Does Pursuing Our Passions Mean We Are in Crisis? It seems in life whenever we decide to actively pursue our dreams or child-like passions, we are labeled as having a crisis.
A mid-life crisis, an existential crisis, a post divorce crisis, postpartum crisis.
Why is this? Is it because going for what we love threatens other people?
Or is it because it takes a crisis to wake us up to how we are living in complacency. From there, we can begin to move forward and live authentically?
I would love to know your thoughts as I ponder a newsletter post on this topic.
productivity
Have you noticed that when workplace performance dips, people's first reaction is to rush to explain it? What they rarely do is slow down long enough to notice how the work started to feel different first.
And that doesn't show up in dashboards - but it does show up everywhere else.
The teams that recover fastest are the ones that say, 'Something feels off. Let's talk about that.' And that's irrespective of incentives, or even tighter processes.
In my experience, performance doesn't fall off when people stop caring, it falls off when people stop being sure about what caring looks like anymore.
This probably stands out to me because I spend a lot of time inside teams when performance is under pressure.
If you have any perspective on this, I'd love to hear your thoughts.
Ralph, Thank you. This is a really thoughtful extension of the point and I agree with you on the core issue: more time is often a very blunt response to a nuanced performance problem. What you’re describing at the policy level mirrors what I see inside organizations.... AMA with Jeffrey Ladish. Wednesday 2/4 at 2:00 PM CT
Executive director of Palisade Research; studying AI loss of control risks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALfhq3r7Cz0Something that makes you aware of how long you've pursued something and indicates the gap between where you started and where you are. IMPORTANT! It would be heaven if they could hold the ideas clearly enough -mark them; create a branch thread to be followed later?- so you could... Productivity Systems vs Meaningful Aligned Work. This might be a false dichotomy.
But, every few months, I come across some new productivity idea and get mini obsessed by it. GTD. Anki cards. AI Assistants.
As far as I can tell, I don't have a cohesive system for work or anything. I keep all my tasks in a txt file. Most of my computer files live in my downloads folder or a dropbox sync folder. I have my own "internal" system that's taken bits and pieces from what I've learned.
Recently, I read this article, A receipt printer cured my procrastination
Basic idea is printing out your tasks with a receipt printer (very fast, very cheap, very small). Having it be physical and visible rather than stuck in a digital todo app.
Also saves the headache of manually writing these out on notecards/post-it notes.
I went ahead and bought a receipt printer off ebay. But I have a sneaky suspicion that I'll love this for a few weeks and then drop it entirely.
(also the concern that thermal receipt printers are toxic in daily frequent exposure but there's more expensive paper that's suppose to be neutral/healthy)
It feels like all these systems are modernist hacks to predict and control human behavior rather than trusting its natural eros towards what is meaningful.
On the other hand, meaningful work tied to my identity that's in direct connection to others/near environment, I don't need any system or task manager to do. It naturally flows and gets done.
Then again, there are just thigns that need to get done like paystubs and taxes that I don't have any eros towards so maybe there's a happy medium of systems for necessary but not interesting tasks and trusting natural interest for everything else?
I recognize the pattern of getting super excited about a productivity system for a while and then at some point finding that it falls off. I've heard this associated with ADHD, but idk about that, I think it might just be a pretty normal, human thing.... Productivity Systems vs Meaningful Aligned Work. This might be a false dichotomy.
But, every few months, I come across some new productivity idea and get mini obsessed by it. GTD. Anki cards. AI Assistants.
As far as I can tell, I don't have a cohesive system for work or anything. I keep all my tasks in a txt file. Most of my computer files live in my downloads folder or a dropbox sync folder. I have my own "internal" system that's taken bits and pieces from what I've learned.
Recently, I read this article, A receipt printer cured my procrastination
Basic idea is printing out your tasks with a receipt printer (very fast, very cheap, very small). Having it be physical and visible rather than stuck in a digital todo app.
Also saves the headache of manually writing these out on notecards/post-it notes.
I went ahead and bought a receipt printer off ebay. But I have a sneaky suspicion that I'll love this for a few weeks and then drop it entirely.
(also the concern that thermal receipt printers are toxic in daily frequent exposure but there's more expensive paper that's suppose to be neutral/healthy)
It feels like all these systems are modernist hacks to predict and control human behavior rather than trusting its natural eros towards what is meaningful.
On the other hand, meaningful work tied to my identity that's in direct connection to others/near environment, I don't need any system or task manager to do. It naturally flows and gets done.
Then again, there are just thigns that need to get done like paystubs and taxes that I don't have any eros towards so maybe there's a happy medium of systems for necessary but not interesting tasks and trusting natural interest for everything else?
I love this set of questions. (Btw, have you read Four Thousand Weeks? It does a similar exploration. Nothing revolutionary for you, but you'll still probably enjoy it). I think the biggest thing that got reaffirmed for me was: completion is impossible...... Productivity Systems vs Meaningful Aligned Work
This might be a false dichotomy. But, every few months, I come across some new productivity idea and get mini obsessed by it. GTD. Anki cards. AI Assistants. As far as I can tell, I don't have a cohesive system for work or anything. I keep all my tasks in a txt file.... What helps you wake up? Question, friends. I have been struggling with some intense tiredness in the mornings. It's like my body has become a teenager and thinks I should sleep until noon each day - but mornings are my favorite time!
Have you ever dealt with morning grogginess? What caused it? What do you do to get yourself going?
The things that have made a difference here for me are exactly what you'd expect, but I'll list them just in case. Fixed wakeup time. Including weekends, don't deviate more than an hour even on weekends, and ideally it's the same time everyday.... Thoughts on AI coding an effifciency? would love yalls thoughts on this. Here’s a provocative start:
This whole thing is bullshit. So if you're a developer feeling pressured to adopt these tools — by your manager, your peers, or the general industry hysteria — trust your gut. If these tools feel clunky, if they're slowing you down, if you're confused how other people can be so productive, you're not broken. The data backs up what you're experiencing. You're not falling behind by sticking with what you know works. If you’re feeling brave, show your manager these charts and ask them what they think about it.
From a Mike Judge substack article
that’s one take.
There are a few other takes that I’m aware of, but I’d really love to hear the developers first
I totally agree with this. The result for my team shifting into a heavy ai coding workflow has been something like 20% more stuff being built, at 50% better quality, with half as much time being spent on the tedious parts of... Thoughts on AI coding an effifciency? would love yalls thoughts on this. Here’s a provocative start:
This whole thing is bullshit. So if you're a developer feeling pressured to adopt these tools — by your manager, your peers, or the general industry hysteria — trust your gut. If these tools feel clunky, if they're slowing you down, if you're confused how other people can be so productive, you're not broken. The data backs up what you're experiencing. You're not falling behind by sticking with what you know works. If you’re feeling brave, show your manager these charts and ask them what they think about it.
From a Mike Judge substack article
that’s one take.
There are a few other takes that I’m aware of, but I’d really love to hear the developers first
I don't know that I have one coherent take so much as a mismash of thoughts. Trailheads, you could call them. --- If we think of AI coding assistants/agents/workflows as tools, one notable thing that pops out is the degree to which they're non-deterministic, imperfect, and... Thoughts on AI coding an effifciency? would love yalls thoughts on this. Here’s a provocative start:
This whole thing is bullshit. So if you're a developer feeling pressured to adopt these tools — by your manager, your peers, or the general industry hysteria — trust your gut. If these tools feel clunky, if they're slowing you down, if you're confused how other people can be so productive, you're not broken. The data backs up what you're experiencing. You're not falling behind by sticking with what you know works. If you’re feeling brave, show your manager these charts and ask them what they think about it.
From a Mike Judge substack article
that’s one take.
There are a few other takes that I’m aware of, but I’d really love to hear the developers first
I've been a developer for over 20 years, so I speak with at least some authority. IMO the focus on increased speed and efficiency is one-dimensional. I actually don't know if AI coding tools make me faster, I'd guess for some projects they do, and some they don't.... - AI gave me TikTok brain. I fell into a pattern of ask ChatGPT first, think second. And it caused me to think less for myself. Any problem or idea with building my business, writing software, etc. my default would be to ask ChatGPT, read its response, then start thinking about it. It fried my patience for my own thoughts the same way that TikTok brainrot fries attention spans. I was looking for immediate answers and that cheap quick dopamine was giving me the illusion of productivity.Now that I’m aware of this trap, I try to think through things on my own first, then ask AI an open ended version of the same question (to avoid steering it to my same conclusion), and use its response to challenge/refine my thinking.
I've also seen my AI General Assistant use fall off over time for anything creative or productive. It's mostly an information and coding copilot for me these days. I use it for sanity checks on important decisions sometimes.... Quick reflections on vibe-coding:
- kicks up weird addiction cycles in me
- the end product feels more like 20-30% jordan's creation and 70-80% LLM's. The text for example is all a little off, the style, etc, and it drifts because it's so easy to have it do it and so much more "time consuming" to go fix all the little bits (plus you have no guarantee it wont fuck something else up) and keep them coherent, versus just surrendering to the llm
- As a result I feel weirdly not that autonomous... like is the LLM working for me or am I working for it? This feels similar to the addiction cycle too
- There's a vibe that's similar to the "HR Lady" tone and em-dash hell of the LLM writing; like everything is sanitized and optimized for general professional sleeze marketing and you can't quite put your finger on why it sucks. The glassmorphism designs and gradients feel similar
- I continue to feel like I'm learning a lot from it, but I have updated to think that at the current stage its at, its actually an unhealthy practice and so is a little like a blood sacrifice that should be used sparingly. I imagine this will change, but maybe it'll get worse.
Even as a programmer I feel the pull to outsource my thinking to the machine when I use LLMs. It feels almost like a reflex, subconscious, as if my brain notices that it "got something" really easily and sets a very low ceiling for how hard I'm willing to work.... Would you still scroll if you knew your stats? I read that the average person checks their phone 150 times a day!! Wild right? It would be cool if social platforms gave stats like, you have logged in 8 times today or you have spent 55 minutes total here today, or 5 hours this week. Then could have qustions like, what have you been up to here? Or, do you feel this has been time well spent? Feels daring!
Nice! I like noticing what I'm doing along these lines thanks for the question! Here are a few that come to mind. I write things in obsidian, which is so simple and straightforward and clean and offline-obviously that it helps me stay away from websites generally, more than I... Would you still scroll if you knew your stats? I read that the average person checks their phone 150 times a day!! Wild right? It would be cool if social platforms gave stats like, you have logged in 8 times today or you have spent 55 minutes total here today, or 5 hours this week. Then could have qustions like, what have you been up to here? Or, do you feel this has been time well spent? Feels daring!
Yes! I have a chrome extension for Gmail called inbox when ready, and it tells me how many times I've checked my inbox each day. Also after X times, it makes me wait like 10 seconds before I can check again. It's very helpful....