9 ms·

Procrastination and the fear of not being good enough

• jonesn11 2y ago
  My personal opinion is that the procrastination the guy is experiencing is due to an underlying mental health challenge
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• codemogul 2y ago
  How do you eat an elephant? Small bites. When everything seems like a elephant... start with small bites. And get a good way into the elephant before you start measuring how well you are doing the eating.
  • falcor84 2y ago
    I never liked that joke. Obviously, as an individual, you can't eat an elephant in small bites, as (assuming it's dead) it will start spoiling very soon after you started biting into it (and if it's still alive, you might have an even bigger problem). So the actual solution would probably involve a lot of logistical planning and preparation on how you would carve it efficiently and then refrigerate and/or distribute all the pieces. Not doing so, and only thinking one bite at a time, would be a massive waste of the elephant.
• DeepYogurt 2y ago
  Getting started is the hardest step. Thank you for sharing!
• bluecoconut 2y ago
  Worrying what others think resonates with me a lot. Every few weeks I try to motivate myself to write more online (HN, X, blogs) and consistently get “self sabotage” stuck. (Been going on for >2 years) The article just says they pushed through and “put it aside”, but that has never seemed to quite work for me. I can push through once or twice, not enough to build a daily habit/obsession like I want. Anyone have any tips that worked for getting over this hurdle?
  • deathtrader666 2y ago
    I always remind myself that even the celebrated works supposedly have glaring holes in them. If they can get popular and be cherished, then my work too doesn't have to be "water-tight" at all times.
    • imtringued 2y ago
      Just think about the human batteries in the matrix movie. Anyone who heard that thought the machines were using human brains as biocomputers, but no, they actually insist on the battery explanation.
  • bee_rider 2y ago
    I have no idea if it will help, but the amount of nitpicking I see when people post things online is much more than the amount of nitpicking I’ve seen in the actual PhD defenses I’ve attended, or the research paper peer reviews I’ve gotten back. Of course, it is always possible that you’ll bump into, like, the one person who has much more experience than most professors in a topic, on the Internet. Alternatively, maybe the professors, being experts, can find the positive contribution in imperfect projects.
  • akomtu 2y ago
    Write under a pseudonym?
  • phito 2y ago
    It might be your unconscious deciding that it's not worth doing? Posting things online is rather useless and often brings more negatives than positives.
  • matwood 2y ago
    It took me way too long to realize this but most people don’t think or care about you. I’m not saying this in a bad way, but only worry about those that matter like your family and friends. No one else thinks about you anyway, so don’t preoccupy yourself worrying about what they think.
• protoman3000 2y ago
  From own experience I can say: Forget about trying to change this from the perspective of thoughts. Cognitively understanding that you should "just" stop worrying about what other people think about your work might not bring you far. Instead, realize that anxiety is a bodily phenomenon and as such needs to be addressed with the body. That means: Breathing techniques, exercise etc.
  • JumpinJack_Cash 2y ago
    > > That means: Breathing techniques, exercise etc. It also means alcohol, drugs, shrooms, ketamine, MDMA, Research Chemicals, uppers, downers, amplifier substances , smoothering substances, focus enhancers, dissociatives... I mean the modern society seems like coming up with some trends such as the war on drugs, the vice taxes and all the patronizing BS, only to discover that there is a reason why those things exist and we indulged in them for as long as we have been around in the first place
    • fourier54 2y ago
      while they do have therapeutic effects (some, I wouldn't say alcohol does), I don't think they should be proposed as methods to relax stress. Too many downsides and are not sustainable as regularly used substances. Yes you do feel great in a night of MDMA but the feelings you have the following days almost negate the positive aspects.
    • reubenmorais 2y ago
      I think some of those substances can have positive in a very narrow set of circumstances. Being vigilant and only using them in those scenarios can be just as hard as the hard solutions you were avoiding in the first place, like sleep, diet, exercise, cleaning up your routine, etc. I'll add some color on how some of those can go wrong, hopefully this saves someone else from having to learn it first hand: Alcohol - messes up your sleep, without which your mind will never be operating as clearly as it could. If you frequently mix it with other substances, it'll also turn into a trigger, making you crave said substances every time you have a drink. Use with moderation. Shrooms - these are really nice, but like most psychoactive substances, they'll definitely get in the way of focusing on hard tasks. Doing something fun gets more fun with shrooms, doing something hard gets harder. Use with moderation. Indulge, don't escape. I'd give the same advice about LSD. Ketamine - has an extremely broad profile of effects depending on dosage. You can mitigate this a bit by correctly measuring and dissolving it in nasal spray, but even then tolerance builds up very quickly and you end up compensating by doing more. It has a small dosage window where it'll be an indulging drug, just adding a pleasurable shift to your perceptions, but then as soon as you go over that window, it will turn you into a little dissociated zombie, unable to hold an interesting conversation with someone who isn't on the same ballpark of high as you are. It can cause serious damage to your urinary tract. Indulge, don't escape. Try to use once per month at most. MDMA - can be amazing at low dosages, but evidence indicates it is neurotoxic in most doses you'll run into in parties. When it starts to come down you will want to do more, so if you're trying to be careful make sure you have measures to prevent you from doing so. Hangovers can be brutal, specially on higher doses. At higher doses it'll make you confused and mess up with your short term memory, but your social confidence will still stay high, so you can turn into an obnoxious person rambling about something for the third time in half an hour to whoever is unlucky to be nearby. Indulge with a lot of caution, don't escape. Use lower doses. Give it a 3 month break between uses. Research chemicals - unless you are the researcher, stay away from these. Some drugs have very different effects to others that are chemically very similar and often impossible to differentiate with standard test kits you'll be able to buy and use without being a chemist. Reliable information on their effects, dosage, interactions is difficult or impossible to find — not only for you, but also for your EMT or doctor, in case you need medical assistance. Uppers - addictive, can cause re-dosing, will fuck up your sleep and your appetite. Suppress orgasms (and often erections). Stress your heart muscles and your arteries and veins. When taken for productivity, will give you short-term gains that turn into holes you'll need several weeks to dig yourself out of. Use with extreme caution. Amplifier substances - in my experience, there's no such thing. You can do substance X today and have an amazing "amplified" time, and then do the same dose again a week later in a different setting and have a real bad time, constantly in your head, seeing the negative interpretation of everything. The things which make it more likely for a substance to be an amplifier can't be fixed with more substances: how well are you sleeping, eating, exercising? Are you mulling over some difficult conversation instead of just having it? Are you surrounded by people you like who are good to you?
• umutisik 2y ago
  Great observation. I have observed the same thing in my own life. The solution: do things that you really believe people need. Then you owe it to them to find out if you actually are “good enough”, and you don’t care what others think because all you care about is whether the people who need it are happy with it.
• adamnemecek 2y ago
  [flagged]
• bbor 2y ago
  If I had to sum up the reason in one word, it would be laziness. Wild to read this from a modern perspective. It's like reading about women being shamed for being 'hysterical', or religious peasants blaming their natural sexual feelings on demons. It just doesn't hold up to scrutiny... What is 'laziness' when applied to something that you clearly want to do? How can someone want something, yet simultaneously choose to not want it? Turns out the answer is simple, and the nerds have known it since 1801[1]: you don't exist. Your continuous, unified self is an illusion brought about for instrumental reasons. Treat yourself like a system to be optimized, not an ineffable soul to be brought away from vice through logic. If you were tasked with improving a malfunctioning software system, you'd be laughed out of the room for starting with "well, clearly, the system is just sinful, and choosing to make mistakes." [1]: Immanuel Kant, The Critique of Pure Reason, Chapter I.2.II.1: "Of the Paralogisms of Pure Reason" Now to these conceptions relate four paralogisms of a transcendental psychology, which is falsely held to be a science of pure reason, touching the nature of our thinking being. We can, however, lay at the foundation of this science nothing but the simple and in itself perfectly contentless representation “i” which cannot even be called a conception, but merely a consciousness which accompanies all conceptions. By this “I,” or “He,” or “It,” who or which thinks, nothing more is represented than a transcendental subject of thought = x, which is cognized only by means of the thoughts that are its predicates, and of which, apart from these, we cannot form the least conception. Hence in a perpetual circle, inasmuch as we must always employ it, in order to frame any judgement respecting it. And this inconvenience we find it impossible to rid ourselves of, because consciousness in itself is not so much a representation distinguishing a particular object, as a form of representation in general, in so far as it may be termed cognition; for in and by cognition alone do I think anything. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/4280/4280-h/4280-h.htm#chap72 https://www.gutenberg.org/files/4280/4280-h/4280-h.htm#chap7... For the more empirically minded that are understandably resistant to such an unnatural conception, try to find discussions of "laziness" in these articles. I'd be surprised: https://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/executive-function https://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/executive-function https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/symptoms/23224-executive-dysfunction https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/symptoms/23224-executi... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_dysfunction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_dysfunction
  • 2y ago
• luckydata 2y ago
  I just want to appreciate how the author used the sane "fear of not being good enough" instead of the idiotic "impostor syndrome" that everyone uses to mean the same.
  • grugagag 2y ago
    What’s wrong with impostor syndrome? Perhaps overused term but that for a good reason, many people are battling the same insecurities while others are confident on hot air. Very few have a backing for being confident.
    • luckydata 2y ago
      Because impostor syndrome was a term supposed to describe a medical phenomenon that proved not to exist. Around my parts we call that "bullshit".
      • grugagag 2y ago
        And it was adopted to mean what we all know it means. The origin may be completely wrong but it got a meaning that is not too far off.
  • cortesoft 2y ago
    "Imposter syndrome" is just the term we have given to "fear of not being good enough". What is wrong with coming up with a term for that fear?
    • luckydata 2y ago
      I don't agree with medicalization of normal human experience. It's not a syndrome if it happens to everyone and it's perfectly normal. It's also a way to justify being a pussy, which is a sentiment I don't condone under any circumstance.
• atmavatar 2y ago
  While hard work may pay off in the future, laziness always pays off now :)
  • loopdoend 2y ago
    Even if the "future" is say, 5 minutes away. I procrastinate about the dumbest, smallest shit.
  • caseyy 2y ago
    And laziness in a way is very natural and healthy. Resting, digesting, being present is boon to longevity, vitality, and creativity. Mindless production has been put on a pedestal too much in recent years.
  • justsomehnguy 2y ago
    Lazuness is a tool, thats why I'm on the 10th year implementing a simple script
• pessimizer 2y ago
  Perfectionism is a problem that a lot of us have, and it stops us from failing enough times to perfect ourselves. Finishing a failure is a success. Somebody reading your blog entry and hating it is successfully attracting a reader. Somebody telling you how terrible something you wrote was is successfully attracting a reader and inspiring a reaction. If the substance of the bad review hurts, it means you've communicated something clearly enough that it was easy to pick apart. If you understand and accept the criticism about how you were wrong, now you have a better chance of being right. This is Hillary Rettig's specialty; she largely focuses on being kind to yourself, and getting out of your own ass. The world isn't ending when you fail. https://hillaryrettigproductivity.com/the-seven-secrets-of-the-prolific/ https://hillaryrettigproductivity.com/the-seven-secrets-of-t...
• bsenftner 2y ago
  Our industry really needs to learn about about self conversation audits: An ever present sense of pressure, feeling imposter syndrome and that bleeding into self criticism and anxiety is 100% fixable, and this information needs to be much wider distributed within society. Dr. Aaron Beck and Dr. David Burns introduced the concept of “cognitive distortions” - they identified various methods humans use to lie and deceive themselves in their self conversations. Dr. Burns publishing of a book titled “Feeling Good” that kick started the entire Cognitive Therapy movement, which is the idea that one can talk themselves out of unhappiness with the right guidance. It is all about learning how to identify self deception; once one learns how to be truthful in your own self conversation, the emotions and unrealistic expectations fall away leaving a more stable and logical individual. Here’s a summery, but be careful searching this topic online as the “fraudster community” loves to prey on people seeking self help information. Filtering. We take the negative details and magnify them while filtering out all positive aspects of a situation. For instance, a person may pick out a single, unpleasant detail and dwell on it exclusively so that their vision of reality becomes darkened or distorted. Polarized Thinking (or “Black and White” Thinking). In polarized thinking, things are either “black-or-white.” We have to be perfect or we’re a failure — there is no middle ground. You place people or situations in “either/or” categories, with no shades of gray or allowing for the complexity of most people and situations. If your performance falls short of perfect, you see yourself as a total failure. Overgeneralization. In this cognitive distortion, we come to a general conclusion based on a single incident or a single piece of evidence. If something bad happens only once, we expect it to happen over and over again. A person may see a single, unpleasant event as part of a never-ending pattern of defeat. Jumping to Conclusions. Without individuals saying so, we know what they are feeling and why they act the way they do. In particular, we are able to determine how people are feeling toward us. For example, a person may conclude that someone is reacting negatively toward them but doesn’t actually bother to find out if they are correct. Another example is a person may anticipate that things will turn out badly, and will feel convinced that their prediction is already an established fact. Catastrophizing. We expect disaster to strike, no matter what. This is also referred to as “magnifying or minimizing.” We hear about a problem and use what if questions (e.g., “What if tragedy strikes?” “What if it happens to me?”). For example, a person might exaggerate the importance of insignificant events (such as their mistake, or someone else’s achievement). Or they may inappropriately shrink the magnitude of significant events until they appear tiny (for example, a person’s own desirable qualities or someone else’s imperfections). Personalization. Personalization is a distortion where a person believes that everything others do or say is some kind of direct, personal reaction to the person. We also compare ourselves to others trying to determine who is smarter, better looking, etc. A person engaging in personalization may also see themselves as the cause of some unhealthy external event that they were not responsible for. For example, “We were late to the dinner party and caused the hostess to overcook the meal. If I had only pushed my husband to leave on time, this wouldn’t have happened.” Control Fallacies. If we feel externally controlled, we see ourselves as helpless a victim of fate. For example, “I can’t help it if the quality of the work is poor, my boss demanded I work overtime on it.” The fallacy of internal control has us assuming responsibility for the pain and happiness of everyone around us. For example, “Why aren’t you happy? Is it because of something I did?” Fallacy of Fairness. We feel resentful because we think we know what is fair, but other people won’t agree with us. As our parents tell us when we’re growing up and something doesn’t go our way, “Life isn’t always fair.” People who go through life applying a measuring ruler against every situation judging its “fairness” will often feel badly and negative because of it. Because life isn’t “fair” — things will not always work out in your favor, even when you think they should. Blaming. We hold other people responsible for our pain, or take the other track and blame ourselves for every problem. For example, “Stop making me feel bad about myself!” Nobody can “make” us feel any particular way — only we have control over our own emotions and emotional reactions. Shoulds. We have a list of ironclad rules about how others and we should behave. People who break the rules make us angry, and we feel guilty when we violate these rules. A person may often believe they are trying to motivate themselves with shoulds and shouldn’ts, as if they have to be punished before they can do anything. For example, “I really should exercise. I shouldn’t be so lazy.” Musts and oughts are also offenders. The emotional consequence is guilt. When a person directs should statements toward others, they often feel anger, frustration and resentment. Emotional Reasoning. We believe that what we feel must be true automatically. If we feel stupid and boring, then we must be stupid and boring. You assume that your unhealthy emotions reflect he way things really are — “I feel it, therefore it must be true.” Fallacy of Change. We expect that other people will change to suit us if we just pressure or cajole them enough. We need to change people because our hopes for happiness seem to depend entirely on them. Global Labeling. We generalize one or two qualities into a negative global judgment. These are extreme forms of generalizing, and are also referred to as “labeling” and “mislabeling.” Instead of describing an error in context of a specific situation, a person will attach an unhealthy label to themselves. For example, they may say, “I’m a loser” in a situation where they failed at a specific task. When someone else’s behavior rubs a person the wrong way, they may attach an unhealthy label to him, such as “He’s a real jerk.” Mislabeling involves describing an event with language that is highly colored and emotionally loaded. For example, instead of saying someone drops her children off at daycare every day, a person who is mislabeling might say that “she abandons her children to strangers.” Always Being Right. We are continually on trial to prove that our opinions and actions are correct. Being wrong is unthinkable and we will go to any length to demonstrate our rightness. For example, “I don’t care how badly arguing with me makes you feel, I’m going to win this argument no matter what because I’m right.” Being right often is more important than the feelings of others around a person who engages in this cognitive distortion, even loved ones. Heaven’s Reward Fallacy. We expect our sacrifice and self-denial to pay off, as if someone is keeping score. We feel bitter when the reward doesn’t come. References: Beck, A. T. (1976). Cognitive therapies and emotional disorders. New York: New American Library. Burns, D. D. (2012). Feeling good: The new mood therapy. New York: New American Library. Leahy, R.L. (2017). Cognitive Therapy Techniques, Second Edition: A Practitioner’s Guide. New York: Guilford Press. McKay, M. & Fanning, P. (2016). Self-Esteem: A Proven Program of Cognitive Techniques for Assessing, Improving, and Maintaining Your Self-Esteem. New York: New Harbinger Publications.
• caseyy 2y ago
  The author might be struggling with people-pleasing and perfectionist tendencies. People-pleasers often do things because other people would like them more if they did these things. As such, the reward for work like writing a blog article is positive external reinforcement/approval or minimising the risk of confrontation, disapproval, or even aggression. If their work pleases few people (not enough readers), they may feel like it wasn't worth doing, or if their work attracts criticism, they may feel guilt or shame for doing it. Fear of these consequences fuels procrastination. Writing should be about the innate purpose of writing. It is to learn, to express yourself, to communicate. If one wishes to do these things, then there is almost never procrastination, as these actions always bring only positive rewards. There is no negative outcome to learning, to expressing yourself in written form, and communicating. Sure, the type of things you learn, express, or communicate could bring some negative consequences, but those actions on their own do not. They bring good results and feel good to do. Perfectionism exaggerates the expectations one would put on themselves and their work. So people-pleasing may become people-impressing, people-delighting, and people-sweeping-off-their-feet. Anything less may bring the shame, guilt, and disappointment, and then "procrastination" becomes pretty much guaranteed. Because it's not really procrastination, it is a natural and very rational decision to not engage in activities that would bring only a bad outcome. Humans, generally, really don't want to hurt themselves. We learn not to touch the hot stove, just as we learn to not do things that don't meet our (sometimes delusional high) expectations. Everything in procrastination is a lot more logical and explainable than it may seem. People-pleasing/conflict avoidance + perfectionism combo is common in tech workers. This has taken me decades to learn, now it helps the programmers I train, and I hope it helps you. Of course, everyone's life is a bit different, so don't have an unreasonable expectation that what I said applies to you 100%. It may only apply 20% and still be helpful.
  • daoboy 2y ago
    This post made me feel defensive. Which is a good time to stop and reflect. Thanks for sharing the thoughtful advice
    • caseyy 2y ago
      That's wise and quite emotionally mature. I'm only sharing some thoughts and not attacking anyone. So if it feels a bit like an attack, perhaps one of your core beliefs is being challenged. :)
• Rendello 2y ago
  It goes from chasing value to desperately trying to find value in the world, searching your memory for something worth anything.
• dexwiz 2y ago
  I really think we do a number on kids expecting a 100%, perfection, as a goal. And then only give them one chance to achieve it, but ask them to do it day after day for years. It creates some really unhealthy coping mechanism.
  • DilutedMetrics 2y ago
    It really warped my perspective when I moved out of the USA to Europe as an adult and found out that's not how school works elsewhere in the world. Still coping with it lol.
    • ezequiel-garzon 2y ago
      Could you elaborate? I always found the "grading on a curve" a distinctly American approach that leads to grade inflation and an overall lower academic level. Now, granted, the US provides very unique opportunities for students that want to go above and beyond, but that's another story.
• spuds 2y ago
  I struggle with this myself, especially around writing. My solution, from a coding perspective: If I had a massive new app to build, it would indeed feel overwhelming if I felt like I just had to sit down and build it. I think we get extra stuck on that with writing, as it often feels like we just need to go from an empty page to a well-reasoned and edited blog post, with a lot of ambiguous struggle in between. With programming, I start breaking it down into pieces of functionality, and smaller ones, until I have a list of concrete things I can actually get my head around and write the code for. I keep on doing those small things, build the structure around them, and eventually I have my app. I do the same with writing now. Not an outline really, but a list of concepts I want to get across, then smaller ideas. I write out a few of those, often a paragraph at a time. The structure starts to reveal itself, and soon enough I have a new blog post. I think the key here is arriving at something small enough that it doesn't feel overwhelming. New app or blog post feels like way too much in the moment, and my body and mind to everything possible to avoid it (procrastination). Writing out a paragraph, coding a function - very doable.
  • Sparkyte 2y ago
    I agree with this, but when working with a team I always feel motivated to see the progression made. Rarely do solo developers work well with others and rarely do collaborative developers work well by themselves. It really depends on the dynamic of the environment and the goal of the team.
    • hinkley 2y ago
      Which is a pretty pickle when you’re trying to hire devs. A candidate with a large GitHub repo may actually not be the team player you’re looking for.
      • Rinzler89 2y ago
        >a large GitHub repo I feel like in SW, impact and quality should be a lot more valuable than quantity of repos/apps you write. A few lines of code that fix a Gnome/KDE/$BIG_FOSS_PROJECT bug would be a lot more valuable in my book, than say another one in the millionth pile of JS note taking apps, or a repo full of "Baby's first Rust app"
• alsetmusic 2y ago
  I procrastinate about everything. But one stark exception to the theme of “not being good enough” was looking for a new job after layoffs in 2023. It wasn’t that I thought I wasn’t good enough. My experience and resume is pretty solid. I procrastinated because of how shitty the experience is dealing with companies on LinkedIn who get flooded with applications that either a real person might not read (due to software filters) or someone lacking a real understanding of tech won’t accurately asses my skills. I ended up getting a great job that I was really happy to land. But I only applied sporadically because just the thought of having to endure the slog was mentally painful. Fear of what others might think didn’t stop me from building effective automation at the command line. It prevented me from publishing my work on GitHub. It took being in the job market to push me past that as I wanted to let my work speak for itself for technical reviewers during the screening process. On a different note, present-tense me is always harassing future me with ambitious plans set as reminders. The sense of failure from constantly pushing them off is demoralizing. Some of that came from depression (I’m in treatment now) and some was a byproduct of being a high-achieving alcoholic. The latter sapped my mental fortitude and turned me into a passive streaming consumer. Each time I quit drinking, projects abound as my mind clears up. Apologies for trembling a bit. Procrastination is one of my greatest challenges, now that I’ve corrected so many other self-sabotaging behaviors. It’s one that I still haven’t really begun to figure out how to address. But hey, I’m doing pretty well otherwise, so there’s that.
  • bitwize 2y ago
    Get up early on the first of the month and post on that month's "Who wants to be hired?" Hackernews thread. I got a job this way, and the experience sure beat StalkedIn.
• StefanBatory 2y ago
  I grew up with parents who had anxiety. I had to be perfect, I couldn't make any sort of mistake because they'd get angry at me. Naturally, I ended up not even attempting doing anything, because the punishment for not doing something and making a mistake was the same.
• encomiast 2y ago
  I understand how this feels. If this was me, that 'October 19, 2024' line would already be gnawing away at my psyche. 'I said I was going to write more, it's almost been a month…'. This is one of the reasons I took the dates off of my posts (even though I think they might be useful to readers).
• inglor_cz 2y ago
  From someone who published nine books and over a thousand articles in the last ten years: writing begets writing. If you fall off the bandwagon, returning to the activity is tedious. First lines feel like hard work, as if you were a totally unfit person trying to climb a steep hill. Then it gets slowly better and if you can persist and write for several days, you are "in the flow" again.
• sbergjohansen 2y ago
  To anyone interested in further exploring this theme I warmly recommend "The Courage to be Disliked" by Kishimi and Koga.
  • swapxstar 2y ago
    That sounds interesting. Will check it out. Thanks!
• siva7 2y ago
  Hey HN, what do you recommend against coder's block? I often freeze when wanting to write code.
  • vdvsvwvwvwvwv 2y ago
    Debugging is great. If I get block because the code is too complex, debugging is a good way to interact and understand the code. It starts to make more sense. Console logging is still coding too! Debugging can be console logging or stepping through with a debugger. Or even run the program with different inputs.
  • dexwiz 2y ago
    Write out what you want to do in a single line. Then make a list of items needed to achieve that. Then split each of those items into 3s. Then split each of those items into 3s, again. Do this enough, and you will have the code you want to write. Then it just becomes a pseudo > real code transition, and LLMs are pretty decent at that.
• amonith 2y ago
  Maybe because you care about what others think you actually tell yourself that you need to write and read more to become "better" (not necessarily than others, just "better" as a person because you feel inadequate) and your body tells you that it's not actually what you want? The solution might be to use the internet less and enjoy the offline life some more, not to "overcome the hurdle".
• pooingcode 2y ago
  Im struggling with this once I reach the point I can release a project. It’s a sort of writers block I guess.
• hshshshshsh 2y ago
  I suffered from this. The issue is the ego. Ego has a lot of ideas about itself and others. Ego has such high opinion about itself it only can do great work. Which prevents it from doing anything. It's kind of a way of avoiding failures. Because failures will break the grant ideas about himself OP has created. I accidentally went through a spiritual awakening which diluted ego. I have no problem in doing any kind of work now. Whether it's great or petty. OP needs to work on the ego. Or figure out a situation where OP has to ship things no matter what. Which is hard unless you are jobless and can't figure a way out apart from building useful things that people pay for.
  • nefrix 2y ago
    Why did you delete the links? Your comment regarding the ego stayed with me, and today I wanted to access again the links you shared, and saw that were deleted.
    • hshshshshsh 2y ago
      Do you mean mean this one ? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42103115 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42103115 I also recommend Waking up with Sam Harris. That's what got me started.
  • calstad 2y ago
    I know it’s a bit of a personal question, but can you elaborate on your ego diluting experience?
    • hshshshshsh 2y ago
      I think it would be really hard to understand without experiencing it. But I will write down anyway. So before dilution I had this strong idea of who I was. I had this back story. There were certain things I do. And certain things I don't do. I used to judge everyone. I had a very high opinion about myself and used to constantly do or find things to validate that. Now I don't have a story in which I live on. Each and every moment is intense. Sunsets are absolutely beautiful that you cannot describe through words. Spending time in nature is surreal. You do the right thing instead of doing things to validate your narrative. The dopamine hit I used to get when I used to do certain things is gone( i use to confuse these dopamine hits as me doing something right). This unlocks doing things more from Intuition and less from memory. There is less fear. There is more flow. More creativity. No regard for authority or beliefs. Everyone is equal. You want to know and not believe. That said it's not all great stuff. You also have to work through some existential questions which you were previously isolated by the ego. Like mortality. Impermanence of everything. Aging body. What happens after death. Nature of awareness. Why I am aware. Is awareness eternal and it's implications etc etc.
• Liquix 2y ago
  "The most thunderous sound arises out of quietude." - Zhaungzi "The monotony and solitude of a quiet life stimulates the creative mind." - Albert Einstein "If you don't have time to read, you don't have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that." - Stephen King In other words unplugging, making time to read books, and allowing yourself to be bored are all good ways to stimulate the creative mind.
• saltcod 2y ago
  This piece was short, but it reads well. You’re definitely not a non-writer. You should keep at it. Look forward to reading more.
• ksassnowski 2y ago
  This resonates so much with me. I’ve even written a blog post a few years ago with almost the same title[0]. It hasn’t really gotten better since then even though I’ve built even more cool stuff since then (hell, I even was #1 on HN for a whole day earlier this year). [0]: https://www.kai-sassnowski.com/post/never-good-enough/ https://www.kai-sassnowski.com/post/never-good-enough/
• SoftTalker 2y ago
  One thing to keep in mind is that the vast, overwhelming majority of people in the world, or even your town, don't know who you are and will never be aware of anything you do. This goes even for people who are relatively well known in their field. It's nearly daily I see some story here about someone who is apparently "well known" and my reaction is "Who? I've never heard of this person." Don't worry about being good enough or what other people will think. The truth is almost nobody even cares.
• redbell 2y ago
  > This ties into my fear of not being good enough. I’m constantly worried about what others might think of my writing. If I don’t think it’s great, how can I expect anyone else to? I believe this belongs under the term Perfectionist Dilemma, as defined by Adam Miller [1]: The perfectionist dilemma is when a creator values the quality of a finished product, such to the extent that it inhibits their ability to iterate, change, and even produce. For many, it’s the ultimate writer’s block, invoking a fear that the finished product isn’t or won’t be as originally intended. > When I read articles on Hacker News about people doing incredible things and writing brilliantly about them, it’s hard not to feel overwhelmed. I totally agree with this. I believe it's an instinct feeling, so I'm accepting it as it is. _________________________ 1. https://medium.com/@thatadammiller/the-perfectionist-dilemma-91a4c89bf353 https://medium.com/@thatadammiller/the-perfectionist-dilemma...
• jctdrs 2y ago
  "Recently, with a bit of encouragement from a friend" Thank you friend..
• tonymet 2y ago
  [flagged]
• mattfrommars 2y ago
  TIL: there are randoms in the world who feel the exact what I feel, on daily basis for past three or four years. It is frustrating. One recent mindset change I have adopted that reduces the feeling of overwhelming is: 1. Say it out loud, "I have plenty of time" and breathe deeply 2. "I have to work within constraint for which I do not have control of" 3. Can things be a lot more worse then they are? Fortunately, the answer to this has been 100% yes. Things can be worse in terms of developing complicated medical condition to family complication. 4. There always be be 'noise', work on reducing it and accept the 'distractions' are noise. Since distraction is noise, ignore it instead of giving into it.
  • Aeolun 2y ago
    > 1. Say it out loud, "I have plenty of time" and breathe deeply The older I get, the less this is true, but the less I stress about it. There’s a great many things I’ll be able to accomplish, but never everything that I would want to. And that is fine.
    • hackable_sand 2y ago
      For real? The older I get the more it is true.
• michael-online 2y ago
  The first three minutes of this Ira Glass interview are pure gold, and I listen to them at least once a year to remind myself to keep fighting. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=X2wLP0izeJE https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=X2wLP0izeJE
• rsktaker 2y ago
  I think when I've read things I liked, it's because I was sort of writing when I was reading if that makes any sense. I know I'm stretching the meaning of the words a bit, but it feels to me like whenever I've read words that I've written and don't really feel what I'm talking about, it's because I'm a different person now and so the words aren't really my own. But as I'm writing, the words are full of meaning, to just me, and I'm really saying something honest that I know is honest. After a while though, they seem dead. So I write all the time (literally, and all over the place too) and I don't really care to share it because the words I've written aren't even all that impressive to me - it's more how I feel about the words I'm writing. Or maybe I'm just saying that. I feel like when people say (share with others) that they think something, it's actually just a ploy to trick themselves into thinking that way - because being the person that would genuinely think that way is an attractive thing for them. What can I say.
• marcuscreo 2y ago
  This resonates with me so much! The only thing that has worked for me to overcome my crippling fear of writing shitty blogs on the Internet, is to write more shitty blog posts. I write every day, publish every day, send them to my email list, every day. 90% of them are crap. Next year I hope 80% of them will be crap. And so on. I have also noticed that when I send a particularly crappy one, I don’t get a lot of unsubscribe or hate, because people just wait for the next one. I’m guessing the 3500 people on my list generally want to receive them, or they would leave. Most of them are crappy in particular ways: two personal, too broad, too vague, too long, Too $hort, two philosophical, two tactical… You get the idea. Publishing often allows me to try a wide variety of approaches, lengths, styles, tones, topics, without fear that I am doing “wrong.“ If you want to connect, drop me a line at marcus@marcusblankenship.com. Always happy to support a fellow writer.
• theseagin 2y ago
  If the plan is to put more effort and just do better I'm afraid, you will fail again, sooner or later. Not because effort does not count, because it's too vague. You can write two lines with a pen that weighs 20 kilos, that will be a lot of effort but you've only written two lines. What can you do instead: 1. Trouble writing because you want something perfect: Write crap, sit down and tell yourself I'm going to write one line, that's it. Just one line. But do it everyday. 2. Care too much about what others think: If others perception of what you write is hindering you, just don't share everything you write. In this early a stage the point is to get good. Occasionally you'll write something that you'll be really proud of, share that. Not every word that comes out of our heads is pure magic, we all think and write a lot of crap. Welcome.
• ilidur 2y ago
  Review: The author uses this article to say why they're not writing as much as they want. They break it down into two reasons: self judgement of quality, and the quality bar set by articles and projects in their sphere of reading. It ends with having acknowledged the issues, the author is ready to write more. Opinion: having seen this with many friends I think the author does good to acknowledge it, but the main thing to figure out is why they're writing. To be prolific at writing does not need to imply prolific at publishing. I've actually started to write these review style comments because far too often the articles posted here don't have substance and interesting debates happen around bad data. So I wanted to see a change and critique the content not just the general concepts behind it. I now write more without having to accept my contributions are significant. But also create a network effect where friends read my reviews instead of being swayed by the upvotes and comment sizes, or worse the algorithm.
  • r17n 2y ago
    I really like this idea. I hope this catches on.
• irjustin 2y ago
  Something that's not really answered in this post but maybe in another one is - why are they writing? I used to have the exact same ambitions, blocks and difficulties writing (you can see on my blog). Turns out, I just don't like writing. It's something that many smart minds extol as a great practice, which I 100% agreed, but once I gave it a serious go for myself, just didn't really enjoy the journey, product nor the outcome. Usually, you need to like one of those elements otherwise there's a good chance you're not doing the thing for yourself, but because someone else is giving you the reason. Do try though, because you won't know until you do.
  • hilbert42 2y ago
    "Turns out, I just don't like writing." For many of us writing is tough and quite hard work so it's understandable why many don't write much. For instance, when I look back at my posts on HN—which I rarely do because it's embarrassing—I see typos, wrong word usage and grammatical errors that I didn't notice at the time. I only wish I could correct them. I had a colleague who is now deceased but he could take pages and pages of handwritten notes and they were perfectly legible, logically coherent and could be essentially typed into papers with little or no editing. I envy his ability, I only which I could write with such accuracy and fluency. I've often wondered why I can't do that. It seems to me that too many concepts come into my head at once and I lack the ability to sort them quickly and write them out in a linear/coherent fashion with enough speed. The result is that editing can take more time than the actual writing. It's somewhat of a disincentive, so much of what I'd like to write doesn't get written. It's interesting to compare say Mozart and Beethoven in this regard. Looking at Mozart's handwritten scores one sees page after page of almost perfect notes without cross-outs or alterations. On the other hand some of Beethoven's scores are such an unholy mess they're almost illegible. On evidence, it seems the mental processes of both these geniuses worked in quite different ways. Edit: it seems to me whether one likes writing or not one has to do so to communicate efficiently and effectively. I've often wondered how many great ideas have been lost because they were never documented.
  • globular-toast 2y ago
    Yeah, I'm with you. Whatever you do, you need to like it. So many people try to start new habits like writing, reading, exercise etc, but if they don't like it, they will invariably stop before too long. I think the first thing people need to do if they want to start a habit is find a way to like it. If you want to exercise most, then cycle to work. As you'll enjoy it more than being stuck in a metal box you've now made exercise a habit. If you want to read more, you need to find books you like and ways of reading them that you like (paper, ereader etc). If you want to write more you need to first find a way to write that you like. You might like writing with pencil and paper. Seriously, try this. But you might prefer a WYSIWYG word processor. You need to try it. Then find something you enjoy writing. Fiction? Blogs? A private journal or memoir? Bottom line is if you don't like something you won't keep it up.
• moth-fuzz 2y ago
  I have a problem with how procrastination and perfectionism, this sense of being 'not good enough', is almost universally phrased as not being good enough for others. For caring too much about others' opinions. And that the solution is to just Do Art For Yourself :tm:. I've tried that. I've tried shunting out everyone else's opinions. But then of course, if you lock me in a room with me, myself, and I, you now have 3 of my biggest critics all in the same room. I don't really care what others think, never really did, and none of these anti-procrastination or anti-perfectionism pieces help when it's my own standards that I'm not meeting.
  • lapitopi 2y ago
    I was in a similar boat, and this book[1] helped me a lot. It deals with the roots of procrastination, which lie in poor mood management and the lack of self-compassion. If you want to go deeper into self-compassion, I found this book[2] very helpful. [1] Procrastination - Fuschia M. Sirois PhD [2] Radical Acceptance - Tara Brach
  • echelon 2y ago
    I definitely feel this more than worrying about others' perception. Paradoxically, I also often feel that some tasks are _too easy_ and won't start them because they're simple, uninteresting, or unrewarding. I feel like I can execute them perfectly, so I put off getting started.
• wswin 2y ago
  Actual failure is not trying https://youtube.com/watch?v=OZEPbyIA8XI https://youtube.com/watch?v=OZEPbyIA8XI
• la64710 2y ago
  There is no new insight in this blog .. why did it get so many upvotes? Clearly I must be missing something.
• bimguy 2y ago
  I read a Virginia Woolf recently, To The Lighthouse. In which the mother describes her teenage children as having "incurable laziness". Which I found hilarious.
• twodave 2y ago
  I think self-reflection is an underdeveloped skill. Everything from weight management to pre-occupations (or even addictions) to getting work done to eating healthy —these are all problems that require self-reflection to recognize. And then once the issue has been identified, the next thing to do is seek help. One of the great lies that everyone believes is that nobody understands me. I’m on my own. I have to fix this myself. Bullshit. So whether you just talk to a friend, attend a support group, pay for professional help, etc., these are all very effective at helping those who desire change to actually change.
• asdfman123 2y ago
  My tricks for beating procrastination are: 1) Give yourself permission to do bad work. If you're stuck, just start writing whatever junk is in your head. Make it hilariously bad! Write like a total idiot. But often that alone is enough to unstick you. Having very rough work is infinitely better than staring at a blank page. 2) Procrastinate "a little bit" Rebrand some procrastination as manageable short breaks, stop beating yourself up, and take control back from your rebellious subconscious. That way, you're working with yourself, not against it. 3) Always be asking yourself, "What's the smallest thing I can do RIGHT now?" and doing it. E.g. you might not know how to write a full paper, but you can write down all your random ideas on a sheet of paper. Do that. Then once you're done with that, the next step might be writing an outline. Then, expanding each outline into a short paragraph... But don't think that far ahead, just do the smallest thing now!
  • jdironman 2y ago
    I feel like this also applies to software development. I have a friend, who is a perfectionist. they're really smart! a lot smarter than me actually. with that being said total output and progress towards a goal we both share is higher on my end because I'm as they put it "more industrious". I don't say this as a brag, but more people have different struggles to get started and different motivations. I'm not motivated by the big picture, I'm motivated by the challenge in front of me. others might be motivated by the big picture and not the smaller challenges. either way, I think recognizing that fact, and your motivation, alone is a step in the right direction.
  • Jerrrry 2y ago
    How do you know you're not in a local minima? the whole one digs can be deepened similar to Zeno's Paradox by procrastinating a little bit with bad small distractions allowing time to exponentiate small problems into untractable ones. It is a little reductionary, almost akin to telling depressed people to have a slightly better today than the day before; not necessarily wrong but just rephrasing the problem. It is correct, but only by definition.
    • asdfman123 2y ago
• hjaveed 2y ago
  I have suffered from this myself. The only way to move forward is to take action and not worry about the end result or outcome. I write to share my ideas now, document and also to make myself accountable
• hjaveed 2y ago
  I have suffered from this myself. The only way forward to your point is to take action and not worry about the outcome or how others perceive it. I write now to share, document and also to make myself accountable
• simonw 2y ago
  I will repeat my standard advice for writing more: lower your standards, and allow yourself (in fact force yourself) to publish things despite knowing that they could be better if you just changed a few more things... Also, write about things you've learned and projects you've built: both of those are topics where you aren't expected to provide shining new insight never seen before online: https://simonwillison.net/2022/Nov/6/what-to-blog-about/ https://simonwillison.net/2022/Nov/6/what-to-blog-about/
  • bbor 2y ago
    Love the overall message, and you’ve obv got the HackerCreds to back it up, but I’ll throw an obligatory “what does it mean to force oneself to do something?” IMHO the idea that you can ‘force’ yourself to do things puts a moral/normative element in the discussion that does more harm than good. It makes one feel like they somehow chose failure, when it inevitably arrives. We all agree that are limits to self control, otherwise people would force themselves to work all the time, or not be depressed/anxious, or snap out of ADHD - or, hell, not to feel grief. “Encouraging”, “welcoming”, and “promoting” the defeat of perfectionism-based procrastination seems more helpful in the aggregate, IMHO
    • simonw 2y ago
      Force may be too hard a term, but basically I mean that you should bias towards publication even when you're not yet happy with what you've written, and constantly remind yourself that publishing content that isn't 100% perfect yet is a virtue that should be celebrated. The alternative is a folder full of drafts and never publishing anything at all.
      • bbor 2y ago
        Fair enough, well said! I'm fighting a philosophical battle that's somewhat orthogonal to publishing writing, so "it's a virtue" is already a win for me. For any passers-by who might not realize, this kind young man is a recent (?) celebrity in the AI space for publishing quick, no-nonsense takes on the cutting edge of open-source LLMs. So he's got the receipts to back up this claim, lol
• kmod 2y ago
  I think people here might like Oliver Burkeman's books where he talks about this stuff a lot. I loved his book "Four Thousand Weeks", and there is a new follow-up "Meditation for Mortals" which I have not read yet but seems to be well-received. He's one of the few people I've seen address what I think is the key difficulty with this sort of stuff: that you can think think that you're addressing procrastination/perfectionism when actually you are engaging in it (with a target of fixing your procrastination/perfectionism). It's a difficult situation to break out of, because it seems like any effort to break-out would necessarily have this sort of grasping, but I think he (and Buddhist meditation) talk a lot about that key challenge.
• laptopdev 2y ago
  A lot of people apparently have similar self-beliefs. Recognize these are beliefs. Identify and map out your current belief system so that you can analyze it for what it is. That's what you have to do when you are uncertain, is map things out. When you develop more self awareness you can choose different belief systems, like in the matrix.
• GVRV 2y ago
  Just like the author, I wanted to read and write more. As I'm taking a year long sabbatical, I just started writing (badly) at https://www.gaurav.io/blog/ https://www.gaurav.io/blog/. The idea is to write a post every weekday (excuse the last 2 weeks – it was Diwali) even if I think it's a terrible post. The value is in getting the post published, not publishing something great, at least for now. I'm doing something similar with reading – 50 pages minimum everyday. I've read more books in the last 4 months than in the last 4 years by just keeping the streak alive.
• black_13 2y ago
  [dead]
• ingen0s 2y ago
  Let’s goooo!!!
• stef_841 2y ago
  "Done kills Doubt".
• stef_841 2y ago
  Done eats doubt for breakfast
• perlgeek 2y ago
  I've been listening to a psychology podcast, and they label every "should"-statement as a cognitive distortion. > While I do read articles here and there, it’s far less than I should. Formulating it as a "should" abstracts away who wants it, and makes an artificially abstract norm out of it. But what is actually? It's probably just something that the author wants. Not doing something I want feels less bad than not doing something I should. There are lots of things that I want and don't get or don't do, I'm already used to that. It's a bit like the passive voice in writing, it hides who does something, or should do something. Some "should"s are also what we think that others want us to do, often just assuming that without asking. And so on. If you assume that every "should" is a thinking error, some go away, some become "want"s. It's a good first step, I recommend it.
  • gsuuon 2y ago
    I (too recently) realized "shoulda, coulda, woulda"'s are generally useless, and to focus on only "need, want"s. If it doesn't fit into these two categories then it's not important enough to think about.
    • CastFX 2y ago
      "Nonviolent Communication" by Marshall B. Rosenberg is a wonderful book (I picked up from HN) that explores this concept very well. Definitely recommend a read
  • docmars 2y ago
    > Some "should"s are also what we think that others want us to do, often just assuming that without asking. Yep, and to take it further, I'd argue this kind of thinking is a reflection of any shortcomings that you think others perceive in you. It's an inadequacy complex. You think about others saying: "Bill doesn't read enough. He isn't intelligent enough. He isn't informed enough. He spends too much time doing other things..." -- says who? Sometimes this can come from loved ones or colleagues priding themselves in their own hobbies or activities. Other times it can come from past criticism you've received from friends or family. There is so much freedom in doing something for yourself (because you know it's right) versus pleasing others, when it doesn't really benefit others. As an example, I don't cave to the pressures of working out because I know I'd only be doing it to impress others. I'm at a healthy weight, but I play recreational sports instead to get my exercise, because I enjoy doing it. I also benefit from socializing with others and being outside doing something competitive.
• docmars 2y ago
  When it comes to writing, one of the best decisions I've made is to just start typing what I think, and then go back and proofread it, make edits sentence-by-sentence, figure out if things could be worded better, and finally, trim some fat if whatever I end up with feels too lengthy. It helps you learn your own thought patterns and understand whether your logic is sound or not. And you're right, getting started is the name of the game. Someone brilliant once said: beating "procrastination" is really just imagining yourself starting the task, instead of being in the middle of it or finishing it. Instead of picturing the document full of paragraphs after writing for several hours, what does it look like for you to sit down at your desk or couch to write? Do you need coffee first? What's a good motivator for getting started? Can you find a new trigger to motivate you, like a snack? Some people like to reward themselves after doing a task, which can help, but I find myself saying: "Ooh, I'm going to brew some coffee before I start" and that gets me excited to follow through with whatever I set out to do.
• riqbal4 2y ago
  I had same issues as you have outlined about writing before I read someone say "don't worry about others and just write for yourself" and all my fears about writing went away. So just write for yourself and I can guarantee you that others will read what you write.
• aashutoshrathi 2y ago
  this resonates a lot with me. looking forward to more blogs from you and start writing myself. godspeed
• heavyjoe 2y ago
  McClelland’s Three Needs Theory: Power, Achievement, and Affiliation. I had suffered from this until i realized that my main motivation (learned from all my experiences in the past) for everything i do is Affiliation. And more or less what is written here "I’ll never get anywhere if I’m paralyzed by the fear of what others might think. It’s time to put that aside and focus on my own growth." is what helped me get some distance to what others may think.
• jeter02 2y ago
  I have to remind myself procrastination is a fear problem and not an ability problem. Asking for help. Fear of getting more stuff to do. It prevents me from getting a sh*tty first draft down and from that. ONly thing I have found is like body doubling even in the form of coffee shop and people not even doing. I think there are frameworkds too. It is just sometimes fear can preventing using the many tools. Also a plan of "What does done look like". Great topic.
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• brianjking 2y ago
  All I can say is dear god am I in this post or what.
• comatoast 2y ago
  This is just ADHD. Look up the symptoms (there's a lot more than just "can't focus sometimes").