You get several “clean” hours every day, where you either do work or stay away from the computer—no willpower required. Magic.
How do you feel about working now compared to before? Are you more enthusiastic, or more reluctant? Are you staying away from the computer as a form of procrastination instead of going to it but not working?
1) As far as I can tell, my feelings about work haven’t changed.
2) Yes, now I sometimes walk away from the computer if I don’t feel like working. But these pauses are much shorter (because online procrastination makes time pass really quickly, compared to offline), and I always end up doing something productive like writing or playing the guitar. This was actually an unexpected benefit of the practice.
Vladimir is sleeping now. I will leave your first Q for him, but answer your second Q because we had a discussion about it.
We are in our apartments when we are being monitored, neither of us owns a TV and the internet has been the primary way for us to procrastinate or distract ourselves.
We would both continue to consider the experiment a success if all it does is to continue to prevent us from using the internet to procrastinate or to distract ourselves from our work—it is not necessary for us to work at our computers the whole time we are being monitored.
So for example, I spent part of the time that Vladimir monitored me shaving and talking to my apartment manager because that was the most productive use of that time. (Of course, I told Vladimir that that was my plan.)
I see. I had thought your experiment “when I want to be working on the computer, ensure I am not procrastinating on the computer instead” but it is actually “try to ensure I am not procrastinating on the computer”.
How do you feel about working now compared to before? Are you more enthusiastic, or more reluctant? Are you staying away from the computer as a form of procrastination instead of going to it but not working?
1) As far as I can tell, my feelings about work haven’t changed.
2) Yes, now I sometimes walk away from the computer if I don’t feel like working. But these pauses are much shorter (because online procrastination makes time pass really quickly, compared to offline), and I always end up doing something productive like writing or playing the guitar. This was actually an unexpected benefit of the practice.
You… you can write without a computer? WITCHCRAFT!!!
Vladimir is sleeping now. I will leave your first Q for him, but answer your second Q because we had a discussion about it.
We are in our apartments when we are being monitored, neither of us owns a TV and the internet has been the primary way for us to procrastinate or distract ourselves.
We would both continue to consider the experiment a success if all it does is to continue to prevent us from using the internet to procrastinate or to distract ourselves from our work—it is not necessary for us to work at our computers the whole time we are being monitored.
So for example, I spent part of the time that Vladimir monitored me shaving and talking to my apartment manager because that was the most productive use of that time. (Of course, I told Vladimir that that was my plan.)
I see. I had thought your experiment “when I want to be working on the computer, ensure I am not procrastinating on the computer instead” but it is actually “try to ensure I am not procrastinating on the computer”.
You have understood correctly. That is what Vladimir and I have defined to be our goal. (But we can probably help people achieve the other goal, too.)