15 years of 'productivity hacks'

Past becomes prologue / Issue 1,404

Mar 13, 2024

Oh, hi friends!

I've been thinking about the various work, productivity, and creativity tricks and hacks I've absorbed, shared, abandoned, and exalted over the years.

There are many! How many?

I kept a block timer at my desk and set it to 15-minute increments.

For a while, Moosti was my homepage and I worked in 25-minute Pomodoro cycles. (I actually did this yesterday…)

I once wrote this newsletter in the morning before rushing to work, giving myself 20 minutes max before hitting send.

To mimic the structure of a college semester, I created a multi-week syllabus for my projects.

I built ornate systems in Airtable. And Trello. And Notion. (Now I just use Apple Notes.)

I themed the days of the week, batched my email, and lost untold hours this week to reading Kate Middleton conspiracy theories, which isn’t a productivity hack, but just something I had to share.

I've read the wonks: David Allen, Charles Duhigg, Cal Newport, Tim Ferriss, Oliver Burkeman, Adam Grant, Malcolm Gladwell, Carol Dweck.

I've read the motivators: David Goggins, Mel Robbins, Suze Orman, Jen Sincero, Seth Godin, Steven Pressfield.

I've read the creatives: Austin Kleon, Liz Gilbert, Meera Lee Patel, Twyla Tharp, Anne Lamott, Ed Catmull, Gretchen Rubin, Rick Rubin.

I even wrote not one, not two, but three motivational journals about setting boundaries and moving toward your most meaningful work.

Speaking of boundaries, there have been stringent periods with lots of "no thanks," and "sorry I'm not available for that right now."

And there's been free periods with dreamy, unscheduled time, when I’m likely to drop everything or kinda disappear for a week or two.

Quotas have played a big role; I once wrote three screenplay/play pages each day for 18 months. Aaaaand then none for a year.

I love to aim for a high failure rate (and notched 165 failures in 2017).

At some point, who knows when, I wrote 30 plays in 30 days and shared them on my website.

Like our cat Lula, I embraced my nocturnal side, and used to write first drafts at 11pm. (These drafts weren't particularly good. But they all became something to edit.)

Seeing this list is humbling.

Shouldn’t I have more to show for all these strange adaptations, these experiments, these trials and many errors?

Yes and no.

The point is there is no single right way of working.

Who you are, and what you want, and how you do everything, will change many times.

When you compare today's results with the results of last year—or even last week—you're remembering only a tiny fraction of your life during that time. What else was going on? What were your priorities? Where was your attention?

All of that gets fuzzy, and yet still you wonder, in today's terms, Why am I not moving fast enough?

You are.

I promise you are.

So revisit the tricks of your past if you need to.

Adopt some new ones.

Abandon them all.

Slow way down.

And there is one question that’s never failed me: What’s providing the strongest flicker of excitement right now?

If you move in that direction, whether with one hack or two tricks or none, you won’t be disappointed.

Everything you learn will add up in ways too impossible to imagine.