Attention is your scarcest resource (2020)

Fair, but when I say "waste" I mean more "cannot and should not be consciously marshalled toward a specific effort"

Also sometimes this same network that creates insights creates things like when I couldn't remember the lyrics to Mingulay Boat Song (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29l90zcoTBo) so I bopped around the house for a week singing "Heel ya ho boys/Let her go boys/She's a vampire/Set her on fire" so it's not all diamonds in the mine

I don't think Maslow would agree.

You have to decide for yourself because you're the only one that cares in the end. The main problem is that we're easily getting tricked into spending time on things we don't even particularly enjoy or things we enjoy in the instant but know we will regret later. It doesn't matter if you spend your time saving children from starvation or collecting pokemon cards, as long as on your death bed you're not overcome by "did I just waste my life ?" thoughts.

But that's not new:

> Continue to act thus, my dear Lucilius—set yourself free for your own sake; gather and save your time, which till lately has been forced from you, or filched away, or has merely slipped from your hands. Make yourself believe the truth of my words, that certain moments are torn from us, that some are gently removed, and that others glide beyond our reach. The most disgraceful kind of loss, however, is that due to carelessness. Furthermore, if you will pay close heed to the problem, you will find that the largest portion of our life passes while we are doing ill, a goodly share while we are doing nothing, and the whole while we are doing that which is not to the purpose

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Moral_letters_to_Lucilius/Let...

When you use your phone to surf the Internet you’re often doing it to just fill time, rather than it being an activity you really want to do (like those things you list). You often tend to come out of a long phone reading session feeling a bit hungover and possibly guilty at the time you’ve spent, compared to say building a model boat where you’ll generally feel positive and refreshed afterward. Using your phone is also generally not one activity you’re paying close attention to, you’re hoping from one thing to the next never really getting a sense of flow.

To be clear I’m talking about the mindless scrolling many of us do, if you’re reading a dissertation on battery chemistry or something on your phone I find that’s a different story.

I thought a lot about this. In life, we have things we have to do (work, chores) and thing we like to do (could be anything, also work, why not).

So the problem appears when you start to feel that you spend your life on things you have to do, and you have very little time for things you want to do. This is something everybody experiences at some point.

For me, one of the most happy periods of my life was when I was working 4 days a week, for example. It gave me a lot of space to actually feel I'm living. It also gave me a slightly greater sense of control over my life, and the time to appreciate it. As for the type of activity, it's secondary.

of course you're right, starring at your phone is also "living". it's just not the way I want to spend my attention / my life.

If you want to change your life you'll have to leave your local maxima, I'm afraid. Just imagine 10 years passed and nothing has changed. What was the point in living, just saving for retirement?

I'm training to become a voluntary avalanche dog handler. Having a physical dog that I'm responsible for and who needs the training helps a lot. Having something like that in my professional life would have been immensely helpful.

Read once somewhere that both heaven and hell surround us and it's all about what we choose to pay attention to.

When nothing works, go for delusions (only if you're stable enough to not have them break apart the nature of your reality too much).

Also, go travel; be it on the other side of the city in a new coffee shop, in a new town for their town's day or sth, or in a new state/country/continent, travel somehow manages to shuffle the internals in one's brain enough to reboot to a different baseline; good trick for when current internal state is too meah.

sounds like selffulfilling prophecy

that just sounds like depression with a lot of extra steps.

Volunteering is also nice. People are there because they want to and at the end of the day it gives you a nice feeling of doing something good.

I am bad at directing my attention. But at least my disciplin is equally bad.

Speaking of ADHD, sometimes I wonder whether that might be a false positive self-diagnosis in my case.

About 10 years ago, when I consumed much less media content like Instagram or YouTube, everything was different in that I used to be an avid reader of fiction, which I now can hardly do without losing focus.

That's also very much task-dependent. When I have a task that I find either intellectually challenging or with a critically important outcome, I am usually hyperfocused, and even pausing for lunch is an annoyance.

With less rewarding tasks, however, I would say attention and discipline are exactly what I wish I had more of. Writing documentation, listening to other people talking in calls, etc.

As someone who couldn't agree more with this part "Speedrunning a career at the expense of living the rest of your life just seems psychotic to me.", I don't think they see it that way. For a lot of people who work this much, the career is the dominant part of their life by choice. It's not popular to admit that anymore but they don't have a destination, they are doing what they enjoy (working a lot).

I’m glad I’m not the only one! I decided early on that the balance means more to me than making more money or having the most amazing resume.

do read the link. don't be like that (assuming it is real)

I'm loving the idea of calling something a "load of cope," especially these days, haha. Thanks for that!

HN has been very anti-grind, anti-working hard for as long as I’ve been reading it.

Really? We must have been reading two different HNs. I have the impression that posts appreciating work-life balance get more upvotes that the ones trying to sell you "your career is the most important thing you have" narrow outlook.

Really doesn't strike me as satire at all to be honest. Seemed to have been giving it completely straight.

I’d like to reiterate this one. Also, having a kid will reduce your “free” time; however, it will also force you to work more focussed.

Just another data point — anecdata, n=1.

I'm an academic in the humanities with kids, currently in my late 30s. While having children certainly reduces the time and mental bandwidth available for purely intellectual pursuits, I’ve found it forces me to focus more sharply on what truly matters—both in life and in research.

Paradoxically, I feel more intellectually alive now than before. The recent advances in AI are transformative, and they’ve opened up unprecedented possibilities even for resource-constrained researchers like myself. This moment in time feels uniquely energizing and urgent, especially for the humanities.

Of course, having kids is a major responsibility, and in academia—where short-term contracts and financial insecurity are common—it can be daunting. I feel incredibly privileged to be able to do both: raise a family and engage deeply with my field. But this is very personal terrain, and there’s no one-size-fits-all answer.

Are these people you know rich and able to use money to deal with the hard problems of raising children?

If I had money for cleaning services, landscaping, laundry, day car, large suv etc it would be easier

This entirely depends on how present you want to be in your kids lives, especially early lives. If you want to be there frequently you need to get the time from some where.

If you're fine with them going off to daycare or having your partner raise them solo, then you don't need to sacrifice any of your time really.

Important to note he didn't mention success once despite you doing so twice. Rather he said children are a detriment if you have "strong intellectual interests". He also didn't make a value statement of being happiness/unhappiness or talk about "pursuing some larger goal". He said it's a different - not worse -lifestyle that isn't the most conducive to said hobbies/interests. Which anyone with a child would immediately resonate and agree with.

Also wholly disagree. I don't have a kid, but I am married, and nothing has helped me more. Best thing that ever happened to me.

Being in highly challenging intellectual positions is not the same as actually producing highly valuable output. Are they effective in their positions after having kids? Do they have stay-at-home partners?

Most of the 40+ intellectually driven people I know have family and kids.

Honestly, having kids seems to focus people and help them drive toward efficiency and priorities.

I think some people just slow down more than others when they age.

Alternatively, their priorities might simply be revealed by their preferences and energy allocation. Like the people who want to be very physically fit, but when it’s time to work out they can’t find the motivation.

Speaking of fitness, 40s is when lifestyle and health choices start to catch up to people. The cumulative impact of diet, sleep, exercise, and choices like alcohol consumption start to appear in the 40s or even 30s. There was a stark split among my friends in the 30s where those of us who stayed fit and had even moderately healthy diet, sleep, and lifestyle diverged from those who ate whatever they wanted, didn’t exercise, or even frequently drank alcohol. Claiming a lack of energy due to age (or blaming family, career, kids, etc) was the first major divergence.

I feel the same way, but there were definitely a period when my son was younger when the two felt in conflict, and my drive is absolutely different now.

I felt an urgency when I was younger that isn't there any more (while ironically being acutely aware I have less time).

I don't know if that is age, or that I feel more content with family life and so feel less need to chase other things, but it's a distinct difference.

Yeah could be age but more likely both -- can't imagine such a dramatic change in just 2-3 years.

I'm 37 and still very intellectually driven (no children). I do think in general you're correct, though, because it's harder to find people like this as I age.

It could be the case. Thanks for the kind words! I found it difficult to tell what I really want.

> I might have a surge of energy for a couple days but it’s hard to sustain when the choice of pushing forward means stealing from my energy that I could reserve for my family

This is exactly what I'm feeling. Occasionally I got motivated and wrote some code for my side projects, but my heart would be gone for the next X weeks/months. I don't know why I need so much time to recharge, but that's it.

> I do think it will return. I’m trying to be present in my kids life at the age they want me present. Before long, they’ll have their own life and hobbies and then they’ll be out of my house. I think each of those will mark steps in my return to my former self. I was selfish with my time before because it didn’t really effect anyone, being selfish with my time now would cause me a great deal of regret and at the end of the day I value family well beyond my own interests and hobbies.

I agree with you. I definitely don't want to regret about not being present, thus the struggle. But as you and others said, hopefully this is going to change. Good luck!

Yeah, kinda painful TBH. I try not to read about them anymore. It's just pointless.

Thanks! The more I think about it, the more I feel it's my own issue and family simply makes me more vulnerable.

"Never felt being successful in life" -> "Want to achieve something" -> "Naturally turns to hobbies" -> "Family and kid takes focus and time away" -> "Get frustrated"

I think that's the loop I'm in.

I agree and dont understand the OP. I drink coffee out of the fear that I would waste my whole days time. The coffee allows me to spend some hours of focus time on what I want. In line with the blog posts point. This has been a struggle to all my life, its very hard to control my focus, my attention. I've been diagnosed with adhd (for whats that worth) and at some point took medication who's whole purpose was to allow me to control my focus. When I have unbridled focus, I suddenly have access to my brains full capacity. I think my IQ is easily 10 or 30 points higher / lower depending if I have focus or not.

Interesting to consider here is that we can measure time, but we can't measure attention. How we use attention alters how we experience time. It also alters the quality of what we can get from the time spent.

There are a lot of interdependent dynamics involving the experiences of time, attention, the outcomes of their use, and the resulting qualia between the three.

Shopping and paycheques seem extremely quantitative, but the matter of time and attention is quite qualitative as well. I wouldn't agree that they're the same, either.

One could argue that what you buy has qualitative aspects, but let's say you're just buying commodities to feed yourself or clean your home or what have you. Not choosing between New Balance and Nike and worrying about the corresponding qualitative factors. In this scenario I find the two hard to compare meaningfully. They seem like they're layers of abstraction away from being properly compatible.

I realize this is entirely subjective and these ideas are fairly fungible at a glance. It's just interesting to think about.

Well... unless you know how to turn your brain completely off while being awake, you're probably always giving your attention to something. Consequently, attention and time both spend at very similar rates.

This makes me terribly sad for the TikTok generation to enter their 40s. I’m in my 30s and don’t use social media, and I’m already saddened by the amount of my life algorithms have wasted

Time isn’t really a currency though because you have no option not to spend it. I’ve never really understood this analogy.

> Then comes that other discovery

A lot of us don't get it until the first big loss.

Attention is not the sole use of time. Nothing wrong with taking a morning sitting in a cafe and watching the world go by if you don't have anything urgent needing doing.