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- Hacker News
- This hits home so hard (did I write this?). I'm curious how many are afflicted with this. I don't hear enough people talk about the powerful addiction of "podcasts + headphones". There is an endless amount of content, so if you're not careful, the majority of the voices in your head will not be your own.
This happened to me. I justified it because "I was learning", and "it's like listening to the radio, but better", or "this content is good for me", but when every moment alone is filled with someone else's words and thoughts, you stop having any of your own.
by LiteUser - > I don't hear enough people talk about the powerful addiction of "podcasts + headphones"
I have headphones on everywhere I go. If I’m outside I have them on, while I’m doing work in the office I have them on, when I’m doing sport I have them on. When I don’t have them on, I’m usually at home and I’m playing stuff via speakers.
I’m not playing stuff only when I’m out with friends, of course.
To be honest I think it’s one of the reasons why I feel very good and comfortable being on my own alone. But I definitely agree that there might be some kind of addiction in all of this.
> but when every moment alone is filled with someone else's words and thoughts, you stop having any of your own
I don’t necessarily agree with this, especially because I think about the thing that is being discussed and agree/disagree for different reasons. I might argue that podcast give you a reason to think about “unusual” things sometimes?
by mattrighetti - I’m not able to do my work with music, or even noise-canceling headphones. I’ve tried, and it doesn’t work.
I know that I’m unusual, in that sense, but there you have it.
I do listen to music, on my morning walks, though. That’s the only time, during the day, when I do.
- Have you tried brain.fm?by andsoitis
- You're not unusual. Constant need for something in your ear is a very new phenomena and for some reason a lot of people have gotten in the habit of isolating themselves from the world around them and stopped being in presence of the reality. Sad.by kkotak
- I prefer to work in silence. But by that I mean actual silence. However, I live in a city where there's construction going on I can hear through my window. If I have to work from the office, there'll be colleagues yapping around (helps with creativity or whatever the sugarcoating is for the open office). Bonus points for one of the offices being next to a different construction site.
In these situations, I tend to prefer having some kind of "ambient" music on, instrumental only, so I can be isolated from the distracting environment. Noise cancelling doesn't work well enough against voices, although I do enjoy the reduction of random ambient noise (A/C hum and the like).
by vladvasiliu - There's a researcher at Harvard, Arthur C. Brooks, who wrote a book on this, the importance of the default mode network of the brain that is engaged when you do nothing or are bored.
People who drown out boredom or silence tend to eliminate wandering thoughts, introspection, autobiographical thinking, pondering of relations, effectively the kind of internal reflection that's necessary from time to time. It's pretty common now to hear people say that they're uncomfortable with silence exactly for that reason.
by Barrin92 - I recently bumped into default mode network as a concept and started noticing the constant aversion I have for "doing nothing". Now I try to take more of my breaks without constant barrage of external stimuli.by Mulderns
- This hits home for me. If I have spare time without other peopled my headphones are in. If I'm walking the dog, doing the dishes, mowing my tiny lawn, driving home after dropping kids off I have a podcast or audiobook in my ears.
I read an interview from a musician I'm a fan of where they were responding to "what do you listen to when you are driving?" and they responded along the lines of "I like to listen to the engine and my thoughts". I winced a bit thinking how little time I allow my brain to just do its thing.
by NewLincoln - I have a habit of going for a daily walk of about one hour and intentionally avoid bringing headphones to just be with my thoughts.
But I've noticed that if I have something on my mind, I just tend to ruminate and spin in circles. Not sure how constructive or useful at all that is. At least listening to a podcast or similar can provide new things to think about.
by vladvasiliu - I've done several solo multi day hikes in the last 6 months, mostly ones where I stayed in a hut or campground at night and socialized around dinner, but hiked solo during the day. No podcast or music, no cell service. It's amazing how quickly I get used to having no input once it's the only thing to do, yet also how quickly I go back to always having a podcast on in the car and for my runs.by annzabelle
- I find that if I'm driving or doing a chore or something, listening to nothing can sometimes be boring, but if I listen to a podcast I'll sometimes get distracted by my own thoughts and miss 5 minutes of it. Music tends to be the sweet spot in the middle where if my mind wants to wander then I'm not missing anything important, but if my mind doesn't want to wander then I still have something for it to focus on.by hatthew
- Being bored is kind of the point though. You should let yourself be bored sometimes. It's a relatively new phenomenon where we have completely avoided any minute of boredom.by SchemaLoad
- Similar for me but I actually like podcasts in the car for this reason. Listening to podcasts sometimes triggers me thinking about issues I care about. When I realize that I’m no longer following the podcast, I just turn it off and let my thoughts go wild.by serial_dev
- I’ve been trying to start this “I don’t need any distraction for this task” challenge, but honestly it’s been REALLY tough for me. I’ve even noticed apprehension to start a particular chore like folding laundry if I don’t have something to distract me. Its like… because folding laundry takes so long, without a distraction it feels like I’m wasting my time, or just running out of time in the day?
Doing dishes, mowing the lawn, even just waiting for agents to finish, this need for distraction has really taken a hold of me, and it’s even getting in the way of me wanting to do things that I feel would motivate me again.
I can’t help but wonder if agentic development has exacerbated this problem for me. There are so many more times where I just have to wait for things now. Sometimes I can multitask, and work on two things at once, but often that ends with me doing both things with less craft. So I end up consuming content more, which feels addictive too… and I’m not even talking about TikTok or Instagram or Youtube Shorts (and i don’t judge those who do consume there). I mainly consume longer form Youtube, Podcasts or honestly, TV shows that I’ve seen multiple times before.
It’s like the agentic tools incentivize NOT thinking very hard, and so I do it less, making it more intimidating to start thinking hard about a problem because it feels like a waste of time. Which, paradoxically, is why I think I am consuming much more content than I used to, filling up space with intellectual junk food.
by mangoman - At the start of this year I wrote down "Get rid of your Airpods" as a New Years Resolution. This was basically my proxy for "stop filling every spare moment with audiobooks and podcasts".
I still haven't done it, and my reflex for listening to something - even after my listening backlogs emptied a few months back - suggests I'm essentially addicted. Especially considering how much better I feel when I don't take my airpods out with me.
So, time to deal with that I guess. Thanks for the push.
by DavidPiper - > So, time to deal with that I guess.
So, time to deal with that.
- i've also been mindful of this for a few years but it's not something i've thought to talk to others about - imagine telling your friends you're addicted to podcasts.
i still walk around at home with my airpods in like a zombie, but i've found some opportunities to free my brain, like when i'm walking outside in the city for short walks i try to go airpod-free. or when i have a short drive, i listen to the radio (NTS) instead of a podcast and it reeeeallly feels great to feel unplugged and listen to my thoughts and feelings for a bit. i guess the stimulation from those activities (seeing the city, having to drive, etc) helps make it easier to unplug a bit.
other things that are obvious in hindsight: i think it's also easier for me to exist at home without ear heroin when i've slept really well, when i'm not feeling pressured or nervous, and when i'm not amped up on coffee or stims.
by deinonychus - Yea this is a good one but it can be so hard. Seems obvious that constant information streaming outside of silencing your own thoughts also makes the moments where you do have to sit in silence lower quality.
I recently listened to the Hammock Driven Development talk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f84n5oFoZBc) and it raises the very interesting point that it's not really the concious mind that makes big breakthroughs on hard problems, it's mainly the subconcious mind synthesizing information. It seems obvious to me that constantly intaking information will ruin this synthesization.
Sadly for some reason our brain loves filling the silence with junk...
by aselimov3 - The other thing is that (speaking as a software developer) most work is not hard.by Cthulhu_
- > for some reason our brain loves filling the silence with junk
Natural selection might pick for this trait because if you can gather and evaluate and otherwise process a large volume of information you might be able to better find food, avoid getting eaten, and finding a mate to mate with.
executive function and intuition filter, but you need a bunch of data to feed on.
by andsoitis - > constantly intaking information will ruin this synthesization.
I don't find that it does, for me. If I'm chewing on a hard technical problem, then I actually need the surface-level distraction of a podcast or a news article or a ballgame to keep it from dominating my conscious thoughts and let my subconscious get to work.
Where I agree with the author, and you, is that I can't do creative work - mainly writing, now, but back when I did this sort of thing professionally: coming up with approaches to a text, or ideas for sets and costumes, or exercises to get my actors where I wanted them to be - without time spent in "silence".
N=1, and all that, but I'm always intrigued by how different people's brains work, well, differently.
by eszed - > I’m a slow thinker, like really slow. It takes a few minutes just to get my thoughts moving in a direction. But once they pick up momentum, I can easily spend fifteen or thirty minutes exploring an idea, weighing different options
Here's to the slow thinking! Cheers!!
by chanux - I like this poster.
https://xcancel.com/pinkerhero/status/1877163466168922473
>Good morning
>I'm moving a bit slow today but... I plan on having a good day anyway!
With age, this is becoming my default setting.
by andai - When this was posted to HN, a lot of people could relate: https://sive.rs/slow
For me, I'm not sure if "slow" is the right word. I think "delayed" or "sporadic" is more accurate.
Thoughts for me are like when a word is on the tip of your tongue, but you can't think of it right away. Often you'll think of the word later: you weren't actively thinking about it, but the thought was simmering in your mind and just randomly pops up.
by Leftium - Thank goodness for asynchronous communication! I would have hated to work back when phones were the primary method of communication. I still get phone anxiety whenever I have to make a call.
- It’s very difficult to intentionally find time to be bored. It’s sort of the opposite of an activity, and the brain hates it. One passable option is to take a 20 minute walk with no stimulus beyond the scenery. Journaling regularly. Meditation provides a similar experience but feels like a different lane.
For me I do find a similar experience to the OP. It’s easy to feel yourself going a little crazy getting sucked along the current of modern life. Flowing from one activity to the next, looking at one’s phone in the between, never any chance for an extended thought except when laying down for bed. If you don’t break out of this mode it’s easy to let weeks go by without noticing or taking much conscious impulse to shape your day.
by chis - > It’s sort of the opposite of an activity, and the brain hates it.
While this is true, I'd word it differently:
It's sort of the opposite of an activity, and we've conditioned our brains to hate it.
Boredom used to be absolutely normal in our society for pretty much ever, and the urge to do something about it when it occurred was a lot weaker than it is now.
by Cockbrand - I don't think you need to find time to be bored, the times have always been there and we didn't search them out before. Just don't mask them with multitasking.
Waiting for a bus, waiting in line at a post office, waiting for your wife to get ready for bed. Those moments are still there and if you don't pull your phone out the boredom is still there
by dwedge - The way I write my novels is by reviewing a chapter I'm stuck on and its context, then going on a long run, and 20 minutes out, shutting my music off. I have, at that point, at least 20 minutes, if not 60+, where I'm easily thinking about and brainstorming for the chapter. It's wonderful. It sort of "compresses" the ambient sounds in the same way eating pancakes with syrup temporarily destroys your ability to taste slightly less sweet things.by KPGv2