Understanding these swings of productivity can allow us to better gauge whether or not the day will allow us to generate the code that needs to be generated, but there's a level below that I think is important.
-We put a lot of emphasis in our day on completion and hitting deadlines. This emphasis can cause us to create strong attachments to completion and deadlines. Sometimes this is warranted because of external factors (the "critical-path" of the project require us to get this done by a certain date and time). But many of our deadlines are internal deadlines that we've set for ourselves. We set a goal that we will be this productive by the end of the day. The unstated condition of this internal productivity deadline is that we'll feel guilty and ashamed if we miss the goal. We'll fee like we're not measuring up to our expectations and wonder if we're worthy of the task at hand. We'll feel like our day has been wasted and wonder if we're capable of doing anything at all.
+We put a lot of emphasis in our day on completion and hitting deadlines. This emphasis can cause us to create strong attachments to completion and deadlines. Sometimes this is warranted because of external factors (the "critical-path" of the project require us to get this done by a certain date and time). But many of our deadlines are internal deadlines that we've set for ourselves. We set a goal that we will be this productive by the end of the day. The unstated condition of this internal productivity deadline is that we'll feel guilty and ashamed if we miss the goal. We'll feel like we're not measuring up to our expectations and wonder if we're worthy of the task at hand. We'll feel like our day has been wasted and wonder if we're capable of doing anything at all.
It's better for us to remove deadlines wherever possible. We won't be able to get rid of the external ones where folks are waiting on our contributions (though it may be possible to renegotiate those if they're not hard deadlines) but we can let go of the desire to meet arbitrary productivity levels and arbitrary deadlines.
I also am grateful for the work of Leo Babauta of [Zen Habits][5] which provided me the ideas of mindfulness and focus containers. They have been transformative in my own work, as this book demonstrates. I committed to spending at least 10 minutes each morning writing each section, and the results are the work you see before you.
-Thank you to those who helped me directly with this project. Thank you to my mom, Sharon Maloney, for help in my editing of this book. Any mist steaks what remain are an responsibilities of the author. Thank you to Beau Sheldon for reviewing the chapter on mental health and for helping me to better understand and highlight areas where folks struggle. Thank you to my friend, David Revoy, for his amazing cover art and for his inspiration throughout the project. Thank you to Esteban Manchado Velázquez for adding CSS and cleaning up the HTML version of the text. Thank you to the beta readers for your valuable comments and feedback in the Framagit Repository, including (in alphabetical order by handle or first name): Brendan Kidwell, D. Joe Anderson, David Revoy, Eric Hallam, Jer Lance, Matthew Piccinato, Matthew Balch, Midgard, Nicholas Guarracino, RJ Quiralta, Valvin, and Wilhelm Fitzpatrick. Thank you to Paco Esteban for editing fixes.
+Thank you to those who helped me directly with this project. Thank you to my mom, Sharon Maloney, for help in my editing of this book. Any mist steaks what remain are an responsibilities of the author. Thank you to Beau Sheldon for reviewing the chapter on mental health and for helping me to better understand and highlight areas where folks struggle. Thank you to my friend, David Revoy, for his amazing cover art and for his inspiration throughout the project. Thank you to Esteban Manchado Velázquez for adding CSS and cleaning up the HTML version of the text. Thank you to the beta readers for your valuable comments and feedback in the Framagit Repository, including (in alphabetical order by handle or first name): Brendan Kidwell, D. Joe Anderson, David Revoy, Eric Hallam, Jer Lance, Matthew Piccinato, Matthew Balch, Midgard, Nicholas Guarracino, RJ Quiralta, Valvin, and Wilhelm Fitzpatrick. Thank you to Paco Esteban and Shreyas Ragavan for editing fixes.
My deepest gratitude goes to my wife JoDee and my parents for their support and belief in me. Words cannot express the love and thanks I have for you.
projects / themediocreprogrammer.git / commitdiff