Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman

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Author: Shortform
Full_Title: Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman
Category: books
Last Highlighted Date: 2024-02-22 21:50:26.592507+00:00

Highlights

Burkeman contends that you and most humans live with the mistaken belief that if you try hard enough and find the right time management solutions, you should be able to gain total control over your time.
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According to Burkeman, having total control over your time encompasses 1) the ability to complete all necessary tasks and projects, both short-term and long-term, in the time you’ve allocated them and 2) the ability to decide exactly how to spend your time.
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The Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries fundamentally altered the way humans regarded time by transforming it into a resource that laborers were expected to use efficiently to maximize profits
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Time-saving technology contributes to the delusion that you should be able to fully master all your time, believes Burkeman. When you save time using technology, you automatically develop the expectation that you should be able to save and wield greater control over your time in other realms of your life.
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This experience of becoming accustomed to greater speed is a facet of the psychological phenomenon called hedonic adaptation: the process of acclimating to changed circumstances so that your general level of happiness returns to its base level.
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According to Burkeman, the more tasks you complete, the more tasks will appear to occupy your newly freed-up time.
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Similarly, if you accelerate your pace of work in an effort to complete all your tasks, you’ll feel forced to increase that acceleration in the future, writes Burkeman.
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You also lack control over your time because you allow yourself to be distracted from important tasks that matter to you by minor tasks that don’t, writes Burkeman. This is because when tackling a task you want to execute well (like being a good parent or writing a novel), you risk falling short (by taking your anger out unfairly on your child or writing a bad novel, for instance). When you fall short of achieving your ideal, you’re forced to confront the unpleasant possibility that you may not be good at the task and that you might never master it in your lifetime, claims Burkeman. By distracting yourself with minor tasks, you can avoid facing these disturbing thoughts—but you lose control over how you spend your time
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Burkeman believes that you distract yourself from important tasks because you fear that doing them might reveal a personal weakness.
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So, how do you overcome negative ego-driven behaviors? Tolle recommends practicing mindfulness, the ability to be present and in touch with your inner self. When you can be present enough to recognize that you’re engaging in an ego-driven behavior, you can stop it.
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Form of Suffering #1: You Feel Guilty About Not Being More Productive
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Form of Suffering #2: You Isolate Yourself to Gain Control Over Your Time
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To make matters worse, the more isolated you are, the more you continue to isolate yourself. This is because the body processes loneliness and isolation as a threat, which triggers a “fight or flight” response.
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Form of Suffering #3: You Don’t Get to the Most Important Tasks
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Form of Suffering #4: You Obsess About the Future at the Expense of the Present
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Burkeman adds that capitalism causes you to think in this future-oriented way because it’s designed to utilize present resources to make future profits. As a member of a capitalist society, you’re compelled to think about the present in terms of how it can improve the future.
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Fact #1: You’ll Never Feel as Though You’ve Mastered Your Time
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Tactic #1: Make Time for Critical Tasks Now
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Tactic #2: Limit Your In-Progress Projects
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Tactic #3: Resist Distraction by Being Okay With Discomfort
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To develop a tolerance for discomfort, Burkeman proposes that when you notice yourself being distracted from an important task, immerse yourself more in it by paying closer attention to it.
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(Shortform note: In Indistractable, Nir Eyal provides a more elaborate, four-step framework for how to resist distraction: First, identify the trigger that makes you want to distract yourself. Next, write down what the trigger is. Third, pay attention to the feeling of discomfort that accompanies the need to distract yourself (as Burkeman recommends). Finally, resist the cravings for distraction by telling yourself you’ll give in and distract yourself in 10 minutes. Usually, the urge to distract yourself passes in that time.)
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Tactic #4: Stop Expecting the Future to Unfold Exactly as Planned
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Burkeman adds that you can help yourself become okay with the idea of not having control over the future by considering how little control you’ve had over your life until now. Most of your life has been a series of events over which you had no say
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According to David Epstein, author of Range, humans’ needs, wants, and even personalities change over the course of their lives. Reminding yourself that you don’t know for sure what you’ll want in the future may help you worry less about achieving future goals
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Tactic #5: Develop Patience for the Current Pace of Life
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You can cultivate patience by simply paying greater attention to the world around you.
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Tactic #6: Align Your Free Time With That of Your Friends
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Fact #2: Your Life Is Finite
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The second implication of a finite life is that you must use your time carefully and in service of projects and activities that matter to you and make you happy, stresses Burkeman. Don’t waste time trying to get through your to-do list, but rather dedicate it toward meaningful activities—like spending time with family, for example.
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Tactic #1: Commit to Your Life Choices
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Tactic #2: Focus on What’s Happening in the Present, Not the Future
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As discussed in Part 2, the delusion of control over your time encourages you to sacrifice your present time in service of improving your future time use. But because you can’t control the future, instead spend more time thinking about how you can make the most of the present.
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Tactic #3: Incorporate Purposeless Time Into Your Schedule
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Incorporating purposeless time into your life keeps you from thinking exclusively about the future in a way that erodes your ability to enjoy the present, elaborates Burkeman.
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Tactic #4: Don’t Dedicate Your Time to Changing the World, Because You Can’t
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