o2l's comments

Thank you so much for this! I came across this interview a few days ago and loved it so much that I was going to transcribe it myself. <3

I maintain a set of mind modes which I can 'slip into' while doing anything. These are abstract ideas which help me remember how I felt when something worked for me and I find myself subconsciously repeating most of them periodically.

I name them in odd ways that appeal to me but they are commonly known ideas.

I take a few minutes to mentally prepare myself and accept this mental state, and try to sustain it for a few hours at least if it's working, otherwise switch to something else.

A few examples are -

* Numb & dumb (to be numb to stimuli and dumb in action and keep moving forward with task at hand) - This helps me remember not to be nitpicky about small details, to ignore minor distractions and just do the damn task at hand. In short, to suppress procrastination.

* Plan & Execute (Do not make a single move without a plan) - Helps me think before I act, on certain days when I am overwhelmed and have a tendency to suffer with decision paralysis.

Question : Why would people (these days) be motivated to spend time on reading about a subject slowly as opposed to trying to read short targeted content (blogs/tutorials) quickly and jump into the practical bits?

May be it's just me and the kind of people I have been meeting who do not seem to have as much patience and time and would prefer getting hands-on experience quickly.

I can see how I might sound complaining about going through ~30 pages of information whereas full books with several hundred pages take much longer to read and this is relatively much shorter.

I have had the same feelings for the last few years now.

I started strong at 18 with an explosive growth in knowledge and skill till about 23 years of age. I was praised by pretty much everyone around me and that had turned into a positive feedback loop.

The plateau started when I started giving time to other things in life like relationships and a few other changes.

I am sitting at 29 now feeling that I have not made any progress since I was 23 and I can't get myself to do something about it, much similar to you. I get started sometimes but do not follow through till the end which has now become a behavior.

Recently, after some self assessment and after talking with a close friend about this, I have observed that the things that led to my past success were - time available to commit to a single purpose, absence of any other priorities in life, youth and energy and the biggest one being social approval/appreciation, even if it was on a very basic level (being praised by teachers and friends who were regular people)

In my opinion, if I were to start socializing more in situations where I get to share my interests and knowledge and work with other people interested in the same field, I would start getting feedback again and can learn a thing or two from others at the same time. This would surely revive my interest and keep me motivated to do more, so I can share it with someone.

For us who work professionally, our words of appreciation/praise for others become shallow or emotionless over time and work becomes just work, hence work is rarely a place of motivation for most. (May be things are different at FAANG or fancy startups where people are more driven for excellence)

Another observation I have made about myself is that I have a tendency to day dream grandiose scenarios where I master a technology without anyone's help and build something so cool that the world is going to be in awe of me and I am going to get back to my glory days. This may be true in theory if I were to commit myself to learning or building something and keep making consistent progress but it never happens cause they are just day dreams.

I have a better chance at success if I put myself in a position where people around me are interested in learning and mutual growth. I haven't figured out what would be the right medium to do this yet.

I came across Andreas Kling's YouTube channel just yesterday while reading about SerenityOS on HN and I could relate a lot of my situation after listening to this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNT3VqZApsc

Hope it helps you too.

Couldn't see anything annoying on Brave browser except the overlay on article page.

I have much more appreciation for Brave today and how it molds my daily browsing experience.

This perspective of viewing when you know nothing about a subject and having an opinion only based on the work itself, and not instantly comparing it to something similar you saw the other day or claiming it's not even that hard or that pics have been heavily edited ( I believed that they weren't since the title said photography ). Do people lose this perspective of looking at something with fresh eyes when they know a little or too much about it ?

How do you put scientific basis for enlightenment? Most of the people who have claimed to have a path towards enlightenment have focused on the mind and that too remains private to the practitioner. If it adds value to the seeker's experience or gives someone more clarity, then that method has gained popularity and acceptance. You don't see a scientific basis for his methods but your opinion is not based on experience either. It is indeed a shallow dismissal.

The Science Of Yoga by I. K. Taimni - A commentary on Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. This might fall more on the religious side for many people but the author as well as the original scripture has nothing to with Gods in Hindu religion and describes how we perceive our reality and how should we proceed to understand it and ourselves further. I have read a lot religious scripture commentaries but this original scripture and author's interpretation of it is something next level for me.

Best Radio Ever ! Makes me feel that I can immediately connect to the vibe of any nation/community through the music or shows that they like. Not too many features like many here thought you should have had, I think you have hit the right balance where I can choose a radio and continue listening to it without having extra controls over volume or giving the ability to browse while still listening which could unknowingly distract a user from listening the current stream. Thank you for making this.

I am 25 now. Until 3 years ago, my dream was to become really good at computer science, move to the US and join Google. I have always had interest in ancient history so I tried to look more into Indian ancient history since I am Indian. I sincerely tried to understand the oldest scriptures which I could find which led me to commentaries & books written by people ranging from millennia old to present living and surprisingly most of them talking about the same thing ( at least the authentic ones ). I wouldn't say that I have become more religious and I am totally against any kind of belief. Currently, I would say that I have committed my life to find truth (not facts) and filtering out lies from my life, mainly through personal experiences and propelling my search by looking at pointers from others.

I will still continue to learn cool things in the domain of computer science because I enjoy doing it, but after all the reading and understanding I have done in the past three years I already feel more open and accepting to everything that comes my way, which was earlier limited to only a handful of interests.

I definitely do not have a time limit set until which I plan to work and retire and then decide to start living. I know that I am living a pretty good life and I am making it more wholesome as it comes.

My advice to a 25 year old would be to take time out, if you aren't already, to see what you have been doing and what you really want to do, irrespective of whether you see that as a passion or not, but when you get to do what you have decided to do, do it wholeheartedly so you can enjoy the act itself instead of waiting for the fruit of that action to enjoy. Happiness is not "there" and "then", it is always "here" and "now".

Can you share the names of other physics books that you think are good & readable ?

The importance of education is unparalleled in the current state of world.

Looking at the unrest in recent college pass outs, I would prefer if we could bring Apprenticeship back. In current times we have a variation of it called internship, but for most people they still have to go through a full fledged college education to become eligible for that internship.

Of course, Apprenticeship is not the answer for all fields but it would be good if companies also got into the business of educating people ( for money ) but treating them not just as a student but more like an apprentice.

An alternative would be to have collaboration between businesses and educational institutions to reduce the gap between learning and applying what you learned.

This can be relatively easily applied in developed nations and a bit hard to apply in developing / underdeveloped countries.

I graduated 3 years ago from a college in India. Luckily, I was interested in my field enough to start researching about how things we learned in college, worked in real life. But for most of my fellow classmates, it was just for the sake of getting a degree and supposedly becoming employable right after passing out. So when they actually passed out, the world was quite different than what they had expected.

Those are my 2 cents.

YCombinator too believes in the power of education. This was posted in September 2016 - https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs/#education

That's a very good insight.

Also, email me if you need to talk about this. Sharing thoughts about this kind of stuff always helps.

I can strongly relate to your situation. To me it felt like there is a constant unrest in life, you are not happy about how things are but not that motivated either to change overnight.

The quickest way to get what you want is trying out small changes which can have big impact on your day, which gives you hope that you can change.

Below are such small changes that made a big impact on me. I have come to know about these methods from the book "Mind Hacking" by Sir John Hargrave. It is a free GitBook and I strongly recommend it. Not a long read. -

1. Mindfulness Meditation -

  I follow the below order

  - Be aware of your breath for some time
  - Be aware of your thoughts for some time ( don't fight them. Let them free but observe )
  - Identify negative loops (Things that you believe in or repeatedly say to yourself that puts you down. Eg. I am a bad dancer)
  - Write positive loop for each negative loop ( Eg. I love dancing. Literally write this on a piece of paper everyday for a couple of times. It is to make it stick in your head )
  - Simulate situations in your head which you are afraid to face or are confused about.
  - Think of the best possible future situation, 4-5 years down the line. Think in as much detail as possible.
  - Think of the perfect day where you get everything done exactly as you wanted to. Again, think in as much detail as possible.

  Also, try to stay mindful of your actions and thoughts throughout the day. It will help you control yourself and your unwanted habits like checking phone frequently or procrastinating.

  You don't have to identify negative & redefine positive loops everyday unless needed.

  This routine takes 15-20 minutes in the morning and has helped me be clear minded and motivated throughout the day.

  I owe my current job ( which I am very happy with ) to this routine. It inspired me do things I won't normally do. The rush of positive energy I felt during the first few days was something I have never felt before, as if I was high on something very strong but positive.

2. Writing down a detailed to-do list the night before

  You have to make a list of things you think you can do the next day and write them down in the exact order you want to do them in. Keep the list very practical and write in on a piece of paper or white board. Try not to do it on your phone.

  Then, on the next day strike out the things you have done. This will give you a clear sense of accomplishment and in case you are ahead of schedule, it will motivate you to do even better.

  This also eliminates the need of thinking what to do during the day and you will have very less confusion.

  I implemented this a few days ago and it was the most productive and satisfying day I have had in several months, not just work wise but on a personal level.

The key in both the above methods is that you are actively taking effort in the process of figuring out what you really want to do in life or just the next day. Implementing either one of the methods would only take 15-20 minutes of actual thinking every day, so give it a try.

May be most do if you look at them from one person's perspective. The point here is to try something else for a change until you figure out whether you want to go back to doing something you liked earlier or moving on.

But aren't they already big in terms of users. And the people who valuate the business should be easily able to cut through this false appearance. Whatsapp got a big valuation with <100 employees.

I have not been a founder of any company so I can't comment on that part. But I can strongly related to this part - "what it would be like to work at Wal Mart, or the construction site outside, or as a bagger at a grocery store"

I am a passionate web developer but a few months ago, I had these exact same thoughts mainly about switching to a low stress job. Later I realised that I needed a break badly and the monotonousness of work ( building some kind of CRUD all day ) for me personally was making my life severely discomforting. So I left the job against everyone's advice and for the next few months I had terrible arguments with my family about this decision. But I was at peace the moment after I left the job and I think it was the right decision, even though my family wants me to regret it.

It's not that you hate what you do, but you definitely need a break and not just like a vacation, but actual handing over of responsibilities to someone else. After a few months, I felt like being back into the business and the optimism for work was back.

So this is probably against what everyone else is advising here but if you don't like it, leave it. Your wife should understand this too, if this is so important to you that it makes you cry. And definitely take up a stress free job for a change. It should help.

As far as leaving the company goes, you might find someone in ranks just below you who could be able enough to take over most aspects of your position.

Let me know, if you think this is a completely wrong advice.

This is amazing!

It's hard to compare Here Maps and Google Maps here. It's out of question that Google Maps provide a superior experience as compared to Here maps. But all the Google Maps imagery is processed, even while using the 2D option ( This is true only for countries with street view, from my observation. It's brilliant how they use street view along with satellite imagery to make a 3D model ). For my country India, the quality of images are slightly better on Google Maps, whereas when I check for other locations like Beijing, Here Maps seem slightly better than Google. It's weird how image quality change from country to country. It must have something to do with how they use their resources to provide best quality to probable customers and also country specific laws might apply for releasing satellite imagery.