Cheap Productivity Thrills

When Sia sang “I love cheap thrills” she probably wasn’t referring to the perverse satisfaction of maximising every moment of her day. Yet many of us (the author included) are undeniably addicted to working our way through hefty “to do” lists and finding ways to maximise our time.

We live in an always-on, get-things-done culture where “doing” invariably feels like “winning”. Many of us confuse the two and end up chasing cheap productivity thrills in place of meaningful gains. Perhaps without even realising we’re doing it.

With that in mind, this article will not be a remix of greatest hits such as “I’ve freed myself from the clutches of our productivity-obsessed society and so can you”. Any ambitious person risks getting sucked back into the productivity vortex at any time. 

Rather, it’s an exploration of the myths we tell ourselves to keep us focused on getting it all done, and how we might rewire our brains to come up for a breath of fresh air more often.

So if we don’t do more, we do less, right?

Remember the first time someone told you “less is more”? I was a child and someone presented me with a “fun size” chocolate bar. Less is NOT more. More is definitely more, and fun size chocolate bars are just small.

Logical? Then it follows that the only way to get more is to do, be, make, chase, have… more. Less and more are opposites, and when more has worked for you as a strategy in the past (do more work at school to achieve more, for example) it follows that the only way to more is more.

Moreover (pun intended), when your entire strategy for success (at school, in early life) was doing more, it’s a huge leap to rewrite those old stories. When to risk “doing less” and see if you still get the same result?

The stakes are forever higher: there’s always a successful project, a professional relationship or a promotion at risk. It’s never the right time to “do less” and see if it leads to more. Plus, no one’s ever told productivity lovers how to do “less is more”. What if we do less of the wrong bits and drop balls? It’s pretty daunting stuff.

If we are to dare to do less, we need to bust the “more” myths first.

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“Getting more done will reduce my stress”

Myth #1 is, at the surface, a perfectly logical argument. The less I have on my to do list, the less stressed I will be. Yet bestselling author of (yup, you guessed it) Do Less, Kate Northrup, explains that living in societies that praise achievement fuels an addiction to achieving goals we set for ourselves. And she cites this as a cause of stress, rather than a way to resolve stress.

When ticking off never-ending “to do” list items in an attempt to eliminate stress, we are creating stress as well. We feel a “rush” of productivity when we achieve something, but we’re wired to keep adding to the list just as quickly as we cross items off.

At its worst, it’s the human equivalent of a labrador chasing its tail for hours and heading for a nap after “such a busy day”. That’s why, when we’re beaten by the to-do-list, the sky does not fall in and the world keeps turning. The person whose Birthday card you forgot to buy forgets you forgot, the deadline you missed is postponed to a more reasonable date and the event you ducked out of will roll around again next month.

“The more I pack into a day, the more I get done”

Myth #2. The more you get done in a short space of time, the more you get done in a day, right? Wrong. The net gain is subtracted from somewhere else. When we engage in energy-sapping activities all morning, our bodies will try to buy back time in the evening.

Packing most in at the time that we’re most productive is a perfectly acceptable strategy, as long as we’re prepared to give time back later. The temptation comes when the “to-do list” isn’t done, and the evening rolls around. We forget how much we asked of ourselves in the morning. Can I squeeze a little more in?

You might say: that’s all very well, but I’ve seen people survive on minimal sleep for years. How do they do it?

This point was recently addressed on a podcast I listened to with Dr. Neha Sangwan on the topic of burnout. If your body doesn’t claim its sleep that evening, or that weekend, it will find other ways to “win”.

Dr Sangwan explained it like this: if you sleep-deprive your body and you don’t spend enough time in bed, your body will make itself sick, and send you back to … guess what? Bed.

As she uttered the words “the body will always win” I felt a bit defeated. As someone who needs a lot of sleep and would like more hours in the day, resistance suddenly felt futile. Doing more by doing more is no sustainable strategy if the body will buy back the time in other ways.

“Doing = getting done”

Myth #3. Our lengthy to-do lists are in direct correlation with the impact we have on the world, right? It’s unlikely that every item on our to-do lists is a high return on investment for us. Some of them, when reevaluated, may not truly matter.

This is where it gets a bit murky. How to jolt ourselves out of a mindset of “it all matters” and sift through tasks to find the treasure? Greg McKeown, author of Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (there’s that “less” word again…) offers a simple frame of reference when asking ourselves “will this help me towards my goal?”: “if it isn’t a clear yes, then it’s a no.”

How we deal with the “no” is up to us. We can Discard it, we can Delegate it or we can Do it anyway. If we feel ourselves gravitating towards the latter, we know we’re letting our productivity urges get the better of us.

We all have things that are important to us to accomplish each day. But sometimes they’re hidden under a mountain of other seemingly important “to do’s”. If like me, you’re often in pursuit of “more”, take a fresh look at your to do list and ask yourself “what will happen if I don’t do this today?”

Author’s note:

Some cultures embrace the hustle more than others. Recently, it’s been refreshing to spend time working in Auckland, where the pervasive hustle culture has been toned down a notch. There’s less pride in being seen to “do it all” in the same way as Singapore and other global cities.

Opening hours of shops and services force everyone to switch off for a few hours before bed, rather than inviting people to burn the candle at both ends. It’s easy to escape the city and enjoy a breath of fresh air.

As I sought to take as much of the mindset as possible back to Singapore, I realised that escaping the cult of more is not as easy as it looks on the surface, and it needs further exploration… thus, the inspiration for this article emerged!

What’s your take?