 hours.
| mr90210 wrote:
| Where would you go if you wanted to target procrastinators?
| II2II wrote:
| When it comes to HN, I definitely have mixed feelings about the
| procrastination aspect. Yet I am unwilling to drop it since
| there are stories that I am genuinely interested in and make
| life better. So it is a net positive in my books.
| atmosx wrote:
| It's also funny how all these posts are so "western" in style:
| 'Hey look at me, I did something a bit difficult for 3 days,
| now I am a guru!'
|
| Not trying to knock the author but the time window is simply
| too small and this approach is simply too common online. Let's
| see if the author can actually change lifestyle for more than 5
| years and then we can discuss about "lessons learned".
| WaitWaitWha wrote:
| Many Asian, North African, and Middle Eastern countries
| struggle with similar problems. And, this is not even
| developed/developing nations. I see it in economically poor
| or non-industrialized countries too.
| marcinreal wrote:
| This is a bit harsh; the article does contain a lot of useful
| advice. I myself implemented many of these tips about two
| years ago, and am still going strong. I do fall off the wagon
| here and there and get sucked into my phone, especially when
| I'm avoiding something in real life, but I really value
| having minimal notifications. I also love focus modes (though
| I've only known about them for about a year I think) -- great
| for working, sleeping, and overall mental health. But I would
| stress this important point: if you have trouble implementing
| these steps, there may be a bigger issue in your life that
| you're avoiding.
| ninkendo wrote:
| What does that have to do with being "western"?
| Barrin92 wrote:
| the self-help and productivity genre does have a uniquely
| American bent (more so than Western I'd say), these blog
| posts always read like some form of digital Protestantism,
| they do love their busywork. Immediately jumping to
| thinking you're procrastinating, rather than say
| contemplating when you're not churning out one book per
| year is an attitude you won't find everywhere.
| leobg wrote:
| Well put. That focus on "productivity" also has something
| of what Nietzsche called the "slave mentality". That
| belief that you're worth only what you produce, like a
| cow. I actually subscribe to this reductionist belief
| myself in many ways - but it's an easy target to feel
| smug about when reflected back by somebody else out there
| preaching it as gospel.
| fleddr wrote:
| I think this doesn't do the intentions of the author much
| justice. He clearly explained how his addictions
| destroyed his ability to focus on any task at all, no
| matter how much value you place on that task.
|
| Reading a book or watching a TV series uninterrupted are
| hardly ambitious or productive tasks, yet entire
| generations now can't focus on such "lengthy" task.
| jpeter wrote:
| Hacker News doesn't count because i am "learning something",
| even though i can't recall a single thing I read today
| sockaddr wrote:
| Hah. Yeah it feels like the knowledge I gain here most often
| is just further training of my "intuition module" with little
| to nothing discrete being committed to memory.
| SV_BubbleTime wrote:
| My parents use the same argument about social media.
|
| "Facebook doesn't count because I only use it to keep track
| of what people I know are doing."
|
| That has to be right up there with the number of times I have
| heard "I don't use Facebook, I only use Instagram".
| mtgx wrote:
| eastbound wrote:
| "I just watch this TV show because I want to witness how
| stupid TV can get."
| [deleted]
| freediver wrote:
| I collection of links and quotes on stop reading "news"
|
| We are what we read: https://tinygem.org/about#stopnews
|
| Entire TinyGem service was created with the purpose of collecting
| content worth reading.
| mingusrude wrote:
| I recently switched Twitter to strictly timeline and that pretty
| much fixed Twitter for me. I still use it but it no more doom-
| scrolling.
| ph1p wrote:
| the "zero news diet" should really be done more often. For
| myself, it would be "zero Twitter diet".
| jansan wrote:
| I put Twitter on my router's domain blacklist. The only way for
| me to read Twitter is through nitter.net, which is not much fun
| and readonly, so there is no risk to get addicted.
| Kiro wrote:
| Zero HN diet would be the most effective.
| cocoflunchy wrote:
| I managed to completely stop using Twitter by removing all my
| follows. Then when I'd mindlessly open twitter I'd be presented
| with a blank screen. After a few days I just stopped opening
| it.
| throwaway4aday wrote:
| This is a very smart strategy. You effectively trained
| yourself that there was no reward to be had from the
| behaviour and so broke the habit. Someone should make a
| browser extension that does this for other sites, essentially
| allows the masthead and other boring trim to load but removes
| all of the content.
| ben_w wrote:
| The browser extension kinda already exists -- I've
| accidentally done that to a few sites with Adblock Plus.
| Zanneth wrote:
| Aaron Swartz wrote a blog post about the news[1] and just how
| terrible it is for the brain. Reading his post had a major impact
| on me--since then I have always thought differently about the
| time I spend online.
|
| It's interesting how people, including myself, try to justify
| various addictions. How am I supposed to stay informed about
| important topics without the news? How do I know how to help
| people in need without knowing what's going on? There are much,
| much better ways than reading CNN/NYTimes every day. Also, there
| really is nothing new about the human condition today compared to
| a hundred years ago.
|
| [1] http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/hatethenews
| tootie wrote:
| Man, I don't get it. News is bad for you so become deliberately
| ignorant? Don't get distracted by the world so you can work
| more? It's like saying traffic lights distract you from
| driving.
| edub wrote:
| I can't square it either. Lets say that you live in a world
| where rich people want to control the narrative by making
| entertaining news shows to distract the populace from what is
| important, but needed a way to trick the people that sought
| to dig deeper from more authoritative sources that are less
| TV-entertainy... then I think it would make sense to tell the
| people that are digging deeper that it is bad for them and
| they should stop paying attention to the news for their own
| mental health and productivity.
|
| I recognized that I was over consuming the news during the
| Trump presidency and needed a reset, and decided to not spend
| any more time reading the news than the short summaries that
| Axios posts and ignore all other forms (including John
| Oliver, although I do still watch Closer Look).
|
| It appears that my actions and aspirations don't seem to be
| making the world a better place, but it is too depressing a
| thought to think that the best thing for me to do is be
| ignorant to the bad things in the world.
|
| I plan on trying out subscribing to Delayed Gratification to
| see if that is a better path. https://www.slow-
| journalism.com/
| fleddr wrote:
| There's a lot of wiggle room between sane consumption and
| addiction. And addiction is becoming the norm. I'd add that
| even if you were to consume no news at all, you'd still get
| the summary of it one way or another.
|
| I'll now continue with my hot take: being informed, even
| being an expert, on anything outside your field of work is
| overrated, if not useless.
|
| Say you've been following the recent war in great depth. Or
| the pandemic. Or US politics. You've invested hundreds of
| hours reading about it and have developed an understanding
| far above average.
|
| Now what? What are you going to do with it? Debate online, a
| lost cause? What is the tangible benefit of understanding
| without purpose?
| JacobThreeThree wrote:
| Agreed. People just want their worldview spoon-fed to them.
| Once they realize that it's not healthy, it's too daunting to
| actually put in the effort needed to construct their own
| worldview and apply it to their life, thus the head-in-sand
| ignorance approach.
|
| I'm surprised Aaron Swartz, of all people, had this view.
| dageshi wrote:
| No, they just realise it's not productive anymore. It's a
| time sink that pushes misery and drama into your life
| without any practical way to do anything about it.
|
| I don't think the human mind is designed to absorb all the
| worlds ills and misery, the news amplifies the worst of
| what's going on in the world and delivers it to you minute
| by minute, the only rational way of dealing with it is to
| either cut it out or become unspeakably cynical about it
| all.
| ben_w wrote:
| I realised a long time ago that even shedding merely a
| single tear every time an evil deed is done would lead to
| dying of dehydration in one's sleep.
|
| I mostly try to cut out the news, but the options are not
| limited to _just_ cutting it out or becoming cynical: an
| ex went into politics with a genuine desire to make the
| world right. She is (or was) Green Party (US), so not
| making much progress, but it is at least a different
| path.
|
| I definitely agree our minds aren't fit for this world:
| more people online than heartbeats in our lifetimes,
| combined with a psychology that treats a list of more
| than 7-ish items as infinite.
| maccard wrote:
| > News is bad for you so become deliberately ignorant?
|
| I actively avoid news (to the point of changing channels on
| the TV and Radio when it comes on), and yet somehow I still
| managed to be kept aware of what's going on, and avoid being
| ignorant.
|
| > It's like saying traffic lights distract you from driving.
|
| It's actually more like saying every pedestrian in a city is
| going to jump in front of you when you're driving. You can be
| aware of pedestrians, cars, bikes, and be a careful
| considerate driver without needing to fear that every person
| is trying to jump in front of your car, in the same way that
| you can be an informed person without getting daily updates
| on the top 10 stories in the UK right now.
| koonsolo wrote:
| I much rather want to talk to the person who reads books
| written by experts, than to talk to the person who watches
| the news every day.
|
| I'm sorry but there just isn't any comparison. Have you ever
| read news about something you are an expert at? It's just
| laughable inaccurate.
|
| News is entertainment, not information. If you want
| information, read a book written by an expert at the field.
| tootie wrote:
| News is as much about breadth as depth. There's relevant
| news on topics I'm never going to read a book about. And a
| lot of news is very much written by experts and a lot books
| written by biased cranks.
| misterprime wrote:
| Also, if you engage with someone who consumes from a
| different news bubble than you do, it's incredibly
| irritating, while engaging with someone who consumes from
| the same news bubble as you is incredibly boring.
| aeze wrote:
| Reading news that will have little to zero impact on your
| life takes away time you can spend doing more meaningful
| activities. It doesn't just have to be 'work'. It can be
| hobbies, spending time with your kids, whatever you want.
| tootie wrote:
| Not all news is global. And besides we all vote. I hope. Do
| you live your life with no perspective of your world?
| landemva wrote:
| More time to play in white water river parks and more time
| well wasted on ski lifts. I sometimes chat with tourists and
| listen when they tell me what is important to them.
|
| 'Deliberately ignorant' is your value judgment. Spend some
| time in rural eastern Europe, and the perspective changes for
| the better. Media propaganda is simply unimportant.
| tootie wrote:
| I don't understand this at all. Work and family restrict my
| travel. Reading news on my phone is inherently portable.
| And I'm not sure what visiting rural Easter Europe is
| supposed to prove. A lot of it is engulfed in war and I
| can't imagine those people are better off being completely
| ignorant of what Russia is doing. Certainly many of them
| are to everyone else's detriment. Media propaganda is
| obviously a bad thing, but reading credible news isn't.
| Unless you want to descend into abject solipsism
| ben_w wrote:
| Are you going to do anything about the war in eastern
| Europe?
|
| If the news causes no change in your actions, you might
| as well have put a small pebble in front of the phone and
| had it, instead of your eyes, absorb the photons emitted
| by the screen.
| fleddr wrote:
| I think this is a brilliant remark, although it likely
| will be taken the wrong way.
|
| I've personally come to the conclusion that us humans
| aren't designed to take on the misery of the entire human
| population, and that we should stop projecting this
| assumption.
|
| If there's no difference between caring and not caring,
| we should be quite a lot more humble in virtue signaling,
| or best just shut up.
| landemva wrote:
| You suggest I do what? I could talk to people about two
| decades of NATO encroachment on (shall not be spoken) R.
| Or discuss with people how in the weeks prior to
| conflict, VP Harris was in Munich and said Ukraine should
| join NATO. Or discuss how comedian and Vogue model
| Zelinsky said Ukraine should re-acquire nuclear weapons.
| While true, none of those fit the rythmn of the
| mainstream narrative.
| tootie wrote:
| I'm not sure what you're getting at aside from asserting
| Russian propaganda. Ukraine has every right join NATO and
| if Russia thinks that's a provocation then they should
| take a look in the mirror. NATO isn't a mutual defense
| association, not an anti-Russia club. The only reason
| they think so is because they keep invading countries.
| landemva wrote:
| February 20 Zelensky in Munich started to talk back the
| 1994 no-nukes agreement.
| https://www.farsnews.ir/en/news/14001201000618/Ukraine-
| Threa...
|
| https://treaties.un.org/Pages/showDetails.aspx?objid=0800
| 000...
|
| Donbas vote on self-autonomy has curiously not been
| allowed. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49903996
|
| "Proposed in 2016 by Germany's then-foreign minister,
| Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the plan details free and fair
| elections in the east under Ukrainian law, verification
| by the OSCE international security organisation, and then
| self-governing status in return."
|
| 'Ukraine has every right join NATO ...'
|
| Maybe. Just as Cuba had every right to host USSR nuclear
| missiles in 1962?
|
| 'Why the hell would Ukraine join NATO? I thought Russia
| was their brother?'
|
| Yes, eastern Ukraine aligns with R. Western Ukraine hates
| R. The movie 'Mr. Jones' may enlighten you about the
| starvation, and the NYT propaganda at the time.
| tootie wrote:
| Maybe Nazi Germany had a right to the Sudetenland? You
| can't just make these assertions as though we're talking
| hypothetically. Maybe in 2019 you could pass this bs but
| now that Russia went and invaded and is indiscriminately
| killing and kidnapping civilians it's beyond question
| that Russia is an unequivocal bad guy and Ukraine missed
| a chance to better protect themselves because Europe was
| too timid.
| ben_w wrote:
| Fun fact: the USSR asked to join NATO.
| koonsolo wrote:
| Well, joining NATO at this point seems like a wise
| decision, don't you agree? If you want to call it "NATO
| encroachment on Russia", why doesn't Russia attack NATO
| then?
|
| Why the hell would Ukraine join NATO? I thought Russia
| was their brother? Any idea why they would want to join
| NATO? Ah! Maybe it's because they don't want to be
| invaded by the brother neighbour that likes to invade
| little countries around them.
|
| NATO expansion is Russia's fault, don't be stupid and
| claim otherwise. Look at how this war already quickly
| expanded NATO.
|
| Keep listening to your Russian propaganda.
| ben_w wrote:
| I'm suggesting you limit your news to things which are
| actionable rather than affective.
| spacemark wrote:
| Yes, deliberate ignorance pendulum swings too far. Of
| course "free" information is not very useful because
| someone else is paying for it, motivated by their
| interests not yours. So do the adult thing and don't
| throw up your hands and give up, instead pay just a bit
| for useful information. That way you know a bit more
| about who is funding it and why.
| JoshCole wrote:
| Rhetoric is a dangerous sword - its sharpest edge is the
| pommel. You seem to think you've pointed out a logical
| inconsistency in Aaron's argument structure. What you
| actually did was propose that news does not exist; actually,
| that information itself doesn't exist.
|
| In the actual argument they claimed that news wasn't the best
| information source in an argmax over sources on the basis
| that other mediums have selective pressures which more
| strongly correlate with utility generation - partly because
| of medium influences and partly because things which aren't
| new are subject to selective pressures for longer and thus
| the filtering mechanism of that selective pressure is more
| discriminating.
|
| You aren't engaging with that argument, but you act like you
| are. So when you claim that no information is the alternative
| proposition you've actually made a mathematical claim: that
| the count(set{news, **other_sources}) == 0. This is clearly
| nonsensical because the minimum size of the argmax over
| information sources necessarily included news and so was
| obviously at least one, but often more. So your basically
| asking people who would agree with you on the basis of your
| argument to take on the claim that 0=N. Yet if it does then
| it follows that news doesn't exist in the set where you only
| get to choose news. So they have to not only believe that you
| are right, but also that news is not a source that they can
| choose, but this contradicts your premise.
|
| Some questions to ponder to help you get it:
|
| 1. Why aren't you trying to refute the existence of evolution
| and natural selection?
|
| 2. Why aren't you trying to disprove that approximation
| accuracy is a function of the computation that goes into the
| approximation?
|
| If you _really_ thought you were right you would be trying to
| tear down the works of Charles Darwin and would be laughing
| at Donald Knuth for the stupidity of classifying things by
| computational complexity. Yet you aren 't.
| mtnygard wrote:
| I hadn't seen that post before. This paragraph hit me as a
| tragic irony:
|
| 'This seems to be true, but the curious thing is that I'm never
| involved. The government commits a crime, the New York Times
| prints it on the front page, the people on the cable chat shows
| foam at the mouth about it, the government apologizes and
| commits the crime more subtly. It's a valuable system -- I
| certainly support the government being more subtle about
| committing crimes (well, for the sake of argument, at least) --
| but you notice how it never involves me?'
| Balgair wrote:
| Kinda like the Murry Gell-Mann Amnesia Effect
|
| https://loricism.fandom.com/wiki/Gell-Mann_Amnesia_Effect
| Buttons840 wrote:
| Plus, whatever the news is talking about endlessly this week
| will most likely be far down the list of important events
| come next voting seasons (or whatever milestone is important
| to you).
| khaledh wrote:
| For me, the zero news diet would be really hard to apply to HN.
| Any suggestions (in addition to noprocrast)?
| pacifika wrote:
| Use one of the Havkernews Digest services to get a periodic
| email. Fomo is the biggest reason for me to keep checking back.
| pella wrote:
| try check only 1x weekly AND only the "top 10%"
|
| go https://hckrnews.com/ -> set "top 10%"
| khaledh wrote:
| I've seen this one before, but never tried it. I'll give it a
| try. Thanks!
| hvs wrote:
| As someone with serious concentration issues (unless I'm
| hyperfocused, I may have undiagnosed ADHD) I found the _biggest_
| help for me was cutting out caffeine.
| barking_biscuit wrote:
| hmm... caffeine actually helps for ADHD as it's a stimulant. I
| can only take my meds on weekdays and I've pretty much had life
| long addiction to either coke, pepsi or red-bull. When I
| started taking effective medication I basically stopped
| drinking caffeinated drinks. Just don't need it. I can't take
| my meds on the weekends, and virtually always I go get
| something with caffeine in it to help.
| lazide wrote:
| _it depends_ - caffeine uses different receptors than are
| helpful for many people with ADHD, and since it isn't managed
| by someone outside, it's easy to get big swings of usage or
| other problems due to, well ADHD.
|
| It's common that folks with ADHD will use Caffeine, it just
| doesn't work as well as other stimulants for many people.
| hvs wrote:
| As I said, I _may_ have ADHD as I have a lot of the classic
| symptoms, but I have a daughter with diagnosed ADHD and I do
| not have nearly as significant symptoms as she does. All I
| know is cutting caffeine improved my general concentration
| and significantly decreased my anxiety as a bonus.
| toyg wrote:
| As a person completely unqualified to diagnose anything but
| with similar problems, I suspect the real root of your
| issue might just be the anxiety. If you could address the
| roots of that, caffeine would probably become irrelevant.
| cja wrote:
| Untreated ADHD is a common cause of anxiety
| rr888 wrote:
| Me too, mild sedative helps, like after a beer I can finally
| concentrate. Makes RTO a problem. :)
| saos wrote:
| Even tea? :(
| gatane wrote:
| I stopped drinking tea and my daily anxiety halved :)
| hvs wrote:
| You might be able to get away with a cup of tea every once in
| a while, but I tend to be an "in for a penny in for a pound"
| type of person, so it's complete elimination or 4-5 cups of
| coffee for me.
| swah wrote:
| Was this on the short term?
| hvs wrote:
| No, it's complete. I was drinking 4-5 cups of coffee a day
| and my brain was a cluttered mess. Now it's just mildly
| cluttered.
| EForEndeavour wrote:
| On a much smaller time scale, I _have_ noticed that when I
| skip my usual morning coffee (say, running out of coffee,
| going for a run with an accountability buddy, or traveling
| and staying in a "coffee desert"), I feel remarkably
| clear-minded and calm, even though I crave the smell,
| taste, experience of coffee. When I let it last, this
| mental calmness lasts until early afternoon, when I'd
| usually get coffee #2 of 2, as the dull withdrawal headache
| sets in and I chemotactically writhe my way toward
| increasingly desperate sources of caffeine.
|
| I've been drinking at least 2 cups of coffee ("cups" is a
| fuzzy measure) for maybe 15 years. Maybe I should power
| through the withdrawal and discover for myself if I've
| accidentally been undermining my mental clarity and life
| quality this whole time, instead of giving myself energy
| and helping concentration as I'd been assuming.
| kzrdude wrote:
| I don't think there is a silver bullet or a tick box solution.
| You have to want to stop. Change your behaviour.
| TimTheTinker wrote:
| Sometimes there really is - for people who want to focus but
| find it frustratingly difficult because of their brain
| chemistry (ADHD or whatever).
|
| For me, it's sleeping enough, nicotine patches, green tea,
| L-Tyrosine, Avmacol, and no coffee. This regimen has helped me
| improve my work performance significantly. It doesn't "fix"
| everything, but it sure makes it so much easier to function and
| to focus what I want to focus on.
| kzrdude wrote:
| That sounds great, I've certainly too gone through a better
| sleep period where I focused on better sleep - no coffee for
| two years and lots of other measures like that. And it works.
| That's not a silver bullet, that's hard work. :)
| ge96 wrote:
| For the last couple of years my sleep pattern has been
| crazy. Sometimes I would stay up two days in a row to rest
| my sleep pattern back to 9-5 schedule. I preferred to be
| sleep deprived as it made my job more interesting.
|
| But lately (since a month ago) I have been thankfully able
| to maintain a 12/1-8:30 range sleep pattern.
|
| I do a 15 min workout 5 days a week. I have been fasting so
| I eat a big meal a couple hours before sleeping. Read a
| book half an hour before sleep.
|
| So far it's been working. Fasting is weight loss reasons.
| Also helps me personally focus since if I eat too much I
| get lazy/tired.
|
| Other thing I'll comment on is regarding personal projects.
| I lay out a plan, when the day begins (weekend) I don't
| open anything (social media) I just immediately work on
| this project. Thankfully I can dump the most of the weekend
| days toward the project.
| Kye wrote:
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| fuzzfactor wrote:
| If you have trouble doing this on your own, an alternative
| often not considered is going away to camp for the summer.
| synergy20 wrote:
| Block websites will help definitely.
|
| another "threat" is when you have a few kids, your daily life is
| cut into pieces with random and sometimes strong background
| noises 24x7x365, not much you can do there.
|
| personally, that impacts my focus the most and there is no cure,
| and it usually lasts for about 20 years when kids are finally
| into colleges.
|
| obviously there are many good stuff out of raising kids, and I
| enjoyed it, but focus-on-tech-advancement is not one of them.
| koheripbal wrote:
| This is why many people with kids want to physically return to
| the office - fewer distractions.
| jader201 wrote:
| I've WFH for the past 8+ years, my kids are now 18 and 15 (so
| they were 10 and 7 when I started WFH).
|
| They can definitely be a distraction, but I was able to
| minimize it by having an office with a door + setting
| reasonable boundaries. Also, they're out of the house at
| school for many hours (except for COVID -- that was a bit
| tougher, but that was the case for everyone).
|
| I have no regrets. One of the reasons I WFH is to have less
| time on the road and more time w/ family. My oldest has said
| that he's glad I WFH, and that he didn't like me being away
| when he was younger.
|
| Of course, every person/family is different. But for me & my
| family, I think minimizing the distractions in other ways
| while WFH + accepting the remaining distractions was worth it
| in the end.
| watwut wrote:
| Among my peer, parents want to work from home. Single
| childless people want to be in office.
| treyfitty wrote:
| My kids leave me alone at home. My PMs at work however...
| ChrisPebble wrote:
| Anecdotally all but one of the parents I know (including
| myself) prefer working remotely. I tried to find if there
| were any survey results and found a survey by Harris Poll on
| behalf of Zapier that said that "56 percent of parents want
| the option to work remotely" [1].
|
| I have a private office in our home and know that's not a
| luxury for many others, but the quality of life as a parent
| working from home vs being in the office is dramatic. With
| the kids home during the summer the noise and distraction
| levels do go up, but honestly are still less bothersome then
| the open office floor plan I was in previously. I think it
| really depends on your home situation as well as how your
| office was setup, but my guess is that a majority of parents
| would prefer remote positions if available.
|
| [1] https://zapier.com/blog/remote-work-report-by-zapier/
| [deleted]
| mberning wrote:
| Having kids in the house is like being in a damn WWI trench
| with shells exploding over your head constantly. Ok, maybe not
| that bad, but it's horrible for your ability to get anything
| meaningful done. And then by the time they hit the sack and you
| finally have a few moments peace, you are worn out and ready to
| hit the sack yourself. My ability to burn the midnight oil has
| gone to zero basically.
| subpixel wrote:
| I find that when I regularly exercise and don't drink at
| dinner I can put kid to bed and have a few more hours
| available. But - big but - spending that evening time working
| has become anathema to me.
|
| The best rule I've put in place is work happens during the
| day or it doesn't happen.
| 1-6 wrote:
| I'm curious because I've had kids early. Will I ever be able to
| catch up with peers who've decided their focus would be on
| their job and forego having children later in life?
| insightcheck wrote:
| I'd like to question the premise that you have to "catch up"
| with peers, and that comparisons make sense. Especially in
| the private sector, career growth isn't solely dependent on
| technical skills.
|
| Some peers can get big career boosts due to nepotism or
| networking and switching companies. Others leave a large
| company, giving up the chance of promotions to senior
| management, and create their own startup or join another at a
| senior level for advancement. Other people change industries
| and start at a junior position. Yet others decide to work a
| stable job for lesser pay, maybe at certain departments or
| agencies in the public sector.
|
| I honestly don't see where competition with peers becomes a
| factor, so long as you're working enough to maintain valuable
| skills that hiring managers and organizations are looking
| for.
| lampshades wrote:
| I don't think you will. I don't think I will either. I've
| stopped caring about career advancement because it's a fools
| errand for me.
|
| Competing with single people is incredibly depressing. (I
| have to find a way out of this hell hole, I hate tech)
| sethammons wrote:
| I had my first kid at 15; are you that early? It was a rough
| start. Mom and I are still together 24 years later. We played
| life on hard mode and I don't recommend it. I got a near full
| academic ride to a university but had trouble getting books
| and supplies. My wife worked mostly as a waitress at first.
| After several attempts at different jobs, I landed as a
| software developer. I was in my 30s before we could save a
| penny. I make a couple hundred grand a year now and can buy
| my (now three) kids what they need and want and my retirement
| account is healthy
| tylermac1 wrote:
| You will get out of your career what you put into it. I had
| kids at 24/26 and have found success relative to my peers in
| the field.
|
| Sure there are sacrifices to be made with respect to career
| options. You can't (or shouldn't) just move cities every
| three years when a new job comes up, but working remotely can
| level that playing field quite a bit.
| rvba wrote:
| It depends.
|
| The "mid" positions often require a grind. For example to get
| a skill.
|
| The "top" positions often are a new set of hoops that you
| need to jump. First you need to actually get the position:
| what sometimes is about who you know, sometimes about what
| you do, sometimes sheer luck (e.g. those above you quit) or
| by just grinding and applying everywhere. Also at some point
| a new hoop are sales. Nobody cares that you cant do your job
| if you can bring in new customers worth millions.
|
| In many ways life is pure luck. If you choose the right
| company you can get options and become a millionaire while
| someone better will rot in a failed startup (If you are in
| Europe you are out of luck - generally no options).
|
| Maybe you start a company while you are still relatively
| young? Many did. Many failed. There are also those
| motivational lists who show billionaires who started a
| company after a certain age.
|
| I was thinking of writing a book about this, but I am not
| sure if there is a market for that. Since what I wrote above
| sounds a lot like those sharlatan self help books.
| insightcheck wrote:
| You can write a longform blog post and submit it to HN, I
| would read it. Ribbonfarm's "The Gervais Principle" (2009)
| [0] is a top example of a very long blog post split over
| multiple parts, yet insightful enough to be shared widely
| on HN and still provoke thought, long after a first read.
|
| [0] https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-
| principle-...
| tiahura wrote:
| It depends on your wife. If both of you work, then probably
| not.
| cortesoft wrote:
| The commenter could be the wife. Or it could be two men
| sanedigital wrote:
| Maybe. Maybe not. But no matter what those other people do,
| they'll never ever be able to get more youthful, energetic
| years with their children and (hopefully) grandchildren. All
| that money and even Elon can't buy time.
|
| I had kids relatively young for a yuppie male (27) and while
| that was 100% the "right time" I would have done it earlier
| if I had known how great they are.
| yao420 wrote:
| I'm really struggling with this right now.
|
| I'm turning 33 next month and really want children. I have
| endless memories of my dad and grandfathers teaching me
| amazing lessons and being best/strongest men I have ever
| been around. I want to fulfill that role that for someone!
| We didn't have much money but camping or diy building is
| something fondly reminisce on and made me who I am.
|
| My partner is 25 and is not decided on children yet due to
| also growing up poor and and having a rougher realationship
| with their fam. We've lived together a year now but she
| recently got an IUD and was happy about the '10 years of
| freedom'.
|
| To her kids is a 'probably after I finish all my
| goals/traveling'.
|
| We were recently vacationing in Barcelona and met 3 young
| boys at the hotel and played a game of uno with them in the
| lobby. They lived in the Bay Area and I imagine their
| parents were techies, they were indian, 6-12yrs, long hair,
| well spoken, had skateboards, and wearing tie dye.
|
| I CANNOT stop thinking about them.
|
| I'm considering an ultimatum but I love her so much.
|
| Sorry for the rant HN, I just needed somewhere to say it.
| insightcheck wrote:
| The biggest concern is that there doesn't seem to be a
| concrete end goal for when you can have children. From
| what you've written, your partner is 25, has an IUD, and
| communicated that she doesn't want children for the next
| 10 years. The endpoint of "probably after I finish all my
| goals/traveling" is so vaguely defined, that it could
| never happen. One can spend a lifetime pursuing goals and
| traveling.
|
| You likely already considered the fertility odds, but to
| add context, according to a resource approved by the
| department of health for Victoria, Australia [0], the
| odds of having a child increasingly drop from age 35
| onwards. There are also likely risks for men trying to
| have children after the age of 40, according to a
| balanced article on WebMD [1].
|
| Negotiation is an option besides an ultimatum, and I
| actually think most opinions on the internet about
| relationships go for breakups far too soon. You have
| valid concerns that you can address with negotiation; in
| specific:
|
| 1) There is no clarity for the timeline of having kids
| (10 years plus after a vague goal of reaching all other
| goals of your partner).
|
| 2) From the tone of your partner, it's possible she
| doesn't seem to be taking your valid concern with
| seriousness, though perhaps serious conversations may
| just didn't come to mind at the time you wrote your
| comment.
|
| 3) Your partner hasn't seriously discussed the fertility
| implications of having children that late, at least from
| the contents of your comment.
|
| To compromise, consider the red lines. Would you be
| willing to stay in the relationship without kids? If the
| answer is "no," it's almost inevitable you will be
| resentful and the relationship is likely to have a very
| negative effect on your life.
|
| Would your partner be willing to have kids? If the answer
| is "no," it's also almost inevitable she will be
| resentful if she reluctantly goes into it; if the answer
| legitimately is "yes, but after a certain point of time,"
| then you have room to work it out. The compromise
| solution is to have a specific endpoint when you will try
| for kids (with a clear "yes" for trying for children at
| that point). If there is none, moving on may be a hard
| decision but the right one for personal happiness for
| both people in the long-term.
|
| As with any online advice, please take this comment with
| a huge grain of salt because there is an enormous amount
| of information and nuance lost when communicating a
| situation over text (or even over a conversation in
| person). However, the main principles of compromise--
| knowing each others' red lines, and account for possible
| long-term resentment due to agreements favoring one side
| disproportionately--may hopefully still be helpful. Best
| of luck to you.
|
| [0] https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/conditions
| andtrea...
|
| [1] https://www.webmd.com/men/news/20141202/older-dads-
| health
| unity1001 wrote:
| > I'm considering an ultimatum but I love her so much.
|
| Dictating, forcing things is not the way to go for such
| things. You cant force children onto an unwilling mother.
| Its best if such things are handled amicably and with
| consensus.
| lampshades wrote:
| You should find a new partner.
| insightcheck wrote:
| Not necessarily. There is almost always room to have a
| discussion and to see if there can be compromise
| acceptable to both sides first.
|
| In this case, it may be acceptable to have kids at a
| later age; in addition, there could be other related
| concerns not mentioned in the comment (a lot of
| information is lost when writing about something online),
| which could make having kids acceptable.
|
| Then if it's truly a red line issue (one partner
| absolutely does not want to have kids, while the other
| does), both people will know that they at least tried
| very hard to work it out, and reached an understanding
| that there could be long-term unhappiness or resentment
| if the relationship persisted. Then there can be few to
| no regrets with moving on, which is difficult after being
| in a relationship for a long period of time.
| Arainach wrote:
| There is no compromise on children. Some people want
| them, some don't. This is one of the biggest sources of
| relationship strife and needs compatibility quickly or
| folks should agree to part and stop wasting time.
| insightcheck wrote:
| It's not a black-and-white issue. There is compromise if
| a person doesn't want children right now, but is
| genuinely open to it when there is more career stability.
| Some people may also be open to children, but not at the
| expense of giving up one's career (some couples have
| worked it out by having the man de-prioritize his career
| for a while).
|
| I do agree that people can waste time if a person says
| they "don't want children right now," but really mean
| that they "don't want children ever." In either case,
| there is no harm to clarify this before going right to
| breaking up over hesitations.
| goblinux wrote:
| I know the feeling. I think your best bet would be
| sharing with her gently and honestly, and if that doesn't
| go like you hope then looking into some couples'
| counseling/therapy to resolve this if she's agreeable.
|
| Family baggage is tough and there may be stuff she needs
| to work on within herself too before she's ready.
| Encouraging that is a good way to be supportive and work
| towards the goal of kids together.
|
| Strongly advise against ultimatums
| ryanwaggoner wrote:
| The worst thing you can do for yourself, your partner,
| and your future kids would be to pressure your partner
| into having children when she's not ready or doesn't want
| to. Her path is her own, and it's completely valid.
|
| My advice is to have an honest conversation where you try
| to understand where she's at on this and why, without
| trying to change it.
|
| And then if you determine that she really doesn't want
| kids, or may not ever, you might have to make a very hard
| choice to either accept that and let go of your dream of
| having kids, or to follow another path without her.
|
| But own it as _your_ choice, without resentment. She
| doesn't owe you a child.
| 1024core wrote:
| I met a guy who was ~ 45 or so. He had been with his
| (then ex-) partner for 15+ years. She had wanted kids,
| and he kept saying "next year", "not ready yet", etc.
| Finally, at the age of 43 she gave him an ultimatum to
| make up his mind, and he replied "nah... don't want
| kids". She dumped him right away.
|
| I met her too a little bit later, and boy, the resentment
| was strong with her. I couldn't blame her.
|
| With things like kids, please don't be wishy-washy; make
| up your mind and set specific goals, timelines, etc. Kids
| are an expensive investment of both money and time.
| usefulcat wrote:
| Let's say you stay together now, and 10 years from now
| she still doesn't want children (which, for the record,
| is very much her prerogative). What will you do?
|
| If you don't split up at that point, this difference is
| likely to become a source of resentment. You may also
| regret not having split up earlier so that you could meet
| someone who is a better match for you sooner.
|
| This is the kind of thing that people really need to be
| on the same page about for the relationship to be viable
| long-term. Attitudes towards money (how much to spend,
| save, etc) is another.
| daniel-cussen wrote:
| I read generated. Too much, too dense.
|
| But let me still respond to this, as freedom of speech:
|
| Leave a message for the top female executive at the
| company she most admires. Ask your wife then leave the
| message. Just tell them leave this message. I've heard of
| similar messages. That executive _will_ talk to your wife
| and _will try_ to give her the message you want to give
| her.
|
| Apparently for women once you realize you're a fertility-
| dead-end your body takes its toll on your failure. Not
| for men as much because a man is fertile much longer, and
| more uncertainly, and it's more reasonable for him to be
| a fertility-dead-end because men are better and worse
| than women, they are a gamble by their very nature.
| yoyohello13 wrote:
| I feel you. It's a really tough place to be.
|
| I'm 32 and my wife is 33, we've been together for 12
| years. I started having the itch to have kids when I
| turned 30, but my wife 100% doesn't want them. Choosing
| between a life without children or leaving the person
| I've shared my whole adult life with is intolerable.
|
| All I can say is you're not alone and I wish you the
| best.
| j7ake wrote:
| You won't beat them by absolute number of hours. However, you
| can surpass your peers by having more focus, being more
| organized, and thinking outside the box.
|
| Anecdotal evidence: PhDs with children often are just as
| productive if not more than those without. Most PhD students
| are inefficient due to not focusing and thinking they
| infinite time.
| mattgreenrocks wrote:
| It's really up to you and depends on what you want your
| career to look like.
|
| Also, be careful of playing games where people are willing to
| give up more than you are. For me, I don't derive as much
| meaning from a career as I thought I would, probably because
| I put too much expectation that it would provide that.
| insightcheck wrote:
| > "For me, I don't derive as much meaning from a career as
| I thought I would, probably because I put too much
| expectation that it would provide that."
|
| "Designing Your Life" is a book based on a Stanford course
| on career planning that explored this idea very well. A
| summary is at [0], and a relevant idea is that focusing on
| one area of your life is likely not sufficient for a good
| life. For example, over the course of a week, it can be
| useful to make sure you are hitting goals in "work, play,
| love, and health." It can sound like common sense, but it's
| useful to consciously do this, especially for people
| inclined to optimize for just work, at the expense of
| physical health and relationships.
|
| An anecdote that stuck out to me was a positive example
| about a person who rose to a high level at a large company,
| then kept refusing promotions because he finally struck a
| good balance between career and having time for family. I'm
| sure this may not always be the best idea, but I liked the
| idea behind inclusion of the anecdote, which is that
| continuously climbing the career ladder may not actually be
| helpful for one's personal goals.
|
| [0] https://dansilvestre.com/designing-your-life-summary/
| mattgreenrocks wrote:
| Thank you for your reply. I will try this out soon.
|
| I'm already at the point where I'm uncertain if I want to
| progress on the career ladder. Advancement in my career
| at this point mostly means striking out on my own more
| through product-based businesses.
| AzureShill420 wrote:
| Do you feel like there is really anything to "catch up" on?
|
| I'm in my mid 30s with no kids - while I can see that my
| career happens to be more advanced than close friends who had
| kids early, the signal to noise ratio is pretty high.
|
| I'd think about it this way: enjoy the path you've set
| yourself on and savour the years where you have both your
| kids and your health. When they become less dependent on you,
| the option to lean in to a career is still available, and
| with a few more grey hairs you probably won't have to work so
| hard to prove yourself to begin with.
| lampshades wrote:
| Tip: don't give advice to people with kids when you don't
| have them yourself. We don't want it because you all have
| zero idea what we go through.
| davidro80 wrote:
| bravetraveler wrote:
| Another unsolicited tip: take quality advice anywhere you
| can get it
|
| This reads harsh, so apologies if that wasn't intended.
| Just... I feel this is more of a disservice than anything
| haswell wrote:
| Nothing about their advice is specific to the role of
| parenting itself, but more about perspective on life
| choices in general. If they were telling you how to be a
| parent, sure, but there's nothing wrong with trying to
| learn from each other's experiences.
|
| Not having kids may afford some advantages in some
| circumstances, but in my experience, the decision is
| often made for reasons that most people don't see, and
| not just because of career goals. I know plenty of
| parents and non-parents, and if there's one thing I can
| say about non-parents, rarely is career progression a
| sufficient form of purpose / satisfaction in life. Most
| parents I know would never trade their decision to have
| kids for a slightly faster trip up a career ladder, but
| that faster trip isn't necessarily real either.
|
| I'm in my mid 30s, and I personally will never have kids.
| I made this choice partially because of the environment I
| grew up in, where I was a defacto parent for younger
| siblings for most of my formative years. I love my
| siblings, but simply put, I'm done parenting, and have
| enough of my own baggage I'm still dealing with after
| that experience. This baggage is heavy enough that work
| is still a struggle. I may appear unencumbered to those
| around me, but that doesn't automatically equate to more
| bandwidth to advance my career.
|
| I've found career success, yes, but not because I don't
| have kids. If anything, my career focus impeded my
| personal growth, so I'm working on that in my 30s.
|
| Ultimately it's a tradeoff, and while some people may
| occasionally find themselves at an advantage in some way,
| it's unclear if this is an advantage to aspire to, or if
| it leads to any improvement in life satisfaction.
|
| If there's one thing I can say, it's that work and career
| progression isn't really what it's cracked up to be, and
| isn't "enough" for long.
| lampshades wrote:
| haswell wrote:
| If you continued reading, you'd see the context behind
| why I made that decision. At this point, you are not
| making any attempt at a good faith conversation here, and
| that's unfortunate.
|
| But since I'm curious, is it the age that made you stop
| listening?
| lampshades wrote:
| haswell wrote:
| I see. It's really unclear why you're engaging in such a
| hostile way throughout this thread, but it's really not
| in the intended spirit of discussion here.
|
| Apparently you did continue reading, but in case it
| wasn't clear, it was an abusive environment, and sharing
| my personal decision not to be a parent again is just my
| attempt to share one perspective on what it means to have
| or not have kids when working through one's career.
|
| Based on what you've written elsewhere in this thread, I
| hope you find some peace.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| lampshades wrote:
| > It's really unclear why you're engaging in such a
| hostile way throughout this thread
|
| The depression that I previously mentioned.
| pb7 wrote:
| Coincidentally, you are seemingly the least mature person
| in this discussion right now. Speaks somewhat to your
| "anyone who doesn't have kids isn't an adult yet" comment
| holding little weight. One would expect a parent to have
| more empathy, not less, but here we are.
| vkk8 wrote:
| This is a bit crude way to put it, but maybe you're
| right.
|
| At least for me, becoming a father changed my perspective
| on everything so much that it's almost like I'm not even
| the same species anymore as I was before having them.
| Sometimes people without children feel like they're not
| even proper adults even if they are older and/or more
| senior at work or whatever.
| lampshades wrote:
| Spot on, I'm so different now than I was then I disregard
| anything anyone without kids says.
|
| > Sometimes people without children feel like they're not
| even proper adults
|
| I feel like they're not real adults too.
| ska wrote:
| > I feel like they're not real adults too.
|
| FWIW, This doesn't sound like a healthy place for you to
| be.
|
| Childless people giving parenting advice to people with
| children is on average going to be just as off target as
| most times where humans try to give advice without any
| personal lived experience. It doesn't indicate anything
| else though, prima facie.
| wiseowise wrote:
| Seek therapy now.
| wiseowise wrote:
| Are you the parent hive mind or what?
| acdha wrote:
| This reads as somewhat mean spirited, which I hope you
| didn't intend. I thought his advice was supportive - they
| very clearly acknowledged not being a parent but then
| pointed out that there isn't a clear cut productivity
| gap. That kind of reassurance seems useful since people
| can easily tell themselves they're irrecoverably behind
| and worry far more than is helpful.
| lampshades wrote:
| Maybe it is. You're responding to a mentally broken man.
| acdha wrote:
| That sounds rough. I hope you can find a path to
| recovery.
| jader201 wrote:
| I'm sorry you feel broken. Virtual hugs from an internet
| stranger.
| lampshades wrote:
| Thanks, I appreciate it.
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| Switching to text only [1] browsing changed my relationship to
| information and vastly improved my focus while using computers. I
| highly recommend it.
|
| [1] Text mostly (90+%). Those few occasions I want to see images
| as part of a web page it's possible to turn that on.
| nunodonato wrote:
| do you use any particular browser or extension? or do you mean
| stuff like gopher/gemini?
| b215826 wrote:
| On Firefox, setting permissions.default.image in about:config
| to 2 blocks all images.
|
| http://kb.mozillazine.org/Permissions.default.image
| nonrandomstring wrote:
| I use w3m a fair bit, because of emacs. Also have "Links"
| (variant of Lynx maybe) set up in some environments.
| aszantu wrote:
| may sound stupid... I recently started to test around with
| vitamin B supplements, inspired by some NMN interview, refined
| Vitamin B seemingly turns back age #inmice. Decided to play
| around with the real thing first... B3 itself helps me sleep
| better, Yeast tablets feel like coffee, a full vitamin B complex
| seems to aleviate focus issues. For the first time in a while I'm
| able to actually work on something without getting distracted
| much.
|
| Suffering from some adhd-like symptoms I used to be happy to be
| distracted. Now I'm even unhappy when a coworker wants something.
| AND I don't enjoy gaming... which is weird and frustrating
| because I consider myself addicted to video games.
| flawn wrote:
| can you introduce me to that NMN iceberg? what the heck do
| these people using that experience, this undoubtedly can't be
| 100% legit
| HellDunkel wrote:
| I had a similar problem. My solution is to go offline in the
| evening- 3 hours before going to sleep.
| djohnston wrote:
| I've managed to consolidate all my distracted news consumption to
| HN but indeed I need to break myself from this reflexive habit.
| bckr wrote:
| I'm in the same boat! I feel better because my twitchy fingers
| always lead to learning or discussing something new and
| interesting, but they're still twitchy fingers.
| Jeff_Brown wrote:
| I try to keep my productivity improvements secret, because any
| time I announce one -- especially if I also explain why it
| happened -- I immediately falsify whatever I just said by losing
| all focus and producing nothing of interest for a while.
| rpmisms wrote:
| This resonates deeply. It has to feel like a secret to me.
| webscout wrote:
| I use sites like https://biztoc.com once or twice a day and I'm
| more or less done with news. Just make sure you only read the
| headlines ;)
| marcinreal wrote:
| Great article and important message.
|
| > Lifting the phone should not unlock it. This setting is called
| "Display & Brightness/Activate on Lift" on the iPhone
|
| On my phone it's called "Raise to Wake". I didn't know that you
| could turn this off, but I just did so because it's inconsistent
| and sometimes doesn't work. I like predictable behavior, even at
| a minor cost to convenience.
| [deleted]
| endisneigh wrote:
| Ironically this page is a great example of why it's hard to
| focus. Unnecessary images, stylization and colors. Unnecessary
| links to other distracting websites. Flashy flash.
| pristineshatter wrote:
| Let the man create the blog he wants to create.
| dxdm wrote:
| Maybe there's a lesson for him in that comment.
| papito wrote:
| If you want to get your life back, read Stolen Focus. It has all
| these tips and tricks but it does a lot more - it explains _why_
| our focus is shot, and dissects the forces behind it.
|
| It's much more sinister than most people suspect.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/Stolen-Focus-Attention-Think-Deeply/d...
|
| I was spending hours per day on Twitter, and then I learned that
| overusing social media _rewires_ your brain, and you essentially
| unlearn to digest information in bigger chunks. This book will
| horrify you, and that 's exactly what needs to be done.
|
| And if a book (to listen to) is too much for you to focus on -
| listen to Ezra Klein's interview with the author, at least:
| https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/its-not-your-fault-you...
| A4ET8a8uTh0 wrote:
| I did not see it listed here, so I will mention Digital
| Minimalism by Cal Newport, who, among other things, discusses
| news in particular, but digital distractions in general and
| proposes a way to deal with it by changing our relationship with
| technology.
|
| I am currently going through the steps proposed by him and while
| not easy, it generally supports the point of the article.
|
| That said, it is not just news.
|
| edit: Just in case. No connection to the author other than being
| a happy reader.
| rr888 wrote:
| I really like his message but I feel each of his books could be
| a blog post. Good blog posts, but nevertheless something you
| could read in a few minutes. Instead you have to buy/borrow a
| $10 book, then he rubs it in by talking about how productive he
| as he has written so many books.
| pphysch wrote:
| It should frankly be criminal to predate on user's attention to
| the extent that most popular apps do.
|
| I keep my phone on DnD 100% of the time and ruthlessly disable
| notifications, but have a semi-smart watch that vibrates for
| texts/calls. I'm still addicted to checking my news feeds but at
| least they aren't literally yanking my attention.
| y42 wrote:
| I'm doomed. Did not read more than the head line.
| namaria wrote:
| Turning off all notifications on my personal phone was a life
| changer. No longer I feel like I'm wearing an electronic collar.
| Giving everyone who has your contact information access to your
| attention is poison to the ability to concentrate. Another big
| thing for me was cutting down on infinite scrolling, blogs and
| videos and spending a lot more time with long form content
| (mainly books). Attention is our most precious resource and we
| should guard fiercely against attempts to monetize it.
| ge96 wrote:
| My phone is always on mute (no vibrate either)
|
| Only alarms to wake up
| andrewljohnson wrote:
| Having a family and responsibilities made this infeasible for
| me. Most apps on my phone are denied notifications, but
| people can still text/call me.
| LeonM wrote:
| Not sure about iOS, but with Android you can create
| exceptions for selected contacts in the do-not-disturb
| mode.
|
| I've added my family members to that exception list, and
| leave the phone on do-not-disturb mode 24/7.
| ska wrote:
| This works well for some people, but not universally as
| noted elsewhere in the thread.
|
| I guess it basically comes down to: how likely is a call
| from an unknown number to be important for me? It turns
| out this is wildly different for different lives.
| namaria wrote:
| I also have family and responsibilities. But I am very
| careful whom I give unfettered access to my attention.
| copperx wrote:
| Everybody who depends on you directly (partner, children,
| parents, and extended family) should be on you VIP
| contact list and have direct access to you. I find that
| reduces my anxiety. I don't get distracted by
| notifications, or the thought that someone might be dying
| and trying to reach me.
| ge96 wrote:
| Just commenting about phone calls
|
| I have stranger phone call anxiety and the other thing is
| spam/scam calls. Which thankfully my phone has been good
| at flagging/blocking.
|
| Regarding notifications I used to have phones that either
| had LED blinking indicators or sound/beeping ahh, crazy
| used to just drop what I was doing to check it.
| andrewljohnson wrote:
| The issue for me is, for example, my wife drops my kid
| off for a camp and then the camp calls me in an
| emergency. So I can't just only take notifications from
| known callers.
| NRv9tR wrote:
| You can do this. I do. Known numbers only and whitelist
| school, doctor, etc. If you really wanted to go further
| you could have a second number via google voice you only
| give to those places. Maybe even tie notifications on
| that to your calendar where you put your kids events.
| watwut wrote:
| The teacher from school or preschool will call from
| basically random phone. Possibly own phone. Or whatever
| office she is in phone. Camp counselor always calls from
| own phone which is fairly often different one then where
| you are supposed to call.
|
| Neither of these calls often. Maybe once a year you get
| call like that. But when they call, you really want to
| pick up.
| andrewljohnson wrote:
| I just can't... it might be some counselor's random cell
| phone calling me. Plus the kids go to many camps per
| summer, and many activities during the year, so I'd be
| constantly updating my phone book even if not for the
| main issue.
| happimess wrote:
| I am also a parent coming on the end of a summer, and
| whitelisting people who _may_ contact me about my child
| sounds like a nightmare.
| layer8 wrote:
| Kids survived perfectly fine in the past without their
| parents being available 24/7.
| misterprime wrote:
| The kids that survived, survived perfectly fine.
|
| The kids that didn't survive were buried and no longer
| interact with us.
| happimess wrote:
| Many summer camps require that you be available to
| retrieve your kid if e.g. they start showing Covid
| symptoms. I'd love to drop them off and forget about it,
| believe me.
| andrewljohnson wrote:
| It seems disrespectful to my wife and the camps to refuse
| to be available for emergencies.
| v-erne wrote:
| Few years back brother of my spouse took his wife to
| Spain (thousends kilometrs from here) to drive around and
| see some sights. At some point they got a flat tire and
| while he was trying to fix it two nice gentlemans on
| motorbikes took everything they had by force (including
| phones). My spouse brother managed to borrow a phone
| frome some stranger that was driving by. And when he
| tried to call the only number they both could remember,
| his fathers, he did not answers.
|
| Can You guess why? Thats right - he also had a policy to
| not take phone calls from unknown numbers (especially
| foreign). They had to go to ours country ambassy in Spain
| (which took a while) and beg for help.
|
| Since that day his father answers all calls :)
| elenaferrantes wrote:
| You can leave a voice mail. I don't answer to unknown
| number anymore due to heavy phone spam. My thought is "if
| it's really important they will leave a message".
| mirekrusin wrote:
| If wife is nice, she can be whitelisted, no?
| Popeyes wrote:
| If you have Android. Minimalist is very helpful in blocking
| app notifications.
| mprime1 wrote:
| If you're looking for a 'lean' source of news (just the facts, no
| commentary) try Wikipedia:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Current_events
|
| (RSS feed available)
| bananabiscuit wrote:
| Unfortunately, it is a mistake to think that just because you
| are only presented with high quality facts (statements that are
| very likely to be true), that you are getting an objective view
| of the story. You would be surprised how unrepresentative a
| story can be made purely through omission or selective
| emphasis, and Wikipedia is very guilty especially of the
| latter. The talk pages are usually very revealing of what the
| articles fails to mention, if you happen to catch them before
| the discussion gets archived.
| nequo wrote:
| This is very true about agenda setting.
|
| What _is_ great about Wikipedia 's "Current events" portal is
| that you don't have to sift through tweets that are selected
| by the news feed algorithm to make you angry, or a stream of
| op-eds that are selected by an editor to do the same, in
| order to get to the facts. Much healthier psychologically
| while still staying reasonably informed.
| anonporridge wrote:
| This is something a lot of people don't understand.
|
| It is impossible to have an objective and bias-free source of
| information, simply because the amount of information that
| exists is unimaginably enormous. It's impossible for any
| single human mind to absorb everything that's happening, so
| we have to rely on services whose job is filtering that
| information into a small set of important bits.
|
| By selectively choosing which bits of information you share
| or emphasize, multiple different sources can all technically
| be telling the gods honest truth, while also all pushing
| completely contradictory narratives.
|
| Everyone is pushing a narrative, and it's critical that we
| all try to understand the incentives of the pushers of
| information we ingest.
| kej wrote:
| I liked the way Howard Zinn (who had his own rather strong
| biases, of course) made that point in the afterword to _A
| People 's History of the United States_:
|
| >But there is no such thing as a pure fact, innocent of
| interpretation. Behind every fact presented to the world--
| by a teacher, a writer, anyone--is a judgment. The judgment
| that has been made is that this fact is important, and that
| other facts, omitted, are not important.
| stripline wrote:
| I learned this when I dated a law student while in college.
| They teach an entire class to the first year students
| dedicated to presenting the facts of the case, the way
| lawyers do in their opening statements. They actually had
| to create the set of facts for each side. It was really
| interesting how you could totally bias it by what you
| emphasized or left out and the different words used (i.e.
| word connotations).
| LesZedCB wrote:
| Manufacturing Consent is a must-read
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing_Consent
| everybodyknows wrote:
| > Everyone is pushing a narrative
|
| But this an exaggeration. Some people are truly equivocal
| on a question, yet still able to muster the effort to write
| about it.
|
| One way this happens is that some specific issue puts the
| author's internal values in tension. An example would be
| recall/impeachment of some corrupt official, where the
| tension is between the two goods of removing the bad actor
| from power, and maintaining the norm of orderly transition
| of government power.
| stephendause wrote:
| I would recommend people use sites like allsides.com or
| ground.news to read from a wide variety of sources across the
| political spectrum. Any one site (even one edited by a variety
| of people) will have its own set of biases, so I find it best
| to visit Web sites that contain links to coverage of the same
| event from a few different sources with different biases.
| insightcheck wrote:
| I think it's better to manually assess bias and think
| critically about how news articles report information. The
| sites you linked are interesting, but had some major flaws.
|
| For example, AllSides includes Breitbart as a source. While
| it identifies it with the maximum value to the right, it
| doesn't give a barometer of credibility. For a reader
| deciding whether Breitbart is worth reading, one should
| closely examine credibility, not just political leaning.
| PolitiFact and Media Bias/Fact Check discussed the
| credibility of Breitbart at length [0] [1].
|
| Then for ground.news, the way it portrays bias is also
| relatively simplistic. The most prominent indicator is
| left/center/right, but biases have a lot more nuance. It's
| more useful to account for how certain publications take
| certain policy stances. Leanings can be anti-establishment,
| pro-establishment, socialist, neoliberal, pro-consumption
| (e.g. Wired), or anti-consumption, and this information is
| lost when relying on left-center-right categorizations.
|
| The best way to do this is to manually select a few
| publications that are high on factual credibility, write down
| their specific biases or leanings, and compare stories across
| the personally-curated selection of publications. You then
| personally have more control and understanding of the
| articles you are presented.
|
| [0] https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/jul/28/stella-
| imm...
|
| [1] https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/breitbart/
| divan wrote:
| Also https://legiblenews.com
| woweoe wrote:
| Wikipedia is incredibly biased in terms of what news it cherry
| picks though. Just read through the debates of what gets
| proposed for inclusion, and then think about the stuff that's
| outright deleted.
| lloydatkinson wrote:
| Do you have some examples?
| mcphage wrote:
| There was a great article posted here a few years back I'd
| love to find again, that discusses how to use Wikipedia to
| reinforce a position without lying. Splitting your side
| into a bunch of mutually reinforcing pages, careful choose
| of when to include or exclude adjectives, and so on. I
| found it pretty eye-opening.
| woweoe wrote:
| "Just read through the debates of what gets proposed for
| inclusion, and then think about the stuff that's outright
| deleted."
| marginalia_nu wrote:
| I kinda also would like to see a concrete example.
| erdewit wrote:
| For example, the entire entry for "mass formation" was
| deleted. The Dutch version still exists:
|
| https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massavorming
| leobg wrote:
| Ok. So the author tells us that news is bad for us. Isn't that
| well known since like ten years ago? When opening the article I
| had been hoping for something new...
|
| ...if y'all catch my drift here ;)
| tmaly wrote:
| The one thing I really like after switching from Android to
| Iphone was the consistent interface to be able to shut off all
| notifications in one screen.
| semidetached wrote:
| I stopped watching 24-hour news channels in 1991 when I saw how
| the Gulf War coverage was turning so many into zombies. By 2010 I
| had stopped regularly reading a list of news web sites I'd
| constructed. HN is about the only thing I read regularly online,
| and I'm getting less regular with that. I watch local news
| sometimes but only to sneer at the local weatherman who's job
| here in central Texas could be performed by one of my pugs. If
| I'm going to starve to death pushing a pleasure lever it ain't
| gonna be one connected to the infotainment industry.
| planarhobbit wrote:
| Hear hear.
|
| To add, I started treating most information outlets, including
| HN, as endless faucets of propaganda, misinformation AND
| misdirection. The outrage is, at best, a farcical play of human
| dramas unfolding on a stage. To take any of this seriously is
| borderline pathological.
| tessela wrote:
| Extra tip for iOS/macOS/iPadOS users: go to Settings /
| Accessibility / Display & Text Size / Color Filters and enable
| the Grayscale filter.
| smoussa wrote:
| I went on a zero news diet a while back and have recently got
| back on this diet again. It's one of the best decisions I've made
| for my productivity.
|
| For those with fear of missing out on current affairs -- events
| are really only worth knowing about if someone has made you aware
| of it in real life. Otherwise it's likely not that important.
| ckosidows wrote:
| You're on HNews?
| [deleted]
| lordnacho wrote:
| Get one of those browser extensions that limits your use. This at
| least tells you how much time you've spent. It's easy to get
| carried away reading one long form article after another.
| woweoe wrote:
| So basically block the entirety of Reddit, which I agree would be
| good for all humankind.
| shakow wrote:
| > which I agree would be good for all humankind.
|
| I disagree with that statement. I know it's fashionable on HN
| to spit on Reddit, but for all its flaws, Reddit also birthed
| fantastic communities that are hard to replicate somewhere else
| due to the network effect, e.g. /r/WarCollege, /r/hoggit,
| /r/AskHistorians, /r/Rust, /r/LinguisticsHumor, etc. - come for
| the dumb memes, stay for the niche communities.
| woweoe wrote:
| But surely these are just commercialized versions of forums,
| the latter being a far more versatile medium to have
| discussions on? Reddit has monopolized the entire forum
| industry and ruined online communities.
| PaulsWallet wrote:
| If you are talking about default subreddits then sure but there
| are some great communities on reddit that I think are great
| pieces of the internet. A lot of which I'm sure exist because
| people don't need 100 different forum accounts to access them.
| Also generally, I see no difference between reddit and Hacker
| News except Hacker News drips with a unique brand of elitist
| smarm you can't get elsewhere.
| vinny2020 wrote:
| I'm proud of myself for reading the article to the end without
| distraction. I have been news free since the 2020 US election
| results were broadcast so I agree that a news diet is an immense
| boost for productivity. Why worry about things you can't really
| change. If it's important enough, trust me, you'll find out about
| it. I also use screen time to limit social media apps, but they
| are truly the crack cocaine of the the 21st century.
| Scarblac wrote:
| I see that Rolf Dobelli has a book on avoiding news now. But he
| made his point crystal clear in an article he wrote in 2010
| already, and put as a freely downloadable PDF on his website. I
| can't find it there now, but here's a link to that PDF on some
| other site: https://www.gwern.net/docs/culture/2010-dobelli.pdf
| planarhobbit wrote:
| One would think he would also avoid the great majority of books
| out there too, as they're just as trashy and toxic as news are.
| walleeee wrote:
| Gwern's site is a gold mine of various interesting tidbits
| KindAndFriendly wrote:
| "...I cancelled my subscription to my formerly favourite online
| news portal (the German "Spiegel-Online")..."
|
| Very good. Spiegel Online - unfortunately - became terribly bad
| over the last years, with click-bait headlines, sensational
| reporting as well as pushing fear & anxiety throughout their
| articles.
| muffinman26 wrote:
| Do you have a different German newspaper you would recommend
| now? I used to read der Spiegel regularly to keep my German
| from getting too rusty.
| going_ham wrote:
| I disabled chrome and youtube for most of the time. Unless I am
| looking for something specific, I keep them disabled. This alone
| reduced by HN scrolling and YouTube binging by factor of 2-3
| hrs/day!
|
| Finally I have free time to relax and do nothing!
| fleddr wrote:
| I think the follow-up needs some more elaborating.
|
| "I won a lot of time back so that I can go back to writing 15
| novels" is a little off putting for many.
|
| Start simple with usage of your reclaimed time. Put your phone in
| another room and watch a 2 hour movie, uninterrupted. That's a
| thing a lot of people today can't even do, so already an
| accomplishment.
|
| Even pure boredom, doing absolutely nothing, is healing. The
| point is that you have uninterrupted time, it doesn't matter if
| you spent it "productively".
| mberning wrote:
| It is said that Napoleon did not open his mail for 3 weeks after
| it arrived. His belief was that most issues would resolve
| themselves and were therefore unimportant for him to attend to.
|
| If you go back and watch the news from 2-3 weeks ago it is
| amazing how much of it is just nonsense. It's especially hard to
| go back and watch covid discussions from a year ago and hear just
| how wrong most information was.
| kortex wrote:
| Sounds like a great way to get a bench warrant for avoiding a
| legal summons in today's day and age.
|
| Knuth has a secretary which prioritizes his snail mail. I think
| filters are a great way to go. I have tried to pre-bin my mail
| but my tray organizer has just been covered over with assorted
| cruft, which kinda makes the system untenable until I stop
| procrastinating...
| rr888 wrote:
| What I did is tell my boss about my difficulty and now they check
| in on me twice a day to look at my progress. I hate being micro
| managed, but really helped me to work on delivering.
| ramblerman wrote:
| I'm not sure if this was sarcasm, but if not ...
|
| It's a dystopian nightmare, that you would voluntarily request
| this.
| rr888 wrote:
| Lol I hate it but the extra eyes makes me focus.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Get out and ride a bike or something. More blood to the brain; no
| digital distraction. Take a shower and bam! productive. That's
| how it works for me.
| LesZedCB wrote:
| agreed the days where I get out for a morning bike ride are
| some of my best
| frostwarrior wrote:
| To me, mindfulness meditation helped me a lot with concentration
| because it was like learning mental aikido, in the sense of not
| trying to remove invasive information, but redirect it in a way
| that doesn't affect my focus. Everything stops being so important
| by default
| paulpauper wrote:
| _During the aforementioned train ride, I cancelled my
| subscription to my formerly favorite online news portal (the
| German "Spiegel-Online") and deleted the associated app from my
| iPhone. I used the initial motivation to cancel additional news
| subscriptions and deleted the related apps from my smartphone and
| iPad so that I wouldn't be tempted._
|
| Here is what he should have done: replaced his smart phone with a
| dumb phone if possible. It does not mean he gets rid of the smart
| phone but deactivate it. And have two computers: one for business
| and one for leisure and keep in different rooms. If possible
| disconnect the work computer from the web. That way there are
| fewer possible distractions. It's not enough to just remove apps.
| The device itself is addictive.
| mauliknshah wrote:
| Typo: It's Daniel Kahneman and not David Kahnemann.
| jansan wrote:
| I think routers should have more fine grained settings, so I can
| block social media during weekdays, HN on weekdays except
| lunchtime and evening, and allow my children only to access their
| 5 websites that they need for homework/study during a few hours
| in the afternoon. This would help me a lot.
| terminalcommand wrote:
| A more extreme measure some users here used to take was not
| access the internet at all during their downtime. When you come
| home from work simply not use the internet. I guess exceptions
| can be made for streaming movies/music. Ideally you should
| download and stock up on these.
|
| I remember some users deliberately not connecting internet to
| their homes to stick with this. There were also some users who
| switched to "dumb" phones to reduce distractions. I guess these
| could work.
| bishopsmother wrote:
| even with your router's domain blacklist, it may not be so easy
| to block all social media (specifically, apps[0]). I don't
| imagine cigarette manufacturers are keen on making it easier
| for people to quit smoking either.
|
| [0] https://www.tigerdroppings.com/rant/tech/facebook-app-and-
| un...
| closedloop129 wrote:
| Did he regain concentration and focus? It's more like he just
| reduced distractions. That's not the same.
|
| What if being distracted is not a bug but a feature and his mind
| doesn't want to continue the path of constantly writing books?
| Instead of eliminating distractions, it could be more helpful to
| find the activities that don't create the desire for
| distractions.
| Digital28 wrote:
| He also says the pandemic didn't affect him, but honestly,
| whether it was Long COVID or an indirect psych effect of
| isolation, I've had extreme issues concentrating ever since
| 2020 that have been absolutely bullshit to manage.
| andai wrote:
| Re: wide-scale reports of cognitive decline since lockdowns:
|
| > In lab animals, isolation has been shown to cause brain
| shrinkage and the kind of brain changes you'd see in
| Alzheimer's disease -- reduced brain cell connections and
| reduced levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor, which is
| important for the formation, connection, and repair of brain
| cells.
|
| https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/how-
| isolation-a...
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| my mind doesn't want to continue the path of constantly
| working. I've done a lot of kinds of work and am not young,
| coding is my third career, and I've never found "the
| activities" that pay rent and don't create the desire for
| distractions. Want it or not (I don't want it) that's a problem
| it's on me to solve.
| kortex wrote:
| "Trivial inconveniences" are a big hurdle when trying to build a
| habit, but are a great tool for breaking bad ones. Anything you
| can do to break the dopamine loop helps, however small it may be.
| I've had success with:
|
| - setting long passwords to social media that aren't autofilled
| (saved in bitwarden) and logging out after each session
|
| - nerfing addicting parts of webapps (plugins which block the
| facebook news feed but allow messaging/groups helped a TON)
|
| - forbidding dedicated social media apps and only using "worse"
| internet sites
|
| - router DNS blockers, even if I can get around them, the act of
| having to bypass it raises my awareness I'm doing something
| subpar for myself
| vbezhenar wrote:
| My method is using private browsing to open addicting websites.
| This way their address will not be saved in history and I'll
| have to type it which sometimes stop me from doing that in mid-
| way. Also helps with automatically logging out.
| kibwen wrote:
| I've done this with YouTube and it's been extraordinarily
| effective for me. Without the history associated with my
| account, the recommendation engine just shows me the default
| junk, preventing me from falling down rabbit holes when I
| just want to watch some video. For keeping in touch with
| channels that I still want to follow, I've subscribed to them
| via RSS.
|
| If you need an extra push to enforce that you only use
| private browsing, you can install any browser extension that
| blocks sites and then tell your browser to not permit that
| extension to run in private windows.
| eastbound wrote:
| We sound like casino addicts who voluntarily try to be
| banned from casinos.
|
| At least we're only losing time, not money. But we're still
| losing health, by staying in bed too much because of social
| media...
| kibwen wrote:
| The problem is that whereas casinos are strictly
| recreational, a lot of YouTube content is actually
| extremely informative and educational. The problem is
| that going to YouTube just for the educational stuff
| still subjects you to the addictive stuff.
| stevage wrote:
| There are also extensions that block all recommendations.
| Makes YouTube a much calmer experience. Go watch one video.
| Now...you are done.
| ben_w wrote:
| Adding to that list: disable mobile data for Safari and Chrome
| so I don't mindlessly browse on the go or during lunch.
| LukeShu wrote:
| > and logging out after each session
|
| I started using a Cookie AutoDelete plugin for privacy reasons;
| but it's also been great for this purpose, so I don't have to
| remember to log out.
| brudgers wrote:
| I find trivial inconvenience essential for establishing
| _positive_ habits.
|
| They make me focus on my intent to establish a habit.
|
| Habit establishing requires perseverance in the face of a bit
| of bother.
|
| The big hurdles are the big hurdles. Small frictions get
| smoothed by repetition...or by simply becoming ordinary parts
| of the process.
|
| Willingness to do things that suck is the nature of positive
| habits.
|
| To a first approximation if it doesn't feel a bit unpleasant at
| first, it probably isn't a positive habit.
| tartoran wrote:
| Interesting take on how habits feel at first as without
| system 2's input (From Daniel Kahneman's thinking fast and
| slow) habits carve their way into our brains basically
| seeking the most reward or dopamine. So without constant
| monitoring of system 2 we end up as entertaining craving
| systems, seeking patterns to satiate the urge for dopamine.
| Good habits may be bitter at first but the rewards are reaped
| in the long run.
| Melatonic wrote:
| Getting rid of the apps I think is the most effective - and as
| a bonus - much less opportunity for intrusion and manipulation.
|
| Although if we are specifically talking about social media such
| as Facebook then I mainly advocate at this point just to dump
| it. You can still use the separate messenger app and function
| even with a fully deactivated account.
|
| Instagram I found (for myself) relatively easy to spend a small
| amount of time on every few days but the amount of
| advertisements has just gotten insane. After not logging on for
| 3 days or similar it appears to now be giving me about 5 ads
| for each real post of someone I follow (half of these are
| "suggested posts" which are not true advertisements but are
| really not much different). You would think they would be able
| to track the fact that when they do this I almost immediately
| close the app and use it less. I am just amazed they do not
| start with at least a few page scrolls of no ads and then
| slowly transition them in.
| stevage wrote:
| I stopped using FB in the traditional way by unfollowing
| literally everyone. however I use it much more for groups
| now. I really get a lot of value out of local community
| groups in particular.
| daniel_iversen wrote:
| A few other suggestions too:
|
| - if you need an app, turn off notifications at least (and move
| it occasionally to another folder)
|
| - turn on iOS Screen Time so you have that second to re-think
| if you want to use the app in the first place (pattern
| interruption)
|
| - turn your phone colors to greyscale - I know it sounds odd
| but I had it like that for a couple of years or so and it made
| me reduce phone time, more productive and less stimulated by
| the phone (even for a good long while after turning it off)
| stevage wrote:
| This one never did anything for me. But then, I was never
| into scrolling things with pictures, much more into reading
| text.
|
| Do you know why it worked for you?
| cultofmetatron wrote:
| this so much. I had tried giving up twitter but the convenience
| was always there. Then one day I had enough and told a gun nut
| to set himself on fire. Now whenever I am tempted to get on
| twitter, I have that offensive "delete this tweet" screen show
| up to remind me that I shouldn't bother with this crap. I'm all
| the better for it.
| nextstepguy wrote:
| I never archive my passwords on social sites and the idea to
| reset every time is a real burden. This helps too.
| everybodyknows wrote:
| Also:
|
| - delete browser bookmarks, desktop icons, "favorites" ...
| throw93232 wrote:
| >> CNN, WSJ, and BBC
|
| That is a news equivalent of junk food. Clickbait partisan
| outrage generator.
|
| I would suggest some independent podcast with daily or weekly
| summaries. Much higher information density.
| ben_w wrote:
| Given the junk food analogy, things with much higher
| information density would be like drinking neat olive oil.
|
| I think a more useful thing is to filter news down to only that
| news which is _important_ rather than merely _engaging_ , and
| leave engagement for either friends or hobbies with a ratio
| depending on your personal level of introversion/extroversion.
| throw93232 wrote:
| I just checked front side of CNN, first 6 titles are about
| some unofficial trip. They do not know if it will happen,
| what will happen, where it may happen, what that means...
|
| There is no value for me there. Even if I invest time into
| filtering, there is no value to gain from that. Maybe it is
| important, but I am not policy maker or investor, it is not
| important right now for me!
|
| I can find out about that visit week later, after it actually
| happened. Without all the speculations and opinions. And
| since it will be podcast I can listen while running or
| exercising, and with much lower investment from my side.
| ben_w wrote:
| I think you've underestimated what I mean by filtering in
| this case: unless you're a politician, almost literally all
| political news is pointless; unless you are a game
| developer or unsatisfied with your VR headset, literally
| all news about VR headsets is pointless; there's no point
| watching a weather forecast for any place you are not going
| to be in; unless you're an investor or looking to invest or
| borrow, financial news is pointless; unless you're in the
| royal family or selling memorabilia, gossip about any royal
| family is worthless; ...
|
| Does CNN have any content that's genuinely important to
| you?
|
| But the argument also applies to podcasts: no value in any
| fact-based podcast if you don't act on the information it
| gives you, just as there's no point in fiction-based
| podcasts if they don't entertain you.
| zorg42 wrote:
| thanx - pragmatic collection of suggestions
| epolanski wrote:
| Removing social medias reclaimed lots of my life, the absolute
| peak of my happiness was when I stopped following any news at
| all.
|
| There's some sort of stigma agaiinst people who don't follow the
| news but I ask, what positives doesfollowing the news brings to
| your lifes?
|
| I realized none and there is a huge proven link between following
| news and anxiety/depression.
|
| Sadly I felt back to watching news with the war in Ukraine.
| 121789 wrote:
| Does anyone know how to block websites at something like the
| router level? I find myself able to get around normal browser-
| level blockers fairly easily. I'd love to use some parental
| controls against myself from like 6-5pm on weekdays
| 1123581321 wrote:
| A custom DNS provider in the router is probably easiest. Use
| NextDNS or CloudFlare for Families with controls on, and then
| give the login for the DNS and the login for your router admin
| to someone else.
| bishopsmother wrote:
| If you're willing to be a beta tester - I'll set you up with a
| free account (see about[0]); I'm open to
| suggestions/implementing new features based on user demand
| (e.g. Slowdown as a Service).
|
| [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bishopsmother
| dehrmann wrote:
| If you have DoH enabled, it's hard. If you don't, with OpenWrt,
| it's easy enough to configure its DNS server to add IPs to
| ipsets after a lookup, then configure the firewall to drop
| those requests over a time window.
|
| > I find myself able to get around normal browser-level
| blockers fairly easily.
|
| You're still just 30 seconds away from disabling the rule.
| nop_slide wrote:
| Might be able to do that with a pi-hole
| rr888 wrote:
| I did this, works great until you realize how easy it is to
| pause blocking.
| cloudking wrote:
| Put Adguard Home on a Raspberry Pi, and point your router DNS
| to it. https://github.com/AdguardTeam/AdGuardHome
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