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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!
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).
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
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?
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.
My record is 55 hours of straight coding.
Followed, no doubt, by six weeks of debugging.
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
Unfortunately for many people there is no commercial, paying field which they'd enjoy.
If he's really worried about procrastination on the job, however, something a little more structured like systems administration might be a better choice. When you have people screaming at you because they just lost all connectivity, the urge to procrastinate for the most part vanishes.
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.
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.
spelling..
-------
"In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
-- George Orwell
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.
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
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?
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.
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 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.
- 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 don't agree with that assumption. I really like what I do. A lot. But, I often have a similar problem with procrastination. In my case it's often because I enjoy thinking about the problem and solving it in my mind. Implementation is a long boring part that I sometimes even dread. Documentation is even worse.
... the list goes on.... How do you do this and not begin to be exhausted by it?
I noticed this kind of problem started with me in about 1995. I was a Mac dev at the time and was suddenly finding myself exhausted by Apple's continuous cycle of producing massive huge API's for devs to learn...all just to abandon them shortly thereafter. PowerTalk was one such example. If you want to build a world-class product it's going to need to have all 1 million checklist items finished as features in it. Which means you have to follow all the trends and respond accordingly. Trouble is, each one trend is a huge job.
It used to be that a single person could produce a great work in the computer field as a hobbiest. Commercial software wasn't a whole lot more impressive than shareware. Now days it's tough to go alone. You can do it if your application targets a niche. But, imagine writing a shareware word processor alone today? Who would bother? Why? OSS gives us a way to deal with this by removing the "alone" factor, replacing it with ad-hoc teams, or virtual teams, or even real teams. But, OSS is starting to really piss me off. Maybe people that still support OSS haven't been out of a job for enough months.
So, today, there is just so much to know and learn and follow. It's too easy to start feeling that it's all just a bunch of crap trivia and lose interest entirely. I have long-time (18+ years) dev friends that now sell cars and hope to never touch a computer again. At my last job I'd look out the window at a construction crew and wish I could be shovelling dirt, too. Of course, they looked up at the building and wished they could be out of the rain.
How do you keep up your C++ skills, and your Perl skills, and your Java skills...while learning UML, trying out Struts, contributing to Mozilla, developing on opinion on Rebol, D, or Erlang... offering "tech support" to all your family and friends,
Another poster suggested exercise. He might be right. I used to run a *lot* and play inline skate hockey. But, all that ended about 1995. So, for me at least...it's either lack of exercise, or the fact that CS is more complicated chock full of trivia than ever before, or the combination of both.
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'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
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.
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
**Worst advice ever**
/. community. He's seeking out different ways at becoming productive. Your response was delightfully unhelpful.
Him: "Can slashdot tell me what I need to get myself boostrapped and productive?"
You: "You know what you need punk? To bootstrap yourself and get to work!"
He knows what his problem is, that's why he's asking the
Some people are blessed with the talent to just be effortlessly productive. Others need to put effort into it, some will not become productive until a crisis hits them, and a few will never be productive at all (which costs everyone time and money.) If you're in the first group, then congratulations, if you're in the second group, then congratulations that you found your system, if you're in the third group then I'm sorry for whatever may have happened (that also seem to have added a new crutch to you that you're not entirely aware of.)
Unfortunately, in the modern world, this is very difficult.
None of this breeds any kind of productivity ethic. Even if you are very interested in a field, and approach its study with enthusiasm, you are likely to run out of steam before you reach the end of your study, gradually disillusioned by the degree to which you must endlessly specialize, sublimate your own identity, avoid creativity, sacrifice future freedoms and learn the ins and outs of petty business, all in order to simply build a career doing something you thought you liked.
I personally feel that most men (and women) given a chance would prefer to be craftsmen (and women) of some kind, in whatever their chosen field, bringing a quality and uniquely personal product to the people of their own community. Instead, because of the nature of the modern marketplace, many essentially become clerks and civil servants in one field or another order to be able to draw a wage.
As a result, and lacking enthusiasm, we end up sitting around browsing the Web and dreaming of something better... but those who develop the fortitude to switch inevitably find that their new field is, on balance, not all that different from their last one... still all business, anonymity and colorless, impersonal nonsense.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
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 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"
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.
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
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).
Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
hth
'yields false when preceded by its quotation' yields false when preceded by its quotation.
No offense Paradox but I'm reading lots of platitudes - "Quick learner", "less training", "practice learning." Not sure this translates into anything solid given my 20 years of coding in various ways.
I had a recent experience that I found amusing (kind of). I kept reading how employers were looking at "soft skills" now a lot more than the past and how "pure tech" wasn't going to cut it. Recently I wound up hooking up with some head hunter whose client insisted that any potential candidate take exams on Brainbench.com. Fine. I went along. I took an exam they set me up with. I scored 79% on the C++ exam. Not bad since it had been YEARS since I had actively coded in C++ (real stuff like class design, not simple subclasses to handle GUI events).
In my day I would keep up with the ANSI committee and enjoy reading what Scott Meyers et al had to say. (Aside: I just dumped my entire collection of "C++ Report" into the recycle bin)
That was then, this is now.
Turns out, the head hunter's client (who I might work for) had REALLY wanted me to take the Visual C++ Brainbench exam. I thought to myself, "Wow, so much for soft skills if all they are interested in is a number on some exam." Despite having Microsoft on my resume and having a capacity of "Lead Architect" in my last employer it seemed they were looking for some "magic number". I told the head hunter "No thanks" (much to his chagrin) and sent a polite letter to the HR person who sent me the URL for taking the test stating that I didn't think it was a "fit."
Truth is, today I WOULD in fact like to leverage my soft skills more than in the past. These people were looking for a grunt coder. Plain and simple. Been there, done that.
Fed up with the idiotic HR people and the dearth of anything interesting, today I'm selling cars by choice. Hondas specifically.
Let me make things clear, my biggest frustration in tech is the idiotic HR people in various organizations that are the gate keepers. Next come the moronic head hunters. But it's just the nature of the business and a necessary evil, particulary with the limited opportunities nowadays.
When I look at all I've done and what I know... then to have to deal with people who haven't the slightest clue and are simply matching buzzwords, well, it's all quite frustrating, really. Never mind that I transitioned from my last employer in a major way from Windows to the LINUX platform, never mind that I worked at Microsoft and have shrink wrapped software to my credit, never mind that I worked on a source level debugger at one point in time for Motorola... HR people don't understand any of the latter. Nothing.
To all tech people let me just say this, something I am passing along from a high level manager I once heard - "I know you love all that technical minutiae but don't forget about the soft skills." More importantly, since we're in a down time, if you go try something utterly non-tech it may spark surprising changes in how you view the world and yourself.
To give you some food for thought, how many CEOs do you know that were prime time developers? Yeah, Bill Gates might have coded in his day but I can assure you he hasn't done shyt for the last 15+ years. He was a businessman first and that's what succeeds in our society (the social element of the equation). Always has, always will.
Something I've had to learn the hard way...
-M
PS: Oh yeah, I'm the one selling cars that SPAZOID12 up above eludes to.
Stop posting to slashdot asking why you aren't getting work done.
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.
Actually, last year I went to RedOctane.com and bought to of their ignition 2.0 pads and a copy of DDR (Dance Dance Revolution), after playing DDR once in the arcade. It has made me much more fit and I have noticed a sharp increase in my energy levels and metabolism. It is not monotanous like exercise, and it is a quick 30 min, full-body cardiovascular workout (you must use your entire body to keep yourself balanced). I'd seriously recommend this to anyone, don't worry about looking foolish, once you get good at it you will be quite impressive. If you don't even want to initially invest the money in the pads, go to ddrfreak.com and try to find an arcade near you that has it, and spend one or two dollars to test it out. So far this year, I have gotten about 7 friends addicted to this game. My Computer Science buddies and I at Clemson play it during coding sessions to clear our mind, not to mention it's a good way to reward yourself for hard-work. -Justin Ames
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.
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.