Trying to opt out of loudness-war

[JEL]

1). Take frequent breaks. Just stop an do nothing or listen to something else.
2). Listen unfocused. Sometimes, often, I'll listen to a mix while doing something else. Like surfing the web or doing the dishes. If anything jump out at me then it's probably worth adjusting.
3). Print a mix and listen to that. I think when we have the full multitrack at our fingertips we don't view it as one entity. We may hear issues but pass it off as something that can be fixed later on. I think it helps to get perspective by printing/bouncing a mix and listen to a version of the mix that can't be tweaked.

I did 2 and 3 for this one.

I found 2 surprisingly effective. Apparently distracting your mind opens it up more to wrong sound. It's like you don't notice the music so much, while it's sounding 'correct', but as soon as something is 'off' it just grabs you attention (making it more easy to know where the errors are). Very clever trick
Thank you for that

Number 1 takes more discipline though, because once you're working you don't really want to stop. Kind of like kids can't wait for Christmas-presents, I can't wait for the final mix to be done lol.
I will have to work on that and be more patient.