I do a small trick that seems to work wonders (at least for me).<p>I don't limit myself at all. When I want to do any activity that seems to be dopamine-fuelling (emails, HN, Reddit, Stripe, other metrics, even company Intercom), I just have to set a timer to certain duration. I can reset, snooze, or extend durations however I want. No rules. Just the action of setting a timer.<p>Oddly it has made myself way more conscious and intentional. Resulting in almost no actual distractions when I do want to focus. Technical tricks (blocking apps, websites, or DNS) are unfortunately too gimmicky because it's so easy to bypass. And personally I had no results with those.
It's worth remembering that what works for John Carmack may not work for you.<p>You may have more distractions in life or job that you cannot get rid of.<p>Your baseline innate ability to focus may be very different.<p>You may have less experience training the skills required to focus.<p>Watching how successful people do things can provide useful inspiration for things to try, but you have to apply your own critical thinking and find what works for you.
There's an old blog post that I really liked on John Carmack's work ethic <a href="http://bookofhook.blogspot.com/2013/03/smart-guy-productivity-pitfalls.html" rel="nofollow">http://bookofhook.blogspot.com/2013/03/smart-guy-productivit...</a> from someone who worked with Carmack.
> I go for a four mile walk every day (audiobooks!), but doing it when the sun went down to avoid the 100+ heat was punching a hole in my work day, so I adjusted my schedule to wake up earlier and do it in the morning.<p>Interesting. I do a mile run at lunch, and find that "punching a hole in my work day" is beneficial for focus, not a detractor. Things I like about my lunch run:<p>- short, fits into 1 hr schedule with eating/getting food<p>- guaranteed sun exposure even during winter<p>- rare to have schedule conflicts due to before/after work commitments, so easy to be consistent<p>- good reset if needed<p>- running + mulling things over works well for me
having ADHD I really cant express how frustrating it is knowing that others are able to simply choose to maintain focus on something. i have never had the ability to control that. sometimes it happens, and i never get to choose when it happens.<p>what could i have accomplished in my life if i had the power to choose to focus on one thing for more than a couple of minutes? i could have accomplished a lot more than i have accomplished, i assure you of that.<p>once in a while, maybe 2-3 times per year, my brain starts focusing on something i want or need to focus on, and this is an absolutely magical time for me. i progress toward my goals on that topic so quickly when this happens, and i learn so much, but it never lasts. subsequently, i have a lot of shallow understanding of many things that i have been able to focus on previously, and almost zero deep understanding on anything, because the power to focus usually only lasts a week or two.<p>i guess this is why ADHD is defined as a disabling medical condition in the US. it really is a severe handicap to one’s abilities.
I used to use this back in the day....
<a href="https://github.com/viccherubini/get-shit-done" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/viccherubini/get-shit-done</a>
You get rid of them.<p><a href="https://plasmabeamgames.wordpress.com/2021/10/08/mitzi-the-cat/" rel="nofollow">https://plasmabeamgames.wordpress.com/2021/10/08/mitzi-the-c...</a>
Some other people have mentioned this in child comments but most of this, for me, comes down to having a good night's sleep.<p>If my kids woke up in the middle of the night or were up early, I'm distracted pretty easily. With a good night of sleep, I power through my to do list.<p>I also wonder what the shape of my "productivity / hours slept" curve looks like. In my case, I feel like I am more more productive than most people if I have 8-9 hours sleep. However, I feel WAY lower than most other people when I only sleep 6-7 hours. Not sure how I could ever measure or confirm this but I would love to know if this actually the case.
What helped me a lot was the "focus mode" in the digital wellbeing settings of android. I block my biggest distractions (WhatsApp, Twitter, Reddit) from 9-6 and only starred contacts will ring.
The number one thing that works for me is logging on to HN and seeing a post of some guy struggling with procrastination. I see that, think "wow what a loser", then think "fuck I'm doing that too", and close the tab and get back to work.<p>Posts from people who beat this don't work. I need to see a loser and see myself behaving like him. Then the break between my identity (I'm fucking awesome) and my actions (I'm doing loser shit) gets me out of it. Whacky, eh?
If i could live a life 10% similar to this guy’s life i would he so happy. I am not talking about money and fame. I just think that people like carmack are genuinely free. They are that kid that wanted to make awesome things and satisfy their curiosity and actually succeeded at it and they continued doing it in their adulthood. Just bloody awesome.
The DNS block on my work laptop is something that surprisingly worked for me. I put a few barriers to sudo unblocking it like making the file immutable so I had to go through multiple steps to get it working.<p>Over time, I stopped looking at twitter on my work laptop and during my working hours.
I just realize I have been care less about procrastinating and productivity<p>instead doing or targeting stuffs day by day I just set my goals for each week<p>like this week I should do this this and this its easier for myself instead day by day task list
Sorry but hearing what he said on Lex's podcast about how he aims to solidly work for 10 hours a day or something crazy I absolutely do believe he has "magical discipline"
Almost totally unrelated rant about Twitter UI: Elon Musk answers Carmack tweet, you open that tweet to see the replies, there are at least 10-15 useless replies from Twitter randos and then there is the Carmack reply to Musk! I mean, leaving aside the blue checks, the number of followers etc, it's a conversation between two parties with 3rd parties jumping in, why can this be highlighted properly??
Here is something I discovered for myself:<p>If I work on something that I truly enjoy, then I am 100% focused on it and can't get distracted at all.<p>If I work off a backlog full of seemingly boring and meaningless tasks which some PO came up with and which I don't find remotely interesting or impactful then it's near impossible for me to not get distracted.<p>Long story short:
If you struggle to stay focused, then maybe your work or your role in the company sucks (e.g. being overqualified for the tasks assigned to you, not challenged enough intellectually, etc.).