Use delayed responses to wean needy people when you think they are abusing your time and helpfulness. For instance, the new guy comes by asking for help getting started but keeps coming by for things he should do himself. You don't want to be rude but want to stop it. Progression like immediate response->5m->1h->1day has worked for me with email.
Delayed response is also great to cool off heated discussions.
Boomerang for Gmail is a great way to send delayed messages. I've used it to schedule replies for "tomorrow" while still being able to write the reply immediately, and thus keep up my good "Do it now" Inbox Zero habits.
Don't use it for people you care about. I've wrecked a potential date because he found out I've used Boomerang to fake indifference. It’s quite easy to figure out the email was sent through Boomerang and even how much delay youset. It's better to be "honest" or let it cool in Drafts.
Summary of best comments on the original repository
The best advice posted (best comments) in the original repository included (I blatantly pirate-copied it over from their various authors):
Avoid commuting, or failing that, commute effectively (i.e. by train or bicycle and not by car, so you can do some useful work or exercise).
Start your posts with a summary if it's more than 3-5 paragraphs. Use paragraphs.
Treat craigslist as a free storage. You don't need to physically own all the tools if you can pick them up for <(0.1 paychecks). Treat those things as if you'd already own them. Pick 'em up when you actually need them.
Spend more effort (money, time) on optimizing things you regularly use, such as clothing, matresses, hygiene products, kitchen accessories, and ergonomic computer hardware.
If you are trying to do X, surround yourself with people who do X. E.g. if you want to read, go visit a (university) library.
If you are looking for a job, tell everyone you know. Many jobs are gained through personal connections. Post on facebook.
If a complete stranger or an acquaintance can do something useful for you, ask. (Politely. At a convenient time. With an appropriate amo
Get enough sleep. It will give you better intelligence, happiness and health.
There is existing lots of research on how very bad sleep deprivation is for cognitive performance. Many smart people are keen to get smarter by taking nootropic drugs, which have not so good evidence of effectiveness, and not much evidence for long term safety.
Not to be sleep deprived is a massive, free cognitive enhancement. Not only is it good for your cognition. The long term health effects have been studied, and it is not only not bad for you, it is indeed very good for your health. You will almost certainly live longer as well as smarter!
Many smart people also stay up late at night and get up too early to get enough sleep. This is a bad bargain. It is hard to change this habit. However, the gains are potentially very big for people.
I have changed my behaviour before big days at work when I have to appear smart. In the past I am staying up late the night before to practice and prepare. I would not prepare for such meetings by drinking alcohol, because I know it would impair my cognitive function, including how well I am able to assess my own cognitive function, so I would not perceive how impaired I w...
If you're reading a document on a computer where you have to scroll to find the footnotes and then scroll back up to find where you were again, you can instead open another copy of the document in a new tab/window, and leave it at the footnotes.
You very probably have not all recommended insurances in your country of residence or your mandatory insurance doesn't cover everything you'd want it to cover. Same goes for savings, you don't save enough for old age and emergencies. Basically if at some point you would have had to do something to prepare for the future, you didn't do it.
The short version about insurance is this: Never insure anything where you can go "damn it" and pay in cash, the same rule goes for deductibles. On the reverse, insure anything that you absolutely have to pay for and would financially ruin you. Some possible areas are your house, liability insurance and health care cost. Google "necessary insurance" or similar.
The short version about savings retirement plans is this: Use google to find out if your government provides sufficient provisions for retirement, if you plan on retiring at all. If not, look for ways to provide for old age and/or invest money, the sooner you start, the better. Hold about three months worth of living expenses in the most liquid form possible to cover emergencies. To ensure saving, order your bank to transfer a set amount of cash every month to a seperate bank account which you can not access on the go.
A couple addendums:
1) If you have a family, your death goes on the "would financially ruin you" list. If anyone needs you, you need life insurance - and term is extremely cheap(I just sold a couple half a million each for $50/mo), so don't use money as an excuse unless you're destitute or extremely ill. To a lesser extent, disability insurance(though it tends to be pricier).
2) You may not want to ever retire, but the human body in old age is a very insistent creature. Plan on retiring. Better to have and not need than need and not have.
Don't keep significant savings in accounts that don't bear interest for an extended amount of time.
This is a rant; probably skip it if you're not in the mood.
I have debit cards and credit cards but high debt and no savings. I am depressed and (because of that) have poor executive function (i.e., getting-shit-done ability).
I have a job where I can work flexible hours. An obvious solution to my problem would be to work more hours. And yet here I am not doing that!
I could also move to a place with lower rent, but that would require me to do some combination of throwing stuff out (which is work) and getting people to help me move my stuff to the new place (I have mobility issues that prevent me from doing a lot of lifting things). Also, I'm hoping my current low point won't last forever and I kind of like my current place and would hate to move out of it because of a hopefully temporary problem.
I could also see a therapist, but they cost money. I could also try drugs, but they cost money and most of the ones I've tried so far either do nothing (bupropion) or make things worse (paroxetine). (Except modafinil. Yay modafinil!)
I sure feel like a dummy for being incompetent at life, but feeling that way doesn't actually help me not be incompetent at life.
Please, have this positive reinforcement. It was given to me when I needed it but I don't need it anymore so I'll pass it on.
This has happened to many of us. We've been in these ruts, I've paid for fuel with nickels and dimes because I used all my quarters on food. Shit happens, problems pile up, but if you can stabilize, that means you can crawl out of the pit. We get overloaded, we can't fix everything at once, it feels like all the problems are too interconnected to fix.
But you are capable and have worth, so treat where you are as the temporary situation it is and start dealing with it as such. Pick a problem and address it, the first one takes time but if you have food and shelter you have time. Once that is done pick the next problem, fix it, this one will go faster. Rinse and repeat. And four years later (YMMV) your will be counting your assets for a new credit card and have the pleasant shock that they are a gross positive.
TL:DR Some people make this a way of life, some people treat it as a temporary place to be.
Relevant in winter, when air is dry and noses are frequently blown: Placing petroleum jelly in one's nostrils for moisture, despite being icky, is a superior experience to a nosebleed.
Keep your work desk productive.
De-clutter your work desk regularly, getting rid of things you don't actually use. This includes equipment, paper, plants and even furniture that's doing nothing. Put misplaced items back to their designated space. Designate spaces for supplies and references if you haven't already. Free nearby spaces which are cluttered with things you don't actually use. Put those things out of reach, fill the space with other things.
A good idea is to remove every single item on your desk and think about what you actually need. Repeat this monthly. Put everything back to its place at the end of the day. Repeat this daily. If you find that you need to fetch something daily, put it closer.
Install a smoke detector (and reduce mortality by 0.3% if I'm reading the statistics right - not to talk of the property damages prevented).
Make a will. It's worth it, and too easy to put off. Here's a will-writing guide I wrote, including free ways in which you can do so (which also covers how to leave money to charity in it, but is a complete guide.)
Where would be a good place to discuss an old Boring Advice?
E.g. I have gave in and bought myself a smart phone last year, but the utility I derive from it is yet to turn positive. I should have been better off if I either allocated a significant portion of resources to learn using it properly, or not buy at all.
On dealing with a cold:
If you feel a bit warm/cold/sticky/itchy, check your room's climate with the CBE Thermal Comfort Tool. Adjust your surroundings until you enter the blue zone. Click the "SI/IP" button to switch between metric (SI) and U.S. customary (IP) units.
If you're in the blue zone and you still don't feel good, then start looking for trickier explanations (e.g. air quality or illness).
You can read posts on a Blogspot blog sequentially by adding ?m=1 at the end of the URL of a post (so that you get the mobile version -- but actually I like what it looks like on desktop computers too) and using the navigation arrows near the bottom of the page, below the comment box. (They work backwards, i.e. the left arrow links to the next more recent post and the right arrow links to the next earlier post.)
Before stepping in front of a car make eye contact with the driver.
Do not assume they saw you just because they slowed down.
Use rechargeable batteries.
After two years of constant use in my headphones (8+ hours a day), I still get a full week's worth of power from each battery. I don't recall how long traditional batteries lasted, but I don't think it was all too much longer. I don't have any to compare it with as a major benefit is not needing to worry about buying batteries ever. I do need to make sure I keep charged and discharged batteries separate.
Estimate how valuable your time is so you can more easily determine if a cost that saves time is worth it, e.g. getting faster internet access. Also, consider using neutral hours.
Here is a little psychological trick that can be useful for those of us who have troubles with decision-making. I have found it rather helpful and time-saving on quite a few occasions.
So, suppose you are totally stuck trying to make a Buridan's ass choice between case A and case B, and you need to make a quick decision. Your quick utilitarian estimate have not been able to solve your problem, if you continue the deliberation, you are running the risk of missing both opportunities, and you are wasting your time and brainpower on this decision. There is also...
If you give to charity, use the recommendations at GiveWell.org. (Familiar and boring to most people here I know, but new people might see this thread!)
80/20 tax law for your country. Unless your a tax lawyer you aren't going to have the need or ability to learn it in detail, but simple changes can often save several thousand dollars a year. In particular tax deductible savings accounts and charitable giving deductions are your friends.
This is the first post of the 2015 repository rerun, which appears to be a good idea. The motivation for this rerun is that while the 12 repositories (go look them up, they're awesome!) exist and people might look them up, few new comments are posted there. In effect, there might be useful stuff that should go in those repositories, but is never posted due to low expected value and no feedback. With the rerun, attention is shifted to one topic per month. This might allow us to have a lively discussion on the topic at hand and gather new content for the repository.
The first repository to be rerun is the Boring Advice Repository, because of... on a whim.
Enter original motivation (by Qiaochu_Yuan):
This is an extension of a comment I made that I can't find and also a request for examples. It seems plausible that, when giving advice, many people optimize for deepness or punchiness of the advice rather than for actual practical value. There may be good reasons to do this - e.g. advice that sounds deep or punchy might be more likely to be listened to - but as a corollary, there could be valuable advice that people generally don't give because it doesn't sound deep or punchy. Let's call this boring advice.
An example that's been discussed on LW several times is "make checklists." Checklists are great. We should totally make checklists. But "make checklists" is not a deep or punchy thing to say. Other examples include "google things" and "exercise."
The Boring Advice Repository is filled with lots of diverse advice, I've summarized some of it in a comment below.
So what should go here? To go with Qiaochu_Yuan again (adding emphasis):
[...] Post other examples of boring advice. If you can, provide evidence and/or a plausible argument that your boring advice actually is useful, but [...] err on the side of boring but not necessarily useful [...].
Upvotes on advice posted in this thread should be based on your estimate of the usefulness of the advice; [...] do not vote up advice just because it sounds deep or punchy.
I don't know if you should post new advice here or in the original repository. Perhaps search the old repository with ctrl+f (when on windows) and if you don't get results, post it here.