alt Hacker News> The only way I can convince myself to do it is by finding a suitably engaging show I can distract myself with on my phone while I huff and puff.
> Combine the task with something you enjoy. You know what makes cleaning out the garage a lot better? Some good tunes.
This motivational advice is deeply misguided. These are very clear examples of "dopamine stacking". The idea is that by combining a stimulating activity (eg watching show/music) with a motivation-requiring activity (eg working out/cleaning) you can get an initial boost in motivation to accomplish the hard task. It works (initially) because the stimulating task (show/music) is giving you a dopamine increase which feels like motivation to complete the hard task. The problem is that if you repeat this behavior with any consistency, your dopamine system quickly adjusts the high activity-combo level of dopamine as a new baseline. Soon not even the dopamine you get from the combination is sufficient to motivate you to accomplish the task. At this point people often seek another short lived dopamine-increasing stimulus to combine into the mix.
You can see this pattern in people who exercise only with some combination of pre-workout, caffeine, music, phone scrolling.
The off-ramp is learning how to derive dopamine (aka "motivation") from the actual activity itself.
further reading: 1. https://youtu.be/PhBQ4riwDj4?si=n-afP-Rj_k7qfATz
Replies
> The off-ramp is learning how to derive dopamine (aka "motivation") from the actual activity itself
So, just start liking the things you don't like? Sure, ideally that's the solution you want, but it's not exactly actionable advice.
I'd also worry that the association of a fun activity with one you don't like can reduce the amount of fun from the first activity even when you stop doing them together. This is obviously not a scientific experiment, but I always struggled to wake up in the morning even with alarms (which I've since improved at with better understanding of some specific sleep conditions I have), and in an attempt to try to make it less annoying, I tried a couple times over the years to pick a song I liked as an alarm phone rather than a typical alarm sound. It never helped make waking up any easier, but it completely ruined both of the songs I tried for me in the short term, and even now years later I don't really enjoy them nearly as much as I used to. Hearing the opening notes of either of them just reminds me of the annoyance I felt waking up years ago.
Person with severe ADHD here. At least for me, it also helps because many hard activities are not stimulating enough for the effort they require, and persisting through understimulation is HARD.
Really, deeply misguided? It's "deeply misguided" to listen to music while coding? I find that hard to believe.
So, where does the evidence come from? I don't buy the explanation, and I can't find any article published by Huberman on dopamine.
I generally agree. Some of the things I don't want to do are actually pretty complex and require my full attention so I wouldn't be able to listen to a podcast or music with lyrics. Maybe I'm in a weird situation that requires some kind of shift. On the other hand, I am sure I can do 30 minutes on an "assaultbike" without having to distract myself with a TV show.
The "treat yourself to a donut" suggestion got me. Sure, eat a donut, completely negating the caloric burn of the 30 minutes of aerobics you're motivating/rewarding yourself for.
Ha my pre-workout is ibuprofen and redbull
Firstly, Huberman has turned into a hack, and this video is a great example of his drift into "just trust me bro" pop science. Secondly,
> You can see this pattern in people who exercise only with some combination of pre-workout, caffeine, music, phone scrolling
Where do you see this pattern? I would wager nowhere, even if it sounds like it "could" happen. I've worked out with a lot of people. I listen to music while working out, as do many people. I would enjoy working out less without it. But I'm not in some Dopamine spiral where I need to stack more stuff on top just to keep working out. I've been doing it for years.
I've noticed a lot of health influencers like Huberman, who need to make content frequently, have been honing in on gut-feeling conclusions derived from novice science facts you can expect anyone to know about. He casts a wide net with a Psychology Today level concept, and he builds an audience of people that can't separate the lazy conclusions he makes from the objectively true but elementary facts he bases them on.
Look at the comments, where people are accusing each other of being dopamine hijacked because they eat and read at the same time. Give me a break. Your reward system is not a fragile thing that is easily broken. The actual causes of dopamine hijacking are things like spending all day playing video games, not having a coffee before working out.
I don't think listening to or watching something entertaining while doing something unpleasant or boring or uncomfortable is an example of dopamine stacking. It's just a distraction technique that helps you take your mind off the aspects of it that you don't want to think about or be aware of.
Listening to music or a podcast while you work or exercise is a completely normal, non-dopamine stacking, thing to do. In the past, before radio and recorded music, people daydreamed or sang to accomplish the same goal.