Personal essays
The dial also goes to 0
Focus
Sometimes I can write or code with music or television on in the background.
In particular, when I’m writing books there are particular albums I’ll play while I work.
I may nod along with the music for a bit but after a while I get lost in my work.
At some point I’ll notice a song and realize that I was in a flow state where I wasn’t hearing anything and now I’ve come out.
My period of concentrated productivity has ended - for now.
I wrap up the paragraph or section that I’m working on and close my computer.
It’s like that moment at an amusement park at the end of the ride where the safety bar that was holding you in place releases as the ride comes to a stop.
Not an amusement park person? It’s like when you’re driving somewhere and you get to your destination. You turn the car off and release your seat belts.
There’s no point in sitting there. The journey has come to an end. You need to get out of the car and do the thing you came here to do.
And so, when I notice the music playing again I know that my current journey has come to an end.
It’s time to do something else.
Ineffective Breaks
There are a bunch of things I can do.
If I’ve got a serious deadline, I may try to push through and write some more. I know that it’s not going to be very good but it gives me something to edit and improve next time.
I may walk to the kitchen to think about what I want to write next. This is a break in my active work, but I’m still working.
“Daniel,” you say, “it doesn’t look like work. It looks like you’re grabbing a handful of pretzels.”
This is actually an important point. It doesn’t look like work to you and it doesn’t look like work to me so I may count it as resting - but I’m not resting.
There is no in between.
My pretzel visit was a break but not a break.
And so I sit back down at my computer to do more. Maybe a break or a change of venue is all I needed. I can often be quite productive this way. But sometimes I need an honest to goodness break.
I’m going to take a leap here to something that seems totally different - it isn’t.
I mainly cook for myself and I don’t use a lot of salt, so restaurant food tastes really salty to me.
Before I got to this point I used to mostly cook for myself but stop for something pretty much every day. Restaurant food didn’t taste salty then because I’d never given my tastebuds enough of a break to really reset.
I used to drink a lot of Diet Coke. At one point I stopped and just drank tap water or soda water maybe with a splash of bitters. All of a sudden my tastes for sweets decreased. I hardly ever eat dessert.
I thought my issue was sugar, but Diet Coke doesn’t have sugar - my issue was sweets.
So when I hear the music, I realize I need a break - a real break.
Real breaks
Littlewood was a famous mathematician who contributed a ton to the field.
But he also thought a lot about the creative process.
He wrote that we should “Either work all out or rest completely.”
There’s no in-between.
You’re working on something and need a break. You need to rest. Littlewood says, rest completely.
Don’t continue to kind of think about your problem while taking a walk or sitting in front of the television set with your computer open.
“This is a pure waste,” Littlewood says. On the one hand you aren’t getting any work done and on the other you aren’t getting the rest you need.
I don’t tend to eat desserts - but when I do, I really enjoy them. I don’t think of excess calories or say to myself, “I really shouldn’t.”
That is a pure waste. If you’re going to break a diet to eat a dessert, really enjoy the dessert.
This morning, I took a break from writing this essay to meet a friend for coffee. I enjoyed our conversation, I didn’t think a bit about this half-written essay, and I enjoyed an Almond Croissant.
To not have done these three things would have been a complete waste - I should have stayed home and written.
If you’re going to take time away from working, really take time away.
The Spinal Tap amp is louder because the dial goes up to eleven. But the dial also turns all the way down to zero.
Imagine that music turned all the way up to eleven. It’s all you can hear, feel, or think about.
Now dial it down to zero - not five or six - all the way down to zero.
There’s a palpable relief where you can breathe again.
Take the time to turn things down to zero now and again.
Essay from Dim Sum Thinking Newsletter 257. Read the rest of the Newsletter or subscribe