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How Do You Get Work Done?
canuck asks: "I am currently a university student and have a major problem: being able to simply sit down and get work done. I can set aside a day to work, whether it is homework or contract work, and I will be lucky to have an hour done before dinner time. The only time I can actually get solid work done seems to be after midnight under a lot of pressure (ie. a deadline the next day). This has led to too many 5 a.m. nights and turning down too many invitations to go out only to stay in and accomplish nothing. I have stopped playing games, stopped watching TV, tried reading the Seven Habits book, and am currently seeing what classical music does for me. I don't think I have ADHD, and I am not sure what else to try. If it is computer work, the web is always a click away, and I can always escape to my imagination. I know many of you will have had the same problem. Can anyone please give advice on how to overcome this problem, be it a little trick, medication, or anything else?"
Exercise would be my first recommendation. It will keep your sleep habits in line pretty well. Physical activity seems to be what's missing from most of our lives today. If I don't make it to the gym, my schedule will slip quickly to 1AM, 2AM, 4AM...which isn't good since I left college years ago ;-)
The other thing I would recommend is finding a buddy to go do exercise with you. It helps if you're both accountable to each other for showing up. And just having someone to do it with you doesn't hurt. This carries over to work as well.
I'd imagine you sit there thinking about a million things, but you can't concentrate on what you need to do because it seems like you can put it off. The later, you wind up with many things to do and little time. You get a bunch of work done at this point, but there's so much you have trouble keeping up with it. I had the very same problem in college.
Another thing that might help you is getting a job a couple hours a week. As long as I've had something constant to do, it's kept me going. Just don't get something that follows you home...go there, do your work and then head to class or do some homework.
Honestly, part of it is just sheer will as well. You have to resist the urge to just read a page and put stuff down. Set a bedtime for yourself and a wake up time for yourself and follow them.
That's about the best advice I can give you. If you do have some mental disorder such as ADHD only a psychologist can diagnose it. Although many times it's over diagnosed.
At the very least you should visit a professional therapist and have them give you a psychiatric evaluation. He/she can diagnose your problem--maybe you're just a really bad procrastinator--and perhaps prescribe some medication, if necessary.
Read this for more information about A.D.D. : ADD Foundation
And go buy this book, if you're interested: Driven to Distraction
Homestarrunner.net -- It's Dot Com!
Seriously, get your surfing out the way first thing in the morning. Then sit down and code. It's not hard. If you can't hack that, learn to love coffee. My record is 55 hours of straight coding. What's yours?
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
canuck-
I'm a university student as well and as you can see (I'm sitting on slashdot) I have some of the same issues. However there have been some shining examples of good behavior on my part, and here are what I think are some of the apparent factors/causes:
a. social proof, i.e. studying with a bunch of people
b. meaning, a meaningful purpose
c. distractions, lack thereof, i.e. lack of other things to think about
Examples with causes:
-studying in the basement of the library (a, c)
-studying for imminent test or other grade-altering material (b, and possibly a)
-studying for something that will be applicable to some upcoming event i.e. work (b, and possibly a)
-studying for something that is less dreadful than what I should *really* be studying (b, c)
-studying at a coffeehouse, with ambient-type music like classical or trance (a, c)
*****
Other notes:
Speaking of coffee, I highly recommend coffee for the few hours that I seem to get out of it, really studying.
Something else I've found useful to keep my mind focused is to bring a notepad which I designate as a "worry pad." When I think of something, like, gee, I should do laundry or pay bills, I just write it on the pad so that I can focus on studying.
I find it helpful to like what I am studying. If I currently don't like it, I try to find a way to like it. If I can't find a way to like it, I begin to consider studying something else....
Or maybe this problem of not being able to study is not a problem as a gift. Perhaps studying as much as some others at your school is not your idea of fun and you can try pursuing something that seems more fun to you (without studying).
Quit reading Slashdot.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
You're a typical college student... that's all you have.. =P I find locking myself in a study room or a library without any electronics extremely helpful. I usually do this for 8-9 hours straight, bringing food, pillow, and stuff that allows me to be perfectly comfortable. In the meantime, I will slowly, but eventually finish studying or homework... If you don't think you can do it, you can always join a buddy program and get someone to do it with you!
I'm not the devil.. just his advocate.
It'll save you all kinds of time...
-- Alastair
I humbly suggest the elimination of the motivational-pointers dept.
disipline..
If you REALLY like what you do, you will be more interested in doing it than surfing, you won't procrastinate, etc. If you're not excited about what you're doing (and I mean so excited that you can't WAIT to jump on your latest project) you might wanna consider choosing another field.
Denver Isuzu Suzuki
I use rewards for my self, as stupid as it sounds.
Like today, I have to write some thankyou cards, and fill out some rebate forms. So, I promised my self that after I do that, I'm gonna go to walmart and spend 20$ on something fun and/or stupid!
It turns out I was depressed. I used to just aimlessly drag boxes across my desktop, lost in my imagination. Maybe not getting work done is just a symptom of a bigger problem. Just a though.
ender-iii
when i had to study for an exam, or do some work that didn't require the computer, i would use it as an opportunity to defrag my HDDs. keeps you away from the computer/web/games and might just force you to get osmething done.
I have the same problem. I wonder how many other young geeks are in the same boat?
Exercise is an excellent suggestion, and I find it keeps me on an even keel. I walk 24 miles a week.
But what really motivates me are what-if scenarios about if I lose my job, my house, my wife, my family. I can't relax and forget how horrible it would be to lose what I have worked so hard to get.
Turn off the internet and any other PC distractions and close the door. Just put on some quiet relaxing background music that wont distract you and then just work.
unless you're a plant or something. You'll have more energy and more free time, and you can party all night long. Just sleep as soon as you get home, wake up refreshed without need of an alarm, and go to work halfway through your day.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
but I got distracted by China building a 10 Teraflop computer in the next article down. ;-)
Convince yourself the work is fun. I was a political science major and I was actually interested in the stuff, about history and global economics; how the world really works; war and peace.
i find that most college subjects are at least partially interesting... so be glad you are learning instead of watching some mindless drivel on the tele.
take interesting classes, learn to look on the bright side of it.
Well, first I check /. and see if there is anything interesting. Then I surf around and check the various blogs and newsites I read. After that I check /. again and maybe post a comment to an interesting article.
/. journal (which everyone should read, cuz it is full of wierd bullshit). Then I surf some more. That is how I get my w........
If, while I am surfing around, I find something cool I post a link to it to me
Never mind.
- -
Are you an SF Fan? Are you a Tru-Fan?
Pretend every night is 4 hours away from the big exam or the big paper, since that appears to be the time when you get everything done. Just don't pretend that you're handicapped or something.
Obviously I had similar problem, unless I am under presure and there is some form of danger, I hardly get the work done. I have find out that I can get it done also when I am angry. I think it has something to do with the adrenalin in blood. So I can get on 'adrenalin rush' somehow and then do a 3 days of work in few hours. The downside is you get burnt out feeling for few days afterwards.
The way how you raise adrenalin in your blood may vary, try whats best for you.
If programs would be read like poetry, most programmers would be Vogons.
I was just going through this about a week ago. I started taking some supplements twice daily and I've been able to work all day for the last couple days non-stop. I also exercise, which helps quite a bit. The supplements I'm taking are:
Tyrosine - 100mg twice a day
Grape Seed Extract - 200mg once a day
Magnesium Citrate - 800mg a day
Ginko Biloba - 120mg twice a day
My concentration has improved dramatically, so I suggest it's work a shot. Don't sue me if you have an allergic reaction and die from any of those supplements, though.
I'm ACing this just so it isn't linked to my name. Apologies.
Exercise, like the first poster suggested, didn't do squat for me. Of course, each person is different, but you sound a lot like the way I used to be. A *lot* alike.
What worked for me? Wellbutrin and/or Effexor. I wasn't depressed, and I really wasn't an ADD type. Although I kind of thought I might have been ADD.
All of the sudden, I went from someone who was capable of doing things to someone who actually WAS doing things. I was balancing my freakin' checkbook, which I hadn't done in ages because it was too much trouble. I was getting stuff done, getting things knocked out of the way. It was incredible.
I personally think it was overstimulation. Computer games, television, the Internet, college, everything was so exciting. To sit down and do something that I was capable of but just had little interest in was really next to impossible for some reason. I just couldn't lock my brain in on it.
I seem to have a bit of the same problem as you when it comes to programming... I sit down, start to code, and at the first problem I encounter, I just load up mozilla and lose myself for hours... I have found a solution tho, I un-plug my cable modem! seriously! Then I resume coding... sometimes I find myself opening mozilla only to find there's no internet connection so I continue coding
I don't know what you should do in college, but it will get a lot easier once you get a job in a real office. It's FAR easier to concentrate when you get dressed and go to work every day -- your brain KNOWS that it's time to work, and you will actually do it. You need a good way to seperate your dorm/web surfing life from your homework/contract work life. If you find the answer, tell us; I'm sure that we'll be interested!
I am very familiar with your problem, and the thing I'd recommend is getting a decent amount of physical exercise. I always find it easier to concentrate on schoolwork (or any other work) after 30-45 minutes of running and a shower.
:)
The biggest problem is motivation. Often when I don't feel like working, I definitely don't feel like exercising either
Give yourself rewards. Make some of your usual things (going to a move, etc) a rewards. You'll only get that new pair of headphones if you manage to finish the term paper this weekend. That way, you get artificial pressure.
:-) I always spend time dicking around playing with new features when I should be doing work if I'm writing a paper. Seriously, if you're working away, absolutely restrict yourself from learning new features of the software you're using properly. Do the bare minimum in research to get whatever it is working properly, and get back to work.
Eliminate distractions.
Don't use Linux or LaTeX.
Don't browse your usual news sites. You can only run across something to sidetrack you. Slashdot is really bad about this. Avoid Slashdot comments like the plague.
Get interested in what you're doing. Most schoolwork actually *is* kind of nifty, but if you're treating it as torture, it will be.
Only eat snacks/pizza/whatever when you're doing work. Good way to get yourself in a mood of enjoying homework.
May we never see th
First thing to start getting your work done: QUIT READING THE FRIGGIN /.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
You're going to ask /. for medical advice? Holy cow. Go see a psychiatrist, explain the situation. My doctor heard that caffeine helped me focus and immediately had useful suggestions.
Go out there and get some professional advice. Quickly. You have a five hour deadline for this task.
Sometimes I have one of the little kids inside starving for something, and it won't let me do anything else until it's satisfied.
The way out for me is to vary my activities between physical, emotional, intellectual, spiritual, family, etc. (or however you slice this for yourself).
Trying to keep some balance between these aspects of my life keeps me out of the rut.
But, I still get into the rut sometimes when I get out of balance. That's life.
Just stop being a child and do your work. Then you can play.
Gotta learn how to be an adult sooner or later, might as well be now.
No this isn't meant to be a troll, its just reality. Use a crutch now, always use a crutch. Its time to grow up dude.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I'd start with not setting aside an entire day for work, that's just overwhelming
...) in terms of how much of the
for anyone. When you start by telling yourself "I'm going to work all day" you
are probably going to fail because just the sheer length of the day and magnitude
of what you have to get done can become overwhelming.
The key to fixing your problem is probably to make the tasks in front of you not
seem so overwhelming through a number of techniques. I sympathize with your plight
because as a student myself I had a hard time initially, but it's worth knowing
that over time your ability to work hard for longer will improve... like so many
other things it's a question of practice.
Music may or may not help you, that seems to be a very personal thing. I can't
stand to have music while I work (because I want to listen to it and not work)
but have a colleague who has music on (low volume) all the time. Personally I
have found that the quiet droning voices on NPR help keep my mind on the job and
if something I really do care about comes on it's a little welcome break from
what I am doing.
You might also find that some other non-work activities actually bring more focus
when you are working. If you go to a gym, run or do some other physical exercise
I've found that it has a great effect on concentrating the mind. If you are
drinking a lot of caffeine laden drinks while working you might find that cutting
back enables you to concentrate more because you are not overstimulated by caffeine.
But specifically...
1. Prioritize the work
Sit down and make a list of all the tasks that you have to get done. I use a
real paper notebook for that sort of thing because it's satisfying to cross them
off as you go.
Once you've made the list order them (1, 2, 3,
job you'll get done, or how hard they are to do. If you knock off a few hard
tasks at the start when you are more focused you'll start to feel better and the
smaller tasks coming later will seem less overwhelming. (I think in the Seven
Habits book this is "Put first things first"---but really it's commonsense, if
you get out of the way the stuff you are dreading doing you'll feel better and
get more done).
For example, right now I am working on the test suite for my open source project
and it's *boring*, *long* and *hard*. But I've got a list and slowly by slowly
I'm seeing progress.
One reason that lists can be problematic is if you write down all the tasks and
realize that you haven't got enough time... hence the next topic...
2. Set yourself some goals
It's important to take your list and set some goals. "I'm going to finish
task X by lunch". Then try to stick to them. If you find yourself unable to
stick to the goals and timings then go back and replan. You'll have a better
idea of how long the task is going to take and that will motivate you more...
Thinks "If I finish Y tonight, then tomorrow I'll just need to do A, B and C"
3. Reward yourself
I've found that stopping my main tasks and doing a little other task that I
find interesting is a good way to keep the motivation up. For example, I'll
have a goal "finish X" and when I've done it I'll stop and do something unrelated
which I enjoy.
For example on my open source project I have this long boring test suite to write,
each time I complete a task I work on a fun task associated with the performance
of the project. You can do something similar which means you actually praise
yourself through a reward for going something done.
4. Eat well
Nothing like being hungry to screw things up. Eat good food, stop for meals and
eat them.
Good luck,
John.
I try to break a task down into smaller chunks. And try to set deadlines for the chunks.
I know where you're coming from, I'm also a university student and am about to enter my final year. So far I leave it till the night before and pull an all-nighter. I'm averaging a 2:2, just by doing this method. I'm sure I can graduate with at least a 2:1 if only I'd get my head down.
Something I've recently discovered is that I don't get work done due to distractions, like you say the web. What I now do, if I need to read a book is go to the library. Its full of ppl doing work, so you're in an environment of work without the distraction of computers (if you go to a floor without them). The only distraction I've found in my university are the views, some lovely views over Hull, UK. ahh, well I have gotten work/revision done before the deadline by making use of the library.
Good luck with your studies.
The first thing is to make sure you've eaten something healthy with carbohydrates (brain fuel) and low fat.
Secondly, make a todo list that's broken down into smaller task (i.e. not 2 big tasks but maybe 10 small ones) and keep crossing then off, this way you see the project moving forward.
Third, space you caffeine out, too much can make you jumpy and you loose your concentration.
Fourth, try some supplements like Natural Factors PS IQ Memory it may help.
Finally, when all else fails leave the room and go for a walk, avoid surfing Slashdot, it corrupts the mind!
An exploration of mixology, spirits and bartending.
You can try two things at the same time: Diet and self-hypnosis.
With diet, eliminate sugar & caffeine. Add lots of vegetables. Supplement with fish oils which are like a brain boost. Once I changed my diet around I started thinking clearer and my concentration improved.
With self-hypnosis (either by yourself or with a trained professional) you can train yourself to increase concentration and, more importantly, block out distractions, including distractions from your own mind.
In the end, the most likely cause of your procrastination is because you don't want to be doing what you must do. If you can find a way to better enjoy the work you've been assigned, then you'll find that you can sit down and work on it with ease.
If all else fails (and it shouldn't, as you're the one in control) unplug your network connection, and get someone to check up on you every hour to make sure you're not just sitting there sharpening your pencils or something.
Thanks so much for posting this, I will read the replies you get with great interest. I remember back in times before I had net access. I just seemed to get a lot more done. Now it's always irc or surf. The other day, the net was down all night, and I sat down and got totally immersed in an interesting book. Felt great. Oh well.
you'd be amazed at what getting rid of a global distraction can do :)
Okay, snorting ritalin isn't for everyone, but it helps. I also reccomend exercise as a way to focus your mind. It's effects are hard to explain, but ever since I started biking i've found a tuned body helps the mind. (Sounds like new age shit but, hey, it works.)
Also try downtempo music, much like what you can find on SomaFM
Recursive (adj.): see 'Recursive'
Exercise every day or two, eat well, go to the library to study, unplug your network connection, enrich yourself with essays and articles you find interesting, and do creative things (paint, write, draw, whatever).
Being an effective worker has mainly to do with what you don't do when you are working because there's much less separation between the "personal" and the "work" spheres than people seem to think.
Online citizen journalism from the inner city: The View From The Ground
I have similar problems working in areas I just don't much care about. If you are working on something you really like, the Internet and such won't be a distraction, because they aren't as much fun as your schoolwork. Try some different fields. Maybe you'll have better luck studying history or biology than CS.
For me, it is philosophy. I still love to hack when the opportunity presents itself. But as for CS as an academic discipline... since I discovered philosophy I've never looked back.
What's good for the syndicate is good for the country. --Milo Minderbinder
by someone else
Ditch the TV. :)
I don't have one, and I'm still breathing.
People discover the meaning of life between getting piss drunk and the following hangover.
I recently went back to school via an online university (The one that's named after a mythical bird...) and one of the first classes was identifying your personal learning habits. Take a look at yourself and your personal habits. Are you a morning person or a night owl? Like to have background music/noise, or do you like the quiet? Identify these things, then build your study enviroment around them. You'll do yourself more harm than good if you try to work/study in an enviroment that isn't what your mind likes to have around it. The book we used was Peak Learning by Ronald Gross, ISBN # 0-87477-957-X. I'd suggest picking one up and spending a few days going through the excercises in it, it helped me both in my study and work habits.
Face it - either you will exercise some self dicipline and do the work when you need to or you will fail to do so.
This may sound rude and/or offensive, but it is coming from somebody who went from a barely passing D student to a 4.0 gpa. How? By deciding to exercise the self discipline necessary to study before anything else.
Going to miss a party? Too bad.
Going to miss a tv show or sports game? Record it.
Either you will decide studying is important enough for you to exercise the self discipline to study or you will be a poor student. There is no middle ground.
Apparently, it seems that some people are actually working.
Life can be sometimes scary. I will head back to bed so i won't be traumatized any more minute.
Pelops
You may be overwhelmed by the size of the task ahead of you. One way to help is to set a series of intermediate goals. So you say, "within the next hour I will have the data structures defined" or "by 9 pm I will have coded up the main input routine."
Then you can promise yourself that once that is done, you will give yourself X amount of time to goof off, surf the web, ask questions on slashdot, etc. Then it's back to the next goal. Or you can say that if you finish the goal early, then you will allow yourself to play for the unused time...if you fool around too much in the middle, you won't get the free time allowance.
This gives you a sense of accomplishment as you realize you have done *something* and you don't spend mental time stressing over your lack of results so far. Don't worry too much about trying to balance each goal to be the same amount of time, etc. just make it something that shows good forward progress.
Now of course setting goals takes time, so it will cost you some time to do this...but the overall result should be more productivity given the work habits you describe. The shorter the time period for the each goal (i.e. is it half a day's work or 15 minutes' work) then the lower your "work to planning" ratio is, but for some things you may really need to do some microplanning to get going.
You also should try to identify what part of the work you find the hardest to get done. For example when I am writing code I find actually typing in the code the first time to be the hardest part...I can design the algorithm/etc OK, and then once I have the first version typed in I can get it compiling no problem, then debugging is a cool mental challenge. But the part where I just type in all the variable declarations and for loops and whatnot is the hardest to avoid procrastinating during.
So if you can figure that out, then you can focus on getting over that hump (set goals of the shortest duration during that time).
- adam
Discipline
The Internet is full. Go Away!!!
The other thing to do is make lists of small segments, if you procrastinate. This will force you to work more steadily. Yes I'm a procrastinator too, and this works.
The last thing to do is get out of the house and go somewhere where there are NO distractions. Not Borders or Barnes and Nobles, but the local law school library, where nothing interests you and everybody else is working hard.
My 2 cents worth.
..........FULL STOP.
As many out there, I have the same problem (major case of procrastination). However, I sometimes get the job done. Generally, the problem does not lie when working: the problem is getting started. Once I'm studying or working on a project (be it code, report, etc.), I generally enter "the zone" and I am able to work for 3-4 hours straight at an amazing pace. So what you want to do is get over the preparation phase and get started the earlier possible. Find something interesting fast in what you have to do.
Another tip: when studying, do not just read a book. Take notes.
so you have problems getting important stuff done in time alotted. no health problems. college student. i've got it!
quit crying! use this thing called willpower. its kind of like a diet. it wont work unless you dedicate yourself to it. same thing. make yourself do it. quit cheating. and dont bore people with your lack of willpower.
I used to drink a lot of pop (or SODA if you call it that ;) and eat lot's of candy ect. i cut back on pop and drink lot's of water + a little caffine never hurts.. anywya all in all i can work much better. also i beleave that people with "add" are just used to concentrating on what they like (ie trained from tv (switch channels to whatever you want) radio .. really anywhere you go. i mean think about it.. possibly anyway good luck and just keep at it.. your not alone and ritilen does NOT work or whatever it's called now (i have friend's who've tried that some for years but nothing changes except it keeps your mind occupied? or something to the effect you don't go wow look at this ie it's anti tv ect..) hope you read this + something here helps.. good luck!
If i was you, you'd be me and we wouldn't be having this conversation
The exercise suggestion above is a good one and then you just have to find how you work best. If you are only productive after 11 pm then at least make good use of the rest of the day. Don't waste it on /., games or TV.
Lasers Controlled Games!
do what I did one time when my dealine was 2 days away and I thought it was impossible to get some projects done, I had a friend come over to take my DSL modem and cables away. that way i had no surfing but pure hardcore computer work just on the good ol' comp. I usually do work faster with just the radio on and it works fine for me, but I too had that problem with having the web just a click away. So i recommend doing it cold turkey style. Permanently cut yourself off from the web before starting a project or lock yourself in a room with just the computer (and radio if it helps you concentrate much like it does for me). AND REMOVE GAMES FROM YOUR COMPUTER TOO!!!
As others have mentioned take care of the sleep and exercise. My body tells me that my development efforts (or anything creative) happens best in the evening and never in the mid-afternoon. Not everyone has this luxury, but I don't even consider hitting the editor before 8pm. Also consider that there is a lead time for maximum creativity. If possible, schedule uninterrupted time that includes a ramp up period. In the long run, conforming your schedule to your body rhythms yields the most productivity.
No, really. It helps.
It also helps to "remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy", Exodus 20:8. Whether it be Saturday, Sunday or some other day, I believe the important thing is to have the day once a week and to actually share time with God on that day, and to refrain from working on that day. Very important for the peace of mind and concentration. (I have found this very different from just "remember to rest".)
Remember, the Law is for our own good, not because God just happened to decide it should be so.
I have a major problem: being able to simply sit down and get work done. Can anyone please give advice on how to overcome this problem?
Simple. Get caught.
There's nothing more motivating than getting a warning about your performance, particularly if it's coupled with the boss making subtle remarks that prove they know exactly how much surfing you've been doing.
Turned my work around, I can tell you.
If you're on Slashdot, it's possible you have Information Addiction, as recently discussed here on Slashdot. It's sorta like ADHD in some of the symptoms. Anyway, if you do think it applies to you, you're not alone. I'll often plan ahead to get something done, have full intention of doing it and plenty of time, but it just doesn't happen. I always find something "more productive" to do. Writing a paper is hard when you decide you have to read all about the IRC RFC.
I used to suffer from this problem REAL BAD. Like you, I could not get anything done, even if I locked myself in my office for the whole day. The Internet, MP3's, TV, whatever was available served as a distraction. I purchased countless books on procrastination, all of the "PUMP YOURSELF UP" motivator books, asked other people for advice, etc. Nothing worked. Then one day, I don't even remember how, I came up with a system that worked. Each time I had a project to work on, I would sit down the night before and develop a plan. 1) I break down each of the major tasks needed to be completed. 2) Under each task, I break down all of the subsections that needed to be completed 3) Under each subsection, I fill in the details that needed to be done (sometimes in paragraph form). 4) After everything is listed, I go back through and assign time guidlines. When I follow this, it works out great. I think the whole problem is that sometimes a big project like writing a term paper is just overwhelming. Rather than trying to figure out where to begin and what to do, it's easier just to click onto your browser of choice and say "I'll do it later". When everything is listed and broken down into little sections, the project isn't as overwhelming. Just a bunch of 'little projects' that need to be done. I'm not if this will work for you, but it makes things MUCH easier for me. Good Luck
The instant you think of something that you need to do, immediately begin doing it. If you are at college, you should have a constant barrage of things. Do not bother trying to organize your time beyond the classes you must attend and meals you must eat. If you follow my advice correctly, you should be busy constantly.
The problem you are having is that you have many things to do. Sitting around worrying which to work on first is just a waste of time. Which did you think of first? Work on that one until you make significant progress, then switch to whatever you thought of next. Constant calculations about how to make yourself more efficient by prioritizing tasks drain your energy and increase your stress, while using my 'work whenever you think about work' method will get things done.
If you get distracted between the time you think of something you need to do and the time it takes to start doing it, you have the attention span of a hamster. I would warn you that you can make up all sorts of excuses for this, like attention deficit disorder, all the while insisting that you are intelligent (which may be true). But being intelligent is only the potential to do things - nobody will care that you are intelligent if you are too unfocused to use your mind. Lack of accomplishment equals lack of capability in most people's minds.
Concentrate. Stay busy. Start now.
dictionary.
That is probably your biggest problem. When in school, I never got work done at home, too many distractions! The best thing to do if you want to get some serious studying done, go to the library or form a study group (yeah, nerdy as hell but think of the nice big salary you're working towards in a few years).
Think of school as a job, a shitty paying job but a job nonetheless, and make set hours every day that you'll dedicate to work. Sneak in lunchtimes and breaks as well or you'll burn out in a couple of hours. It'll get you into a routine that'll ultimately end up in that nice piece of paper that's your ticket to big bucks (hopefully!).
It doesn't get any better in the real world either, I have a hard time getting motivated even though I know I'm getting paid for it!
'Code' can be a plural. Therefore, the sentence was correct.
Marxist evolution is just N generations away!
Motivation and desire. You have to want to do this work more than you want to do all those other things- TV, web, snacking, whatever, because otherwise the work can't beat them.
This is a basic psychological thing and we all go through it; it's one thing for your outer lobes to realise that the work is important but it's another thing to make your brain stem choose the unpleasant and boring thing over the fun and interesting thing.
I don't think locking yourself away from all distractions is the answer either, because you can still daydream. I think you just need to try to find ways to make the work more interesting and stimulating.
I've had projects where I've worked until 6AM, gone to bed and tried to sleep but after 10 minutes just got up again and went back to my workstation because all I wanted to do was work on this project. That's how to beat the distractions.
Build your own website - full service homepage system your m
Okay, I'm sure that will get posted a hundred times, but here are some other ideas:
At least those are some of my ideas. Also, finding some way or time to calm down and reflect on life helps to. This can be when you exercise, or do your journal, or go to church (if you're into that sort of thing). Point it, every now and then you'll need to stop and remember why it is you want to be productive.
While you will probably get a lot of trolls responding to this, a good work ethic is important and not easily gained. It's something a lot of us could use improvement on.
Who said Freedom was Fair?
I alway outline my big tasks a make a list of things that have to be done. You don't have to do "8 hours of homework" you have to read these three chapters, write a paper, and *blah*. So you list those tasks on paper and do them one at a time.
Using the list you can visually see your progress, you can see the whole "task" laid out, and you have predefined times to take breaks (i.e. I can read slashdot after I read chapter 12).
Easy, and it works.
After I got a subscription to an ISP back in 1997, I noticed that my productivity went down with regards to music composition and production. It was quite a shock to me since I'd always been able to come up with new things almost every day. Then, at one point, I was reading the online diary of one of my favorite musicians (Ryuichi Sakamoto) and he noted that ever since he started using the web, he'd become less productive. He suggested that it was a combination of the distraction it provides, the wealth of information that exists as it relates to your own personal interests and the "six degrees" nature of most web content that leads you from one of your interests to another. His personal approach was to schedule time that he was allowed to use the web. After reading this, I applied this approach to my own life by completely removing the ability of my audio production system to do anything on the Internet. It can only share files and mount other shares on my LAN, but that's it. This could be done in a number of ways. So, if you have more than one machine, I'd suggest that you dedicate one to being your development machine and leave off any ability to access the web. It's worked for me, although I will say, that if you catch yourself spending less time at the "development" machine, you might want to check your web usage vs. your productivity.
Un-news
...but keep a written list of activities and items you need to do for that day. By writing your 'To Do's' on a piece of paper (instead of typing it on your computer), you'll reinforce the idea that things have to get done. Paste up that list on your monitor, and as you accomplish a task, cross thru the item (don't erase). By seeing what you have accomplished, you will be further motivated to getting the other items done. Prioritize your work, and don't try to get everything done in one day. If that doesn't help, and you really want to kill some time, read my toon. :)
The PC Weenies: 11 Years of Online Tech 'Too
Yes, seriously. My answer is "don't read this". You're asking how to stop wasting time on the internet, but you ask the question on the one site that probably wastes more geek time than anything else.
This answer is probably five or six pages down the list of replies, so if you're reading this answer, you've already wasted way too much time here.
(Spudley Strikes Again!)
I would recommend pyDance or Stepmania for exercise in a fun, hasslefree and open source flavor.
You just need a dance mat and a PSX2PC adapter to start. You can do it at home, you can start on a slow and easy level and get better while seeing the success in your scores and a half hour can easily get your shirt soaked with sweat.
Jan
I've found that burning the network cable helps. Be mindful of the smoke, though, as it may have some undesired hallucinogenic effects.
Marxist evolution is just N generations away!
-Certain foods make me unproductive; the only one I've positively identified: pancakes. -Electronic music helps me stay focused, while any music with lyrics scatters my thinking. -Finding the right combination of things to do at once helps me. If the other "side tasks" are at least educational, I see them as non-harmful at worst, even if they're not directly related to the task at hand.
Argue for your limitations, and sure enough, they're YOURS. -Richard Bach
Hey man- I feel you're pain. I'm a university student who had, and in many ways still have the same problem. Personally, I feel it's from just the nature of society today. There's too much f-ing stuff always around us. It's hard to get any direction. Don't let people make you think you have a problem, that it can be solved by medicine or that you have ADD or whatever. What you need is discipline. That's the stuff we don't get enough of these days, really. What you have to do is really just take some time in your life to not just acomplish something, but to really get away from everything so that you can put it into prespective. Me personally? I did alot of volunteering, often in far away, hard-on-the-body type of places. You should try volunteering in a refugee camp in yugoslavia or diggin wells in africa for a summer. I know people will think it's crazy, but before you can get discipline, you really need prespective to understand where you stand in the world and in you're life. hey, it certianlly won't hurt. Other than that, try you're local soup kitchen, or try habitat for humanity. I bet you'll find building houses every weekend really centering. I know maybe it sounds crazy, but lots of people have these sorts of problems these days. It's bascially the penalty for living in such a succesfull opulent society.
Step one: The ability to do work best only under pressure is a dead end. Learn to create the feeling of urgency for yourself by giving yourself artificial deadlines or goals.
Step Two: Batch, Block, and Backbone. Batch similar activities together and keep them prioritized. Block out designated time to do the activities. Have the backbone to not let other activies invade your designated time slot for what you are doing.
Jay
Proudliberals.com
well might i suggest alcohol, or thc, if legal in your area, coding while drunk (not piss drunk) or stoned (not trippin off your ass) can b fun, and you can accualy come up with some pretty intresting work arounds, just be sure to comment the hell out of your code, so you can figure out later what the fuck you were doing. and another plus is once you start codeing, while un-sober, a few clicks seems like too much work, its much easier to just position your wireless keyboard in a comftrable position, sit back and let the code flow. mice + drugs dont mix.
Noone writes jokes in base 13!
I found that I would try to do way too much in one day. I would tell myself I would do everything tomorrow in one project. You can break everything up into projects, but also it helps if you break the projects up over time. So say I have Project A, B, C to do. I would split them up into sub parts, and do something like the following: Monday A1, B1, C1. Tuesday A2, B2, C2. Etc. The key is to not over work it to or you get sick of it. If you finish all of Monday, try to do something completely different, and don't just move onto Tuesday to try to get ahead. I found myself doing A1-3, then I couldn't do 4-5 for days later cause I was just sick of it.
i know about that problem, I had to setup a second box that runs instant messaging, irc and my emailclient in order not to get distracted all the time by e-friends looking for a chat while i should be working. If i catch myself refreshing Slashdot every two minutes for over half an hour or spending too much time finding a wallpaper, i just go home and try to get some sleep. I try to work in blocks of three hours, take a halfhour surfbreak and so on... That keeps the focus sharp for me...
bada bing
Really, you can try all the tricks in the world but it really boils down to being able to be disciplined enough to focus on the task at hand.
I am a college professor and have had similar problems through college and graduate school, but when push came to shove, I just buckled down and got the work done when it was required.
For non-computer related studies, I would recommend going to the library or a place where it is quiet and there are few distractions. Of course, stay away from the damned computers!
For computer-related stuff, don't bother with all the suggestions about unplugging the ethernet, routing slashdot to localhost etc... you will always be able to circumvent your own barriers. Just FOCUS dammit! Meditation, breathing exercises, etc. may help, as well as soft music - although for some this can be a distraction.
I was never able to pull off the all-nighters; my body just isn't made for it. So I would always get my major studying done during the day and early evening. Staying up late just wasn't an option for me because my brain would shut down after midnight.
One tangential point. It worked for me anyway: when studing for a test, do you major studying up to, but not beyond, *two days* before the test. Spend the day before the test going over the highlights of the material, but don't cram the day before. This always worked best for me. I think it's because it allowd material to enter my longer-term memory where it stuck.
A squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag is fast and bulbous, got me?
Geez, don't read the Seven Habits. Covey's trademarked[tm] every other[tm] word, pretty[tm] much. Additionally, even Covey admits he does everything he can to convert you to his religion.
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
I'm serious. It's what all the hard workers at my boarding school did, and they're all at Ivy League schools now. Just go to your health center and fake having ADD. It's pretty easy. Nothing will make you concentrate as well. Look on Google for more info.
I split my life into about four parts:
School
Work
Research (mental masturbation)
Friends/Games
Games are now gone, as well as most of my friends. I learned to quit taking my work home no matter how fun it is. School follows me home like a stray dog and doesn't take a hint.
While I'm in summer classes I quite #3, or during exams and presentations.
For all of this I'm still in your shoes, so I'm not being much help am I?
The major thing I have to do to do work is put aside slashdot.org.... sounds funny, but it is true... I started to spend a lot of time reading comments, and news about the site.... and other sites like it: macslash, linuxtoday, etc...
This might sound ludicrous to those who live off of caffeine, but I've found caffeine absolutely has a completely detrimental effect on my ability to get work done. I become panicky, nervous and confused, and I can't keep a clear train of thought.
This certainly does not apply to everyone, but may to you.
Ever heard of APD? (Avoidant Personality Disorder)
:)
This is one of about twelve well-known and described and generally accepted personality disorders that some people suffer from who describe the same symptoms that you do.
Avoiding difficult/painful/stressful jobs that you actually need to do and want to get done, but keep avoiding.
Perhaps you don't "qualify" for all of the traits "necessary" to have the disorder, but you may still have recurring patterns in your life that are common to this disorder.
What I found very helpful, informative and insight-giving is "Cognitive therapy for personality disorders: a schema-focused approach" by J. Young.
He analyses the schemas (patterns) in the lives of people with -among other things- Avoidant Personality Disorder and describes how to handle them.
Even if you don't want to read it, I thought this would give you some clues about what to google for
I make lists all during the day of what I need to do. Mark off any finished with notes. Very important!!! Before you quit for the day review your list(s) of things to do and then make a list for the next day. When you start the next day you'll have task 1,2,3 ... etc. ready to get your head back into the project.
Seriously, I go to work and pop open Slashdot to begin the day with a dose of nerd news, and by the time I've finished all the articles and replied where I felt it necessary, its time to go home. I never get anything done.
As for your sig, tho... I'm going to have to take the other side. Go, Goldilocks!
If it's computer related, you need to take a look at your life.
Likely, you can just say, "Fuck it all." and continue not doing any work. Years of heavy mental labor for a tech support job ain't worth it, dude - Switch to a useful degree, like Liberal Arts or something.
a cable tv tuner on your video card. ;)
As the first poster says, get excercise.
And stop reading slashdot or any other blog leading up to the time your deadline!
Easy enough for me to say. I can't even do it myself.
That's all.
Unplug your network cable, move to a place with no IP connectivity, put on some music, and get concentrating.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
Break up the task into small time pieces. Make agreements with yourself, such as:
1. I'll work for 30 minutes when I first wake up, then I'll have breakfast. (This one is important because it gets you "connected" with your task right away.)
2. I'll work for 45 minutes, then I get to play for 15 minutes.
I've found that by setting _time_ goals rather than _milestone_ goals I eliminate most of the pressure. Keep your time goals relatively short. If you're making progress, you can work longer, but you've *already* achieved your intermediate time goal (positive reinforcement). We all know that projects usually take much longer than we originally expect, so it's important to measure the success of each time-slice *not* by whether you've finished a certain segment of your task, but rather by whether you've made good use of the time (i.e. stayed on-task).
Lastly: get your eyes checked. Make sure to tell the "eye-care professional" that you need to be able to read *comfortably* for 8+ hours per day. If your eyes get tired it's easier to become distracted.
I wish I had figured this out when I was in school.
that occasionally work:
- I set KAlarm (the KDE reminder) to pop-up frequently (every 10-15 minutes) to remind me of something that I must have done soon or simply to bug me. The result: Surfing the web, playing games and watching movies becomes less pleasant since I'm constantly reminded that I shouldn't be doing it. When I need to work at the computer it obviously distracts me from working too but on the other hand then I just click it and don't feel guilty of doing something that I shouldn't (and actually even feel satisfied that I'm doing what I should).
- In addition to KAlarm I might put a note or a book that I should read somewhere where I'm forced to see it if I try to eg. watch TV. Again: It reminds me of what I should do.
- I count the hours wasted on doing nothing useful, when I notice that they're >5 it bothers me a lot and hopefully pressures me to waste less time.
In conclusion: I have pretty much the same problem as you do - until it's too late I can't prioritize tasks.
All this takes is discipline. There is no real secret to this. We are not talking just deciding to do things better, we are talking about actually making a shift in how you focus on your goals. I hate to say it, but it will mostly come with maturity. All you need to do is decide, "It is time to get serious about this all. I will do my work now and not put it off for later, I will not procrastinate, I will not surf the net or play doom or anything, I will get my computer work done." It just takes some dedication and dicipline.
Sorry, I know you are looking for that magic pill that is the solution for this, but there isn't one. This just takes a shift in the fundamental way that you see your priorities.
RonB
It is human nature to take shortcuts in thinking.
I have always had a hard time not thinking about multiple things at the same time, I think it comes on par with being a serious computer geek. Something that seemed to work for me though is to start studying zen. Some of the basic philosophy, and I'm sure I'll get corrected on this, is to be able to focus your mind on one point at a time. I've found, especially with a recent promotion and
heavy workload, that this practice helps both bring calm to my hurried life, and helps my accomplish work one step at a time. Just my $.02
You'd better think twice about this. If you ever want to get Life Insurance or be insured for a preferred rate, get the insurance BEFORE YOU SEE A DOCTOR. Otherwise, in all likelihood you will not ever be able to get life insurance (if they put you on prozac, or the like).
Welcome to the USA, Inc. Run by the corporations for the corporations. Why the fuck should depression or ADD exclude someone from life insurance? I could see adding a clause against suicide (but the law won't let them).
Oh well, just think of the consequences when you cannot insure yourself (and your family) because you cannot motivate yourself to work.
Good luck.
Of course, there are pitfalls here, too. For instance, you may love bumming around for twenty years, get sick of it finally, only to find yourself too dysfunctional to go to school even though you really want to. That would suck. Also, you'll find that the bum's life isn't usually awash in women (or whatever turns you on). Most people (though not all) are looking for less starry-eyed partners.
If you're going to school to please other people (parents?), you might want to sit down and really think about what YOU want out of your life. You only get one, you know. You're not doing anybody any favors spending all that money on something you're only giving a half-assed effort.
kind of
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Everything posters have suggested so far can be summed up in an online resource called Cyborg 101. (Google it, its original source has vanished, but many copies exist.) Written by a one Angus Wong, it reviews various "extreme" studying methods, especially if you're in some kind of academic jeopardy. It's a good, geeky read.
I always think of the old Nike ad campaign when I need to quit procrastinating. I just keep repeating "Just Do It" to myself to get motivated to work on what I've been procrastinating over. It's such a simple slogan. Don't think about what you need to do, just do it. Nobody is going to do your work for you. By putting off doing something you don't want to do you are only prolonging the agony, just do it.
Many universities, at least in the U.S., have a student advice center, or student counseling services. They usually have *free* workshops on time management for students, avoiding procrastination, etc., and I recommend that you try such a workshop. If it's a one-day thing, that's great & can be helpful. If it's more than one-day, or if you can get one-on-one with a student counselor, the help you recieve will be much more effective than random hints from this site---follow-up sessions will allow you to accurately identify which things work for you, what the root causes of your problems are, etc.
/.'ers... You weren't going to tell your friends that you asked us this question, so don't tell them where you're going on Tuesdays at 1:30pm. Tell them it's a date. :-)
I'll admit I only skimmed the comments up to this point, but they seem to center on: better time management (e.g., make reading a part of the work you do before you go home; separate 'work' and 'non-work'; keep a "worry" notepad...), removing distractions, getting regular exercise, and coffee. All these things and more will be addressed in depth in any decent workshop aimed at university students.
BTW, on the exercise thing, no need to spend hours in the gym---and that will stop you from doing work anyway!---it's just to get your blood flowing, so a 15-minute jog in the morning should be fine. And my personal feeling on coffee is that it's great if you're having trouble staying alert, and you need to double your thought rate. But if you are having distracted thoughts, then having twice as many of them isn't what you need right now.
Sure, there's the stigma of going to a counseling center, but compared to accepting advice from quasi-anonymous
And if your university doesn't have this sort of student services, then you should get a better book about personal time management. This "Seven Habits" stuff seems like pop-psychology to me. Well, it might work, but I'd look elsewhere.
zach
I have exactly the same problem you describe. I can sit at the desk, stuff right in front of me, and still end up doing no work for hours. I may surf the net, read mail, pick up a suddenly interesting (but unrelated) book, make coffee, doodle, making suddenly important phonecalls, decide my chair needs reupholstering or whatever.
Only when I am cornered like a frightened rat, with the third extended deadline breathing down my neck, voices screaming at me to get going (no, not in the head; they belong to people hat need my results) and my stress level is high enough to induce cardiac arrest am I able to focus and actually do it.
A partially successful strategy is to put yourself in a situation where you have another, even more important, task to do; this will transform your duties into avoidance activities and will suddenly get done quickly and easily - just witness how clean and well-organized your apartment is after an important deadline. Of course, that does mean the new, hugely important task will be lingering instead.
On the downside, I have never found any way to really solve this. I just put up with failing myself over and over again, putting off stuff I should have done long ago. On the upside, even with such faulty strategies, I have managed to get a Ph.D. - and high blood pressure, jeadaches stomach pains and stress-related mood swings, but hey, you can't have it all.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
It's called 'discipline'. Your parents/teachers/self obviously never instilled it in you. Try this:
* next time you want to 'click that browser' to escape into imagination, don't.
but how will you know not to? You can write that very simple directive down on a postit and stick it to your monitor. A gentle reminder not to do things that are 'not work' - in any form you can create it - is all it takes until you no longer want to skirt the responsibilities.
(yes, it is hard at first, but like anything, with practice, it gets easier.)
> If the DMCA had been thought of 20 years ago, would BIOS have been circumvented?
well, the only problem with this point is the answer is certain. No.
very good example (I think I've seen you have this as your sig for a while, at least, I've seen this sig before).
-pyrrho
I learned a long time ago to pay attention while eating Chinese take-out:
1-Discipline and commitment are the paths to organization and accomplishment.
2-Dedication is a secret weapon and the enemy of distraction.
3-Personal responsibility is not optional.
Pass the noodles.
- if you're struggling within yourself, you're lost. Learn to recognise this mental state (of internal struggle) and drop it immediately.
- instead, look with detachment at the 'lazy' half of the struggle. The more clearly you see it, the less power it will have.
- once the laziness is clearly seen, visualise yourself beginning the task, in detail. You can do this lying in bed or anywhere, but the important thing is to get over the initial hump, and sort out a clear picture of the first steps you need to take.
It's this startup-barrier that's the real problem, but reducing it to a manageable size is just a question of thinking it out clearly (not sweating, exercising, or promising rewards or threats).
I used to have similar problems, and found that a little planning went a long way in keeping me productive.
Start by writing a list of things to do. Include things like laundry, cooking and housework -- not just work.
For complex tasks, write an outline that breaks down what you need to do.
Also, keeping a journal ON PAPER helps. There is a reason why people have been writing down their thoughts for centuries. The journal can be simply a checklist or brief description of what you did.
The journal is the most important part. When you look over a month or week's worth of journals, you are basically forcing yourself to be honest about what you have done and how you have done it.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
Admitting to myself that I have ADHD was the best thing I could have ever done for myself. It's really not as bad as most people think.
What you're talking about sounds exactly what I was going through before I did some research on the topic. What most people don't realize is that, as an adult, the proper approach to solving ADHD is medication AND behavioral. Without the behavioral approach, the medication will eventually just be a crutch that only gets you by for a couple of hours.
Do yourself a favor. Go see your physician. Tell him exactly what you've told us. Ask for an ADHD evaluation, and make sure it's being done by a psychologist that specializes with ADD/ADHD. Even if you don't get medicated, the psychologist can help you work on your attitudes and habits to solve the difficulties you are having with concentration and effectiveness. As an adult, you are much better equiped to make the changes necessary to change.
Realize that while the Seven Habits are good, what is best is WHAT WORKS FOR YOU. And you can only learn that through trial and error. Seeing what work for you and what doesn't.
Good luck.
The only thing that did it for me was working in the industry for a few years. Getting a job, being required to work for 8 hours solid, and being given many responsibilities are what have taught me how to sit down and focus.
I'm not sure what experience, besides perhaps ROTC, you might be able to put yourself through to help you to learn the necessary discipline and focus. Have you considered consulting Buddhists? Seriously!
Coffee does help to get work done, and even for studying. However, if you're studying for a test on a coffee high, remember to drink some coffee before the test as well. I don't know why it works that way, but I can *always* (and I have a lot of experience with coffee, more than it's healthy to have) remember better what I've studied under the effects of caffeine if I'm again under the effects of caffeine. I seem to remember from high school psychology that there is some reason for it, but I'll let those that aren't engineers explain it.
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.
I saw this mentioned above, but I thought I'd reiterate. I find that using some sort of task list or todo list tends to motivate me more. It helps put your jobs in perspective and provides more concrete goals. There is also a good deal of satisfaction in checking off completions.
I always thought things like tasks lists and prioritization were for the anally-retentive...and maybe they are! But they work for me.
I get work done just the way you describe it (even with deadlines only being able to use one hour of a fully reserved day), and don't have any problems with that ;-)
"We can confirm that Debian does *not* ship the version with the trojan horse. Our version predates it." [CA-2002-28]
You might want to try reading the book Ordering Your Personal World
09
Let me put it this way: let's say that you were a friend of mine. I walk up to you and say,
/. right now."
"I am currently a university student and have a major problem: I'm a heroin addict. I can set aside a day at a time to break the habit, and I will be lucky to have an hour go by before my next hit. The only time I can actually go without a hit seems to be after midnight under a lot of pressure. This has led to too many 5 a.m. nights where I'm so strung out that I shake in bed while having vivid dreams even though I'm wide awake. I have tried reading self-help books, and am currently seeing what Heroin Addicts Anon does for me. No matter where I put it, the needle is always within reach when I need a hit. Can you please give advice on how to overcome this problem, be it a little trick, medication, or anything else?"
Tricks can't cure you. Meds might make you change, but only while you're on the meds. Procrastination is a part of you, and I say this because I'm a procrastinator myself (though not nearly as serious as one). Procrastination is brought about from a lack of intrinsic motivation, which means that you're stuck with it until you find something which will be overwhelming enough to change you on the inside (or influence you enough to make up for your lack of intrinsic motivation)...ex: you fail a class outright because that 15-pager you saved for five hours before it was due never came through, and the prof is anal enough to say that there's no way to make it up, forcing you to take summer school to finish the credit before you graduate. And even then, your motivation will only last until you finish the class.
Sorry, buddy, but if you're a procrastinator by the time you reach college, there ain't no simple snake oil that'll fix you up. Believe me, even if you try to cure your ways, I can promise you that you'll be playing the "one more hit to quit" game..."I'll get to it just one hour later...gotta see what's on
Pick 4 or 5 songs you like (preferably similar, from the same band, etc.) and play them in a loop while you're working. I've found that this lets me concentrate a lot better on the work I'm doing. It's as if my brain uses the songs as a "clock" or something, and doesn't wander off as much. Weird songs seem to work best. Radiohead, Sonic Youth, that sort of thing.
Actually, you may want to get yourself tested for ADHD, the symptems you are describing are pretty much the diagnoses for ADD/ADHD.
I can relate to sitting down to work, and at the end of a 12-16 hour day only having 1/2 of work done. It's gotten to the point that I am now spending most of my time working on getting a diagnoses and the problem fixed.
The way ADHD works is a bit insidious. Without an understanding of how it works it's easy to label yourself as not working hard enought, etc. My first realization that I might have a problem was when I took Wellbutrin for the first time, it became easier to make decisions, ie betweeen making a decision to do something and actually getting started took about 2 hours with the Wellbutrin it was instant, ie decide to go to the store, grab keys and jump in the car.
Anyway, I suggest getting yourself tested for ADHD by an expert. Testing should take approx 6-8 hours for complete testing.
/* TODO: Spawn child process, interest child in technology, have child write a new sig */
I'm in a similar boat. I just can't seem to get motivated to work. I'm a student, but writing papers just kills me.
:-)), I find that along these same lines is prayer. Taking a regular daily time to listen to God helps me to focus. Like exercise and sleep, it's easy to cut this time out ("Oh, I'll pray later tonight..."), but I find this just kills me. It is what brings meaning to my life and gives me a reason to continue doing all the other work. I heartily recommend finding some method of prayer that works for you. :-)
This past year I tried pushing myself harder and harder to get the work done. It got to the point that the harder I tried, the less I got done. I was simply unable to function.
Looking back at this past year and comparing it to previous years I noticed one key difference: I had stopped taking time off. As deadlines loomed I continually convinced myself that I could take a break after I finish this current assignment. Then others came up. I fell further and further behind, so I kept pushing myself harder and harder to finish. I started cutting out sleep, excercise, and most social activities, and it just got worse.
Take a day off every week. A day that is restful, rejuvenating, and different. This doesn't mean laying around watching TV all day once a week. Usually I just feel worse for having done that, but sometimes it is what I need. Find a nice hobby and set aside some time for it. Spend time with family and friends. Do something different. On this day, use your little worry list to take note of any concerns that come up regarding your work. Jot them down and then get on with your day off.
Also (disclaimer: I'm studying to be a priest
The best way to deal with this is to go out from your room and study somewhere where there are no computers. I usually do my work durring the time I have few hours between my classes. I simple don't go back to room and I do my work. If there is a computer around, its a whole different story though. Another good places is dinning place. ;)
I noticed though that best work I do is when I'm working on something under pressure because class is only few hours away. So I gave up on studying times and I just do it like before. I guess you should just make your peace with the fact that you are a geek and you'll have at least 3.5 gpa this next semester
127.0.0.1 slashdot.org fark.com metafilter.com kuro5hin.org
I pretty much managed to kick this behaviour about a month ago. It's probably easiest to explain with an example, which is keeping my personal space tidy:
Write down a list of things that need to be accomplished, sub-tasks if you will. In this case, picking up clothes, sorting clothes into clean and dirty, picking up litter, making my bed.
If any of these tasks looks like it'll take more than 10 minutes, split it into sub-tasks. And keep doing that until you have a list of little tasks that you think will take under five minutes each. Write these down in a text editor. If any of the tasks daunt you with their difficulty, break them down into manageable chunks.
When you have this list, write down a start time next to the first item. Do it, and see how quickly you can do it. When you're finished, write the finishing time, and how long it took you. Are you happy with that time? Write down the beginning time of the next task immedietly. Repeat.
Hope this helps...
Score:-1, Funny
...when I was in college, and also when I went to work, which got me fired before I learned to control it. Here are some tactics I used to get over it (some of these have been mentioned):
1. Stay busy. If you don't have time to waste, you wont waste it. Or you'll flunk out.
2. Social pressure helps- study in groups, do work in groups. I found letting myself down much easier than letting others down.
3. Routine is king. Get into a routine, especially with regards to sleep.
4. Change your major. If you hate your major or you're doing it because it's trendy/lucrative, change it. Study something you really love. When your textbooks are so fascinating that you stay up late reading them the night the reading is assigned, instead of the night before it's due, you'll find motivation isn't a problem. I changed my major and went from academic probation to the Dean's list.
5. Get a girlfriend (or boyfriend). Preferably someone who likes to party, but is a serious student. My last year of college my girlfriend saved me, in two ways. First, you're not out chasing the ladies (or gentlemen), so you aren't as inclined to hit the bars on, say, a Tuesday. Second, she studied a lot, which left me feeling as if I should also be studying, so I did.
Those things helped me a lot, and I hope they help you. Good luck!
Eagles may fly, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.
If you were interested in what you were doing, you wouldn't even have time to break away and post this question.
Kind thoughts do not change the world
Mom: why didn't you do your chores?
Me: I forgot...:-\
Things started to change when I started sitting.
Meditation has been dismissed by lots of posters, especially in that last story about meditation in the workplace, but your story rang out a clarion call that sounded eerily familiar. I stumbled into it from a completely different angle, but have found that sitting has allowed me the mental clarity to pay more attention to the things around me. This, in turn, lets me do the right things at the right time. When it's work time, I work. When it's goof off time, I goof off. When it's time to go to the bathroom, I go to the bathroom. :)
I came to the realization that when it comes down to it, I'm the only one who can live my life. There's no easy way to do it. However, if you practice mindfulness, you've got a walking stick to help you on the path.
Despite the fact that we're two different people and no two folks are the same, I'd recommend that you take the time, once a week, to sit. Just count your breath. Exhale, inhale. That's one. Exhale, inhale. That's two. If you lose count, don't sweat it, just start over. Set a timer for twenty minutes. Or just keep an eye on a clock that's in sight. Here's a guide to practice that you may find helpful. Some of it may not apply--you don't need to jump into a monastery and shave your head :)
I hope you find the peace you're seeking.
Fighting the War on the War on Drugs.
http://smokedot.org/
I've had the same problem. Take 25mg of zinc per day (make sure without copper), and stay off wheat, diary products and foods with gluten in them, and your problems may go away. It'd have to write a vast amount to explain why, and as I'm about to colapse with tiredness, I'm not really able to.
Sensory integration, autism, attention allocation problems can be caused by physiological upsets. Its roots are primarilly in heavy metal exposure and vitamine deficiency, but these can be overcome. Go see a cleaver natropath.
The web is a massive time waster. I didn't
need it (didnt have it!) when I was in college.
Cancel it, or pick up a 2400 baud modem. You can use that to check your mail, but it will keep you off the web because it will be just to slow..
Now you can get your work done instead of reading Slashdot, and all sorts of other silly webpages..
I made straight A's when I was taking a full load. Don't "overload" yourself, but "underloading" can be just as bad. Yes, it sucks and all you do is study, eat, and sleep, but it does get rid of a lot of procrastination problems (if you procastinate, you get immediate feedback) and a lot of personal problems (those get suppressed deep, deep inside, where noone has to even know they exist).
/. and you should be fine through college. Then you can come back to /. and realize how naive you were for studying so hard.
Also, get a study partner. Don't "study" together by talking. In fact, it is better if you have a "competitive" edge on your relationship. You know, "I can study longer than you and make better grades than you" kind of disfunctional relationship. Sit next to that guy all semester long in the library and I assure you, you will do well.
Also, work on that ego. Think you are the smartest guy EVER and that you are going to get a GREAT job after you graduate. Life will be GREAT if you just devote ALL your time to school. No other issues are important or relevant to you. The world will be better because of you.
I don't know, it seems the human brain doesn't do well with moderation. It has a stable point somewhere at "doing nothing" or "doing everything", but never anyplace inbetween. Also, you have to believe that you are not going to live your live being "average." In short, you need to LIE to yourself and stop coming to slashdot. Slashdot lets a lot of truth get out, like the only "non-average" person is Bill Gates and, the reason he is "non-average" is because he is lucky, a sound businessman (ruthless liar), and dropped out of college.
That the rest of us are destined to devote our lives to phb's greedy dreams of self-gratification through exploitation of others and our only escape from this hell, Open Source, will forever be attacked by "The Man," trying to prevent the slaves from revolting.
Yeah, just forget that last part I wrote and stop coming to
Sdelat' Ameriku velikoy Snova!
I want to share my own, pathetic example with you, though. Most of my life has been plagued by severe procrastination, since around middle school, I think. High school was horrible--I can remember spending two days creating a chemistry lab notebook that I was supposed to have spent a whole semester on, just to give one instance.
In college, I eventually got worse and worse until I stopped attending classes (because I was so far behind) and failed an entire semester.
I worked in a restaurant full time for a year, and got re-admitted to school. I talked to a counselor and kind of worked things out, so I thought. Still, I had to continue working to support myself while going to classes part-time, so it took about 8 years to graduate.
I worked for a couple of years, which was no problem, then went back to school for my master's. Still okay.
Then I entered a Ph.D. program at Yale and it started again. Really bad. I never finished my dissertation because of the time wasted. There were other factors involved beyond my control, and to be honest I don't think I would have stayed in my field if I had completed the dissertation, but still the responsibility lies with me.
So now I'm unemployed (by choice, followed my girl to another state, leaving a good job where I was becoming miserable because I procrastinated at the parts of the job I didn't enjoy) and I'm trying to use the down time to do some writing, something I've always wanted to do but didn't have the courage.
I've got great starts on two projects that are wonderful ideas...essentially I'm halfway through them, and I'm stuck. Like a wall.
What's the lesson? I've bought every decent anti-procrastination book on the market, read them and tried to implement the suggestions. But I even procrastinate about that! I've done therapy, both group and individual. It was useful in many ways, but here I am, still stuck.
I think it may be chemical/biological. It is very, very difficult for me to concentrate on one thing for more than, say, fifteen minutes. Even reading has become harder, and I love to read more than anything else. Once I get a job I'm considering Prozac or something to see if it can take the edge off my tendency to be distracted.
I'm not lazy. I'm a hard worker and wherever I work I'm quickly valued for my contributions and innovations. In school I was regularly in the top 10% of the brightest students, except when it came time to follow through and produce. And still, I know that I've wasted years of my life. They're gone and nothing can bring them back.
So, I urge you to find out what the problem is and fix it, or try to fix it. Because the clock is ticking.
Ok, I understand the problem. Been there. Done that.
/.
you've got some lousy habits. I don't know what they are but they're lousy.
First off, listening to music while trying to work? Bad idea. Classical could be ok. The reason is that it becomes background noise. Music with lyrics always distracts me because I start singing the lyrics in my head while also reading. Unfortunately the lyrics become the focus and the reading is just that. No comprehension.
Internet? unplug. that simple. turn off the 802.11. just don't get online. No instant messenger. No checking of e-mail. Hell no
take a break. do rewards like others have said. read a chapter, then just take a walk around the block. read another chapter, get a snicker's bar.
Schedule yourself. 1 hour of the web a day. use an RSS reader. makes things much quicker. The day that you want to work is not the day you want to check out homestar runner. Don't try doing your work before you've scheduled yourself to go to bed.
-
Even among nonbelievers prayer is known for what they call its "psychological effect". I really can see no reason why it should be off-topic and things like meditation, yoga or positive thinking on-topic.
;)
Yet I'll be the first one to admit that lots of prayer is just psychological effect. Though I'll never admit its only effect is psychological
I've been diagnosed with ADD and I have two suggestions for dealing with procrastination and focusing problems. Note that I don't to either of these much anymore, as I'm medicated, but they worked well enough at the time.
t asks_and_contexts_. One minute you're studying faithfully --- at your mental office, so to speak --- and the next, you're in your mental rec room, playing FreeCiv; or in your mental coffee shop, chatting on /. And, Oh God, the futzing that one can do with a GUI! Desktop icon arrangement. Wallpaper. Themepacks, for heaven's sake. It's a temple of distraction in here.
/etc/inittab to boot to initlevel 4. Learn to love vi or nano or emacs: They work great for comp sci projects, and if you have an essay or a paper to write, do it in vi first, import it to word_processor_of_your_choice (for formatting) only when you're about to print it.
Suggestion #1:
I have a little theory to the effect that, for a certain percentage of the population, GUIs have made focusing a lot more difficult: Sure, your taskbar, icons, buttons and menus make it easier to switch rapidly between many different tasks and contexts, but they also _make_it_easier_to_switch_between_many_different_
So here's what I recommend: Ditch it. Ditch the GUI. Install Linux, if you haven't already, and configure
If you can't ditch the GUI for whatever reason (i.e. you need a proprietary Windoze app, or you can't bear to install Linux) then I recommend setting up a new account (linux) or user profile ('doze) that will only allow you to run only those applications which you need to get the job done. If that doesn't work, you should seriously consider getting yourself a (second-hand?) laptop upon which you will place only work-related programs --- preferably, one without WiFi or some other way of exposing it to the Lethean floodwaters of the 'net.
Suggestion #2. This next one is a little weird, but it works well for me. Note that it might work less well if you don't have any roomates, as it depends greatly on your desire to avoid embarrassment. It also requires that you have an extra room in your house.
Make yourself a home office in a well-heated room, and keep only work-related things in it. When you go to study, take in all the food, caffeine, and books that you'll need for a stint of about five hours. Set an alarm clock to go off in five hours. Now, close the door, and take off your pants. Yes, you heard me, take off your pants. If necessary, take off your shirt as well. Put them in a plastic bag, and tie the bag shut. Put the bag away (the further away the better.). This way, you can't leave the room suddenly without raising eyebrows: If, say, you have a sudden impulse to jump up and watch TV, or phone a friend, it'll take you a good five minutes to dress, which should be plenty to reconsider and sit back down.
After a couple of months of this, you get in the habit of staying in the room until the alarm sounds, you don't have to take off your pants anymore.
- undoware.ca
Works for me:
here
You lack discipline. Shut up, do your work.
/. is detracting time from anything else I need to be doing. :)
At least you realize that you have a responsibility to fufill the commitments you have made.
You seem to know what is is you need to do, just suck it up, and do it.
I used to have the same problem back in college. The professional world isn't so forgiving about such behavior as college.
I finally came to the realization that if I just decided to STFU and do it, life would be better.
Look at me now, this time I'm spending posting to
jrw
The single best tip Iøve gotten about getting things done was from my former advisor. It's fairly simple, but it really helped me get out of the check news/check mail/game a bit/etc slump.
When you start working in the morning, don't do anything other than the work you're supposed to do, until 12 o'clock. Don't check news, don't check mail, don't fix a little bug in an unrelated program, don't try to get through that last level in your game. Nothing but what you're supposed to do. It can be hard, but you can tell yourself "I can do this until 12".
This works partly because you get at least some hours of concentrated work in the morning (assuming you get to work before 10ish), but also because you get into your work. Once you've spent two hours of concentrated time on your work, your brain has started spinning, and you should find yourself wanting to fix that next problem in your work as much as you'd otherwise want to play that next game level. It gets your interest up (assuming that you have some interest in your work to begin with, but as a student, you should have some).
The only thing I allowed breaks for was to go to the bathroom or get something to drink. It was quite hard at first, my fingers kept wanting to go M-x gnus on their own, but it was very rewarding.
-Lars
Yeah, when I entered college, I seemed to have the same problem, and staying up till 7am doing homework always leeves you drained, not to mention unable to think clearly. As someone stated earlier, exercise makes a BIG difference... I've found that a small jog for about half an hour or an hour in the mornings really boosts my energy level throughout the day!
Then, make a schedule of times to do your work. I usually perfer right after class, as my brain is still active, the material is still on my mind from the lecture, and my friends are usually not home. Also, I've found that going to the library or computer lab to get work done is better because there's alot less distractions (like the TV, PS2, people, etc). Finally, make a reward for yourself after you finish what you're doing AND consider the consequences if you fail to get your work done.
Probably the reason you can only work after midnight is because the world has gone quiet and your brain can forget what's going on around you and focus on work.
First, get yourself into a quieter, more solitary work environment. Second, meditate on your tasks to get started. Write down what it is you expect to accomplish that day, and when you are ready to work on a task, close your eyes and visualize everything you need to do for about 5 or 10 minutes. If your mind is particularly cluttered, try adding a short nap to the mix to get reset. Use these techniques to "tune out" day time noises also.
I supposed you're posting about having trouble concentrating because you have a fast approaching deadline? :-)
sounds like another opportunity to procrastinate to me
surely then you know someone who is prescribed/sells adderall. It does wonderes for concentration but then again it is a precription medicine that you are not being precribed so be careful.
Also take note that some adderall is time release (Adderall XR or something like that) so the best way to take those is to crush it up and put it in a little piece of toilet paper and then swallow the towliet paper (Takes away the time release). That way you are super concentrated for the 5-6 hours you need to do stuff.
Hope it helps!
I had a rough time with my first year of university and a much better second year (after taking some time to work for a living).
:)
On days you get out of class early go the somewhere quiet, like those desks with the built in walls in the library, and read over material for a course you had that day for about 50 minutes. Then go to work afterwards.
The noisy people in the computer lab were a huge distraction. Find somewhere quiet to work out the problem _before_ sitting down at a terminal. A top-down approach makes it easy to write pseudo-code (in stages!) on paper. Then when you go to the lab you basically just type up the code.
Plus people think you are really bright because you "coded" your assignment in 1/8 the time they did.
You may not think this now (or you may) but one of the best things about school is being exposed to people with simillar interests as yourself. It took me a while to figure out that it can be really useful to talk to other people about problems and even studying a bit with others can help (but you all have to try to stay on topic).
One big bonus is you get you know people to call on/send work to after you're done school.
Spread out your options. Don't take a whole semester of options unless you really enjoy the subjects. It's easy to think about dropping out when your work doesn't interest you.
Finally, get out, do other things, don't spend your life tied to a terminal. Relax a bit, have some fun but don't forget why you are in school or you might leave. (You have to figure out "why" on your own.)
Chad
I have this problem too. The fact is, when you make yourself work, your productivity goes down. The reason you get faster at crunch time is because you WANT to work then. What I do to remedy this is to do some other activity that lets my mind wander. Excersize, vacuuming, washing dishes, cleaning, etc. This way, you're mind will wander and start thinking about the work that you should do, and then you'll psych yourself up for working. When you start working, if you start to drift again, go do something again to get back into work mode. A very long(~1 hour) techno song also helps. I have a song that I have had many successful work sesssions with. I use this if I'm really having a hard time focusing.
'Code' can be a plural.
Sure it can. Just ask Darl (All Your Code Are Belong To Us) McBride of SCO...
-- Alastair
So, what are you doing when you aren't working? Are you sure that you aren't just futzing around in order to avoid getting down to business?
When I was in college, a friend and I used to pull all-nighters to study for exams. A third friend, Dave, usually joined us, but insisted on staying in his own room. Invariably, Dave would wander over around 5:00 a.m. and we'd give him some money to go uptown to a bakery that opened at dawn to buy breakfast. After our coffee and croissants, all three of us would walk to campus and take our exams. My friend and I usually did well, and Dave usually did poorly. He'd whine, "But I stayed up all night, too!"
Well, turns out that Dave spent all night wastng his time. He'd spend so much time "getting ready to study" that he never studied. In other words, a classic case of lack of discipline and avoidance.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
I totally sympathise with you, man. I'm a newsgroup/forum junkie.
I suggest this: plain old text mode linux with framebuffer console, with mouse support No X installed.
Learn Vi and/or Emacs, and delete lynx from your system.
As far as music, I think some of Paul Oakenfold's 2 hour DJing sessions keep me on focus. They're repetative, and always driving, with few words.
Essential Mix BBC radio 1 - Live at Gatecrasher 1999.
Also, eat less than you need to, and fill up on caffeine. The combination of motivation, hunger, and acceleration usually gives me about 3 or so hours of being in the zone.
Good luck.
You might try these guys Johnson O'Connor Research Foundation for aptitude testing. Basically, if the task or job you are doing isn't exercising your dominant aptitudes (innate abilities versus developed skills) the result is the kind of thing you are describing. TG
I've always had the same problem. You have to really think hard about what it is that prevents you from working, and attack those things relentlessly. This may take years. What breaks your concentration? When you notice you've gotten a lot done, think hard about what led up to you reaching that state!
It's totally different for everyone, but here are some things that work for me :-)
Other people find techniques like making schedules, having a really strong routine, making lists, etc very helpfull but not I. Also, caffeine is an evil drug that makes you THINK you're really productive, when in fact you're not getting shit done... at least in my case. Avoid it unless it's measurably helping.
I am currently a university student in the social sciences and I find myself in a similar situation as well being easily distracted from doing my work.
;) (yes, I'm joking at own expense)
I find three things are key: organization, Commitment, and eliminate distractions. Notice a pattern here(?) - the same answers are popping up on other posts.
Organization: I used to keep track of everything in my head. Big mistake. I'd leave assingments to the last minute sometimes.
Try and organise your binder/notes as much as possible. I avoid doing things electronically i.e. using Outlook or my Palm since records can easily be lost. I just bought a $20 planner. I put everything in there: appointments, contacts/friends, work shifts, assignment dates. Best money ever spent. Just find one well laid out which works for you.
Commitment: Stay on track w/ work. Its easy to say "No get it done later". Work on it till its done. If you find getting paid for work motivating, then find some way to reward yourself afterwards.
Eliminate distractions: I go do my work in a public library since its close to home, or in the school one. Sit somewhere away from people you might know won't be i.e. I'm in social science so I'll go into the geography floor.
Now its easy to say it all, but you really have to plan on doing it and sticking to the plan. Also, if you find the Net distracting, dual boot your system - even two copies of Windows if need be - one w/o access to games Network/Internet resources/access.
You should note, that I truly am a social science student, since I don't mind writing too much
Obsessing over it and not blowing off any steam is going to turn you into a rifle-wielding maniac with a love of rooftops. Have your study time, but don't leave out the play. You'd be surprised at the problems you can solve when you're distracted.
Set aside time to work, but remember to take breaks for food, or your brain won't work very efficiently. Start each session with planning out your goals and write them down. Break the tasks down to small chunks that'll only take a little while to complete. It feels really good to check off each item as you get it done, and helps get you motivated to move on to the next. If you get stuck for too long on anything, take a quick break for a walk or cartoons or whatever distracts you, and you'll come back to it fresh and with a new way of looking at it more often than not.
Just a little one, but large enough to calm the nerves and drown out background thoughts and noise.
;)
If your in the USA, be careful I think they still chop off hands for posession.
Maybe you work too hard. Have you ever stopped to consider why you are trying to be more productive? Are you competing for a promotion? Are you just trying to make more money? Maybe you're in a hurry to have your first stroke or heart attack.
Maybe you should just slow down. See the real world (you know, with trees and stuff). Get a grip. Do you belong to your employer, or are you an individual?
I have the exact same problem. I can't concentrate on homework unless I am under pressure or I am to tired to be distracted. The solution I found was to get up and hour early and do homework in the morning. Sounds evil, but it works. Get in the habit of it and you find yourself with too much free time ;)
bash-2.04$
bash-2.04$yes "Don't you hate dialup connections?"| write USERNAME
Works even better if you do it with some girl of your class you *really* like and she just likes you as a friend. When you're distracted, it'll be with her, and you'll focus on that. When she's not distracted you won't be either, as she should be the most interesting thing in the room and she isn't interested herself. And normally she'll be inclined to finish the work in time for the deadlines.
Sounds stupid, but hey, it worked for me [I can't get shit done at home]. And we both graduated as CS Masters this year, so there's at least some truth to it
I found the worst place for me to do work was at home in front of the computer. It was too easy to get distracted.
I did many of my assignments in the computer lab at school - fewer distractions so I could concentrate on working. It was also motivation for me to get it done, so that I *could* go home.
Studying, I would either go to the library, or work downstairs. No computer.
I use Macs to up my productivity, so up yours Microsoft!
First off you need to sty to relax and not stress yourself out about this. It will help you try to find a solution to the problem.
I'd try to just spend a month or two working whenever you can and try to keep your mind open to look for things that promote or distract from your ability to concentrate.
Work at different times. See if your body is more inclined to work at certain times.
I know that when I work at home I almost never get anything done until 4 or 5 in the afternoon. So I just don't really bother trying to work until then.
Buy some headphones (good ones that fully cover your ears) and see if listening to music can block out the noise around you and help you concentrate.
Leave off the caffeine drinks until you determine what is causing you problems. Too much caffeine can make you jittery and stressed.
Change the layout in your work area to see if that is causing you any discomfort.
Most of all, try to see if you can determine those factors that actually cause you to lose concentration and then see what you can do to eliminate them.
And ignore any comments about ADD or ADHD. Most times people just need to relax and learn to listen to the demands of their bodies and minds.
fool. we know what you're doing. we were all addicted to muds when we were your age.
If you're at a computer, depending if you need to be connected or not to the net... why not just remove your ethernet cable so the web ISN'T a distraction.
Cocaine
If you don't stop reading this right now you owe me $1,000. Send check or money order too...
When doing mentally intensitive work (problem sets, writing computer code), you need an environment that is undisturbed. This can also included software that is immediately available on you computer like the internet, your email account, AOL instant messinger (where a friend decides to chat while you need to remain focused on what you do).
About five years ago I attacked this problem by going to a hard drive trey that allows me to have multiple C drives for the same machine. My work drive (which has my compilers) does not have an internet browser, internet access of any type, and only work (project) related material on the drive. This isolates you from interruptions like (you have mail -- ding, ding). The machine runs faster (compile time are quicker which helps you to focus), and the temptation to take a quick breal (such as check mail or slashdot) is gone.
When I am working, the machine will only do work and all other distractions are removed.
Just a suggestion that has helped me.
Tom
I finally uninstalled all the card games from my machine. I don't enjoy playing them, but somehow I managed to sink a lot of time into them anyway. Unplug your network cable, move the TV to another toom. Sure, you can just plug it back in or move it back (or even re-install the games in my case), but that's a fairly deliberate action that at least triggers a clear signal to yourself that you are breaking the rules (and might as well go out with your friends). Sometimes a (mostly) mental obstactle is enough to keep you in line.
Another trick that helped me sometimes was to recognize when my mind was wandering and set a fairly short but focused goal. Read 50 pages and I can go get a slice of pizza, or get 10 problems done and I can go to a movie. Actually take the reward--this isn't meant to be a carrot on a stick--and you'll at least get more done than you would have otherwise without beating yourself up for hours. It can also help develop the mental discipline you are seeking stepwise.
- Russ
Here's my tip for you: it's really important you learn how to work efficiently in college, because when you graduate, life will only get harder. Exponentially harder.
It's not the difficulty of the work that makes life outside of school hard. It's the time management. First off, in school, all you really have to worry about is studying and good grades. In the real world, you have to get a job, make rent, pay bills monthly (not just once a semester when your tuition is due, worry about your credit, where your next meal is coming from.
And that's just you. Add on, getting a girlfriend, making sure your apt. is condusive to a relationship, then you get married, have kids, your expenses double, triple, quadruple.
Then add on worrying about not only yourself, but your family, your career, your retirement, etc.
I'll just say this. When you're trying to juggle ten things at once, maybe that will be enough motivation for you to get your work done. I look at it this way: If I don't do the work that needs to be done during the time allocated, I'm fucked. Because then I'll be worrying about it all evening when I'm doing everything else I'm supposed to be doing. And there simply isn't enough time int he day to everything. And you'd be surprised how quickly life catches up to you. For most people, to have eight hours to concentrate on ONE assigment is a freaking luxury! That's a goddamned vacation.
So, I say to you, enjoy your time while you're in school, and figure out how to work efficiently and quickly, and multitask. Because, when you get out of school, that skill will be invaluable, and life sure as hell doesn't get any easier when you graduate. In my (and I would say most Americans' experience) it only gets harder. You'll know that when you have a 2 year old to feed at 2 am, an impending layoff at work, and your car just broke down ... etc.
I had the same problem all through middle school, high school, and a short time of college. I've been diagnosed with ADD, I'm not hyperactive, and I'm not fidgety. I simply have trouble focussing without a fire under my ass.
Smoking marijuana actually helps me focus on one thing. It all started when I was taking a Linear Algebra correspondence course and wasn't able to just make myself sit down and do the work. After smoking a little, it was easier for me to concentrate on the work. I would go back and scan it for errors sober, but any mistakes I made were the same ones I tend to make when I'm not under the influence.
As far as how much to use, that's a personal thing. Just a small amount makes it easier for me. Of course, don't do this at work...only when you're working at home.
Often, when I am having trouble starting something, it is because the scope of the project is too large. For example, "do my taxes" is something I put off until the last minute, whereas "organize my reciepts" is much more likely to get done, and frequently results in a boost in enthusiasm to do more.
Im a struggling engineering student who cant spell and have a hard time learning math. Great comobo over all but I digress.
What gets me through it is knowing that if I slip, I will have to find a new line of work. Considering the current market, that doesnt sound too bad, but when weighing the other options, nothing else will make me as happy. So when its a rock or a hard place, choose the one that hurts less.
"It doesnt matter how you do it. Get it done."
Once the weight of your work dawns upon you and you realize you are playing with the rest of your life, motivation and concentration wont be an issue. Its your life, time to work hard.
If you think you have ADD then one word for you - Adderal - It is most effective even if you don't have ADD. Just take one and you will be shockingly productive! oh yeah and physical activity might help also, but who really knows? Getting work DONE is unnatural for humans. We have to find special motivation for each of us. If you are having such a hard time getting this specific work done, then it obviously doesn't intrest you that much, perhaps you should check out another field of study!
Most universities have lots of experience dealing with people like you.
Many of them have specialized counselors who can help you with this.
And if you do have some kind of learning disability, they can help diagnose & treat it.
Be sure to use a different email address when applying for jobs when you graduate. Now that I know your lazy, I wouldn't hire you.
I read in some book (I think "Good to Great" by Collins) something that I find very useful. It's called the "Not To Do List". Instead of a To-Do list, which sometimes gets crowded with obvious large tasks or minutia -- make a real TO-DO list along with a NOT-TO-DO list.
On really busy days, my NOT-TO-DO list includes Slashdot, believe it or not. It also includes checking the weather, stock quotes, instant messaging, snacking, staring out the office windows for cute gals, etc.
If you actually tracked how much time you spend goofing off, distracting yourself, you'd see how valuable the NOT-TO-DO list is to boost your productivity.
Schedule your task to be completed about an hour to a day in advance of when it acutally has to be done,
try to figure out approximately how long it would take you to do a task,
add some time to allow for minor distractions (bathroom breaks, mental blocks, etc...),
start your task at your estimated time before your scheduled deadline,
and make a note that your task HAS to be done by your schedueled time. That's what I'd do.
Not noteable, IMO a rubbish article.
I used to have the same problem. I found I couldn't study without drifting off onto some, more interesting topic. I dropped out of college after 3 years, and I discovered that when I got a job, I didn't have those problems anymore. I work as the CTO for a company that provides extended long distance service in Georgia, and I've found that if I feel the task at hand is actually accomplishing something then I have no problem concentrating on it. If I consider a task to be pointless or unnecessecary, then I have a real problem putting my mind to the task. I think I had such a hard time concentrating in school because I thought then and still do that it was a waste of my time. It appears I was right at least in some respects. So maybe your problem isn't that you have a hard time concentrating in general, maybe its that you think (maybe subconciously) that its a waste of your time.
[Is Greek the Professional Language of Lawn Mowers?]
I've had the same exact problems in college. I was always around a computer, and whenever I needed to use a computer for homework, I would end up wasting my time profusely on video games or getting another shot of useless information.
First (and most importantly), GO TO THE LIBRARY!!! Perhaps bring some snacks, as studying for a long time can make some people hungry. The library is the only place where I can get things done. I may only work for an hour or two in the library, but the work I accomplish in that time is of higher quality than if I spend more time working on the same project/assignment at home.
Alternative places are parks. It's less painful to read those dense engineering books at a nice day in the park.
Also try budgeting your time. Make a set amount of time for tv, and for homework, and stick to it. This has been rather difficult for me, but it works for some people.
Also try waking up earlier. It is much easier for me to do work at 6 am in the morning when there is nothing to watch on tv. Unfortunately, waking up at 6 am (or earlier) means you have to go to bed earlier. And do not turn on the computer if you will be working at home! You will end up taking frequent breaks instead of doing homework.
Good luck.
I have found I also need to take my Ginkgo Biloba extract, morning and night.
Ginkgo is described as promoting "ideation". That is a way of saying that it helps when you suffer the peculiar kind of depression not characterized by thoughts of suicide or feelings of worthlessness, but rather, simply, that nothing comes to mind. You sit and it just doesn't occur to you what you might do. If you're in circumstances where you need to look busy, you do passive things, like poking the reload button on slashdot.
It takes a couple of weeks for Ginkgo to have any effect, and it's always easiest to forget to take it when you need it most. I keep it next to my toothbrush.
If you're worried about not getting work done, I'm betting that you're also thinking to yourself about not only this work, but asking yourself what if you don't finish this piece, and thinking about what else needs to get done as well.
I know, because I do it myself.
Concentration is a skill. It's not something that comes instantly to everyone, it's something that needs to be practiced. And it's not hard to practice it, either, but it does take some disipline.
First, learn to clear your thoughts of extraneous stuff. I do this by mostly telling myself that, first, if I worry about all the rest of the crap I have to do, I'm not only not going to get *this* done, I'm not going to get *any* of it done, and I'm no better off than when I started -- so, Part-of-me-that-worries, shut up and let me get some work done, so you can worry about something else. It's kind of a zen, clear-your-mind of all thoughts moment.
Second, try the following exercises::
Practice Sitting Quietly: Sit down for an half-an-hour a day, at your desk. No distractions, no extra stuff to work on, and just one project to finish. Take a quick, zen-cleansing breath, and don't think about everything else you have to do. (Don't panic, if what you have to get done takes more than that time, I'm just saying you have to *sit* for that time.)
Complete Something Every Day: do something that you can complete in one day, and do one of every day. If it's a book, slice it up into chapters or 10 pages or whatever. If it's one calculus set, use that. Do that every day, at the same time, once a day. It give some sense of accomplishment, gets you practiced at doing something on a regular basis.
(Note, I got these from Daniel Pinkwater's book Fishwhistle, but they seem to help.)
Finally, also do these:
Exercise: I know it's been said, but exercise exhausts the muscles, gets the blood flowing, can heighten concentration, and is generally good for you. It may seem like a waste of time, but it gives back in concentration what it takes in time; so if it's 4 hours of worrying over something, or 1 hour of exercise and 3 hours of working, which is more productive?
Sleep: Do it. Regularly. It helps with concentration, sleepy people can't concentrate.
Give it a shot. See if it works for you. If not, try the following things which have worked for friends of mine:
Earmuffs: Seriously. My brother cannot concentrate unless there's no noise about. You can find these for about $5-$10 at any hardware store; some even fold up for carrying. They block out sound like earplugs (not a bad idea either) and allow you to not hear any sounds around you.
Tai Chi and other Martial Arts: These heavily emphasize concentration, so it may be that they do you more good by both getting you exercise and by helping you practice concentration.
Good luck!
Whatever you do... don't read this.
There is a Psychology Today issue that has an article about procrastination and work ethics. It's the September Issue, 2003, and it has Homer Simpson and Marge kissing on the front of it. The article is called "Stand and Deliver". I'd give you a full text because I feel it applys to you, but one needs a subscription to their website.
Hope that helps,
-Adam
Love your life.
For me, it's surfing the net that blows away any chance of productivity. So, disconnect for a while.
/but no Internet connectivity/, I'm able to focus a lot more (as opposed to compulsively reloading slashdot). When I sync up at the hotel I often have 15 or 20 emails in my outbox ready to go and some other work done too.
I've found that being on an airplane is a big multiplier for my productivity. When I have my laptop open on the airplane
For those of you that don't fly a lot, I find that temporarily disabling your Ethernet port has a similar effect. Every 5 or 10 minutes I still find myself unconsciously clicking on one of my Favorites buttons and then the web browser pops up with an error, and then I have a little laugh at myself and get back to work.
As I "Did not invent work" as we say in Germany, i.e. I rather prefer coding, reading /. and such, I had your problem at the beginning as well. What helped me was and still is
Try to work hours, don't get tasks done I.e. I found out you easily can work a whole day and still be depressed that there is so much left to do. This easily leads to the point where you do not even start working, because the remaining pile seems so incredibly huge. To tackle this, I set up sort of a timetable. I committed myself to work 4 - 5 timeshifts, each about 1.5 hours long with half an hour break in between (for making coffe, doing laundry, getting rid of the coffee again, ...). That makes up easy little steps.
If you loose motivation it's like: "oh it's only 20 minutes to the next break, I'll get them done. And at the end of the day you have something to be proud of, if you've been disciplined enough to keep to your plan.
It will be about 7 pm then, so there is enough time left to do things you like and you do not have to feel guilty.
It worked for me, so try it. After a year or so you get used to it that much, that it just feels natural and you can dare to make some deviations without loosing the diciplin completely again.
As a side effect you get your work done and if there realy should be a timeslice with all the work completed (It occured to me only once or twice in the last three years :)) you still can read those background stuff you felt would be advatagous long ago to get that extra good feeling.
Well that's my 0.002 EUR
And perhaps you would find it easier to relax and focus on work if you used either some well smelling oils or incense.
Good luck getting it fixed.
It's 19:11:42. Do You Know Where Your Meat Body Is?
If I went to a coffee shop, I'd either find myself people watching or someone I knew would come in a sit for awhile. (With wireless more common today in coffee shops, you may have to physically take you card out to ensure concentration.)
If I studied in the University Union, it was loud and I'd still see people I knew. So, I used to end up at the library or to the warehouse that housed the school printing press (I had keys, and there wasn't a soul around...very boring).
Now that I have a job (copywriter) and a laptop, when I absolutely have to get something done, I have to yank my ethernet out and go sit in another room with my laptop. I'm shocked at how much of my day is dicking around on the internet. I'm also shocked at how little I want to play with the apps on my laptop when it's unplugged and I have to do some writing.
As to all the people that have listed so many good methods so far, I noticed a lot of 'reward yourself's. This is fine, and if it works to set mini-goals, then more power to you. But once in the real world, there's no time for a granola bar or a game of Burning Monkey Solitaire every half hour. You will need to learn how to be rewarded by the completed job at hand. When you are doing projects that clients and employers are paying for (rather than school assignments) it feels good to finish something you can be proud of. This good feeling is what you will need to strive for to be your 'reward'. Good luck!
You know what?
1- Stop wasting so much time on the web. Grow up and just get over the "temptation."
2- Get lots of exercise to burn off the extra energy that makes you fidgety.
3- Eat better. Less caffiene and sugary crap, more healthy meals.
4- If all else fails, BEER. Alcohol can calm a man down quickly.
..specially beer. While alcohol my not be an answer you at least forget the question. (freely adapted from Henry Mon)
ADD, ADHD, Bipolarity, whatever. I really think that people who have your problem--avoiding the work that's expected of you--all suffer from the same condition. You haven't found what you love to do. Right now you're *thinking* you want to be in the field you're studying for, because of money or friends that do it, or some other "glamorous reason". But there's a problem. In the words of THGTTG: "The hours are good but most of the actual minutes are horrible." That's the REAL problem--when you find what you LOVE to do, you won't even be calling it WORK--you won't differentiate.
I've personally run into this problem a few times, especially with my more boring classes (I'm a college student as well). I've found the most important thing is to remove the distractions you keep finding, and then every time your mind drifts, realize it and say "oops, ok, back to work now!"
For instance, if you're doing a programming project, you probably need your computer. But you almost surely do NOT need an instant messenger client or email; you might not even need access to the web. If you can close the first two, or even completely unplug your computer, you'll remove some of the most worst distractions (web, IM, email).
If it's not computer related, go find a study room in your dorm or the library. Somewhere away from your computer (that part's important!), and preferably away from other people who're going to try to interact with you. That way you can concentrate on just the work you're trying to do.
Two more points, though they've been mentioned by previous posters.
A full day is a lot to bite off at one time; try 2-4 hours of studying (depending on the subject, you may have to go longer amounts of time) and then going outside. Not outside the room, I mean outside as in grass & trees. If possible, get some exercise; it'll help clear your head.
This brings up the second point, which is rewarding yourself. If you work in small increments, don't do something like "study for 1 hour, WarCraft III for an hour" because you'll be looking forward to the reward for that short of a time. It sounds like you need "study for 3 hours, WC3 for 30 minutes".
Oh, and one other trick: find someone who studies more than you, but not insanely so, and study with them (if you can). That way you can take a break when they do, and use their NOT taking a break as a sign that you've got more you could/should do.
SuperCalendar.com - Web calendar with RSS, AIM/SMS notific
What always worked for me was finding a friendly, local, 24-hour restaurant (with free coffee refills) and working there. There aren't any of the normal distractions, and I always found myself getting a lot of work done.
Through experience, you will gain motivation where there was once none. When you find it's hard to commit to something yet you intend to pursue it the natural order of things usually takes care of the problem. If you cannot seem to commit to the work you desire to accomplish, you simply lack the proper motivation.
:)
If the consequences of not getting the work done are disasterous or nearly so, but you won't commit to it, then the problem will take care of itself. Meaning, if you can't hold your job so you're poor, you may eventually get a new job and be successful because you now have the motivation of not becoming poor anymore.
It's possible that you could fall into crime (or some other path), but that in itself is work, so you would have to have more motivation/desire to commit crime than actually play the lawful society game in the first place.
Experience is the best teacher.
Rationalizing situations where you can't seem to work is much easier if you've experienced the consequences of your actions.
Now, go read my first paragraph again, because then you will fully understand.
Also, a note on work that you initiate yourself:
Many times after going through the above example (losing your job, gaining a new one, and then successfully holding it) you'll find there are still nights where you must battle your incorrect rationalization of going through the crap you must go through in order to keep your job. This can be a healthy motivator for accomplishing something outside of normal business hours to one day be your own boss.
It all works out in the end, you just have to choose which direction you will go. Whatever happens, you're going to protect your livelyhood and/or sanity. Your decision will ultimately be based on your core personality.
Unfortunately, *knowing* this is how the world works won't actually motivate you, but after you experience the above examples, enlightenment is at hand.
Also, a comfortable chair, some headphones, good friends, and a significant other helps.
In the distant past, I wrote some poetry. Actually, it was pretty good. Now, with a middling job, a seven-year -old, a wife, and a yard of weeds, I'm trying to write poetry again.
What I've found is that there are periods of time when poetic constructs just make themselves known to me. These seem to be times when I'm in a transition between one part of my daily life to another, like on the train home from work. Or times when I'm somewhat detached, usually via alcohol, from the sober world, but yet not drunk; just sort of disengaged.
The point is that these are transitional periods, and my brain manipulates data and stimuli differently than it does during the "hard sets" of time I try and block out for this work or that. It's as if the sub-conscious is given an opportunity to have its say in the conscious realm. Just yesterday I gave myself an hour "to just write." And what came of it? Almost nothing of any quality.
I don't know what work you want to do, but don't under-estimate the value of a pencil and pad. Whip them out when your brain says to, not when the clock dictates, and get it in the computer later. The mere booting of a computer/editor has already set up a hard set that your mind might be rebelling against.
Finally, don't be afraid to consider that maybe you're just not cut out to do what you're doing. I sys-admin, and it's very much against my nature, but it brings in some money for the family. I'm continuing to prepare to get out of it entirely, and though I love supporting and tinkering with our home network (Slack, freebsd, NT and Mac), I will cherish the day I get out of Computers as a profession.
And good luck.
"A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are for."
-John G. Shedd
You seem to blame a lot of things here except yourself. The only way you will get anything done is by sitting on your arse until you've done it. If you can't be bothered to do the work, you might as well drop out of uni because you're going to get crap results at the end of it and you're just wasting everybody else's time in the meantime.
I used to do that all of the time - and the truth was, that I never really HAD to study before, so I never learned how to sit down and force myself to do it.
The best advice I can give you is to fail a class. This will scare the shit out of you, and convince you that regardless of how many flash games are out there, they're not as fun as your homework.
I think the best thing to do is just remove the distractions. Unplug your computer from the internet. Maybe set up a 2nd profile on your computer that can't access the games or something.
Go to the library. I hate libraries, so the experience of being there makes me want to get my work done quicker.
Get a laptop. Sometimes, I find just being in my room with all of my things too distrating, so going somewhere foreign helps me keep my focus.
and, above all....make sure you're studying something you enjoy, and you feel good about. That could be the entire problem. it's much easier to devote your whole day to something when it's fun.
I learn't this very early in school. The philosphy is it's easier to focus on and achieve a short term objective than a long term one. So break down your objective into manageable pieces.
An example is a 1000 page book you DON'T want to read. If it has 30 chapters create interim goals as you start each chapter based on the # of pages in the chapter. The goal would be targeted at say 100 pages in 2 days or even a chapter a day. But it has to be something manageable and each person is an individual and therefore it is different for all of us.
Also keep your eye on the big picture and focus on the rewards if this is achieved. This will aid in keeping you motivated which is perhaps the most important thing.
Self motivation isn't easy but it is required.
To summarise:
Break down your large project into small manageable, feasible goals within a set time frame.
Focus on the rewards of the big picture
Hope this helps both you and everyone reading who may have been unlucky with other methods.
> Can anyone please give advice on how to overcome
> this problem, be it a little trick, medication, or
> anything else?"
I do only unpaid work on Free Software, with no deadlines. Since there is no pressure I don't put it off.
Of course, I'm poor as a churchmouse...
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
In the best and worst of times, I encourage myself by stipulating rewards for valuable work. Ie. if I finish such-and-such by a certain time, I'll play Diablo II for an hour. The trick, of course, with Diablo II is to stop playing ;)
I have found this trick to be a valuable exercise in motivation. Perhaps someone else may, too.
Cheers
I've already seen at least one "grow up and get some self-discipline" post. Easy to say, much, much harder to do. I've struggled with the same issues and I think that the roots are in my modern upbringing- I think motivation is something we *learn*.
Going back a couple of generations, kids were forced to do chores and work their butts off (on farms, etc...). You learn self-discipline pretty quick when the alternative is getting beaten by your parents. From one perspective, this is cruel and comes with its own host of problems, but children did learn how to work hard. There's a reason why parents used to send undisciplined kids to military schools (or the military)... many came out the better for it.
So in addition to putting rewards or "carrots" in front of you as many have suggested, it can also be helpful to find some "sticks". This is very hard to do on a "micro", day-to-day level... learning discipline is *hard*, and you'll have to go through some pain to make it happen. It's best to make one big decision to go through the process, and then take the day-to-day decisions out of your hands. Take some time off from school, and try something like the following:
* Join the military, or an alternative like the Peace Corps
* Spend a year working in a construction trade
* Spend a summer as a forest fire fighter
* Do some sort of extended "outward bound"-type thing
You'll learn endurance, confidence and self-discipline, and it will stick with you after the fact. It's an investment in your character and personality, and will benefit you for the rest of your life.
-R
I've only tried this for a few days at work, but I've found disconnecting my web browser (by removing the proxy server info at work, though at home I could do the same thing by typing gibberish into the setting) except for at lunchtime, and when I *really* need to Google for something, helps a lot. When I'm on a dull but difficult project, it's too easy to bounce to the web after every little microstep of accomplishment, and then stay there. Even though I can trivially re-enable it, disabling the browser proxy is enough of a "doorway" that a decision to jump over is going to be very deliberate, and therefore less likely.
Plus, as cheesy as it sounds, I printed out the word "TRUST" in a big font and hung it on the wall. I want to be a trustworthy employee in terms of effort applied.
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
You can put all your "distracting" applications into a group that your "work" login doesn't allow access to. You can remove the network cable except in specific pre-planned periods.
.
Nowdays I have to get a lot done, and there are a few things I've found very helpful (and believe me I used to do my homework in the lesson it was being handed in for 8))
- If I think of something else that needs doing I write it down, I don't start doing it disrupting the current task
- If I think of stuff late in the evening I write it down so I dont spent the night trying not to forget it
- Split big tasks quickly into a list of little subtasks, cross them off as you finish them
- Don't sit on irc , its the ultimate productivity killer and distraction bar none (some people seem to swear by putting all their non "work" stuff on a seperate desktop so its not in their vision except when they take a break)
- Remember you can read your email just once or twice a day. Ditto web news sites/slashdot
- Don't look at a pile of things and think I really ought to be doing something. Do *something* even if its pick the easiest looking task to knock off the list.
- When you build up a pile of tasks that can't be done in the required time (wait for final year university 8)) prioritize them and cross of stuff you have to discard, don't sit around doing nothing because you can't do them all.
- Get into a routine (I'm dire at this but when it works it helps). Get up read email, go do work the same pattern every day.
Ultimately though its about willpower., someone suggested exercise, one good exercise way to learn about relaxation and willpower is martial arts. Not all of them are about beating the crap out of people (although if you like that sort of competitive thing there are plenty to choose from), others like Aikido are much more about self control and at the extreme soft end they verge into deeply internal things like T'ai Chi
Do you lack motivation? I myself have a similar problem and I believe that the cause is lack of motivation. I'm no longer sure if I want to graduate in my field of study (or what I'd really like to work with) and I believe that that is the biggest cause for these kinds of problems. Short term goals, ie. "this must be done before the deadline tomorrow" work but not long term since the long term goal for me isn't clear. So, unfortunately, I'm making less progress in my studies now, even though I now have the required experience to study efficiently but no longer the motivation I had as a freshman. Now I can determine what is important in a book with 500 pages but not manage to read it whilst I as a freshman couldn't determine what was important even though I could spend 10 hours straight reading.
If I took off my pants I'd be tempted to have a wank.
Only a true procrastinator would research ways to stop procrastinating in order to avoid the task at hand.
I haven't read any of the responses to your question but it almost seems inevitable someone will suggest getting a prescription for ritalin. Some of the problems you've described would be more than adequate for a psychologist to classify you as suffering from ADD, ADHD or a myriad of other clinical terms.
( Many of the things you describe going through, I experienced at one time earlier in my life, and thats why I'm leading into this discussion of ritalin.) *shrug*... I've gone through the ritalin phase of my life and dont plan on going back. You might try it as well, and for a time, it will provide some new perspective on the way you view the world around you. In my case, it slowed me down just enough to *capture* was going on, almost like a freeze-frame on lifes daily moments.
Unfortunately it's not the perfect drug for everybody. It did slow the world revolving around me, giving me the chance to sit down and truly focus on tasks but leaving me often confused and dismayed, its quite difficult to convey the strange episodes of mindless fog that I was going through.
At a friends suggestion more than 3 years ago I dropped ritalin (no pun intended) and starting smoking pot (22 years old at the time.) Everything ritalin did, marijuana did better and without the side effects (certainly it has its own set of side effects but they're not nearly as mentally debilitating.)
Try going cold turkey from ritalin after you've been on it for 6 years, its worse than a nicotine habit IMHO. With pot, I never worry about withdrawal kicking me in the teeth like the ritalin does (I travel to the u.s. every 3 to 4 months to see family, never experienced any sort of withdrawal symptons from pot. Although I'd prefer to take it with me, its far too risky to cross the u.s. border with it, obviously.)
Thats my advice to you, take it for what its worth, it might help, it might not. And if you've graduate DARE with honours, you might as well ignore everything I just said because it wont make any difference.
My college days still travel with me as I approach my 43rd Birthday. What I have had to do to get work done is: dedicate time to critical topics. I use a 2-3 hour work block for stuff. In my case, X Windows programing class was given 2-3 hours perday for material review and note rewrites, while the projects got their very own time block elsewhere. I also blocked in sleep. In a way, its a class. If I had to cut into rest time I would do my best to make it up elsewhere. Being reasonable in what you intend to do is another key aspect. You could simply top that to do list with "get the sheepskin" and then die hard at it for years. Break the big down into bits, do the bits, then bring them together. Limiting interrupts was my biggest problem. My College was at a serious lack of library space, so I used unoccupied lab space in the physics department, as well as odd space I could find on campus - Lo and behold, I soon had company asking for tutoring, a face to sing the joys of life at, as well as people more interested in disrupting others study time than anything else.This occured even when I shifted my time to getting up at midnight to study! I still remember 8 or so friends entering the off campus lounge at 3 AM to discuss the nights inspection of the adult clubs in up here. Home was only a little better, as an Italian/Brazilian house hold gets real loud around world cup soccer time. Its loud most of the time as well.8) Best answer i can give you is - line the stuff up, maintain a to do list, ( or keep a note book of stuff to do, and cross off items on that list as they get done. ) Keep stuff finite - no vast projects with half vast plans. Keep the focus on the stuff in front of you. That is why it is there.
The real question here is.
..just take things in manageable chunks, not everything here in this industry is "fun" and exciting.. (i.e. data entry, html, answering questions from lost clients, building help systems etc..)
"What are you doing?"
I find that it is difficult to get work done when I have "no" interest in what I am working on..
I will read cnn, read this page, look up some obscure shit and then end up working on something else until I force myself to slog through whatever it is that I need to finish but don't want to.
If you are programming, then start reading books and articles and pages about the thing you are working on, try out examples and sort of work "around" the problem until you have come up with a solution instead of just jumping into a project blind.
People here with ADD and ADHD love to tell everyone else they have the same thing, but in the real world the doctors get kickbacks for prescribing drugs for those things and if you talk to anyone who works in primary education or daycare they will tell you that almost every child is on something these days because parents turn to drugs to 'fix' the problem of kids being hyper.
Don't assume you have a problem, that is a very defeatist attitude, you don't, so just knock that off. The real issue here is "time management" and "interest" and I hate to say it but, if I have jumped into something over my head, I get the same way
Take a day off, bring a pad of paper and a pencil and write out in a flowchart what you want to do. Turn of Instant messaging, turn off your email client, put on headphones with nothing playing and get down in it..
-cheers
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
I have no advice at all; all I can do is empathize. I was just like you, to the point where I never graduated.
:)
I made my problem worse by choosing the wrong major: I stupidly chose math instead of Computer Science. I *was* good in math (it was the only subject I was good at), but I was the classic computer nerd, spending all my free time playing with the computer at the science museum. I would have worked harder at computer science than I worked at math, because I enjoyed it more. (I'm *extremely* lazy. I don't work unless I enjoy what I'm working on.) Of course I still would have blown off all the English, History, etc. classes.
The only reason I'm not a Thunderbird-swilling wino is that I had the good sense, after dropping out of college, to enroll in the local community college. Somehow something had changed by then; perhaps I was properly motivated; in any case, I took (the community-college equivalent of) computer science, and got a 4.0. And I got a "co-op" job (working part time while also being a part-time student) at a local software place, which turned into a permanent full-time once I graduated. That company has long since imploded, and I've moved on, but the lack of college degree has never hurt me -- whenever I've interviewed for a job, the interviewers (correctly, in my opinion) have been more interested in my previous job than in what I did in school.
Maybe my advice is: consider dropping out of wherever you are now, and trying a community college. You might not work any harder, but at least you'll waste less money while you loaf
I am using lynx to type this on a machine that is being installed with FreeBSD. So execuse my spelling mistakes since ispell and mozilla have not been installed yet. Anyway...
Seriously, I have noticed you have posted several times about stories involving ADHD. I have a sevre case of it and aspergers( mild autism ).
It is a bitch and living hell sometimes. Anyway what I did to get into college this fall since I dropped out previously because I was not disciplined enough to study, was to cut off port 80 on my computer for a few weeks to study for the entrance exams. I passed.
I have internet addiction and yes its real. Start off by filtering out port 80, second check slashdot once a day after you did loads of work. This is classic pavlov physcology. You need to reward yourself and use a lab computer from school after you did your share of work. Also you may want to consider a lighter workload from school if you work full time. If you have ADHD which it seems you do from your posts then it is appropriate. My attention span is improving with age as my brain rewires itself but its still a problem. If you can financially afford it try school full time and find a part time job. Or just move into a dorm in school and do education full time if that is one of your more important goals.
Last if you have trouble being motivated, perhaps you need to relook at your major. Greg Leah (famous BSD hacker and writer of the original FreeBSD book) is a chemical engineering major. If doing complex math problems bore you then do not major in CS. For example I have an interest in ecology and I'm going to be a bio-chemistry major. School is fun and should not a chore. My father has a saying "major in what you like the rest will work out". If you do good in something it will show and open more pathways then majoring in what looks right and have a mediocre GPA. Also if your job is causing you problems look for another one. Yes the economy sucks but looking won't hurt.
http://saveie6.com/
There are schools for people with this problem, such as the "postgraduate program" at St. Thomas Moore School. "Your Son Will Succeed". This is where rich, but lazy, kids are sent.
-
for the boy who is an "...underachiever, a good boy without serious social, emotional or behavioral problems, who was simply 'lazy with the books.'" The school "...is based on the belief that teenage boys need structure, order, clear expectations, close personal attention, and consequences appropriate to their behavior, if they are to successfully and happily develop to their fullest potential."
... "effective guidance must include giving direction and encouragement to young people throughout the day, every day....
If that seems too constraining, try three years in the Army.Extra structure is available, and even mandated, for students doing poorly. Instructors teach both their subject and "...the Study Skills essential to mastering academic content." Extra Help is "a time when all teachers remain in their classrooms at the end of the day awaiting students" and students doing poorly are mandated to take advantage.
For students not up to expectations, there is the Academic Campus, which is a requirement to stay on campus for the weekend and attend a two-hour study session for the subject he is doing poorly at. Any student receiving more than one Warning Notice must participate in an additional 45 minutes of Supervised Study each day after school. When the needs are greater, there is a Peer Tutoring Program which enlists advanced upperclassmen to help, and private tutoring can be arranged.
There is an extensive Postgraduate Program for those students who "...have been graduated from high school without the opportunity to attend a good college with a reasonable expectation of success."
I've seen alot of posts saying "If you liked what you were doing you would have no problems". While I can't disagree that this is true, life isn't about doing what you like all the time.
To get at the greater truth of a problem alot of times requires working on subjects and disciplines that you don't enjoy. Do not fall into the line of thinking that you have to "love" everything you are doing. Have some self respect, try and think of the greater goal you are working towards, whether it be more money, more freedom, more knowledge.
Just remember that "you" are ultimately in charge of what you learn or do not learn. (aside from any biological problems one might have.)
Can anyone please give advice on how to overcome this problem, be it a little trick, medication, or anything else?
Having been a similar kind of student in college, but have gone to a successful career, I don't think you're going to find medication or tricks or anything to 'overcome' your nature. The key to success is recognizing that the world's got people like you for a reason.
"ADHD" classifications, IMHO, are usually a label placed on the hunters by the gathers (to horribly oversimplify things). Do some research on hunter/gatherer models of learning and motivation and you'll get some good insight here.
Approaching this all from a "learning system culture" sort of macro operating system for humans, Gatherers are well suited to working together in cooperative teams, they learn via second-hand sources well, and fundamentally seek and accept extrinsic direction. They are motivated by these outside sources which they trust implicitely. They make good committee people, good followers, etc. Society needs people like this to follow rules in conducting their work. Understand that post-secondary education is the pinnacle of their system, and you'll see why you may be having problems.
I'd strongly suspect from your description that you're of the hunter ethic. Are you self-taught? Motivated by doing things you want to do (instead of what society/teachers/parents/friends tell you to do)? This model is also needed by society in conquering new things and treading outside the predictable, safe areas where gatherers like to reside. Understand that society needs both of these. If you're in the latter category, quit dwelling on the fact that you may fail miserably in the gatherer's universe (they didn't intend it for you anyways) and focus on doing what hunters do better.
Find out what topics self-motivate you. Design your own education program (and understand that you need to present third-party credentials to the gatherers you deal with - absent college degrees, get yourself certified in the various areas, e.g. CCIE, CISSP, Security+, A+, and various other certifications for your area). Make it a golden rule that you never burn bridges - your reputation is the only thing you have to offer.
And don't forget that the early years are the hardest for the hunters because we don't have a formal educational system that's designed for our success (the existing one is actually designed to classify us as a disorder and medicate us!).
Nearly every CEO and business leader I work with is of this hunter ethic (in fact, a savvy investor may wish to avoid gatherer-run companies, like Lucent, that lack any tolerance for risk and vision). Just hang in there, make yourself an expert at something, make certain that you protect your integrity in everything you do as this is critical, and success will find you.
*scoove*
I actually have the same problem, and i've found my biggest distraction to be the computer itself--instant messages, emails that need responding to, web pages that need to be checked every few minutes for updates (thanks slashdot and fark!), and just general screwing around all conspire to keep me from my appointed task.
My breakthrough came when i went to a coffeeshop to work with a laptop on an empty battery and no free outlets to be found. I started working on a notepad, and before i knew it i had the entire design for what i wanted to do laid out, and most of the code hand-written. It was amazing, and surprising. Obviously there's some things you HAVE to have a computer for, such as debugging, but i've found the more i limit my computer usage to only the most necessary tasks the more likely i am to accomplish more than 15 minutes of work a day. Incidentally, in that one eight-hour stint at the coffee shop i got more work done than in the three weeks previous, which is more a testament to how badly i was blocked working at home than how productive pen and paper made me.
also this guy has some good articles on personal productivity you may find useful.
It's that simple. You yourself explained the problem - the web is just a click away. I think its obvious why you can't get any work done until 12AM - that's because past 12AM slashdot isn't getting many stories posted, there's no good programs on TV, most of your buddies aren't on IM, and all of a sudden there's not much to do BUT work.
;-)
You know when I am surprisingly productive? On plane, train and automobile trips. I can't hook into the Net, watch TV or play games, so I've got three choices: work, read, or talk to someone. If I choose work, I can concentrate for hours without problem, but when I'm 'wired' it becomes much more difficult.
I think it's funny that everyone talks about having ADD and ADHD. For some people its real, for most its simply them trying to cope with the new information age - where info is updated by the minute. It creates what I would call an 'info lust' - the need to know the latest NOW. Inform me. Entertain me. Help me get away from a boring life.
Unhook all your connections for an entire day - see how much you get done. I bet it will be a lot.
BTW, as an aside, I know someone who has ADHD, and trust me, if you had it you couldn't be a programmer. They're moving faster than normal people, and they cannot concentrate EVER for more than a couple minutes. They want to talk just to talk and they will ramble on about nothing and try and goad you into conversation. (It's not to irritate you, like with trolls, its instinctive.) Going to bed? It takes every ounce of energy for them to keep from trying to to get out of bed and find someone to talk to. And the person I know is very nice, not a bad person at all - it is just that they can't help what they are doing.
I know someone else who has been 'diagnosed' with ADHD who doesn't come anywhere CLOSE to this description. Mostly this person has trouble listening to their parents, paying attention in school, and are tempted by lots of distractions like TV/games/computer/etc. In other words, generally behaving like kids/teenagers who are 'wired'. So if you are able to get work done in the wee hours of the night, you're right that you probably don't have any sort of mental problem. =) Just maybe a problem with keeping your hands away from the information superhighway, so to speak.
Stop posting to slashdot now and get to work
You have three options for dealing with it:
1.) Drugs (holy shit they're effective... just scary to notice your very self change)
2.) Gimmicks. The comments are already full of dozens of them.
3.) Self-Dicipline. The hardest, but only true solution.
Personnaly I was on Dexidrine for a year, and as much as it was extremely effective, the whole thing kinda freaked me out. But then having been on it I've seen the advantages of being in control of myself better, and it has made it much easier now that I'm not on anything.
You might want to think of the drugs and gimmicks route as a way of easing yourself into better self control.
Let your performance steadily degrade until you flunk out or get fired. Stop bathing and just sorta let yourself go. Let your irresponsibility alienate your friends and family. If you're still living off your parents, find some negligent way to kill them so you don't have them to fall back on.
Once you lose everything by being a lazy, worthless bum, you may finally find sufficient incentive to never let it happen again.
I had a similar problem with concentrating through college. I also lived a similar lifestyle with work and Computer Science. It left me with little social time and frustrated that I could not party like the others. Many years later and after living in Europe I found the solution....Smoke a joint. I know what you are thinking...You had to go to Europe to figure that out?? However, I am being serious. It isn't viewed as much s an evil over there and you don't have the governent flooding you with anti pot comercials which have no research or statistics to back them up. Don't smoke it around a group of individuals that are partying. Smoke it around a group of intelectuals. When I am at home and I smoke. I end up reading some of my old college texts and other books relating to math, physics, etc. My attention span is greatly increased. It is also great if you have a partner that you can discuss the readings over while you smoke. I only smoked a few times in college and they were in party atmospheres, which gave me the impression that it was only something for recreation like alcohol. However, if you do it in a more relaxed and focused environment. You will notice that your concentration will increase and your mind will be able to multi-task. This may be a controversial solution to some. However, it works for me and many others. It's time that we got rid of the hippie and stoner steriotype we have of cannabis users in this country. I do work in the IT field and work with many others like me that have CS , Math and Engineering degrees from very respected universities that do the same.
but then I saw this %$#@! article and I've spent 2 hours reading it. :/
Back in HS I was about to fail a class and had only a few weeks to go over a whole book of american history!! What I found to work best for me at the time, and im sure it'll work now, is to GOTO THE LIBRARY. When I goto the library I go in with the attitude of, I WENT TO THE FUCKING LIBRARY WILLINGLY, THE ONLY REASON FOR ME BEING HERE IS TO GET SOME WORK DONE, NOW GET IT DONE! And then I just start working. I managed to read several chapters a day, which really suprized me. I know american history isnt exactly technical work, but there are alot of specific events you must remember with dates and junk. Anywhoo im getting bored writing this.. lol
Punishment system
First, lock the door to your room. Next, put a nice CD in the stereo, on loop. For example, Fatal Portrait by King Diamond. This is a nice enough CD but you don't want to listen to it more than once in one sitting. It's also a rather short CD, so it loops quickly. The rules are simple: no leaving your room and no stopping the CD until the term paper is written. Trust me, after a few hours it practically writes itself.
Another trick useful for writing papers is to randomly choose books from the university library and find some way to include them as sources in your paper. I did this with nearly every paper after a certain point. Sometimes got some odd comments on, for example, why I quoted Modern Dress in the 20th Century to bolster my arguments about Edmund Spenser and the Catholic Church...
I have a very simple solution that hits the problem like a baseball bat. Listen to music using headphones. Two reasons: 1 - It will boost my concentration like 400% 2 - It will avoid getting distracted by avoiding you turning your head (since it's plugged in the computer and the wire is short.
how long until
My teachers started complaining about this same tendency in me when I was in first grade. I'm now 31 years old and it shows no sign of abating. I'm just lucky enough to have found jobs that have been pretty tolerant of it. But I don't ever expect it to go away.
If the computer is your major "first draft" tool, consider changing.
Get off the computer by scribbling things with pen and paper. You don't need to stay at you computer to do this. You don't need to stay home to do this. Then you do your final draft on box once it's done.
Personaly, I even code with pen and paper (drawing charts, put down algrorithms). When coding comes, it takes less computer time to finish the job.
So why don't you talk to a trained professional who actually knows brain things, get it diagnosed correctly and exercise (if said trained professional deems it necessary) better living through chemistry. People seem to think there's some shame in that so they'd rather continue their lives at severely reduced efficiency rather than get medicated. Asking Slashdot for psychiatric advice is like asking Slashdot for legal advice. The best advice you'll get here is to talk to someone who can actually figure out what's wrong with you.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I find that the less time I have the better I use the time I do have. Back in high school when I played Varsity Lacrosse, we'd have practice three hours a day, five days a week. When I'd get home from practice, I'd get all my work done right away and have it done before I would ever have my homework done out of season. I had a similar problem in college until I got a job last semester working twenty hours a week. Now I just get my work done because I don't have time to spend four hours surfing the net.
When you go to bed at night, review what you have to do tomorrow. Then visualize yourself finishing all of the tasks AND feeling good about it. Repeat the same visualization before you get up in the morning. If done well (takes practice) getting up in the morning is like Christmas morning every day of the year. You'll find yourself hitting the ground running, getting the jobs done. The procrastinating takes care of itself. Experiencing feeling good about finishing is absolutlely essential. Reuse the same feelings you've had from previous projects. Then, in your mind, transfer the same sense of accomplishment to the next task. It works.
I'm alot like you. My conclusion is that everything else becomes more interesting than what your working on so procrastination happens. Someone suggested a small burst of exercise during studying/coding and I've found that to work wonders as well as a 20 gamecube break. "Just a tenion breaker...it had to be done." -Cereal from Hackers- Oh yeah...working in a coffee house really helped me too, just gotta find away to afford all the coffee.
"Had I been less firmly resolved upon settling down definitively to work, I should perhaps have made an effort to begin at once. But since my resolution was explicit, since within twenty-four hours, in the empty fram of the following day where everything was so well arranged because I myself was not yet in it, my good intentions would be realised without difficulty, it was better not to start on an evening when I felt ill-prepared. The following days were not, alas, to prove more porpitious. But I was reasonable. It would have been puerile, on the part of one who had waited now for years, not to put up with a postponement of two or three days. confident that by the day after tomorrow I should have written several pages, I said not a word more to my parents of my decision; I preferred to remain patient for a few hours and then to bring to a convinced and comforted grandmother a sample of work that was already under way. Unfortunately the next day was not that vast, extraneous expanse of time to which I had feverishly looked forward. When it drew to a close, my laziness and my painful struggle to overcome certain internal obstacles had simply lasted twenty-four hours longer. And at the end of several days, my plans not having matured, I had no longer the same hope that they would be realised at once, and hence no longer the heart to subordinate everything else to their realisationL I began again to stay up late, having no longer, to oblige me to go to bed early one evening, the certain hope of seeing my work begun next morning. I needed, before I could recover my creative energy, a few days of relaxation..." ---Remembrance of Things Past by Marcel Proust (Vol. 2, page 210-1)
... I close my web browser and stop reading Slashdot.
No, really, I'm serious -- it works!
If you're a college kid (and yes, you are a kid, get over it), and you don't have work to do, find some work to do. And stop posting on slashdot. The real world is elsewhere.
If you only do an hour of work-what are you doing the rest of the day. When I was in school, I had a part time job, took a full class load, and still had time for happy hour. My grades dropped from straight A's in high school to B's in college, because I was always out at the record shops, art museums, concerts, or clubs. I always managed to get my papers and projects in on time-sometimes staying up all night doing them. That's just how it is when you are in college. Now that I've been out in the real world, I have absolutely no time for anything. I work about 50-55 hours a week, and have a family. When I have projects due, it is no problem for me to sit down and do them in the evenings. As you get more responsibility and more work, you adapt to the situation. Work becomes a habit. Hopefully, a good habit. My time now is precious, so I try to get all my work done before it is due, so I have have family time or just plain down time. Enjoy yourself in college- I guarantee you will not have the time to worry about how to get the work done when you are out- You will just have to get the work done!
I don't think I've seen this one yet, but it helped me immensely and it's something I wouldn't have normally thought of: make it as simple as possible to do your work.
What does this mean? Eliminate ANY possible hinderence to getting your work done. If you surf the web a lot, remove your browser shortcut from the desktop, quicklauch bar, dock, or whatever. Put it in the start menu or something. Only access the web through Explorer or Konqueror in filesystem mode, so you have two steps to accomplish before you start surfing; calling up Konq, and typing in a URL that you want to go to. Remove all games from easily accessible places. Put the documents you are working on as shortcuts on the desktop. Anything, as long as it makes it as easy as possible to work on things.
It feels silly when you do things like this (how can this make a real difference?), but every little bit helps.
I find it sad commentary on either the /. readership or the times that someone saying, "Suck it up and just do it." is this far down the page. I worked my way through college finishing my senior year working full time on third shift and going to classes *after* I'd worked all night so it can be done under more difficult conditions. You just have to decide on what your priorities are. If its play then get used to asking, "Do you want fries with that?" Think about that as a career choice the next time you're feeling "distracted."
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
I, like most others who read /., am in the same boat. My suggestions are as follows:
1) Sleep. Make sure you get a good night sleep, plenty of resources on how to do this out there!
2) Music. Get some background music. If you're nice and familiar with it it may help occupy your brain in a non-distracting way. Works great for me!
3) Air. Open the windows. It'll keep you more alert and awake.
Finally, if all else fails, remove everything from your computer and environment other than the items needed to study/work. An easy way to achieve this is to use a laptop with only the essentials in your local/school library.
I notice a lot of people cheerfully diagnose ADD or ADHD. What a bunch of baloney, this is just the human condition. Of course, it could be a good early indicator that you don't like your work and you might consider finding something more fulfilling to do for the rest of your life.
and focus on the task at hand.
:D
Okay, seriously, I have the same problem of putting stuff off until later. I work best at midnight, like you do. The best thing is to get rid of the distractions. Don't install the games, television, chat software on your work PC. As someone else suggested, go for the minimal desktop.
Clear away the accumulated detritus from around your physical desk, including swag, magazines, and all but 1 or 2 manuals. Keep dead-tree manuals around instead of browsing the net because it's too easy to get distracted.
Comfort can kill. Don't lie down in front of the computer.
This was the most painful for me -- stop drinking as much coffee. It can lead to short term productivity increases but really screws up your attention span in the long term especially if you're missing sleep like I was (I still have to force myself to get more than 5 hours a night).
I work from home and have started adhering to a task list. This is easier when your mortgage timeliness depends on getting work done
I found some great gems in these posts so far, now i'm gonna go and be productive... after i hit refresh 20 times in a row.
I have always found that organization is the best way to work through a paper. I can just stick to what I've come up with and I work twice as fast. Always prepare for the unexpected.
Would it be dangerous to make an imaginary person that you listened to all the time when he told you what you needed to get done? I've never really done this to myself, but sometimes I think if I made this voice in my head that I acted was real, and listened to everything it said that was beneficial (not jump off a bridge or anything)... but my only fear was maybe I would respect that voice/imaginary person and start obeying bad things.. like maybe it starts to get a mind of its own... but I wonder if that would happen or if it is dangerous at all. I mean you remember your parents telling you what to do and stuff, and that was beneficial for the most part (if you had good parents... im not talking about any extremes or anything). Well, since I posted this (I hardly post unless I have an idea that no one else has said -- if anyone has posted this in reply to the article plz link mine to it so I can read theirs too) I think I am going to try this method.
a whoel day and he does 1 hour. He just sounds like a lazy worker. Please, never apply for a real job then, you just keep doing your contract work. You are going to end up being a burden on your whole department, and probably then promoted since you cant produce as a worker bee. This crap makes me mad. How come the rest of us have no problem putting in an 8 hour day, and this joker is looking for how to focus. Here is a focus point, stop being a shmuck and work for a change. 1 hour before dinner, you should be ashamed of yourself! --dan
It worked for me.
A lot of it is willpower and just sitting down and crunching out whatever it is that you have to do. I'm not a coder or a programmer, the only real work that I do inside of the home; I however do attempt to generate content for my website (the poor excuse for a site that it is); write AD&D advenutres for several area conventions; and short stories. This is of course something that everyone else claims to do also, but most people that I've met who say that they do some writing turn out to be people who don't really do much of anything. No offense meant to anyone.
Scheduling has helped me an awful lot in my work, settin ggoals is also the best way to do anything. If you're doing something like writing, or coding, or whatever else you might be doing on the comuter. See how far you can get, just sit down for as long as you can hold yourself in front of your monitor and crack away. Once your done, you go back and see the amount that you've managed to push out.
Use that amount as a goal or a guideline, say you were writing and you nailed down about 200 words before you went stir crazy. Just say to yourself that you'll write 200 or so words a day, and you'll get there.
Of course if you have deadlines to meet than that really gets thrown out the window. It's mostly a matter of self-discipline and scheduling. I think the first respondent metnioned physical activity, and that's something that is absolutely great. Unwind, relax a bit and then get to work, even if you do it in like fifteen minute bursts.
Again, as for deadlines, I really can't help because I seem to just magically get motivated the night before when those come around.
What usually works for me, especially with things I don't like, is to schedule breaks more than scheduling work. You can't work a whole day on something that you don't enjoy, not easily. Force yourself to work for an hour, for a half hour, then get up and walk around. ;)
Another thing I've done is just unplug the computer from the internet. Or do my homework without using the computer, if you can do that. Shut down your IM programs, IRC, email. Check them in an hour. Part of it's willpower, but another part of it is giving yourself a situation where you can succeed.
Know thyself
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
As an adult sufferer of ADD, I have found something that helps - a PDA. After I got one (old, B&W, Palm) it help immeasurably. It forced me to organize and prioritize, such that I got into some good work habits. It also helped me to really consider the individual tasks to complete even the most mundane errands, so that I now can get things done on time, the most important aspect of the working life. Pirsig's gumption traps, Quality, and his concept of rhetoric as the initiator of action seem to be embodied in the structure an organizer can give.
Too bad I figured all of this out in my fifties. Get an early start.
davel
dot-sig.
I once complained to my father when I was young about not wanting to do my homework. He said something that has rung in my ears ever since:
"Bob... part of being a man means doing things even when you don't want to."
Those words have kept me going through "aw, crap, I really don't feel like doing this" moments throughout my entire life.
Flat5
...that the people most qualified to answer that are probably getting work done right now and aren't reading Slashdot. Personally, I'll waste too much time myself, but I always realize it in time and put in enough hours at the end. Because in the end, it's not that I can't concentrate on something for hours without end (e.g. certain computer games), I'm just too lazy to do so until I *have* to...
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Actually he is right, moreso if he tweaks it just a bit by making it difficult but not impossible to access.
Want to get serious work done? Walk across the room and disconnect the network cable from the wall. Really need access (like to submit your homework, as you suggested) walk over and plug it in, submit your work, and then unplug it again.
For someone that is easily distracted, removing the ease of distraction (ie, a direct connect to the net) is better than Ritalin.
Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
I have basically the same problems, as far as I can tell. I'm also a university stuent, majoring in Computer Science. Whenenver I start working on something and it isn't imminently due (or hell, even when it is sometimes) I immediately get distracted and look at something else. Sometimes it really annoys me. But the thing is, I always, ALWAYS, get it done. My cumulative GPA right now is some god-awful high number like 3.94 or something (out of 4.00). For whatever reason I can do decent work regardless of my seemingly defective habits. I actually have made a little bit of progress, if only because some of the projects I have to do now are so huge...I can convince myself that something is "imminently due and hanging over my head" 2-3 days before the due date, instead of the night before, and do a reasonable job of concentrating throughout that time. But basically it works for me. I figure I would probably test positive for ADD if I wanted some drugs for it, but I really don't want to become dependent on those unless my life becomes seriously screwed up without them, which it hasn't.
So the question for you, before you decide to do anything, is, is this seriously fucking my life up? If it is, by all means, see a crank brain doctor, start exercising or joining study groups or unplug your net access, or whatever. But if not, just accept that you have a different, but equally effective, way of doing work, and don't let popular opinions on study skills make you feel like you are inadequate. Because the fact is, there are people out there spending 4 or 5 times as much time as you are on their assignments, and planning and micromanaging their lives in minute detail, who have not been able to get as far as you can, and they are not better than you just because they can act more organised.
As a bookseller, I've found many people simply do not realize the wealth of information that is available on this subject. Start with the Books > Subjects > Health, Mind & Body > Self-Help > Time Management and the Books > Subjects > Business & Investing > Business Life > Time Management and then check out the Books > Subjects > Business & Investing > Management & Leadership > Motivational section of Amazon. One book I'd recommend is Getting Things Done by Ed Bliss.
Also, you might want to check out the study guides and test strategies section available at any college or university bookstore.
An much deeper and profoundly thought provoking book that directly deals with focus and will is P.D. Ouespensky's The Fourth Way. Be warned, however, this one is not for the faint-hearted.
Words to men, as air to birds.
ADD, ADHD aside, these are also symptoms of depression.
The vending-machine diet is exactly the wrong thing for some of us when it comes to concentration...
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
For some reason, i get hte most amount of work done when I have the least amount of internet connection.
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
that I often get distracted too but I disagree. I think it's more a case of
I think this is a very common problem - I know I suffer from it at work quite frequently. I can't promise to give you a perfect response, but here are some random thoughts related to the topic...
:)
:)
:)
1) If you just can't get around to doing something, it maybe simply because it's an insanely boring task. We all have to do them for sure, but it can be difficult. First idea (and this isn't a joke) - can you get someone else to do it? If you're at work - delegate, swap tasks, do a deal, whatever. What's boring to you might be just what someone else would like to spend an afternoon doing. If you really have to do it yourself, I simply make a deal with myself - no ps2/tv/web/pron/insert fave poison here until it's done. I have some self control so that usually does it
2) Sleep. I tend not to sleep enough mainly due to having too many more fun things to do. I find my concentration wanders a lot more when I'm tired. A few good nights sleep can help my concentration at work (even with things I hate doing) a hell of a lot.
3) Give your mind a break. Rather than do something else on the sly and feel guilty - allocate some time and go and do something else on purpose. If you've got a long piece of work break it up in advance and allocate fun time during the day. I find my focus is better when I sit back down at something after maybe 30 mins off.
4) Music. Classical might work for you - certainly not for me. Where I work speakers are banned but headphones are fine. I've loaded my PC up with a big selection of tunes for different moods - the key for me is choosing the right tune. For full-on 110% rush coding nothing beats full-on (extremely loud) dance music. I'm a DJ so I've done a bunch of mixes which fit the bill. I find that when my head starts nodding and my feet start tapping, my fingers can't help but keep up
I dunno - maybe some of that will help someone
---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"
I was the same way when I was in college. I didn't even have the web as a distraction. My record for no sleep was 54 consecutive hours.
I never got any help for it, but I think it might have been stress related. I simply couldn't shut my mind off and was stuck staying busy. I spent a lot of time in the school of music practicing, and a lot of time in the Library.
You should go to student health services. I did some reading about sleep depravation back then I found that if it happens often enough, brain damage may result.
Sooner of later, you will need to crash after all of those hours, I slept 14 hours once. Unfortunately, it was through a mid-term. Do yourself a favor and talk to someone.
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. -Frederick Douglass
I suffer from the exact same thing, but I actually suspect that I do have ADD or something. I can't focus. My mind wanders. I get lost in my own train of thought. Sometimes I'm worried I've done things or will do things I can't remember ever doing. My student room look like an accident in a warehouse or something.
I read a lot to manage my money, but the only way I can find time is to find a local restaurant or coffee shop (I don't know of a 24 hr library) without wireless. Sometimes I drive some distance and then do it.
First, I don't have the distractions available. Since I can't work on them anyway I can only accomplish what I take with me, so I usually get it done.
Second, it creates fixed or sunk costs (in economic terms what you have to spend before doing the first thing, but in this case time - if the web is 3 seconds away I might do something, but not if it is 30 minutes away).
Third, at most places like that, I can get refills on drinks and have everything else so I really don't have to get up much from the table.
In my case, my stomach benefits since I eat slower when I am reading and can read better when it is slower. My attention switching is satisfied by the food and beverage.
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I have several PDA devices, but don't schedule with them. I use a piece of paper (or small pad or index cards) and pen.
I list the things I really need to get done, and sometimes add color or icons to indicate urgency and/or importance.
When I have some "free" time, I look at the list and see if there is anything I can/want-to work on. Instead of just surfing or doing something else, I try to do something (including personal projects - "go to the bookstore" can be on it). I keep adding and transferring and sometimes use these copy times to reestablish priorities or set my day.
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The first technique creates blocks of time where tasks may be accomplished.
The second organizes my time in general so that I am doing things I need to get done more of the time.
Computers are the most wonderful tool for distracting yourself ever created. So get yourself a cheap used notebook, and only load the software on it that you need to get work done. And for God's sake, don't hook it up to the Internet!
I'm generally "Interesting," "Insightful," and even "Funny" here. What the hell happens to me at parties?
1. Disconnect from the internet. I used to spend to much time reading/responding to email, reading slashdot, craigslist, etc... When I'm working, I just disconnect from the internet. I set aside time in the morning, and afternoon to check emails and such.
2. I have a laptop, so this works for me. I usually go up and work at a coffee shop near my house. There are to many distractions at home, so getting out really helps me focus. Don't go to Starbucks though, it's usually very crowded and loud. The one I go to is very peaceful, they play soft music in the background, nothing annoying.
Wow, I'm just like that. All through college (3 of them) I had the same problems. I've been out of college for years now, although I do teach at the local community college sometimes.
:o)
Here's what works for me.
- I tell someone else what my goals are and how I'm doing on them. My wife works nicely for that. Very nicely in fact since she reminds me about the mortgage, groceries, etc. Her Work for Sex exchange program is an excellent motivator too. Or more often, no money = more headaches.
- I keep a piece of paper or white board handy and write down what I'm doing. I use it like a memory stack. Task A, A.1, A.1.1, and so on and I cross them off when I'm done. It's very easy when tracking a bug looking 12 different files and lots of different calling procedures and arguments to forget what your trying to accomplish in the first place. I used to go through a lot of paper, but it's helped me a lot.
- Use SafeSex Software - a nice little utility from the makers of Winamp. It's always on top and a quick way to jot down your thoughts instead of paper once you get used to it. It's a little box on the desktop that says STAY FOCUSED. You can make it say what you want.
- Since most of my projects involve using the same programs, I wrote a script to load them all at once on my desktop *AND* start my accounting program. Once I see that timer going and I know I'm billing the client, it's hard to start browsing the web. Since the IDE and Project files are open I get right to work.
- Put slashdot.org in my HOSTS file as 127.0.0.1. I haven't had to do that in a long time, but for a while I was using it way to much. I feeling much better now.
You could try being a man, instead of the spoiled little baby that you are. Mommy isn't going to do your work for you anymore. Grow the fuck up.
Personally, most classical music annoys me. There are a few exceptions. When I'm really working, I wear headphones and listen to loud music. It drowns out the external annoyances. One really good one is Frank Zappa's Shut Up And Play Your Guitar; a 3 cd set of mostly guitar jams, with no annoying lyrics. I'm not a fan of most of his stuff, but this one is good.
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
In highschool, a teacher had a banner on the wall that said "The secret to getting done is getting started".
Its simple, but its true. I find that if you can just break down and open that book, or fire up visual studio and write a couple lines of code, or whatever, you will be more inclined to keep going.
If you keep thinking about getting started, you never will.
I used to be just like that and I found what helped me:
1) sepearate work and play.
stay off the web unless you need it. make yourself focus entirely on the task at hand. don't think of work when you're playing and don't think of play when you're working. the first will bring you down and make you feel guilty. the latter is hard, but with practice you learn to stay focused.
2) if you're bored and don't get anywhere, give it a little time to get back on track, then if that doesn't work, go somewhere else. taking a walk will freshen your braincells. get some solitude, listen to music, whatever.
3) work with a friend. a companion is the best motivator. preferably someone who shares your task, but it doesn't have to be. someone you can bounce ideas off can be all you need.
4) learn to motivate yourself. e.g. if you fail this class you will have to do it all over again next year. understanding the consequences of slacking off sometimes is enough to motivate you into working, but don't let it get you down. think positive.
also, you're probably not sick, just burned out or in a "creative phase". try to stay positive and create good habits. stop feeling guilty and do something about it!
Submitted cowardly, for your consideration
Why is that so? I think this is very unfortunate. How can this be changed?
Look around you--what attitudes do see on the part of your management? Do people tell you to provide the very best design or do they say get the job done cheaper and faster? One thing to remember is that most engineers and designers work for organizations who aren't in the engineering business--they're in the construction or manufacturing business and their prime concern is getting product out the door. Engineering is a necessary expense, but product is what makes the money. Engineers are generally expected to aspire to management positions, and the decision is usually made about age 40. After 5 years working with budgets and marketing goals, an engineer's technical skills get rusty.
In the legal profession, lawyers work for more experienced lawyers, not MBA's; likewise physicians work for physicians. Mentoring is part of the job. How to change things? I don't know. Philosophically, I think in a organization where engineering is the chief business, it would be different--not that business considerations would ever take a back seat to technical prowess, but the balance would be better. But that isn't the way that mechanical engineering is typiclaly practiced.
I would like my success to be measured in terms of how good I am at that, not by the number of people who report to me. What do you think?
I think that's praiseworthy--but keep in mind that your view of success is likely to differ from that of the people who employ you. I got lucky--I've been able to stay technical all my career. It's meant frequent job changes and a few lay-offs. Not counting contract positions, I'd worked for 7 different companies by the time I was 45. The last lay-off was a (well-disguised) blessing that got me into private practice, so my business _is_ engineering. I'll never be rich, and I work like hell, but I never enjoyed it more. The business of engineering is an interesting one, and once it isn't muddled up with some manager's pet projects and a lot of corporate foolishness, it's very refreshing.
If flexible scheduling is an option, use it for what it's worth. If getting the job done means working in the middle of the night and your output is optimal by doing this, then do it. The best programmer I have ever employed was like that: his muse usually got active around 11 PM and he would usually code until 6 AM or so. Because of this we kept him on flex time and tried not to call him at home before noon. He would do emails and follow-ups in the afternoon and then start programming again around midnight.
When *I* was on flex, I was a bit different. I would wake up around 7 AM, do email until 9 AM or so, then drove to the office for 4 hours, which helped me skip the morning traffic jams. Back at home before 3 PM meant no afternoon traffic jams either. Goof around til early evening and then code from 7:30 PM or so until 1-2 AM.
If flex and telecommuting are not an option, the best thing is to get buy-in from your manager to block out your schedule from non-project intrusions. I now work for a 15-person firm, and I am the only programmer here, plus I have to provide IT support. Whenever I am forced to switch to full-programmer mode the ops manager pretty much builds a wall around me. Anyone that needs me for non-programming tasks needs to go thru her first. This cuts distractions by 75% and I can work 45-hour weeks instead of 60+.
A warning on late-night coding binges: watch out for your health. I don't have a sleeping cycle anymore thanks to 8 years of graveyard shift plus 3 years of flex-time. I have been on a 9-5 schedule for a year and I still have no hope of a regular sleep schedule. Your circadian rhythm will get shot to hell if you are not careful. Also, be careful with the caffeine binges and snacking!
Pedro
----
The Insomniac Coder
I agree that a lot of this is in your mind. It's like your outlook on life: if you want to be happy, decide that you will see the good things in people and that your glass will be half full, instead of criticising everyone and being pessimistic about every situation. No-one else can make that decision for you.
Lots and lots of people experience this sort of thing while at university. Yes, I did too. I was well known for the unusual hours I kept, and my lack of attendance at lectures where I wasn't convinced about the material and/or the presentation, something else I'm sure many here can relate to. But while I don't want to knock those with a genuine problem, most of the time it's just laziness if we're honest about it. Trying to pin something like laziness on a condition like ADD is a typical cop-out of someone lazy; several such conditions are themselves of dubious scientific validity and believed by many in the business simply to be people making excuses.
Of course, if the laziness is caused by a lack of motivation or a negative outlook, sometimes deciding you want to overcome it is a good start, but doesn't help much with actually overcoming it. Then I find breaking the task down to be helpful. If something seems overwhelming, it's probably because you're trying to jump in at the deep end.
For example, maybe you need to write a complicated piece of code that might wind up hundreds of lines long, and you know what you want it to do but aren't really clear in your mind about how you're going to do it. In that case, try just writing the pseudocode algorithm in comments in your function. If it's going to take several functions, that's OK, write pseudocode for the main one first and then the others as it becomes convenient. Don't worry about details at first, or following any rigorous structure, just figure out the main idea. You can always add more details later if they're helpful. Once you're basically happy with the pseudocode version, start hacking.
Similarly, if you're anything like me, you wind up building up household chores horribly. You know that putting that load of washing through will only take five minutes to put stuff in the machine and another five minutes to take it out again, but somehow it's all too much effort. When this sort of thing happens, I make a list of all the little things I need to do: clothes washing, washing up, hoovering, cleaning in the kitchen, cutting the grass, food shopping, filing bank statements, etc. Then I just pick the items off, one by one. I'll put the washing in, so I've got something started, then wash up or do the garden while it's going, and so on, making best use of the time. When you actually get down to it, you can do a lot of stuff in just a couple of hours, and most individual things only take a few minutes. As with the coding problem, it's just getting over the mental barrier that says it's too much hard work to get started, and (for me, at least) the way to do it is to break a big, unsurmountable problem down into little, manageable ones.
Somehow, finding the motivation to break the big problem down is never as hard as finding the motivation to just attack it without really knowing how. Then solving the little problems is much easier, and once I've started, I've got a plan and know what I need to do next, so I can keep going without losing concentration. I can write hundreds of lines of good code a day like this, or do every piece of housework there is in a single afternoon. Try it, maybe it'll work for you too. :-)
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
The surest way for me to have a productive day, is to spend the first 5 minutes of the day thinking about what I want to do, and how to go about it. Sometimes this leads to taking some notes, but it always leads to me sitting down excited about what I will be doing.
I used to be a university professor -- you might (or might not) be surprised to hear that I had the same problem as my students. If you think it's discouraging looking at a blank screen when you have to write a 10-page paper, imagine staring at a pile of several hundred ungraded exams or essays.
I recommend that you buy a cheap, digital kitchen timer, then set very simple goals. If you don't feel like working, set the timer for just ten minutes and then work (no Web or anything else) straight until it stops. Goof around for a while, then do another ten-minute stretch. When ten minutes gets too easy, bump it up to fifteen, thirty, or whatever, but *never* make it so long that you cannot get through without being distracted. It's OK to keep working after the timer runs out, but it's never OK to do anything else while it's running.
The other advice on this list is also excellent -- exercise always helps me work -- but the kitchen timer gives you a fallback when all else fails. Best of luck.
1. Stay off Slashdot
2. Use LISP: get more done in less time
When I have this problem (still do, even though I'm not a student anymore) I either a) go to a room without a computer or b) disconnet my network cable. It's also the best firewall invented(TM).
Welcome to the life of a Comp Sci student. Deal with it; I did. Wuss.
When I was in college I found I did my best work if I woke up at 4 am and did my work until around 9 am. There are very little distractions at that time usually all your friends are a sleep or finishing their last minute work. There is nothing good on TV. And the environment is usually is very quit. At first getting up at that time is tough but after a while it gets easier.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Break down a large task into small steps. Next to each task, in the first column, predict how difficult that task will be on a scale from 0-100%. Leave a column blank, which will be the percentage of the actual difficulty after you do that step. Next column is predicting how satisfying it will be, 0-100%, and then one more blank column used to record the actual satisfaction after the step. (It's a cognitive therapy technique.) IANAD. I'd be curious if anyone actually tries this, how it works out for them.
With your pants off, you'll be playing with yourself!
It's different for everyone - but from college (and now grad school) I can give you some advice from my own personal view point and what I saw roommates/friends do. - Study somewhere/work somewhere where you CAN'T get distracted by outside entertainment. ie the library. I know that an hour of studying in the library was about equivalent to 3-4 in my apartment sometimes. - Breaks. I cannot concentrate after about 45-50 minutes of studying/doing work. So I take a 10-15 minute break then come back to it. It takes self control to stop the game your playing or stop screwing around on the web, but you come back refreshed and get that 'first go' benefit again. - Disconnect the internet from your PC. Period. Don't plug it back in. Give the network cable to someone else to not return till your done. - Get a 'buddy' to study/work with. I don't know exactly what kind of work you are doing but when there is two of you, pushing each other back on track can help keep you both in line. Also, you can explain/work through things together that I've found can actually help MORE then studying alone. - Small amounts of caffeine or alcohol. Use them to either relax or hype yourself up. By small amounts I mean a beer. Or one drink. Or a cup of coffee. Remember: If you get yourself hyper, your not getting jack done...use it when your tired or to focus...basically, taking caffeine pills and coffee doesn't work. Particularly dissolving them INTO coffee. You end up running around in circles all night and getting nothing done. I speak from experience.) - If you experience symptions of ADD ALL the time (not just working...) then see a doctor. Get tested/checked out and get the medicine to help. I think medicating children is a horrendous idea, but if it persists into adulthood then you def. could benefit from it because you've learned to 'overcome' as much as you can...IMHO. That's all I can think of now. Hope those little tidbits help. Myself, I just study or work for 30 minutes and if Im getting nowhere take a break. Once I get 'rolling' I just keep going until something stops me. Then I restart over until I get back into it. Seems to work - it's frustrating sometimes but...hell...that's life.
I know someone who has a candle with an uncommon scent that he lights whenever he does serious work. It's actually a pretty good strategy - the scent is a reminder to work, and since smell is the sense that has the most effect on us, it's probably one of the best reminders to work work work that you can have.
Granted, it's not a big help until you start associating the smell with work, but I'd give it a try.
The other option is red bull, but after drinking those regularly, you start to feel like crap.
I have very similar, if not exactly the same problems (and I'm a college student too).
;-) does wonders for your ability to do work. For me, it works well only with logical, flow-based work like mathematics, physics, computer science and other ideas where creativity stems from logical application of concepts, not things like writting where speed of thought != productivity.
Like a lot of others here have said, exercise works well. However, if you're not too squeamish about putting chemicals into your system, have some connections, and a few extra bucks, I'd recomment self-medication with Ritalin or Adderall.
Snorting a pill of Ritalin or half a pill of Adderall (or two pills of Ritalin / whole pill of Adderall -- depending on how adventerous you are
Of course, it's *very* bad to become dependent on chemicals for your ability to do work (Ritalin isn't particularly habit forming unless you do a *lot* of it, but Adderall is pretty bad since it also gives you a moderate euphoria), and so I wouldn't recommend this solution for than once a week, if that often.
However, when you've got a whole load of problem sets to write up, or a long piece of code to deal with, and caffeine just won't cut it, Ritalin and Adderall will focus you for hours.
Your milage may vary, and check sites like erowid.org before you do anything with chemical you don't feel comfortable with.
I have suffered from same symptoms and planning worked wonders for me. Some tasks take weeks or months not a couple of nights, so waiting for deadline pressure won't accomplish anything. Also, some tasks do not have deadlines, and sometimes they are the most important ones.
The worst situation for me was when I was writing my MS thesis, calculations and speculating about the results were fun but writing them up was taking forever, because I was always distracted by some more calculations or other things to try. I guess this is roughly equivalent to surfing web or playing games. So, I started writing an outline, a very skeleton thing with no meat on it. But that gave me something to work on. Then I have written the outlines of chapters, then sections, then subsections. So, I reduced the task to chewable bites, i.e., paragraphs. Then I started writing those paragraphs and compiled the thesis through LaTeX as frequently as possible. It was rather like, when you are running, you see a post and say I'll first reach there, and when you reach there, you spot another post.
Of course, writing a thesis is very easily analysed into pieces which can be monitored continuously, but to some extent it works for other things to. On another note, analysing what you will do is a necessary step anyways, combine that with a roadplan so you will have something concrete to work on rather than something abstract which you can get away from easily.
ato
Seriously, this is what worked for me. Being a perfectionist (but a procrastinator) what would do wonders is to just sit down, and get started. If it's a paper, I'd start by putting down my name and the date, and then put down one - three sentences, and after that I would be off.
:)
Coding, write the first class (that actually does something so you can see it take effect) and same thing.
Sometimes about halfway through hit a dead spot and get distracted by slashdot etc. The trick there was to have started things at least a day earlier so I could just hit the sack when I found producivity going down.
Unless you start, it won't get finished, so the trick for me was to just start
You sound so much like me, most of my life, until a few years ago. It seemed like there were never enough hours in the day for me to get anything done. Things that other people did routinely were huge overwhelming tasks for me. I wondered how they did it. I would feel badly about my inability to get anything done, too, and this negative self-talk seemed to make it even harder to face a task.
Somehow I got through school, though, and actually did well. Fortunately I was smart so I didn't have to do as much work as others did to achieve the same results. I also did well at work, because as a software developer, I love what I do, so it's easy for me to focus on it.
But my every day personal life suffered. Household chores, bill paying, making (and keeping) appointments --- stuff like that made me crazy. In addition, I couldn't remember anything --- details like dates, phone numbers, what to get at the grocery store, even plots to movies I'd seen --- these things flew out of my head quickly without a trace. I had what I call SPADD -- "Smart Person Attention Deficit Disorder". Which means: I can figure out ANYTHING, but I can't remember shit.
About 2 1/2 years ago I started taking Wellbutrin to help me quit smoking. Not only was I able to quit smoking completely within a few months, but I found it made a radical change in my "SPADD". First, the negative self-talk stopped completely, and gradually, that strange feeling of having boulders in the way of everything I needed to do disappeared. Even decision-making became easier. I didn't have to struggle anymore just to open the mail, and all those other chores that I used to avoid.
My life has improved so much. I can't even explain it. It truly feels to me like there are more hours in the day now, and my life is more enjoyable.
Another odd thing is that music sounds better to me now. Which led me to a theory --- I think people with "SPADD" have a hyper-awareness that gets in their way of living. I was always both listening to music and THINKING about listening to music at the same time. That was true of everything I did --- I would be watching a movie AND THINKING about the experience of watching a movie, or paying bills and thinking about paying bills. I could never just "DO" it.
I love being on the Wellbutrin, I feel like I'm normal now --- which in my case is a good thing. I know there are a lot of people who are going to rant about how BAD the medication is for you or how immoral it is to rely on such a crutch --- but those people don't live my life. I'm better now.
One thing to keep in mind, to anyone who goes this route --- it takes months to get the full effect of the Wellbutrin. The first week or so can be uncomfortable, with sleeplessness and edginess, but for me that has completely disappeared, and I actually sleep better now than I ever have.
Izora
http://ob-la-blog.blogspot.com/
I'd say in a given week i do about 15 minutes of actualy work. Hell, now I have up to FIVE people working under me!
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"There was an error processing this sig, document does not conform to DTD, expecting: (sig), encountered (bs)(bs)(bs)...."
I guess schizophrenia is just a matter of self discipline as well? or altzheimers?
I agree sometimes ADD is self discipline related, but not in all cases.
Your attitude of blaming them for being weak or whatever is typical.
Several drugs, in double blind studies, have dramatically increased how well and the duration people can perform concentration type tasks.
How do you explain that?
Everything in our brians is checmicals: emotions, perceptions, feelings etc. To think that concentration, ann obviously physical activity chemically speaking, cannot be affected by the rate at which chemicals are produced by our bodies is just willfully ignorant.
Good for you if you dont have it, I am glad you don't, but for once stop making simplistic judements about other people when you obviously have no idea what you are talking about.
I dont have it either, and like I said, sometimes it is probably just a matter of self (or parental) discipline but I am at least open to the idea that some folks probably have a chemical variance that affects it.
I believe the same thing about weigh gain, some folks just process suger differently and some people over eat for emotional reasons, but it doesnt mean _all_ overweight people are that way for any single reason.
My advice to this gentleman is to see about trying non medicial solutions and practices that might help first. Meditation, mental self programming are both good to try and learn about, even if you end up also needing medication.
There are groups and books about good things that ADD folks can do to help, I am sure many of those techniques probably would help many non ADD folks as well.
Wax on, wax off baby!
I often find myself in the same position and I have found that writing stuff on paper can often get things started and, though at a much slower writing pace, sometimes done more quickly if I am being easily distracted.
Another thing to do is, if you're using OSX, get the utility dockswitch and create a dock that only has microsoft word (not AIM, not your web browser, nothing else). Hope this helps.
**When craziness is bliss, 'tis folly to be sane**
Lots of good tips in here. College is behind me now, but I had almost the exact same problem. In the end, I resorted to working exclusively at night; that way I wouldn't be interrupted by anyone and there wouldn't be any point in going out (except on weekends).
But please don't follow my example; it was hell on my social life (I'd be too tired to hang out with friends during the day) and it completely messed up my day/night rhythm. In fact, I'm still suffering from an unstable sleeping pattern to this day. It's gotten to the point where I can't pull an all-nighter or have a quick daytime nap without lapsing.
Hee-hee. Dying tickles!
At the very least you should visit a professional therapist and have them give you a psychiatric evaluation.
Indeed. As various people have pointed out, it could be all sort of things, including ADD, depression, bipolar disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, a variety of cognitive impairments, and who know what else.
For the original poster, or anybody who is having substantial trouble leading the kind of life they want, it's worth talking to a professional or three to rule out things that they already know how to fix.
It's also worth ruling out the kinds of things that were not part of our evolutionary history. So take a month to sleep on a regular schedule driven by daylight, eat relatively simple, unprocessed food, get regular exercise, avoid drugs (including caffeine and alcohol), consume minimal TV, and so on. See if that has any effect on your problems; if not, feel free to resume your previous lifestyle.
I'm sure that will sound crazy to the Slasdot crowd, but it's really just Debugging 101: if something isn't working, get back to a known good configuration. When I tried it, I discovered that my hackish random sleep schedule and my fondness for large amounts of caffeine and sugar were great short-term productivity aids but had terrible long-term impact.
Now, I avoid using an alarm clock (which forces me to get enough sleep) and if I use caffeine as a productivity-enhancer, I make sure to kick the habit once the crisis is past. And I keep an eye on the glycemic index of the food I eat.
Of course, I don't expect this to help everybody; people vary a great deal. But it worked for me, and I encourage anybody who feels blocked by themselves to use their hacker debugging powers to find out what it is.
One thing I found that helped me during college, and I wish I did it more, was to go do work somewhere else...
At home, I had the distractions of TV, my own computer (with games or other timewasting stuff on it, hell I'd sort my mp3 playlist to waste time), my guitar, etc, and I found it very hard to get work done... the hardest part was starting to do it...
So, what I'd do when I finally got smart about things was go to a library, a computer lab, or even a coffeehouse to get work done. The coffeehouse was probably the least effective only because I was plenty content to people-watch there, it's a hobby of mine, but all of these places were usually better than home. I went to those places with a purpose, and it's almost like having walked to that place was the act of "starting" my work, since I fully intended to do so once I got there... it helped blur the line between wasting time and actually starting my work, I guess...
I still find myself going back to that difficult state today, and since now all work I do for my job is on computers, I'm stuck at home (no more college computer labs, no laptop to go to a coffeeshop with)... So, now it's a matter of will more than anything else.. I just have to force myself and remember that once I'm a couple minutes into having started the work - it really is usually downhill from there... it's just starting that's SO damn hard...
hope that helps some... obviously all of this is still going to require a change in you, and not some magical solution to the problem... they say alcoholics are always alcoholic and must battle it for the rest of their lives... well, be prepared to battle procrastination/sloth for the rest of your life too.. it's tough...
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SOme solid advice for you if you truly are diagnosed with ADD then the best thing at this point is to visit a psychiatrist i have struggled personally with ADD for 22 years against medication and sincerely wish i had not. From some of the comments already posted on here was one of the main reasons that i never did get help because of the stigmatism that most ppl associate with something they do not consider real or problematic. For those of you out there that claim to "just grow up" im sorry but while your tough love approach probably means well it is the LAST thing needed we already feel ashamed that we cannot perform some functions which you take for granted, now your going to claim that these deficiencies dont exist? yeah thanx alot. There is nothing like that to make a person want to go and get the help they need. some people claim that it is merely a crutch i claim what good is a one legged man without a crutch. For those of you who cannot understand this situation it is unfortunate for the rest of use but soon you encounter situations similar to it yourself. everyone has skills and weaknesses learning to operate to peak efficiency within them is part of growing up. on a personal note there is a new adhd medication that you should look into that just came out STrattera which is getting rave reviews with the ADD world. good luck jsin
I have been diagnosed with ADD but not until I was 20 yeard old. What you describe as your day sounds shockingly familiar. BTW you don't have to be hyperactive to have ADD, that would be specifically ADHD. The medications for m/AD[H]?D/i work really well but are of course, not perfect. I take 4, 10 mg pills of Adderall a day. If I'm at work I absolutely NEED my Adderall or I will just refuse to get any work done and I'll be crawling under my skin (like you I have an office/tech job with the web just a click away). After taking the Adderall my concentration starts to improve and my attention becomes "stickier" such that if I'm working on a task for more than 10 minutes I will probably follow that task to its completion or at least work on it for another hour or two. The trick is (when on the Adderall) to always force yourself to just start doing a portion of the work and realize that 10-15 minutes later you will find it very difficult to stop doing that work. One huge caveat though! If you start goofing off for 15 minutes you will find it very hard to stop goofing off and may get a solid hour or two of your time hacked off for making the mis-step. Overall I get a hella more work done (and very good work I might add ;-) on the Adderall.
BTW, my first time taking it is how I really discovered I had ADD. I asked a friend at work if he knew of something that would keep me awake since I was really tired and he suggested to try one of his adderall. So I did and for the first time since I could remember I had an incredible feeling of relief and a sesation to all the mental static. I was finally able to concentrate.
Maybe you just don't like what you're doing?
Fastforward 18 months, I was able to pull off this graduation thing and find an awesome embedded software job where I'm required to be in the office by 10:00AM. I thought it would be hard but I value the job and what it affords me so much that I don't want to screw it up by not hitting deadlines or sleeping in. My body is on a new sleep schedule (though I force myself to go to bed by 2AM sometimes); and I'm totally satisfied. Of course, I still make trips to /. and kuroshin and personal email during the day but I make it quick and make sure I get my work done. There is room to improve but what it takes is finding enough motivation to keep you focused. Find a significant other that keeps normal hours, get a job you really like, accept projects with firm deadlines... stuff like that.
--Let's hack root on 127.0.0.1 --panZ
nothing brought clarity of vision and mental focus to my life like killing a hooker.
don't wuss out and just beat them though, that never works and you waste twice as much time in the end.
There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
I, too, had problems concentrating. As an experiment for myself I cut out sugar for a while and noticed a DRAMATIC difference in my ability to concentrate. I have no sugar related illness, either, but I now if I have desert out at a restaurant with friends I can feel my brain being fuzzy the next day and I get hardly anything done at work.
One of the more useful pieces of advice someone gave me while I was writing a thesis was "don't stop work until you know what you're going to do next".
When you're in the flow of writing, be it text or code, there's a tendency to keep going until the train of though you're expressing is expended, then take a break. Then when you sit down again to get on with the larger task, you're faced (once again) with having to re-engage with the whole task. Whereas if you've left a couple of sentences or code comments to yourself detailing exactly what the next small step should be, you have a small task to get re-engaged with.
This has helped me a lot over the years. However, as another poster mentioned, you seem like you're in a pretty bad place. I've occasionally gotten to then point of procrastinating a week away or worse, with all the attendant depression and self-doubt, but it's inevitably been connected with the project or the line of work I was doing at the time being a really bad fit. While you're struggling to get through it, you might want to think about whether it's the field you're in as a whole that kills you, or just this project.
Good luck.
A lot of people who have procrastination problems do so because they feel anxiety about the work. I don't mean high-level anxiety attacks, but just general anxiety over work that may not be very fun. You have ot learn to allow yourself to feel he anxiety, without flinching or trying to supress it, and then start working even though you experience it. It will eventually subside. Also, you'll start to realize that feelings are just that: feelings. They provide information, but they don't have to control you. As for ADD/ADHD, don't even worry about those labels. It's a sad society when not being a driven workaholic is seen as a mental disorder.
Get a government job. If you never get anything done, you'll just be like everybody else there.
Table-ized A.I.
I don't have exactly the same pattern as you, but I also procrastinate quite a bit. The thing is, sometimes it's not so much lack of will power or lack of attention, but you don't feel strong enough to do the work. Two things I'd recommend: 1) do your work right after you wake up, in the morning. Try waking up earlier than you're used to (i.e. 6 or 7 a.m.). You'll be less inclined to waste time 2) if you can get some emotional inspiration, that's also good. Many suggested involving social aspect in your work -- these two are related. Finally, look at what you are trying to collect at a given time. Most distractions promise easy rewards that accummulate -- for instance, gathering new information on the web. It's very easy to continue in a certain direction once you are on the path to accummulate something -- information, money, stamps -- whatever you're into. You have to find a way to apply this to your work. For that you need to break it down into smaller tasks and assign approximate time you'll need to complete them. Then your 'accummulation vector' will be knocking each task off. Alternatively, it can be how much items you learned or remembered. The important thing is get off the rationalizing, conscious voice in which you explain what you have to do, and somehow connect with the mostly non-verbal part of you that actually does the work by stringing together one idea to the next, in a sequence.
Working in a group with anyone that's focused on getting their work done normally helps me. It doesn't have to be a pretty girl or a person that's working on the same homework. Being around anyone working hard, and possibly actively reminding you to work if you get too far out of line, is more helpful than anything short of a deadline 2 hours in the future.
Find someone else with the same inability to focus, and set up a relationship where you hold each other accountable for getting your work done on a reasonable schedule, and it'll make all the difference in the world.
ADD/ADHD might be horribly overdiagnosed, but it's overdiagnosed like that because almost everyone has these problems to some extent. It isn't that hard to find someone to do this with.
Dear Whiner,
/., shut your IM client, web browser, RSS feeds down, turn off your pager/phone, open you friggin editor, crack open a soda, light up a smoke and put your damn hands on the keyboard and get to it!
Sit your ass down and start coding/studying. This is the only advice that works. Screw working out, yoga, fruit juice, vitamins, etc. You teach yourself to do it by doing it. Just like writing a paper, start putting words down. Whether it's designing the architecture or actual coding, etc, just start doing it. It will suck at first and slow to come, but with in 30 minutes you will be starting to get in to the groove.
Face it, most of the code is not new or original, it just requires to be written. You prove this fact by being able to pump it out when your feet are to the fire. Granted, some projects require some original thought but that part is done during design not during coding.
So get the fschk off of
Then once you've developed an actual work ethic, then read up on how you can improve it.
There's an argument that listening to any type of music occupies the creative side of your brain, leaving only the logical side to do work. The logical side on its own can only do things it's done before or use things to build new ones in old ways. You need your creative side to do new things, including writing, coding, engineering, learning, etc. Peopleware has an experiment that tests this, and comes to this conclusion. I'm still looking for a more scientific study.
I listen to long, looping tracks of natural sounds like ocean waves, rain, and thunderstorms. They're pretty close to white noise, which blocks out most environmental noise like fans, traffic, and human speech. It doesn't block out bass though; distance is about the only thing that attenuates bass.
I should be working, but instead I'm reading Slashdot.
The latest Slashdot meme.
i used to have your very same problems until i began to take classes in debianzhang with my dog maybe you don't know that you can make coffee with rice
I've had those days after you've been working non-stop 12-16hr days, and you get to the point where you're less productive than before.
My dad gave me a book recently on the connections between adrenaline and stress. Basically, it talks about handling stress so you don't let it get out of hand, as stress triggers adrenaline, which affects your sleep patterns and causes you to make snap decisions without thinking things out or being creative.
I've had depressive fits where I haven't left my place for weeks at a time, but now that I reflect on it, they were all triggered by times of high stress. So now, before I get to far in, I try to relax. Unfortunately, saturday morning cartoons have really sucked in the past few years, so I don't have that 3-4 hrs of relaxation per week.
If you're not getting stuff done, set a timer, wait, relax for an hour or so, then press back in on it. Personally, I find that I do some of my best work near 6am.... no matter if I got up early to do it [working right after I get up, or until I've been up all night and start to get tired]. Tired is actually a sign of being relaxed, as if you're pumping with adrenaline, you won't fall asleep.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Use one of the tricks used to quit smoking...
Put a rubberband on your wrist and kjeep it there for a few weeks. Then every time you feel like straying from working, snap your wrist.
After a few weeks, you won't want to not work because your body has trained itself that NOT working causes pain.
How could I say to men: "Speak louder, shout! For I am deaf!"? -Ludwig van Beethoven
No point in worrying, the stress will probably do more damage then lack of sleep (IANAD). While in school there'd be times when we had midterms, labs, quizzes all in the same week. Some people would pull all nighters get stressed out and do a crap job on everything. Other would prioratize (sp?) and would concentrate on what had a bigger affect on their grade (which was not always a midterm or quiz) and would end up doing better on everything.
-prioratize
-dont stress out, if you have a big project due and are going nuts SCREW IT. go relax, have a beer with some friends, give your brain a rest-blow off energy, go to the bar, dance, drink, exaust yourself, then go home and have a nice long sleep
-DONT STRESS OUT
-if your young you have lots of time to finish school
First, have a work area (or computer) where you don't do anything but work. This might be a small weak laptop, it might be a study area at your school, whatever.
Go there when you need to do work. If you find that you're unable to, leave. Don't fuck around, and don't put in 10% while daydreaming.
When you're working, work 100%. Try to get into that "deadline mode." You'll be amazed how much you can get done, and your friends will be jealous at how you spend most of your time "not working."
When I was a guitar major in college and had a rigorous night job, I had heard of this practice regimen put together by a well-known jazz guitarist named Howard Roberts (Hal Leonard Publications). He called it the "Superchops" program. You practiced an hour a day, six days a week for twenty weeks. It basically went something like this:
:)
1.) Clear your work area of all things not pertaining to the lesson.
2.) Make a ten-minute recording of what you were going to play over.
3.) Stop. Make quick mental notes of what you are about to do.
4.) Play over the recording.
5.) Break. Two minutes. Put the guitar down, stand up and stretch, etc.
6.) Repeat #4 and #5 two more times. That's about it. The POINT is that an hour every day of something is much more beneficial than cramming a bunch of hours into one day, and provided you are not SUPER tired from what you were doing that day, your current physical condition shouldn't be a problem-exercise is good, of course
Try setting up a daily work regimen of whatever you are doing that has REALISTIC goals for daily achievement. It worked for me.
NOW ABOUT ADD/ADHD...and NO this is NOT FLAMEBAIT!
Ritalin is a class two drug with side effects similar to cocaine. Frankly, no kid anywhere should be ingesting it, and neither should you.
My question is (and this is REALLY going to piss off some people), does ADD/ADHD REALLY EXIST? Is it an officially recognized disorder by the CDC or some other government body, or well-respected independent body? Or is this a massive bullshit campaign?
It is going to take a lot of convincing to prove to me that we are not just making excuses about why our kids can't concentrate in school, yet they can come home and concentrate on kicking my ass on Half-Life. Find me the links that show me that ADD/ADHD actually and truthfully exists. Better still, post decent links that outline BOTH sides of the debate.
Once something's been approved by the government, it's no longer immoral. - Reverend Lovejoy
Chalupa
Some people swear by doing work in Starbucks and the like. Again, fine, as long as you only plug in your wireless card once in a while to reconnect. Remember that email and the web are there to provide information when _you_ want it. You are not there to serve your email account or to press "Send/Receive" constantly and otherwise enslave yourself to your machine. Whether you consider it addiction, enslavement or whatever, you have the full and complete power to avoid it, and I recommend you do so. If your willpower seems insufficient, then I recommend a trip to a shrink, exercise, or whatever will help you reestablish control over your life.
I had a lot of the same procrastination problems... fortunately I was a good enough test-taker and writer that I still escaped with a high GPA, but my procrastination made college much more stressful than it should have been for me.
One thing I found that helped is to set mini-deadlines for myself. Rather than taking all of your work and saying "I have to finish all of this by tomorrow", break it down into smaller chunks and tell yourself "I have to finish this part by noon, this part by 2pm, this part by 4:30pm" etc. Try to plan the deadlines out so they're realistic, but try to challenge yourself at the same time.
Instead of letting yourself think, "I have 'til tomorrow, I can put it off just a few minutes longer...." over and over again until it's 1am, you want yourself thinking, "I have to finish this part I'm working on by 2pm!"
Also, it really helps to set goals and treat the achievement of your goals as sort of a game. Seriously. If you're playing a competitive video game against your best friend, you'll put some serious work into kicking his ass and you'll feel good about it. Put that same attitude into achieving your goals in education and life in general, and you'll find yourself with a lot more energy and motivation.
You say you got rid of TV, etc., and then say: "If it is computer work, the web is always a click away, and I can always escape to my imagination." So how about doing your computer work offline? Unplug the computer from the cable modem or switch, and do your work on that. Do you really need to be online to do that work?
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Sure, exercise is good for getting the juices flowing, but how about a little throwdown with the old wifey-wife/girlfriend/boyfriend? I find it particularly helpful for motivation if I take charge sexually and do something very male and agressive. I don't think I could have built the Vodkatea ( http://www.vodkatea.com/g ) glossary system were it not for Doggy Style.
The flag just makes more sense than the constitution. - Judas Gutenberg
This is a drug sold in Europe which increases brain blood flow and oxygen delivery (used to treat kids to increase their learning capacity and alcoholics to reduce effects of their brain damage). I used to take this stuff starting one month before exams while studying in the University (Moscow State Technical University, Russia). Graduated with Honors, but I doubt this was due to the drug - I haven't felt anything special.
ADD is like an attention span of 5minutes. Normal like 30 or 40 minutes.
Concentration is simply using force of will to increase attention on 1 thing.
Sounds like you may be trying to do it all in 1 sitting and then when you drift off, you never get back. Maybe, your smart and didnt need any work-study habits until you hit college, and then you found your really lacking in them, and the stakes are much higher, now you have much more anxiety about it.... Attention span is like a skill too, and can wax and wane depening on what you to. If you spend your time chatting, websurfing, and channel hopping, you can expect your attention span to wane, spend your time reading , and solving word problems, and playing chess it will go up. But its not going to go up all at once. The other problem is tha learning concepts is discrete, its like on either on 1 side of the plateu, or you've climbed up and you're there, if you go way from it before you've 'grokked' it, you have to climb back down the wall, you'll have to climb back up later... (BTW the calories burned learning new ideas and concepts, over facts, is not igsignificant... you may want to reconsider going vegan... or at least find a diet which can feed sugar to the brain quickly... ) So, the problem may you don't have enough of an attention span to learn college level concepts... if you really had ADD you'd have problems with 6th grade concepts.
So, what I'd do is study do work for about an hour, and then relax. And then repeat. Also spend some time reading for pleasure , or playing chess, it will help your attention-span, but won't cause you more anxiety.
Oh yeah, you could have depression too, watch for that.... I had serious problem with concentration when I had depression... Make sure you're getting enough sunlight, and exercise, because its better to self-treat for SAD depression, because it's the last thing they will look for... And drugs will typically hurt your concentration as well as your wallet.
In my opinion, the best way to get work done on a resonabe schedulle is to pop on some headphones with a little deep progressive trance, pop a couple of hydrocodone, and take about 10 good deep hits from your favorite water pipe. Thats it...instant productivity.
In the end the only real solution that I found which works for me is to get up first thing (bout 7am), have a shower, eat, get dressed and then start work straight away. I seem to find that if I sit down in front of the TV or look at my email or read
Try it, see if it works for you
shit
I should be fscking working
Extended Warranty? How can I lose!
this is a healthy habbit he is going through in fact i went through it and am still going through it and loving every minute of it, now then what your suffering from is PROCRASTINATION, also known as lazyiness with a sequence, first you get the work, then you analyze it, then you figure out how long to set it off, then you dink around to the last possible minute and then finish it. and wala, its done by the dead line and you had much fun, however new comers to the field of procrastination might not know its an art form, like painting, and naked modeling, its very percise if you want to be a lazy fat ass all day but still acomplish the goals at hand. now then it seems something inside of you is trying to tune your art of procratination like a child trys to tune in on singing or such, all you must remember is that your a damn newb and you will suck at it at first, but with time, slacking, porn, and games with a little work at the end, your life with be most lame and enjoyable rewarding. please note that between the time you get the task and you finish it, this is called anaylizing. so you must not stray from the task to far, this invovles going to the movies, what will they think of you if you hop in your car with 4 babes and go see THE HULK? thats right, YOUR A LAZY ASS, but no you can avoid this by being grumpy, ahh yes loosing at quake matches and then taking your anger out on co works is WONDERFUL stress relaxation and it perfectly okay becuase you have a hard task that your working on! so keep working at it, personally i do EVERYTHING that doesn't benifit me in about 5 minutes at the VERY last minute, and am very succesful at it. so remember if you can't do it at the last minute then it isn't worth your time and you'll pull more hair then good. GOOD LUCK padawon procratinator!
dextroamphetamine is your friend
this is a healthy habbit he is going through in fact i went through it and am still going through it and loving every minute of it, now then what your suffering from is PROCRASTINATION, also known as lazyiness with a sequence, first you get the work, then you analyze it, then you figure out how long to set it off, then you dink around to the last possible minute and then finish it. and wala, its done by the dead line and you had much fun, however new comers to the field of procrastination might not know its an art form, like painting, and naked modeling, its very percise if you want to be a lazy fat ass all day but still acomplish the goals at hand. now then it seems something inside of you is trying to tune your art of procratination like a child trys to tune in on singing or such, all you must remember is that your a damn newb and you will suck at it at first, but with time, slacking, porn, and games with a little work at the end, your life with be most lame and enjoyable rewarding. please note that between the time you get the task and you finish it, this is called anaylizing. so you must not stray from the task to far, this invovles going to the movies, what will they think of you if you hop in your car with 4 babes and go see THE HULK? thats right, YOUR A LAZY ASS, but no you can avoid this by being grumpy, ahh yes loosing at quake matches and then taking your anger out on co works is WONDERFUL stress relaxation and it perfectly okay becuase you have a hard task that your working on! so keep working at it, personally i do EVERYTHING that doesn't benifit me in about 5 minutes at the VERY last minute, and am very succesful at it. so remember if you can't do it at the last minute then it isn't worth your time and you'll pull more hair then good. GOOD LUCK padawon procratinator!
You don't even need to use a glizty word processor for formatting your papers. Just use LaTeX. It's pretty easy to get used to, and once you're good with it it's faster to just type in the markup than to move your hand from the keyboard to the mouse, locate the cursor on the screen, locate the icon which performs the desired function, move the cursor to the icon and click it. It's great stuff. It's not wysiwyg, but it's trivial to preview every time you make a change. LaTeX is The Right Way(tm) for entering mathmatical formulae. The best part is it does exactly what you tell it to, unlike graphical word processors aimed towards the braindead which second guess everything you do.
In anycase I have to kind of disagree with the parent here about the command line being less distracting. Sitting at the command line I'm just that much closer to nethack.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
drop out of school - it is meaningless anyway - but then again, if you're not incredibly lucky or a genius, you'll need that diploma - so stop whining and work!
The only real way I have found to over come this is to find something that exicites me.
Then you need to deal with an distractions on your mind. Such as other things that need to get done and any some deep seated psychological issues need to be delt with ^_^ and all should work out.
If you hate what your doing, or have something to strongly pressing on your mind, you'll never be able to give it the focus it deserves. This may sound a little to simplistic but thats what works.
I hope the third little piggy got mad cow - ^_^
My wife has worked with ADHD kids and tells me this is the best thing she's seen to focus and motivate them to produce (other than intrisic motivation, which is of course the best motivator, but this technique does lead to intrisic motivation).
Think about what you should be able to accomplish in 15 minutes. Set an egg-timer for 15 minutes, and do that task you visualized. You can eventually work up to larger increments. You'll probably find yourself beating the timer in some cases.
I know it sounds simplistic, but knowing that pressure seems to be a large motivator for you, the motivation of knowing that bell is going to go off sounds like it might do the trick. This stuff works on adults as well as children. In my wife's experience, it's never failed her (with her students).
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We arranged tri-weekly study sessions, where we'd go over the class notes to get a better grip on what the lunatic Russian algorithmatician was talking about, and then tackle the homework.
Now the reason this helps, is that it creates accountability. Letting yourself down is much easier than letting someone else down. If you're studying alone and you ditch to go play Warcraft, you don't feel so bad. On the other hand, if you know two other people are sitting there, expecting you to participate, it's much, much, much harder to just take off for frivolous reasons (and in college, there are millions of frivolous reasons to give up in the middle of a problem set). Similarly, the time spent is more productive (usually), because you're not as likely to sit there and pick your belly button if someone is sitting across from you, working with you, periodically looking at you, and asking questions.
Questions. Those are important too. Discussion and dialogue are great hooks for keeping your mind on the task at hand. There were plenty of times when noone in the group had any idea what the correct interpretations of our professor's babblings were. We were dumbfounded at some of the things he said, and joked about it, but that's the point. Had I been by myself, I would have dropped that subject, and moved on to the next line in my class-notes. To this end, I think it's a good idea to try and find people who are approximately about as smart as you are. People who are significantly smarter are not likely to want to spend as much time as you would want in study sessions (a generalization, but I did notice that on the occasions when someone much brighter joined the group, they'd take off early). Similarly, keep stupid folks out of the group, because they will hold you back, lingering at length on concepts you don't feel like you need to spend time on. Unless they're hot, in which case, you make sure you grab that back room in the library and stay there all damn night until she can speak in binary.
...and after all that, years and years after graduating from college, I was finally diagnosed with adult ADD. Hah!
In College I would usually lock myself in the library for a few hours to get things done. It was quiet and I used to use the closing time as a deadline to complete my work. Unfortunately I didn't discover this until my senior year :).
www.lonseidman.com
Consider what I am doing:
:-)
:0) by:
...etc.
;-)
1) Trying to build a not so average publishing API, with some truly remarkable features in Java, using parallel databases.
http://www.aesgi.com
It works, but it has issues, and what is more, its fast.
2) Talking to companies about Linux, on average I spend about 20 hours a week at corporations discussing Linux...
I have to digest enourmous amounts of data to build these presentations, so the amount of research I do approaches about 20 hours a week.
If your in the Madison area, you ARE on my hit list.
3) I run 6 miles a week, or about 5 hours a week doing something healthy for myself.
4) I sleep 8 hours. Very important.
Plus I eat like a pig, but thats OK because I am blessed with the metablism of a small gerbil or equivalent rodent. 5% body fat! HA HA.
I am the disdain of women everywhere when I go out to eat.
5) I am building broadcom chipset drivers for my 802.11G card for my Linksys access point.
Surprise, you can't get braodcom drivers for Linux.
Probably because Microsft has paid them under penalty of IP to make them specifically for Windows...
ONLY.
But I am reverse engineering them using a windows box.
HA!
Just try and stop my from releasing them soon Billy Boy!!!
6) I have to write proposals for deploying solutions I come up with, thats another 8 hours at least.
7) I am a LLC in the state of WIsconsin so I have to do quarterly tax reports, plus handle 1099's plus, I am considering sponsoring a H1B Visa guy, who is a good friend of mine, so he can become a US citizen. Got to do all that business stuff too...accounting, setting up my own computers, etc.
So, I am CONSTANTLY working, and if I may say so I get it all done on time under budget (mostly
Buy a laptop. I can work anywhere and do.
The ole office/apartment can get opressive, so I go out and work in restraunts, the student UNION, Barns and Nobles or Nicks Bar on state street.
Since I have a sager notebook. I get about 40 minutes of battery life, so I have to pick places I can steal electricty from.
Point is, I work constantly, no rest for the weary...or in my case....the wicked.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
I LOVE the fact that I'm sitting here procrastinating by reading an article about overcoming procrastination by way of anecdotal evidence. Seriously, at what point in human evolution did life become this easy?
-Rylfaeth
Work from midnight till dawn. The problem with working during the day is theres too many disractions, family, friends, and other distractions prevent you from getting work done in an effient manner.
I myself wait for everyone to go to sleep, the only time its quiet in the city is during the middle of the night so I'm assuming this guy lives in the city.
When theres no one to distract you, you'll be able to spend all night working.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Check Out:
d es tiny.pdf
:D.
http://students.washington.edu/andrey/articles/
I am the guy who wrote it, I just don't want to make an account atm
Feel free to give me feedback:
http://students.washington.edu/andrey/
I find that the only time I ever get distracted from what I am doing is when I am not really enjoying what I am doing. When I am enjoying something, it can actually by quite hard to pull my attention off of that project/activity. So much so, that I don't watch TV anymore because I can never find the time away from the other projects I really enjoy.
If you find that you can concentrate on certain things, but not others. It might just be that your subconcious is telling you that you are not doing what you are meant to be doing.
Too often in life I think we start off on a direction that does not jive with our inner desires and personality simply because they pay more or have some other perceived benefit.
In my opinion, it is always better to do be doing what you truly enjoy than doing something you do not. Even if it means a loss in income or social status.
That said, a day job is already enough work without bogging it down by self help books, motivational lessons, techniques.
Find what you truly enjoy, find a way to do that full time.
- Persnickity
As an ex-PhD student (booted out!) I certainly know what you mean.
First, I'd like to say, many of the suggestions I've read here are required to get work done. But I "conquered" several of the habits for effective working and that wasn't enough. I learned to break a problem down. I learned to prioritize. I learned not to think of the whole day ahead of me (or else I could convince myself that I could start later).
It took awhile to admit to myself, but I finaly found the missing element for me. That element is not only elusive but admitting "you have a problem" doesn't sound disciplined. The answer?
I was usually lonely.
Sound odd? I thought so. Like I said, it didn't sound very, er, macho. But I figured I could sacrifice relationships for 4 years or so to finish my education. But everytime I sat down to work, I wanted to be somewhere else. That was the feeling I learned, and that's how I could describe the problem, and feel it coming on. I could avoid work for weeks, literally.
When I did start to date someone I felt completely "focused" for the first time in over a year. It was very unusual. I could sit down and just work. Work. Work. Sure enough, about a month after the relation was over, I was back to procastinating and that feeling that I should be somewhere else.
If you don't have a significant other, I think the mind tries to make you feel out of place so you will get up and go where people are. That is the best chance you have at finding someone. The feeling can keep lingering indefinitely. Also, like the poster pointed out, a party (or a study group) would help for a few hours afterwards, but then the feeling came back.
I was surprised it was that simple.
P.S. Long projects (as in 4 years long) will simply drain you no matter what.
P.P.S I would bet that the ideal grad student is 30 or older and married.
Depression and procrastination are often welded at the hip. Zoloft works well without making one sluggish as some anti-depressants do. Completely avoid alcohol, drugs and tobacco. Get treatment for depression as it can rob you of your life in a thousand subtle ways. With many people depression will pop up over and over during their lives and make no mistake, depression can be as big a curse as any of the big name mental illnesses like schizophrenia. The up side is that well handled it is usually no bother at all.
Once you get your immediate needs met it might be time to examine just how happy you are in the path that you have chosen. The college years do involve a rather rude jolt when youth must confront the demands of the world. In high school kids are treated as a wonderful resource. As they get their first jobs they discover that the business world looks at them like green, minimum wage fools. Then kids find out that college can make some severe demands. It isn't too surprising that many kids get into depression or drugs. One answer is to take that computer and really find a way to clone that babe that sat next to you in high school.
DISCLAIMER: I'm not a lawyer or doctor or counselor. My messages are for entertainment purposes only and are not to be taken as advice to be carried out.
:) -- this simple exercise can be life-changing if you have the courage to do it properly (I permanently & instantly stopped smoking due to this 10-minute exercise after many failed attempts over many years to stop smoking 2 packs/day). Then ask yourself the right questions like "how" you can correct it. Yea it sounds like common sense but you'd be surprised.
During college years, I had similar problems but I've learned to overcome them.
A lot of this will sound like common sense but sometimes it helps to hear/read it from another person. Most importantly, its a lot easier said than done for some people.
BASICS:
1. KNOW THYSELF: Stop lying to yourself and making excuses. Find out why you do or don't do things. Keep asking "why" when you get shallow answers like "because you're a lazy undiciplined moron"
Speaking of asking the right questions....try Personal Power II CDs from Anthony Robbins. If you can't afford it, buy it used on EBAY or check out one of his books at the library that talk about Neuro-Associations. If you get the CD and are able to finish it within 30 days (doing all the assigned work & exercises on time without skipping any days) then you'll probably have positively changed your life beyond recognition--but that's easier said than done because the assignments can be very tough (but worthwhile if you're into designing your life to be what you want rather than being on autopilot).
For people who think Tony Robbins is corny (he is sometimes), they should compare their own bio to Tony's bio (deep link so it looks funky)--that said, don't treat any author as a "perfect" guru because their shit stinks too--think of them as a coach and experiment with what they teach and throw away the stuff that doesn't work for you. Basically, be aware of the 10 most common bullshitting methods when reading anything so you can throw away the nonsense parts while keeping the useful bits--IMHO, there's even a few BS methods used in Tony's bio & work but they're still highly useful after throwing those out.
Discover what pain/pleasure you associate with tasks you procrastinate--and force yourself to consciously consider/feel the pain/pleasure of what will happen if you continue procrastinating important tasks.
2. APPLY what you read or learn--without action, they are useless. Reading Seven Habits or other books won't help unless you actually apply what you learn from reading it. DO NOT read another book until you actually apply the stuff you learned from the current one because you might be reading self-help books to avoid real work rather than to change yourself. A clue might be the tendency to read these books while you have a important and probably unpleasant stuff to do that is more urgent than reading these books.
3. Start simple and begin a sleep schedule you KNOW you'll succeed at following. Like going to bed 10 minutes earlier each night and getting up 10 minutes earlier NO MATTER WHAT until you reach a normal schedule. Then set a HARD STOP where you go to bed by midnight NO MATTER WHAT--face the consequences if you didn't get stuff done by midnight when you wake up 7-8 hours later.
4. Write down your goals for the day and prioritize them--actually INCLUDE things like web surfing, etc. but place them at the end of the list and put a time-limit on that like 1 hour (use an alarm clock/phone or stopwatch). DO NOT do lower priority tasks until the high priority ones are done. Keep this tasklist short and doable--if there's clearly too much for 1 day, then be realistic and schedule accordingly.
5. Become more predictable in a good way--form good habits like having productive da
Read Driven to Distraction
You may not have ADHD, but you may have some form of ADD (which is different)
Sounds exactly like the problem that I'm dealing with right now, and have dealt with all my life...the stuff they say in that book is surprising and very enlightening.
You might re-evaluate whether the area you are working/studying is really something that you enjoy doing. It sounds like you may not be.
Granted, there will always be days where what you are doing seems like drudgery. But, if it is chronic, you might just be struggling down the wrong career path. Better to adjust your course now while you are still in college than suddenly realise while sitting in your cubicle 15 years from now that you really wished you had become a vetrinarian (or lawyer, or MBA, or plumber or whatever).
My experience has been that if I'm doing something I enjoy, productivity flows effortlessly.
Logic is not Divine.
especially if you work as a software engineer. It's been said that "programmers are most productive when they wander around with a hollow look" ;-)
Although managers often don't understand, the work is done better and faster with counterproductive things like distracting for news
Boo hoo hoo. Discipline is hard work. There are no quick-and-easy tricks. You can become disciplined the quick-and-hard route: the military. But if you don't wanna get your ass blown off in Iraq, I suggest you merely buckle down and DO what it is you're needing to do. Some people do have genuine ADHD. But too many people use that and other excuses instead of blaming themselves. Self-responsibility! Self-discipline! They're disappearing in the poor-me, everybody's-got-a-mental-disorder, safety-net 90's and 00's.
Don't think about doing it... DO IT
And always follow white rabbits...
I dont have a problem sitting down and studying for hours. Its people who prevent me from being able to do this.
How can you study when people constantly distract you, ask you questions, or force you to focus on them? The best thing you can do is avoid people and thats exactly what I do. I avoid people so that I may avoid being distracted. Avoid your friends, Avoid your family, Avoid girls, just lock yourself in a room or go outside somewhere where no one is, and do your work.
I cant wait till I have a car so I can drive somewhere quiet at night and study all night in complete silence, I dont know how people study efficiently in the day with cars making noise, birds making noise, and people all over the place. I also dont know how people study in the day in a house with other people living in it, people asking you questions all day, bugging you, asking you for favors, asking you for help, giving you chores or some distracting task to do.
You see? Its all about environment, thats what its about. The best environment to study is a cave or dark room with a lamp and a bunch of books. Just like from the dark ages. Sounds primitive but this is the best way to study, complete isolation. This is why monks do it, why jesus, muhammed, buddha and other holymen did it, etc, you need to completely isolate yourself from the world and all of its assosiated problems, the better you get at doing this the better you'll focus.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Several drugs, in double blind studies, have dramatically increased how well and the duration people can perform concentration type tasks.
Just because a drug does something doesn't mean it's fixing a problem. Caffiene dramatically increases how long someone can physically stay awake, but that doesn't mean the person has a sleeping disorder.
The guy's absolutely right. 99% of "diagnosed ADD/ADHD" cases are simply lack of discipline or something similar. And I DO know what I'm talking about.
I cant say how to solve it, I just want anyone reading this to know that you not alone outthere. I have problem consentrating at work, I surf tomuch.. I have found that if I can manage to start working, Music helped me to sheeld off the reality and the time goes faster.. But.. Music does not always work. One thing I do try to do is to think of what I will do the following day. I do this while Im leaving work.. Cause then Im happy Im away from it all, but still you got the work in the head, so.. decide what you have to acomplish for tomorrow.. and only decide to do ONE thing tomorrow.. If you manage to do what you seout to do, be darn happy. If not, try again.. and if you done more then what you decided.. go buy you something you like =) ... Mmm, that last doesnt happen as often tho =)
i was diagnosed (sp?) with a form of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. I obsessively have a compulsion to make plans to do a lot.
Question
http://www.ironfroggy.com/
Have you tried Methamphetamines? If not I would highly recommend it. After going though every pill in the book I came across Ice one day and it has completly changed my life for the better. I can sit and focus on anything without being distracted whereas before I couldn't. Just don't overdue it. :)
As an electrical engineering student, this happens to me -- everyday. Despite what everyone is saying here, there is just no way to avoid it if you are in a demanding major. The web and tv are "escapism" proxies. You just have to weave them into your lifestyle to benefit you instead of having them hurt you.
My advice to manage:
1) Set your life full of as many deadlines as you can handle. As an undergrad I am a teaching assistant, take grad classes, work in the robotics research lab on a group project, and explore new things I'm interested in (Linux, Computer Vision, and Robotics). Needless to say, I don't get home until Dinner. With constant deadlines, you will always be on your toes -- and that is a good thing. Nothing brings out the creative juices like a deadline.
2) Leave the TV ON during your favorite shows and do school projects that require the use of your computer. Yes...leaving the TV on is usually a bad thing, but if you can manage these two things at once you'll be happier then sitting in front of a comp wishing you could watch your favorite show.
3) When not watching TV and just plain studying, take a break every half hour to read a website article or chat for a few mins with a friend.
So what are the downsides of this plan? You are constantly stressed with all the work that needs to be done and some of your real life relationships outside of school suffer. Is this a bad thing? Depends on what kind of person you are and what is most important to you. It's allowed me to keep a 4.0 and to compete for a spot in a top grad school. (Hopefully)
Now I know I haven't got a split personality but I do not recall writing this post.
Same issue. Not only do you have to unplug and hide your game consoles, TV and radio. You need to turn off your cable modem too. My internet connection at home and at work lures me like a siren's song. I think I do have ADD -the hyperactivity. My focus inproves as the deadline approaches. My suggestions are to give yourself your own deadline to do a small task invovling your work. Break them down and once you step back to see what you've done you'll accomplish more than you think.
....... Thus ends my attempt at wit or whatever
Maybe your so-called unconcious mind is actually doing you a favor, outside of your awareness. Isn't that what it's supposed to do?
Try this. Fill in the blanks...
Or try this...
1. Pretend that the behavior you don't like is actually a good thing
2. Via courageous introspection, enumerate the hidden benefits of the behavior
3. Refactor the benefit: Find new, better, faster ways to acquire those same benefits, but don't interfere with other needs in your life (a job, self-expression, blah, blah)
Give yourself some credit. "Self-sabotage" is prima facie evidence of internal conflict. And this gay little process I've described is a great conflict-discovery tool.
Good tips, so far. What I've done is to make a priority list which is really short.
1. Finish masters thesis
2. Ensure that there is no #3.
This will make it really easy to decide what to do. You either work, eat, sleap or take a break. TAKE BREAKS! This is necessary to do some real work.
I've been able to work for 6 weeks 80+ hrs/week without a mental breakdown. The most important thing was that IF I wanted to so something, I was at least at the right place. You can decide that you will do two weeks of this and have one week of party if you think you won't hack this.
So, I did do a lot of surfing. However, I still made 8 working hours a day. My agenda:
-8.30 get up
-9.45 be at university
-12.00 lunch
-13.00 thesis again
-18.00 food
-20.00 thesis again
-24.00 leave university & wind down for sleep
-24.30 be in bed
The only good excuse to not be at university: excercise.
nosig today
If you put everything off until the last minute, it only takes a minute to get done.
JET Program: see Japan, meet intere
I find that I worry about the work that I have to do, the thoughts bounce around in my head as soon as I get home, and I think about how I am going to do the work. Of course the work never gets done.
What works for me is being away from the computer, sitting in a room and just starting the job.
Start no matter what, don't plan it just start. You then find that it isn't as bad as you thought it was. (unless you procrastinated and its 12am with the paper due at 9am) The main thing is to stop analyzing and get to work, don't think you have a problem, few of us really have problems, the rest are just created by people who believe they have them.
I have the same problem but I blame it on the fact that I am taking 6 courses and it's frickin 31 deg C outside! People get bummed when they are forced to live in a dark cave staring at aftificial light source all day.
I try to get outside as much as possible but it always seems that the weather is best when I am trapped indoors doing assignments.
I enjoy engineering but it's hard to care when you'd rather be outside enjoying the sunshine.
I dont think its about time management, its about how you spend your time. You dont have to be organized, when I solve a problem I solve the complicated part first and then work on the easy part.
In school I read chapter after chapter just going right through the books staying a couple chapters ahead of the class, I then re-read or scan the chapter the test is based on and I pass the test.
Repeat that again, going chapter by chapter and then go backwards and rescan chapters when its test time but just read as much as you can at a time. Dont be precise, dont be like (I'm going to read exactly 2 chapters), instead be like (I'm going to read at LEAST 2 chapters)
Then just read until your eyes get tired, if you read 4 chapters, good, take a break; make a few posts on slashdot, play quake or some game, then open up the book again. Repeat this process for the entire day just switching from task to task, going back and forth when a task becomes so boring you cannot stand to do it anymore.
I can read for a good couple hours, maybe 3 tops, then I cant stand to turn another page and I come online. Sometimes talking to friends helps to get your mind off of it, so call a friend.
Other than that, just try to always be doing some kinda work, even when I post on slashdot I have about 5-6 webpages open where I'm doing research, I never just do a single task, when slashdot gets boring I go back to the research picking up exactly where I left off.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Totally worthless, thanks.
Responding to "I'm having a problem keeping on task" with "just get some willpower, loser!" is the last thing in the world that will help someone. His aim is not to feel worse about not getting the job done, but to actually get the job done.
I don't understand why so many people seem to think the answer to whatever problem is just to think up new (or dwell on old) reasons the problem exists. Some people seem to think feeling bad is a good thing. There are solutions to these problems, lots of people have great suggestions here. We can do without the sulkers and those who think telling someone "you're just not trying hard enough" is the answer.
Even if it turns out that you are in fact just not trying hard enough, thinking about it that way only makes you depressed. Changing your behavior and finding a new way to look at the problem can solve it, beating yourself up about it cannot.
This Like That - fun with words!
I had problems in my humanities and anthro classes when I had to write stupid papers about stupid subjects. I think my speed and quality of writing drops 80 - 90% when I have to discuss the interrelation of "red" color symbols in some dumb book.
So here's what I would do. I would first STRETCH! I would make sure my body was awake and not tense. Then i would open the office-suite-du-jour and create two new documents. Then I would fullscreen said document editor. Now: I would start writing any old thing in document 1, hopefully getting around to discussing the paper I was goiing to write. Once I had an idea ANY IDEA I would shift+tab to document window 2 and start writing it down. When I came to a lengthy pause, I would flip back to doc 1 and write what I was thinking.
Then after a few hours, i would have one document with essetially, a dialogue of me talking to myself in plain english. In the second window, I would have more formal writing in a horrid mishmash order. I wouldn't even look at these documents. I'd save them, close them and come back after a good break (usually overnight). Then I would combine my thinking-struggles with my writing-struggles into a paper that I was assured to convey both my mental process and thoughts, as well as a structured discussion of those points.
The important lessons here:
1. KEEP TYPING. Even if you stop thinking - keep your hands moving. It keeps the momentum going.
2. FULLSCREEN - this removes all other distractions, making the only distraction to type on the junk document.
"One touch of Darwin makes the whole world kin." George Bernard Shaw
I have a wireless account through TMobile, so I go to borders and start working... The distractions at home are too much sometimes.
This is a problem you'll be facing all your life; but good planning will help you to be highly productive. Good luck!
[this
... I do have a similiar working habit as described by the sender of the toplevel post. Tomorrow is again a deadline so I will keep it short.
I just started to realize that doing things in the last possible moment gives me a thrill that I really do love. Nothing seems to me more boring than knowing the course of things days in advance.
I had times were I made myself miserable because I believed I was doing wrong and not performing well, but there is never more motivation to be efficient and innovative other than when the breath of the beast is really close so to speak. And I am highly effective this way, as I start to learn to watch for the right moment to do things, and then hit them hard with precision.
Preparation and caution are necessary to survive, please do not forget that as there are also things out there that hunt us...
I hate you all... I have a bunch of responses I have to write for english; and instead of working on them, I'm sitting here reading this. Oh well. I've found that if I practice an hour or so of Piano, then I can concentrate more easily on my assignment.
Try to work on something you really like.
What's in a sig?
I took nearly 6 years to get my 4 year degree and other than band, I really had no good excuse for it (no job, no minor, no remedial catchup classes, semester abroad, etc). There were times where I wondered to myself why I was even going for an engineering degree. I also had the same concentration problems. My best (and often only) studying occured a couple hours before the exam. The less homework counted toward the grade, the better.
However, I never refused to go out with a friend only to stay at home and not do work I intended to do--that's was a big difference. I already knew my own habbits. I wouldn't do the work, so why lie to myself and deprive myself of my friends' company only to sit around and surf the net or play UT?
In the end, I've found that college was about patience, not effort. You can beat yourself up over things, or you can coast through it. If you coast, it'll take a little longer (and cost more money), but you'll enjoy it and one class at a time, you'll get through it. And college is one of those places you really can't go back to, so why not stay a while and enjoy it? My advice to you is lessen your class load and just take a little longer. Sure it'll cost more money, but these days, everyone is in debt for something. It may as well be for something you enjoyed, right?
Why is everyone (not just everyone here, but everyone collectively) always so quick to jump on medicines?
There's nothing wrong with amphetamines, unless you're injecting crap you got from a guy named Spike next to a dumpster behind a 7-11 at 3am. Adderall, Dexedrine, etc. work very well. They should be a last resort, to be sure, but being productive and flipped out on prescription speed is better than being unproductive and tired. That stuff works much better than caffeine (which actually makes you more jittery and doesn't improve concentration at all; only wakefullness). You don't know what concentration IS until you've snarfed down 40mg of Adderall and read a few hundred pages of extremely uninteresting stuff. Warning: you might get the urge to clean your apartment incessantly.
Stupid people make stupid things profitable.
Here's a technique that helps me immensely: I keep a small slip of paper and a pen in front of me. I write down the one thing I am supposed to be working on and keep it in front of me. It can be even a very small task like "open project file" which only takes a few seconds. If I keep writing down the next step, then doing it, after a few minutes I "get into the groove" and proceed on automatic pilot without the help of the paper aid.
I've found that my posts don't format quite right w/o a sig.
if you are having such a difficult time, perhaps the subject matter isn't very engaging. in that case, maybe you'll be screwing your life up if you continue down that path. /.ers, you're likely to get a number of conflicting or uneducated opinions on the matter, and consequently even if there are opinions which are worth something, it will be more difficult to pick those out from the others.
on the other hand, perhaps the subject matter is interesting, but the work feels pointless. in that case, it may be time for total re-evaluation of life within this economic and social system.
another alternative is that you genuinely wish to do the work, but find that you cannot. in this case, the desire to do the work is internal - rather than driven by a feeling of urgency or necessity - but you feel as though you simply cannot bring yourself to do it. in that case, it may be wise to consult a doctor or psychologist in an effort to determine the cause of this condition. if you listen to
as a last thought:
this feeling of always having to do something, to be engaged in an activity that moves your life and mind in a direction that other people can see and approve of, may be detrimental. you say that you go online and look things up during the time that you're trying to make yourself work? as far as i'm concerned, this is probably more worthwhile than the work you're putting off. in a general sense, it may be wise to re-examine your purpose and the nature of what you consider to be productive.
Deleting "Return to Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory" was the single best productivity decision I've made in a long time.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
I have exactly the same problem, try to work in the day, but get distracted and end up working an night.
Accept it.. Don't even go near your computer in the day. Sleep in, do your food shopping, go to yoga in the day time. When all is quiet at night I start serious work, knowing I have to be quiet so as not to wake my flatmates.
Will
per mere, per terras
Emacs is better, always!
As a doctor I guessed that you'd have something to say about nutrition being the foundation of all good works. A healthy body leads to an healthy mind, etc.
Any thoughts?
I find that whenever a big project is due, I want to do anything else but that. Therefore, my room becomes extraordinarily clean, clothes are washed, and I practice my clarinet.
Also, sometimes in my procrastination, I'll work on other projects that are not due for quite some time, because the prospect of working on the current project is so unappealing. That is the key.
So... for any project that is due, start working on it a long time in advance. If it is so dreadfully dull that you don't get any work on IT done, you'll soon have finished every other project due for the entire semester. While you'll still have to painfully cram that ONE project, the other projects will be done.
A slightly saner alternative is just to start early on the project, and set very very small, short term goals for yourself. Say "Today, I'm just going to write an outline, one sentence for each paragraph, of the paper." And so on. If you start far enough in advance, you'll be surprised that it's done, and probably at a higher level of quality than if crammed.
-Alex
-- I prefer the term "karma escort."
By the sounds of it, I have the same problem as you do.
What I found helped me was getting away from the computer. It's just too much of a distraction.
Instead what I do (even for computer assignments) I start by sitting down with a pad of paper and I start working through the assignment.
I break it down in to a series of smaller steps (kind of like an outline).
After that's done, depending on the assignment, I'll start to write out (sometimes in point form, sometimes in long hand) the ideas I need to cover for each of the points. Keep expanding on those until you feel that you have enough detail to sit down at a computer and put it down in good.
A new feature is just a bug waiting to happen. And vice versa.
Here I am browsing the threads about how not to waste time, when I'm SUPPOSED to be studying right now! Arggghhh!!!
Logic, macros, and more
You might have it, because I have/had the exact same symptoms. I was diagnosed and started treating it soon after I failed to get into a PhD program (because of the ADD), and soon before I almost lost a job because I couldn't finish projects (luckily I found out about ADD on time). Here were some of my symptoms:
- Being unable to study one thing for more than 30-40 minutes, even if a final was the next day.
- Being the first in a study group to want to take a break.
- Procrastinating on finishing a simple paper, even though I'd already read 100's of pages and knew the material inside and out.
- In meetings, constantly feeling 5 minutes behind and unable to contribute immediately.
- At work, getting up to photocopy a useless paper just for the excuse to get up and walk. Unable to sit at desk for 2 hours straight like 99% of coworkers.
- Going to mail a letter. Can't find stamps: forgotten to organize office supplies. Search garage for organizer, notice packet of seeds for garden: garden pots not ready. Must wash pots with bleach, search for bleach in laundry room, notice unwashed clothes. Go to collect other clothes, notice unread magazine. Oops, post office now closed, still don't have stamps. Ever have days like this?
What helped me was that a sibling was diagnosed with ADD, and when they discribed their symptoms, I recognized *some* of the symptoms. Now, theirs was the H-type (hyperactive and/or overtalkative (latter often in women)), mine was the Non-H type (prone to daydreams and/or distractable in thought). Even as siblings we didn't have the exact same symptoms. I have suggestions:I managed to graduate from the university but it took a long time. I think my nutrition was bad. I ate too much everything that was bad for the liver.
- Quit drinking coffee
- drink less alcohol
- eat less carbohydrates
Also,
- sleep well
- exercise (you'll learn to like it!)
- get a girl friend and fuck her hard in the morning and in the evening (www.unstoppable-confidence.com, www.fastseduction.com,Google:"double your dating")
- study something that you are really interested in
- change your mental state (NLP)
- think hard every evening for five minutes: "Why am I such an efficient student?" This will start an unconscious process that will change your life! Try getting 2 more reasons every evening. This technique is from book "unstoppable confidence".
If you'll do this all, I guarantee, you'll be a very efficient student!!!
It's easy... Just get incredibly bored with everything else, and school work will be a happy distraction to keep your mind off of your otherwise dull and pointless existence.
A year or two ago my DSL connection was cut off due to a billing cock up - the amount of work I got done during the down time was astounding.
I agree with the parent post about caffene is bad. I had the same prob as you and kept trying to be more alert/motiviated with caffene, it turned out to make me feel vacant and not as sharp, and then get headaches which totally killed my thinking.
:)
caffene is bad, just stop it now.
Other things to try is the ADHD drugs. cylert was super effective for me, but I only tried for a year when classes were hard and non-interesting. I used to be easily distracted, but while taking that medication, I could sit down, do the work, and finish. One task after another. It was nice. I have mild ADHD though, even ADHD varies between people so your milage may vary.
music - http://www.subatomicglue.com
The only way I have found to be really, truly effective, is to keep a daily log of my activities. And be brutally honest. If you sit down to write a paper, but don't, you write 4:30 - 6:15 Slashdot. Not paper. For me, having to write down that I was goofing off motivates me to Get Work Done.
Why are you in college in the first place?
You're clearly not having fun, and you're doing something that you've decided (emotionally, not mentally) is unimportant.
No? You think you need to be in college? Try giving me some reasons otherwise - and see if YOU find your arguments convincing (again, emotionally, not mentally - it's not your abstract mind that keeps you going when school gets tough). If not, then you're wasting your time and energy.
Find something else that you *want* to do. Right now, not some abstract idea of a career some 10 years down the line. Assuming you're smart, you'll have both good times and bad, but you'll learn a lot that isn't taught inside classrooms but is equally important to having a successful life (and your life is more important than your career, right?).
College will be waiting when you are truly ready for it, when you really have a desire or need to learn something.
P.S.
It's interesting that someone else mentioned Persig's "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". Reading Chapter 16 in Part III, where Persig discusses a hypothetical student might be of particular relevance to you right now.
(This is a (kludgy) way of making a bookmark, anyway!)
Karma: Excellent (My Karma? I wish...:-( )
Hey Cliff, I was in the EXACT same situation you were in....EXACT. and if anyone tells you to have more discipline....hearing that over and over is just going to make you feel even worse about yourself, because if you were like me, locking yourself inself in a room with no distrasctions whatsoever led you to daydreaming over your homework. last year, my freshmen year of college, my one friend from down the hall in my dorm gave me a pill of Adderall (he's prescribed it for ADD, so....no he's not a crazy amphetamine drug dealer). now, keep in mind, this drug is WIDELY abused among my age group, and people take it to stay up for days, and to get total energy highs off of it. you see, for people who don't have ADD, it pretty much acts like speed.....it is a stimulent. but for people with ADD, stimulents have a somewhat reverse response on the body....they slow it down. (this is why caffiene never kept me up or did anything for me). When I took this pill.....it totally opened my eyes to the fact that I may have had ADD. I wasn't hyper or crazy or anything as most kids got on it. I totally chilled out at my desk, was able to focus on ANYTHING. I wrote like 4 huge papers thats night, and totally forgot to look at the clock-in-the-corner of my screen while I was so in tune with what I was doing. Every minute went by I got so much work done, and wrote my best paper that whole school year. this night prompted me to go see a psychologist and see if I had ADD. well sure enough, I was diagnosed with ADD (with like a 80% above the median line or something like that). I was on a couple of drugs that didn't work till they found that adderall worked best for me. Now my grades have improved dramatically and I get so much work done. and when I'm done with my school work, the adderall makes me EVEN more into computers and coding. Not that I'm all about drugs here....in fact I've been against this for quite some time. But...it's really working out and my lifestyle has improved because of it. cheers matt
This is basically what I do for my programmers as a manager: I work with them to get very specific schedules that keep them on top of their progress. We review progress regularly. Very few people understand this process and think of it as a waste of time and complete BS. However, it is extremely effective at keeping people and projects on time.
I had difficulty studying when in college -- it was strange, because I never had difficulty before. It ended up that my eyesight was getting bad. I got a pair of glasses and that solved that problem.
Eat right and take vitamins(good ones, not that one-a-day crap) -- it's amazing how that helps in keeping one alert.
Also, sometimes, you just have to do whatever it takes -- brute force studying is sometimes something you have to do -- If you have to read something in triplicate to finally "get it", so be it, do it.
By the way, don't understimate the power of studying with a group. You'll get your work done faster, make great friends, and learn essential teamwork skills as a side benefit.
Yeah..I have it also. That's why I always say things that give me bad kharma here (fuck you very much, /.).
Anyways, there's Ritalin, Dexedrine and a couple other drugs which help a lot. I only found out after 49 years. Maybe you'll figure it out now, fix it and get on with it.
1. Quit caffeine.
2. Organize. Get a feel for what the components of a job are.
3. Every time you notice that you have become distracted, stop and go back to what you were doing.
Every.
Time.
It takes a while to get the hang of working straight-through, but it can be done. It's experience, training, and maturity that make the most difference.
Could medication help? Maybe. However, for years, people were telling me I needed treatment for ADD, and I've gotten better. I'm still twitchy, I'm still easily-distracted, but I'm doing just fine now, because I've learned to adapt.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
Hold up, I'm being serious here. I have a real problem getting down to work, but have found that if I have a small joint I can actually get in and do all the boring stuff which I normally can't get myself motivated enough to tackle.
:o)
I think it's because it just really helps me focus on just one thing for a very long time.
Of course, I am not suggesting that people should take illegal substances just to get work done, no, what I am suggesting is that everybody should move post-haste to Amsterdam and turn it into the new silicon valley...hmmm...this might just work!
I need a conversion chart or other explanation for this 2:2 and 2:1 stuff. My context work hasn't gleaned much, other than "2:2 is good".
Or some way to at least say "this needs an explanation/defintion" -- perhaps a tag. Let authors say "this word/section is important", then let editors/readers/other_workers add the details like links, etc. -- load them into mouseovers or right clicks. Add more types of links, color/look-wise.
Ok, I'm wandering here... Have this on my desk by the end of next week.
I often experienced this feeling of being unproductive in cases where the goal of a project (even my own hobby projects) are desireful, but the path to reach them is long and much work. The typical thing to observe on myself then is "just looking at the news", "just checking email", etc.
;-), make some tea and breakfast. By the time I finish its about 9:40 and I spend 20 minutes reading emails and getting news. But from point 10am I start working concentrately until around 14am. Every half an hour I do a 5 minute away-from-computer break.
I overcome this by deciding this day should be a productive day and starting with sort of a ritual: I ensure to get at least 8 to 9 hours of sleep, then at 9am I wake up (yeah, I work from home
This works out nicely and I get a lot of work done. Because I have not broke this matter yet I accepted that the unwanted piece of work are unavoidable anyway (as I have to work on it in the next few hours) and just do it.
I sometimes find that I'm procrastinating all the time and have a hard time forcing myself to get anything done. I've found that it helps me a lot to break down what I have to do into a series of smaller tasks or goals, and just tackle them one at a time. It sounds simple, but for me it makes all the difference.
Faced with a lot of work do to, I think I procrastinate mainly because I find it all overwhelming. Simply breaking it down into smaller pieces makes it much less daunting, and gives you a place to start. Once you get started, you can just concentrate on one task at a time, and check them off as you go. That's my USD$0.0145-worth. (I'm Canadian.)
hth
'yields false when preceded by its quotation' yields false when preceded by its quotation.
I've found that work takes the longest when it's something I dread. Like vague essay assignments & such. Interesting work, however, such as programming, takes almost no time at all. Find your work interesting (or find interesting work) and you'll feel like there's not enough of it to fill your day.
I think I'll try it out quickly, hang on a sec.
$%£$%$£%$CVASg...NO CARRIER
I am NaN
...you're doing the right thing in the first place? Maybe it's a bit cryptic of me, but really -- are you studying the right field if you can't get motivated to learn about it?
No, really. Go to your doctor and have him write you a prescription for adderall. Your problem is exactly what adderall is designed for. If you want to know what it feels like, EVERYONE on college campuses has some, so buy a pill off someone for a couple bucks and see if it works for you. Just remember to lay off the caffeine when you're on it.
I have experienced exactly what you described in the post. I was diagnosed "ADHD/WO" (ADD With Out Hyperactivity). My symptoms and those of other Adults I read about are EXACTLY what you described.
I went on medication and now I'm off it. You see I don't know to this day whether I have ADD but the medication only made me focus on the minutiae of tasks and I lost the bigger picture. "ADD" in most cases is just a characteristic. Any characteristic is advantagous sometimes and disadvantagous other times.
Long story short the posts about exercise are a good start, but the best thing I've found is having a good breakfast. I have bacon, eggs and tomatoes on toast every morning and im able to focus for most of the day even if I have a late lunch.
By the way, grill the bacon its alot tastier than fried bacon. Also put butter, sugar, pepper and salt on the tomato halves and grill them too.
Let me know if any of this helps.
Well, i have/had the same problem. I usually start to late and for me it's just a matter to get started. Just do it.
Stop posting to slashdot asking why you aren't getting work done.
Whenever I can't seem to concentrate on work (usually because it's something I don't really want to do) I just have a beer. There's something about the alcohol of a single beer that makes me able to concentrate on one (and only one) task. More beer than that and you can't think clearly enough, so be sure to stop at one. Try it. It works.
That's not the only problem. "High" in that sentence was an adjective, therefore it should have been "really high," not "real high."
But I found the articles here http://www.dexterity.com/articles/ of great use, and they are written by a fello techy.
If you've only a year or two left of school, be sure to focus on that fact that you've only got a relatively short amount of time left until you're free. If you're just starting out, I'd seriously start shopping around for a new major. But you should still try to pick a field which is interesting but still has some practial use (hard sciences, engineering, business, etc.) and avoid those that seem a little too easy and fun (art, sociology, etc.).
Now the other key thing is to live well below your means. This allows you to live off the earnings of a part-time job. You won't be able to afford a new car, but now instead of spending time working to pay it off, you can spend that time learning how to fix a used one. Instead of ploping down in front of the TV to help you unwind from a boring day at work (and don't forget that you had to work longer at your job in order to pay for the cable TV in the first place) You can instead spend your (large amount of) free time writing a screen play for a movie (or what ever floats your boat). And after a few years at your current job you will get bored and start procrastinating again. That's the indicator that it is time to change jobs/careers again.
It is virtually impossible to do work without rewarding yourself in some way, whether watching TV, posting on /., etc.
/. when there is work to do.
;). Personally, I like anime, and will use BitTorrent to get fansubs. Takes a while, but I have a reward after a few hours. Every 20-50 minute distraction means 3-5 hours of work done. Not a bad deal. Screw around with Windows all you want, but if you want to actually do business turn to Linux - it helps.
With me, I have a dual boot system, but if I want to do college work, I boot into Mandrake 9.1. There are limited games which will amuse, but not for long. If you use a Linux distro for work, and avoid spending too much time on forum sites like
Although you could get pretty bored with Mandrake, don't forget DivX capabilities built in
they say do what you enjoy and the rest will follow. mabey you are pushing yourself into a place your not naturally supposed to be. if it does not come naturally why do it. when you actually enjoy what you do you have a hard time finding time to do the other stuff. like eating and sleeping.
coupled with regular bowel movements. I kid not, this helped me focus when I need to
With this thread, and the previous ADD thread, many useful posts are being done anonymously. I assume this is because posters might not want to go on the record as having ADD or similar diagnoses. While most of the time mod-reading at 0 = boring comments, with these threads reading at 0 = insightful comments. In the ADD thread I could have used 20 mod points for useful AC comments.
The trick that helped me get my undergraduate thesis done was simply to unplug myself. I'd turn off my cell phone, pick up my laptop, leave the NIC at home and go out and find a quiet place to work with no distractions.
/.!), you'll be surprised what you can get accomplished in a day.
If you simply can't unplug yourself, turn off your IRC client, instant messaging services and e-mail client. With a little self discipline (no reading
I hope you get some useful tips out of people today. Good luck with your studies!
Henry
(Now a post-bachelor PhD. student, thanks to this technique.)
I don't think you should be to worried about having ADHD, ADD or beeing depressive as mentioned in the comments.
I think ADD/depression/anxiety are real problems, but the drugs people are only treating the symptoms not the underlying problems. I think the analogous situation is the pacing back and forth behavior of the animals at your local zoo. Unfortunately, most people aren't ready for this guy's solution.
I dont think it is circular reasoning for this reason: Discipline can be aquired in small steps, where as there is no clear way to aquire concentration in small steps.
Discipline is a skill, and for people who are not naturaly gifted with discipline, it takes practice. Just as you might learn the lines in a play, you set some small goal achieve that goal, repeat the process then take on a greater challenge.
Having discipline can solve alot of problems: Weight and unhealthy diet, lack concentration, procrastination, laziness, as well as almost anything else you want to change about your personailty. Discipline defeats victim mentality, and protects against depression and helplessness.
I think if dicipline was viewed as something that needs to be learned, more people might seek it as something to add to their education, along with math and language skills.
I suggest these excersizes: Pick something that is a little difficult to get yourself to do. Maybe you dislike pushups, or you hate doing dishes. As a dicipline exersize only, and not for any other benefit some task might give you, set a schedule and stick to it. I.e. "I will do pushups every other day at 5:30pm" or "I will do the dishes every night right after dinner" or "I will abstain from watching TV on tuesdays". Stick to it, and do not allow yourself to give an excuse. If it is inconvenient, do it anyway. Predict confilcts in your schedule and if you will not be able to complete your task because of a conflict, then do your task earlier and let that be the only thing that exempts you from doing it at your scheduled time. Excuses are the biggest obstical in learning discipline, so defeating them should take prioirity. Keep this going for several periods. When you feel you have mastered this, then take on a greater challenge. These challenges are not required to have any benefits, they simply must be more and more difficult to complete. After a few weeks you will feel more empowered, more ambitious and more self confident. You do however need to keep exercising it to keep your discipline muscle in shape, but it is easier the second time even if you let it go for a while.
Im not here now... Im out KILLING pepperoni
Try having kids you goddam whiner.
You'll realize that your life was nothing but free time, and you could have done whatever the hell you wanted to do whenever the hell you wanted.
Now you're trying to figure out the last section of your term paper while fishing a small piece of human shit out of a bathtub.
"Oh no, I only have 12 hours till my paper is due! Good thing I won't have to spend 7 1/2 of it changing, feeding, and entertaining the child!"
As a side effect, they make you into a cranky, bitter adult when you're only 25.
Oh well. I love him anyway... wonderful Peter.
Death and danger are my various breads and various butters.
I can't sit still for more than 15 minutes at a time and work. Due to my depression, I find it hard to concentrate and remember things and I get nervous. I can write code, but it takes me a long time. As a result, I am currently on disability. I still try to keep my skills up to date at home working on small projects, but I still find it hard to work.
What helps me is music, if I play music I like, I can relax and not be so nervous. Which means a MP3 Player, an audio CD, or a radio next to the PC. Now this won't work in a cubical environment unless you wear headphones, if they allow them.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
So I just throw things around.
Try to build up a little willpower. Sheesh.
It sounds like you're just plain old-fashioned lazy and procrastinating.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
127.0.0.1 slashdot.org
that should solve your problem!
There are no tricks. No good books, no magic potions. You need to stay away from the Internet, including /., while you're working! Turn off your phones, turn off any music or TVs. Get yourself away from any other distractions, like people, especially boy/girl friends. Set goals for the day and for the week, and reward yourself in small ways for meeting those goals. Don't lose hope after a failure, but redouble your efforts. If you find that ultimately, you can't do it, after really giving it all you've got, you should seriously think about a plan B, perhaps a different career.
You end up with a final 'classification' on your degree:
:-|
First = amazingly good, please please stay on here and do a PHd.
2:1 = good at the material and academically minded
2:2 = probably either good at it and lazy (or poor in exams), or studious with less natural affinity towards the material
3rd =
Can't really equate it to "GPA" or whatever because that concept doesn't exist over here at all. Also, UK degree courses stick very closely to the subject you're actually "doing" - rarely taking any modules that are entirely irrelevant to the course.
Man, I could have written this question myself. You and I are in pretty much the same boat.
First, I would like to point out that I'm writing this in order to avoid getting any real work done.
Second, a quick rundown of the advice I've seen here, and my opinion:
-Exercise: Tentatively disagree. Exercise is great in its own right, and it may help your overall well-being. But I've had times in my life where I was putting ten or twelve hours a week into the gym. When you're done, you'll feel more relaxed and have a bit of an endorphine buzz, but it doesn't mean you're going to sit down and kick your latest project in the arse. In short, get some exercise, but don't expect it to solve all your problems.
-Psychiatric evaluation: Agree
-Self-medication: Disagree
-Just grow up, act like an adult, and get your adult things done: Bugger that. You need ideas, not a reason to beat yourself up even more.
-Stop browsing Slashdot: Wholeheartedly agree. [God, I'm a hypocrite] You admit that the computer itself is a problem, so try and limit your browsing time as much as possible. Start with 30 minutes a day. Don't beat yourself up if it doesn't go that low. It's just a guideline for evaluating individual browsing decisions. Do I really need to know the latest SCO news? Is this week's Onion really *that* funny? Personally, I've found that I can get ninety percent of the enjoyment in about a minute, just by browsing the headlines.
-Disconnect the Internet: If you can get away with it, do so. It helps if you wget any resources or APIs you find yourself using a lot. You need to construct every barrier to goofing off that you can.
-Maybe you're in the wrong field: Unless there's a "play video games for money" career field I'm unaware of, this advice is far too easy to give. Others have said that, if you find yourself retreating from your coding in order to study something like astronomy or psychology, or to do some writing, then there may be a viable option there. Give it a look, but realize that doing something for fun isn't the same as doing something as a career.
I would also add, write lists, write sublists, and keep them someplace extremely handy. Also, enlist the aid of your friends and enemies by announcing your goals and intentions. If you know that others are expecting you to perform--or waiting to see you fail--then you have more incentive. Once you're far enough along on a project that you know you're serious about it, let it be known.
I can't emphasize this enough: Put yourself in positions where results and accomplishment are simply expected. The busiest and most productive time in my life--which doesn't necessarily mean the most useful--was when I joined the Army at the ripe old age of 17. Man, 1995 seems like such a long time ago. During the year of training, I had to haul butt in every aspect of life: Exercising, learning, keeping the barracks in a drill sergeant-approved state, and dealing with all the other crap. I didn't have a choice.
Try this: Go to someone you trust, explain your problem, and ask them to let you send them a weekly status report of your current goals and projects, and the steps you're taking towards accomplishing them. If you have a major assignment, schedule time with the teacher to explain your progress. Let them shame you into working.
I wish I could say that this advice is guaranteed to work. It works for me, when I actually bother to do it. Good luck.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
Staying focused is hard when you feel overwhelmed with tasks and it seems nobody cares. It is a lot easier when working as a team. If you have someone to talk with working on the same project (not necessarily working jointly with you, just another student with the same assignment) that can be a big help. Set up a *scheduled* time to meet each day to discuss progress, say 10-10:30am and 4-4:30pm. Think of this as your *break*.
Write a brief email progress report each day, a couple paragraphs outlining major accomplishments, obstacles, and what you plan to do next. If you feel you don't have time to pause to do that you are probably thrashing and not really accomplishing anything. Send this before your meeting so the meeting can go fast. Don't get bogged down in chit-chat.
getting started is the hardest thing, but even once you start, you need the motivation to get through to the end. that was my problem, which is why i always ended up staying up late at night doing work. it had nothing to do with exercise or what i ate or drank (i rarely consumed caffeine). even if it's not a large project, but something smaller, like keeping up with the reading for the class or studying or doign the weekly/daily homework. i had no problem starting it, but finishing was rough. i actually found that the reasons for all of this was because i stayed in teh dorms all the time.
my advice... living in teh dorm can make it tough to get work done, especially when all your friends live in the same dorm. go somewhere else to get work done (library, other buildings, etc). i found that i got more reading done when i went to the library than any other time. the only time this was a problem was when i didn't get enough sleep and fell asleep doing my reading. if you have the option of doing your homework during classtime in the classroom or leaving to do it later, stay and get as much done as possible in the time you're there. also, stay away from part time jobs where you can work while you're not in the "office". that'll make it harder for you to do school work because you don't get paid for it, but you get paid for the other work.
the only other time i've ever been able to get all my work done is when my courseload was lighter (summer classes or going to school part time). but that's probably not an option.
please me, have no regrets.
It worked for Bart Simpson
It is not what you have . .
.
It is the think that you do not have
You need a GFD dude
And i will be shocked if anyone in \ knows what GFD is.
I'm like that as well. Last summer session I noticed I did much better when I was exercising and had to manage my time, by force. For example, I was taking 7 credits during a time when 6 is maximum full-time (I had to get a waiver). My seventh credit was weight training so it wasn't a problem.
:-) anime of course)
... so after reading many of these posts I am going to try going to the gym in the morning to climb, then to work and finally class. Hopefully that will help my problem.
My schedule every day was something like:
-Wake up
-Go to Weight Training
-Change and go to Linear Algebra
-Study for 2 hours then go to lunch
-Return to library, study/do homework until Discrete Math
-Go to Discrete
-Go to the local Rock climbing gym for 2 hours
-Eat dinner
-Go home, do my Linear Algebra homework
-Watch a 30 minute television program (at 1230
-Go to sleep
-Repeat.
This schedule was enough to keep me busy and really productive. It felt great. I didn't have enough time to assimilate my Linear material though, and had to drop it. I noticed a drop in my productivity immediately.
This session I haven't been able to go to the gym to workout because of injuries and my schedule hasn't much permitted Rock Climbing in the evening. I've been having trouble sleeping and waking up. No matter how little or much sleep I get
Since it seems like you can handle the pressure, try taking more classes and/or going to work more.
Just a note, I've been told I probably had ADD when I was a child, but it seems like I grew out of it. The person that said it thinks it to be true because of how I think and how I behave on a normal basis, but am able to concentrate on something and become extremely proficient.
Regards
M_O
Mathematician, n.:
Someone who believes imaginary things appear right before your i's.
Yeah, it's a stupid slogan from Nike(tm). I agree that all of the stuff mentioned previously about getting enough sleep and avoiding caffeine make sense. I used to find that procrastination was a big one too, and your description sounds a lot like that.
Oh, I've got a month to do that...
I'll be ok, I've got a week...
No problem, still got a few days, more than enough time.
OH CRAP!!! 2 HOURS BEFORE CLASS!!! %#@!
Actually getting started is the hardest part. Once you actually get started, things start falling into place.
If it's allowed, try doing stuff as a team with someone else. It's actually a lot easier to convince yourself that it's ok to slack off than it is to convince yourself AND someone else. Of course, this assumes that you've not allied yourself with a team of slackers. You REALLY don't want to get into a MacKenzie Brothers situation.
My advice, take some time off, if you can. And relax, bore yourself do death. And after that you'll want to do anything. Worked for me this summer. I took the first 2 months free in my summer break. And now I'm working, and I like to work now, because it's a contrast to the boring first 2 months. But if you can't take off, this won't work :/
Add this line to your /etc/hosts file:
127.0.0.1 www.slashdot.org
Okay, serously, not everybody has the means, but I have my desktop that I use to do nothing but work on. I have my laptop in front of the couch, that I use to do things such as read Slashdot, etc...
Shrinks suggest for people who can't sleep to reserve the bedroom for sleeping only (except the obvious other thing that people do in there). Study in another room, do everything in another room. Discipline is the key, though.
Damn! You're on your way to either a Nobel prize, or violent mental breakdown. In either case don't you think your solution is a bit too sociopathic?
And it pays to experiment with what works for you. Trust me - university may seem like hard work, but it's the best place to learn about what works for you. FWIW - I don't think it's a free ride - concentration requires an act of will. You must decide to achieve a certain goal, and then use willpower - not medication, tricks, or gadgets - to achieve that goal; I just don't think there's a shortcut...
I'd suggest you put together a plan based on the amazing amounts of feedback you've had already (and I would stick "get diagnosed with ADHD" way back on the list). Keep some kind of diary to see what works - it's easy to fool yourself that you're getting little extra done now that you've set an exercise regime, when in fact you're plowing through a lot more work.
Google for "state of flow" - there's a fair amount of research into reaching a productive state.
If you plan to work in software development, this is the one thing that will make or break your career - you can teach a monkey how to code in C, but only people who can concentrate for prolonged periods can create good software. This is a learnable skill, but it's potentially harder to learn than coding !
Good luck.
It's all very well in practice, but it will never work in theory.
Seriously, you're asking the wrong group of people.
Slashdot and all the other sites like it are a huge time sink. The people who hang out here are just like you.
Face it, you're not going to get real help here. In fact, I won't even attempt to answer your question.
Oh, whoops, I guess I forgot that I was posting to slashdot.
I'll write a few.... *click* *click* *click*
Many Thanks,
Luke
Also, I began doing Tai Chi, but I imagine Yoga or any other kind of exercise will help you focus.
This is the best advice I've seen here.
:-)
I had a similar problem after law school. Law school required a structured approach to study, but the structure was imposed by the needs of my professor. I didn't just spend n hours studying. but I had to read x number of cases before the next class. It was easy to see progress, and easier to plan other things I needed or wanted to do around those tasks.
Studying for the bar examination after law school was entirely different. I knew I needed to spend between 8 and 12 hours a day studying if I wanted to pass. But that seems overwhelming, when you're looking at three months' worth of work, seven days a week.
I tackled it by breaking things down into discrete tasks, i.e. writing a practice essay, or doing a set number of practice problems. It was easy to guage progress by the amount of work actually completed vs. the amount of time I spend working. The time felt more or less irrelevant.
Then you need to plan to spend some time checking the larger picture to see where you are in the scheme of things.
Last, but definitely not least, plan to take breaks. I found that I started losing my edge after about 50-60 minutes of concentrated work. So, I assigned myself 10-15 minutes of breaks, and took them. I grabbed my iPod, and took a walk in the sun (it burns! it burns!) and once dressed in shorts the whole day so I could take a series of breaks to go for a short but furious swim.
I didn't get to exercise as much as some people are suggesting (unless you count Playstation2 as exercise), but my walks and swims left me feeling refreshed.
And yes, I passed the bar examination.
I would take Ritalin, because I think it might help, but I am not sure how to get it. Do I just ask my doctor?
Do something really fun on a regular basis, I usually go to a bar to see bands I like and get completely loaded. Get kinky with sex, masturbation, autoeroticasphyxiation, whatever it takes to go nuts with playtime, then it's easy to sit down and get focused on the boring everyday shit. Get a buddy who has a similar problem and help each other out. Dress up like a girl and have your buddy put a noose around your neck and choke you while you give him a blowjob. Have him tie you up and piss on you in the shower. Put on a skirt and stockings and go out in public. Drink booze slowly while you work to keep a mild buzz on. Get into blood drinking with safe people you know. Put on a wig and get fucked in the ass. Exercise strenuously in the morning when you first wake up. Stay away from the television and radio. Get to a point where you are either sleeping, working with focus, or playing in an exciting manner. Do crazy shit because your problem is that you are bored, and that's natural because work is boring. You just need to make playing super exciting, but safe so that you don't get injured to badly.
I had many of the same symptoms you did in college 15 years ago and have only recently figured out the root cause. In my case it was ADD without hyperactivity. I had a hard time concentrating and could get off track by the slightest thing. What worked for me was to be extremely anal about my environment. The goal was to minimize distractions. That meant a closed door, no books around, headphones on playing classical music, facing a blank wall. Recently I have also started taking Adderall XR 30 mg. It appears to be working. I used to have some of the same problems, e.g. not being able to resist the tempptation to surf. Now it is much easier for me to focus. Feel free to contact me directly with any questions. Chris
1. If you cut all regular use of caffeine, you'll find that when you need to work for long hours for whatever reason a single cola will probably do the job.
2. My favorite way to procastinate on one task is to do another, preferably something very different. If I'm really tired of coding, I'll go pay bills or mow the lawn. That way you get the benefits of feeling like you're procrastinating, but are still getting things done.
3. Take breaks periodically as you work. I found that if I work more than about 2.5 hours straight I stop thinking well, which fscks up my code. I find 5-10 minutes every hour and a half works well for me.
4. Get a steady sleep and work schedule. Even if you're not a morning person, if you get used to accomplishing stuff from 1-4PM and again 8-12, say, you'll be able to put in a full day. This is an issue of habits, so you need to be used to doing this kind of thing.
5. Once you have the steady work schedule, make sure you stick to it, even when you don't have a pressing job to do. If, for example, you finish all the code you need to write for right now, start brainstorming your next project, or find something that's on your "Someday I'll do this" list. If you're done everything you can possibly do right now, enjoy a break. That's your reward for working well.
Just so you know, I went through precisely the same thing a couple of years ago, and what I've told you is about all it took for me to snap out of it.
I think you need a break. I've found that it's easy to get burned out after the fact and when you need a break, it's already too late and your work suffers. There is a formula for managing your work and rest, but I don't remember where I came across it.
This is my world and I am...
I hope this gets through the filter and all the noise on this. I have ADD. Diagnosed after 49 years. Go to a psychiatrist. Try ritalin, dexedrine, whatever they prescribe. It may take awhile to get the meds right and readjust the compensations you've probably developed, but eventually you'll probably be a lot better. The ritalin helped me immediately. Don't listen to these guys here with their well-intentioned, but generally stupid advice. See a professional.
1. Eat, shit, exercise and sleep at the same time (respectively) everyday. 2. Avoid caffein and sugar. 3. Never stuff yourself with a meal, i.e., eat small portions. 4. Never go more than 3 hours without eating something. 5. Take a multivitamin everyday. 6. Dedicate the same hour (not too long after awaking) everyday to the most important work. 7. Do not dwell on negative thoughts. EVER! 8. Do not forget to have fun and enjoy life.
Which isn't to say you have to work. Just, if you don't work, just sit there. Do not read slashdot. Do not read Usenet. Do not browse the web. Do not pick your nose. Do not look out of your window. Just sit.
You'll soon get so bored you'd rather work.
This may sound crazy, but it works for me and has got me out of some very blocked spots.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
For me being productive and involved comes with how closely I believe in what I'm doing. If its something I'm truely interested in I'm self motivated to do it. If its something that is mandated upon me in which my creativity is suppressed, then I'm less inclined to follow it. The more the disenfranchised I am, the more disinterested I become. This is even more evident if the task is led or significantly influenced by narcassistic personalities. Their artifically induced pressure may infact serve you to neglect the very things you're interested in - leading to a vicious cycle of 'oh I'd love to do that but after I get job x done' - job x never being done because you're never motivated enough to do it.
My work and career can be characterized as "hunter" style. I'm a consultant whose work is 99% in my control. But that doesn't mean I wasn't hurt by my ADD. My type of ADD means not being able to concentrate on what I love to do, no matter how much I wanted to or needed to concentrate. My diagnosis and current ability to control my ADD lets me work at full capacity instead of 20% capacity. I control when and where I focus, rather than distractions controling it. Without distractions my "hunts" take half the time- I get twice as much bucks for the time I spend.
Simple. I don't.
Did you just choose submitting an article to /. over working?
... or get a job you like. There is really no other option if you're unable to wrap your brain around unpleasant tasks. Some people manage this on a daily basis, but there is no reason you should expect to.
sig sig sputnik
I also dont know how people study in the day in a house with other people living in it, people asking you questions all day, bugging you, asking you for favors, asking you for help, giving you chores or some distracting task to do. Expensive headphones and a $100/mo CD budget got me through living at a crowded fraternity house on the ground floor at an Engineering school. If you cut your caffeine consumption down to mostly water, you'll hardly feel that $100/mo, either. And you'll sleep better.
____ _______
Duty now for the future!
Start paying for your own tuition.
Amazing magic tricks
As a partially tangential aside, you may recall the media coverage for Provigil, the drug that allows non-jittery wakefulness for up to 48 hours, without dependency issues or major side effects. Provigil is a trade name for the chemical modafinil, which is Schedule IV in the US and requires a prescription.
Adrafinil -trade name Olmifon- is the precursor drug to modafinil, and it has the benefit of remaining unscheduled and uncontrolled in the US. It also has the same effect as modafinil: adrafinil is metabolized into modafinil by the body. Adrafinil also costs about 20% of an equivalent dose of modafinil. Quite exciting (just watch the potential liver side-effects)...
I have yet to locate a US supplier of adrafinil; I suspect this is largely due to the lack of FDA approval.
I suspect you simply don't like what you are supposed to do.
Re-think your decisions. Find out what you really want to do, and find a way to do it. It might be difficult, but you will be motivated.
Try a float tank. Lots of fun, great for reorganization/confrontation and they'll teach you about nothing.
My problem with this method was that during my degree I looked forward to the pissup after handing in a coursework so much that when I didn't have it finished in time I still went out and celebrated. In my final year I was lucky to hand in any courseworks on time, the punishment for handing in late (-5%/day) was far outweighed by getting sloshed in the uni bar with my mates.
I remember reading a story in one of Stephen Coveys books that helped me immensly. Take a glass jar, fill it with big rocks...is it full? Probably think yes, but take pebbles and add them, shake it around so the pebbles fall in between the big rocks...is it full? Take sand, pour it and shake up so it falls into the cracks left...is it full? Take water, pour water in until it fills the jar.
What's the moral? You can always fit more in? No...the moral is that if you don't put the big rocks in first (the important stuff in your life), you won't have room for them at all. Figure out what's most important in your life, and make a commitment to tackle them before everything else.
I highly recommend the book "First things first" by Dr Stephen Covey. It's an amazing book about time managment that focuses not on getting more out of your time, but on how to structure your day to accomplish the stuff that really matters. I believe, out of my entire (read: $%#ing huge) library, First things first is the book that has contributed most to my life.
I used to suffer from the same problem. Now with a wife and kids, I grab every moment available for work, as I don't know when the next chunk of time is going to be available. My most productive time is now 7am to mid day now, rather than midnight to 7am. I still drink coffee, but avoid caffeine after about 2pm. I also work in an area that I'm enthusiastic about now, while in my previous life, I wasn't
"...we should just trust our president in every decision that he makes and we should just support that." B.Spears 2003
you can ask other people for advice on how to change yourself, and the answers can be entertaining and even useful. but what's your criteria now that you have all these wonderful words of wisdom so arrayed before you? how does something "sound like a good idea"? or is everything "worth a try"? how will you know when you find "good advice"?
don't forget, too: there will be the cynical lurkers who don't tell you anything, secretly hoping your undisciplined methods result in your eventual removal from the employment pool. how do you react to this unprovable yet highly probable knowledge? what advice can you infer from their silence? will you use the same selection methods as for the voiced advice?
of course, not all silence is cynical, not all experimental procedure is empirical, not all cajoling is base, not all change is irreversible.
good luck!
There's only one real problem here. You can't get anything done if you're in the same room as your computer. The bandwidth at college quickly becomes like crack and you can't stop surfing/downloading/etc. I had the same problem and the solution was so simple. Just go to the library. Take your work, get out of your room, and sit in the library until your hw is done. The only problem now becomes finding the motivation to go to the library. I recommend going there after class before you come home. Also, and this might sound strange, but keep your room clean! I would let my room get so messy I almost felt confused just being there and that doesn't help :)
God only knows.
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
How can you avoid this? Well, I can't say I have found the solution, but here are some ideas.
- Try to work on the project for at least 2-3 hours on the day it is assigned.
- Try to work on projects either in your school's computer lab or the library, where other people are working hard. Maybe set aside 2 hours to go work on stuff in the lab before you head home each day from school.
- Make yourself work for 30 minutes and then allow yourself to surf the web for 30 minutes (or whatever time division you like).
- Make an outline of the solution. Each main bullet represents the bigger parts of the project. Then break down each bullet a level or two until you understand the work involved more exactly. Then just work down your outline completing bullets one at a time. Be sure to print out the list and check off the bullets (believe it or not, but checking off the bullets is rewarding in itself).
- Don't demand perfection for the project on the first round. Just get something that works now and then polish it over time if you have more time.
- Don't make overly ambitious plans about what you are going to accomplish. Start simple and then add bells-and-whistles later.
- Make backups of your document/code (or use revision control) so that if you decide to experiment and it fails you can get back to your previous point without wasting time redoing work.
- Try to avoid interruptions by other people. When you are deep into a project, any interruption means you'll have to spend 5-10 minutes to get back into your flow.
- Try to do the work now rather than later. If you know you have to finish a project, and that finishing it will be unpleasant, then get it over with now so the burden of the project won't be weighing on you for the next 2 weeks.
- Realize that you are not alone. On nights before projects are due, maybe half my class are in the computer lab furiously trying to finish their project. The other half are probably at home doing the same thing. Many people procrastinate, especially when they work unsupervised. So don't feel bad thinking you are the only screwed up person.
Good luck!My approach is to get up earlier than anyone else gets up - currently this is 4:30am. I am then able to use my prime productivity hours to pursue my own interests. I then work my weekly job from 9:30 to 6:00 or 7:00pm. In the evening, I can never get anything done due to "all the things that are going on". I'm basically worthless by that time anyway. I would also recommend giving up coffee and alchohol. I have tried to use these and other stimulants/depressants as tools and was never successful in the end. Now, I just drink good water. Come to think of it, I don't know anyone that has come out ahead by attempting to override their natural biocycles. I'm sure that there are exceptions. I just haven't seen one.
Fuck it...
Bum out and drive cabs.
You get to do what you want when you want...
It's what I have done, and I love it... Computers sucked out to much of my creativity and life force.
Does it go on forever?
I could never get my schoolwork done either. But I can hold down a job just fine. ... of course it's harder to get a job now than 10 years ago.
If you find out please get it posted here.
Practice.
*rimshot*
[o]_O
...I'm now all but weaned from it; I can take it or leave it, doesn't matter. But when you really need it - for me, it was at 4am during a 24-hour mountain bike race - it's amazing what two consecutive $tarbucks Doubleshots can do to your motivation, metabolism, and energy levels.
Of course, I hadn't slept that night, and the drive home several hours later required a couple of Redbulls.
The pain was excruciating and the scarring is likely permanent, but that just means it's working.
works for me...
Have you been DaMa9eD today?
No caffein, no alcohol, no eating while working, no non doctor ordered drugs, don't skip sleep exersize showering or any class.
Find a study partner.
Pray or meditate daily.
Seriously consider dropping out of college until you are properly motivated.
Visit a homeless shelter to see where all play and no work leads - i.e. provide yourself with some motivational shock therapy.
You're wasting time. Working is entirely a matter of willpower initially. It's hard. Remember that your brain is a like a muscle: if you don't keep it in shape, it won't be in shape. Getting it there will be painful, but once you're there, getting work done will be much easier.
Don't watch television. Don't listen to the radio. Don't read the newspaper, don't read slashdot (I don't during term). Check your email when you get up, at lunch time, and after dinner unless you're expecting an important message. Chew out anyone who calls you during the day. From 9AM to 6PM is work time. Go to your classes when they start, go back to where you study directly afterwards, and keep working. Find the most obscure nook of your university's labyrinthine library (don't they all have those? Aren't they wonderful?) and work hard. Don't like your surroundings? As long as you've got sufficient desk space, you won't notice them if you're actually getting something done. Remember, there's a big line between thinking about doing something and actually doing it. I'm double majoring in physics and math (and pulling a 3.8 because of my...destructive effect on electronics), and teaching Renaissance dance on the side. I don't think about these subjects except when I'm actively doing something like classification of groups. Thinking about them is not productive.
Go to bed. People stopped inviting me to parties because I'm usually asleep by 11. At some points in the year it was 9. When people were loud outside of my room, I came out with a sword and smiled evilly at them until they got the message and cowered back down the hall. Between swimming, working, and SCA stuff one to three nights a week, that was basically all I had time for (but I cooked entirely for myself as well).
Of necessity this requires denying yourself some licentiousness, but you'll find it's like eating potato chips: once you've stopped doing it, you lose the urge and wish for a nice steak instead.
Besides AD(H)D which is (in my opinion) a bit overdiagnosed, there are many things that can seriously limit your motivation to get things done.
Broadly speaking both depression/mania (in different ways) and anxiety may give you this kind of problems. You are definitely not in a dead-serious psychiatric condition (otherwise you wouldn't be posting in Slashdot) but it is quite possible that you are either anxious or depressed (propably not manic, though).
You should bear in mind that mental diseases are reasonably common and a big percentage of the population suffers from them every year. It's a pity that most people do not realize they need treatment until they are in serious trouble.
Seeing a psychiatrist is propably a good idea. You can even have some tests done (if you prefer this sort of thing) like the Rorsach ink-blot test or various IQ tests or use some depression self assessment questionaries. Distraction is a mental health symptom and psychiatrists ARE trained to diagnose its cause.
Another possibility is that you are plain-old lazy and you need some serious self-discipline. Try training yourself in the importance of doing small things absolutely on time (imagine that you are in the army) and keep going even when you feel tired. Exercise is good because it teaches you to force yourself beyond pain and exhaustion.
Last but not least, respect your personality traits and try to make careful choices. Some people just don't take the pressure. This is not bad. Just because our current culture emphasizes working until our bones melt does not mean that this is good for you. If you cannot meet deadlines chose another profession, another field, another lifestyle. As a friend once said to me (I used to study in an ultra-ambitious university) : "You are not in the race track, it's ok to relax".
If you can find someone to work with, this will be a great way to
stay focused and also speeds up the work a lot (even for people who
doesn't have a problem with staying focused).
Try it with different persons and you will also learn their habits
and find out who you work best with.
Good luck!
This week I have a major deadline by Monday morning. At the beginning of the week I thought I would need to do 40 hours. I'm an independent freelancer, so that's 40 hours of *coding*, not 40 hours at work. Bleah.
Monday: 0:30
Tuesday: 5:30
Wednesday (freaked out): 10:30
Thursday: 6:00
Friday (freaked out): 9:45
Saturday: 5:45
So I guess I need to be freaked out to really put the hours in.
The other thing that is helpful is to have a stopwatch. If money is actually attached to the hours you are coding, and you stop the stopwatch when you go hit slashdot, then you earn less money. That's why switching to freelancing was a bit better for my discipline.
But the other thing is that when you are procrastinating and wasting time, make sure to try and do it doing something that feels otherwise productive. About a year and half ago I started blogging, which is a great timewaster. But it also makes me develop opinions, and I found that over time my writing started developing more and more of a theme, usually centered around politics. Now my writing is getting a bit noticed, and I'm thinking more about participating in local politics. The urge to procrastinate can be an awesome clue about what you're really interested in, as long as your procrastination is something that truly expands your outlook on something.
skkkoooonnnggggkkk ptui
Granted, such a simple suggestion is out of vogue, but here we go: exercise your will. In other words, force yourself to concentrate and work on what you're supposed to be working on. Master your passion for distraction. You will find that it gets easier over time, much like most other things.
- Hundreds of thousands of children prescribed the drug Ritalin for hyperactivity might simply be the victims of lax parenting, new evidence suggests. A British scientist has cast doubt on the existence of conditions such as attention deficit disorder (ADD), which will fuel the controversy over the increasing use of Ritalin.
Stumbled across it at the psych watcg blogBut basically you have to push through whatever mental barrier it is that is hanging you up. but you can do this on some some of a baby step basis. so that it gets easier over time.
of course, YMMV
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
For me I found that after I changed my habits in regards to eating and excercise, I can do more in less time. Even the tedious work doesn't feel as much like suffering to me. The plan I followed there was Bill Philips' "Body for Life" book.
Once I found that things were going better I discovered through a friend a Tony Robbins product called "Time of your Life". Some great things in there to help get organized in regards to goals, work product, and other things in life.
Between the two, I've gone up like 75% in my productivity.
Cancel cable. Works great to eliminate one of the major distractions you probably have. I still watch movies aplenty, but those are finite, well-defined beasts that have a clear ending point, at which time I get up and do something else. Anything else. No more frittering away the hours in front of the tube channel-surfing. Just remember, pretty much ANYthing is more productive than sitting on your couch watching TV. It may not be the productive thing you wanted to do, but I guarantee you'll still be better off at the end than if you had watched TV the whole time. Even if it was just to clip your toenails instead. Remember, good hygeine is important too.
A friend of mine in your position dropped out of college, joined the military, got married, then went to college while in ROTC, then the government paid him to get a masters degree while still a USAF Officer.
I was in the exact same boat as you, and I found that the only thing that actually got me to sit my butt down and study and get something done was to study with some friends. If you don't have any friends in your classes, now's the time to make some! :)
Work?...Work?...I don't do no stinking work!
A lot of people have already commented on the benefits of exercise and better ways to approach what seems to be an impossible task. I'll try move on and discuss a short bit on proper eating, how it impacts exercise, and vitamins. 1) Stay away from eating junk food and easy snacks. Treat your body right. In 1st and 2nd year, I was so depressed I was kicked out of University after my first year of engineering because I couldn't get myself to study. There were too many distractions, and every time I tried to focus, I just wanted to do something, anything else. In addition to this mental desire, I had this physical feeling; an autonomic nervous system 'fight or flight' response that made me just uncomfortable trying to sit still. I dealt with this using exercise and proper nutrition. Knowing how to control and deal with my body helped me eliminate this issue. If you've never ever experienced the after-workout effect of endorphins, let me tell you, studying during this period is incredibly easy. Today, I'm healthy, fit, have a CS degree, and getting a salary. 2) Don't take vitamins for granted. Although I've been reading that new studies (can't remember the reference, sorry - do a google search) indicate that regular multi-vitamins may actually be slightly BAD for your health, what I'm about to suggest is a simple B vitamin complex. For people with depression or anxiety issues, this is a god-send. Read articles/books on this vitamins, this stuff *matters*. If you don't want to do any work, just grab a stress-relief vitamin. They're pretty costly, but they're primarily just a composite of b-complex and E + misc. I sincerely hope that the above two are helpful in some way. University is meant to be challenging, so thoughts about having ADD is not unusual... Most of my friends thought they had it too.
If at all possible, make yourself a second local login account on your computer. Set it up so that the second "work" name has access only to a few things: your office suite, your basic information needs, under no circustances IM or chat or music, and your internet browser with absolutely no favorite places or bookmarks listed. If you can motivate yourself enough to make and use this second screen name when necessary, I'd like to believe that you won't end up surfing away your day.
It should hopefully keep you focused on the computer end. But nothing stops you from being pulled away by others or by other things but yourself.
The answer is simple, though you wont like it. What is it?
... I don't wanna hurt your feelings or anything, but it is really this simple.
JUST DO YOUR FUCKING WORK. MAKE A LIST AND DO IT. NOW.
Hope that doesn't sound too harsh
It is a matter of controling your mind instead of the other way around. Strange thing is, when you follow this advice you will feel _much_ better and have less anxiety worrying about everything you have to do.
#6495ED - cornflower blue
I have the same problem with concentration and productivity. I have a telecommuting job, so being online is critical. However, I find the following routine helpful: First, decide what needs to be done today. Second, unplug your ethernet cable. Third, don't re-connect the cable until the work is done, or if there is a specific work-related reason to re-connect it. Another tip: Only read Slashdot once per day.
This system has several advantages. First, I'm never faced with an insurmountable task. When I began, my house was very cluttered, and it was hard to get excited about cleaning it. But it's not so hard to think "I'll just clean the living room for 30 minutes and I'll be done and on to something else". Second, for thinking tasks (like coding), the fixed time means I don't stop "between thoughts" on a project. When the time is up for a task, I stop right where I am, even in mid-sentence or mid-expression. The anticipation this creates keeps each task fresh in my mind, so I can pick up at full speed the next time I begin that task.
Back when I was in college I could never study in my dorm room - too many distractions. My solution: Go onto campus at night and study in one of the large lecture halls. It's quiet, there's plenty of board space for working problems, minimal distractions, and IMHO, the classroom atmosphere was more conducive to learning; especially when I told myself I wasn't going to go back to the dorm until the studying was done.
if you post this kind of lame simple question on the front page, what the hell happens to all my ask slashdot suggestions??? I have had some really good RELIVANT submissions before that have just got shot down. One was asking about small lcds for mobile computers and projects, another was about the projects I could make out of the parts of an old car. I think those are way closer to something people would care about than this guy who doesn't have the self control to sit down and do his work.
If I think of something else that needs doing I write it down, I don't start doing it disrupting the current task
Get a tiny voice recorder. Not the 60+ minute digital dictation things, just a little one that captures 30-90 seconds of voice. I bought my first one of this VoiceIt model for $40 7 years ago and it changed my life. I never EVER forget anything now (which has it's own problems :) because I can just dictate it into the voice thingy and transcribe it into the PDA/whatever later. If you rely on scribbling it down, you'll often fail right from the start because A) you'll forget before you get a slip of paper and pen, or B) writing isn't an option -- like when you're in traffic, mowing the lawn, etc.
It's critical that it be small enough (credit card sized) that you just carry it in your pocket everywhere, not just when you think you might have some bright ideas ...
Cell phones these days often come with a voice memo function, but that solution is often lacking due to A) size of cell phone and B) they won't store more than 5 discrete memos. I frequently have 10 piled up in my VoiceIt before I have a chance to sit down and transcribe into my PDA.
Remember you can read your email just once or twice a day. Ditto web news sites/slashdot
One way to effect this is to turn OFF automatic retreival of your email from your mail server. When you're ready to spend 15 minutes on reading and replying to emails, hit the "fetch" button. Auto-retrieval just breaks your concentration every five minutes.
And, finally, cable TV is evil. Cancel it.
One simple rule for its versus it's
I do this on a much longer timescale. I really want to purchase and install a solar electric (photovoltaic) array on my roof and start helping other people do the same. My wife really wants us to get the bathroom renovation project executed. So I've decided only get to do the PV array after the bathroom is done. Consequently, I'm busting ass on the bathroom project :)
One simple rule for its versus it's
You may want to read a book called "Flow - The Psychology of Optimal Experience" by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
It covers the topic of getting deep into your work very well.
Basically he says "Flow" it is a state that you enter where you can focus, you get a lot done and you do not notice time going by.
It explains why some people are on the order of 10X more productive than others (i.e. they naturally achieve "Flow" easily).
Probably every techie has been in this state sometime during their education.
What you may be suffering from is that subconsciously you know you're not really "into" it (in "Flow") so you just look for the closest interesting thing (the net) where you can "Flow". This is a different passive kind of "Flow" as time does indeed seem to fly by quickly but other challenges your mind needs are absent. He talks about why this kind of "Flow" is ultimately unrewarding as it does not efficiently "add" much to what you are (similar to TV - you don't move closer to your own goals and you're not adding to your abilities).
In your case the close deadline overrides in your mind the fact that you're not really into what you're doing and you force yourself into it. This is also not as good a "Flow" as your brain may be at odds with itself feeling forced to do something (even if it was through your own inaction that you're in this negative position).
The book does have some cookbook steps on how to achieve "Flow" at work (make it a game, set rules, create clear doable goals...) but reading the whole book is what is helpful - all of the supporting information gives you a much better shot at being successful following the steps.
I have the same problem as the original poster, and about the only thing I found that helps when I really need to concentrate is music - it provides just enough distraction in the background that I find I can concentrate on my work much better - weird, but it works for me.
a prescription for Strattera would help.
I got a fine fine woman (Hi Kirsten!), and when I get my work done, it's time to get "some work" done with her, if you know what I mean. Whether it be man or woman, get yourself someone and get busy! There's no better motivation that that. :)
I'm currently involved with an NIH-funded research project to build an ADD/ADHD diagnostic device. Comparing baseline EEGs of people classified as ADD/ADHD and those of people classified as "normal," there is most definitely a physiological abnormality present. The ratio of low-frequency (Theta, 4-8 Hz) to high-frequency (Alpha, 9-12 and Beta, 13-20) activity is markedly higher in ADD/ADHD individuals than in normal people.
There are various neurofeedback (self-regulation of neural activity based on real-time signals) available, but one has to be selective regarding them. It has been my experience that the devices that don't require active participation (so-called "dream machines") aren't of much use. Those that require active participation by the patient, however, have proven results in training people to manipulate active brain states. For more information, I'd suggest going to a local university library and thumbing through the Journal of Clinical Psychology as a good starting point.
Have you never heard of the saying "The less time I have, the more work I get done." It's so very true... You've just got to get motivated :/
Amen, brother.
Back when I was a single guy with my parents paying for everything, it was about all I could do to turn in enough work to keep going reasonably well in school. Friends, Harpoon 1, Tetris, doing layout on the school paper, email, obsessing on girls, and straight up writers block often left me rather paralyzed. For stuff I was excited about, I could do good work. Otherwise, it was mostly late and lousy.
Fortunately, I went to a school (Hampshire College) which was very project based, with written evaluations and no tests. So for those four years, I really had to shape up. No coasting through on multiple choice skills, I had to WRITE. And the written evaluations were profoundly more effective than a grade. I remember Eqbal Amahd's "Waggoner shows insight, occasional brilliance, and a certain sloth" better than I ever would have a "C+"
Skip forward a decade or so, and now I'm a father of a 16 month old and a 3.5 year old, and work out of the home doing freelance writing and consulting. In many ways, this should be a nightmare of distractions, but I'm actually more productive than ever before. In the last two years, I've done a lot of consulting for companies like Microsoft, Adobe, Sorenson Media, Getty Images, The Associated Press, The Criterion Collection.
Some tips:
Don't be paralyzed during the first draft. If you're writing, it doesn't have to be perfect the first draft. Just WRITE for a while, and let it take the shape it's going to have. It's much better to write a first draft that you have to throw out entirely than to sit there without writing anything.
Don't sign on to projects you're not excited about. One reason I do well on the consulting and services side is that I only sign on for projects I'm really enthused about. I get pretty enthusiastic, as anyone who has seen any of my presentations knows. But stuff that bores me, bores me, and won't get my best attention. I never offer to do boring stuff for money (one of the better parts of being freelance).
Quit when you're too tired to work well. This was a hard-earned lesson when my daughter was born before my book was done. I spent hours trying to get stuff done, but too tired to work well, when I should have been asleep so I could work well the next day. All nighters rapidly become self defeating.
Cash the advance check. If it's important you get something done, don't leave a way to back out of it. Make completing it your only option. The specter of hideous failure is a great stimulant.
Do what floats your boat at the moment. Turn having multiple commitments into a strength instead of a weakness. When you get bored on your current task or project, switch to something else you aren't stuck on. It's all about finding SOMETHING you can make forward progress on at any given time.
Use, don't abuse deadlines. I pride myself on hitting all my deadlines. But I rarely have stuff done much before the deadlines. The key is having a good idea how long things take, appropriately padded for worst cases. Always leave enough time to do the job well.
Turn off the email. I get a lot of my best work done on the first class cabin on Alaska Airlines 737's. Why? No email, no wife, no kids. Just me, the headphones, and a PowerBook. The email is probably the biggest part. It's really hard for me to not check it when I get that beep, and it definitely throws off my thinking. So I quit Entourage when I'm working well. This goes for Slashdot too.
Need to do it. In school, it's hard to escape the fact that what you do doesn't really matter all that much. It's not like the teacher's job depends on you figuring out some new insights. So, find a question you feel you need to answer. This is easier in the real world. Mortgages and bills have a profound way of focusing your attention!
My video compression blog
It really works wonders. You have to isolate yourself from things. Say your trying to get yourself to eat good food. Well, you want to make good decisions easy and bad decisions inconvienent. So get that junk food stuff out of sight, throw it away or give it someone. Same with getting work done. Find a room and only put necessary items within grasp and distractions out of reach. You'll find your productivity increase. You have the ability, you just have to be in the right environment. Remember you have to control your ears and eyes or else someone else will.
Huh?
Self control/Self Motivation is the first step. Realizing that it has to be done, one way or the other, either at my convenience or not. Having said that this is not an easy thing to master, it has taken me nearly 17 years of schooling to get it right and even then, if its something that I particularly despise I still end up pulling an all nighter to have it finished hours before the dead line.
:).
A few pointers:
* Remove distractions: If you find you can't get anything done at home go somewhere were distractions are less abound (trust me, there is only so many hours you can spend in the library staring into space before you realize your folly
* Plan ahead: A few tricks, set the due date 2 days before for small projects/assignments and a week before for big projects/assignments before the actual due day, have this in your mind as the actual date is has to be done (not as a ¥I¦ll start it tomorrow, its not like its actually due today¦), this helps in the event of the unforeseen.
Plan your life in general, if you know that you can go and do something if you finish your project/assignment before a certain date/time it can be quite the motivator.
* Social life: Well what can be said, there is a reason geeks get good marks f. All I can really say on this one is that my social life has always been inversely proportional to my marks. To master this one is really tough, it can be done but it is a tricky road. Having friends who value the need to get work done, and do it well helps. Go out and party when your studies/work commitments are low and lap it up while you can (post exam time/holidays).
* Rest/Best time: Realize that you are not a machine and you do need rest, don¦t expect that you will be at your best at the end of a hard day before you have had anything to eat. Identify times that would be most ideal for study, be realistic!, It is one thing to spend hours forcing it an getting nothing much done, its another just to not try because you don¦t feel like it.
I know this is all quite obvious but what it really comes down to is self control and realizing that you¦re the one who determines how you spend your time.
And if you still find you waste the evening to end up doing the work after midnight, maybe you should just embrace it, go out, party, have fun, be back by midnight and start working then, plan that time into your life. Having said that don¦t use it as an excuse not get anything done either.
My best time is from midnight to 4am, I realize this and factor it when planning things, I can be a curse or a gift, you decide.
GPLv2: I want my rights, I want my phone call! DRM: What use is a phone call, if you are unable to speak?
I just stay at uni after my classes until all my work is done. There's not much in the way of books or music or games to distract me in the lab, tho' if the internet is distracting you, you may want to disable your web browser / telnet etc somehow.
Vino, gyno, and techno -Bruce Sterling
and give yourself a suitable daily ration, I set up 15 views. Then when the adverts start appearing you know it's time to get on with what you're supposed to be doing -- like filtering porn spam out of your e-mail, now that's a never ending task so you actually never have to do what you are supposed to be doing. Wonderful isn't it? :-)
I suffer from very similar problems. I have not found a solution, but I have found some things that may help. Some of them are worth sharing.
Anyway, good luck with the whole thing.
I had a similar problem. Coding lifestyle combined with lack of excercise.
:)
So we built a huge koi pond / japanese garden.
It requires a pretty regular amount of moderate excercise which you get to see the results of.
The physical activity makes you more physically tired so that when you feel like sitting down in front of the P.C.... you kick butt!
Otherwise you'll be outside landscaping and feeding three-foot Japanese Koi fish!
It helps... Amazing, but true.... Worked for me!
Sounds like a lack of real consequences. When it comes down to "get it done or get fired" or something similar you'll see the real picture. School and its workload and timelines have nothing on the working world!
And then when you think you're at your best, have a kid or two. You learn to make every ten minute session at the keyboard mean business.
- Sig this!
As odd as it may sound, my experimentation with psychedelic substances has put many things in my life into a new perspective which has resulted in much less procrastination on my part. YMMV, but some magic mushrooms, LSD, or MDMA might help you to light a fire under your proverbial ass :).
I find working in public in a Cafe is great: few real distractions, no net access (leave the WiFi card at home), and an endless supply of coffee.
The next time you're confronted with a difficult term paper or project and you find yourself starting to procrastinate, try this: try to finish the project as quickly as humanly possible. In fact, set an impossible deadline and try to meet it.
For example, say you have to write a fifteen page term paper. You've put it off for weeks and now you've been sitting in front of your computer for hours and haven't made any progress. Try to finish the paper in ONE HOUR. What this will do is force you to focus on exactly what you need to do to complete the paper. If you're blocked on something, for example, what subject to choose for the paper or a particular thesis, this approach will force you to make a decision, any decision, and move forward. Basically what you do is move the sense of focus and urgency that you usually feel at 5AM the morning of a deadline, earlier to a more comfortable period of the project.
Another thing this technique will help you with is learning what methods REALLY make you most productive. For example, the standard advice for writing a paper is to always finish an outline first. Well this doesn't work for me. I like to write a lot about a subject, paragraphs and paragraphs, until I understand it and a thesis and outline emerges.
What's interesting is that not only individuals, but organzations, groups, and companies can procrastinate or get stuck in the planning stages of a project and never finish. See "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" and "Extreme Programming" for more on this.
Seriously, the internet is the new time waster. Better than TV, it is too easy to surf oneself into oblivion. Check your email from somewhere other than your workplace. Do you really need to check slashdot once every 2 hours?
I like a cup of tea or two during the day to get and keep me going, but as you say, it doesn't substitute for sleep. I have to be careful to have my last cup by 4pm or so if I'm going to go to sleep by 11pm, or else I'm up late not getting anything done, and am that much more tired, and hence more in need of tea, the next day.
My video compression blog
Been there, had these issues in college.
What got me through:
1) make a distraction-proof workspace:
NOTHING but your work materials on your physical and virtual desktops; everything else at least in neat folders or binders, and preferably shelved behind you out of sight.
2) GET A DOOR THAT LOCKS YOU IN. Some doors, when locked, can still be opened from the inside. just by turning the knob. Get a door that you have to "unlock" before you can leave. When you're trying to concentrate, lock the door. The first week, you'll be surprised how many times you "wake up" about to stroll out of the door to do something else.
3) Strong Routine
States of mind can be conditioned; if you ritualize "starting work" you can eventually use the ritual to create the state of mind for good concentration.
4) Strong Routine, part II: don't get into the thing where when you're "at work" you're thinking about laundry and when you're "at home" you're thinking about work. That's a dodge, don't let your mind get away with it. Pick work time and home time, and stop mixing them.
Good luck. This sucks, it's frustrating, and the "dude, you just need discipline" folks just don't get it and never well.
As for reading, I'd recommend "Out of the Fog" over "Driven To Distraction".
As a final warning, this gets WAY harder when you get older, have kids, and can't do huge unproductive hours to get the few productive ones.
Yeah, and smoking isn't addictive. How far did we have to push the tobacco companies to admit that?
How do you explain that?
Pretty easily. 80% of so-called double-blind studies are transparent: the patients can tell whether they are on the drug or the placebo. This more than accounts for the 5-10% that any of these drugs outperforms the placebo.
I guess schizophrenia is just a matter of self discipline as well?
Your statement apparently demonstrates your ignorance. You know nothing about schizophrenia, and assume that no-one else does - just for the sake of an argument.
Schizophrenia has never been scientifically linked to a chemical imbalance. If you want to get the inside story from somebody who actually successfully treats schizophrenia start reading here.
Dave (clinical psychotherapist), http://www.deep-trance.com
In 1994 I came back to Uni as a part-time student, after seven years as a junior public servant. Much to my surprise, I handed pretty much everything in on time. In first year I got almost straight High Distinctions without really raising a sweat! I did well enough in my degree course that I'm now planning to begin a PhD in 2004.
So what happened in the meantime? I guess the main difference is that, after spending seven years in a job I couldn't give a stuff about, I lost the mental habit of tying my self-esteem so closely to the quality of my work. At Uni I had been so afraid of not excelling that I couldn't bear to start, especially because, for the first time, I was now finding the work difficult. I suspect that many Slashdotters will have had similar experiences, being almost completely unchallenged by their lowest-common-denominator secondary education and then hitting a brick wall in their tertiary study.
I was a fat, plain chick with buck teeth and glasses the first time round, but I'd always done well at school. I felt I had nothing else to hang my self-esteem on. The second time around I still looked about the same, but I'd gotten over the high-school programming that told me that I was primarily to be valued by my appearance (and, furthermore, that it was sensible to judge my own appearance on the basis of what some know-nothing moccie-wearing outer-suburban yobboes said about it!)
I guess the take-home lesson is that sometimes your psychological need for success is so strong that it stops you succeeding. If this happens to you, it can help to find something other than academic perfection to tie your self-esteem to -- perhaps sport or fitness, or a good relationship. (Seven years in the Public Service is also an option, but not one I recommend.)
It is a woman's prerogative to change other people's minds.
Wow, well first it's relief to know there are others that have very similar study problems as myself.
/.
My study habits have in recent years devolved into your situation. Let me tell you how I used to do well in school and studying.
Thanks to the constant pressuring of my Dad when I was young I developed an impulsive studying habit. Simply, I didn't feel comfortable with myself until I was satisfactorily done with all my homework. I was not terribly uncomfortable or stressed prior to homework. Rather, it would just be on my mind. And I would feel very guilty if I was goofing off and there was homework to be done. And when I finally was done with a cycle of homework I would feel vindicated and free (until the next cycle of homework).
Now this might sound bad but it worked. And compare it to myself now. I have let this habit slip and have been suffering poorer grades and much greater worries about school and my job future. The average worry/stress level due to homework in my current lazy state is much higher than my past worry/stress level (when I was always slightly worried about homework, unless I had finished it). Back then I was not constantly worried about job future or my school future because I knew I was getting good grades.
Or to put as my DAD (who got great grades) says "You CAN pay now or you WILL pay later".
Sorry to here you and so many others that have responded are in similar situations.
My other tip: Study in a place far from all the toys you have at home! Library, quiet coffee shop, just some place where fun stuff is out of reach. Saying that, I'm going to get off
I believe the same thing about weigh gain, some folks just process suger differently and some people over eat for emotional reasons, but it doesnt mean _all_ overweight people are that way for any single reason.
barring severe physical disorder that would manifest itself in many things more than just being fat, people are overweight because they ingest more energy than they expend.. it is as simple as that.. the minute differences between each person's ability to process sugars are so far out of the picture it's laughable.. whether it be bad habits, emotional problems, or just fucking boredom.. you are overweight because you consume more than you use.. everything else is a copout that you can file under emotional problem
1. Remove yourself from your recreation space.
This is a simple one. All you do is: Don't play where you work and don't work where you play. If you can't do this, because you only can use the PC in your room to do work, or the like, then do something like go buy blue sunglasses (i'm serious here) and wear them whenever you're studying/working. Do not do "fun" things when in your work glasses. Do not answer the phone (buy an answering machine, and call them back if important). Ask your friends who come talk to you while wearing the glasses to leave you alone until your scheduled break. Put on big earphones that block out a bunch of noise, and don't use them otherwise. Put on music that requires no interaction (I like vocalless techno, or classical from digitallyimported.com 's webstreams). If music is distracting, leave the headphones on with no music.
2. Determine your plan of attack before setting out to work
Whatever task I am to do that I need to do I do the following: Set up a list of small, achievable subgoals. Then I do these or determine that I can't do them. If I can't do them, I try to determine if they are necessary, and if so, what further resources would make them possible to accomplish. At work, this means I use bug tracking software to divide the software changes that I need to make into little acheiveable subtask's called "Engineering Change Requests". They have what currently happens, what needs to happen, and a method for determining the change has been made. These have the added benefit of emailing my supervisor (who is also my primary QA) and showing that I am getting things done. When I want to learn something from classnotes or a book, a divide all the things I want to learn in an outline, and either learn how each point works, then I determine if I have the points by making up a test for it.
3. Map out what time you wish to take on your task in the next week or two.
Record the times that you will do your task in a notebook, scheduler, or calendar. If you use none of these devices, put your devised work schedule on a peice of paper in plain view in your recreation space so you have to see it all the time. This should be done either, immeadiately upon the reciept of a task, or B at a set time or two every day or week. Do not work outside of these times, but do not allow anything to invade these times.
4. Build dicipline with the aid of your friends and computer.
Using both friends and your computer to help you become more diciplined does work. I have two hosts file (the file on your computer that it checks to determine a website's IP address). One version in a "get work done" version. The other is a "Normal/Recreation" file. The get work done hosts file blocks slashdot, cnn, kuro5hin, plastic and google groups (I am an avid reader of rec.gambling.poker). You "block" a site by redirecting the domain to the localhost with a line like
. On the friends side of this, I will ask my girlfriend, co-workers, or other friends to check back with me about something I want to be sure I do. If you feel like your imposing, make bargins like: If you ask me on Tuesday afternoon "Have you studied all the topics you planned to for Calc III?" I will buy your soda for the week. Remember, you don't want them to become your mom. You're actually trying to not have to ask them to do it anymore, and you should view it as shameful when they do and you haven't done the task yet.
5.Use your ability to pull all nighter
Want to see every step I took to start my company? http://www.rowdylabs.com/blogs/pitchtothegods
"It's not that I'm lazy. It's that I just don't care." -- Peter Gibbons
Nerd: Derogatory term typically directed at anybody with a lower Slashdot ID than you.
Every day, make a checklist of items that need doing. The ideal task granularity is about 1-2 hours. Check off the items you get done; at the end of the day, roll over all the unchecked items onto tomorrow's list (unless those tasks have become irrelevant).
It's not usually realistic to clear the list every day, but it's important that you carry over the unfinished items - if you slack a day, your list will be big and scary the next day, which might help you focus. I keep the list on a notepad on my desk - I'm talking paper and pencil here. A friend who uses a similar technique occasionally drops in the task item "cross this item off" just to help the sense of accomplishment; it's okay to throw in a few easy ones.
Start the day with a couple of cups of coffee, then switch to something without caffeine - herbal tea or something if you like the hot liquid aspect, decaf coffee if necessary. Don't keep up the caffeine all day long.
It is a choice you have to make. Write that essay or check out that pr0n?
Seriously, though. What I do to help stay focussed is put on loud music, drink some caffinated drink (or maybe ginzing + guranna) if I'm sleepy, and use the Internet for research only. I use MozillaFirebird, so I can always bookmark an interesting link or open it in a backgrounded tab/window.
If things get really bad, there are ways of dealing with it. You drink lots more caffine, play speed-metal with unintelligable lyrics (so they don't distract you). You unplug your ethernet cable from the wall, give it to a friend, and tell them not to give it back until your project is done.
Then there's meditation. I'm still being serious. There's a kind of meditation (Transcendental Meditation, look at http://www.learntm.com/) that helps me keep my mind clear and has been my coffee substitute for at least several months now. But whether you believe in that (and its scientific studies) or not, there has to be something that works (lots of things at http://www.thinkgeek.com/caffeine/ might help)
The bottom line is, whatever it takes. You say you can't focus. Have you ever focussed before? What were you doing then that worked? It doesn't matter who you piss off or appear really damn strange to, doing a day's worth of work vs. doing an hour's worth of work should be worth it.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Probably a waste of my time posting this -- I'll be amazed if you read this far ;)
There are hundreds of ways to procrastinate and hundreds of reasons for doing so.
I'm going to give you the basics of motivation though.
We avoid feeling bad and we chase feeling good.
When you think about studying, you feel bad. When you think about doing something else you feel good.
Make sense?
So you have to condition yourself to feel good about studying. Try this:
Buy some REALLY NICE chocolates (or other momentary treats). Promise yourself one for simply sitting down. Another one for deciding what to study. Another one for preparing your books etc. Another one each for reading/writing a paragraph, then a page etc.
Each time you eat the chocolate, think about the benefits of having qualifications eg a cushy job for life vs working at McDonalds.
If that doesn't work, go and see an NLP-trained hypnotherapist who will refund your money if they don't help you.
i had the same problem at uni , i figured it out during my last year. :) Just do little bits at a time , i garrantee you produce better results....
wrt assignments , i found the sooner i started them the better the result , so on the same day as i got the assignment , i would start , knowing that i am only going to do 1/2 - 1 hour work on it. Then do 1/2 - 1 hour the next day , and so on. 1/2 - 1 hour isnt a long time so you dopnt procrastinate , and it gets you into the assignments groove (for lack of a better word). Befor i was doing all nighters , and procrastiniting till 11 pm!!! when the assignment was due the next day
(garrantee will not be honored)
It seems evident that unproductivity can be a very complex problem, with multiple underlying causes which may operate in parallel (i.e. a person dominated by "inner greed" may also have chronically low blood sugar, which in turn may be due to genetic predisposition or diet; or a person with ADD may also be depressed). Bad work habits, poor posture, and unreasonable demands placed on a person of limited intellect and physique (as we all are) are among other factors not discussed in depth in this fascinating thread. It seems that there could be an entire multidisciplinary medical degree offered in this field; a degree, of course, which few sufferers of this disorder, syndrome or whatever it is could be expected to obtain (although looking at the practical skills of several doctors of my acquaintance gives a glimmer of hope. BTW, AFAIK IANAD.) In hopes of adding a shred of content to this aimless rant, let me just say that there does seem to be a positive correlation with age and Chronically Unproductive Syndrome, i.e. persons of ages 13-25 seem to be more likely to be sufferers than those outside of that age range. Perhaps this is related to the concept of discipline, or rather lack thereof, as one component of CUS. Let me advance a trial definition of this concept: something which can be developed over time, through a combination of logical analysis, trial and error, and hard work, which results in one's being able to attain one's goals in spite of adverse circumstances. Not an easy thing to obtain, and rarely obtained without help. But one of incalculable value.
This is not a self-referential sig.
I'd recommend getting a copy of Mel Levine's "The Myth of Laziness" and/or "A Mind at a Time" and reading them for suggestions.
;). It looks at neurodevelopmental profiles in terms of attention control, memory, language, spatial and sequential ordering, motor systems, higher thinking systems, and social thinking systems. Each of these systems has several subsystems. For example, memory has short term memory (how many numbers can I remember), active working memory (how deep is my task stack), and long term memory (how much C++ or Perl syntax can I remember). Everyone has their own strengths and weaknesses in all these areas. It's not unusual to find a person performing well overall who has a few specific stumbling blocks. The important thing is to identify which areas are weak and work on those areas instead of saying things like "if only he'd apply himself".
"The Myth of Laziness" is specifically about "output failure", the situation where someone learns much better than they produce. It analyzes 8 different contributors to output failure: language dysfunction, impoverished ideation, ineffective motor output, insufficient memory, weak production control, insatiability and/or social distractibility, low mental energy, and disorganization. Everyone has a different profile in these areas. It's important to identify the bottlenecks for a given individual and work out coping strategies that deal with the specific problem.
"A Mind at a Time" is more oriented towards K-12 education (although a lot of it applies to the adults I work with
My wife introduced me to these books. She works in special ed at a junior high school. When she was reading them, the cases from the books kept bringing back specific kids and situations from the previous school year. I work at an engineering company, and the descriptions of attention and social disorders ring a lot of bells. We're all dealt a mixed hand. The key is to recognize and exploit our strengths and to find ways to cope with our weaknesses.
Good luck
advice. If I were you I would make a room in your house or apartment that doesn't have anything in it. Just bare walls and floor. Go in there for as long as you can stand. Maybe just five minutes at first. Gradually increase the time you stay inside. My idea is that you are overstimulated. When you go into this room you are essentially depriving yourself of stimulation. This lets your mind kind of catch up with all the crap you have been taking in. Then maybe consider getting rid of things that are distracting. Don't listen to the radio while you drive, don't have it on while you eat. Don't listen to music all the time if you do now. Don't have the TV on while you do things. If you have a lot of clutter in your home, get rid of it or stow it away. Simplify things. Don't read junky stuff like magazines or newspapers. If you get rid of enough distractions it will become easy for you to do what you have to do.
Get yourself a little timer. Set it for fifteen minutes and
discipline yourself to work the entire fifteen minutes. You
can take a short break then, but after a few moments you have
to make yourself set the timer and work again. If your short
breaks get to be too long, time them too.
Trying to work hour after hour on something that doesn't really
capture your mind is very hard work. It can be done, but it
requires a great deal of mental discipline. Most people won't
do it. But if you can get five fifteen-minute sessions every
two hours, that will add up to something. Most people can make
themselves work for fifteen minutes at a time on something if
they have a motivation to accomplish it, even if it isn't fun.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Sometimes the truth hurts.
This question is kinda like asking how you can reduce your weight and get a model figure, but without cutting out the cream cakes and sodas or taking up regular exercise. It cannot be done. You must simply decide that you want the fitness and physique more than the sodas and sloth, and do something about it.
Same here. You can try all sorts of remedies for it, medicinal, psychological or whatever, but at the end of the day, what's needed is a change of mindset, of philosophy. And there is only one person in the world who can make that change, and nothing in the world that can help him. You can do things to help, to make it a bit easier, but you have to make the big effort or those other things are just a waste of time.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Hmmm can't see while I am typing so forgive any spelling errors. I think that using false controls like stopping the TV or moving the games to a different login and stuff are just ways of skirting the problem. While excercise is definitely good paticularly in setting up a routine the bottom line is you have to learn to discipline yourslef to do what you want when you decide to do it. You said that pressure from a deadline will allow you to get it down with a 5am night - you just have to learn to take that emotioanl pressure and apply it at will.
Canuck, I've been in a similar situation to you.
I think the causes are two-fold. Firstly your mind probably isn't functioning as well as it could be. Try reading, meditation, yoga - something to refresh your mind and perhaps bring some inspiration or motivation back into your work. Second, think about your work and what originally motivated you to start it in the first place. Presumably you came up with the idea or design for the game in the first place, so there must have been something personally driving you there. Recapture that mindset and, like some other posters have said, make some initial small steps toward improving the project.
In the UK, there are typically four grades you can get when passing an undergraduate honours degree (i.e., a typical university degree). In decreasing order of merit:
The gaps in standard between first and 2.1 and between 2.2 and third are the widest, and the better universities go to some lengths to look at borderline cases and put them the right side of the line.
I don't know how useful a comparison that will be for those of you Stateside who think in terms of GPAs, so by another measure: generally speaking, "serious" employers will look for a 2.1 or above from a good university (perhaps top 10 or top 20 in a relevant subject).
"Elite" employers -- the big banks, management consultancy types, law firms, etc. -- will look for a first, often from one of a small number of very top universities. Then again, that's as much because of the kind of person who tends to get a first as the level of skill or knowledge they have. They're looking for high-flyers.
If you're going on to do a higher degree (masters, PhD, etc.) then you'll be wanting a first, or maybe a good 2.1, depending on subject. In some industries, IT-related ones for example, you'd be mad to do this as a career move, because the extra years of experience in industry are worth much more; you study more because you enjoy the subject and want to research, not to progress your career. In other industries, chemistry for one, anyone serious about their subject has a PhD before they go into industry. The latter subjects tend to be the ones with more industry funding, a higher proportion of people going on to higher degrees, and lower requirements for entry into such studies.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
I especially agree with what you said about turning down other activities. My friends are always doin this or that, but I always say 'no thanks, i'm swamped.' But most of the time I just sit there watching tv or surfing the net. I don't even play time-intensive video games, though, despite the fact that I would love to. Instead, I just widdle the time away slowly. It's like my conscience allows it if the activity doesn't require a large committment, even if it means I waste even more time with it.
My only advice is to, at the very least, try not to turn down fun things to do when presented with opportunities. if you anticipate not doing the work anyway, you should at least enjoy yourself. that may be more realistic than just saying "don't procrastinate."
For years I struggled to stay focused in college, but I could hardly ever stay on task with what I was supposed to do. I figured I was just lazy, despite the fact that I hardly ever went to bed until 3AM, and in that time I had coded two websites and started on a 4D Tic Tac Toe implementation on a calculator. I only ever got papers right, and I didn't realize why.
Recently, I realized that the reason I could write papers so effectively was because I would have to go to a lab to write them (I lacked a printer). In the cold, sterile, uninteresting environment of a laboratory, a lot of work could get done. You could still surf the web, which was a problem, but you couldn't start coding anything, you couldn't read anything you didn't bring, you couldn't nap, you couldn't get around to building that Gundum model, etc.
You really need a proper mindset to study, and you need a location to get that mindset. I find it further helps to plan on sleeping in the lab, to prevent any sense of external distractions, such as a warm bed, from creeping into your thoughts. And after sleeping for three hours on a hard wooden window sill, you are usually ready to get serious about what you have to do to get somewhere else.
Hope this helps!
-c
The ______ Agenda
Just a note to everyone who posted. This was easily the best, most adult thread I've read on Slashdot. Canuck is very lucky to have a group like you advising him. I even learned a few things. This is why I read /. - Thank-you for this.
My (first) senior year as an undergraduate double BS major (computer science and technical communication) saw me wasting more time than ever before instead of finishing that damn Pascal compiler for CS423 (Compiler Construction).
I was inspired by two things: (1) the health-related pamphlet from the university's nurse's office about how important sleep was, and (2) a friend from the (then) Hong Kong who seemed to be wide awake at 3am while I was conking out.
I ended up shifting my schedule to avoid most social interaction outside of class. Yes, this will make you a generally unavailable outcast. You might be lucky enough (as I was) to be fairly friendly with a large number of people; your subsequent abscnece will make you more so.
The trick: Go to be around 5pm. Wake around 1am.
It's pretty easy to start; just stay up late one night. Go to bed when finally exhausted. Wake up at your usual time, then you'll be tired early in the evening. Set your alarm for 1am, and go to sleep. Around 1am, you'll feel a bit groggy, but by day number 2, you're already on the schedule.
It's absolutely amazing how much you can get done when there's no one else to talk to. Really. I'd talk to my partner in the compiler project on where he'd left off, and he'd wander off to sleep. Then I'd take over and code up a thousand brilliant, wide-awake LOC. By the end of the semester, our compiler passed every test case the professor threw at it.
I kept with this "anti-social" schedule through the remaining three semesters of my senior year and got my two BS degrees (not a double major) with highest honors. It works.
You want to get stuff done? Drop the social life, shift your schedule, and work your butt off from 1am on.
Advice: Don't conceptualize tasks, define them. Simple well thought out tasks it's whats all about!! Example: Monday morning CS340 class. The teacher gives an assignment due in 2 weeks to write a task scheduler using some known symentric multiprocessor algorithm. Teacher provides input data and samples of output data. What do you do? What do, you, do? Don't say: By Monday I should have 50 % done. Say: Tuesday: Program that captures input data completed and running. Careful read-over of assignment browse subject, think about it. Wednesday. Design and define all function and data types AKA skeleton. Thursday. Code functions and data types.ALL Friday. Friday: Run functions use own dummy data. Get the drift? It's all about ORGANIZATION. GOLDEN RULE: Once you are done with your task for the day: STOP STOP STOP. If you follow this rule you are less likeley to make mistakes. Good luck! Cabazorro.
- these are not the droids you are looking for -
This is why they deny life insurance for anyone on any anti-depressant drug for ANY REASON. If you don't believe me try this: Drop your insurance, get Prozac prescribed for a side effect (not depression), attempt to get insurance.
Then you'll see. Do you think the insurance companies actually give a shit about people?
Granted ADD is likely over-diagnosed, most of the books on ADD address that.
But maybe this book would help convince you. Basically, with the right hardware you can SEE pictures of the brain with places where activity isn't correct. Then there is a high correlation of these kinds of images to types of attention disorder behaviors.
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/
"Using a nuclear medicine technique called 'single photon emission computed tomography' (SPECT)--a controversial step, according to some of his peers--Dr. Amen scans patients' brains to identify various abnormalities."
cat >> /etc/hosts.deny
slashdot.org
^D
I have ADD, no hyperactivity.
I have tried the standard medications. None of them had a significant beneficial effect.
I have learned many techniques for coping with ADD. I can rule out bad parenting and moral failure as a cause in my case.
It is not laziness. I am distractable. I am interested in so many things. I tend to persue them all. This is NOT laziness.
My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
steve Pavlina has some GREAT articles on personal productivity. very simple and straightforward. i've tried a lot of stuff but this one works for me SOO well...
Get More Done
try it. you will definitely get results!
if i only knew in university...
andrew - who is posting this from SIGGRAPH 2003
I'm easily distracted from boring things, but here are a few things that have helped me:
1. Have a buddy who depends on you for help. When he calls at 10am asking for help on a problem that you haven't started, you start working on it.
2. Prioritize, but don't be afraid to switch between tasks sometimes. I still do this at work: if I'm getting nowhere on one task, I switch to something that I can make immediate progress on (sucks when all you have left is the hard stuff, but that means you got the rest done!). Don't consider fun stuff as an alternative to tough problems.
3. Small goals, small rewards. No more oreos until you finish the next paragraph. And hey, if you get on a roll just keep going. Even if you don't finish everything at once, you'll have less to finish later.
4. "Anything worth doing is worth doing half assed." I've spent 10 minutes trying to figure out a sentence without typing a word (and then gotten distracted). If I type a rough draft and fix it later I can get on to the parts that I already have worked out in my head.
And I agree with some of the other comments about exercising and eating proper meals.
According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV), published by the American Psychiatric Association:
Can't quickly find an online transcription and don't feel like typing it all, so check it out at your local library and read up on the diagnostic criteria. Probably a lot of people who are taking ritalin don't actually meet all the criteria.
Keep your place of work and your place of rest seperate. The whole "home office" thing is a horrible, horrible idea. Same goes for studying at home.
There was a time when I was able to get a lot done at home... but before long my brain learned to associate my living room-slash-office with relaxation and fun. It works the other way too -- the stress of doing stuff you'd rather not be doing gets associated with your home. As a result, I never feel quite relaxed here... there's always a sense of guilt in the back of my mind when I sit at home and do nothing.
Best advice I can give you --- find a nice spot in the library and always study there. Never bring your work and study back home.
BEER.
OK, well I can speak from experience that I do my finest work under pressure. I've tried this non-procrastination route you speak of, and it hasn't gotten me anywhere. Some people work better when the heat is turned up.
Seriously I think it is just hard-wired into our psyche. As computer geeks, our minds are working on many levels all the time... multi-tasking if you will. This constant flow of information, and the pursuit of more, leads to this hyper ADHD type personality. It's always been that way, and I don't think it is going to change any time soon. Just face the music, you've become one of us.
www.GamezCore.com For Hardcore PS2 Gamerz : By Hardcore PS2 Gamerz
There is a school of thought that says that satisfaction in work requres using ones natural aptitudes. The Johnson O'Connor research foundation http://members.aol.com/jocrf19/offers aptitude testing and counseling after determining ones aptitide profile
1) That "hot" career WON'T be hot in 4-6 years when you hit the workplace. Because by that point it will be glutted with losers like you trying to get rich quick. See the IT field today for an example of this in action.
2) "Yet another English major." Snob much?
3) People do much better work in the fields they enjoy. Grim Sean is completely right.
4) There actually aren't that many English majors out there who can actually cut write well, and the ones that can are in a steady demand. It may not net you $100K a year, unless you can stand ISO 9000 work, but you can make a pretty good living. I do.
Jon Acheson
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
if you find that you are having a difficult time getting work (projects and the like) completed on time, or that taking tests is rather arduous in the time given, talk to your professors. even if you dont have a doctors note saying that you have confirmed ADD, it is still beneficial to let them know you are having some difficulties. they may be able to extend the testing time for you, give you later deadlines for projects, or just be able to point you in the right direction (ie, tell you what sections are most important in the reading for the lecture so you can focus on them more).
if i repeated something already said, my apologies. i definitely dont have a long enough attention span to read thru everything.
cheers
1. Whenever your about to work on something, list out all the parts you need to work on (I did this on a giant white board). Then, when you complete each item cross it off. That 'crossing off' is a reward for your work and when your board is filled with crossed off items you feel a great sense of accomplishment and you realise what you've done in your time. Make sure that every item on the board is an item that would take only a few minutes. Bigger items should be split into subitems. Doing it in a notebook is great when your whole notebook becomes a giant list of crossed off items. 2. Motivation - Motivation is difficult, but once you have it nothing can stand in your way. But motivation is psychological. The only way I've found to create it is to 'convince' yourself that what you are studying or working on is interesting. You have to believe that you will use what your learning for some purpose that your highly motivated about already - thus associating your learning with an exsisting source of motivation. Or you can try to create a new source of motivation by convincing yourself that your project is by itself a great achievement that will satisfy a desire that your have. For example, I've always wanted to have a complete control of computers in a way that noone else in the world could have. So, every project for me was a matter of creating a toolbox of code that I would someday use to be able to create anything I wanted quickly.
First off: be a masochist. Get depressed about your work ethic. It sorta works like Ryoga on Ranma 1/2 (but don't bother researching that anime if you don't already know that character). Always be ready to punish yourself, and that punishment is work. If you're like me, the work you do do is very meticulous, and you'll rather not do something at all rather than do it poorly. For this, I take a two-stage approach: write out your solutions to homework assignments on scratch paper first, then type it up neatly. It works for essays, math proofs, etc. This will keep you from spending too much time on formatting / word choice early on, and you're probably a fast typist, so the second stage won't take too much time. Plus, you probably usually skip proofreading too (I find it revolting to review my work after it's "done", this kinda forces me to do at least one quick review pass when transcribing).
If you find lecture time boring, use it to work on your homework. You probably love to multitask anyway, so it may as well improve your attentiveness to the lecture, and it's more productive than falling asleep or zoninng off (which you claim to be a pro in already).
Join some extracurricular activities (design projects, professional societies, etc.) These will give you the extra pressure you need to do well on your core curriculum, and tend to have more "soft" deadlines, so you can allow them to slip before more important things go. Plus, these opportunities are among the only things that make your college experience different from self-instruction from textbooks. Take advantage of them, you'll likely never have a chance to participate in projects like them ever again. They also provide invaluable fodder for interview questions in the future.
If you start to falter, seriously consider taking a leave of absence and join the workforce for a semester or a year. Unfortunately, I waited until I had pretty much blown an entire semester (GPA: 0.5 ) before I gave this a thought. It was probably the best thing that ever happened to me (the experience, not being on academic probation). It was a real confidence builder, and focusing my mind on real problems really helped me understand why some school subjects were important when I returned. Plus, once you start making your own money and paying your way through life yourself, you'll finally appreciate the ~$100 per lecture hour that you're really spending.
Finally, get a supportive girlfriend or wife. This might be hard to find, but I was lucky. Parents can put only a certain type of pressure on you.
A couple of years ago, NHL 2001 was my constant entertainment. The thing was, the game had a penchant for random crashes. Not constant, but you could expect 1 every 3 period of play (for the non-hockey fans, 3 periods = 1 full hockey game, minus any overtime). To be able to progress through a season, at the end of each period of play, I would save and quit the program entirely. Then, I'd fire it up again and continue. Or, if I was feeling adventurous, I would just save and continue without exiting the program (however, to do this, I still had to exit the gameplay portion of the program, and continuing involved going through the whole loading process again).
Around the same time, I found that Calculus homework and Physics studies simply weren't getting done - not because of time spent on games, but because I didn't spend any of my other time on it, either.
To solve the two problems, at the end of each period of play, I would stop and spend 15 minutes studying (which, incidentally, is the length of the intermissions between periods in the NHL). Then, I would resume play. This steady toggling between gameplay and studies made the whole studying thing a lot easier to deal with. The key is the fact that the nature of the gameplay had very structured and definite stoppages of play (unlike, say, a Final Fantasy game, where you could spend 100 hours straight without stopping actual gameplay, if you so chose to). The crash bug that I was avoiding actually helped, as it made stopping between periods pretty much mandatory, and it was actually more effective than if the stops were between entire games (I was always ready to go for the next period, and studying seemed more like a "break" from the action, instead of a roadblock keeping me from starting the next game).
I have to find a way to implement something like this again, except without the crash bug.
I find bong loads really help my productivity. Code pigging is sooooo boring. Sucking one through does wonders for my outlook and productivity.
Sedative dart in the neck.
====
Crudely Drawn Games
I don't know if this applies to you, but I've been boozing, smoking weed and doing other drugs throughout college, and towards the end, right before graudation, I found myself frustratingly unfocused, unsharp, and demotivated. I was still doing all I needed to get done but in a real inefective manner. I would drive home and end up at work because my brain switched off and I drove where the instinct took me. Etc.
I haven't smoked or done drugs, and barely drank beer, since graduation in May. It's not a long time to claim being "clean" but I certainly find myself smarter. I work full time for a very demanding firm and I am real "high" on the fact that I can keep up. The difference between my mind now and while I was doing drugs is significant, and it didn't take all that long.
Cutting down on coffee and cigarettes and going to the gym probably factored in too. I still drink coffee but only when I "need" it rather than having at least 2 cups a day as a matter of habbit.
Like someone else suggested, snorting Rittalin would help the immediate problem but it doesn't seem like a long term solution to me. Like any drugs that speed you up (like extacy) you're just "borrowing" happiness/conventration/energy from yourself. Burning the candle from both ends, so to speak. I am sure it comes back to bite you eventually (I've snorted Rit to study for finals a few times, it does work wonders)
It's also important to not burn yourself out. I have coworkers who come in on the weekends and almost literally sleep in the office. I think it'll burn them out quick. If you take a two week span, we may be as productive on the first week, then they'll overtake me on the weekend because they're working and I am having fun or relaxing, and on the 2nd week I am sure to catch up and overtake because they're drained and I am rested.
What this all comes down to is equilibrium. Maintain the equilibrium between work and rest, and don't take chemicals into your body that'd offset your other levels one way or the other (neither depressants like weed and booze, nor speedy things like coke and Rit are good for your productivity, especially in the long run.)
Hope this helps.
Ecce Europa - Web Design for Business
As strange as this sounds, i study best in very loud, noisy, busy places. During exams, i plunk down 8am to 5pm in the university cafeteria. I know it's weird, but i think it's the "white noise" of people coming and going that helps me concentrate. In a quiet library or something, every little noise grabs my attention.
The other good thing about studying in a cafeteria is that crappy food is always convenient.
My only other advice is to drink lots of water, rather then coffee, coke, etc. I'm not commenting on caffeine (i am a coffee addict), but the water seems to make a difference in how you feel gernerally (helps flush out your system maybe?)
-Michael Roy Some people are like Slinkies. Not really useful, but you can't help smiling when you see one tumble down
Over and over again, I hear the term discipline. But for me disciplane doesn't work. Its all about commitment. I have wrestled with accomplishing my goals and I am proud of my results. Here is my philosophy:
/. already did a good job defining his self-image and he already decided for himself where he stands. So hes good for step 1.
Like many things in life, getting stuff done is ultimately about 1) the image you choose for yourself and 2) your commitment to it.
1) The image you choose for yourself is all about how you want to percieve yourself. It is the "I want to be_____" where the blank can be anything from "hardworking and efficient" to "not such an asshole" The most important thing is that your self-image has to come from you. YOU decide your image and YOU decide for yourself if you are reaching that image. What other people think and tell you cannot matter. For example, the person who submitted to ask
2)Be committed to your self image.
Discipline is all about punishment and restraint. whereas commitment is all about valuing yourself and your self-image. I prefer to be committed to myself than to discipline myself. Being committed includes finding out what it takes in the real world to attain your self image (i.e. doing the research necessary to find out how to be more efficient). Furthermore, being committed to yourself means not letting other people judge your progress. Don't let anyone say your finished when your not or vice-versa. Staying committed means you have to both value AND judge yourself. This is the hardest part but its worth it.
Stick to these steps and always stay committed. Envision what you will be like as an efficient person and then strive for that. But stay committed. It is very rewarding to stay committed to yourself and it almost always produces good results.
Read Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco for more info.
Don't worry about it!
All it means it that you are a deadline-oriented person. That is, you need deadlines imposed on you to get you going. There is nothing wrong with this. It's not a pretty or glamorous way to live, but it still means you can get things done.
See, you seem to be trying to adjust yourself to fit a predetermined set of working habits, i.e. that of the stereotypical "model student". But if you think you need to become one of these workaholic types to do well in your studies and try to force yourself to become one, you will have great difficulties. So instead, adjust your working habits to fit yourself.
I am also very deadline-oriented, and if I may toot my own horn, I just graduated First Class Honours. So I like to think I'm qualified to give some tips for deadline-oriented individuals:
In short, don't try to be perfect. Accept your limitations and deal with them. I'm sure you'd like to try to improve upon some of your bad habits, but University just isn't the place to attempt that. There's way too much else going on!
Well, I'm not a psycho-analyst, but to me you certainly don't have any 'disease'. In your case I just don't think any meditation, or exercise is needed. It all is just about liking what you do. I had practically same problem, though you also seem to have low responsibility grade, but it doesn't all that matter. To me it is obvious, that you simply don't like what you do, and the cure is to find the job that you'd love. Try to think about what kind of things you'd like to do, what profession, may be you'll take some courses, but hell, it is really so rewarding to have a profession that you like, so even money are not so important. Try to devise what you'd like to do, get some training (if needed), quit your current job and go find the job you'd like.
I have had the same problem as you. sometimes worse than others. Typically, the worst times comes when I get some serious burnout. During those times, I can't even read a paragraph and comprehend what I'm reading, but that was an extremely serious burnout.
Often, it's simply a case of 1) really believing in what you are working on, and 2) embracing the task before you to the exclusion of all others.
Many ADD/ADHD and related sufferers have a related "skill" that, unless recognized, is often unutilized. I call it hyper-focus. It is the ability to get so drawn into a situation as to be totally absorbed. Easy examples are TV, games, and the internet. These are passive hyper-focus subjects. Reading is another, less passive one. I have found, through careful practice that this same "skill" can actually be trained as an active skill. Instead of absorbing material, absorb a concept or task with and equal zeal, to the absolute exclusion of all other conscious thought.
It takes practice, but is somewhat like learning how to break over into your second wind as a jogger. If you're not familiar with that, it's the point where you are sooooo wiped that your body tells you you can't go another step but you push until your body just say, "ok, whatever" and it feels like you could run all day. It's a very cool thing. What was pain only moments ago now feels exhilerating and refreshing.
Breaking over into active hyper-focus has a similar mental exhileration. Once you find your zone it will be hard to break out of it. You will find yourself accomplishing incredible things.
When you do this, though, make sure you do it in a disciplined way or you will face some serious burnout. Don't do serious mental work more than five or six day a week. Force yourself to rest an entire day from any mental excercise. Also don't regularly work your brain that hard for more than 10 hours a day. It becomes addictive and like any other addiction, it will eat you for lunch.
I know. I burned myself out so bad once that I couldn't do any serious mental work for over a year. I had to maintain only, and that, not effectively. I nearly lost my job, etc., etc...
Intentionally play, just do it with moderation so that you can focus on the joys of accomplishment and fullfilment in your work as well. Work is a part of life. It can be quite fulfilling if it is balanced with rest, contemplation, play, and relationship. Balance your life. If one part starts to take over, make youself adjust it.
Hope this helps....
Feel free to contact me if you need some practical day-to-day help on this. It's a process, not a quick fix. Life always is...
--==-- I've found Karma to be a relative thing... Ya know, the kind you invite to Christmas...
How the hell did you make it this far in school and not know how to get things done? Your doing contract work?? I can only imagine the quality of your work. Your barking up the wrong tree as well...asking other people how to do it is just leading you further away from achieving it.
Sometimes I think the editors at slashdot have no sense of humor...then they go and nullify my fears by posting an article like this :)
I have used this technique during my "worst days" to get back on track. Starting with when you get up, keep a record of what hours you spend doing what. Be very honest with yourself. Include things like time for eating, watching TV, wasting time on the Internet. When do you get up? When do you go to bed?
Then you can identify where you are really "wasting" time. Time spent with friends is not, IMHO, a waste of time. Neither is time spent exercising, or fucking your partner. etc.
Do this for a week and look at the results. Where are you truly wasting your time? Cut down on whatever that happens to be.
What others have suggested is ways to either reduce the "pain" associated with the work or increase the "pleasure".
We all work on the pain/pleasure principle: everything we do is an effort to reduce the pain and increase the pleasure in our lives. The pain or pleasure may be happening right now, or it may be some future pain/pleasure that we believe will occur.
Where it gets fun is all the ways we lie to ourselves in order to legitimize increasing our current pleasure. "Oh, I'll just check Slashdot real quick... what's ten minutes compared to the rest of the day?" "Yeah, those donuts are full of calories... but man they are so good, and they're not going to make any real difference." Yeah, sure.
I use a complex strategy to counter my procrastinating habits. I have to; my rationalizing habits and strategies are very ingrained and complex. I have to out-think myself. The details involve adding things to the "pleasure" side and removing things from the "pain" side until "pleasure" is greater than "pain":
- Stop thinking about it as one big project: break it down into pieces that are manageable in a small timespan. (Fifteen minutes to two hours.)
- Find a way to make the work less boring, unpleasant, difficult, etc., and more interesting, fun, personally rewarding.
- Create a meaningful reward system. And commit to it. (I tend to go right from one thing to the next and not reward myself: this is bad, because it increases the benefit of rewarding myself up-front, which makes me procrastinate more.)
- Focus on the unpleasant consequences of procrastination and let that be a spur. (This in combination with breaking the project down is a real winner: the consequences of procrastination are far more severe than the pain of getting one task done.)
There are other things I have to remember, too: it doesn't have to be perfect; it doesn't all have to get done in one session (it's okay to take breaks); getting it done is usually preferable to doing it the "right" way. These are antidotes for the training ("programming") I got from my parents.
Good luck. And be proud of yourself for asking for help!
-Thomas
1. When choosing a career, don't let "sensible" type thoughts overrule your feelings.
I was a biology major in college, which in
hindsight was a mistake.
I did like learning biology and thinking about
it. But I didn't like lab work. And I didn't
like biologists as much as I liked social science types.
1.5 You have TONS of time to choose a career.
Do what you feel would be fun in college,
academically. Take a year off from college if
you feel like it. I'm serious. Take fewer
classes each semester if it would make your
life happier.
2. If you go into therapy, (which I recommend)
ask around and identify a GOOD therapist.
3. Talk to lots of people when you make
decisions. And not just on line. Talk to
people who know you and have in-depth info
about options you are considering.
4. Talk to your friends about your weekly
and daily schedule. Ask them "Does it
make sense to go to Joe's party Friday,
or do schoolwork?"
Good luck.
As long as he is eating a balanced diet, as we should all be doing, then not much needs to be done. He didn't allude to any symptoms indicating racing thoughts, flight of ideas,etc which can be common to ADHD. From all that he said, it just sounds like he is a procrastinator. He can do the work when he needs to (last minute), thus he seems to be able to function well when he wants to. This then indicates that this is probably a choice and not something organically wrong with him.
..........FULL STOP.
Here's a tip I saw recently, but I can't remember where (maybe on Slashdot).
When you are working on a project and making good progress, don't keep working until you get to a good stopping place. Instead, stop right before you are about to do a particularly easy part of the project. Then when you start again the next day you will have an easy task to complete to get you back on track.
I guess this works the opposite way too. If you at a particularly hard part of the project, finish that up so the next day you won't be dreading starting the project up again.
As a fellow university student (COMSCI,INFS, LLB) I know the feeling. Although I now study, I used to be exactly the same - I never had to work at school even up to the point where I left to go to university at 16. Even then, I didn't do it properly until one day I realised that although my marks were good, I still had unrealised achievement potential and decided to exploit it. I embarked on a strict study routine (a totally new experience!) involving doing the work as it came along, and studying progressively rather than doing it at the last minute - it's a much less formidable task that way (you don't have to concentrate on those bits of paper for so damn long), and does away with the daunting task of ploughing through vast amounts of material imperfectly just before exams. I take my notes roughly during the day, then at night I sit and type them up. This is perfectly sufficient study in my opinion, and there is the additional bonus of a nice set of notes to study from at the end of the semester. Although it does take some getting used to for a lazy night-owl like myself, I made myself do it by focussing on the rewards of such a regimen....to wit, better grades and no guilt about how I wasn't trying. The other thing is exercising regularly. You will concentrate much better and for a longer period of time if you go to the gym or for a jog before you sit down to work. The exercise break also has the effect of creating a gap between lectures and study. If you don't take a good long break, it is almost impossible to focus. One should also avoid studying on a full stomach, as blood flows to the stomach to digest and one's ability to concentrate is dramatically reduced. However, although the above will help, the only real solution is to kick yourself into it - I had to. All you need to is to make yourself start studying effectively, and it will eventually become a routine.
...on account of the processors not being able to get all of the hexane [3rd par] back out again [2nd par].
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Yes, you too could be painting other people's houses while you live in your car. If that doesn't motivate your ass to do school work, nothing ever will.
Ditch the social life, ditch the internet connection, do the work. Period. Life's a bitch.
After considering some of the other responses, I would agree with the sentiment that there seems to be a decision along the lines of "OK I'm just going to f***ing do it", where you really decide to start working.
The strick is being in the right place and time to make this decision and not be distracted after it is made. For me, leaving the usual places where I procrastinate (my house, my car, etc.) and going somewhere where I can really concentrate (*Library*, Denny's, etc.) helps a lot. I think it works so well, because I habitually do not work well at home and do habitually work well in libraries. Keep in mind that in order to get work done in a place, where you're usually unproductive, you have to fight a whole lot of brain wiring.
I think some people call it "flow".
--Isaac
Get married, you won't have trouble getting work done the rest of your life.
This may sound like a joke at first, but I am serious, having a wife around will eventually lead to kids and a person that will always expect more out of you than you feel like giving, eventually you just end of up changing out of your wife's sheer will.
Again, this may sound like a joke, but having mouths to feed makes you the best worker in the world. I was making minimum wage when I had my first child, and it got me to see college as something serious.
Then, while in college, I was the only one in 40 people in my group that took everything seriously, I had an internship my second semester, I took summer classes, I worked all night at learning to code and design, I got hired half way through school, my last year of school I started freelancing, now (aside from time spent on slashdot and reading news) am quite productive on a daily basis and have a growing business.
The real secret is being able to take the future seriously. First you take the first month seriously, as that is when rent is due, then you take a year seriously as you deal with taxes and find out how much you've made (or didn't make). Then you realize, "I am going to be 80 years old some day"
When you finally see that you will be 80, then you take your health seriously. Visit some old folks that are in constant pain, I have, they all wish they had taken better care of themselves. ( for a geek, it means stretching, good posture, no caffine and exercise).
When you really, really truly believe that your every day actions have a long term effect, then a light blinks on you and you see that the few extra hours you spent coding instead of surfing (there is a thing called information addiction...) actually do move you forward in life. And that the few hours you wasted, move you backwards.
Debt makes you realize this as well. I have business debt, my first year was not profitable at all, I spend $50 a month in interest on it, it will be paid off in 2 years, but now I see that $50 a month is $600 a year, and if I had saved that starting 20 years ago (at the age of 8) I would have $12,000 + interest in the bank, and that would have gotten me through the lean times in my business.
A real important lesson to learn is by accepting wise advice as much as you would experience. Experience is a bad way to learn. For example, an old man that has chronic back pain told me to take care of my back because "you don't want to have pain like I have" Well, if I didn't change my life around every day, without having the experince of pain pushing me to make those small decisions easier, then I will end up where he was, and feel like a total fool for it when it happens.
Just take a current or past experience of how you wasted your time and didn't apply your self, and extend it into the future. Then you will see where your failure to work will lead you.
I hope the best for you, I work hard, but it is always a struggle to continue working with games and news a click away. Also, 10 minutes of work is more than no work at all... do small bites at a time, don't expect the world right away, you may find that after a few small bites, you want to finish your meal.....
-v
I'm exactly where you are: university student with a discipline issue (less so now than before, but I still deal with it).
The key is to remove yourself from distractions. If you must do computer work, you just have to resist the temptation to go to the web
However, if it's not computer work, LEAVE YOUR COMPUTER!! I've found it's the only thing that works for me. If you have other homework besides computer stuff, or reading, or whatever, don't kid yourself by doing it in the presence of your easily-accessibly computer.
(I speak here as though the computer is the major distraction --- because for me, it is. If yours is something else, get away from whatever it is).
Of course, ultimately, there's some plain, old-fashioned disciplined involved. You just have to habitually force yourself to focus on the task at hand.
Don't become a regular here, you will become retarded. -- Yoda the Retard
I don't have ADD. I have a different condition which my psychologist (who has this condition too) calls "absent-minded professor syndrome".
Basically, I have much, much memory for the abstract, but almost no memory for the concrete. I'm constantly forgetting to turn the car headlights off, where I've put things, appointments, deadlines and so on.
How do you cope with it? Well, I live my entire life in a diary. Everything I need to do gets written down. If I don't have the diary with me, I cross my fingers and am not allowed to uncross them until it goes in the diary. Every day I transfer stuff from one page to the next. It's low-tech, but it works wonders.
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
...I don't have a motorcycle... is there a book "Zen and the art of Cantankerous Japanese Direct Import Toyota Master Ace Surf 4WD Diesel Van Maintenance?" With a section on getting it to exceed 0.01G (and that's downhill) without exhaling its rings in small pieces?
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Find your self a Joe Board (or a Jane Board) and ask if you can study with them. Hint - he sits near the front of the class. This person is so dumb that the only way they made it to the university at all is by incredible self discipline and long hours of studying.
Arrange to meet your Joe Board at the library at the same time every day for the same duration. (Say 2-3 hours) Scheduling is easy because Joe Board studies 3 or 4 times more than you do.
The best place to study might not be the library. Joe Board will know a good place.
When you go to your study place, do not sit in a far off private corner where you can goof off. Sit in the middle of a sea of tables where people are quietly studying and will glare at you or shush you if you make any noise. If you distract Joe Board too much, he will get pissed at you. He knows that if he goofs off, he has no chance of staying in school.
When you go to your study place, take only as much work as you can complete in your chosen time frame. Leave EVERYTHING else at home. If you finish the work you brought, go home.
What is the best time frame? It is the amount of time you can study before you start to get distracted and do anything but the task at hand. For me, its about 2 hours. Pretending that I am going to study any longer without the pressure of an immediate deadline is self delusion.
The key is that you need to go to your study place for a reasonable period of time every single day. Find yourself a study buddy who can help you make sure that you actually go. Pick your study buddy based on their study habits, not on how much you like them or how well you know them.
If you want to read a book, try Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. It is loosly about how to focus your attention and is popular with the extreme programming crowd. The book is better than it looks.
How is a dude who has problems with his attention span gonna sift through all these insightful suggestions? It's gonna take way more than 15 minutes to get through half of this!
...is better than being becalmed". Then you at least have steerage way.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
When you are part of a study group, people in the group depend on you to show up and work. This is very motivating. In a study group people complement each other, benefiting from their combined knowledge.
At Copenhagen University this is considered so important that when you select the courses for your first semester, you also have to select a study group to join. Later on during your studies it becomes your own responsibility to get a study group.
...wouldn't-you-like-it-to-be-harder-than-steel emails.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
I deleted my keymap.
For months, I knwe I had a serious netrek problem that was eating up 50+ hours per week. The problem was, every time I had an opportunity to switch contexts, such as starting a one minute compilation, I would automatically telnet to my favorite netrek server and play for an hour or more. Do this a half-dozen times a day and a 10 hour work day just isn't that productive. So after a couple of years of this, I got rid of my keymap and was netrek-free for about a year. I relapsed for a while playing netrek / netrek hockey, until, again, I deleted of my keymap.
For me, gaming is all about immediate gratification. It would have only taken about 10 minutes for me to remember and recreate most of my keymap, but I haven't since reached a point where I was willing to do that. My resolve is strong enough to avoid setting myself up to play a game, but nowhere near strong enough to avoid playing when it's just a command away.
It's been suggested that I have ADD, but I haven't been formally tested. I also have a serious procrastination problem. If you're anything like me, my advice is to decide what is important and what you are able to get rid of, and then to get rid of the triggers of your unwanted online habits: change your game passwords; get your online characters banned or transfered; get rid of your addictive bookmarks, and do whatever else it takes to make it not worth the effort to readdict yourself.
I have this really bad habit that I HAVE to take a break and do something else fun as soon as I clear a major hurdle in programming. For example, I go and watch TV for a bit or surf the net after every major C function I write. The reason it is bad is that I lost my train of thought while I'm taking a break and I forget some important details of my design. I don't see how I can avoid this because I simply can't code one major function after another. I introduce errors that way as well. It's kind of a Catch-22.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
what do you mean how am I a sociopath lol.
Come on at least know the definition of sociopath before using the word, take psychology.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
I'm always astonished in discussions of ADD how little people know, and how much they have to say about it.
If you have a genetic or environmental cause for low reuptake of dopamine, your Exectutive Function - the name of area of the brain that, yes, instigates, organizes and executes - will be crippled. To a larger or lesser extent, but crippled nonetheless. Evidence that this is an inheritied condition was discovered at Brookhaven, only a few years ago, a glitch on one of the dopamine aelles.
It is perfectly possible to be unable to execute a single shred of all the good advice on this thread. I am hopeful of the day when psycholgy is no longer confused with functional brain conditions.
One of the most common misunderstandings about ADD comes from people who say, Hell, I'm not ADD, I can focus for hours and hours! Attention Deficit does not mean you cannot pay attention, it means that your ability to direct your own attention is not entirely volitional; your brain cannot organize itself. One is thus vulnerable to any strong pull in the environment, pleasant or un-. ADDers can hyperfocus like nobody's business - on something that interests them. And of life of endless interests minus the ability to shape and direct them is most definitely a circle of hell.
With just enough dopamine to keep distrability in check, the ability to hyperfocus can make for an Einstein, a Tolstoy; that enviable state of being in the Flow. But the Flow is yet another hell, when you can't do anything else. When your life is a combination of endless periods of Flow - and endless periods when you cannot *do* a single thing at all.
Small doses of amphetamines have the seemingly paradoxical effect of organizing the thoughts, of focusing the lens of the mind. No one can judge what it means to someone with ADD to be being able to focus at will, yet just about everybody does.
It means being able to set goals, to begin work, to end work. To accomplish what others take for granted. Which has, in other words, nothing to do with moral fibre at all.
As to those who brag about getting by on caffeine instead of those nasty drugs - sheer ignorance. Bragging about the ability to make emotional judgements when simple science stares you in the face. Coffee, for example, is a poor way to self-medicate, having detrimental affects on blood sugar and mood, to name only two. Whereas 10mg of Adderall XR provides mixed amphetatines salts. Clean dopamine.
These are not the opinions of one woman, and that is part of the point. It is simply a case of looking at things as they are.
When you peel away everything else, intelligent choices become clear.
Yes, I am yet another person with the same problem. BTW, thanks for asking openly about it, now I can save this Slashdot link for future reference. :)
:O
;)
Anyway, I might have one suggestion that wasn't mentioned often enough. Think about how interesting you work/studing is. If not much, can you switch to anything else? I don't know if I have ADD myself, don't think it's a hot concept among the doctors where I live, so I never tried to find out. But when I am trying to study a textbook (not always, depends on the topic and quality of the book), I usually start dozing off in several minutes. I really can't stiffle the yawn.
This never happens to me if I am doing something interesting. A few weeks ago I was helping two BBC journalists organise their trip to Nizhny Novgorod. I was able to easily concentrate on that and keep the concentration for two weeks. Then during the trip I slept for <7 hours per day and always woke up before the alarm, which is a big feat for me, as normally I always oversleep (10+ hours) and don't notice any alarms whatsoever.
Pulling an all-nighter is nothing new, yes, it's easy to concentrate on your work when you have a deadline in 12 hours, no excuse to postpone the work, and when it can realistically be done. But I see that if the work is interesting, I can concentrate on it as long as it is needed. This is true for other things/projects/tasks that I had. If it is interesting, my organism takes care about concentration without any need for external stimulants.
Another thing that might be useful is to set a very rigid schedule. Have a break every two hours - eat some fruits (this have an additional benefit of being healthy) and evaluate what you have just been doing. Stop doing that if it wasn't productive. In this case you will never loose more than 2 consecutive hours reading Slashdot, chatting, or surfing the web. Always go to sleep at the same time, in this case you will never loose the night doing unproductive things (I am writing this at 9 o'clock in the morning... I hate my life... May be I don't have ADD, may be I have a depression...).
P.S. If you can, try to find someone who would pester you constantly to get the work done. Preferably a girlfriend who enjoys being thoroughly pesky and annoying. Use it to your advantage.
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
Are you bored by your college major? If you are forcing yourself to study some area that you aren't interested in, don't do it -- it'll end up being your boring career when you graduate.
Absolutely right.
I'm 20, and have that old-man-what-the-hell-etc syndrome. And it's all due to an absolute independence (except on my last dentist bill that I got semi-bailed out of).
Now all I can think about doing is going to school and studying cool stuff and getting really good at it instead of fulfilling someone elses dividend margin.
I find that doing all my school work at school and not bringing any of it home is the best way to do things. If I try to bring work or school home I don't ever get it done and I feel really guilty about it which just weighs me down. If you've got homework to do grab a bite at the school cafeteria and then head to the library and do your work. Then, when you head home or to your dorm or wherever, you can relax. Keep the two completely seperated. This has always worked for me and I hope it can help you. Best of luck to you.
--Greg
Steve Pavlina has some great articles about this issue.
E.g. You have to train. Sit down and work for 30 minutes keeping in mind that you will have a reward afterwards. Reward can be anything you like - watching a movie, having a dinner, playing a game.
I tried it myself. The result is that after some time you don't have to force yourself to sit down and start working. Your mind doesn't feel big pain to work because it knows that something pleasant is waiting afterwards.
BUT, NEVER DO IT OTHER DIRECTION. If you say "now I play a game and afterwards I will start to work really hard" - you are dead. Your mind will feel the pain if you finish a game and it will resist.
The "secret" is, IMHO, to be a gratification-delayer. Psychologists some time ago did studies on young children, asking them if they'd rather have a marshmellow now, or two after some time interval. Those who could delay gratification and wait for the two marshmellows, proved to be more productive and successful adults. In fact, these researchers found, IIRC, that this ability to delay gratification had the greatest affect on a person's adult success, more so than race, religion, socio-economic background, and so on.
From your comments, it appears as if you are not one who can delay gratification. I would encourage you to change this post haste. How does one do this? That, clearly, is the 64 thousand dollar question. While I don't know what will work for you, here are some suggestions you might want to give a try:
Do not underestimate the importance of learning how to delay gratification. It can mean the difference between a successful, happy life and one where you are constantly burdened with deadlines, financially strapped, and constantly stressed.
In any event, best of luck, and I hope you find a solution to your problem.
I could not justify my existence if I were a turkey farmer. Would I terminate myself? Undoubtably, yes.
It might just be laziness. Or it might be something more than that. Check out The Anxiety & Phobia Workbook by Bourne.
Nothing is particularly hard if you divide it into small jobs. Henry Ford
There's a guy who keeps emailing me about cheap viagra. I'm sure he also does nootropics. Shall I forward your email on to him ?
which is why I am posting this after just having taken a shower at 1 AM in the morning after sleeping until around 2 or 3 PM this afternoon after... Well, you get the picture.
Some pieces of advice:
1) If you don't want to do something, you should not be doing it. It's The Wrong Thing. And as Abbie Hoffman said, "Do Your Thing And Only Your Thing". Which is a restatement of the great English occultist Aleister Crowley's "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole of the Law. Do Thy Will And No Other Shall Say Thee Nay".
2) Secondly, Three Steps, No Fail: Figure out three things you can do to approach a goal. They must be three things that you absolutely CANNOT fail at and they must be able to be accomplished in one week tops. Do them. Then decide the next three things to be done based on your goal and what you have accomplished so far. Repeat until successful.
3) Yoda's Rule: "Try? No! Do - or do not. There is no try." This is basically a restatement of the samurai principle that everything must be done "whole-heartedly" - i.e., no holding back. The samurai also said that there should be no more than three things of importance to you in your life at any one time.
4) Abandon your hells. This is a principle from one of the Japanese religions as well. There are ten hells everyone goes through. They start from physical wants and go up to the last hell, which is success (that, too, is a hell). The only way to get through each hell is to drop them. Just abandon the thinking that produced them.
I could give you a lot more advice, but I'm late to accomplish ANYTHING today so....
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
... is to enjoy your work. breaking down a huge chunk of work into things that are quickly done, so as to get a feeling of accomplishment, also helps.
I recommend, Raja Yoga for instance the one thought by the Brahma Kumaris
Its not a problem of gratification, its a problem of being able to focus and an inability to manage your time. Its not that you're distracted by a new game that you just bought, it's that you will somehow find something else to do rather than the task you should be doing. It can be mowing your lawn, doing laundry or even cleaning your bathroom; none of these things are fun, nor do they help you complete your important task, but they'll keep you sidetracked.
The worst of both worlds is when you have a tendancy to procrastinate and a tendancy to have high anxiety under pressure. That way you put things off, and the closer it gets to the deadline, the more anxious you get, which makes it harder than ever to concentrate. You end up thinking "oh my gawd, wtf am I going to do all of this", and since you don't like feeling like you're about to absess, you do something to escape, like play a game or watch a movie.
Here's three things that'll help people like this: scheduling, chunking and environment. You need to schedule when you're going to work on your project or you'll find your days disappearing very quickly. Breaking the task up into smaller chunks makes it easier to concentrate on the pieces rather than on the whole, and make it harder to get anxious over the Big Picture. Finally, pick a good environment that will help minimize distractions. Good places would be a library away from home - if you're still having problems concentrating, you can just walk around for five minutes, then come back to what you are doing. If you try that at home, you might be tempted to check your email or talk to your roomates, which will amount to 5 hours sucked into web browsing or watching a TNG marathon with your roomie.
I've found that you have to be in the "zone" to get work done. Sometimes sitting down to do work I can get stuff done, but rarely. I find that, and I read something about it (from Slashdot I believe) that you need to get your mind working on the task without distractions to get the creative juices flowing. And as long as the train of thought is unbroken you can get a lot done. I find that caffeine, classical or techno/trance music played through headphones works good for me. Sometimes other forms of music help as long as it's not to complex because you don't want it distracting you from thinking about the task at hand.
"Hard work never killed anyone." -- Some Dead Guy
Visualuizing myself finishing really helps me when I masturbate.
I am so so sorry.
I like having fun and doing something fun. That should beat work any day, right??
Well, is there a way to make work fun so you don't really know the difference?
If I'm trying to build something that I can use to have a lot of fun, I can really concentrate.
Try this - if you can build a little fun into the work, even if that means building something outside the scope of the work, you may find that you become really motivated. I haven't tried this yet since I just thought of it so I'm going to try it.
Know your pads. One time pad: good for cryptography. Two timing pad: where to take your mistress.
Firstly I agree with your point (Chalupa) about ritalin. It is a hardcore anphetamine, developed to treat cocain/crack withdrawl, chosen for children due to its limited effects on sleep patterns (compared with Dex or similar) but still thrashes your liver, kidneys and digestive system. I have seen the effects of day-to-day speed addiction in adults who should know better (at 30 she looks 40-50 and gets sick when she drinks alcohol, is paranoid, depressed and has a poor immune system) it is upsetting enough when its the effects of abuse - but to feed it to kids is just wrong. Sure, phet may deal with issues of motivation and self esteem in the short term but we are breeding a generation dependant on otherwise illegal substances. ADD etc is real, but widely misunderstood (often by those who diagnose/prescribe) it exists in a spectrum of symptoms loosely termed 'learning difficulties' most people can identify with one or more symptoms to some extent and need not be a problem at all. I was first diagnosed Dyslexic at about 9, which was just stupid because I was reading adult books and have never had trouble processing incoming data of any sort. then at 12 I was diagnosed Dyspraxic (clumsy child syndrome) which didnt fit either but was the only dyslexia type thing at the time with no effect on reading. At 19, I was tested again and was diagnosed 'Disgraphic' which is a hand-eye coordination issue (i see a straight line in my head - draw it and it comes out curved) it all worked in my favour - my lazy teachers put me in front of a BBC micro and told me to type - now I am an acomplished geek who works in the book trade - no medication required.
This perpetual motion machine Lisa made is a joke, it just keeps getting faster and faster. - Homer
speaking from my experience, I find the biggest problem is disciplining yourself. During semester time there is always something better to do then assignments and revision and the trick is to stay focused on studies while enjoying yourself as well. Metrics can help. We learnt about the PSP methodology in a recent unit and man that thing is really good. You keep track of your time and if you can stick to it for a week it gives a good idea of where you are spending you time. After that its a simple exercise in planning your time and keeping track and improving. Check out the PSP book by H S Watt, it is good stuff. Although I DO love being a lazy bastard......
I found a small cabin without water, toilet and of course no connection, but it had electricity. I lived there for a month while finishing my thesis. It was a 45 minute bike-ride on rather rugged roads down to campus (and a whole lot longer back, mainly because I would usually have a heavy backpack with food and bad uphill).
But it was absolutely great living out there. You can live at a so much slower pace, yet get so much more work done. pics from the place.
Employee of Inrupt, Project Release Manager and Community Manager for Solid
1. Drink water. Nothing else. No caffeine. No sugar.
2. Exercise. Regularly. Cardio atleast 30 minutes. Get that heart rate up. It'll clear your mind and help you focus.
3. Quit screwing around on the computer. Uninstall all the crap. Unplug the cat5. Make it so that you can only do your one task on it. And promise yourself a reward after you get that task done - ie I'll write up this/code up that, and afterward I can surf for 30 minutes, and then go for a walk/bikeride around the neighborhood/local trail for 30.
4. Take a drive down to the inner city. See how the people are living. Thank your lucky stars to know you aren't there. Realize if you don't get off your ass, you may be.
http://slashdot.org/~tf23/journal
Any one think it's just plain boredom? That's my problem. I just change what I'm doing to get over it or find a new way to make it intresting again.
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one " -Albert Einstein
You say you "aren't ADD". How do you know what you are or aren't, until you've been tested?
I was diagnosed with ADD two months ago, at the age of 34. If I'd gone for testing 20 years earlier, I'm sure my university career would have been a lot smoother (it wouldn't have taken me 7 years to get an undergrad degree).
ADD is a highly controversial diagnosis, though. Make sure you find someone who isn't afraid to make the diagnosis where appropriate, but who also isn't afraid to NOT make the diagnosis.
Read the book "Driven to Distraction" (I'd look it up on Amazon, but I'm too distracted right now) for more information.
All you need is a beautiful wife to watch over your shoulder to make sure you're doing work and not watching porn / homestar runner. Plus you get to sleep with her. That's exercise *and* stress relief, rolled into one! And someone talked about delayed gratification? Random reinforcement? Baby you'll get that by the truckload :)
your present 'work' or 'studies' are not of interest to you. what i suggest is that you change your major or field to coincide with whatever you dream about or really enjoy. by the way, if you continue with the present focus, your imagination will be submerged even more in the years ahead. branch out and focus on what you find most attractive.... then you find happiness and will not have to force your interest.
first: get rid of distraction. you said the internet was just a click away; so GET RID OF YOUR CONNECTIVITY when you need to get things done. If you use the internet for your work because you need email, restrict your connectivity to port 25.
start your day with some healthy exercising. a sound brain comes with a sound body.
Don't listen to music when at work; it'll only distract you.
Maybe you're suffering a mental disorder (lots of people do, whether they know it or not). Visit your doctor to be sure
less likely solution: Maybe some self-medication could help you too ! a collegue of me had a similar problem and solved it with amphetamin preparates (which is BAD for your health; I wouldn't recommend it to you !). But less hazardous drugs exist too ! just consult your doctor.
Troll ? Troll ? Where ? This isn't Tolkien !?!
r.
Exercise is good, (I run 5 miles a day). Good food is better. But the most important thing is attitude. If you are not grateful for your privilage to study then you should take a year off and work. I found I did a lot better in grad school because I was really grateful for the opportunity after working in a job I didn't like. If you don't believe me just really talk to any of the foreign students in your enviroment that had to work really hard to get to the position you are in.
Bookmark indeed.
GeekNights!
Late Night Radio for Geeks!
n/t
Can anyone please give advice on how to overcome this problem...medication
Stay away from Medication as behaviour modification. Im not a Scientologist, so dont rail against me for being crazy (please)... but I dont believe that the modern psychotropic meds as a 'cure-all' is a good idea. I cant comment on *exactly* why you cant sit down to do work -- i have much the same problem... but taking medication to be 'more productive' is never the answer. Frankly, if you are not 'productive enough' for the path youve chosen, you need to consider something else... if your imagination provides pleasure, why avoid it? Your humanity (literally) is at stake, do not risk your "self" -- by taking chemicals -- so that you can meet external goals.
If your clothed, fed, and relatively capable of staying that way, you are not mentally unstable enough to justify this course of action.
Did you ever consider that you have simply chosen to do something that you dont enjoy? if so, why do it? Life is too short to torture yourself -- or choose medication to make that toruture bearable.
The obvious answers of course are exercise and turning off your fucking computer or at least getting off the Net and not coming to Slashdot. Rewarding yourself etc is great. BUT in college unless you are a CS major (are you?) you don't need a computer that much.
It is much more important to get the information into your brain and integrated than to get it into your computer. And, there are very few (any?) computer-based tools which will make your life easier now. Seriously. I can say this because I powered down 25 kanji a day for 9 weeks in my off time at Middlebury college one summer and it was just pencil, paper, and a 1 cm window I tore with my fingernail. People's brains just don't need computers except to manipulate big information complexes. You don't have that problem now. Also I remember (maybe I'm just wierd) that I could usually remember what part of a page an illustration or quote was on (a biology textbook), and in that summer of learning Japanese my head got so meshed with one book (Nelson's kanji dictionary, awesome) that I would be able to somehow turn to exactly the right section I needed the first time my thumb hit the edge of the book. Try being creative. At least it will be interesting, will save your eyes, and will make sure you are only looking at things you need for your work.
I will tell you that I had a wonderful time looking for quiet places to study. I found the beautiful law school library (at Cornell), carrels (little desks) deep in library stacks, the President's library, the ABC cafe, and other quiet areas successfully.
But here is some advice that might help you even after you've gone through everything else. I once spent a few days of a summer internship with a customer who happened to be a Billionaire with a capital B. I have to tell you, it made a big impression. Just being in close proximity to someone and understanding how they think makes you sharper. In your case, find a friend who is really good at studying and ask if they can show you where to study. Or find someone in the same shoes as you are and make a deal to beat each other up to get your work done.
Anyway if anything else I recommend trying to turn off the computer and using paper and pencil/pen and other paper-based technology. Sometimes I know you just feel too energetic or too zoned out to do anything. Those times I recommend doing exercise and working up a sweat. Your body metabolism will get charged and after you cool down your brain chemistry or whatever it is will probably be more crystal clear. Or, go for a walk by yourself in the evening with your books, find somewhere you don't know, sit down and just start working. If you post more about what your work is people might have more answers for you but the best answer I think is to remove all the barriers to learning you have, including low energy/blood sugar levels, distractions, visual input, muscular aches, and so on. Oh yeah, you can also go do your laundry at a laundromat.
I have a nice desk setup in my bedroom with my computer, and plenty of space to work. The problem is, I can't work in my bedroom! I sleep, read, and play in my bedroom. When I'm in there, I simply can't change my head around to focus on work. Instead, I set myself up on the large dining room table with a pot of tea and work there. I find I can concentrate for hours in that room. I now associate it with work, and more importantly, productivity.
I am a university student diagnosed with ADD when I was 10. In my personal experience ADD is when, even when you want to consentrate on a task, you are unable to. ADHD is when you want to sit a be quiet are are also unable to. (these are -personal experience- definitions, not the medical ones) I'm a computer science minor so I do my fair share of programming durring the school year and at first I did the do-it-the-night-before-at-3AM thing then I began reliing on my medication which changes my personality signifigantly and although it allows me to work for a time it also makes me useless when I'm not working. The best solution I found was to break my project into the tiniest pieces possible. I know this sounds like the same advice you'll get anywhere but plan your project to death and break it into tiny little tasks which can be done in under 15 minutes (or whatever you find your attention can stretch to, your best way to find out is. Look at the clock, now start work on somthing you find moderatly interesting, the next time your mind wanders away fro the subject, look a thte clock again, the time inbetween was your attention span, find your average for whatever kind of work you're doing). Then do though throught your time. Do one when you get up or before you go to bed, in the half an hour you have before you go to lunch or class. If you've got a lot of time on your hands do one, then do your laundry or read a chapter in a book (not your school books, or at least a book in a different subject), then do another, preferably in a different section of your work. Mix things up so that you don't feel overwhelmed by just one thing. If you've got a piece that has to be done together but will take longer than your usual block, do it in halves with a short break. Read one (just one) slashdot story that catches your interest, give the parts of your brain you've been using a rest then go back and finish. You'll feel better when you've only got a few loose ends to tie up the night before instead of half the project. Oh and don't leave too many loose ends for the night before, because one little issue can sometimes baloon into another 3am problem. Good luck!
-Department Head of the Department of Redundancy, Department Head
Going back to earlier ADD / ADHD posts...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3102137.stm
"Hyperactivity just 'high spirits'"
Yes just pretend the due date is much earlier that way you will be craming for it and it will be acutally done early.
See I have the same problem im also going to college and having a hard time keeping up to date with all the assignments. But lately i have written in my agenda that its due at an early date so that way i cram and stress it early before the actual due date.
Thats the best remedy
It seems a lot of people are proposing a reward method. :)
I work from home...so, maybe it would work.
I shall ask my girlfriend to give me a bj if I manage to reach my goals daily?
A daily blowjob....I would stop watching tv and sleeping during the day for sure!
Karma: Very Very Very Very Bad
The motivation factor can tough. But, in terms of getting stuff done, I've found it helps to write a step-by-step list of the steps needed to do whatever it is you're trying to do. Don't make them big steps or too general. Just the steps it takes with real deliverables at the end of each step. Then, start to tackle one thing at a time. It might not be as emotionally satisfying as tackling and finishing one big thing. But at least you can hopefully make some progress.
about the only thing I found that helps when I really need to concentrate is music
I'm quite the opposite. I used to have music on all the time when I was doing school homework, but since then I've learned that I can't concentrate on a task while also listening to music: I feel the need to listen to the music, rather than let it wash over me.
Different people's minds work in different ways though. My girlfriend likes to have Soaps on TV while she works, and she can really do this. I'm incapable of even simple tasks, like reading a novel, while *anything* is on TV.
If you believe _Kitchen_Confidential_ by Anthony Bourdain, the life of a "waitron" (or a line cook) IS rather awash in sexual opportunities.
By the way, if you think this book would interest you at all, buy it. It's great.
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
Honestly, I don't really know how I do it. I guess time and being able to do a little bit of everything is just something that you have to continually work on until you have it figured out. I try and do my work first thing in the morning so that I can go to work later and be with friends at night. I do agree with the other person that exercise is a great way to destress also. Even if it's ten minutes...it helps!!!
Most of the posts in this article, including the parent, focus on "How do I alter myself to fit in reasonably well with society?" People who don't do this are generally labled insane, or eccentric "at best." But these people are often the most fascinating, and create the best art. Go to the Visionary Art Museum in Washington D.C. Handel's Messiah? Written in one manic fit.
You have heard the saying, "Jack of all trades, master of none." The same is true of life; if you are a well-balanced person, or even partially well-balanced, then you will never accomplish the types of things that someone maniacally driven in one direction can do.
It is true that you need some small amount of "sanity" to survive long enough to create. You have to remember to eat, wear clothes, not kill people, etc. In the case of many geniuses, it's a fine line.
I am a balanced person, largely because I can't make up my mind. I resent it often, but I realize that it's probably the way for me. Is it "healthier"? Yes. But we need the "crazy" people too. Let's not be so quick to medicate them all out of existance.
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
I had the same "problem" and it is not really eradicated, but it's more in control.
My solution: I've got myself a SmartPhone (the kyocera 6035). Having my todo list always with me is really useful
I've also read the book The Now Habit from Neil A. Fiore. (ISBN:0874775043) I've found it really interesting, there is good trick. The philosophy behind his method is to maximise our "fun time". I have read other "procrastination" book and this one worth the read.
You can also look if your university offer work methodology or "quit procrastination" course.
This doesn't work if you just end up checking out every cute girl that comes in. Nothing breeds sexual fantasization more than boredom.
This is a good way to break down tasks into manageable bites. I use the same tactic when hiking/climbing ("just to that boulder then rest, ok now just to that ledge...").
I prefer to break up tasks into completion based pieces instead of time based pieces. For instance, I also had to do a spring cleaning of my apt. I broke it up into rooms or even sections of large rooms, "I'm going to clean the storage room, then I'll move the couch and get that whole side of the room..." I didn't stop until I had finished that subproject and didn't start a new one until the old one was completed (barring something forcing me to stop temporarily). I feel this is more satisfying for people like myself who have to take a task to completion but would otherwise never start a big task because of the intimidation factor and the fear of not being able to finish the project as a whole.
I couldn't handle your trick of stopping in mid-thought, once I get going I have to ride that wave of mental momentum while it is there or I risk losing it.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
Funny that people who don't have ADD/ADHD are the most sceptical of it. Spend one day driven absolutely crazy because you can't focus on a task, or becuase you can't start a task that you DON'T EVEN MIND DOING then tell me there's no such disorder. Overdiagnosed? Probably. Abused by teachers, etc..? Probably. But it exists. It's a major pain in the ass.
Finally, all those who are talking about focusing for hours at a time. It's called "hyperfocus" and its a symptom of ADHD! It's how ADD folks can work 12 hours straight ahead of a deadline and get something done. It's amazing and wonderful - I'd love to have it on demand.
Anyone remember _A Fire Upon the Deep_ by Vernor Vinge? It's kinda like that, but with bathing.
I have no idea if what you claim is true or not, but from my own experience with owning several dogs, random positive reinforcement works head and shoulders better than constant reinforcement, either positive or negative. That's not to say constant reinforcement can't work, it's just not the best.
I could not justify my existence if I were a turkey farmer. Would I terminate myself? Undoubtably, yes.
I was in college from age 18-19 and then again from 28-29. In that decade split, I learned one thing: it's what you do in the disconnected moments of the day - the ten minutes here, the fifteen minutes there - that makes all the difference. Barring that, setup a class and work schedule that give bigger chunks of time.
At the second college I attended, my roommates were always amazed at the fact that I was able to have my evenings mostly free after about 8:30 at night. Considering that I was taking four or more credit hours per semester than average, also made them wonder all the more.
The trick was that I learned how to do my work in the many little bits of downtime during the day - such as between classes, waiting in line for meals, while traveling to and from classes. I also learned that from time to time I was going to have to "sacrifice" an entire Saturday to schoolwork. Taking a job monitoring the computer lab gave me the option to read materials I had to read for classes while also working, too.
I structured my classes in such a way that instead of taking hour-long classes three times a week, I took three hour-long classes once a week. That freed up bigger chunks of time for extended work or made it easier for me to schedule my computer lab job.
Another tactic is to schedule classes so that they are very close to each other on campus. If you have a ten or fifteen minute walk between buildings, that's time you either lose or have to find clever ways to utilize. I scheduled my classes so that I was rarely more than a five minute walk from one to another.
One other tactic is to jam a lot of classes into Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, therefore having Tuesdays and Thursdays free. Since many profs have work due on Mondays and Fridays, it gives you at least a day and a half before work is due. On most Mondays, I was in class from 8:30 AM till 9PM, but that freed my other days to be a lot lighter. Since most of my work was assigned on Mondays, that gave me a light week to follow up. But I would from time to time still use up all of Monday and work until midnight if I knew I could knockout something quickly that was assigned that day. Tuesday would then come with no classes (or only one - and that was usually scheduled right after lunch or right before dinner so I'd be on campus and not waste time in travel) and plenty of large blocks of time for study and work.
With this schedule and plan, most of my time-intensive work was done by Wednesday at around 8:30 PM. This plan worked great and I was able to graduate Summa Cum Laude.
As I watched younger students work, I saw how they squandered ten minutes here and twenty minutes there in transitioning from one activity or class to another. Do that four or five times a day and you've lost a lot of time that work could have been done in. If you cannot work in those pieces of time, schedule them to be filled the way I did and let time accumulate in bigger chunks.
Blessings!
You're not alone. You'll grow out of it, or get used to it.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I went to college in New Orleans. I discoverd a "standard" schedule was impossible to keep. The walls of apartments that students could afford were paper thin, and there was a bar open to 4am on every corner. If I went to bed I couldn't sleep, and I would be exhausted the next day.
I eventually figured out a schedule that worked for me in the environment. I got up around 7-8pm, ate supper. Then I would go out with friends in the evening. I would get back late and do homework and study. This would seqway into breakfast and going to classes at 8am and when those were finished it was back to bed.
Self motivation was the second factor. I had precious little money to spend, but I only allowed my self to buy a compact disc when I had gotten a good grade on a project or test. At first I was saving money, as I began studying for a new cd harder and harder-- I had to make the rewards harder and harder for myself to attain. Self-motivation will work wonders.
I used to wonder what was so holy about a silent night, now I have a child.
I think you have an impluse control problem. I had the same problem for the longest time until I started taking Welbutrin. It helps me focus and keep distrations from distracting. If you don't have ADD or ADHD this probally would work for you. It is also used to treat smoking under Zyban. It has many other positive side effects, such as weight loss and increased sexual enjoyment. (Note I am not a doctor).
-mu
I don't think the problem here is lack of energy, but rather procrastination.
You can view procrastination as a problem, or as a difference in work style. In college, I used to write almost all my papers in the wee hours before the deadline--before that point, I couldn't get much done. But it wasn't about not enjoying the work (I did, sorta, usually) and it wasn't about fear of failure. I just couldn't get it into gear until I needed to, and then I just thrived. There was a certain euphoria in completing an A paper at 4 in the morning...
In college it's possible to just adapt to this work style. Plan on late-night work. Go out or play games if you feel like it, if you're not up against a deadline. Stop beating yourself up about it, if you can consistently do good work at the last minute.
In the "real world" it's a little tricky. You wind up doing these intense bursts of fulfilling work when there's a deadline, interspersed with long stints of trudging along on longterm stuff. I work great under pressure. I get bored when there's no deadline in sight--I can do the work, but it's harder to do it then.
For me, the biggest problem posed by procrastination--by far--is that it makes you look like a slacker until you hit T-minus-1 and go into a working frenzy. Some people don't understand that your average output is at least as good as the guy in the next cube who's plugging away slowly every minute of the day. And for me that's where the stress lies. My ideal work pattern is to work like a maniac for a while, read Slashdot for a while, go talk to my buddies, repeat, repeat. My main stress at work is worrying about getting busted for steps 2 and 3 of that process.
But here goes.
I had this exact same problem and still do to some extent.
What worked for me, was analyzing WHY I was procastinating on a particular task.
It turned out to be mainly for one of two reasons
(1) The task is mind-numbingly boring(e.g tax returns, paying bills, balancing checkbooks).
In this case, I try to get some help on it, break it down into smaller tasks or just postpone it until it becomes more urgent.
(2) I really don't know what I am doing and I am intimidated by the size of the task. In this case, I try to think of a small subproblem in the task or (very important) ASK FOR HELP. I discovered I was wasting way too much time simply because I was so reluctant to ask for help when I was stuck.
In addition of course, it also helps if you get enough sleep and exercise well. If you are well rested you will feel good, and if you feel good you are more likely to be able to 'push' yourself to complete a task.
The only reason all cover-ups appear to fail is that you never hear about the ones that succeed.
'Code' can be a plural.
The plural of "code" is "codes." However, the plural form of "code" is never used when referring to "source code." Much like the word "water" when used to refer to a drink, pluralizing it is awkward sounding and incorrect.
We don't say...
"I'm sure that the code produced are of real high quality."
"I'm sure that the codes produced are of real high quality."
Anymore than we say...
"I'm sure that the waters were very refreshing."
We DO say...
"I'm sure that the code produced is of real high quality."
"I'm sure that the water was very refreshing."
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
its meant for RSI prevention, but could absolutely be used for this
http://www.workrave.org/
tasty electronic music vittles
replace "our" with out in my previous subject line ;)
tasty electronic music vittles
I'm in the same boat. I work best after midnight, alone in the office, tired, yet caffienated from a 64oz Diet Pepsi / Dr. Pepper mix from 7-11, listening to techno music. The music should be familiar and not random to avoid be distracting.
In this state, I code at 500%+ my normal efficiency, blazing through bug-fixes and enhancements one after another. When I code during the day, there's too many distractions, too many other worries, and considerations. I suck at writing prose even more so, and though I can write quickly once I get started, it takes a *long time* to get started.
If I'm not tired to the point of turning off the distraction demons, I've found that drinking some vodka sometimes helps. Just enough to quiet my internal procrastinator, but not so much that I'm drunk. Use in moderation.
I'm stuck now with a marriage, evening classes and a mandatory 9am job that make it difficult for me to have my midnight coding sessions. Thanks to the rest of you for the other advice!
I found the best way to get started in the morning is to leave myself specific notes on the next day's calendar for my first 3 tasks. For example, "email Mom re laundry," "do calculus problems 1 thru 5," "Outline Ch 1 of PolySci report". Then set a specific time and place to start work (maybe a desk or table). When you sit down [note: don't lie down; stay away from the bed monster], have your coffee or other beverage handy, or do without. The key is to begin. By the time you have done your first 3 tasks, you should be on a roll which will let you easily move on to your other studies. Good luck!
some damn guy: You're pretty smart.
MAKE YOUR TIME
It's called Lexapro. I take it and although I have nothing like ADD or ADHD, I found my focus to go through the roof.
I have to say a good, swift, kick up the pants does wonders for me :) Also, understanding how I think and learn was very useful. Are you a visual, auditory, or kinesthenic learner? Do you need to eat popcorn or put stuff to music, or huddle in a cold, dark corner? Write a list of daily goals, break them into smaller tasks. Try finding someone sympathetic to be accountable to (for that kick up the pants!). But the one thing that worked best for me was writing a timeline of my assignments and then only thinking of one at a time - don't let stress paralyse you.
A qaint remark made on the BS7 post about Shakespeare being the definitive resource for characterisation. Could Asimov also be considered a resource for ideas on science, thinking and learning?
Consider the plot for Profession . This story outlines a similiar observation mentioned above. Where,
[Isimov.I., Profession, 1957 (republished - Nine Tomorrows) - information compiled by John Jenkins]
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
I'm sorry you haven't heard. Welcome to Socialist America. Anyone who doesn't talk to others, doesn't participate in mind-numbingly stupid group tasks such as football games and county fairs, doesn't really bother or interact with anyone else in society in any noticeable way, is a sociopath.
It's probably listed in the DSM somewhere, along with dislike of foreigners and unwillingness to interbreed with other races.
Face it, you're reckless disregard for everyone else is harming us all.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
It's amazing that I haven't ever heard of this before now. I fit your description *exactly*, and from what I've seen the past few minutes searching sites on the 'net, I fit a lot of the other stereotypes of those with delayed-phase syndrome as well. I am *much* more clear-headed and productive after ~10PM. I tend to sleep for 12 hours at a time.
Before now, I thought it might be some sort of sleep apnea, because I do snore terribly, but I typically feel rested and I don't ever nap during the day unless I've done extensive exercise. A friend's father was recently diagnosed with sleep apnea. He said the doctor could tell just by looking at him: he had *huge* bags under his eyes, with a droopy facial expression and apparently other obvious physical characteristics. I don't think that fits me very well.
I remember describing my sleep schedule to a friend a few years ago. It's as though I have a longer "day" than everyone else; I wake up two hours later every day. Eventually, my schedule "rolls over" and I can maintain normal sleep patterns for a while. Invariably, though, I tend to fall back into the same pattern. I've often stayed up for 24+ hours straight and tried to go to bed at a decent hour the next day, but that only works temporarily.
I tried sleeping pills and that worked for a while. It helped me go to bed, but it didn't seem to help with waking up.
I discovered Melatonin about a year ago and that helps tremendously. It doesn't help that I don't see the daylight often, which should be another reason programmers are susceptible. I've thought about using a tanning bed a few times a week, but I don't know exactly whether that would help or hurt.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
The first thing to do is practice good "sleep hygeine".
t ml
Here's a starter:
http://www.stanford.edu/~dement/howto.h
This is very effective.
She will want to organise your life.
Resistance is futile.
Something outside? Civil engineer? Ski instructor? Pilot?
Something where you work with your hands? carpenter? Mason?
These are all good jobs in which you can earn a good living, are respectable, and will engage you in body as well as mind.
Some folks just can't sit at a terminal all day long staring at gdb or Visual Basic.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
As a high school student, i live and die by the chronometer, save for the summer w/o a job.
:( )
My circadian cycle was FUBAR, up at 1200-1300 down at 0400-0500. My lab has no windows (natural sunlight and gaming, coding, and tweaking don't mix), but the same basic 16/8 hr cycle applies when caffeine free, and no scattered brain.
I think i'm gonna lay off the caffeine, save for a 1/4 cup of coffee in the morning ocasionally (read: monday morning).
I took a weight training vlass last year, foir the first 4 weeks I HATED EVERY MINUTE!! then I started getting more energy and started loosing weight and i couldn't get enough of it. must get to the gym now...
Drink juices, the natural kind (orange juice for one). Was at a LAN party a few months ago, the soda ran out (the other 40 or so in attendence threatened to riot), but a pal and I, desperate for something non-caffeinated found a gallon of OJ in the cooler and BAM!! a caffeine-like buzz without the brain fraggage (result: better frag rate, higher kill/death ratio, etc).
in short:
NO CAFFEINE, exercise and wake up at the same time
(during the school year i automagically wake up at 6:00, usually too late tho
Logistical Chaos Officer http://www.slagg.org - LAN Gaming in Sarasota FL,USA
...and I graduated Magna Cum Laude and a Distinction in CS. All through high school people would nag about procrastination, but it was when I procrastinated I did my best work. True, some people should not due it, it is detrimental to the work they produce, but I think there are a few out there where procrastination IS their work habit.
I tried turning off TV, music -- did the classical thing, didn't like it and felt like a sellout -- quiet study area, yadda, yadda, yadda. When it came down to it, 1am to class starting (a la 9am) was when I was the most productive and how I earned my A's. I've actually done assignments before they were due -- in a 'timely' manner, of you will -- and received worse grades than cranking the same assignment out in 4 hours or so.
For me, procrastination not only was a work habit, but it was more productive. It took me the night before a class to finish the majority of the assignment; this is condensed productivity. What would have taken me fragmented nights working ahead on assignments took only hours when the pressure was really on, leaving the majority of my college days and nights open to go to the bar and have fun.
My advice to you is continuing working how you see fit. Only you know what works best for you, and changing that will only make you less productive since you will be out of your element. Crank up that TV/MP3 background noise, run AIM, constantly check your email, and get ready to earn the best grades you can those precious hours before class!
And for the record, I have never had caffeine and don't drink coffee. It is the mindset that beats the tiredness and only the weak crack and go to sleep!
My 'default' state is entropy: My desk is cluttered with everything from tapes to betteries, to The Anti-Federalist Papers and the Constitutional Convention Debates to the Franck Muller watch catalog to my assortment of O'Reilly books to random notes and calculators and schedules and burnt CDs (labeled and otherwise) watches and so forth. I've got a DSL modem and a wireless router and ethernet cable strewn over my room, clothes lying about. Moreover, my schedule defaults to chaos and randomness that any cryptographer would envy: I pull those A papers at 3 AM, have no clue what I'm going to be doing that day; it's all kind of spur-of-the-moment.
That is, until recently.
Lately, I've been trying to take control of my time management and procrastination. And I've discovered that the main problem is the general lack of order in my life. Now, I have ADD fairly severely, and I live in a sort of chaos, so this may not be the case for you, but as I've been ordering the various parts of my life, my study skills and time management has been falling into place.
For instance, every day I get up and organize my desk (and it does indeed need it every day). I put all my little miscellaneous files into subdirectories in ~. All those clothes lying around? Wash 'em, hang 'em up. That stack of papers and books over there? Categorize it by topic.
Another thing that I've noticed that helps is having a schedule. I wake up at the same time every day, and briskly walk for an hour. For one, I need the exercise. Secondly, it helps me start the day with a little bit of energy. Thirdly, it gives me some sense of concreteness in my life. Want to go do something? Check the schedule.
In a nutshell, it's my experience that the more ordered you make your life in general, the more it will become natural to be productive. Granted, it's just a way bring a little order in the chaos, and I still do those 3 AM papers--but I have one, or maybe two papers to do at 3 AM, as opposed to like, five.
Come on, mod this up: you know it was Insightful.
I have discovered a truly marvelous
It's a simple creedo of focusing on things. I tend to put things off too, much like you're saying. A good way of getting work done is to pressure yourself into doing work, sort of in a matter as if you are working at a restaurant, where you are ALWAYS working. Get into that mindset, and you can usually get things done.
And it turns out there was an explanation, and a treatment, that could have benefitted me years ago if I'd only known.
My symptoms are periods of extreme activity, when I am single-minded, incredibly dedicated, and incredibly productive. At home this evidences itself as deep dedication to my hobbies and family. Sounds great right?
Not really.
For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Following the periods of super-activity are periods of extreme lethargy. I can sit in front of my PC for hours and do nothing. Even if I have things to do, important things, I cannot keep my mind upon them long enough to get them done. At home, all I do is watch TV. I can't be bothered to converse, as all it does it make me angry. And there's nothing I can do about it.
It's been like this for (at least) 10 years. Fortunately for me, the majority of the time I am hyper-productive, so the periods of lethargy were un-noticeable. Starting about 2 years, that gradually changed, and now it's become the opposite. I hardly ever have the desire, energy, or attention span to accomplish anything.
I spent more time and energy than I care to describe trying to correct this behavior in myself, on the assumption that is was simply something I needed to work on as I aged. To a great extent it worked, allowing my to remain semi-productive during the low points, and over-compensate during the high points. But no amount of dedication could make it stop getting worse.
As it turns out, I am bipolar. Specifically, I'm mixed bipolar, meaning I oscillate between mania and depression. It runs in my family (which I did not know until several months ago), and has ruined the lives of several of my family members. I always thought they were just eccentric, or jerks, but they have the same problem as me. The sad thing is that when untreated, bipolar disorder gets worse with time, until you sorta drift out of reality. I have an older relative who has gone untreated all her life, and it's sad to see what it has done to her. She's extremely wealthy, but lives like a pauper because she's convinced that she has no money, and that the government is coming to take it all away. She's incapable of having a conversation that does not involve her money, it's the only thing she can think about.
It's funny on one level, and horribly depressing on another.
The solution: medication. There are several to choose from, and my doctor and I are working to find a combination that works for me. So far, it's been difficult, but things are getting better every day.
The lesson here is that if you honestly cannot solve it yourself (and I mean honestly - it took me 4 years to decide I had to seek help), you should see a doctor. Start with your family practioner, and if they canot help, they will refer you to a specialist.
And as a closer, I also believe ADHD/ADD, and a variety of other related disorders, are widely over-diagnosed in this country. Many people who simply need to get their ass in gear and do their share are relying on pills to solve their problems. But if you are one of the few who truly need medication, it's important to find out now, before it becomes unmanageable.
Take it out in the boonies, load, aim...Nah, too destructive. But do unplug that annoyance when you're trying to get anything brain-intensive done. Remember that an interruption, any interruption, kills about 30 minutes of productivity--even if the interruption itself lasts but 30 seconds. The lost time is spent getting back on track, recovering a derailed train of thought, etc. You need continuous peace and quiet to get things done. Multiple fragmented time bites won't cut it!
I've been there. Feeling numb and staring at the screen, just totally blank. I think everyone who's programmed for a living has been there, and then felt the corresponding "Uh-oh, they're paying me to get this done" pang.
I know a famous writer who said "When I've got writer's block, I just write." He picked up a pencil and wrote sentences... bad ones, good ones, poetry, anything, just to get the process underway. Once the cycle had started, he was on the right track, and the engine would eventually "catch".
For me, coding is a lot the same way. The hard part for me has always been recognizing the "blocked" condition... once I realize I'm stuck, then it's relatively easy (for me, anyway) to get out: I just code some infinitely small part of what I know needs to get done, but something I can be completely done with in the next 60 seconds to 5 min. Usually this is something stupid like:
Or sometimes the primitive that's going to need to be in the inner loop. Basically, something that I could ALMOST code while holding my breath which has very well defined scale. If the project is fuzzy, I think smaller until I can get my arms around some part of the code, and code that. Once I'm started, I'm good to go.For me, it's the same way. The longer I've coded, the more I've come to realize that the ability to start coding on demand is a really useful skill, and often :( one of the first to leave you.
i don't get any work done. i go to meetings and sit in on conference calls all day.
it's real fun.
hehe i had that
My medications was this
knowing usually the body hour/hours after dinner signs that wants to rest but most people arent listening.
I just "opened" a comunication line from my body to my brain: it lasts 10-20 min if i dont head to bed at that time only hours after that i'll have another go.
i think the body pumps adrenaline if we dont go to bed when body signs it wants to rest.
my third grade teacher broke me. Instead of working i would stare at whatever there was to stare at and daydream constantly. As you can imagine, there are lots of things to look at in elementary classrooms so I never got any work done. My teacher recognized the problem and had me sit near her desk with my back to the window. When that didn't help she put my desk right up against the front of hers. It was as if we were sharing the same desk and we were facing directly at eachother. She would quitly notice any time i became distracted and brought me back to reality.
Needless to say, I found it extemely embaracing in front of the reast of the class, needing to be babysat like that. It worked. I was quickly back with the rest of my class and was even voted "hardest working" by my class my senior year of highschool.
So my suggestion (if you ever read this far - there's already more responces than I would ever read) is to strip your room of anything interesting. No pics on the walls, no wallpaper (on the wall or on your computer) and unplug you computer from the phone line. Close the shades/blinds (make sure they are plain solid and boring to look at). With nothing to do, you will be so bored that the only interesting thing avalable will be the work at hand. Sure, it will feel like torture, but that will help you want to break the problem on a subcontious level as well.
Still having problems. Find the most annoying person you can and ask them for help. Make sure you cann't stand talking to them or looking at them. The more stuborn they are the better. Now anytime you need to get some work done have them over. Their job is to make sure you work. As you won't want to interact with this person, and will most likely be embarrased needing such a persons assistance you should be cured in no time flat.
Hye, it work for me.
For extra Geek Points, the Vulcan persona was based, in some part, on the Japanese culture. What would Spock think if you weren't getting things done?
Sounds reckless. "We had you because Daddy was a near-bum, but it didn't work and he's still a bum."
..on account of the processors not being able to get all of the hexane [3rd par] back out again [2nd par].
Not all decaf coffee is produced using hexane. In fact, a substantial amount of decaffeination uses solvents that are not considered harmful if they cannot be retrieved. Common solvents include CO2 and water.
Try to find a supplier for 'swiss water' decaffeinated coffee. It really is much better than average decaf...
But remember that whatever method used, decaf still contains a substantial amount of caffeine...
but I never seem to manage to get around to it.
I find my self in a similar situation often. Though, I have not tried much to prevent it. If I am ever stressed or just can't think I go out running or biking. It is best if you work really hard to wear yourself down (Well, not completely, but you have to exert some energy). Then you can enjoy a shower (Best if you have time to cool off and relax first). Usually afterward I feel much better. Personally, I would stay away from caffeine and other things that are not something that you do (for yourself) to accomplish the clean state of mind. (Not that you should not drink caffeinated beverages, but not to do so heavily. They can help so one or two is fine, but you get the picture.) You know how you feel when you accomplish something that you have been working on for a while, and you look back at it and say wow? If you do it yourself you will enjoy it more, and it is not just a physical thing, but also a mental thing that you are trying to accomplish. Now for finding time, you don't. You just have to do it so that you can save time. When you can't think efficiently then you are slower and take up time. If you clear your mind it will take less time to accomplish what you are doing. Once you squeeze in time to exercise then eventually your schedule could relax back to its previous state and perhaps even more. But like I stated earlier I have trouble with this too. So I am not the best person to take advice from, but one thing that I have found to work is exercise and I wanted to let you know that I agree with Delphix.
(And I think the finding someone to help make you go (and you for him) is a great idea, but I would probably not end up doing that. So you/I need to find someone that is willing, and (even though I don't really want to and you might not and want to) after time you/I might enjoy it or at least feel obligated to go for that person.)
Don't worry I am not suggesting us teaming up (we are probably not even in the same area...I hope.) Because right now I think I am ok and will probably find out later that I needed to do that...but until then I will continue running and biking when I need to, and on my own.
my only advice to you, is just be patient. you wont be a student forever. especially not a fresh man. i know the second year is nor as hard and the third year is much easier. then again, maybe its easy for me to talk 'caus i live with my girlfriend... anyway, just be patient - next year all we'll be better. (tomorrow tomorrow, i'll wait for...)