#5: Toxic Productivity
Being Productive is not always a Virtue.
When I am very busy — homework, interview prep etc — I crave free time but when I have free time, I have work FOMO.
Back in high school, a lot of people complimented my ability to manage my time well.
That I could maintain solid grades, take part in sports and extracurriculars while still managing to chill with friends at night was something I was very proud of.
When I came to university, I had lofty dreams. I wanted to do research, be part of a dance team, hit my academic milestones, get a good job, what not.
But all of this would not be possible if I was not on top of my work, always on the lookout for what assignment was raising its ugly head next.
During my sophomore and junior years, homeworks, assignments and projects were so head hurting that I tried to be prepared pro-proactively in order to avoid any last minute, nerve wracking bouts of debugging.
Then there were job searches and interviews.
Any time that I wasn’t obsessively working towards my assignments, I knew I should open Handshake, Indeed, Linkedin and the myriad of other job portals to apply for my next ‘dream’ job.
Heck, my friends in finance not only had their current summer sorted, they were interviewing for the next summer! If I was pro-proactive, they were pro-pro-proactive, with 3 pro(s)!
This crazy life had 3 equally crazy side-effects.
An OCD level obsession with productivity -> If I wasn’t being productive at a given point in time, (working on homeworks, applying for jobs or sending fake messages on LinkedIn) I genuinely felt bad about myself. The day felt wasted. ‘Productivity’ felt like an essential life source, only that this life source made me look really dead, thin and overworked.
Chill Later Fallacy -> I started experiencing this paradox I call the Chill Later Fallacy. First, I would promise myself that instead of taking some time off to chill, I’d work now on some future assignment so that I am less stressed out in the future. But when that future time came, I’d either still be stressed out about that assignment or more likely, fill that free time with some other non-ending work like job applications. Worse still, I would give into to the Chill Later Fallacy and delay gratification even more, continuing the cycle.
Productivity Withdrawal -> In times when I actually had no work — summer and winter breaks — I felt like something was amiss from my life because I wasn’t being productive. It felt like someone, somewhere was still grinding, so I should be too. Even this semester — I graduate in less than a month and am going to work where I’ve always wanted to — I am unable to just relax. To not strive towards some goal is deeply uncomforting.
Starting my final semester, I had deliberately kept my class schedule light so as to have a good time with friends and enjoy Cornell, one last time.
So it was really frustrating to have a productivity withdrawal and to experience a general unease that I still wasn’t doing enough.
Tim Ferris, brilliantly, said in his book, The Four Hour Workweek1,
“What on Earth do you do when you no longer have work as an excuse to be hyperactive all the time and have to finally confront the Big Questions? You freak out apparently.”
and freak out I did.
It felt immensely disorienting to not have something to work towards in such a long time. Getting the job that I had always wanted was supposed to be the end goal, but like all previous goals, it just wasn’t enough. I still felt I needed to do more.
I desperately searched for a new source of motivation, something new to latch onto but found nothing.
So then I took a step back and decided to re-evaluate what I am doing with my life.
What was the point of all the effort of the past four years if I could not enjoy the chill time I had earned?
I decided that enjoying the time that I had left at Cornell, and by extension, the time that I have left in this life, is the ultimate pursuit. All that I do, achieve and strive for is to live a peaceful, happy, joyful life.
Thus, I came to my current conclusion that ->
EVERYTHING I do is a means to an end. The end is to live a joyful life.
So now I work on Metanoia, chill with friends, watch movies, get drunk, make memories while still keeping up with the bare minimum work I need to do.
And that’s where I currently am.
Now I am on to figuring out how to live a life, and not just a semester, of enjoyment.
Nice and heartfelt