The Now Habit: A Strategic Program for Overcoming Procrastination and Enjoying Guilt-Free Play

We’re made so uneasy by the experience of allowing reality to unfold at its own speed that when we’re faced with a problem, it feels better to race toward a resolution—any resolution, really, so long as we can tell ourselves we’re “dealing with” the situation, thereby maintaining the feeling of being in control. So we snap at our partners, rather t... See more

One critical aspect of the radical incrementalist approach, which runs counter to much mainstream advice on productivity, is thus to be willing to stop when your daily time is up, even when you’re bursting with energy and feel as though you could get much more done. If you’ve decided to work on a given project for fifty minutes, then once fifty min

... See more

The difference between seriousness and sincerity is not how involved you are in the activities of your life, but in how tightly you grip. In fact, I would go even further still: Gripping less tightly can unlock better performance and with much less effort, as I’ve written about before. Simple activities, like playing catch, floating in a pool, or b... See more

So, once you’ve got your categorized list of things to do, take your calendar and schedule those things into time slots, placing the hardest and most important items at the beginning of the day. And by “the beginning of the day,” I mean, if possible, before even checking your email. That will make it most likely that you’ll accomplish what you need

... See more