

Trying to pursue many different directions at once? - adityakothadiya
http://sivers.org/donkey

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scarmig
Is this true, though?

The unstated assumption appears to be that doing any single thing can be
highly parallelized and the window of opportunity is infinite. But reality is
rarely that kind.

(1) Some things take 40 years of consistent mid-level effort. Even if you
could quadruple your effort on it, it wouldn't get you there in 10 years.
Building a family, for instance.

(2) The chronological window. We live in a unique time in history (as have
people in every other time). It's an incredible time to be a web developer,
for instance. Ten years from now I doubt there will be as many opportunities.
In the 1950's, you had amazing opportunities at being a worker in heavy
industry; in the 1960's you could play a valorized role in the space race.
Nowadays neither is an option.

(3) Age window. Different ages lend themselves to different things. Sure,
people in their sixties can run a marathon, but it's a hell of a lot easier to
do it in your twenties. And unfortunately many of the things we might want to
do are early on in life--people's career paths are fairly set by 30, and we've
passed our physical peaks by 30. These aren't hard and fast rules, but they're
both very real tendencies that you've got to account for in managing your life
plans.

(4) Some things actively conflict in more than just competing for your time
and dedication. It's impossible to have an undergraduate experience that is
both set in a large Southern state university centered around sports and a
small private liberal arts college in New England.

Multitasking to the point of constant stress can lead only to disaster, of
course. The solution isn't to pretend that you'll eventually get to do
everything you want but instead to choose carefully what you want most and
then do it well.

~~~
shazow
Agreed.

I'd like to expand more on (2), timing is incredibly important for technology-
based ideas. An idea that is ahead of its time or too late could fail just for
that reason.

Let's recount the numerous attempts at tablet computing since the Newton in
the early 90s to the iPad just a couple of years ago. Timing and the state of
technology in time is important.

Sometimes a new technology comes around and threatens to disrupt everything,
like Bitcoin. If you have an amazing idea that capitalizes on this momentum,
now is the time to execute—not 10 years from now when the Bitcoin economy has
been banned and destroyed or matured and stabilized (one can dream). This is
the same way that mobile applications were an incredible opportunity in the
iPhone age of Smart Phones, but much less so today.

Ask yourself: What is the ideal time window for your idea? Though some ideas
are always good, given the right uncompetitive conditions.

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thaumaturgy
OK, I had to laugh at this one. First off, I have a huge amount of respect for
Mr. Sivers; he's one of the few advice-peddlers in the startup world that I
think is probably worth listening to most of the time.

But this is quite the opposite of long-term thinking.

(Except, maybe, in the startup world, where long-term often seems to mean,
"next year".)

Focusing on just one thing at a time for a few years means leaving it entirely
behind when you're done with it; it means not thinking about other things in
the meantime; it means ignoring the possibility that, in 10 years' time, the
three projects that you're juggling simultaneously could tie together in a
really neat (and maybe profitable) way.

Maybe some people are doing lots of things at once because they feel like they
have to hurry, and that could indicate really short-term thinking; but slowing
down to a rate of one thing every few years is, at best, near-term thinking.

I've spent the last three years building a really tiny business because, one
day, I intend to build an empire.

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ddlatham
This only applies when the opportunities you want pursue will still be
available when you have time to pursue them.

Sometimes that's not the case, and you simply have to give up on one to pursue
another.

~~~
DjMojoRisin
I think that people under-estimate their ability to multi-task!

~~~
anamax
While some/many/most people may under-estimate how well they could multi-task,
a lot of people over-estimate how well they actually do multi-task.

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barisme
Or you can do the human thing. Grab the water, move it next to the food, and
enjoy them together. While you're at it, you can even pay someone to take the
donkey to market and trade him for a case of scotch. That's multitasking!

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joeyespo
I can definitely relate to this.

I've been trying to push the related "you can have everything you want to
have, just not all at once" ideology into my subconscious. It's still so easy
to forget. Projects get dropped for more exciting ones. And I know you have to
keep telling yourself to just hold off and be patient.

This is a great reminder, very well written.

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Zolomon
I'm just a university student coming back from a year of work. My ambition and
passion is hampering myself; I love to program, I love computer science, I
love the web, I love the world. There's nothing I don't want to do - but I
sincerely feel the lack of discipline in this world full of opportunities.

How can you focus on one single thing when you want to do them all and when
you see that everything is connected and you don't have the necessary
experience yet?

I've ended up in an infinite loop. Jumping from task to task. Help - I need a
breakpoint.

~~~
drpancake
I know this exact feeling; in fact I'm in the same position having just
finished a year of work before going back to university.

I've got more ideas and interests I want to pursue _right now_ than I have
time in the day. I also can't imagine going back to being an employee after
having this realisation!

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malkia
Very good advice. Thank you! I do the donkey thing a lot, without realizing I
was the donkey.

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da_dude4242
Da Vinci didn't spend much time in any given direction. What I see Da Vinci
doing is relating what he's learning to what he already knows.

