[392c91e8165b]

In my late teens and my twenties, I spent 10s of 1000s of hours in a state of intense absorption on programming tasks. (I am in my 50s now.)

Am I the only one who believes that it is bad for me to spend more than 20 hours -- and perhaps as little as 15 hours -- a week in the state?

Just because an activity feels really good does not mean it is good for you.

I guess I should explain a little how I came to believe that that too much intense absorption is bad for me. Let me start by quoting a passage (which I agree with) from another comment here:

>in order to achieve flow these three criteria must be met: 1. The goal must be clear 2. Feedback must be immediate 3. There must be a feeling that our capability is balanced to the challenge at hand.

The most important things for me to have made progress on in my life are things where it was not clear what my short-term goals should have been (although of course it was important for me to choose some short-term goals to work towards), where feedback was slow and rare and where I felt that the challenges I needed to surmount exceeded my capability. (I would guess that there are problems or concerns like in most people's lives.) In my past, I spent a great deal of time using the pleasures of intense absorption to distract myself from more important things.

Even after I realized that I was using programming and related activities like math and "programming-languages geekery" to distract myself from more important (but less enjoyable and messier) things, I did not know how to stop the distracting activities. In other words, I was addicted to the pleasures of intense absorption, and it took me many, many years to figure out how to extricate myself from that addiction.

If there are a lot of things in your life that are pleasurable -- hanging out with friends, sex or romance, physical exercise -- then maybe you do not have to worry about falling into the same trap as I did. I think that probably what really tripped me up when I was a teenager and a young man was that intense absorption was my only reliable or regular source of significant amounts of pleasure. Well, to be more accurate, satisfying my curiosity, a.k.a., learning, and intense focus on programming and related things were my only reliable sources of pleasure. (I have read that this pattern of only being able to take pleasure in one or 2 things and the consequent problem of addiction to those things is often a trap fallen into by people who were abused as children. I was abused as a child. Perhaps people who had happy childhoods are immune to the negative effects of spending one's days intensely focused.)

I still program for a few hours every week: I write Emacs Lisp code whose only user is me, which I do not get paid to write, and I am convinced it is not harmful to me. It makes me happy when I notice that one of my problems can be solved with code because coding is an efficient way to solve a problem. But if I ever take a job that involves programming full-time, I'll keep a sharp eye out for signs of a recurrence of my previous destructive / addictive relationship with the pleasure that comes from intensely focusing or concentrating. A big warning sign would be if I were to start again to neglect things that clearly should not be neglected like appointments at the dentist and such. Another (more ambiguous) warning sign would be a cessation of the process which has been going on for over 10 years now of my slowing increasing the range or variety of things I am able to enjoy or take pleasure in.

I decided to write this because in online conversations among programmers, we almost never hear (or read) about any negative effects of the "flow state". For me, there were significant negative effects: namely, I would have learned to deal with messy, low-feedback difficult situations at a younger age if I had not spent as much time in the "flow state". In other words, I got into the bad habit of using the flow state to avoid what I really needed to learn: how to make progress in messy "non-flow" situations.

[Snhr]

I didnt realize how much I typed so I put it in pastebin. I've never commented here and your comment gave me hope that someone understands me (I'm sure there are a lot of people who do, its likely a miscommunication on my end) This is also an example of my writing when I'm not focused.. really tired right now but this is important so im half there so hopefully its half readable enough to give me maybe a half answer even though I want the full one I will accept any piece of information that makes me a little more closer to being successful in life)

tldr You made me realize stuff from your post and how do you live without flow and also this is more or less for me trying to figure what the hell my problem is and why I'm not good at a lot of aspects that make a successful person, also you don't have to read it because its probably an unrelated issue that sounds like mine but its worth mentioning just in case it is and I rarely find anyone that I can relate to with this sort of stuff so forgive me.. just trying to learn more about myself.

http://pastebin.com/eBNFJaSH

[collyw]

Reading your post you sound like me at "unmotivated" times in my life. (I would say I go through cycles, but nowhere near as extreme as your description).

When I start getting to the stage you are at, I make a point of doing some outdoor sports (a few people mentioned climbing. My personal preference is whitewater kayaking, or mountain biking - something that requires full focus and involves a bit of adrenaline).

I used to do a lot of outdoor, sports (worked as a river guide for a few years, and kayaked nearly every day). Now I have an office job, and see the difference. Something that gives you a bit of adrenaline helps you achieve the same feeling, as others have described with climbing, but not associated with coding.I think this helps you bring more balance to your life. If you don't do a lot of exercise, just getting fit will make a big difference as well.

At first it might be difficult to motivate yourself, but once you get into a habit you will find it easy, and you may even get annoyed the days you don't get to do your sport.

Anyway, that's what I find helps me. (Promising myself to start riding my bike on the trails on my way home from, now the weather is getting better).

[rmcpherson]

Thanks for writing this. It's important to recognize the downsides of what is often considered only positive. It rings true for me especially.

[yomritoyj]

This is very much my experience too. Binge programming can give you a false satisfaction of having done intellectual work without too great an intellectual effort. I find myself itching to write up some code precisely at those times when I am feeling frustrated that I am not working on something “deep” but when the really “deep” things seem too hard and their rewards too far away in the future.

[392c91e8165b]

Yes. When my main motivation for programming was to get the high that comes from long stretches of time spent in intense absorption, my programming time seemed to be less productive than it is now.

[392c91e8165b]

Replying to myself and quoting myself: "Am I the only one who believes that it is bad for me to spend more than 20 hours . . . a week in the state?"

That is misleading because it gives the impression that I spend a non-negligible fraction of my time in the flow state. I do not. I spend at most 15 to 20 hours a week programming. These years, very little of that time is spent in the flow state.

[lingoberry]

Interesting... I would also like to add that even if you're in a state of flow you are still more likely than not working on the wrong thing/problem or taking the wrong approach. Prolonged flow without any reflection on what you're doing will likely take you very far down a path to nowhere. I've observed this in myself many times.