I do accept that the equation is a pretty accurate description of akrasia and has been proven empirically, but personally I’ve found that the type of strategy OP proposes is not effective for me.
First, the crucial steps of the algorithm require the exact same mental resources that are missing when I have the worst bouts of procrastination. When it’s clear that I’m procrastinating because I haven’t divided the task into smaller subtasks, the idea of doing this division is as difficult as it is to try to start the task itself.
Second, the attacking part of the algorithm seems to provoke far/abstract thinking mode, which makes me more prone to procrastination. Any algorithm or strategy that does not contain ridiculously concrete steps has failed me, sooner or later. Anything that lures me to thinking of, say, long term achievements of using the strategy has made it much more likely to just not use the strategy.
In general, I think it’s useful to establish some baseline measurement for one’s productivity. At the time of worst procrastination, it seems obvious that a successful strategy will cure whatever it is one is suffering from at the moment. But if you adopt a long-term strategy, the effect is probably going to be much smaller than you initially thought and is going to be difficult to distinguish.
I personally measure the time I’ve spent in workspaces I’ve nominated to different types of tasks (“zoning out” (random web-surfing), meta-work (email, instant messaging with colleagues etc), real work). I had to use the system for quite a while to begin experimenting with different strategies. Now I can see if a strategy makes a difference and whether I can maintain it for long term.
Well, I didn’t exactly state any particular experiments in the above post, but I did get some results.
First, the system of measuring my time worked just fine. RescueTime and similar software products do this as well and I encourage anyone considering doing experiments on yourself to get one or arrange a system like I did and then just start measuring. You’ll get a nice baseline to compare to. It’s surprisingly difficult to notice a significant difference and if you don’t have a quantitative approach and historical data, it might be impossible to say if some experiment made any difference. You might think that improving your productivity with some method will feel somehow different, but it won’t. The only way you can say for sure is to have some kind of measuring system.
The measurement system and subsequent noticing that I wasn’t nearly as productive as I’d like to be didn’t make much of a difference. I could clearly see how I spend my time and what kind of events hindered my productivity, but this alone didn’t improve my overall efficiency.
The experiment I did on myself was to start using the Pomodoro method. On average, I got roughly 20-25% more real work done per workday. (Say the baseline was 4 hours which improved to approx. 5 hours a day.) It sounds somewhat pathetic, but I could sustain this over long term. (Since then I’ve switched jobs and I have different kind of desktop setup and I don’t have a similar measurement anymore.) I didn’t become a productivity monster over-night and I do have difficulty motivating myself some days. Pomodoro doesn’t help when I just don’t have the motivation. But now I know that I can improve my efficiency when I am on the groove. I think the difference is that the normal way of chunking the workday drains some mental resource faster and sometimes that will result in the disability to re-focus after a longer pause.
So, all in all, I recommend setting up a system of measuring what you really do during your computer time. But that won’t, in and of itself, make a difference. But it will provide a platform that enables for you to experiment on yourself.
I do accept that the equation is a pretty accurate description of akrasia and has been proven empirically, but personally I’ve found that the type of strategy OP proposes is not effective for me.
First, the crucial steps of the algorithm require the exact same mental resources that are missing when I have the worst bouts of procrastination. When it’s clear that I’m procrastinating because I haven’t divided the task into smaller subtasks, the idea of doing this division is as difficult as it is to try to start the task itself.
Second, the attacking part of the algorithm seems to provoke far/abstract thinking mode, which makes me more prone to procrastination. Any algorithm or strategy that does not contain ridiculously concrete steps has failed me, sooner or later. Anything that lures me to thinking of, say, long term achievements of using the strategy has made it much more likely to just not use the strategy.
In general, I think it’s useful to establish some baseline measurement for one’s productivity. At the time of worst procrastination, it seems obvious that a successful strategy will cure whatever it is one is suffering from at the moment. But if you adopt a long-term strategy, the effect is probably going to be much smaller than you initially thought and is going to be difficult to distinguish.
I personally measure the time I’ve spent in workspaces I’ve nominated to different types of tasks (“zoning out” (random web-surfing), meta-work (email, instant messaging with colleagues etc), real work). I had to use the system for quite a while to begin experimenting with different strategies. Now I can see if a strategy makes a difference and whether I can maintain it for long term.
It’s been nearly a year since this post. I’m curious what your results are, if any.
Well, I didn’t exactly state any particular experiments in the above post, but I did get some results.
First, the system of measuring my time worked just fine. RescueTime and similar software products do this as well and I encourage anyone considering doing experiments on yourself to get one or arrange a system like I did and then just start measuring. You’ll get a nice baseline to compare to. It’s surprisingly difficult to notice a significant difference and if you don’t have a quantitative approach and historical data, it might be impossible to say if some experiment made any difference. You might think that improving your productivity with some method will feel somehow different, but it won’t. The only way you can say for sure is to have some kind of measuring system.
The measurement system and subsequent noticing that I wasn’t nearly as productive as I’d like to be didn’t make much of a difference. I could clearly see how I spend my time and what kind of events hindered my productivity, but this alone didn’t improve my overall efficiency.
The experiment I did on myself was to start using the Pomodoro method. On average, I got roughly 20-25% more real work done per workday. (Say the baseline was 4 hours which improved to approx. 5 hours a day.) It sounds somewhat pathetic, but I could sustain this over long term. (Since then I’ve switched jobs and I have different kind of desktop setup and I don’t have a similar measurement anymore.) I didn’t become a productivity monster over-night and I do have difficulty motivating myself some days. Pomodoro doesn’t help when I just don’t have the motivation. But now I know that I can improve my efficiency when I am on the groove. I think the difference is that the normal way of chunking the workday drains some mental resource faster and sometimes that will result in the disability to re-focus after a longer pause.
So, all in all, I recommend setting up a system of measuring what you really do during your computer time. But that won’t, in and of itself, make a difference. But it will provide a platform that enables for you to experiment on yourself.
The most exciting recent work on procrastination concerns the effect you mention. (http://meteuphoric.wordpress.com/2010/09/16/perfect%C2%A0procrastination/)