Why “I don’t have time” is a lie

https://blogofjake.com/2020/07/06/why-i-dont-have-time-is-a-lie/

20 47 6 years ago

ISL• 6 years ago

age = two years out of college.

I'm pushing 40. The competition for my time between doing a great job as a husband, colleague, son, family member, scientist, and human has never been greater. Indeed, at 24, I couldn't have perceived the competition between goals on which I place maximum weight.

It is possible not to have enough time to do things well. I care very much.

smohare• 6 years ago

Exactly. Boundless free time is often equivalent to no responsibilities. Im not sure how this piece ended up on HN.

Eric_WVGG• 6 years ago

The author has clearly never heard of decision fatigue.

The mind is a muscle and while it can be strengthened, like any muscle it has limits. As one grows more experienced and gets a better understanding of their mental faculties, they come to realize — subconsciously or not — that they are only good for so much thinking in a day. Thus extreme measures like the Steve Jobs-ian "uniform" and chugging soylent instead of wasting five precious minutes every day pondering what to have for lunch.

I've been immersed in "startup culture" for just over a decade now, and if I have one acute observation, it's the shift from "never not working" as an ethos to obsessing over not burning out. There is an entire genre of people thinking very hard about mind-hacks to avoid it (yes, irony alert). Looking forward to when this dude slams into the wall.

(I'm guilty of the "uniform" strategy, incidentally, went to H&M and bought 20 identical black t-shirts and 10 white button-up dress shirts, best decision ever)

((second best decision was scheduling all meetings for the second half of the afternoon))

awinder• 6 years ago

I’ve noticed the same sort of switchover, although there’s the crazy outliers I think it’s mostly come from a good place & I’m happy to see it. Anyone that has to go through burnout knows that A) it sucks and B) there was now no time efficiency to what you were doing, because you are now ~0% effective. Basically it feels like the industry just read the operating manual on the human brain and realized collectively it wasn’t sustainable.

Ologn• 6 years ago

Andy Bechtolsheim said when Bill Joy worked at CSRG, he figured out how much longer it took him to write an e-mail when he had to hit the shift key versus when typing in all lowercase. Subsequently, all his CSRG e-mails seem to be in lowercase.

Marshall McKusick took over Joy's role when he left to found Sun. McKusick said he thought he was capable of any programming feat Joy could do, the difference between them is that what took McKusick a month, Joy could do in four days.

FlagsAreFun• 6 years ago

I agree - I read this less as "you have time" and more as "I have time, and I assume my experience is universal so it applies to you."

I hope this blog stays up for 10 years so the author can look at it then in retrospect with years of accumulated knowledge.

jacobolus2• 6 years ago

The blog post isn’t exactly wrong (leaving aside akrasia, fatigue, ...):

The fact is that when one truly wants something and wants it more than everything else competing for the time in their day, one will absolutely make the time for that thing. Time does not come out of thin air. It comes from the other things we occupy ourselves doing.

It just so happens that “make sure my 3.5 year old and 1 year old are safe, healthy, more or less nice to each-other, doing interesting things with their time, making steady progress learning new skills, etc.” comes before “devote my full attention to my current programming problem 24/7”.

cameronh902• 6 years ago

It's not wrong, it's a straw man. When someone says they don't have time, that's just shorthand for all their other more important commitments take up their time.

Making that out to be a lie or personal failure just strikes me as someone who lacks life experience.

robjan3• 6 years ago

I think the alternative boils down to "neglect my child so I have more free time" which isn't really a sensible option.

hermitdev• 6 years ago

This doesn't resonate well with me either at 39 years of age. When I was single, lived alone in my 20s, I could put in 300-400 miles on my bike recreationally. Now that I'm married, 3 step kids, I'm lucky to have 1-2 hours free, and I usually spend it with my wife.

aSplash0fDerp• 6 years ago

If you could go back (asking the last few posts on this link), would you delay the start of a family?

My bet is that the author sets/follows a 21st century trend that delays clicking on the family.exe or ransomware.exe email attachment :).

Knowledge work should get better with age compared to physical labor, so there may be around 2 decades on the table (married at 25 vs 45) that you are reallocating from your retired years into your prime ones, leaving upwards of 50 years to raise a family.

It may even make being a healthy octogenarian a better wind-down experience compared to the current timeline for knowledge workers in place.

The late-bloomer economy is non-existent (speaking from experience), but this could very well change to accomodate the articles narrative.

I haven't had to synchronize my biological clock to anyone yet (code for lucky) and think the Porsche analogy is a little outdated for how much time is really worth.

cortesoft3• 6 years ago

This person clearly doesn't have young children. I don't choose when I wake up, I have to wake up when the 1 year old wakes up. With no daycare because of COVID, I am juggling parenting and work from the moment I get up until I crash after they fall asleep.

It is literally non-stop. Finding time for the bathroom is a struggle. I get zero work done. I am typing this out while waiting for my four year old to finish going to the bathroom.

And now I have to go.

lopmotr2• 6 years ago

It's still choices. You want to care for your child more than you want to sleep, etc. You don't have to do any of those things. Parents abandoning their children is a popular choice.

fred_is_fred• 6 years ago

I'm unsure if this is a terrible attempt at sarcasm or just a really terrible take.

robjan3• 6 years ago

Lucky you weren't abandoned otherwise you wouldn't be in the privileged position to have the time to suggest that abandoning your child is a sensible idea.

igotsideas• 6 years ago

This is my current life and can verify that we have 0 minutes for other things. However, if you’re POS parent, then sure there is time.

hawk_• 6 years ago

There can be other reasons why parents can have time,they don't have to be POS, may be they organise their time differently or say live in a low COL location and work fewer hours or some such combination.

ramraj072• 6 years ago

I'm in no way supporting the outrageouslu peurile post, but do you think an argument can be made that children seem to take more effort from their parents than needed? The reasons could be still external, but I'm still curious if you can do a good job as a parent without fully dedicating your time.

Full disclosure: am an armchair childless philosopher

steve_adams_86• 6 years ago

The internet is disproportionately filled with the voices of people with excess time on their hands

nine_k• 6 years ago

As one of my friends said, there are always too many "vitally important" things to do. The only way to free up space for another "vitally important" thing is to push out one of the currently present things. The vital importance of many things is mis-perceived.

cameronh902• 6 years ago

This has to be parody, surely? Many, many people work multiple physical labour jobs to make ends meet, some have kids to support, other people have health issues which limit their productive hours. Even sleep, different people have different biological needs - which vary over their lifetime.

Sure there are choices in there, but it's ignorant to suggest that everyone's starting out from the same place, and to call them liars for that is mean spirited.

The central premise - that everyone has 24hr and anyone saying they don't have the time is lying because we all have 24hr - seems to be willfully misunderstanding people. When someone says they don't have time, they're not saying their day is only 18hrs long, they're saying they don't have time after all the other more important things they do.

markwaldron• 6 years ago

This post reeks of privilege.

There are people who quite literally do not have time. They are born into a world where they know nothing other than having a lack of time. They grow up in a household where their parent(s) work multiple jobs to keep food on the table and the lights on. They aren't contemplating taking gap years to travel or learn a new language.

While everyone has 24 hours in a day, not everyone can dictate what they do during them. Free time is a luxury.

burkaman3• 6 years ago

The very next post in the blog is about how the author is taking a "gap year" and how wonderful that is: https://blogofjake.com/2020/07/06/great-year-for-a-gap-year/

Why doesn't everyone do this? If you feel like you don't have time to achieve your goals, just take a whole year off and do whatever you want!

Almost every post on this blog makes me angry, it's really an impressive achievement.

burkaman3• 6 years ago

This seems like an incredibly unhealthy outlook on life. First of all, it completely ignores the concept of necessity. Some people need to go to a dialysis clinic several times a week, or they'll die. That takes time. Some people have to take their kids to school every day. Some people have to commute two hours to and from work because they can't afford to live closer. "Everyone has the same amount of time in a day" is a useless statement, because everyone does not have the same amount of obligations.

It's very important to be able to accept that sometimes you can't do what you want to do, no matter how much you want it. It's important to be able to understand that, for example, "choosing" to sleep 5 hours a night so you can grind harder might be a really stupid and unhealthy idea, even if you really want it.

It's true that many people talk about wanting things that they aren't really willing to work for, but that's ok! Relaxation is good for you, you shouldn't spend every waking second working through some prioritized list of life goals.

Finally, this is kind of petty, but running several miles without water does not make you "truly thirsty". It's not even abnormal, running 5-10 miles without water is fine, maybe slightly uncomfortable if you didn't hydrate a lot that day.

lopmotr2• 6 years ago

There's nothing fundamentally different between necessity and want. Not even staying alive. Most people die because of choices they make. Just not always so soon after making those choices. But it's still a choice. People also regularly make choices that risk their lives because they don't mind a small chance of dying to get something they want.

Spending time commuting to work is obviously a much simpler choice. They want the things they can get from the money they earn more than they want those 2 hours free for another activity.

burkaman3• 6 years ago

I don't think this is a useful point. Responding to someone who says "I don't have time" with "Not true, you could adjust your priorities and die" is not helpful.

ramraj072• 6 years ago

What a load of "I'm 14 and this is deep" material. It's 2020 and people still preach this Jerry Seinfeld/The Secret stuff.

Who here doesn't want money? Or a satisfying career? It's not just a dopamine hit from instagram that makes you waste time there, it's that people are emotional being with far more complex motivations (or lake thereof) than just "not wanting it bad enough." Have you considered the possibility that perhaps people are intimidated by the fear of failure, of feeling they are not deserving or good enough, and hence are afraid to attempt it? Have you considered that they are probably lying to you and themselves because of other fundamental fears they don't want to confront? Have you considered that these reasons can also often be attributed to systemic discrimination, both real and emotional both deliberate and unintentonal, due to race/gender/class?

If you're right, no one browsing instagram should be unhappy since they're doing what they truly want. If you posit that they're just not reconciling their true wants correctly, and that's why theyre still slightly thirsty for other goals, why won't that be an explanation for the other alternative: people have logical wants that are stymied by emotional blocks (fear, lack of overall motivation, etc).

I suppose by extension poor people just don't want to not be poor bad enough, or homeless people don't want to be not homeless enough?

The thought process you have probably works for some people who can fully divorce their emotions from their goals, and glad it works for you if it does. For the vast majority, such atttiudes are nothing more than a bunch of dopamine-hit-filled "motivational" Ted talks which they can never apply in their own life.

mrslave• 6 years ago

Someone close to me struggled with addiction. I was more supportive than most, making an effort to spend some one-on-one time, and having difficult conversations about his treatment. (In hindsight I still wish I did more.) In spite of all my professional experience (where knowing and reassessing priorities is a constant) the most powerful impact on my ability to prioritize in my personal life was a phrase from his study:

What do you want to do? And what are you prepared to give up in order to do it?

This hit me like the proverbial freight train. Every time I have to consider my inability to meet a priority in my personal life, I now always consider it in the frame of what I can lose. Indeed, letting go of things I previously prioritized - but are unimportant - is more joy than most of the pain needed to fulfill many of the difficult tasks in my life.

Perhaps I also do this in my professional life too. On difficult projects in the past I enjoyed the disapproving glances in the morning stand-up when I say "didn't do it" to 2 tickets only to be able to say "done, merged, and closed" to 1. Doing a little bit of each, in some circumstances, would have murdered productivity. If they didn't like which one they should have said which was more important.

I also appreciate what ISL said about the author's age. Time has also helped me to appreciate that everything exists in a context, and a person's age is a very important frame for understanding others.

bedobi• 6 years ago

Glad to see comments recognizing this trash for what it is, what is it doing on the front page?

pmoriarty• 6 years ago

By far the best essay on this subject that I've read is Seneca's "On the Shortness of Life":

https://tripinsurancestore.com/4/on-the-shortness-of-life.pd...

senectus1• 6 years ago

christ what a load of crap.

doesn't even take into account that other resources equal time multiplier.

throwaway045z• 6 years ago

Sad this was flagged. If an accident happened, and your right hand were severed, would you still claim you were "too busy" to deal with it? You wouldn't respond with "Oh you don't understand, I have kids!" or some ad hominem on leisure time among unemployed Gen Z.

In reality, you have a mental list of things you care about. It's fair to say the things you spent time on you cared about more than the things you didn't.

One thing you cared about more: reading hacker news.

Why “I don’t have time” is a lie

Related Stories