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TRANSCRIPT
Exclusive Interview
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#10 (September, October, November 2011)www.ProductiveMagazine.com
Seth Godin
More articles on:4 Generating lots of output4 Fighting procrastination & resistance4 Building habits of constant improvement
On the new Revolution and Passion to take Action!
• Seth Godin • Leo Babauta • Ishita Gupta • Graham Allcott • Celestine Chua • Laura Stack • Michael Sliwinski •
Crazy Productive!
From the Editor
By Michael Sliwinski, Editor
S eth Godin’s new book is “We are all Weird” and it’s really fantastic. With this book/manifesto as well
as my interview with him, Seth is show-ing us how we should start taking ac-tions right away and not be afraid to per-form at our best. We are not pieces of a factory anymore. We are unique and we can show it to the world through our work. I was humbled and excited to be able to interview Seth for this issue of your favorite productivity magazine and hope you’ll enjoy it, too!
We launched the magazine almost 3 years ago and now you’re reading is-sue #10. We’re speeding up. This Christ-mas you’ll receive a gift of issue #11, isn’t that cool? Moreover, if everything goes well this issue will also be trans-lated into French and Spanish. Things are looking up for our magazine and we’re hoping to help millions of people get things done all over the world.
! Links: Michael on Twitter | Michael Sliwinski’s Blog
Productive! Magazine web site | Nozbe – Simply Get Things Done!
Since this issue’s star is Seth Godin, we organized the articles around his mes-sages with Leo Babauta on blogging, Ishi-ta Gupta (who works with Seth) on help-lessness, Graham Allcott on beating resistance, Celestine Chua on habits and Laura Stack on wording. Finally I wrote a tribute–article to Steve Jobs, ex CEO of Apple, who recently passed away. Also, we’re ending this issue with a short piece by Leo on minimalism in New York (Seth’s city).
As always, enjoy, get inspired and take action! …and share this magazine with your friends and family. It’ll be very appreciated!
Yours,
Michael Sliwinski
Editor in Chief, Productive! MagazineFounder, Nozbe – Simply Get It Done!
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Productive!Magazinewww.ProductiveMagazine.com
Sponsor:www.Nozbe.com
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Chief Editor:Michael Sliwinski
Technical Editor:Piotr Wozniak
Technical Advisor:Maciej Budzich
Editorial Team:Lori Anderson
Delfina Gerbert
James Tonn
Tribute:Marc Orchant (1957–2007)The Productive!Magazine is dedicated to the memory of a productivity guru, great blogger and a very close friend, Marc Orchant who passed away on 9th December 2007.
All articles are copyright © by their respective authors.
Productive!Magazine is copyright © by Michael Sliwinski.
Getting Things Done® and GTD® are the registered
trademarks of the David Allen Company.
04 Michael Sliwinski
On a new Revolution and Passion to take Action! Interview with Seth Godin
09 Leo Babauta
Become the God of Learning Your Trade
11 Ishita Gupta
Break Through the Cycle of Fear and Helplessness
13 Graham Allcott
10 ways to beat your internal resistance
16 Celestine Chua
The 8 Habits of Highly Productive People (Part 1)
19 Michael Sliwinski
How Steve Jobs got his last year done
21 Laura Stack
Your Wording is a Critical Productivity Tool
24 Michael Sliwinski
Productive! Show Videos
25 Leo Babauta
A minimalist in NYC
Table of contents
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On the new Revolution and Passion to take Action!How Seth Godin disrupts the publishing industry and motivates all of us to focus on our uniqueness and do the work we’re destined to do. Now.
Interview with Seth Godin
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SG: Well, I’m not sure it’s all of a sud-den. You know “the Dip” was definitely about the very same thing, and a book I wrote back in 1997 called “Get what you deserve”. The point is the market-ing is not advertising. Advertising is a corporate activity that can be done by a committee, marketing is a personal activity that can be done by a human. What I found often when people are stuck on their marketing it’s because they are personally holding themselves back, it’s because somewhere along the way they have persuaded themselves that they didn’t deserve it, that they needed to wait for something, or that some other thing was holding them back. And so I needed to write about it in order for the whole thing to come to-gether.
MS: That totally makes sense. The next thing: practical aspects of blogging. I al-so blog and many people blog... but then they just stop... how do you manage to post so regularly?SG: Well, I think the most important thing to understand about blogging is that if you are blogging for other people you are going to be disappointed. Even if no one would read it I would still blog. And the people I know who blog passionate-ly, all of them say exactly the same thing. So that is the way you have to look at it, you can’t say: “I’m not getting enough comments I’m not going to blog. I’m not getting enough money, I’m not going to blog”. You have to say: “this is a great chance for me to clear my thoughts and put them into the world, what an oppor-tunity”.
Michael Sliwinski: We are here from the Pro-ductive! Magazine, a magazine about pro-ductivity and you are this super–produc-tive guy with one book a year, lots of daily blog posts... how do you get this done?Seth Godin: Well, I don’t go to meetings, I don’t watch television and I focus very much on things that have leverage and try very hard to avoid things that are stalling.
MS: You don’t engage with users on Twit-ter or other social networks… are they a waste of your time?SG: I’m not sure if that’s a waste, all I’m saying is that I can’t do it very well and also do the other things that I want to do. So I go focus on things I can do well and do them with leverage and passion and don’t let the resistance slow me down.
MS: You are starting many things. What kind of tricks do you use that help you fol-low through with these things?SG: I’m not sure it is a trick. I think that the approach that I have is that the re-sistance to lizard brain is a compass. If it tells me that something is uncom-fortable, if it tells me that something is scary then that is exactly what I’m go-ing to do. I look for it as a clue that I’m on the right track.
MS: So it actually suggests to you what to do next?SG: That’s right. You know you have this built–in thing that shows you what the world is afraid of. And if you do that you’re probably going to be OK.
MS: With the “Domino Project” that you’ve launched with Amazon, are you trying to shut down the whole publishing industry?SG: You know it is called the “Domino Project”, because we would like books to spread like dominoes. Like we have this new book coming out called “Any-
thing You Want” and as it spreads it is going to sell more because we’ve or-ganized it to spread. And that is what we are trying to do, we are not trying to knock down publishing like domi-noes, we’re trying to spread books like dominoes.
MS: What would you say to aspiring au-thors? Should they actually go and pitch the publishers or try self–publishing on Amazon?SG: I feel very strong that you should pick yourself. You shouldn’t be waiting for someone to pick you, to give you permission to go and make something happen. If that means working with a publisher, that’s fine, but I don’t feel that anybody should say “no, you can’t do that”.
MS: You are known as the ultimate mar-keter with your books like “Purple Cow” and “All Marketers Are Liars” – now you switched to personal marketing with “Linchpin” and “Poke the box”. Why the switch all of a sudden?
I don’t go to meetings, I don’t watch television and… try very hard to avoid things that are stalling.
I go focus on things I can do well and do them with leverage and passion and don’t let the resistance slow me down.
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MS: Totally. Now, back to your daily rou-tines... do you have a typical day?SG: I don’t have one. I’m very much fo-cused on not having a typical day.
MS: OK. But you still have to focus on hav-ing time to write, right?SG: Well, when I want to write, I write. When I need to write, I write. I think that modeling your day on someone else is a giant mistake.
MS: So, when you do want to write and somebody disturbs you or ask you for an interview. What do you do then?SG: I mean, if you talk to just about any-one doing a lot of output, they are very good at saying “no”. I feel badly about
all the places I can’t go to speak, I feel badly about all the interviews I can’t do and all those people I could reach out and coach or consult, but I can’t do that and do what I’m doing now. So, I don’t do any consulting and I rarely do all the other sorts of things although I’d like to. The discipline of saying “no” becomes really important.
MS: It’s good that sometimes you do speak at conferences because then we all can watch them on YouTube – the one I enjoyed most was about the “lizard brain”. I’ve shared it with my audience, friends, family...SG: Yes. I think that’s worth talking about. The argument I’m trying to make is that there is something going on and we need to be aware of it so that we can do something about it. And once it has a name, once people understand what’s at stake they are more likely to take actions and do something worth-while.
MS: Definitely. So, if you are so busy and you have so many things to do, how do you balance your family life? How do you find time for the ones you love?SG: You know it is funny. People nev-er say “how do find time to have lunch or dinner?” or “how do you find time to sleep?”. We are not talking of life–lunch balance. So I’m not sure I’m interest-ed in conversation about life–work bal-ance. I think you have to have the disci-pline to have the life you want to have.
Anyone who is doing a lot of output, is very good at saying “no”.
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And if you are stealing from one part of your life in order to make the other part work, you are going to pay for it.
MS: Totally true. Going back to our mag-azine, people ask me why I do it. It’s easy, I love learning new things about produc-tivity. Everything we do should be more about just passion and drive. What do you think?
Advertising is a corporate activity that can be done by a committee, marketing is a personal activity that can be done by a human.
Se th i s a w r i t e r,
a speaker and an
agent o f change.
Also known as the
best marketer of our
times. Author of ten
books that have been bestsellers around the
world. Founder of Squidoo and recently
The Domino Project with Amazon.
! Seth GodinSG: Yes. Isn’t that the nature of the rev-olution we are having right now? Isn’t it the nature of what we are saying to people, we are not looking for more people to work in our factories, that’s why we have unemployment, we are saying to people “this is your chance to do work that matters, the work that you believe in”. So why don’t you step up and do it?
I guess I would leave this interview by saying: “there is a fork in a road and you will have to decide if you take action or if you are going to stand by”. My idea for you would be to dig in deep and start taking actions. a
! Links: Seth’s Blog | Seth’s Books | The Domino Project | Seth’s “We Are All Weird”
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A lot of you are like me – trying to do what you love, and figuring out the best way to do that.
Become a God of Learning Your Trade
By Leo Babauta
N o matter what you do, you can put ideas out on a blog. It’s not always easy to do what you love,
because:! You aren’t sure you’re good at it.! You don’t know if it will work.! You don’t know if people will like it.! You don’t know how to get better.! You doubt your ability to succeed.! You might spend months working on
something, only to have it fail.
And these are tough problems. But I have a method for beating them. And it’s a simple trick: Do it in public, and get immediate feedback.
It’s one of the most powerful things you can implement, I promise. Here’s why and how.
Instant feedback is the most valuable thing you can get.
The Lessons of Street PerformersConsider the street musician or juggler or magician: they do a show in public, in front of people who have other things to do and haven’t planned on watching a show, and have to convince that crowd not only to watch, but to pay them mon-ey after having already seen the show.
That’s an amazing business model. If a street performer isn’t good, people won’t watch. But making a small change in the performance, like a better setup or better patter, can make huge chang-es in audience reaction and payment.
And here’s the thing: they see the ef-fects of those small changes immedi-ately. There’s no wondering, “Will this
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Leo Babauta lives in
San Francisco and is
married with six kids.
He’s a wri ter and
a runner and a vege-
tarian and he loves
writing blogs: “Zen Habits” and “Minimalism”.
He’s a published author of a bestselling book
“Power of Less”.
! Leo Babauta
! Links: Leo on Twitter | Leo’s Blog: Zen Habits | Leo’s Blog: Minimalist
work? Will it be an improvement or make things worse?”. Because they know if it works, if it makes things better or worse, right away.
Instant feedback is the most valuable thing you can get. It’s better even than a sale, because a sale might result in a satisfied customer or it might not, and a sale doesn’t tell you how to improve.
Whatever you want to do, if you can do something publicly, even in front of a small group, and get instant feedback, that’s pure gold. There’s no better way to improve. There’s no better way to evolve a method or creative process or business model than through this sim-ple technique of constant iteration and natural selection.
How to Evolve Like a Street PerformerBlogging is one of the best ways to do something in public. Consider: you write about an idea, and you get instant feedback from readers, in com-ments, emails, tweets, G+ posts, etc.
When I started Zen Habits, I don’t think I was that great… I wrote a bunch of posts that didn’t thrill readers. I wrote a couple that did thrill some people, and so learned what works best as a writer – more than I’d learned as a writer in the entire previous decade of writing.
Through this kind of public writing, instant feedback, and constant evolving, I got better over the course of months, not years.
No matter what you do, you can put ideas out on a blog. You can also put software out to beta tes-ters, as soon as possible, with the simplest possible version of the software. You can test reci-pes by making them for people, maybe selling them on the
street in a cart. Artists can put artwork online instantly. Musicians and actors can put stuff on Youtube. A business can put itself online in as small an iteration as possible, without taking months of blind development.
For some work, it will take a bit more creativity. But use this idea of work-ing in public, getting instant feedback, and evolving through constant itera-tions to improve better and faster than ever before.
I admit it can be scary. This is why you can start with a small group, less pub-lic but still using the same ideas, and grow the audience as you grow more confident.
Be a street performer. There’s no bet-ter way to get amazing at something. a
Be a street performer. There’s no better way to get amazing at something.
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Break Through the Cycle of Fear and HelplessnessMost of the time, we’re productive people; we use our time and get our work done efficiently, even throw in some exercise to boot. But what about the days we procrastinate so much we wear ourselves out? Where panic sets in just thinking about our to–do list? I’ve never had that happen to me but for those of you who have, the Fear–Helplessness–Fear (or FHF) cycle is useful to understand.
By Ishita Gupta
A ll cycles aren’t vicious, but FHF is. Fear feeds off of the helpless-ness that comes from not know-
ing where to begin. There’s nothing worse than coming back to a task still panicked and overwhelmed, but fear loves this. Its best weapon is that heavy feeling that makes you walk away again.
Instead of reeling in the cycle, we have to access a different one – the Get Stuff Done (or GSD) cycle, which is ac-tive and forward moving. FHF’s only goal is to stop you from doing the good work inside you. GSD’s goal is to bring out that work by being ruthless and
breaking our pattern of fleeing when the going gets tough.
Since helplessness is the worse feeling in the world, mix and match the below to become the productivi-ty alchemist that you are. I use these tools to combat fear and the paraly-sis that follows with a mixture that works for me.
Make action stepsBreak down the information you’ve gath-ered and tasks in front of you into AC-TION steps (I write “ACTION” in all caps in front of my steps.) For every piece of information or task, there should be one, two or more corresponding ACTION steps. The more ACTION steps, the bet-ter. Creating ACTION steps is so neces-
sary for me that if I don’t use them, I be-come overwhelmed by everything I have to do and shutdown, opting for ten hours in my bed. I also end up doing unneces-sary research, whereas with ACTION
Break down the information you’ve gathered and tasks in front of you into ACTION steps
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ishing. I find that deadlines improve the quality of my work actually because I get clear and focused.
Get the “GSD” mindsetThis is when you’re not focused on how many hours you’ve spent on a task or how much is still left to do. All you’re thinking about is, “I’m going to finish this no matter if someone comes and craps on my head”. There is no thought in your brain except finishing the task in front of you and finishing it as fast as possible. It doesn’t matter if there are a thousand laptops with Facebook open, you can’t be tempted because you are ruthless in your pursuit of getting the task done. I have conquered insane to–do lists be-cause I was able to switch into this men-tal mode and was so surprised it worked for me. But it did and beautifully so.
Focus on your productivityThe only way to learn about how you operate best is to focus on (surprise) how you operate. What works for you won’t work for someone else, so notice how you flourish. Notice when you work best, when you get tired, with whom you work well and with whom you do not work well, and what inspires you or brings you down. Use this as a driver to be your most productive.
Personally, I work best from early in the morning till 3pm and after that I get restless. If I get a second wind or am in GSD mode, I’ll continue. Otherwise, I won’t. I carve out my working hours like a military officer and don’t answer
Ishita Gupta navigates
the divide between
traditional and digital
publishing. As Head of
Hoopla and Media at
The Domino Project
(by Amazon), she launched 6 bestselling books.
She founded and runs Fear.less magazine, lives
in New York City, and her eyes disappear when
she smiles.
! Ishita Gupta
! Links: Ishita on Twitter | Ishita’s site
steps, my research is guided by exactly what I need to know, not everything. Don’t find yourself in that place I’ve of-ten been as I’ve tried to surmount a huge task without ACTION steps: confused, wanting to quit, skipping steps, and hat-ing life in the process.
Here’s an example: “Create ishitagup-ta.com” becomes:! ACTION: Email web guy what it takes
to move ishitagupta.com to another theme
! ACTION: Write what I want the naviga-tion bar to look like for ishitagupta.com
! ACTION: 20–minute research on what other sites look like to see what’s out there.
Chunk it down, create action steps, and see how you start to move.
Set a DeadlineThis is a tip so many productivity gurus talk about and that’s because it works. I give myself very short deadlines for tasks I’ve been putting off – the longer I procrastinate the task, the shorter my deadline is to finish it. Deadlines allow me to plow through my censor and fo-cus on getting the task done, even if the quality suffers a little. And even if the quality suffers a little – so what? Either outsource the task, take it off your list, or give it a deadline with the goal of fin-
I have conquered insane to–do lists because I was able to switch into this mental mode and was so surprised it worked for me.
phones, try not to get distracted (I often fail) and try to honor those hours.
Break the patternIt’s that important that I’m making it the final step. Breaking out of the “I’m scared, I feel helpless, let’s eat ice–cream” pat-tern is so important because if each time you have the same knee–jerk response, you’re conditioning yourself to repeat the same patterns of behavior. Start small and each time you encounter this feel-ing, remind yourself that you’ll work through it and try out one of the tools above. We can change our grey matter and each time you react differently, con-fronting the uneasiness instead of run-ning away, you win; you’re breaking the pattern each time you encounter it.
You don’t need to remain stuck in FHF if you don’t want to. It just takes some awareness, a dose of ruthlessness, and some courage to break free. All of which you have in droves. a
Personally, I work best from early in the morning till 3pm and after that I get restless.
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10 ways to beat your internal resistance
Seth Godin’s excellent book “Linchpin” talks about our need to “ship”. “Shipping” – the art of completing and
moving on rather than striving for perfection and procrastinating – can be hard.
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2. Just do the next actionDavid Allen’s great question in “Getting Things Done” is “what’s the next ac-tion?”. It produces momentum because it overcomes the fear that a project will be large, complicated, difficult or bor-ing. I run my own business and occa-sionally need to spend time on the fi-nances (which I hate for all the above reasons). Telling myself I’m only spend-ing five minutes on something allows me to start. Momentum builds and things get easier.
3. Create space and enjoy the silenceIf your resistance’s voice is screaming loudly in your mind telling you not to do those difficult, daring or high–impact pieces of work, you’re going to find ways to block out all that noise with other noise. There are so many potential dis-tractions available to us to take our minds away from the task and our ears away from the resistance’s voice. Cre-ating the space to focus your mind on what those fears are, is scary because it means we have to go into battle with
Setting deadlines for ourselves doesn’t work. We don’t mind letting ourselves down because there’s no pain involved in that.
By Graham Allcott
M ost of us at one time or anoth-er struggle to “ship” things be-cause we’re scared about the
consequences and without even know-ing it, we’re battling our Lizard brains – the part of the brain that looks after sur-vival, fitting in and not taking risks.
Seth quotes from one of my favou-rite books on this topic, Steven Press-field’s “The War of Art”, which defines the creation of art as a war with our own “resistance”. I personally don’t think any of us can conquer our internal resis-tance completely. Instead, we can lis-ten to it, confront it, and occasionally even tame it. But importantly, in our quest to be productive, we must never allow our lizard brain’s resistance to stop us from “shipping”.
Here are 10 ways to beat the resis-tance, battle by battle:
1. Create a deadline in someone else’s worldWe all know deadlines are great for fo-cusing the mind and replacing our num-ber one fear (“looking foolish”) with a new number one fear (“letting some-one down by missing the deadline”). In-deed, I’m on a deadline with Michael to finish this right now, and believe me it’s my favourite way of getting my fingers to make that tappity–tappity sound that magically produces writing! However, setting deadlines for ourselves doesn’t work. We don’t mind letting ourselves down because there’s no pain involved in that. So tell a colleague, a client or someone else that you don’t want to look bad in front of. Now it’s easier to ignore the resistance’s fear about producing bad work because you have a commit-ment to keep, and you’ll ship.
the resistance. But that’s what we need to do. Get to your desk when it’s quiet, an hour before your team arrives. Turn off your email. Take a walk. Eliminate dis-tractions so that you can confront the resistance and then work out how to beat it.
4. Get a coach or mentorOften the resistance starts to win be-cause you’re not aware that it’s win-ning. Talking through a difficult project or issue with a coach or mentor allows you to externalise negative thought pat-terns. A good coach will help you to ex-plore whether the consequences of “shipping” really would be as bad as the resistance would have you believe. You start to see that you’re in control. You connect positive ideas together. Magic happens.
5. Smile!If you’re about to make a phone call that you’re dreading or about to walk into a terrifying meeting, take a deep breath and smile. Use your body positively to send positive signals and reduce the fear. Walking tall really helps.
6. Change the paradigm from “what if it goes wrong?” to “what if it doesn’t?”Our fear often points us towards imag-ining our failures in such a way that we fail to realise that the consequences of our actions could be unbridled and wonderful success! On the other hand, if we imagine every task as potentially the thing that our ultimate success de-pends on, it becomes overwhelming! So pick yourself out of the negative thinking and imagine a world where your next action doesn’t make you a millionaire, but certainly doesn’t bankrupt you either! It’ll all be fine. Now go ship.
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7. Recognise and ReviewThe only way to realise you’re resist-ing doing something is to have a pret-ty good handle on everything you’re not doing. Keeping good project and next actions lists will, I’m sure, be sec-ond nature to you if you’re reading Productive! Magazine, but make sure you are conducting a thorough week-ly review of your projects and actions. In knowledge work, we don’t just do our work, we also define what that work is. We’re simultaneously both a boss and a worker. Make your week-ly review the time you set aside for your boss–self and your worker–self to meet and talk: your very own per-sonal supervision meeting. A good su-pervisor or boss is someone that coaches you through problems and inspires you to succeed. Your weekly review is your own opportunity to give yourself that gift.
a day, for an hour, work only on those things that you resist the most. Define these things as the ones that have sat on your lists incomplete for the lon-gest time or have the largest potential pay–off. Like Aristotle once said, “Ex-cellence is not an act, but a habit”. What we do consistently, often in small steps, is what will ultimately define us. What the “power hour” idea allows you to do, of course, is NOT confront the resistance for the other six hours of your working day. But you’ll find if you start the day with a “power hour” and experience how liberating it is to win a battle with the resistance way before lunchtime, you’ll start the day feeling like anything is possible. And guess what? When you feel like that, anything is possible.
Like I said at the beginning, I don’t think you can win the war against your resistance completely. I also don’t think lifehacks or shortcuts will help too much here either; it’s about using different tactics for each battle, being aware of where your resistance comes from and finding the ways to “ship” things any-way. Good luck! a
If you’re feeling stuck at your desk, grab your laptop and head to a coffee shop or sit somewhere with a nicer view.
Once a day, for an hour, work only on those things that you resist the most.
Graham specializes in
personal organiza-
tional systems, strat-
egies to deal with the
information overload
and “action manage-
ment”. A naturally “too strategic to be orga-
nized” person who has trained himself to be
productive throughout the development of per-
sonal work–flow systems and developing the
power of good habits.
! Graham Allcott
! Links: Graham on Twitter | Graham’s Think Productive!
8. Change the viewSometimes things are just stuck. Try looking at the same thing in a different way. If you’re staring at your inbox, try printing the page out and attack it with a pen and paper. If you’re stuck on a problem, why not open up a Word doc-ument or draw a mind–map. Similarly, if you’re feeling stuck at your desk, gr-ab your laptop and head to a coffee shop or sit somewhere with a nicer view. A dif-ferent perspective on the same issue is sometimes all you need to get unstuck.
9. Develop playful, productive momentumIt’s a phrase we find ourselves using a lot on our Think Productive workshops. If you think about defining the opposite of stress, it’s “playful productive momen-tum”. Indeed, in Linchpin, when Seth talks about our “inner artist” he talks passion-ately about the fact that we’re all born as curious artists and it’s only as we transi-tion to become adults that our creativity and playfulness is knocked out of us by schools, careers and conveyor belts. So give yourself permission to play, think positively and ignore the consequences. If a child draws a bad picture, they rip it up and start again. Don’t consider that a failure, just consider it an experiment or some useful practice time.
10. Make an appointment for the war and put it in your diaryI’ve been experimenting for a while with the idea of “power hours”: once
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The 8 Habits of Highly Productive People (Part 1)What makes a productive person? Is it the ability to robotically churn out work, hour after hour? Is it the amount of discipline one has? Is it the speed at which one works?
From the Editor: This is a great article by Celestine and because it’s a long and fan-tastic piece of advice we decided to split it into two parts – the first part is here and the second one will be published in the next (#11) issue of the Productive! Magazine.
By Celestine Chua
B efore we can discuss what makes a productive person, we should first define what produc-
tivity is. The common notion of produc-tivity is the ability to churn out a lot of work in a short span of time. True, but not complete. In my opinion true pro-ductivity is the ability to create a lot of high impact work in a short span of time. This is the kind of productivity we should concern ourselves with, not oth-er kinds of productivity which are more empty/busy work that create no impact in the long term.
For example, let’s say Peter types very fast and can reply to 1000 emails a day. That doesn’t make him/her productive, because there’s little output (product) to speak of (unless the emails contribute to tangible, high impact outcomes). However, if John completes just one task in a day that has more impact than the 1000 emails put together, then he’s more productive than Peter is.
I think productivity is really how you manage yourself, and the habits you practice. By selectively practicing cer-tain habits over others, you can get a lot more output for your time. Here, I’ll share with you my top 8 habits in productivi-ty. Practice them and compare how your productivity changes afterward :D.
Habit 1: Ruthlessly cut away the unimportant (and focus on the important)The first thing is to slice and dice every-thing that’s unimportant. Whenever I go to my work desk, I write down a list of things to do for the day. I then evaluate which are the most important things out of the list, first circling them, then rank-ing the items. After which I’ll challenge these items to see if they’re the best use
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of my time. What impact does doing these make? Can I be doing more high value tasks? Doing so helps me ensure I’m working on the absolute most im-portant things for the day. Then, for the non–important ones, I either push them to a later date or find a way to take them off the list. (Learning how to say no to others is very important here.)
It’s my favorite daily self–management tool. For everything you’re doing now, ask yourself, how important is this? Does this bring you dramatically closer to your dreams? Does this create any real im-pact in your life in the long–term? Is it the absolute best way to spend your time or can you be doing more high val-ue tasks? If not, perhaps it’s time to ditch it. No point doing something unimport-ant! Say you’re handling a project that makes no difference to your business after it’s completed. It wouldn’t matter whether you take 1 hour, 3 hours, 1 week. or never – to do it! It would still make no difference!
Going by the questions I raised above, my most important tasks are the ones that bring me closest to my dreams when I do them. For example, working on my blog allows me to reach out to more people out there, which lets me achieve my end vision of enabling oth-ers to achieve their highest potential and live their best life. While other tasks help me progress in my goals too, they’re not as effective as working on my blog.
It doesn’t end with correctly identify-ing the high value tasks. Often times, we’ll be imbued with a stream of ran-dom, miscellaneous requests through-out the day. I used to give immediate at-tention to these things. Say random request #1 comes in and I’ll do it imme-diately since it takes just 5–10 minutes, max. This is the same for random re-quest #2, #3... all the way to #20. After a while, I realized these things take a lot of my time and I don’t even get any
meaningful result out of them. Not only that, I never finish my high value tasks. I may think I’m being very productive when I finish the random things, but truth is it’s just fake productivity.
So nowadays, I use a separate “will–do” list for these urgent tasks. I dump all the incoming tasks here and work on my 20% tasks. At the end of the day, I allo-cate a time slot to clear these tasks. I batch the similar urgent tasks, then clear them at one go. Turns out I’m always able to get them cleared in an hour or less, compared to the few hours I’d have tak-en if I attended to them in the day.
Habit 2: Allocate breaks strategicallyI don’t think being productive requires you to work non–stop like a robot. On the contrary, it’s when you try to do that that you become less productive. While the number of hours spent on work in-creases and the amount of work accom-plished seems marginally higher, the work done per unit of time is lower than your average. Not only that, the work done per extra unit of time actually de-creases.
If you think the above sounds confus-ing, not to worry! Here’s a simple exam-ple to illustrate my point. Say you want to write a book. You can usually type 1,000 words in an hour working on your book. This goes well for the first 2 hours,
and you clock 1,000 words per hour. However, at the third hour, you feel tired, and you type 500 words in the 3rd hour instead. That’s 500 words less than your usual output! This is known as the Law of Diminishing Returns in economics.
Rest is important. No matter how much you want to work, there are areas of your life that it can’t fulfill: Such as love, fam-ily, and health. That’s why our life wheel is made up of different segments, versus just one big segment. Each segment is distinct and unreplaceable by others. By “rest”, I’m referring to any segment of your life that’s outside of Business/Ca-reer/Studies. Taking time off charges your batteries so you can sprint forward when you return to it.
Earlier this year, I did an experiment. I went for a period where I continuous-ly worked without stopping (save for necessary breaks like sleeping, eating, etc). I also went for a separate period where I would work, then space in break times in between work, such as catch-ing up on emails, exercising, walking around the house, reading books, going for a walk, catching up with friends, a short nap, and so on. What I found was this: Output decreases over time when there are no breaks (despite reach-ing the point of diminishing returns).
What this means is when I work non–stop without any breaks, my produc-tivity keeps slipping until it’s near zero. However, when I take breaks, they help me start on a high note when I get back. Even though there are “down–times” away during the breaks, the high out-put more than makes up for that. Hence, by strategically placing my break times, I’m able to maximize my output. Rest, hence, does not prevent me from getting more done – it enables me to get more done. More time spent on work does not necessarily lead to more work done, but applying the above strategy AND combining it with in-
The first thing is to slice and dice everything that’s unimportant.
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creased time spent on work will maxi-mize your output.
If you’re self–employed or on a flex-ible work schedule, you can put this in-to practice easily. Even if you’re in a 9–5 job, you can still do it all the time. Whenever you feel unproductive, throw in a quick break. Walk away from the desk, get a drink from the pantry, go for a toilet break, talk to a colleague about work. You’ll be more perked up when you return.
Habit 3: Remove productivity pit–stops (i.e. distractions)Productivity pit–stops are things that limit your productivity. They can be the music you listen to when you work, your slow computer, unwanted phone calls, alerts from your inbox on incom-ing mail, the Internet, YouTube, Face-book, Twitter, etcetera. These things trap you and prevent you from getting things done.
What should you do then? Well, re-move these pit–stops! Or go to a place where they are no longer an issue. For example, a big productivity pit–stop for me is the Internet. When I write my ar-ticles while online, I have the tendency to click to other sites. I’d check my email, after which I become distracted by the new emails. The emails would lead to follow–up work and replies, which takes time. By the time I’m done, a good 15–20 minutes has passed. Then with-in minutes of working, the same cycle repeats. So instead, when I’m writing, I unplug the LAN cable from my laptop and move my laptop to my bed (which is what I’m doing now as I’m writing this article). It’s a lot faster!
Go about your daily routine and ob-serve when your output slows down. What’s distracting you? How can you remove it? Experiment and try working in different places. Adjust your environ-ment. Make tweaks here and there. The more productivity pit–stops you find and remove, the more productive you’ll be.
Habit 4: Tap into your inspirationI can’t stress how important this is to maximizing your output. No matter what field you’re in, your inspiration is the key to your output. For example, an inspired programmer creates programs that change people’s lives for the better. An inspired structural engineer designs ef-fective building structures. An inspired marketer creates breakthrough market-ing plans that touches people’s hearts. An inspired writer writes continuously. A highly inspired musician writes one song after another.
I fully grasped the impact of inspira-tion when I started my business and was in charge of my full schedule. I realized during the times when I’m inspired, work is simply effortless. Take writing as an example. The words will flow and I don’t even need to process them. They get transferred as thoughts in my mind straight to the keyboard. On the other hand, when I’m uninspired, nothing comes out. It’s like when opening a tap and there’s no water, save for 1–2 drops.
What do you do then? Do you just idle, waiting for inspiration to strike before you do any work? That’s allocating your control to your external world, which re-ally isn’t what this article is about. I of-ten hear people say they’re not planning to write because they’re not inspired.
I think it’s not about waiting for inspira-tion to strike but about learning to chan-nel into your inspiration.
How do you do that? It’s simple. Think about what inspires you in life. Is it help-ing others grow? Connecting with peo-ple? Being recognized for your work? Working with those in poverty? Helping the unfortunate? Being #1 in your field? How can you achieve these things? Find out your motivators, then use them to drive you. My biggest inspiration is to see others achieving their highest po-tential and living their best lives. If there is ever anything blocking them, I’ll feel all ready to rip it away. I use this as the main driver for everything I create. When I’m writing a blog entry, I’ll start by think-ing about an area people are facing blockages, then I channel into that en-ergy. 30DLBL was created because I no-ticed while many people pursue self–help, not many know how to translate what they read into practice. I got in-spired to create a personal development program which would encapsulate my best strategies on how to live our best life. This program would consist of a se-ries of tasks, at a manageable pace of one task a day, which would both trig-ger immediate action and create tangi-ble results. a
Habits 5, 6, 7 and 8 will be coming in Productive! Magazine issue #11 :–)
Founder of Personal
Excellence – one of
the world’s top com-
munities for people
pass iona te about
achieving excellence
in life. This is her passion and her life. Born in
Singapore, she’s now traveling the world and
meeting up with readers.
! Celestine Chua
My most important tasks are the ones that bring me closest to my dreams when I do them.
! Links: Celestine on Twitter | Personal Excellence
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How Steve Jobs got his last year doneSteve Jobs, a person I never got to know personally but who’s been my mentor, inspiration, and product guru, died earlier this month at the age of 56. So early, so young…
became a mentor to the whole compa-ny while letting them run about their business. He showed to everyone (and proved to himself) that Apple could be run without him.
Step 2. The iPad 2He took the stage to show off the sec-ond iPad while nailing to the ground all the would–be competitors. He did it per-sonally to make a statement that “peo-ple don’t really want tablets – they want iPads”.
Step 3. The most–valuable companyThough Steve didn’t “plan” it, Apple be-came recognized as the most valuable company in the world thanks to all he’s done in the past years. Perfect to com-memorate his last year alive.
Step 4. WWDC and the iCloud that “just works”Despite being really sick, he took the stage to show off his latest invention – the iCloud. If you look at the keynote
By Michael Sliwinski
M r. Jobs was known for planning everything carefully. Aware of the fact that the cancer was
winning, he even seemed to have planned his death, timing it perfectly. I think it takes great courage to plan a departure like Steve.
Steve’s Last Year at AppleHe struggled with cancer since 2003, but had won every battle... until now.
With each win came the introduction of yet another ground–breaking innovation. This time he knew it was over and he planned his last year at Apple in an amazing way:
Step 1. Medical LeaveIn January he took a medical leave to let Tim Cook run the company and Steve
He even seemed to have planned his death, timing it perfectly...
© pressureUA / Shutterstock
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Michael Sliwinski is
your chief editor of the
Productive! Magazine
and a host of the
magazine’s Produc-
tive! Show. Every day
he’s trying to help people get more done with
his web application Nozbe – now also avail-
able as a native Android, iPhone and iPad app,
as well as a desktop PC and Mac app (beta).
! Michael Sliwinski
! Links: Michael on Twitter | Productive! Magazine
Nozbe – Simply Get It Done! | Michael Sliwinski’s Blog
carefully, when first says hi, he looks re-ally sick. However, when he comes back on stage for the second time, he’s a dif-ferent person. He’s so excited about the iCloud that he almost jumps off the stage. You can see he’s a product guy and he’s totally in love with this new thing that will change the way we work…yet again. He repeats several times how the iCloud “just works” – as this is what Steve was all about. About technology that “just works”.
Step 5. The Apple Mothership in CupertinoJust after the Apple event, with the same eagerness and spirit, Steve Jobs ap-peared in front of the Cupertino City Council to show them the project he’s been working on lately – The new Apple Headquarters in Cupertino that will be nothing like any other office building in the world. You could see he was excit-ed and needed to present this one per-sonally.
Like many great artist and masters, Steve knew he wouldn’t be able to see it built. He knew he was not destined to work there, but wanted to pass on his dream to a younger generation of Apple employees and enthusiasts. It re-minds me of Antonio Gaudi designing the “Sagrada Familia” – a work of art greater than himself – Gaudi knew it’d take 130 years to build it. He didn’t care. He went on with it knowing he would never see the completion of the project. Ever. Steve was a grand artist the same way.
Step 6. Resignation as the CEOAt his deathbed he finally decided to re-sign from the role of CEO while he was still alive. He wanted to make sure the shock at Apple wouldn’t be too over-whelming. He wanted to see and wit-ness the official transition. Some say he was at Apple on the day he resigned to
make sure personally that everything went according to the plan. I’m sure it’s true. It’s Steve, and we’re talking about a dying man here.
The additional benefit of resigning was being able to witness how people react-ed to it. He received so many letters of praise, articles in press and so much at-tention and he still could enjoy it while spending his last days on earth. I’m sure he enjoyed it, and hope it sweetened the imminent d–day at least a little.
Step 7. Apple iPhone eventThe first event after his medical leave that he didn’t attend. It was Tim Cook’s show with other executives participat-ing and helping out. Steve could relax, knowing his spirit and soul lives on at Apple, trusting these guys could pull off a great show and assure everyone that Apple will do just fine. Again, I’m sure he enjoyed watching it happen. His disciples were doing a great job. Now the Jedi master himself could fi-nally move on.
Final Step: DeathOnly two days after the event Steve passed away. His job was done. Apple was in good hands. His soul and spirit will live on. The death seems to be per-fectly timed with everything that hap-pened this past year. He will be missed. While I believe in the Afterlife, I don’t know what Steve believed, but I’m sure he achieved his Nirvana.
One more thing: Steve’s BiographyEven after his death, Steve didn’t dis-appoint. He was known for adding “one more thing” before closing a speech at Apple events, and it was a moment ev-eryone would be waiting for. This time was no different. His first official and au-thorized biography hit the shelves this October – one month after his death. I’m definitely getting a copy. I’ve read all of Steve’s other biographies and can’t wait to read this one and pay tribute to Steve.
Steve was a real perfectionistHe proved again that even his death can be planned perfectly and he knew how to execute this plan. I can’t even imag-ine how much courage it takes to come to terms with imminent death and plan your last year alive. Yet he’s done it and proved again there’s no one like him.
Steve, God bless, may your soul rest in peace. I know it will. a
“Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart”. — Steve Jobs, Stanford Commencement Speech
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One of the factors that sets human beings apart from the rest of Creation –that has, in fact, helped make us the dominant species on this planet – is our ability to communicate in great detail, with a minimum of confusion and unproductive “noise”. That said, it’s amazing how easy it is to fail to communicate properly.
Your Wording is a Critical Productivity Tool
the wrong way, or simply use too many words. Beating around the bush, couch-ing your message in obscure terms, or burying it in a mass of unnecessary verbiage may cause mental static in the people you’re trying to communicate with, resulting in confusion and irritation. At best, this will slow them down; at worst, they may ignore you altogeth-er. Either outcome will damage produc-tivity, both yours and theirs.
Therefore, whether you’re communi-cating with employees or superiors, you have to make every effort to get your point across with a minimum of noise. It’s crucial to choose your words with great care, so that you can say precise-ly what you mean as directly as you can without being curt or offensive. Let’s look at several ways to accomplish that.
Get Straight to the PointHave you ever tried to discuss some-thing with someone who rambled, re-fused to be pinned down, or liked to dance around the subject? If you have, then you know how annoying it can be – and how non–productive. Maybe the speaker was afraid you’d be angry or upset if he came right out and said what he had to say; maybe he simply want-ed attention; or maybe he just liked to listen to himself speak.
By Laura Stack
T he annals of history are replete with episodes of poor commu-nication (or a complete lack
thereof) that led to widespread misery and pain. On a lesser scale, individu-
als and businesses have to deal with miscommunication issues every single day; and in the workplace, such issues can have a severe impact not just on individual productivity, but on the over-all bottom line.
Even when the lines of communica-tion are wide open, you can fail to com-municate if you use the wrong words in
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Avoid Unnecessary Qualifiers and HedgingSome people just can’t seem to deliver any message, especially a request, firm-ly and directly. They hem in everything they say with so many qualifiers – “what if’s”, “maybe’s” and “could be’s” – that ultimately, what they’re trying to say gets lost, causing the recipients to waste time on interpretation and clarification.
In other cases, the bad communicator hedges the message with terms that make it seem less important than it might actu-ally be. Instead of simply telling the IT De-partment that they need a certain back-up file right away, for example, they might say something like, “Um, if you have a chance, could you pull this file for me? No hurry”. This gives the recipient the op-portunity to ignore the request or push it down the priority scale if they want, no matter that it’s urgent to the sender... be-cause that hasn’t been made clear.
Some people hedge and qualify out of habit, often because they simply don’t want to commit themselves to a specif-ic point or course of action. Some qual-ification is unavoidable, especially when the information you’re imparting is based upon the actions of people you have no control over, or the situation is simply un-certain. But again, you can avoid the worst of the problem by delivering your communications assertively and as sim-ply as possible, without unnecessary frills. Avoiding uncertainty or hesitation. Use the active tense rather than passive: say things like, “I need this file...” rather than “This file is needed...”, because it sounds more direct and imperative.
The reason why doesn’t matter. It doesn’t even matter if the person was amusing or instructive to listen to, as some ramblers are. What matters is that they wasted your time, and theirs, by not getting straight to the point. You don’t want to do this to other people, so your communications, especially your written ones, should be brief and concise.
Some people avoid terseness because they don’t want to seem rude; and ad-mittedly, verbal interaction is often nec-essary, or at least useful, in the work-place as a form of social lubrication. There’s no doubt that politeness pays, and that you should do your best to stay in your co–workers’ good grac-es by being genuinely nice. Nonetheless,
in most workplace situations there’s no excuse not to get right to the point. You can smile when you do it; this should take the edge off for those who are eas-ily offended.
If being straightforward is a problem for you, practice what you want to say in advance. Take a results–oriented stance, envisioning exactly what you’re trying to achieve. Then edit your mes-sage toward that end (mentally in the case of verbal communication, literally in the case of written words) to make it plain and specific. Tweak your message as necessary to avoid sounding brusque, then deliver it assertively, as simply as possible.
In most workplace situations there’s no excuse not to get right to the point
Some people hedge and qualify out of habit, often because they simply don’t want to commit themselves to a specific point or course of action.
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Make Your Requests and Requirements PlainThe bottom line with workplace com-munication is that it must be as simple and unambiguous as humanly possible...and there’s the problem. It’s easy to ad-vise someone to say only what needs to be said, but it’s not always obvious how much that needs to be.
It’s possible to be too terse in an at-tempt to be clear and direct. If you tell someone, “I need information on the Jones account”, that’s direct, all right; but you’re being too vague, because you haven’t asked for enough. Which Jones account do you mean? Furthermore, what information do you need? Every-thing in the whole file, or just this year’s financials? And when do you need it – within the next hour or sometime in the next week?
It’s also important to use the right words to get the point across. If what you’re trying to say doesn’t seem quite on the mark, then spend some time re-fining it, because that’s likely to pay off in dividends of greater comprehension. As Mark Twain once pointed out, “The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and lightning–bug”.
In general, your language should be simple and easy to understand. Don’t address someone like they’re a third–grader, but on the other hand, don’t use fancy words just because you can – and avoid overusing jargon when it’s unnec-essary. Before you refer to something by an acronym or an abbreviation, be sure that it’s a shared term.
Acknowledgement in All DirectionsIn the military, someone who receives a verbal order is often required to repeat it back immediately to acknowledge that they received it. This is especially true in the Navy. It’s standard operating pro-cedure for a simple reason: if a message
is poorly relayed and the wrong action taken, the results can be disastrous.
Your personal miscommunications may not have devastating results, but they can certainly damage productivity. Therefore, acknowledgement of those communica-tions is absolutely essential. When you receive a message from someone, wheth-er they’re above or below you in the chain of command, acknowledge it as quickly as possible. (For superiors, I would rec-ommend that you do so immediately).
Similarly, request an acknowledgement from anyone you send a message to; and if they don’t respond, be proactive about acquiring that acknowledgement. No need to be impolite, just assertive and persistent. Send them a nudge by email or pick up the phone and say, “Hey, I sent you a message about such–and–such yesterday. Did you get it?”. It’s possible they didn’t. Maybe it passed under their radar somehow, or the technology you sent it by just happened to fail you in this instance. This happens occasionally, as all of us can attest.
You can’t let anyone use the claim that they didn’t get a message as an excuse for not getting something done. Get an acknowledgement – not just so you can cover yourself later, but so you can
Laura Stack is a per-
sonal productivity ex-
pert, author, and pro-
fessional speaker
(now president of the
National Speakers As-
sociation). She’s the president of The Produc-
tivity Pro®, Inc.
! Laura Stack
! Links: Laura on Twitter | Laura’s Web Site: The Productivity Pro
make sure that they understand what you need and require, and so that you know that they comprehend the urgency of your request.
The Final WordWhen you communicate directly with anyone in the workplace, your phrasing and delivery must be as clear as possi-ble in order to maximize productivity. Be assertive, plain, and straightforward. Never hem and haw. Don’t use a ten–dollar word when a nickel word will do and avoid jargon when you can. Finally, immediately acknowledge any commu-nications you receive, and strongly en-courage acknowledgement from those you communicate with; require such ac-knowledgement if possible. Make it clear that others can ask questions in order to clarify your wants and needs, and be willing to ask such questions yourself.
While there will always be some poten-tial for confusion in human interaction (we are only human, after all), solid, clear communication at all levels will ensure that such confusion is minimized. If you follow these simple rules, not only will people not have to waste time (and therefore productivity) trying to figure out what you’re trying to say, they’re less like-ly to mistake what you’re trying to say. Mistakes waste time, and time really is money – so it’s crucial to avoid as many miscommunications as possible. a
Request an acknowledgement from anyone you send a message to; and if they don’t respond, be proactive about acquiring that acknowledgement.
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Seth Godin, Fitness and Calling from the Car
Seth Godin on being a LinchpinFor this month’s issue of the mag-
azine I interviewed Seth Godin.
You have read this interview at the
beginning of this issue but I also
encourage you to watch excerpts
from my video conversation with
him – his messages sound a lot
better when told by Seth himself.
Calling people when stuck in traffic jamsImportant – when you do call some-
one on the phone while driving,
make sure to dial the number when
standing still and use a headset and
mic when talking. It can be danger-
ous... but also very productive when
there is really lots of traffic.
By Michael Sliwinski
Fitness for the busy people
We are all busy but our fitness is
critical to our health, performance
and yes, productivity! That’s why I’m
trying to demonstrate to you my fit-
ness routine in this short video.
The best part is, you can do it in
a hotel room when traveling, too!
As always, here are the three new (and very short) Productive! Show videos to help, inspire, and motivate you to get even more done.
Productive! Show Videos
! Links: Hope you enjoyed these short productivity videos. Click here to browse all episode archive.
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A minimalist in NYCI’ve only been in New York City for about four days, but I can easily see how it would be tough to even consider minimalism here.
By Leo Babauta
E veryone is incredibly busy and rushed, fashion and shopping take center stage like almost nowhere
else, traffic and noise reach beautiful crescendos.
Can you be a minimalist in NYC?You can be a minimalist anywhere. All you need to do is reject consumer-ism, and learn to be content with little.
New York City seems to force people to have small apartments anyway, but many seem to try to cram years of shop-ping into the apartment. Instead, allow
the constraint of space become a pos-itive thing: have only the essentials, and empty these small spaces of clutter. Learn to make the most of a small space.
Shopping here is an art. But there are other arts to be pursued: the public li-brary here is one of the most amazing tributes to learning I’ve ever seen, for example. The art of reading can be practically free. The art of listening, of being still, of being present with a friend, of walking aimlessly… these are all free.
Fashion seems at the forefront of the minds of many, but that’s all in the mind. I’ve walked around in second–hand jeans and simple T–shirts all day, and no one seems to care. Reject the conformist val-ues, and force people to judge you on
your talent, your voice, and your contri-butions, instead of your clothes.
You can be a minimalist anywhere, be-cause it is a mindset. We are influenced by our environment, but we also create our environment, and we always have a choice. You can slow down, be con-tent with little, and value doing and be-ing over buying. a
Leo Babauta lives in
San Francisco and is
married with six kids.
He’s a wri ter and
a runner and a vege-
tarian and he loves
writing blogs: “Zen Habits” and “Minimalism”.
He’s a published author of a bestselling book
“Power of Less”.
! Leo Babauta
! Links: Leo on Twitter | Leo’s Blog: Zen Habits | Leo’s Blog: Minimalist
All you need to do is reject consumerism, and learn to be content with little. Just value doing and being over buying.
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