I have experienced a similar thing while freelancing or design and web development. I used to work 16 hours some days and less hours others, but then sometimes I would need to work and found it hard to kick it into gear.<p>I think creativity is like a well, and when you do creative work its like drawing that water out. If you use too much water one day, the well runs dry. You have to wait for the goundwater to fill it up again.<p>Not only did I begin viewing creativity as a limited resource I create and have access to over time, but I noticed that some activities, like reading about science, listening to music, and walking around town actually increase the rate at which the well fills up.<p>So now I have made it a daily habit of doing things that inspire me, and I also daily draw from the well like the author said - but Im more careful not to creatively 'overdo it' and leave myself unable to be creative the next day.<p>Viewing it this way has helped a lot, for all the same benefits the author listed. Im in a rhythm where I dont feel I need a break on the weekend, I just still have energy.
If I told you that every car needed 8 gallons of gas to drive 100 miles, you'd point out I was wrong - so many different makes and models, not to mention variables from tire pressure to driving style.<p>Yet for the potentially even more complex range that is different people, it amazes me that so much of the advice is didactic - we all need 8 hours sleep, 8 glasses of water, and 8 hours of work with breaks is optimal.<p>The closest I get to advice is 'learn your body and what works for you'. Thanks to the OP for sharing what works for him.
As a freelancer, I understand where some of the comments "As a freelancer this won't work" are coming from. However, the last year I've flipped my freelancing model where I offer a more productized service with a clearly defined scope and set price. Instead of doing design work for $XXX/h, I'll deliver A,B,C within Timeframe Y, for Price $XXXX. With clearly defined services, I've actually been working for the last 12 months using a similar model, usually constraining myself to 4h/day with weekends off. My productivity + revenue have increased dramatically. Productizing your service makes it easier to market and generate leads, while it gives you the flexibility to work the way you want and actually free up time. Awesome post OP!
I started contract work last fall. I set me rate assuming a 25 hour work week. At first I tried working ~4 hrs / day everyday day. I quickly realized this did not work for me. Working everyday, even just a little is not sustainable for me. I have a family and they are still on the 9 to 5 schedule, so working even a few hours on weekends cut into my family time which is important to me. So now I force myself to take at least one weekend day off with no prgramming. This is hard because I love to program. Also I have a hard cutoff time during the week days at about 5:30pm when my wife and kid get home. I usually feel like I want to keep working but that forces me to stop (at least until my daughter goes to bed). So now I work 5 or 6 days a week but seldom exceed 6 hours/ day. Most days are closer to 4hrs. It's great at this pace because I usually always feel like i want to keep programming so I don't get burnt out. And if I do have an off day I just don't work.<p>The problem I am running into now is what do I do with my spare time? All my hobbies are computer based (video games and Raspberry Pi projects) but I am trying to minimize my screen time in my off hours. This will get better in the spring and summer as the weather gets better but during winter on the Oregon Coast going outside is hit or miss.<p>And I hear you about not being able to go to bed until I solve a problem I am stuck on, that drives me crazy.
I agree with this article mostly, although 3 hours a day might be too little to make good progress with work for some people.<p>This article reminded me of my previous workplace (about 7 years ago) where my manager discouraged engineers from working for more than 6 hours a day. He recommended 4 hours of work per day and requested us not to exceed more than 6 hours of work per day. He believed working for less number of hours a day would lead to higher code quality, less mistakes and more robust software.<p>Although, he never went around the floor ensuring that engineers do not exceed 6 hours of work a day, and some engineers did exceed 6 hours a day, however, in my opinion, his team was the most motivated team on the floor.
3 hours a day is just not enough for everyone.<p>For some projects it's perfectly fine but some tasks can only be done if you focus for a large amount of time on it, work obsessively on it until you reach a milestone.<p>The greatest work I have ever done, was always done when I retreated like a monk for several weeks, cutting myself of the whole world and working almost non-stop on the task until I made a significant breakthrough.<p>Then I go back to the livings and share the fruits of my work, and of course, take a well deserved rest for several days.<p>The trap into most people fall is that they are confusing being <i>active</i> and <i>working</i>.
I'm pretty sure this has worked for the author, and it will work for a lot of other people as well, but a lot the benefits raised can still be achieved when working more than 3 hours a day.<p>A few points are raised in the post:
1. If you only work 3 hours, you're less tempted to go on twitter/facebook/hacker news.<p>True - but that's really a question of discipline, work environment and how excited you are about what you're working on.
It's perfectly possible to perform for 10 hours straight without distractions, just make sure to take an occasional break for physical health.<p>2. Better prioritization.<p>Treating your time as a scarce resource helps focus on the core features. But your time is a scarce resource even if you work 12 hours a day.
Programmers are in shortage. They cost a lot. And the time you're spending on building your own apps could have been spent freelancing and working for someone else's apps.
Always stick a dollar figure on your working hours. Even if you're working on your own projects.
You should always prioritize your tasks, and always consider paying for something that might save you development time (Better computer. better IDE. SaaS solutions, etc).<p>3. Taking a long break can help you solve a problem you're stuck on.<p>Personally, I find that taking a short walk, rubber duck debugging or just changing to a different task for a while does the same.
If I'm stuck on something, I don't need to stop working on it until tomorrow. I just need an hour or two away from it.
I agree with the author with some exceptions: when you are working as a contractor or freelancer for someone else's project maybe 3h/day is not acceptable. When you've got externally imposed deadlines 3h/day may not be sufficient.<p>But i agree that working less than 8h/day could be really more productive. I also liked the "less stuck for coding" topic as "...it is sometimes hard to go bed without solving some unknown issues, and you don’t want to stop coding in the middle of it..." so maybe forcing themselves to stop could be a solution.<p>Anyway, i would really like to work 4 or 5 hours a day but keeping holidays and weekends free from work and i think this can only be achieved if you can pay your living with products of your own such as your apps and not by freelancing (i am a freelance and i know it!).<p>But i enjoyed the idea behind the article and i will try to achieve it one day.
I mostly agree with the author, but I don't see the point of stopping yourself when you're "in the zone". Why lose the flexibility?<p>What works for me is having a baseline of 3 or 4 hours of daily work, and not imposing any hard limits when I want or need to do extra hours. This works out great, because I have no excuses <i>not</i> to do the boring routine work as it's just a few hours, but I also have the liberty of doing obsessive 10h sessions when I'm trying to solve a tough problem or when I'm working on something fun.
There is a much better alternative: work really hard for 2 to 3 months per year and then take the rest of the year off. If you're doing high value consulting you can easily do this. You may have to forego some luxury but that's a very small price to pay for the freedom you get in return.
It reads like someone who isn't doing much of realtime support. This works great for projects that haven't been unveiled or even ones that require little ongoing maintenance like a game. But if I worked 3 hours a day, my clients would crucify me.<p>Sadly, it isn't always possible.
When I was freelancing there were a lot of days when I didn't do much but then there were days when I got into the flow and worked 2 or 3 days almost straight. Most of the time this ended up at around 40 hours/ week on average but in spurts. This was probably the best work environment I have ever been in.<p>I hate about the corporate workplace that it doesn't accept any kind of rhythm but treats you like a machine that performs exactly the same at all times. Nature is built around seasons and so are humans. They are not machines.<p>I would much prefer to have a time sheet where I can do my 40 hours whenever I feel like it.
I work on a remote team and I am only accountable for my output. I end up working 15-25hrs a week. Sometimes more if something is on fire.<p>I usually work 7 days a week, but invariably a couple days a week I only work an hour, checking email and replying to people.<p>The work I do is of better quality, I'm happier, and I easily could work at this pace until the day I die.
I work 4-5 hours everyday but everyday on my own project. I wish I could have more time on work since most of the rest time I have is allocated to housework and taking care of two little ones. I guess the key is to control your work pace. When a sprint is needed and you are ready for it, a two-week with 90-100 hours in each week would not be a bad idea. Just like running. Listen to your body, pick your pace and keep going towards your goal.
Nice!<p>I actually had similar routine while at school, but it was 6 hours a day total. 3 hours in the evening, usually just before I went to sleep, might be 19-22, or 21-24 and 3 hours in the morning when I woke up and continued for ~3 hours and then left for lectures.<p>I started doing this because I realized that I am no longer capable of pulling all-nighters. And it worked surprisingly well :-)
> Making money on the App Store is really tough, and people don’t care how many hours I spend on my apps. They only care if it is useful or not. This is a completely result oriented world, but personally, I like it.<p>I would guess that, if the OP had a competitor, then the OP would be easily forced out of the market if that competitor worked 4 hours a day :)
One size certainly does not fit all, however, my one take away is that this is huge benefit to paying close attention to what works best for you and optimizing your life around that. When you focus on productivity and happiness (often the 2 are linked) ignoring, when possible, schedules dictated upon you your quality of life will improve.
3 hours is not enough time to get anything done. I'm self employed. I go 12 hours straight before I realize I should probably eat something. I love what I'm doing so I'm drawn to it all day, every day. At the end of the day I've hardly made a dent in my project though. 3 hours is just getting warmed up.
I read an essay several years ago that suggested working three focused hours a day. But, it suggested slowly increasing the hours worked while keeping the same level of focus, and doing restorative activities in the remaining time. The idea was that this would "triple" productivity.
I'm about to quit my day job and work on my own projects. I planed to maintain a 9-6 working style by going to a library with wifi. Reading this post I'm now thinking maybe I can experiment with different work routines and see which one is more productive for me.
What about work 11 hours a week and be happy? Works for me, and I am a freelancer.<p>Edit: I usually do three blocks of three hours each and one two hour block each week. I find three hours perfect to tackle a problem, and a good chunk to be able to reflect upon afterwards.
This is so true of people who give 100% every moment they work, but can't work long hours without feeling drained. compared to someone who goes at 50% and can manage the 40hr/work-week, I wish this method would become more recognized.
Historically, working 24 hours a day (I include sleep because after a certain number of hours you even dream of code or your business) for 1 year typically accomplishes more than working 3 hours per day for 8 years. Or 1.5 hours per day for 16 years. There is just some kind of economy of scale.<p>---------<p>EDIT: I got downvoted. Come up with whatever standard of productivity you want (ANY standard that you want) and adduce a single human who in 16 years times 90 minutes per day accomplished more than I can find a counter-example of someone doing in the same field in 1 year. 1 year of 24 hours a day strictly dominates 16 years of 90 minutes per day, and you cannot find a single counterexample in any field from any era of humanity. Go ahead and try.<p>oh and by the way, in 1905 Einstein published 1 paper on the Photoelectric effect, for which he won his only nobel prize, 1 paper on Brownian motion which convinced the only leading anti-atomic theorist of the existence of atoms, 1 paper on a little subject that "reconciles Maxwell's equations for electricity and magnetism with the laws of mechanics by introducing major changes to mechanics close to the speed of light. This later became known as Einstein's special theory of relativity" and 1 paper on Mass–energy equivalence, which might have remained obscure if he hadn't worked it into a catchy little ditty referring to an "mc". You might have heard of it? E = mc^2? Well a hundred and ten years later all the physicistis are still laying their beats on top.<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annus_Mirabilis_papers" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annus_Mirabilis_papers</a><p>Your turn. Point to someone who did as much in 16 years by working just 90 minutes per day.<p>Closer to our own field, Instagram was sold for $1 billion about a year after its founding date, to Facebook. Point out anyone who built $1 billion in value over 16 years working just 90 minutes per day.