⏳ Time Anxiety Interlude, Part Two
Interlude from Chris Guillebeau's new book — a meditation "On the Lack of Success in Duplicating the Productivity Patterns of Famous World Leaders"
“The nonstop travel I undertook for a decade was linked to something deeper. For at least that long, thinking about legacy was a primary motivator for me. I wanted to be someone, to build something. I connected this motivator with a means of production: if only I wrote enough books, produced events for enough people, started enough projects . . . then, well, I’m not sure what I thought would happen. I guess I thought that, cumulatively, these things would add up to a sum greater than the parts and I could look back and say, ‘Mission accomplished!’”
—, Time Anxiety Ch. 26: Instead of Leaving a Legacy, Learn to Live Well
Hello Dohnuts! I am delighted to share part two of a special guest post this week—my favorite section from ’s new book, Time Anxiety: The Illusion of Urgency and a Better Way to Live. If you haven’t already, read part one first:
🎧 Be sure to also check out the special Free Time podcast episode we recorded (with epic show notes if I don’t say so myself!), and shout-out to for the brilliant graphics throughout the book, another of which is featured below :)
⏰ Interlude, Part Two: On the Lack of Success in Duplicating the Productivity Patterns of Famous World Leaders
By , excerpted from Time Anxiety (read part one here first)
You did not write a book called Atomic Habits. You do not have x number of Instagram followers. Your special on Netflix will not be debuting next month, be sure to tell your friends and click the Like button.
You understand that Barack Obama was able to simplify his decision-making process by wearing the same type and color of suit each day. Yet when you try the same approach, simplifying your wardrobe and selecting the next day’s outfit before going to bed, it does not yield the same effect that it does for a president. You do not wake up in the Oval Office, ready to handle the affairs of a nation. You wonder if this shopworn anecdote about Obama’s suit-wearing holds up at all. Even if a president knows in advance what he’s going to wear, doesn’t he still face a multitude of additional, much more complex decisions? No, this life hack will not solve your decision fatigue.
Nor will the apps, the subscriptions you pay for, the email newsletters. Drugs, AI, the disturbingly accurate algorithms that bring personalized content direct to your handheld device—these things are neither the solution nor the problem. They are sometimes good, sometimes bad, and always extraneous. Peripheral. Symptomatic. An endless side note to the core question.
Question: How will you choose to spend your time?
Meaning: there is a running series of exclusive choices that do not allow you to have it all.
Because: time is running out, and this truth is stressful to contemplate.
Sometimes you must lose the battle to win the war, or at least lose now to fight another day. On some of these losing days you must accept that you will accomplish zero of the seventeen items on your list. You do not complete the latest social media fitness challenge. You share a post about vulnerability, but no one likes it. The New York Times does not ask you for comment.
The Serenity Prayer, offered in Alcoholics Anonymous and other addiction groups, asks for help to accept the things we cannot change, courage to change the things we can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Your mission is similar: to surrender in the war against time, to fight a few well-chosen battles along the way, and to gain the insight to know the difference.1
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P.S. Circling back to the quote that opened this post, here’s how Chris learned to move beyond legacy as a driving aim:
“It wasn’t a time-management tweak or productivity hack that brought me to this point. I still had the same number of hours in the day, just as I’d always had and the same as everyone else does. But in choosing to engage more in writing and creative projects—without worrying nearly as much about the outcomes—I felt better.
Do I still want to leave a legacy? Well, sure, but I’d also like to live forever. While I’m at it, I’d like to win the Powerball lottery, preferably without spending any money on a ticket. I’d like the ability to fly or become invisible. Most of all, I’d like the ability to turn back time, or at least pause it for a while. But since none of those things seems forthcoming—and in fact, since legacy is just as much outside my control as any of the other wishes—I have chosen to refocus.
So I encourage you to do that as well: to be proud of all that’s brought you thus far. To do more of what you can. And to stop trying to do it all.”
—Chris Guillebeau, Time Anxiety
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