I Think Best In The Shower
I just spent 4 hours trying to fix a bug in CommunityWalk. I had one solution in mind and was just banging the hell out of it, trying to get it to work. I finally realized that I would never get it to work, gave up in frustration and went to finally take a shower.
I stepped into the shower, put all thoughts of the problem out of my head and within about 30 seconds I had another, more simple solution bursting through my unconsciousness. By the end of the shower I could see the solution clear as day and within a half an hour I had it fixed.
I don't know how many times this has happened to me. I've got to get better at recognizing when I am in a rut like I was for four hours this morning. The only thing that ever works in that situation is to walk away and forget about it. More often than not I am forced to walk away because I have to give my girlfriend a ride somewhere and within a few minutes into the ride I have a solution. It really has to be one of the greatest problem solving techniques available and I only exercise it when I am forced to!
I stepped into the shower, put all thoughts of the problem out of my head and within about 30 seconds I had another, more simple solution bursting through my unconsciousness. By the end of the shower I could see the solution clear as day and within a half an hour I had it fixed.
I don't know how many times this has happened to me. I've got to get better at recognizing when I am in a rut like I was for four hours this morning. The only thing that ever works in that situation is to walk away and forget about it. More often than not I am forced to walk away because I have to give my girlfriend a ride somewhere and within a few minutes into the ride I have a solution. It really has to be one of the greatest problem solving techniques available and I only exercise it when I am forced to!
posted by The Entreprexplorer | 2:58 PM
1 Comments:
Oh, man, I do this all the time!
I get stuck in a mind rut when trying to fix a bug or solve a nasty problem and just keep hammering away on the wrong path. I think I'm close, so I put off things like sleep or food for hours. But when I finally step away and clear my mind and think about something else, I come back and see things from a different perspective and the solution is obvious. :)
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