
Ask HN: How do you make yourself productive after a tiring day at work? - althaffe
I&#x27;ve found it very difficult to resist the temptation to surf endlessly through Youtube videos or watch Netflix, after long hours of coding at work which kinda drains all your willpower.<p>This prevents me from working on my side-projects or spending time learning something worthwhile after work. How do you find the motivation to work on stuff that matters, even if you are craving for some mindless entertainment?
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davismwfl
1\. Get good quality sleep over quantity.

2\. Set a schedule and stick to it as good as you can, but don't torture
yourself if you blow it sometimes.

3\. Wake up earlier, do some work on your side hustle in the morning hours.
This helps motivate you later too, and gets some of your creative time in on
the side hustle before you start the day job.

4\. When you get home, chill, eat, shower, watch an hour or two of TV or
whatever helps you veg, and then get to work.

5\. Set some short term goals, 1 month, 3 months etc.

6\. Set a work area in your house so that you don't have distractions
immediately accessible.

7\. If you have decent vacation time built up or "unlimited".. Schedule taking
off every Friday for a month to kick start things, that'll give you a three
day weekend to work. If they don't like that do every Wednesday for a month,
or Monday etc. Take one day for a month each week and dedicate it to your side
hustle.

Don't beat yourself up over wanting to enjoy life some too, if you are all
work and no play/relax you'll fail at it all.

~~~
althaffe
Great pointers. Thanks.

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saluki
After a tiring day take a break, visit with friends and family, exercise go
for a bike ride or a walk, then shower and see if you're recharged and ready
to learn/work on a side project.

If not, relax and watch some TV enjoy some mindless entertainment or get to
bed early.

Try getting an early start instead, some of my most productive time is early
morning before the world is up and moving.

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perfunctory
You don't. Make sure you don _not_ get tired at work. Work less. Switch to
part time or take a sabbatical.

edit: I quite liked this talk about sabbatical
[https://www.ted.com/talks/stefan_sagmeister_the_power_of_tim...](https://www.ted.com/talks/stefan_sagmeister_the_power_of_time_off)

~~~
althaffe
I've been pondering about this option quite a lot recently

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pizza
There’s nothing wrong with listening to your body! Someone once commented
something to the effect of “if you work with your mind, relax physically, and
if you work with your body, relax mentally”, and I’ve been trying to implement
that change. Maybe something similar for you (sports/cardio/weights/taking a
walk around the neighborhood) might work.

The problem with extracting the maximum amount of mental energy from each day
is that you might drain more energy than you can feasibly regenerate from a
limited amount of rest per day.

Otherwise, my advice probably is to kill distractions, and block out time in
your schedule for projects, and plan the details before you start to actually
implement stuff, it might save you a good amount of time while implementing
the project.

Also, sleep better if you’re not getting enough, people who sleep long enough
can maintain a train of thought with much greater ease than who are sleep
deprived. Sleep deprived people don’t even realize that they’re losing focus.

~~~
althaffe
I should look more into physical relaxation I guess. I'm getting maybe just
around 6 hours of sleep a day.

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muzani
My trick is to not use any willpower. Your side project should excite you, not
tire you.

My goal is to push one update a day live, whether it's small or big. That
means when I have more time, I work on fixing up the infrastructure so that I
can push updates without code, such as setting up a dashboard. If the updates
are too big to fit in one update, I still push it to server as a matter of
principle, but it might be commented out.

Instead of finding the right way to build something, you figure out how to see
the results as soon as possible.

We spend most of our day building safe things; side projects are there to go
crazy and have fun.

Same goes for learning. Learn new things that interest you, and not some
targeted path to further your career. Pick up small, fun things, and very
often they lead to bigger things.

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jlengrand
Another idea to try is to reverse the problem : Wake up earlier, work for
yourself first and go to work after.

Do nothing productive after work, reserve it for sport / family.

It does a bit of getting used to but it avoids the emotional exhaustion of the
day

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oftenwrong
Work less, and use the time you save for your own purposes. Nobody will care
if you are leaving a bit early. Your productivity probably will not even
decrease. Most programmers work more hours than they can actually sustain
productively.

Most people work until they are tired, and then go home, arriving even more
tired. To arrive home with some energy, leave work well before you are tired.

Don't forget to use some of that extra time for fun.

~~~
quickthrower2
Just leave early? Simple as that?

~~~
oftenwrong
Yes

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navd
Forming a habit

[https://www.dannav.com/rituals/](https://www.dannav.com/rituals/)

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algodaily
You don't-- rest up and move slower, all good things take years regardless.

Check out [https://algodaily.com/lessons/how-to-have-a-slow-and-
boring-...](https://algodaily.com/lessons/how-to-have-a-slow-and-boring-
successful-career) for more on this.

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sharadov
You need a physical activity to reset you brain. Can be as short as 30 mins (
even better if its outdoors).

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jamieweb
How long is your commute? If your commute is short and/or fast-paced (e.g.
speed walk, bus/train that is on time), then you can often carry forward the
productivity from work for a bit at home.

This often works for me, but as soon as I eat, I'll have to take a few hours
break in the evening, then become productive again in the late evening.

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andrei_says_
I’m most successful when I’m able to force myself into a non-brain intensive
activity before attempting any additional work.

It could be a short workout or yoga session, a walk, a dance class.

Then, timeboxed (with a timer!) work session.

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arathore
I have found that doing some physical exercise (gym or sports) in the evening
helps me offset some of the mental fatigue and create bandwidth for other
stuff in the evening.

~~~
althaffe
That's interesting. I've never thought of this before.

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billconan
I set small and concrete goals. I also disabled my netflix account.

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mgummelt
Work in the morning.

