I thought I would give a small update. Outside of blog posts I am not really producing much so if feels a bit misleading to talk about improving ones productivity.

Coffee

I have cut back on coffee. I am fairly certain there are health benefits to avoiding caffeine altogether because of its effect on sleep quality. For now I have cut back by about 50%. There hasn't been any noticeable change to my sleep quality. Perhaps I need to reduce it some more? It is a nice alteration to go along with other health changes I have been doing.

While sleep has not changed my brain has definitely quietened down. A calm peacefulness, not quite detachment but it takes a fair bit to move me out the this peaceful state and even then I quickly revert back to it when left alone. I am still getting lots of things done just in a calm way. I like it, perhaps this alone is giving me a 1% improvement.

Emacs

Emacs is being replaced as my main at home editor. I have never got totally comfortable with Emacs lisp and as that's where customisation eventually takes you this is a productivity blocker. I just haven't spent enough time using it. I really like Emacs but it is an outlier that doesn't overlap well with other technologies. If it was all I used and I invested a few months properly learning it then my productivity would be great. Instead the bet is on a smoother productivity curve can be got by using neovim, Zellij, lazygit and probably a host of other tools as a replacement for Emacs.

I am missing a replacement for OrgMode and often that is the thing that has drawn me back in the past.

When you look to replace Emacs you realise how much it does for you in terms of plugins. I guess it is an Operating System.

If I was coding a lot at the moment this would be considered a step back in productivity but as mentioned I am mostly learning Ruby and writing blog posts. Now is an ideal time to try a big change my environment.

Goals

I am well aware of the quote Learning without application serves no purpose and my current set of goals is mostly learning and blogging. This is something I should spend a little bit more time pondering.