We hold ourselves to a higher productivity standard than machines. When we get tired, or emotionally exhausted, or lose focus, or when we can’t find any motivation, the tendency for ambitious people like us is to be hard on ourselves. Meanwhile, we expect the cars we drive to fail. 

It may not be the most technically efficient way to pay the least amount of money, but it has proven to be the most psychologically efficient. When people feel they are making progress, and can see the number of loans decreasing early on, they’re more motivated to keep going.

We all spend time going down rabbit holes. This is the experience of being on social media. Social media, however, is usually not very productive. 

It’s a grid of eight boxes, with a few scattered titles, bullet points, and lines on it. It helps me reduce stress, improve my health, stay productive while I work, remember my long-term projects, and achieve work-life balance. 

Reframing is free. It changes nothing—but it could change everything for you. 

Beyond the sheer amount of time it wastes, daydreaming gives a sense of satisfaction before anything is accomplished. It sets our expectations for success way too high, especially early on. 

Your mind is waiting near the host’s booth, craning its neck over a phone, checking its watch every two minutes, tapping its foot while it glances daggers at you. 

I had never (successfully) written a book before, but I was confident I could get it done because I had seen the breadcrumbs. 

The things I’ve failed at in the past are better indicators of a future path than new things. If I’ve failed at them before, that means I’ve already gotten far enough to fail. 

The idea of “decision fatigue” is common in popular science right now. The theory goes that we only have so much mental energy to give to decision-making, and when that decision-making energy is depleted, we are more susceptible to “make choices that seem impulsive or irrational.”

Instead of feeling like a failure for not accomplishing some vague whisper of a goal, mapping out your ideal week shows you that you never had time for it in the first place. 

When I was in high school and college, my father tried relentlessly to get one lesson into my head: you can’t do everything. I resisted this lesson with everything in me.

Everyone is busy. Even great composers and Nobel Prize winning authors. The difference between you and people who create great work is not a clearer schedule or more resources or a DNA of genius. 

Working on a plane is funny. The easiest thing to do it to keep working. It’s almost more work to reach below your seat to grab your bag and put your laptop away.

We never feel like we have enough time. We watch the months and years go by, seeing our dreams get smaller and smaller in the rearview, never finding a moment to make them happen. 

“I’m not interested in squeezing something so tight that I get every last drop.”

It’s exciting to find someone who speaks your language. It’s enticing to jump on board with a new style of thought. It’s tempting to synthesize methods from a number of great teachers, because we feel like we’re getting the best of all worlds. As someone who’s done it a lot, I know. 

A hard-and-fast daily creative deliverable for a short-term challenge works wonders.

We misunderstand how the creative process works. We hear stories of great artists creating in a flash during a lightning storm of inspiration, and think we just need to wait for the right moment to come to us. 

“The first mistake is never the one that ruins you. It is the spiral of repeated mistakes that follows. Missing once is an accident. Missing twice is the start of a new habit.”