Four Thousand Weeks

A good antidote to both "grind culture" and "enjoy every moment to the fullest" mindsets. Rather than opposites, these outlooks are almost the same. Put pressure on yourself to achieve specific outcomes at all times. Turns out this is not the recipe to happiness.

Nothing extra-ordinary in terms of content, but special when you think of the book as a compilation of useful frameworks to think about time.

Alas, I stumbled upon Four Thousand Weeks at such a point in my life where I’ve already been a productivity addict for so long that it’s impossible for me to make a fresh start. The central theme of the book - that you won’t ever get to do all the things you’ve set out to do so you should consciously choose and be happy about your choice - is such an aphoristic statement that no matter how you spin it, it always feels bland.

Having said that, the self-help ocean that this book is a part of, is filled with heaps of garbage books, so stumbling upon this one is like finding a needle in a haystack. Few ways of thinking about time and choices that I found interesting:

Don’t think of these things as life hacks - don’t treat life as a faulty contraption in need of modification.

A spin on FOMO (Fear of Missing Out): missing out is what makes our choices meaningful in the first place, every decision to use a portion of a time on anything represents saying no to every other thing that you could’ve done but you didn’t.

The anti-skill of staying with the anxiety of never having time to do everything.

Picking one item from the menu represents an affirmation rather than a defeat. The fact that you could’ve chosen a different and perhaps equally valuable way to spend this afternoon bestows meaning on the choice you did make.

A hobbyist is a subversive: they insist that some things are worth doing for themselves alone, despite offering no payoffs in terms of productivity or profit.

I heard about this through a podcast interview with the author.
It was still not what I expected, but in a good way.
It is about how we deal with the limited amount of time we have on earth and about good or bad ways to deal with it.
A lot of it will sound familiar and he quotes a lot of authors who have written about related topics.

My quick summary would be:
- enjoy everything you do in the moment for what it is
- choose a few things to focus on
- don't worry about missing out on opportunities, you can't avoid it anyway
- just don't worry so much
- everybody is winging it

I think this book could have been a lot shorter, but probably because I am still optimizing for time and sometimes things just take as long as they take.

This book challenges many of my views on efficiency, getting things done, distraction, etc. Besides offering a philosophical, historical, and down-to-earth perspective on life, it has solid advice.

About increasing the quality of the time you spend: 1) "cut out time for yourself first", 2) limit work in progress, 3) resist the allure of seductive but not essential priorities.

About patience: 1) develop a taste for having problems (it will always be that we have problems); 2) embrace radical incrementalism (small, constant work VS. big-bang work); 3) originality lies on the far side of unoriginality (the metaphor is those of busses leaving from a train station, that follow the same route initially, only to diverge later).

Five questions to contemplate in order to get closer to living more: 1) Where in your life or your work are you pursuing comfort when what's called for is discomfort? Does this choice diminish me or enlarge me? 2) Are you judging yourself by standards of productivity or performance that are impossible to meet? 3) In what ways have you yet to accept the fact that you're who you are and not the person you think you ought to be? 4) In which areas of your life are you still handling back until you feel like you know what you're doing? 5) How would you spend your days differently if you didn't care so much about seeing your actions seeing fruition?