[_ptgt]

Does this resonate with anyone else? Is there any studies on this?

I’ve had a similar experience over the past few years — a ton of work focus (at a FAANGM as an ML scientist/engineer) combined with limited social interaction and I’ve noticed my ability to have normal social interactions has declined greatly (“verbally inept” and “difficulty with empathy” pretty much hit it on the head). There’s potentially confounding factors in my case so I’ve been hesitant to attribute it to overfocusing at work although I’ve considered it may be a cause.

In retrospect I’m coming to the conclusion that it’s not really a worthwhile tradeoff and I’ve been pulling back from work a bit. To add to the larger discussion, I thought I was focusing on work for the right reasons (making a difference in the world, gaining skills, self-actualization) but after getting my “dream job” it turned out that it the job wasn’t very fulfilling at all. No technical challenge or abstract impact metrics really did much for my happiness (or money fwiw)... at the end of the day it’s still rewarding social interactions (which don’t necessarily _have_ to be outside of work) that control the needle for me.

[Roritharr]

It resonates with me from a different direction. Up until I've become a dad I could crank out vast amounts of code and dive very deep into a given topic relatively quickly, producing extensive results when being able to focus, but since then I have a strict schedule, can't easily say "I'm coming home a few hours later today" or things like that to conserve momentum, I feel my output drastically reduced.

I'm currently looking for ways to reorganize my way of working so I get a better output and require less compromises of my family.

[IvanVergiliev]

I’ve found it extremely useful to keep a detailed log of my thoughts and ideas as I’m working on a problem that requires focus. It’s like a thread dump or memory dump of my thinking. Then, if I get interrupted for whatever reason, I can easily go back to the notes and “restore” from the thread dump.

This is a pretty good blog post I found on the subject: http://faq.sealedabstract.com/uninterruptible_programming_su... .

I’ve found various side benefits in addition to being able to focus in shorter time windows. For example:

- it’s useful for dealing with interruptions that are part of work too - e.g. if you’re helping teammates with different projects, or have to switch contexts for other reasons.

- it can be useful as an artifact of work. For example, you’ve spent a lot of time debugging a weird issue and you’re still not making progress, so you can use a second set of eyes. You can share your work notes with a coworker so they can immediately know what you’ve tried, what worked or didn’t, etc. In that context, I like to think of it as “offline pair programming”.

[syntaxing]

I feel the same. My attention span is half of what it was before I had a kid and learning new topics at work has significantly become harder. If you ever figure out a solution, I would love to hear it.

[TeMPOraL]

It resonates with me. I hit that once, at my 2nd year at university, as I was in a pretty bad emotional state which almost led me to drop off. Something clicked in my brain then, and I rebounded to extreme levels of drive and productivity (and a weird sense of humor). I nailed that year, went straight from "doesn't even attend classes" to the best student on the year. I earned a pretty good reputation with both my fellow students and faculty members alike. Unfortunately, the effect mostly went away the next year; I regressed to the mean, neither at my worst, nor at my best.

I'd really, really like to know how to enter that state again, and sustain it for longer.

[pplonski86]

Music helps for me. Try to listen music that makes you feel better. I can listen one track in the loop for the whole day and work.

[TeMPOraL]

I do that too, and sometimes this gives me bursts of exceptional productivity. But ultimately, it's just a pale shadow of what I had then, a whole year of sustained, exceptional productivity.

[charlieflowers]

Have you changed caffeine consumption? You might be shocked how much of a difference that can make.

[TeMPOraL]

Changed in which direction?

[seer]

I have definitely noticed this in myself and others - after coming out of an intense “in the zone” coding session I’m definitely more cranky and impulsive.

While this is strictly anecdotal, I do believe there is a tight correlation with focus, social and emotional intelligence. In the sense that if I devote all of my “brainpower” to solving a task, I do reduce my ability to understand social queues and other “left brain” stuff.

But as I’ve taken some time to understand my fellow humans better - deliberately putting myself in social situations and reading some great books about it, I’ve noticed the amount of energy required to “process other people” in my brain reducing greatly. This kinda gave me the ability to be pleasant even after doing some coding.

I can think about it like encountering an embedded language inside my templates or something. Like maybe javascript inside html templates.

If I feel comfortable with that language, I don’t even skip a beat, whereas if its something I’m not exactly fluent in, it gets me cranky - who put this in here and ruined its purity kinda feeling.

So it gets better with time, but I had to put deliberate effort into it.

[kortex]

Very much so. As a dev with ADHD, that focus knob is more external than most. But I definitely have noticed the phenomenon where deep focus and verbal/social fluency are rather orthogonal.

[SomaticPirate]

I’m interested in how this social breakdown might affect the role of being a scientist. I would think explaining results would be a critical role of your job.

[wallace_f]

>No technical challenge or abstract impact metrics really did much for my happiness (or money fwiw)

It resonates with me from a different perspective. I can't speak to the technical accomplisments -- I had a mundane tech job -- but I was making nearly 100k in total comp in my mid-20s in a low COL region, and my job was difficult for me. I know this isn't a lot of cash to many here, but it was a lot to me coming from being homeless at 18. However, my life took a bad turn, unfortunately. I had some unbelievable aggressions and weird things happen to me, and I left my job. I remember my history teacher saying of the past "If I was there, I would have done something about it," and yet all everyone told me at this time was something like "You need to stand up for yourself." I think most people today are just like they were back then, even if we are not burning people alive for witch craft, we still sometimes bully people under the name of pretexts and for unacceptable reasons. I then quit, left to try to play one of the most popular online games professionally (I was ranked #40ish at the time). I was really unhappy despite the intense competition and supposed fun and excitement of it. So finally, after that, I started travelling the world. The thing is, I started feeling like I was in heaven. When you travel, it's so easy to make friends and meet so many people in a setting where you are incentivized to share good memories, and not in a rat race or a "keeping up with the Jones's-type" of neighborhood, university or other setting. I mean, maybe it's that I am like a pariah or witch or otherwise bullied person and I dealt with a lot of extreme bullying that destroyed my social life and this contrasted with anything would be good. But I think it's also a lot about what you are saying: it's positive social interactions that really make us happy. I mean, I wouldn't wish my life on anyone, but I somehow found an amazing life out of it this way amidst all of the aggression and chaos.

[ChrisMarshallNY]

Thanks for sharing that.

Because of things that don't apply here, I am privileged to constantly be around many folks that have overcome great challenges.

I am at the point in life, where personal happiness is much much more important than money, property or prestige.

[wallace_f]

I think we agree, but there are disadvantages. One is the power thing. "Your rights are theoretical until you have 100M" and a lot of people treat you differently depending on your wealth and status. That said, we know that's not the world we want to find ourselves in, but sometimes it is unavoidable. I know there is some balance, and that I am at some risk not joining into the rat race.