The Hypocrisy of Writing a Book on Productivity
Self-reflection, self-criticism, and self-confession
I’m a hypocrite, a soap box preacher, and an egomaniac — but how much of one?
Inevitably, when you write a book on productivity, you open yourself up to criticism; some from the public, some from people that actually know you. (It’s not like writing a book on some niche subject in which people will accept that you’re an expert. Everyone “produces,” so in that sense, everyone knows something about productivity. It takes some gumption to say “Hi. My way is better.”)
From the public, the criticism sounds like: You’re a hypocrite — no one could possibly be that disciplined! or You’re a preacher — get off your a soap box! or Here we go again — another guru peddling snake-oil.
From people you know, it takes subtler forms. An eye-roll from a friend who can’t believe your ego. Gossipy texts. Light-hearted jokes that bare traces of previous, heavier-hearted iterations. A spectrum of comments ranging from tame charges of “he’s weird” to bolder charges of narcissism.
But none of that compares to the self-critiques. Because self-criticism is far more effective. Your imagination can put words in anyone’s mouth and thoughts in anyone’s head. Your imagination can conjure entire conversations in which you are subject to the darkest, most cutting of words by the people closest to you.
When I wrote my book, all of the above happened. For the most part, the criticism was fair: Who am I to write a book about productivity and getting things done when I live at my in-laws’? When I hadn’t found a full-time job? When I still had school debt? When I hadn’t done anything particularly noteworthy at all?
Day 1
As soon as I sent the e-mail, I cringed.
I imagined each of the ~100 recipients rolling their eyes as they read my plea. I erred on the side of inclusion. Recipients included people I hadn’t talked to in months or more, people who had no idea I wrote about productivity or wrote about anything at all. But if I wanted anyone to read my book, I had to start with people who knew me. Presumably, any one of them is statistically more likely to read a book I wrote than a random member of the public.
Day 2
From my journal:
It occurred to me while running: This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to actually see if I’m a hypocrite, to actually see if I can LIVE this productivity system that I just sent out into the world.
The day prior, my wife and daughter left for a 13-day vacation across the country, leaving me with nothing but hours to fill in an empty house devoid of all interruptions. For anyone who is married or who has kids, you know that THIS IS REALLY RARE.
Continuing from my journal:
I have three big goals to work towards. And no excuses for not exercising or meditating or journaling or keeping my inbox empty. If I can’t get these 7 actions done during most of the 13 days, then I really am a hypocrite, a condescending preacher, a self-delusional narcissist.
Did not complete my 7 actions.
Day 3
Loving my freedom of time and space, I took each of the 7 actions:
- I prepared for an upcoming second round interview for a tenure-track professor position (Goal 1: Practice to the point of perfection so I can get a job);
- I revised an academic article I was trying to publish (Goal 2: Re-submit Article);
- I wrote a story on Medium (Goal 3: Market Book);
- I journaled;
- I exercised;
- I meditated; and
- I cleared my e-mail and Omnifocus inboxes.
Completed my 7 actions.
Day 4
One of my book’s axioms is “To Produce, You Must Offend.” Given the expectations most people have (what I call the “short term world”) it is difficult to pursue long term goals (be a “long term person”) without offending people.
I accept this price.
But sometimes the price jumps.
Normally, I’m offending people who have to wait hours for a text reply or days for a call back… not my mom. Not my mom who has cancer.
Normally, I try to schedule my 7 daily actions around the stuff that either really matters (e.g., spending time with my daughter) or that has to be done (e.g., going to the grocery store.)
When your mom has cancer, you take her to the appointment and to lunch afterwards — it’s what a son does. The productivity suffers but you accept it. Maybe it’s not directly related to the “long term” aspect of a “long term person,” but it defines the “person” aspect.
But, still, you must keep going. You can’t put everything on hold. Maybe it’s self-delusion to justify my own selfishness, but I think most parents wouldn’t want their children to pause everything.
From my journal:
Am I an awful son?
No, not awful. But I’m not the best.
Did not complete my 7 actions.
Day 5
From the journal:
The quiet is unbelievable. Really enjoying it. I miss [wife] and [daughter], of course, but there is joy here. (Is that bad to say?)
It’s funny how, when you know there will be no one else around for awhile, things become even quieter. As if the potential of noise is a noise itself.
Normally, I schedule my actions around such “potentials.” But then, with ultimate seclusion, there was nothing to schedule around, forcing me to find reasons to do X at this hour and Y at that hour. It’s only now, looking back, that I see that most of these decision were arbitrary.
I know what works for me in the morning: Journal. Write. Exercise. Meditate. The other actions — it really doesn’t matter. They get done, or they don’t — they get done well, or they don’t — regardless of time or context. Further experimentation is hedonistic.
Completed my 7 actions.
Day 6
From my journal:
Fighting cancer is the ultimate short term versus long term battle. In the short term comes chemo treatments, the loss of hair, nausea, lack of appetite, loss of weight, weakness, etc., etc., etc. Cancer medicine kills you in the short term to save you in the long term.
This realization really makes me hate the name of my book.*
*Book originally called How to be a Long Term Person in a Short Term World. Now it’s simply Long Term Person, Short Term World.
Completed my 7 actions.
Day 7
In reviewing my progress, I had an epiphany: I had too much freedom of time and space. I was wasting time, procrastinating without even knowing it. Not in the binge-watching-of-Netflix kind of way, but in sneakier ways.
Instead of working on the actual structure and substance of what I was going to discuss in my job presentation, I played with the PowerPoint slides. I was lost in the weeds before I even knew where the weeds should be.
For my article revision, instead of fixing the mistakes explicitly pointed out by the editors, I was reconceptualizing a basic premise that underlay my entire argument. I was digging up the lawn when it just needed to be mowed.
Both of these are among the most effective strategies of the Resistance. They operate at the microscopic level, camouflaged, only perceptible if you actively look for them. A cancer of their own kind.
I felt productive because it is the slides that people will see. However, without choosing higher-level principles first, I gave myself neither map nor compass.
I felt like I was making a critical breakthrough, and maybe I was — but there will always be some abstract construct that can be improved or better-articulated. It’s at the lower levels where the real work happens — the plodding, often-monotonous work that just isn’t as fun as the marker and whiteboard.
Realizing this, I wrote:
At the halfway point of the isolation vacation. Need to make serious headway this week. By the end of tomorrow, I want presentation complete such that I could do a walkthrough. Also, need to begin the actual revising of article — no more head-in-the-clouds BS! These days will be gone before you realize it! Probably never happen again. Need to make the best of them!
Completed my 7 actions. (But realized that I’d been completing the wrong actions in preceding days.)
Day 8
From my journal:
Wasted much time this AM . Maybe ~30 minutes reading about Trump’s ban upon people from 7 (Muslim-majority) countries… Often I think about what life would be like if you took [wife], [daughter], and me out of our present (relatively cushy) context and placed us in the context of refugees from Syria or people who have yet to escape. My life (our lives) are such peanuts compared to that. They have no choice but to be short term people.
I really hate the name of my book.
Eventually I found my way back to my to-do list.
Building on the previous day’s observation, I knew I had to work on the substance of the presentation before working on the vehicle of the presentation. But I was stuck, paralyzed with indecisiveness. So I took a random course of action, not allowing myself to indulge in an analysis of what my next step should be. Sometimes you just have to do that.
I grabbed a random piece of paper and began writing the gist of my talk. Sources included the prematurely-created slides and various snippets from elsewhere — on the computer, on other pieces of paper, in my head. I fashioned them into an outline, but as I wrote, the outline morphed into a script. Looking at the length, I knew my presentation would be too long. I wasn’t where I wanted to be, but at least now I had everything in one place. There I could focus my energy, there I could find a way forward.
Day 8 ended with my friends coming over to watch football. Overindulged on ribs and beer. Whoops.
Did not complete my 7 actions.
Day 9
From the journal:
Ate like shit last night, been in a fog since I woke up about three hours ago. Much grit required to work through this post… I don’t think I’ll be going full blast [today]… [but still] keeping the [journaling] habit and that’s what counts. Tomorrow I go full blast.
I wrote the above entry at 9:24 AM. So, just a few hours into the day and I’d admitted defeat for the entire day. I spent the day alternating between lying on the couch and slouching in a chair. This is another classic strategy of the Resistance. It makes you feel productive because you’ve scheduled productivity in the future but there’s nothing actually produced. Therefore: not productive.
Did not complete my 7 actions.
Day 10
Sometimes you have to slow down to speed up.
Upon waking, I decided to go hiking. It was tempting to go forward with my work since I wasn’t 100% happy with my progress. But hiking was the right long term decision.
As I hiked, I jotted down thoughts regarding my interview presentation. I zeroed in on a common fatal flaw in presenting: going over your allotted time. I realized that I was running this risk with a potentially-interesting but not-worth-it aside at the beginning of my talk.
Hiking — getting outside for atypical amounts of time — does something to me that can’t be measured. It’s a renewal of something. It’s tempting to say it “renews my soul” but I don’t know what that means. I just know that people say it.
More apt: Hiking renews my focus. It reminds me of my priorities, both in the meta-whatever sense and as related to my tangible goals. It’s like my journal, in a way. When you explore the outside, you inevitably explore the inside.
Did not complete my 7 actions.
Day 11
Woke up with anxiety. Two questions plagued my mind so I journaled about them.
What if my mom’s treatments don’t work?
What if I don’t get the job?
Journaling doesn’t answer questions like this, but that’s not the point. It gets them out there, on paper, which has the effect of quieting them in the mind. Really loud voices in my head that just want a place to sit quietly. Journaling gives them one.
On a more rational level, writing and exploring the questions makes me realize what I have control over, and what I don’t.
As Epictetus said, there are three types of “things” in this world:
- those entirely in our control (the few);
- those outside our control (the many); and
- those we have some control over (where the important action is.)
Completed my 7 actions.
Day 12
I started reflecting back on my isolation vacation. I made two observations, one specific, one systemic.
Specific:
The funny (or not), insightful thing about the powerpoint presentation is it’s (mostly) the one I should’ve written all along. When it’s simple, it writes itself.
That [CENSORED] egg cuber [CENSORED]? I almost lost a job over that!
My systemwide observation:
Although I’ve been a little loose-y, goose-y with the system, I do have confidence in it. I do think it can actually be my long term productivity system — I’m not a total hypocrite.
Other excerpts:
A strange, interesting time in my life these days have been. Likely to never repeat.
…
Would I take a few more days? Do I wish this happened more often? Yes, of course. But I also miss my family.
Completed my 7 actions.
Day 13
A snowstorm came.
My wife and daughter flew in just before the snow came, but the storm caused my interview to be delayed a month. That gave me a lot of time to prepare for the interview—too much time. But because of the above epiphany, I was able to avoid repeating my mistake.
And I got the job.
I also re-submitted the article.
I posted regularly on Medium.
I strengthened my habits of journaling, exercising, meditating, and ‘Inbox Zero’ing.
But mom still has cancer.
Completed my 7 actions.
The book mentioned above, Long Term Person, Short Term World, is on Amazon. For more on the journaling system described above, check out productivityjournals.com.
