Steve Pavlina
Steve Pavlina writes personal development articles on productivity, sleep experiments, habits, and quitting conventional jobs.
What HN says
HN commenters cite him for his polyphasic sleep experiment and as a source of self-improvement advice, including his formula Intelligence = Truth + Love + Power.
Stats for nerds
186HN people shared it
111linked in comments
931story points
Dec 2023last shared
Top posts on HN
- 1Steve Pavlina: 30 days since I quit Facebook1 person · 187 points · first shared 2011 · 106 comments on HN
- 2Sleep hacks: How to Become an Early Riser14 people · 85 points · first shared 2008 · 43 comments on HN
- 3Do It Now8 people · 81 points · first shared 2007 · 39 comments on HN
- 4Polyphasic Sleep: One Man's 6-Month Experiment (2005)27 people · 69 points · first shared 2008 · 61 comments on HN
- 5Steve Pavlina releases 1000+ personal development articles into public domain1 person · 61 points · first shared 2011 · 24 comments on HN
- 6Jobs vs Passive Income3 people · 53 points · first shared 2012 · 33 comments on HN
- 7Becoming Addiction-Free (2017)2 people · 53 points · first shared 2020 · 54 comments on HN
- 8Do It Now (2005)1 person · 35 points · first shared 2024 · 25 comments on HN
- 9Dropping Adsense - Saying Goodbye to $100K Per Year in Easy Income1 person · 28 points · first shared 2008 · 42 comments on HN
- 10The Value of Ideas1 person · 27 points · first shared 2008 · 13 comments on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
- jodrellblankDec 2009
Anyone want to read through these replies and place some bets on how many goals will have markedly progressed by this time next year?
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/08/how-to-set-goals-you-will-actually-achieve/
"work at becoming a better Dad" - Unspecific. Should being a better dad have the same negative connotations as work?
"Release one app every 15 days and spend 1hr a day..." - Specific, determined. I'd bet on this.
"Stop slacking" - Vague, phrased in the negative, no chance.
"Launch my startup no matter what" - Also vague, low chance.
"I plan to end 2010 with 10x as many customers as I start it with." - Great. I bet he will progress this.
"Go full-time", "Eat healthier and become more active", no and no, bet against these.
"Start eating a proper breakfast" - What, when will you prepare it, how will you stick to it?
- ezlAug 2010
I used to really like it. There's a lot of good, but in the last 2 years, increasing content that I'm not so much a fan of. For the most part the stuff in his "Best of" column on the blog is worth reading.
One of my favorites was applying the 30-day free trial to life habits: http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/04/30-days-to-success/
Also found his article on timeboxing useful.
More recently, posts like http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2008/05/how-to-be-a-man/ don't really ring as helpful to me:
2. Put your relationships second.
A man who claims his #1 commitment in life is his relationship partner (or his family) is either too dishonest or too weak to be trusted. His loyalties are misplaced. A man who values individuals above his own integrity is a wretch, not a free thinker.
Just not my flavor.
- sireatJan 2011
I remember someone recommending Steve to me a few years ago, and I found most of his early writing very inspirational and grounded in reality.
However, at some point something changed in his writing. I started seeing some "glitches in the matrix" Steve was projecting and soon the esoteric articles overtook the normal, logical ones and I could bear to read no more.
Notice, that the main reason he is releasing copyrights is because he feels, we are all the same (that is you are Steve, I am Steve, we are all Steve...no joke) and he has created content by channelling some cosmic energy..
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2010/08/moving-beyond-copyright/
On one hand it could be it is a highly advanced form of pantheism, on the other hand it just sounds crazy to me.
- lhnzJun 2011
I wrote them and can only speak for myself since I'm a developer not a researcher. Though, I do spend a lot of time trying to learn new things, and in an unstructured settings this is not that easy to do effectively. The points I make I have either read elsewhere [1] [2] [3] or common sense and experience have lead me to believe them -- main idea is just to stay occupied and engaged by difficult tasks: I think being overly structured or 'pushing through' isn't necessarily a good idea if it stops the former. That's just my opinion though. I love to hear what others do themselves. :)
[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2562632
[2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1754281
[3] http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2009/02/goals-into-habits/
- forgottenpaswrdSep 2010
My advice is to face the unknown, but very little by little, you can be whatever you want. Our (small) decisions change us, read "the brain that changes itself", I have seen "introverts" become social beast, but not overnight, over the years.
The first thing is that you need to know what do you want to be in a very specific way, write it down, study it.Maybe you want to feel great among people, identify the current blocks or obstacles.
The most important thing is not trying to change overnight, you have already an "introvert" training of years:
http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/04/30-days-to-success/You need to be able to get over your comfort zone regularly, my best advice is find a mentor, a person that is very social, talk to him.
- edw519Jul 2008
Any coincidence that OP has exactly 168 karma (as of this post)?
I clicked on this when I read "How to..."
Nice stream of consciousness essay, but I'm still waiting for the "how to".
http://www.stevepavlina.com/ has lots of good answers to OP's original "how to" question.
I also love this quote:
“Sincerity begins at a little over 100 hours a week. You can probably get to 110 on a sustained basis, but it’s hard – you have to get down to eating once a day, showering every other day, and things of that sort to really get your life organized to work 110 hours a week.” - Len Bosack, Cisco co-founder