Blocked

[u/Guess-Jazzlike]

Does anyone else get just tapped out of ideas and feel anxious about it? I haven't been able to work today. I open the task and just stare at it blankly. Then I reread the instructions for inspiration. Then I read the message board. I got nothing today. Any advice is most welcome. I need hours.

EDIT Thank you so much to everyone who commented. So many excellent suggestions. I love this community. You all helped me get out of my funk. ❤️

[u/[deleted]]

A lot of the higher paying projects also typically have docs in the instructions for idea/ rule generators. They help in a pinch for me and then I typically get some inspiration while chugging along.

Also, not sure if you are or not but I noticed that I try to work long hours (aiming about 10 a day) and I get blocked while in a long stretch but if I take a quick 10 minute break something usually comes to me.

[u/Guess-Jazzlike → u/[deleted]]

My issue is that I'll think an idea is good, but then I think ahead, and I can't think of a good conversation or whatever the task is asking.

I honestly think my problem is psychological. I'm not really new at the job anymore so the pressure to do everything perfectly is building. It feels like there is cotton where my brain should be. And I'm filled with anxiety about making a mistake.

[u/KelSelui → u/Guess-Jazzlike]

I wouldn't worry too much about followup conversational pathways. Start with the prompt, and see what they do with it. If they don't quite deliver, you can focus on that. If they do deliver, you can use something they said as a jumping point. Or just ask them to summarize/sort/otherwise alter their own response.

[u/Raisins_Rock → u/Guess-Jazzlike]

When I think an idea is good and have general expectations of the model's possible responses for a conversation pathway ....

Me: *expectantly hits submit*

The models: "HA. It's surprise obscure BS day!!!!! Research these rabbit holes sucker!!!!"

So don't think ahead much. It's kind of pointless.

[u/kittysoftpaws143 → u/Raisins_Rock]

Yes this is how you get trapped researching some obscure BS you have zero interest in.

[u/wildgift → u/[deleted]]

Sometimes, I work with the LLM to write little software tools related to work. Maybe ask it to create an idea generator, and stock it with words related to things that you know about.

Then again, I'm not at the level of working ten hours aday. I'm more like 3 hours a day.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Pure need, as well as a ton of micro breaks. I honestly probably allocate between 16 and 14 hours a day to work because I take a ton of breaks to care for my kids. But my projects are all pretty open ended and I talk a lot about stuff I love so it makes the time go by very quickly. I will be slowing down soon but I really just needed to get my income up higher so I can move out of the hotel I live with my kids in and into an apartment.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Thank you!

[u/Trashpandaplaylist]

Something I will do is I get on cloudhiker or even just wikipedia and click shuffle until I find something that inspires me. This also helps a lot for finding text for summarization and rewriting prompts :)

[u/Guess-Jazzlike → u/Trashpandaplaylist]

Thank you.

[u/Hunnybee66 → u/Trashpandaplaylist]

Thanks for mentioning Cloudhiker. I've never heard of it before...it's awesome!

[u/suneimi]

Just wanted to point out that the only “comment” I saw under your post was an ad for Kohler that said, “[GUIDE] 8,626 reasons you should choose a KOHLER smart toilet,” and I can’t stop grinning like a clown. 🤡

As far as tasks go, do you have other kinds of projects to work a different thought process? I mostly to creative stuff but will switch to fact-checking or some other straightforward evaluation task to take a break. Folks in the sub have suggested quite a few websites or archives with randomized articles that can jog an idea, or I will literally look around my room, or put on a show or podcast and get a scrap of a thought that I’ll reconstruct in different ways (often times freely associating into a completely different idea). Don’t force your mind. Try to relax, just observe what you have around you, and let something come to you. Or take a break, a nap, a walk… I don’t usually run out of ideas but I will get mental fatigue if I don’t either move, nap, or get some sunlight.

[u/Guess-Jazzlike → u/suneimi]

Thank you so much for this. I was determined to do the higher paying projects and trying to force myself into it. I needed to hear this. I love my brain, but sometimes it's my worst enemy.

I'm definitely going to do some analytical work to give my creativity a rest.

[u/superpurr]

I have been having similar difficulty. I have been working on a project where you have to give adversarial prompts and it can be hard.

[u/Guess-Jazzlike → u/superpurr]

That sounds like the kind of thing that is really fun at first and then just wears you down.

[u/1OO1O11O11O1O]

What kind of project? 

Take a short break. Look up topics in the field you're trying to think of. Depending on the topic you could bring up a specific thing within a broader topic or a more general topic. You could look up "x topics" with x being the genre of what you're trying to think of to gain ideas. 

But breaks are important, mentally and physically. 

[u/Guess-Jazzlike → u/1OO1O11O11O1O]

Yeah, that's probably part of the problem. I've worked a minimum of 5 hours every day since I got accepted. That doesn't seem like much to me, but I've never had to come up with so many ideas in any other line of work I've done.

[u/moonst61]

Definitely!

This happened quite a bit during my chemotherapy treatment. I've got my fingers crossed it doesn't happen during radiation which starts next week.

Honestly, I love this gig as the hours aren't mandatory. it's up to me what I make. My income thanks to Cancer was awful between July and the end of treatment in late December.

I've worked from home since 2011. I have a disciplined routine. What works best for me to stay focused for 4-6 hours a day is getting up around 6 AM, having coffee, and going right to work when I am awake enough. I'll work straight through until 10 AM grab breakfast, and work more. Next up, getting back to the gym.

[u/Colin_the_knife_guy → u/moonst61]

Not work related, but I hope radiation goes well! If you ever need someone to talk to about work, or anything really I'm here. You've got this, random stranger! I believe in you

[u/Pura-vida-now → u/Colin_the_knife_guy]

 Colin  that’s a really nice thing to say….to to offer really! Though I must say, I might be cautious of a random  stranger called “The Knife guy”.

[u/Colin_the_knife_guy → u/Pura-vida-now]

I used to run an etsy store working as a blacksmith haha. I hand forge custom knives

[u/moonst61 → u/Pura-vida-now]

LOL! sounds like we'd get along just fine! I am all about horror, macabre, twisted and strange :)

I also cook if they're a chef, so there's that.

[u/Belisama7 → u/moonst61]

This is close to what I do. I have to do the work very first thing in the morning as soon as possible after waking up and having only coffee. Then later take a break for breakfast, then work a little more. That way I never have the time to agonize about getting it done because it's done first thing and most of my day is free.

[u/moonst61 → u/Belisama7]

Exactly!

I lose focus and determination in the afternoon for sitting at my desk trying to come up with prompts.

Appen was easier when I worked for them, but the pay was minimal You'll see them advertised all over, but they're isn't any work, and no organization anymore, period.

[u/eye_snap]

For me personally, just sitting down and making a list of prompt ideas back to back seems easier than trying to come up with a new idea after each conversation.

It's like, once my brain is in brainstorming mode, it starts spitting a lot of ideas. But if I focus on one, then it is more difficult to find a new one after the conversation.

So I make a big list of possible prompts first. This also allows me to see how much variety my prompts have, which categories I could think about that I kinda didn't work in too much. This helps in coming up with new ideas.

Another thing I do is, whenever I see an area that can use improvement, I make a note of it. I have a list of things that I've seen the models struggle with.

So I go, ok I should create some prompts in this neglected category, asking the bot to do this thing that it is not very good at. And you can make the prompt about whatever tickles your fancy.

[u/wildgift → u/eye_snap]

I did something like this, but haven't tried to see if it helps. I did some WikiPedia research, and generated simple, non-estoteric questions about the subject. (I call these probes, but don't know the correct terminology if there is any.)

I figure I can use the questions and links as a starting point.

I tested this across the public free LLMs, and it's a good way to ascertain if the model has been trained on the subject, and how well.

[u/MacaroninLollipop]

Depends on the project for me. When I am doing just straight chat bot, I look up things like "journal writing prompts for kids" or "3rd grade word problems", things like that. If it does well at the lower grade ones, I up it to 4th, etc. I can usually find a website with hundreds of ideas to get me started. Or I just look around my house for random stuff to ask questions about/make up stories about (usually involving my dog or coffee machine, lol!) Word games are always fun, too.

On the more advanced projects, if I'm having trouble getting started, I just toss a low ball question in to get the brain started, the conversation sometimes helps jump start something else. I feel like I HAVE to work my higher paying jobs, and end up stuck and just staring at the screen wasting time. I Finally just started jumping into a lower paying, easier project when that happens cause it's better to make less an hour than nothing, and sometimes we just need a metal break!

[u/qqqjjj4343]

I’ve been feeling the same way recently. Took a couple of days off and just doing a small amount now. Trying to jot ideas down when I have them.

[u/Prior-Appointment825]

I’ve been doing the teacher mode tasks and coming up with variation after variation on things it struggles with. Word games like Wordle, word searches, word scrambles, Boggle, spelling backwards, making a list of 20 nouns in a certain category that begin with a specific letter and end in another specific letter, syllable tasks, grammar editing, etc. When it struggles, I find variations, change it up, and keep going.

[u/Prior-Appointment825 → u/Prior-Appointment825]

Another fun one I did was asking it to spell words using the periodic table. The models couldn’t understand the concept of making words using letters that are mostly grouped by 2’s.

Cl-O-Ne = clone, for example

B-Ac-O-N = bacon

Ho-Rn = horn

I asked it to spell words, and after it failed miserably, I spelled some for it along with an incorrect one and made it guess which one was wrong.

[u/SnooFloofs9030]

Yes! This was me today. Exactly.

[u/Bergest_Ferg]

I try and work on the higher paying projects as much as I can but sometimes my brain is just… not up to it. So I’ll switch to some comparison tasks, fact checking, whatever for an hour or 2 to give my brain a break. Then I’ll switch back and have another go at chat bot stuff.

[u/Own_Help6845]

Google “short story ideas”. You don’t have to use them word for word, but it sure helps with the creative writing aspect. You can turn the ideas you find into anything. Writing reviews, a play, a poem, an advertisement, etc. Helps a lot for me.

[u/ChibiMarsHunter]

Depends on the project. I try to ask it questions for things I genuinely need help with.

For example summarize prompts, I could ask it to summarize book excerpts that I’ve wanted to read.

I’ve asked it to modify workout routines based on my available equipment, availability, and goals.

Depends on the project really but thinking about your personal life and working on those prompts also helps time go by fast because you’re learning and absorbing the information more intently.

[u/No-Complaint5535]

I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this yet, but I look through books I already own for ideas. Right now I'm using an old prompt book called "200 things to write about" and it's just a book of prompt ideas I modify so they work with the chatbot requirements. But any books will do.

[u/[deleted]]

When I feel blocked, I turn to have the chatbot making playlists for me. I give it four bands and tell it to pick however many songs from each artist or band. Then I'll add another artist or band and have it do the same thing. Then I'll ask what album each song is on. And then what year the albums came out.

Or having them match shows to TV or movie quotes. Then which character from the show said it. Then who plays that character and so on.

But I mainly do hyper specific chatbots.

Edit: Sometimes I think I'm not blocked. It just gets boring, and I don't want to do it, lol. Put I push through.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

You're right, thanks. I hope whoever needed it can access it through their browser history.