what I think about productivity has changed a lot in the past few years. I remember that, since childhood, I was obsessed with productivity. this curiosity started when I came across Ali Abdaal’s videos. I used to be very excited to follow the protocols and practices he mentioned in his videos.
I adopted a mindset that productivity is doing more and more things in a shorter amount of time. this made me optimize everything throughout the day, and I ensured that no time was spent not doing anything. I developed a belief that not doing anything equals wasting your time. there was a feeling of satisfaction at the end of the day when my entire day was filled with something. when I think about it now, there was no thought put into deciding what I actually wanted to do; the only objective was to fill the time with something. until the end of high school, I used to spend my days studying different subjects from different kinds of books. when I finished college and entered the corporate world, I started filling my free time by reading books, listening to podcasts, and watching information-dense videos on YT.
consuming information and building a knowledge base is very crucial. but a few months back, all this became too exhausting for me, and I started noticing that my mind had adopted a behavior where, if I am not doing something productive for some amount of time, I blame myself for not doing something “productive” during that time. I used to feel a lot of guilt for wasting my time doing nothing or doing something that I wanted to do, but that didn’t fit my definition of being productive (such as watching a movie, spending time on YT shorts, etc.). this behavior of my mind was persistent, and instead of helping me move forward, I realized it was crippling the way I operate.
all this led to a lot of frustration and dissatisfaction. that is when I started seeking advice on how to navigate this scenario. in one of the podcasts I was listening to, I heard about a book called Four Thousand Weeks. I picked it up – it was very different from other productivity or self-help books I had read. I had two main learnings from the book: (a) spending time thinking about what you actually want to do, and (b) focusing on doing the next right thing rather than just filling time with anything you think is productive.
nowadays, I spend my time thinking and wandering more than just trying to fill in by listening to podcasts, reading books, and other resources all the time. constantly asking the question of what the next right thing to do is has also helped me focus on doing things that align with my values and long-term goals. these measures have helped me reduce self-blame and feelings of guilt, have improved my clarity of thought, and give me more free time to wander. I’m not sure if this is the right approach, but it seems to be working for me now where I am more satisfied and at peace.
azeem panjwani 