I agree with a lot of what Seth Godin says. He is a rarity in that he consistantly observes, communictates, and then explains the ’so what’. That last bit is a differntiator. But listening to his interview with Merlin Mann today he used an old, tired, jibe – rather than spend 12 hours a day learning how to be productive, you should spend them BEING productive.
This is something that Tim Ferriss advocates in 4 Hour Work Week – drastically cut down the amount of non-fiction reading that you do to the absolute bare minimum.
I disagree. But then you knew that didn’t you… I think it is an easy statement to make, because on the face of it its logic is infallible – but is being made by people who make a living from writing the material they claim we are wasting 12 hours a day reading. God I love sweet irony.
You see, your time is an asset – an asset for you to invest and demand a return from. It is the same as cash. If I have $12 then I would be willing to spend $11 dollars to make another $12. Equally, if I have 12 hours free, then I am happy to spend 11 of these to find a productivity hack, or self development techniqhue that’ll save me 12 hours.
In fact I’d spend more. Why? Because not only am I getting back the 11 hours I have already spent, I am giving myself a tool that will save me more time from now on.
How about and example? George can type at at 30 words per minute. His weekly 10,000 word target for the eBook he is writing is taking him just over 5 hours. One Saturday, rather than bang away for 5 hours, he spends 3 hours researching, and 2 hours completing a typing course on the internet. This boosts his words per minute to 60. He still needs to write his 10,000 words, but it will now only take him 2.5 hours – and every week after he’ll be saving that amount of time. Worth it? Certainly.
What is key is discipline. This certainly isn’t a carte blanche to down a 12 hour Wikipedia spiral every day. You need to decide what you want to learn, and give yourself a set amount of time – for example, only allow yourself 15 RSS feeds maximum; keep research to your lunch hour or an hour in the evening; or focus on one topic at a time and don’t be distracted on to tangents.
Okay, now you’ve learnt something – go and spend a few hours reading other Half-a-dozen Monkeys articles…
