Subskill: Unbundling; optimize separate things separately.
Example 1: Optimize fuzzies and utilons separately.
Example 2: Optimize grades and learning separately (instead of just optimizing grades, or haphazardly optimizing both at the same time).
5SL: Notice when you’re optimizing two things at once. (Maybe because you (a) have a sense of awkwardness or of not getting enough done, and when you list out the desirable consequences, there’s more than one?) Then, find two different things you can do which optimizes each one individually and without worrying about the other one.
Yet I’ve done better doing the opposite. When faced with incompatible courses of action that optimize different things, look for a third alternative that gets both. The choice doesn’t have to be hard—even if the optimizing targets are “save the world” and “talk to cool people”, frustration with the obviously right choice triggers a search for a third alternative as well.
I’d conclude that the most important skill is to stop, notice you’re confused, and work out that it’s because you’re trying to optimize two goals. Whether you then optimize them separately, or find a third alternative, you’ll probably do better than if you conflate “grades = learning” or “utilons = fuzzies” and try to optimize that non-existent conflation.
If you need to work on several projects at once (as is often necessary in the real world), then do it by creating and maintaining a clear separation between them. A separation both of time and attention.
Besides scheduling different projects at different times, do things related to neither project in between so your attention to the earlier project doesn’t carry over. This is an ideal time for routine maintenance/chores. Check email, do the dishes, go grocery shopping, take lunch; to the extent that you need to think about something other than the immediate task, think about the upcoming project, not the one you just left. Then go to work on the second project with your attention on the first broken.
Sense of unproductivity is a good flag for unbundling goals. I recently tried to figure out why I haven’t finished as many free-time programming projects as I used to, and realized that I had at least 4 goals for free-time programming: learn a new language, build something personally useful, build something other people will use, and apply techniques from a textbook I’ve been working through. I couldn’t find a project that satisfied all my goals, so I was skipping back and forth and not finishing anything.
Subskill: Unbundling; optimize separate things separately.
Example 1: Optimize fuzzies and utilons separately.
Example 2: Optimize grades and learning separately (instead of just optimizing grades, or haphazardly optimizing both at the same time).
5SL: Notice when you’re optimizing two things at once. (Maybe because you (a) have a sense of awkwardness or of not getting enough done, and when you list out the desirable consequences, there’s more than one?) Then, find two different things you can do which optimizes each one individually and without worrying about the other one.
Yet I’ve done better doing the opposite. When faced with incompatible courses of action that optimize different things, look for a third alternative that gets both. The choice doesn’t have to be hard—even if the optimizing targets are “save the world” and “talk to cool people”, frustration with the obviously right choice triggers a search for a third alternative as well.
I’d conclude that the most important skill is to stop, notice you’re confused, and work out that it’s because you’re trying to optimize two goals. Whether you then optimize them separately, or find a third alternative, you’ll probably do better than if you conflate “grades = learning” or “utilons = fuzzies” and try to optimize that non-existent conflation.
If you need to work on several projects at once (as is often necessary in the real world), then do it by creating and maintaining a clear separation between them. A separation both of time and attention.
Besides scheduling different projects at different times, do things related to neither project in between so your attention to the earlier project doesn’t carry over. This is an ideal time for routine maintenance/chores. Check email, do the dishes, go grocery shopping, take lunch; to the extent that you need to think about something other than the immediate task, think about the upcoming project, not the one you just left. Then go to work on the second project with your attention on the first broken.
Sense of unproductivity is a good flag for unbundling goals. I recently tried to figure out why I haven’t finished as many free-time programming projects as I used to, and realized that I had at least 4 goals for free-time programming: learn a new language, build something personally useful, build something other people will use, and apply techniques from a textbook I’ve been working through. I couldn’t find a project that satisfied all my goals, so I was skipping back and forth and not finishing anything.