I love creating things. Software, metal models, lego models, house improvements... I just love creating things, big and small.
Sure, there are parts of all of those things that suck and I work to get through them and on to the good parts, but there's nothing else in life that gives me a high like creating something.
Everyone loves creating things. It's part of or human nature. It's one of the things that makes life magic again. Not "being productive". "Being productive" is code for doing shit you would rather not do. If you wanted to do that stuff, you would just do it.
Sure, even the stuff we are the most passionate about entails tasks that we would rather not do. We all get that.
For example, right now I want to work on a research project, but I have to fill some forms first so that I can keep having medical insurance. I would rather not fill the forms, but I will just do it so I can go back to the magical stuff.
If most of what I do requires a Pomodoro-hell-clock, 3 lists and a process that takes 10 chapters to explain, just to discipline myself into doing it, then maybe I made some bad choices along the way. But hey, maybe it's just me. I am just inviting people to take a pause and reflect. :)
I can't even imagine having that kind of feeling related to my job. Especially not if it's about coding. At least not if it's about typical B2B or B2C software.
What do you do for a living if you don't mind me asking?
I run a company called TalkJS (https://talkjs.com). We're a toolbox that lets our customers build a proper chat feature in hours instead of months.
This means lots of API design and I love to do API design. I get a deep sense of flow and purpose when dreaming up a tool (an SDK, a library, a language, a set functions or data types; whatever) that lets other programmers do a wide variety of things.
Admittedly the other half of my job is business & marketing related. I like it too, especially since "sales" in our case mostly means talking to other programmers, and so does "management". But not as deeply as the code work.
It also helps that since we're a remote-first company I can choose from where I work and I stop when I notice I'm too stuck or "my brain is full". We don't really do the typical startup-burnout-marathon.
I am the OP and I am a fellow researcher. I also love my job (most of the time).
One of the reasons I love it so much is that it affords me freedom to think deeply about things that I care about without being in a straight jacket of constant schedules, meetings, two-week sprints or whatever else is prescribed this week by the High Priests of Productivity.
Greatest "productivity" hack for me: having a door that I can close.
My point is that "productivity" is a shallow value, and that turning yourself into a robot will not make you or the world any better.
Speaking of academia, the "cult of productivity" and obsession with status is damaging science. It's not me who says that, it's Nobel Prize winners. For example:
I love creating things. Software, metal models, lego models, house improvements... I just love creating things, big and small.
Sure, there are parts of all of those things that suck and I work to get through them and on to the good parts, but there's nothing else in life that gives me a high like creating something.