I believe productivity is a deeply personal thing. We all have different brains and, therefore, different preferences, perspectives, and situations where we feel most effective
For example, procrastination is deeply tied to anxiety—so it’s important to develop an understanding of your own neuroses and fears.
Action has a momentum to it, and so developing personal rituals to get your own snowball rolling downhill is likely far more important than what yerba mate supplements to take, or what fucking yoga mat to sit and scratch your ass on in the morning.
Most of us, for most of our lives, conceptualize work as a linear function. What I mean by “linear” is that the amount of productive output you create is directly proportional to the number of hours you input.
The only work that is linear is really basic, repetitive stuff. Like hauling bales of hay. Or packing boxes. Or really obnoxious data entry on gigantic spreadsheets. Or operating the fryer at McDonald’s.
Sadly, the “work as a linear function” is where all the religion of “Bro, you’ve just gotta hustle” comes from in the startup world. Since, in their minds, 16 hours of work is twice as productive as eight, the logical conclusion is that you’re all just a bunch of lazy sacks of shit, and you should be putting butter in your coffee at 4 AM and coding until your eyeballs bleed. Hustle, hustle, hustle.
like a muscle, your brain tires out. And if you’re exercising your brain by doing any sort of problem-solving, or important decision-making, then you’re limited in how much you can effectively accomplish in a day.
Cal Newport talks about this in deep work
Every business, job, or project has what I call a leverage point that instantly makes everything else you do more effective.
See, solving problems is like food for your mind. It makes your mind happy. It makes it feel important and worthy and capable—all things directly linked to happiness.
But solving problems is to your mind as food is to your stomach. It needs a variety of stimulation and too much of one kind will cause it to get sick and tired.
But