

Consistency - tomazstolfa
http://www.funkykaraoke.com/2012/06/consistency.html

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meiji
I have to agree and it happens in all areas but actually in a slightly
different form usually. To take the analogy from the post, you start walking
20 miles a day and then someone says that it seems easy to do that so why not
up it to 30 miles a day. Before you know it, the 40 mile day is the
expectation, off days are not allowed and you fall further and further behind,
eventually succumbing to burnout and the whole thing ends badly.

Software projects are the same. Nearly every company I've worked at, a senior
manager says "Well if we can get these guys doing all this and they seem to be
working well within their boundaries, lets push them harder". Pushing people
harder can be good if they are really just slacking, but for the most part,
people can't sustain more than is comfortable for long periods of time without
their work or their mental state suffering. The end result is crappy code,
people who leave companies or those that become non-functioning because
they're burned.

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Mizza
It's a lovely thought, certainly, and I wish I could structure my life that
way.

However, money doesn't behave like that. Fun doesn't behave like that. Life
doesn't behave like that. Love doesn't behave like that.

You can try to set as rigid a pace as you can, but some thing will always find
a way to mess your plans up.

Recovering gracefully is the real challenge.

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btilly
There is a state that I call "waiting in motion". You have a goal. It is some
ways away. It will take a lot of work to get there. But you just make sure you
stay in motion in the right direction, then wait...surprisingly soon you will
arrive.

But it is frustrating to _want_ to be there, and just be plugging away.

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akg
Excellent story. I think people in general overestimate the time they have
available to do things and underestimate the time it takes to actually do it;
which inevitibly leads to situations where you think you can make up for
"lost" time by sprinting forward, tomorrow. The most valuable lesson I learned
about productivity is that small actions, done now, can lead to huge
productivity gains tomorrow. The hard part of course is to subconsciously
justify to yourself that those small actions are actually making significant
progress towards your end goal. It's important not to get discouraged and keep
charging ahead.

What's more insidious are those "busy working" tasks that can consume your day
where you actually feel productive, but haven't made any real progress towards
where you want to be.

There's an excellent TED talk by Daniel Goldstein about the present and future
self; highly recommended:
[http://www.ted.com/talks/daniel_goldstein_the_battle_between...](http://www.ted.com/talks/daniel_goldstein_the_battle_between_your_present_and_future_self.html)

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robryan
As an aside, every other blog I have seen that is part of this svbtle network
(unless this one isn't and is just styled the same) has a nice mobile theme.
This one works poorly with mobile because of the fixed left bar.

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hboon
I thought it resembles Svbtle too. Looking at the HTML source, it is running
WordPress and isn't listed on <https://svbtle.com/>. So I suppose not.

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clinth
It's running a "svbtle-inspired" theme:

<https://github.com/gravityonmars/wp-svbtle>

Also seems to have inspired the name.

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npsimons
For some things, this makes a lot of sense: read something technical
(preferably while taking notes) for twenty minutes a day; work on a small
problem (brain teaser, programming koan, etc) every day; get some exercise
everyday; etc, etc. And certainly, this applies to hiking as well (just ask
anyone who's hiked the PCT).

To me, creativity doesn't seem consistent, though. I might come up with a
great idea and pound out code to implement it one day, then get stuck the
next. I don't see how someone could force themselves to "hike twenty miles
every day" in terms of creativity. Also, sometimes you have to push yourself
to grow or improve. Not saying that "twenty miles a day" isn't pushing
oneself, but if you get comfortable with that, you might want to try pushing
to "twenty-one miles a day".

The part about planning and paranoia is spot on though: even if your plan has
to change (which it will), if you're paranoid enough, you will have backup
plans.

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ahmedaly
I believe that Google is very successful also because they use the same
"methodology".

But still at some point, you have to work fast sometimes to keep in touch with
the competition around you!

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makmanalp
You do have to work faster sometimes, but maybe not in the way you think.
Recall the tortoise and the hare. It really is a similar story. Except the
moral shifted from "never underestimate an opponent" to "even if you're slow,
consistent effort will bring you far".

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MoreMoschops
How about the guy who does a minimum of 20 per day, and does extra on the good
days? He's going to clean your clock. Or the guy who uses a bicycle. Or a car.
Or flies. Or takes a different route. What exactly is the point of this story?
It's advocating consistency through a completely fictional, contrived story.

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npsimons
Okay, change it a bit: you're hiking the Pacific Crest Trail (2,663 miles).
You can't take a bike, a car, a plane or a different route. And most people
agree, 20 miles a day is a good upper limit. Much more than that and you will
make yourself too sick to continue. Bonus points for the fact that it's such a
long distance that you can't carry all your food with you, so you must be
extra paranoid and have a plan (like the article mentions) for food caches.

The more I think about it, the more I wonder why he didn't use hiking the PCT
as his scenario, other than many people haven't heard of it.

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mislav
Where did the 5 extra "miles" come from? He picks a quote where “20 miles/day”
is a good pace to have set for yourself, but then adds this about his team:
“We’ve been constantly marching at a good pace (~25 miles per day)“.

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tomazstolfa
The extra 5 miles are derived from the strength of the team (and each
individual member).

If everyone else is marching at 20 miles/day, we still need to march a bit
faster to win, but not too fast to burn out and crash.

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gamzer
Cannot read the article as the navigation is floating above the text on my
Android phone. At least this is somewhat consistent as it happens quite often.

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tomazstolfa
Thanks for reporting. Will fix.

