Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with flow

How can I achieve a state of creative flow as a writer?

incandescentman — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 19:24:26 -0800

When I'm racing to meet a writing deadline, I feel a sense of exhilaration, momentum, and flow. How can achieve that state on a regular basis so I can make steady progress on my writing? The night before a big deadline, it's always the same thing. Under the gun to file in time, the urgency and pressure fuel me and gets me going. It's not panic, it's energy. Things start clicking. I feel inspired. The writing just flows. I wind up doing 90 percent of the writing in 10 percent of the time.

When the hour and minute of the deadline roll around, I always find myself wishing I had another 24 or 48 hours to work on the thing, now that I finally know clearly what I want to say. But by then it's too late (especially if the deadline is a live presentation of my story).

Imagine if I could get to that point a week before the deadline how much better I could make everything!

I don't know why I'm so lazy.

1. I never actually write anything unless I have to, by which I mean i.e. I have an externally-imposed deadline and someone else is sitting there WAITING for me to file
2. Even then I never seem to be able to get going until the last possible minute

It used to be that I didn't take my work seriously and I could get away with it. In college I did an all-nighter every time I had to write a paper and I always got an A.

Now it's different. I realize that this is my life and I need to stop playing around. So I write every day. However:

1. I have trouble getting started with my writing for the day. It's always "let me check my email one last time" or "oh I just remembered I need to make a doctor's appointment" or even just "let me browse headlines for a while longer before I start." Why do I feel the need to put it off so long before I start?
2. I constantly feel the need to flee my writing task and do something else, anything else. Check my email. Make coffee. Empty the trash on my desktop. Usually the distractions that pull me away from my writing aren't pure time-wasters—I'm not sitting there playing videogames when I'm supposed to be writing. Instead, it's "oh man, my friend is coming into town this weekend and I just remembered I still haven't emailed him back, I should do that right away." Or "oh if I'm going to go running this weekend, I need to order earbuds." They're important things, things I do need to do anyway. But, you know, I don't need to do them at that moment. So when I think about it after the fact, I can see: that was just me trying to escape the task of writing. Sure it's fine to take breaks. But sometimes I realize find I've only done a few minutes of writing at a time between all those other tasks.

(For context, I'm in the process of writing a narrative nonfiction book, which involves a lot of research and synthesizing information.)

Why do I indulge in this procrastination, this "experiential avoidance"? I don't know, because writing is hard and I'm lazy and my brain wants to avoid work? Fine, but writing is what I'm CHOOSING to do. I've had other jobs and they were awful and I don't want to have to go back. Which means I have to find a way to get my writing done.

I realize these are classic writers' problems, but what's the solution for God's sake?

Tell me about an essay that flows really well.

caoimhe — Mon, 04 Feb 2013 10:21:18 -0800

Hello! I am teaching a writing class, and am now teaching students about flow. I would like to do an exercise where I take an essay (preferably, somewhat academic) and cut it up and give it to them to rearrange to show how well the author transitions between paragraphs. The problem is, I can't find one that works in particular! If anyone has a good example, I'd be grateful.

Fighting information overload, one Tweet at a time

NekulturnY — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 10:58:45 -0800

I read this somewhere filter. A few years back, I read a very detailed description of a well known journalist (working at Reuters, or AP or something - it might have been Anthony De Rosa) who explained in great detail how he managed his Twitter and other (social) information streams to find original sources and be on top of breaking news. I would like to find that specific article again. Please don't bury me under any other blog posts about how to manage Twitter or other information streams unless it's REALLY REALLY fantastic - as fantastic as that post I'm referring to (which is unlikely, since I've read about 10,000 articles on the subject and never once found one that was as insightful, precise and detailed). Thank you for helping.

Trying to attach section markers to content rather than pages in CS4.

iamkimiam — Mon, 08 Oct 2012 02:06:47 -0800

Adobe InDesign CS4: I've got a very large document, divided into sections (chapters). Currently, there are section markers on various pages, with each section defined by a labelled submaster (so I can see from the Pages panel where each section begins and ends). When I add content to various sections, the section markers no longer align as the pages reflow (because the markers are attached to the actual page numbers and not the content). How can I fix this so that adding content to sections continues within the submaster style / section marker for that section and not reflow over the pages?

Just 14 more out-and-backs! (Sigh.)

psoas — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 13:39:54 -0800

What do you think about when you're swimming laps? Which is to say, what can I think about when swimming laps?

I'm beginning to train for a couple of longer triathlons (as in, never done anything more than Olympic/international distance) and one of the main drawbacks to my workouts is that I find swimming laps really boring. I do open water swims when I can, but more often than not I find myself in the ol' sensory-deprivation chamber with nothing really to listen to and nothing to see but black and blue stripes. I try to focus on my form (and make sure to keep out of the way when there are others in my lane), but I am slow* and when I have to do a 700-meter piece in a 25-meter pool, it just feels endless.

In the past I've resorted to doing long division in my head or tried to plan a work presentation, which has helped, but I think I'd rather not build the association with another kind of drudgery while I already nearly have to drag myself to the pool twice a week. What works for you, hive mind?

*and I'm OK with being slow. I'd rather save my energy fro the other two events.

Who can flow both this way and that?

radiosilents — Fri, 15 Jun 2012 01:34:33 -0800

So many rappers have a unique "flow"; Snoop, Busta Rhymes, MCA, Kool Moe Dee, etc. I find it interesting that so many of them have a singular style that they excel at. Suggest rappers that are able to switch between various distinct & different styles of delivery.

Make interesting conversations and making them flow

soul24rage — Fri, 25 May 2012 06:07:16 -0800

i need help to make interesting conversations and making them flow Hi guys. I'm going straight to the point. I'm in college right now and I suck at conversations. I really do. I am reserved and it is starting to kill me. The other day, my friend came over to my house for like a week because he didnt had a place to stay and its been the two of us for the whole week. However, there were so many awkward silences and it is unbearable. I feel that i have a reputation of being boring and non expressive. Although I am nice, I guess my inability to make interesting conversations and making them flow is what's killing me. Because of that, I can't get a girlfriend, I can't make more friends and also I think Im getting more depressed each day.

What benefit does a Negative Operating Cycle get you?

MesoFilter — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 12:19:35 -0800

What benefit does a Negative Operating Cycle get you? Other than just cash on hand. Amazon has a lot of cash because they practice Just In Time inventory management & sell out of their products before the bill for that product comes due. Other companies pay the bill first & then wait for the stock to sell out to recoup their money. Aside from the benefit of having cash on hand, what benefit do you get from this? I recently stumbled on this slide from this excellent presentation, which led me to this NY Times article about Amazon's Negative Operating Cycle.

This has me wondering - what are the specific benefits? Why were stock investors so excited about this concept?

I have my own conjecture about how this benefits them and I think I'm fairly on the mark- but I want to ask the hive mind to see if there's a better, more accurate answer out there. I'll share my thoughts on this after a bit (I don't want to influence the response too much one way or the other).

Also how realistic is it that Amazon sees money from goods sold in 2 days? I'm not really aware of many payment processors that do that, but if they're their own payment processor then it would make more sense that they could get money in 2 days from Visa etc. directly.

Do people run like clockwork? (In large open spaces)

piato — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 03:30:58 -0800

Is it true that people flow through convention halls, shopping malls and similar areas in a clockwise direction, more often than not? Our assigned business adviser told us that this is indeed the case, and furthermore that all meaningful purchasing decisions are made between twelve and three o'clock. The latter claim seems believable, but I haven't been able to find any evidence for the former online.

I'm also slightly unclear on what exactly it actually means - that visitors walk in, and imagine themselves at 12, facing 6? Or that they enter and imagine themselves at clock-centre, facing twelve? In which case they would turn… right?

I'd love other any related information, and any other positioning tips. We received some absolutely amazing advice here, and it helped an enormous amount - I'm super grateful!

A career that engenders flow, focus, intensity

SampleSize — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 08:27:12 -0800

Hey everybody, it's another question in my never-ending search for a career I might enjoy! I'm an avid whitewater kayaker. I love just about everything about it, but I think the thing that makes it most addictive is that the intensity, the problem solving, the physicality, the threat of consequences all come together to put me in a state of flow. Are there careers that could give me some of that? This is not, by the way, about fear - which I don't enjoy. It's about "the healthy middle ground that exists between boredom and fear," as it was expressed in a Rapid Magazine article I read recently.

Also, somewhat relevant: I'm male, 37, have ADHD.

How much money flows between companies, consumers, etc?

simpleton — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 08:47:26 -0800

How much money flows between companies, consumers, etc? This might be a fundamental question but are there any books/stats on how much money flows between industries and corporations and consumers?

For example, if I'm going to get my vehicle repaired, as a consumer I have to go to the mechanic's shop and pay for labor and parts.

The mechanic's shop has to pay the owner of the parts shop. The parts shop in turn has to find suppliers for their parts.

Overall, all these transactions involve the flow of money.

For the auto industry for example, there is of course the flow of money from consumers to purchase a car or do repairs (lets say 100 billion dollars in america for example purposes). There is also the flow of money from auto companies and their suppliers of car radios, leather seats, etc.

It would be so cool to have a big but detailed picture for a given industry (auto, health, insurance, entertainment) how and where money all the money is flowing. Preferably a visualization but data is ok too as I can graph it.

Just to get a general picture, not for individual companies really.

Just looking at the yellow pages and seeing all the companies listed there made me think if there is an interesting way to see them from a monetary flow perspective.

Somebody else out there must think this is very interesting.

Let's relax and play a game.

Philipschall — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 20:39:17 -0800

I would like to find some PC, GB, GBA, or PSP games that are very calming. I've grown tired of playing video games that make me twitchy and tense, or games where I play for some sense of power. I'm currently searching for games that have an incredible calming, flow-like play to them. Games that I would fit into this category are games like Osmos, Zen Bound, and Lumines, games that bring stress down and drop me into a sort of non-addicting flow of play.

What games do you recommend?

Looking for a program to help with cash flow calculations for a small business

zara — Thu, 28 Jul 2011 14:28:26 -0800

Looking for a program to help with cash flow calculations for a small business Background:
I work for a small business that does web development work (so no inventory) and I faithfully use Quickbooks Online for all our accounting needs. This has worked out great for taxes/making our CPA happy, but we are having trouble with trying to forecast. Right now we have a giant excel cash flow sheet broken down by week, that has past weeks information (income/expenses) and then shows future weeks (we have a lot of retainer clients, so we know (usually) when those checks come in, and when we pay things out. But, as we have grown, so has the spreadsheet, and it occasionally leads to late nights hunting down formula errors and thinking that there has to be a better way to do this.

Short Questions:
Is there a way to do this in quickbooks? I've tried playing around with their budgeting feature, but never really got it to work/got frustrated. If everyone says that this is the way to go, I'll go back and try again.

What I want is a program where I can enter our bank balance, and say every third week of the month we get paid $X amount by Client X. Every 15th of the month we run payroll. What will our bank balance look like at the end of this month? At the end of the year? Does such a program exist? If its software, we are an all Mac office, so needs to be compatible. If there is someway to do this online...double brownie points.

Thank you!

HEAD BEEN HURTING FOR THREE YEARS NOW

shipbreaker — Sat, 04 Jun 2011 21:38:07 -0800

People with some economics smarts: please look at this graph and help explain it to me. For some extra background, this graph that is freaking me out is found at http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=Ed . It seems sooper-obvious that the red line goes Up while the blue line goes Down. Correlation? Perhaps not.

Looks like that while the outstanding debt from household markets was being reduced (paid off from some source), the amount of debt allocated to each citizen from govt debt increased. Likely due to the bailouts being used to help balance the books of failing financial instutions. I'm no economist, but it looks like this chart is being used as evidence in an argument that the bailout has left the average American in a worse position than they were before.

Why doesn't the paint touch the corners?

KirkpatrickMac — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 05:21:01 -0800

This recent post on MetaFilter on pour painting and this comment about how the paint, when poured slowly on to the top face of a cube, does not run down the corners of the cube, got me thinking about why it didn't ... but after a day thinking about viscous liquids I'm still completely stuck for a scientific explanation. Can anyone enlighten me?

Am I a crazy person from crazytown?

The Whelk — Mon, 17 May 2010 10:35:49 -0800

My Get It Done is different than everyone else's Get It Done: If I tell somebody I am going to do things (file my papers, go to the store, clean up kitchen..etc) it will not get done. if I write it down , it does not get done. But I keep my mouth shut and just keep the plan in my head, it gets done. What is going on here? Do other people do this? Is there a name for it? Also, it seems to work better if you never announce my day's plans aloud. If they stay completely internal, they get done.

You're harshing my flow, man[ager]!

sonic meat machine — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 12:13:03 -0800

I have a manager who constantly interrupts my attention-hungry programming work with easy, quick tasks that she believes "will just take a second, no problem." This destroys my productivity. How does the hive mind deal with this? My manager has no technical background—finds tables in Word a challenge—and seems to view blocks of time as irrelevant. When I told her I needed to take Fridays and only work on programming projects in order to get them done by the deadline, she asked "How long on Fridays?"

This is killing my morale. Programming is my favorite part of my job, and it seems as if my direct supervisor has no comprehension of "flow" or how harmful multitasking is when you're doing something that takes a great deal of mental effort.

Diagramming Data Flow, without Data Flow Diagrams.

themel — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 03:38:19 -0800

I'd like to visualize data flow in a system, but can't really find a standard way to do so. So, I'm trying to describe how a bunch of modules interact in a system. We have "content objects" and "processor objects" which take content and transform it. I have a large number of relationships in the way of

raw_data1 is transformed by cooker A into cooked_data1
cooked_data1 and cooked_data2 are transformed by cooker B into seasoned_data3 and seasoned_data4.

The processors can use multiple inputs and produce multiple outputs, content objects can be used as inputs for multiple processors

I don't think Data Flow Diagrams are appropriate since they don't give adequate representation to the content objects (which I'd then like to visually group to represent different tiers, like "raw", "cooked", "seasoned"), and doing it as an UML class diagram does not convey the distinction between processors and content well enough IMO.

My current best guess is "color-coded class diagram". Does anyone have a better alternative? I have a feeling this should be a standard problem.

Fix my squeaky water!

wongcorgi — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 15:00:20 -0800

I have a tub of water draining into a small hose - it's creating a horrible squeaking, help me fix it! I have an immersion circulator which pumps water into a small plastic bin. It drains through gravity when the water level gets high enough.

Problem is, I get a loud squeaking sound when the water level is at a certain height (which happens to be the equilibrium) and a vortex is created from the surface of the water.

Video is here (youtube). Might have to turn it up to hear the squeaking (taken with my phone). In actuality it's really loud, I can hear it from a room away even with the door closed.

Any ideas on how to fix this?

Does taking breaks for ergonomics hurt flow?

defben — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 04:16:12 -0800

Doesn't taking breaks for ergonomic reasons hurt "flow"? I've recently been having tendinitis issues at work (I'm in the IT field). I've bought an ergonomic keyboard, started correcting bad habits and I also installed Workrave; a small program that "forces" me to take the occasional break.

I've begun to wonder if these breaks are hurting my overall productivity. Specifically with regard to the psychological concept of "flow". Am I wrong or is this just something I have to deal with?

Will a funnel in a river pump water?

cmchap — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 14:57:16 -0800

PhysicsFilter: The Setup: a 3 meter hose with a 1 millimeter interior diameter is attached to the small end of a funnel with a 1 meter maximum diameter and a 1 millimeter minimum diameter. This assembly is submerged in a "quick-flowing river" with the large end of the funnel facing into the current (so, "on its side"). The free end of the hose is raised 10 centimeters above the top of the funnel and this happens to be above the water level as well. The Question: Theoretically, will water come out of the raised end of the hose? If so, what is the equation that will let me input the rate of the "quick-flowing river" get the rate of discharge from the free end of the hose? I ran this past my engineer father, and he past some of his engineer friends. We have differing opinions.One of the engineers is pretty sure that Bernoulli's Principle will come into play.

Are there examples of this kind of "pump" in the real world? I'd imagine they're VERY inefficient.

design my resonator

edtut — Wed, 27 May 2009 21:01:04 -0800

how to design a helmholtz resonator for a two phase flow to eliminate noise of particular frequencies in that flow. i need to design a helmholtz resonator for a two phase flow application to eliminate noise of particular frequencies in that flow.
the flow is a multi phased mixed fluid:
- will a resonator be effective in both transient and laminar flow (or how does the effectiveness relate to the state of the boundary layer)
- what characteristics determine if the resonator is a noise cancelling or noise generating device

any relevant resources would be appreciated

Sudden drop in water pressure on second floor

maudlin — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 08:27:36 -0800

What can I do to investigate a sudden drop in water pressure (or flow) in the second floor only of my house before I call a plumber this Monday? I've already seen this question, but I bought this new two storey townhouse three years ago and all has been fine up until yesterday.

Basement and first floor pressure are fine in all sinks and the powder room toilet. But the second floor water sources have been weak since yesterday. The flow from the bathtub tap is markedly decreased, the sink is a little softer, too, and the toilet flush is definitely weak.

Given the sudden onset and localization, could this be a leak? (Oh, I really don't want to call a plumber out on a holiday weekend if I can help it, although I know that if this could be a leak, I should move fast). Or could a slowly building blockage show no signs until it just reached a critical point yesterday?

My gas grill has low flow.

rocketman — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 10:26:10 -0800

My gas grill is broken. Why would the gas flow decrease so that I can only get one burner to cook on high? My grill is two years old, used semi-regularly for a few summers. I'd really like to use it near-daily this summer. The problem is that late last summer, the gas flow reduced severely. I can get a single burner to cook on high, but when I turn on additional burners, the flame immediately goes down, as though the gas flow is being divided among the extra burners without getting more gas into the grill.

At first, I thought my LP tank was low, but replacing the tank with a new one didn't change the problem. Could the regulator valve be broken? If so, is it as easy as removing the existing valve and replacing it with a new one?

Thanks.

Work Flow Systems - Open Source

bright77blue — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 10:20:28 -0800

Business Process Management - or Workflow Management. I am looking at Bonita and ProcessMaker. Anyone using these? Which one is better for a "non-programmer" in a SMB environment? Oh - and if you have other open source suggestions, let me know. Thanks! BB