Group rationality diary, 5/21/12

cata

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for the week of May 21st. It's a place to record and chat about it if you have done, or are actively doing, things like:

Established a useful new habit
Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief
Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations
Optimized some part of a common routine or cached behavior
Consciously changed your emotions or affect with respect to something
Consciously pursued new valuable information about something that could make a big difference in your life
Learned something new about your beliefs, behavior, or life that surprised you
Tried doing any of the above and failed

Or anything else interesting which you want to share, so that other people can think about it, and perhaps be inspired to take action themselves. Try to include enough details so that everyone can use each other's experiences to learn about what tends to work out, and what doesn't tend to work out.

Thanks to everyone who contributes!

Previously: 5/14/12 (and explanation)

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for the week of May 21st. It's a place to record and chat about it if you have done, or are actively doing, things like:

Established a useful new habit
Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief
Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations
Optimized some part of a common routine or cached behavior
Consciously changed your emotions or affect with respect to something
Consciously pursued new valuable information about something that could make a big difference in your life
Learned something new about your beliefs, behavior, or life that surprised you
Tried doing any of the above and failed

Thanks to everyone who contributes!

I strongly advise against using modafinil casually. I advise conditioning yourself to work hard when you are energetic. Don't get in the habit of being energetic and not getting things done.

If you're going to be experimenting with placebos, I would suggest pre-committing to work hard after taking a capsule regardless of the apparent contents. Then you can examine the differential impact of modafinil versus just pre-committing to work hard for X hours. (I also recommend deciding on a break scheme for your X hours in advance. For example, take a ~10 min. walk/internet browse every 50 min., or have a certain number of timed breaks you can spend at your discretion. This sort of stuff has worked really well for me in the past.)

Thanks for this, the committing to work hard sounds like really good advice. I'll do this too.