Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout

“It doesn’t matter that something you’ve done before worked out well. Your last piece is never going to write your next one for you.”

Rankin’s solution—his personal version of hiring David Hall—is to retreat to an isolated house on the northeast coast of Scotland, in the town of Cromarty, on the Black Isle. As he elaborates: When I go up north, I write in a room at the top of the house. If it’s cold, I’ll light the wood-burner. When the sun’s out, I often go for a walk and do my

Dedicating time or sacrificing money for a project are two obvious bets to push you toward higher-quality work. A natural third option is to leverage your social capital. If you announce your work in advance to people you know, you’ll have created expectations. If you fail to produce something notable, you’ll pay a social cost in terms of embarrass

Aristotle identified deep contemplation as the most human and worthy of all activities. The general lifestyle of the scientist, by this logic, had a worthiness of its own, independent of any specific accomplishments in the moment. Little value was to be gained in rushing, as the work itself provided reward. This mindset supported a Renaissance-styl

taming the impact of small details in your professional life opens up space to pursue bigger goals.

My recommendation here is simple: work on at most one project per day. To clarify, I don’t intend for this single daily project to be your only work for the day. You’ll likely also have meetings to attend, emails to answer, and administrative nonsense to subdue (we’ll talk more about these smaller tasks in the upcoming proposition about containing

Edith Wharton was also concerned about the intrusion of the small on her bigger pursuits. During the nine-year period when she lived at the Mount, her expansive estate in the Berkshires, Wharton insisted on a rigid routine to protect her writing from the distractions of her frequent visitors. From when she awoke until at least 11:00 a.m., she would

This first principle of slow productivity is not just about a more effective way to organize work, it also provides a response for those who feel like their work is corroding away all the other attributes of their existence.

From the context of slow productivity, investments of this type make a lot of sense. The more you can tame the small commitments pulling at your attention, the more sustainably and effectively you can work on things that matter.