⌗Do not burn yourself out.

Sitting at my desk, I had an overwhelming feeling doing too much but also getting nothing done. I would look back at my time and think I did a lot of things, but I just do not recollect any of them. It’s like my body was on autopilot and my mind was taking a nap.

Transcripts (auto-generate)

• 00:09
  hey they're just working cool
• 00:14
  before I started I just want to say
• 00:17
  thanks to JSLA for organizing this I
• 00:20
  mean these events are tremendous and
• 00:23
  there's a lot of work that goes into
• 00:24
  organizing an event like this can get
• 00:27
  around a little pause for JSLA in
• 00:28
  general and actually I want to say it
• 00:35
  thanks to Google as well this is a you
• 00:37
  know tremendous venue with the venue
• 00:40
  like this usually the tickets sell out
• 00:41
  really quickly and that's because they
• 00:45
  have a lot of pull here at Google of
• 00:47
  course the speakers do you have a pull
• 00:49
  as well but I'm also sorry to let you
• 00:52
  know that for us isn't going to be
• 00:53
  speaking tonight but yeah but I'm here
• 00:57
  to talk to you today about something
• 01:00
  that you know a lot of people have been
• 01:02
  wondering about lately and that's how
• 01:05
  not to burn yourself out sometimes
• 01:08
  there's some large expectations that is
• 01:10
  put on us as engineers they kind of push
• 01:14
  us to like a mental edge whether we're
• 01:16
  supposed to be deity like engineers that
• 01:19
  are TEDx engineers or you know we need
• 01:21
  to learn how to do algebraic expressions
• 01:24
  before the next meeting but it sometimes
• 01:27
  it's hard to balance on that edge so
• 01:31
  many of Jacob blow i'm JC b LW across
• 01:34
  the web and you know I wrote a talk
• 01:37
  about this because I got burnt out I got
• 01:40
  burned out multiple times before but
• 01:42
  just recently got burnt out and I'm kind
• 01:45
  of on a sabbatical right now which has
• 01:47
  actually been kind of great because it
• 01:48
  allows me to like think about these
• 01:50
  types of things and I also used to work
• 01:52
  at a company called headspace which you
• 01:54
  know it's supposed to help with well it
• 01:56
  does help with things like stress
• 01:59
  burnout and whatnot but things have been
• 02:03
  kind of weird lately so I mean so burned
• 02:08
  out just in case you know y'all haven't
• 02:12
  experienced it or really know what it is
• 02:14
  it's just to ruin your health and this
• 02:16
  is mostly done through overwork just
• 02:19
  overworking yourself and mental health
• 02:22
  is like super important and there's a
• 02:26
  lot of things you can do to you know
• 02:28
  help your mental health and if you could
• 02:30
  take a little bit of time during each
• 02:32
  day to you know support your mental
• 02:34
  health like I would do it like it's
• 02:37
  totally worth it
• 02:39
  and I want to say that like there's like
• 02:42
  this stigma around you know mental
• 02:44
  health being you know mental health
• 02:46
  issues like burnout or anxiety or
• 02:47
  depression being people that are weak
• 02:50
  you know it's definitely not that you
• 02:53
  know I have to say like I've
• 02:54
  accomplished some things in my life that
• 02:57
  I feel like I had to be pretty
• 02:58
  disciplined about and I still run into
• 03:01
  things like burnout and I still run into
• 03:02
  things like anxiety and depression so I
• 03:07
  don't know if you guys get the luxury to
• 03:09
  work at a company that has these things
• 03:11
  called no meetings blocks but they're
• 03:14
  actually fantastic and if you don't work
• 03:15
  at a company after listening this talk
• 03:17
  you should probably ask for no meetings
• 03:19
  blocks but this is actually a fantastic
• 03:22
  time to kind of just reset and you know
• 03:27
  it's not an implicitly say like take a
• 03:28
  break time right it's kind of supposed
• 03:31
  to be uninterrupted work time but I
• 03:33
  definitely took advantage of these times
• 03:35
  at my prior job to actually take breaks
• 03:38
  and to kind of like in the latter half
• 03:41
  of the no meetings blocks to be able to
• 03:44
  get my work done and I would even like
• 03:47
  on my breaks I would actually invite
• 03:49
  even my co-workers to come with me I'm
• 03:51
  like I'm gonna go walk around the block
• 03:52
  you want to come hang out and just talk
• 03:54
  or hey would you you know spend a couple
• 03:57
  minutes with me in a meditation session
• 03:58
  but I did find out that a lot of my
• 04:01
  co-workers didn't actually view these no
• 04:04
  meetings blocks in the same way a lot of
• 04:06
  times they viewed it as you know this is
• 04:09
  a time for me to get ahead to catch up I
• 04:12
  can
• 04:12
  you know get some work done I can shove
• 04:15
  in a couple you know extra lines of code
• 04:17
  during this time because it's uh none
• 04:18
  your up to work time so I'm just gonna
• 04:20
  like push through something and as a
• 04:23
  manager like that does sound appealing
• 04:25
  like more work more time I like I can I
• 04:29
  mean more time is more work and I can
• 04:31
  actually like you know see tickets
• 04:33
  moving and whatnot checkboxes and but
• 04:36
  what I found out is that like that's not
• 04:38
  actually the case that's not the reality
• 04:39
  of it and it really was more like more
• 04:44
  time does not equal better work like a
• 04:47
  lot of stuff that got pushed through
• 04:48
  when people were stressed out and they
• 04:50
  weren't taking breaks things had bugs in
• 04:52
  it you know wasn't a good product there
• 04:54
  was corners cut you know in a lot of
• 04:56
  places and it's more or less like I
• 04:58
  don't want to like push them you'd be
• 04:59
  like oh well you gotta fix this like
• 05:01
  little thing here you got to make a
• 05:03
  better product or whatever especially
• 05:04
  when I know I'm dealing with somebody
• 05:06
  who's going through something that you
• 05:08
  know they're feeling burnt out or
• 05:09
  whatnot now I put in here meaningful
• 05:12
  breaks because your body wants
• 05:14
  meaningful breaks now going and getting
• 05:16
  in a snack or a coffee I think you know
• 05:19
  a lot of us will associate that with a
• 05:20
  break which actually it is but you know
• 05:24
  doing something like viewing nature
• 05:25
  doing meditations some type of
• 05:27
  mindfulness practice actually has been
• 05:29
  shown to be more effective in sustained
• 05:32
  attention then just doing other things
• 05:36
  like getting a snack or a coffee and one
• 05:41
  of the reasons why you should take a
• 05:43
  break is that your brain is actually
• 05:45
  really good at automating things and
• 05:48
  it's a good thing too because like I'm
• 05:51
  not constantly thinking about breathing
• 05:52
  I'm just doing it you know it helps me
• 05:55
  survive my body automating things but it
• 05:58
  kind of can get us into these weird
• 05:59
  loops of thought to where we stop
• 06:01
  thinking about problems in the same way
• 06:04
  and whenever new variables get inserted
• 06:06
  into the problem it's very hard for that
• 06:08
  loop to actually be able to handle those
• 06:11
  new variables in that loop itself is a
• 06:17
  little thing called flow and flow can be
• 06:20
  great it actually is often romanticized
• 06:23
  in our
• 06:24
  stree it's often you know associated
• 06:28
  with things like creativity productivity
• 06:31
  people even will rearrange their
• 06:33
  schedules around flow you know I want to
• 06:36
  make sure all my meetings are at the end
• 06:38
  of the day so I can have this unfetter
• 06:40
  ated block in the middle of the day that
• 06:42
  I can just get into the flow and stay in
• 06:44
  the flow the flow is actually kind of a
• 06:48
  weird thing because it can also cause
• 06:50
  some pretty crazy human behaviors
• 06:53
  casinos actually will utilize flow to be
• 06:57
  able to keep people in the seats of a
• 06:59
  machine which they actually use the term
• 07:01
  time on device which was actually coined
• 07:04
  a long time ago very before I phones
• 07:06
  were a thing and you know we have to ask
• 07:10
  ourselves sometimes is this the best
• 07:13
  life that we're living when we're
• 07:15
  getting into these flows and we're doing
• 07:16
  all this stuff you know like when I'm
• 07:19
  you know there's been many times where I
• 07:21
  will kind of get into a really good flow
• 07:23
  and then I'll kind of run off to the
• 07:26
  bathroom at the last moment because I'm
• 07:28
  like oh I forgot to go to the bathroom I
• 07:29
  need to go real quick and then I can
• 07:31
  jump back to programming and that's not
• 07:35
  you know healthy if I'm starting to
• 07:37
  neglect my cue my body functions just
• 07:40
  because I'm like I want to write one
• 07:41
  more line of code they actually there
• 07:44
  was a study and they find that people
• 07:46
  actually will sometimes hold their
• 07:47
  breath when checking emails which is a
• 07:50
  very bizarre thing to do so I actually
• 07:54
  adopted I started to adopt some of the
• 07:56
  mindset of some of my peers on my last
• 07:59
  place where I would start skipping kind
• 08:01
  of my no means box and just working
• 08:04
  through them and actually it made me
• 08:07
  unhappy in that unhappiness also gave me
• 08:09
  a bad perspective on kind of just the
• 08:12
  work that I was doing didn't allow me to
• 08:14
  reflect on the times that I was able to
• 08:16
  complete things and do wonderful things
• 08:18
  with my group I just kind of was like
• 08:21
  what's the next problem and to work
• 08:22
  through this now reflection is actually
• 08:25
  a pretty interesting word here as well
• 08:27
  because I think that's actually what
• 08:29
  brakes give you the time to do you get
• 08:31
  into these loops of thought and then
• 08:33
  you're able to kind of like pull
• 08:35
  yourself out of them when you take a
• 08:36
  break and just
• 08:37
  look back at that process and say it
• 08:39
  like was that good you know and if it
• 08:42
  was you jump back into it
• 08:43
  if it wasn't like figure out what's
• 08:46
  wrong and we actually do have techniques
• 08:48
  like this already who here has used the
• 08:51
  rubber ducky technique so only a few of
• 08:54
  you it's interesting so I'll tell you
• 08:57
  about what that technique rubber ducky
• 09:00
  technique is essentially you have this
• 09:02
  inanimate object usually it's a rubber
• 09:04
  ducky or some type of thing that has a
• 09:06
  face and you put it on your desk and
• 09:10
  then you when you run into a big problem
• 09:13
  you essentially will ask this inanimate
• 09:16
  object the problem and actually the
• 09:19
  craziest thing is is that a lot of times
• 09:21
  it will give you a little bit of clarity
• 09:22
  and either you'll be able to see the
• 09:25
  problem in a new light or you'll be able
• 09:27
  to maybe even fix the problem and I
• 09:29
  think what's actually happening here is
• 09:31
  that you're jumping out of the flow of
• 09:33
  montt here you're kind of the flow that
• 09:35
  you're in the same train of thought and
• 09:37
  you're able to throw this problem to
• 09:40
  another side of your brain which
• 09:41
  actually processes language and then be
• 09:44
  able to like look at this thing and
• 09:46
  verbalize it which actually is another
• 09:47
  part of your brain and so you kind of
• 09:50
  like are jumping out of that flow and
• 09:53
  and are able to look at the problem more
• 09:56
  clearly by verbalizing it to this rubber
• 09:58
  ducky there's been many times where I've
• 10:00
  used this technique and actually been
• 10:01
  amazed at like just how well it works
• 10:04
  and I would encourage you to try it out
• 10:06
  there's also another good analogy so I
• 10:10
  just watched a talk by this famous
• 10:12
  Buddhist monk called mingzhou red
• 10:13
  Porsche and he was talking about
• 10:16
  emotions and meditation but I think it
• 10:19
  actually works really well with flow and
• 10:21
  reflection or taking a break so
• 10:23
  essentially when you're in the flow of
• 10:25
  programming you are kind of in the
• 10:28
  middle of a river it's great you're
• 10:30
  moving fast you're going down the river
• 10:31
  but you run into problems
• 10:33
  maybe that's legacy code or something
• 10:36
  like that and you know it gets a little
• 10:38
  bumpy and actually sometimes it can get
• 10:41
  so bumpy that it can turn into a
• 10:42
  waterfall now being in a river a
• 10:46
  waterfall is you know coming up on a
• 10:48
  waterfall that's a terrifying thing and
• 10:50
  that can do many things to your
• 10:52
  but the act of taking a break is like
• 10:55
  going onto the shore and looking at the
• 10:57
  river and being able to observe what is
• 11:00
  going on and you know there's been
• 11:02
  countless times where I've looked back
• 11:04
  at like a crazy bug that you know that
• 11:07
  may have caused us to not deploy into
• 11:09
  production or something and looking back
• 11:11
  at that and saying oh well we fixed it
• 11:13
  and look at this elegant solution you
• 11:15
  know this is so beautiful it's because
• 11:17
  when you step back from a waterfall it's
• 11:19
  a beautiful thing now I work on stuff I
• 11:25
  work on stuff so you get it because
• 11:27
  you've done it I work at stuff at home
• 11:30
  and I work on contract work and I wanted
• 11:32
  to figure out a way that I can promote a
• 11:34
  healthy lifestyle for myself without
• 11:35
  actually just running into the same
• 11:37
  problems that I ran into you well at
• 11:39
  work so I wanted to figure out a way
• 11:42
  that I can actually eject from the flow
• 11:47
  and now you might be thinking and
• 11:49
  rightfully so that there already is
• 11:52
  techniques for this a Pomodoro Pomodoro
• 11:55
  is where you set a little timer and the
• 11:58
  timer goes off you have this checklist
• 12:00
  that you're going through but the
• 12:03
  Pomodoro didn't really work for me and
• 12:05
  it was only a few small problems that I
• 12:07
  ran into with the Pomodoro and tell you
• 12:09
  too if you're using the Pomodoro and it
• 12:11
  works for you do it like I that's one
• 12:14
  thing I want to encourage is like if you
• 12:15
  find something that works for you just
• 12:17
  stick with it and keep doing it but the
• 12:20
  issues that I had was that a lot of it's
• 12:22
  like very based off of static time
• 12:24
  frames and you can actually adjust those
• 12:26
  time frames over time but just like
• 12:28
  during the day the time frames are very
• 12:30
  static and it's also super focused on
• 12:32
  being the most productive human being
• 12:34
  and I kind of don't have the life goals
• 12:37
  of being super productive I I want to be
• 12:39
  a happy person
• 12:40
  more than anything so that was a little
• 12:43
  it wasn't too bad of a thing because
• 12:46
  productivity can help with your
• 12:47
  happiness but I wanted something that
• 12:48
  focused on happiness so if I was into a
• 12:50
  flow that was really bad I'd be able to
• 12:52
  you instead of jumping out and happy
• 12:54
  need to do a checklist or check back in
• 12:56
  I would actually you know find doing
• 12:59
  activity that made me a little bit
• 13:00
  happier now my solutions is really just
• 13:03
  the inverse having relative time frame
• 13:05
  and this could be based off of the
• 13:07
  activity that you're doing you know
• 13:09
  being able to track activity and say
• 13:11
  like oh well I'm really active right now
• 13:14
  so that means that like I'm I'm in a
• 13:17
  state of flow that you know isn't
• 13:20
  necessarily bad but there's I should
• 13:23
  probably jump out of this in some time
• 13:24
  and then also I wanted to focus on
• 13:26
  happiness now this is actually even
• 13:28
  trickier because what is happiness right
• 13:30
  and but one thing I've learned through
• 13:34
  years of meditation is that kind of just
• 13:37
  being able to observe the things that we
• 13:40
  do on a day to day and being able to get
• 13:42
  in touch with yourself a little bit is a
• 13:45
  way to kind of put different
• 13:47
  perspectives on things and to see normal
• 13:50
  things or to see the activities that you
• 13:52
  do in a different light that sometimes
• 13:54
  you can look at it in a positive light
• 13:56
  so essentially I wanted to change this
• 13:59
  to something that's more like a
• 14:02
  breathing exercise now I looked for
• 14:06
  something out there and I think it's
• 14:09
  pretty neat you know like I I can't say
• 14:11
  that like everybody's probably looking
• 14:13
  for the same thing I am but being an
• 14:15
  engineer and we get this amazing
• 14:18
  opportunity to take things that are in
• 14:19
  the back of our head things that were
• 14:21
  like oh this is really cool like is
• 14:24
  anything out there and try to find it
• 14:26
  and if we don't find it we actually have
• 14:28
  the opportunity to build this so I
• 14:29
  decided I was gonna build something and
• 14:32
  there's a couple of decisions that I
• 14:34
  made I decided to build it on the web
• 14:36
  platform I am a web engineer just like I
• 14:38
  would assume probably half of you are as
• 14:40
  well
• 14:41
  and I spend a lot of time in my browser
• 14:44
  so I actually built it in a Chrome
• 14:45
  extension and I wanted to inject it into
• 14:48
  a point that I think is probably one of
• 14:49
  the worst behaviors that I have on a web
• 14:52
  browser which is opening up new tabs I
• 14:54
  had I just like will open up a ton of
• 14:56
  them and I feel like it's just such a
• 14:58
  bad behavior that I have so I wanted to
• 15:01
  inject it into a new tab page and you
• 15:05
  know being from coming from a meditation
• 15:07
  company I was like oh I should use
• 15:09
  meditation and I was like but you know
• 15:10
  what meditation actually is a pretty
• 15:12
  heavy thing to do even if it is like two
• 15:14
  to three minute sessions doing it you
• 15:17
  know every hour and a half
• 15:18
  every three hours that can be a little
• 15:20
  bit heavy of a practice I mean just
• 15:23
  getting myself to do five minutes a day
• 15:24
  is sometimes difficult doing it multiple
• 15:26
  times a day would be very very difficult
• 15:28
  so I actually looked to my meditations
• 15:31
  little brother mindfulness and just kind
• 15:34
  of decided to do a breathing exercise
• 15:37
  because breathing exercise is a very
• 15:38
  light touch and I actually didn't want
• 15:41
  to make it a game but it ended up
• 15:43
  becoming sort of like a game because the
• 15:45
  more you actually start to interact the
• 15:48
  application interacts with you know the
• 15:50
  activity that a user is doing the more
• 15:53
  it starts to become more game-like
• 15:54
  like if you're able to do something to
• 15:57
  reset all your activity or if you know
• 15:59
  that your activity now starts to build
• 16:01
  up and and and creates this kind of like
• 16:03
  you know this application like it starts
• 16:06
  to behave more like a game and it was
• 16:11
  very interesting and how does everybody
• 16:13
  feel right now do you guys need to take
• 16:15
  a break I mean I'm kind of going through
• 16:19
  a cycle right now so so this is going to
• 16:21
  be a breathing exercise it's pranayama
• 16:23
  breathing it so it just slows down a
• 16:25
  little bit and so I'm gonna be five
• 16:27
  breaths so bear with me
• 17:10
  so it's simple very small very small and
• 17:17
  something like that
• 17:19
  you know gives you time to reflect you
• 17:21
  might be thinking what the hell am i
• 17:22
  doing listening this talk right now
• 17:24
  but it's also you know a great way to
• 17:28
  kind of just like pull yourself out of
• 17:30
  the flow and just like think about it
• 17:31
  and and with something that lightweight
• 17:33
  like it's you're not taking a break
• 17:36
  really but you're also pulling yourself
• 17:38
  out of a flow that you're able to think
• 17:40
  about you know what you're doing so if
• 17:43
  you're you know you're like oh well I
• 17:45
  was really getting this stuff done I
• 17:47
  want to continue doing it go for it
• 17:49
  that was like what five seconds now it's
• 17:51
  a little bit longer than that but
• 17:53
  essentially if you're in a bad flow or
• 17:56
  you're like angry at something maybe
• 17:58
  this is the you know just give me that a
• 18:00
  little bit of time will give you the
• 18:01
  ability to like think about and be like
• 18:02
  oh maybe I should go walk around the
• 18:04
  block or maybe I should go go and talk
• 18:06
  to you know one of my co-workers or
• 18:08
  something like that take an extended
• 18:09
  break so you could try this out get
• 18:14
  mucho calm is where you can find the
• 18:17
  link to download it and actually if
• 18:19
  you're interested to see my slides or I
• 18:21
  actually did write a blog post about why
• 18:23
  I built get mucho it actually goes
• 18:25
  through a little bit more of my story
• 18:27
  you can all find find all those links
• 18:29
  there but really I want to encourage you
• 18:32
  like find what works for you fine you
• 18:35
  know the injection point the lengths of
• 18:38
  the brakes you know the type of bricks
• 18:40
  that that work for you because maybe it
• 18:42
  works for me doesn't work for you but I
• 18:44
  think your mental health is the
• 18:45
  important thing and finding what works
• 18:47
  for you is great and but most
• 18:49
  importantly just don't get burned out
• 18:51
  thanks
• 18:59
  you
• 18:59
  [Applause]
• 19:11
  you