Put down the sticky notes
A book helped me understand my ‘productivity tools’ can become cute traps that make me more miserable and create the illusion I can do more. I cannot. <Waves white flag.>
Lately my Instagram feed has been haunted by two things. One is a mutating advertisement for facial oil that insists I need facial oil, because obviously. The other is a genre of advertisements strongly insinuating I have adult ADHD because I have a hard time accomplishing everything on my to-do list, am drowning in tasks, and have a messy house. I do not diminish or mock the under-diagnosis of ADHD in adults—folks whose lives are disrupted by ADHD should have access to therapies that work for them. For people without ADHD, these are symptoms of being a working adult in capitalism. Not everyone who feels as though they are drowning in tasks, lists, alerts, places to be, requests, meetings, emails, etc., has a disorder. And not everyone who has a disorder shares these precise feelings. These advertisements are, unsurprisingly, taking advantage of the overwhelm so many of us feel and offering solutions—mostly via apps—at which we can throw money.
The solution isn’t One More Solution, as I learned reading Oliver Burkeman’s Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals. The solution is consciously making different decisions. Accepting that you, time and, indeed, life are finite and all that s*** is simply not going to fit in the bag, honey. Nor should it. We are governed by modern ideas (thanks, industrial revolution) about productivity. Westerners, and Americans in particular, are conditioned not just to accept those ideas but to embrace them as patriotic ideals. All those bootstraps just about breaking our backs, robbing us of sleep and health, and of precious time with children, family and doing the things we love.
Mary Oliver, who died four years ago today, wrote this, which I think Burkeman would appreciate:
The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.
I have left a littered path of productivity tools in my wake. Bullet journals. This honestly amazing planner that did help me when I launched my business. Apple Notes. Outlook Tasks. Gantt charts. Desk calendars. A Filofax. I still haven’t mastered the tools that would sustain me:
Saying “no” more frequently.
Understanding which projects have tremendous value to me and therefore are worth the tremendous time they will take.
Putting myself on my calendar and not breaking the date.
Building a wall between work and my family and ensuring my business doesn’t encroach on the precious, fleeting time I have with these two irreplaceable humans.
Stepping closer to understanding, for me, what it means to “work to live,” rather than “live to work.”
I have a strong suspicion that imperfection, compromise, and acceptance—an imperfect home, tempered financial goals, dogged determination to ignore the Joneses—are required for this life. These are not easy choices when all the images and messages being thrown your way encourage you to do the opposite. Which we’ve already established is a dead end.
No answers today, I’m sorry. But some ideas and some hope, straight to you. Hope that you’ll master your tools, both the ones that help you keep the chaos at bay and the ones that expand the time you have with the people and activities that fuel your heart and soul.