Productivity
by Oliver Burkeman
What if you'll never catch up?
If you live to eighty, you get about four thousand weeks. Oliver Burkeman, a former productivity geek, says the usual advice makes this harder by promising you'll one day be on top of everything. You won't be. Facing that, he argues, makes it far easier to choose what matters.
Hear a sample · read by Laura
Reply to email faster and you get more replies back. Burkeman calls it the efficiency trap. Getting better at getting through things mostly brings more things to get through, while the work you care about keeps sliding to next week.
You're going to neglect plenty anyway, Burkeman says, so choose what. Pick one or two areas to throw yourself into for now, and let yourself do badly at others, like the garden or a spotless inbox, without the guilt. He calls it strategic underachievement.
The photographer Arno Minkkinen points out that buses leaving Helsinki's central station all follow the same route at first. Get off after a few stops because your work looks like everyone else's, and you never reach the point where the routes split. Burkeman's advice is to stay on.
On the scale of the universe, Burkeman notes, your life barely registers. He finds that a relief and calls it cosmic insignificance therapy. You don't have to make your weeks count by doing something extraordinary. An ordinary afternoon with people you love is already a good use of one.
Four thousand
Live to eighty and you get about four thousand weeks. That is shockingly few.
The efficiency trap
Getting faster at tasks mostly brings you more tasks. You will never clear the list.
Letting things slide
Since you can't do everything, decide on purpose what you'll let slide.
Attention
What you pay attention to, moment by moment, is what your life ends up being.
Patience
Good things take time. Let hard work move at its own slow pace.
A story from the book
In 1929 the Soviet Union gave workers staggered days off so factories never stopped. Families and friends rarely had the same day free, and people hated it. Burkeman uses it to show that time is worth more when shared, so a perfectly flexible schedule can be a lonely one.
Hot take · true or myth?
If you get efficient enough, you'll eventually get on top of everything.
Myth. Burkeman calls this the efficiency trap. The better you get at clearing tasks, the more tasks come your way, so the pile never reaches zero.
One thing to try
Split your to-do list in two. The open list can grow as long as it likes. The closed list holds no more than ten items, and nothing joins it until something leaves. This week, work only from the closed list, and let the open one stay long.
Knotd has the key ideas from 250+ non-fiction books, each in a few minutes, in plain words. Four Thousand Weeks comes with a Hot Take round to make it stick.
Get the whole book on KnotdOpen in the appWhat if you'll never catch up? If you live to eighty, you get about four thousand weeks. Oliver Burkeman, a former productivity geek, says the usual advice makes this harder by promising you'll one day be on top of everything. You won't be. Facing that, he argues, makes it far easier to choose what matters.
The efficiency trap; Decide what to fail at; Stay on the bus; Cosmic insignificance therapy.
Split your to-do list in two. The open list can grow as long as it likes. The closed list holds no more than ten items, and nothing joins it until something leaves. This week, work only from the closed list, and let the open one stay long.
Yes. Knotd has the key ideas from Four Thousand Weeks in a few minutes, in plain words, plus a Hot Take round to test them. It's one of 250+ non-fiction books in the app.
