One Quote:

"Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn." - Gore Vidal

Be unapologetically you.

(Share this on Twitter!)​

One Framework:

The Reitoff Principle

Here are a few scenarios that may feel all-too-familiar:

• You wake up on a Friday morning with grand plans to make world-changing progress on your important project, but quickly realize that you feel mentally drained. You stare at your computer screen blankly and bemoan your inability to focus and your lack of discipline as you fail to produce anything of note for hours.
• You get to your desk during your normal "flow state" weekend creative time and find that you just aren't in it. You sputter your way through the few hours. Later, you engage in negative self-talk about your lack of productivity.
• You make a plan to work on a Saturday evening, telling yourself that you're going to "grind" while everyone else is out partying. You get to your desk and can't seem to focus, but you sit there and spin your wheels, because going out with your friends would make you feel guilty for not being productive when you said you would be.

If you're reading this newsletter, I'm willing to bet you consider yourself a high achiever (or you're aspiring to be one).

This is mostly great—it means you have ambition, drive, discipline, and many other wonderful traits.

Unfortunately, it also means you have probably have difficulty relaxing. High achievers are notoriously bad at chilling out! Trust me, I'm right there with you.

I wrote about this exact challenge a few months ago:

When you're wired for progress, productivity, consistency, and discipline, any break feels like a failure: Productivity is the one true god. Rest is for the weak. Free time is for the lazy. Sleep is optional.

We need a way to fight back against this wiring. To fully embrace rest, free time, and a bit of laziness in our lives when the mood strikes.

The Reitoff Principle is a creation of my friend Ali Abdaal, a YouTube productivity guru who has wrestled with this exact problem.

The name "Reitoff Principle" is a pithy play on words for "write-off"—an ironic, productivity-framework-sounding name for something that asks you to do absolutely nothing productive.

It's simple: The next time you find yourself slogging to get through some "productive" work that you've convinced yourself is necessary, just stop and give yourself the space to relax.

In other words, write it off.

I used the Reitoff Principle last weekend. I had planned on getting a bunch of book writing done during the day on Friday, but as I looked out the window from my desk at the 60 degree February day in New York, I couldn't get my mind to focus on my work. I started the negative self-talk cycle, telling myself I wasn't disciplined and would never get the project done if I had this type of focus. Then I saw my wife and son walking on the street in the sunlight. Suddenly, I remembered the Reitoff Principle. I closed my laptop, took a breath, and walked outside to enjoy the day with my family. It was glorious.

I may not have made any progress on Friday, but I felt so recharged and inspired by the break that I was able to hit the ground running on Saturday and Sunday. Rest really does work!

So the next time you find yourself grinding away, uninspired, remember the Reitoff Principle.

Write it off, recharge, and move on.

One Tweet:

Wonderful story about a 12-year-old chess champion.

Worth the few minutes of your time. Inspiring and heartwarming story, well told by Polina!

One Article:

​Childhoods of Exceptional People​

Interesting article that distills the insights from dozens of biographies of exceptional people in an attempt to formulate a set of generalizable principles about their childhoods.

The few that stood out to me (with my thoughts in italics):

• Exceptional people grow up in exceptional milieus. Basically, exceptional people were surrounded by exceptional people when they were children. This is difficult to control, and not everyone has natural (i.e. family-driven) access to a network of amazing people. It was fascinating to read how those without the family connections built these networks, usually through cold outreach and tenacity. A good lesson for anyone wanting to build a network of mentors.
• They were heavily tutored 1-on-1. Most of the exceptional people studied for the piece were tutored as children. Interesting reference to Bloom's 2-sigma problem, which said that tutored students performed two standard deviations better than students who learn via conventional instructional methods.
• Cognitive apprenticeships. Most of the children took part in cognitive apprenticeships with family or members of their network early in their lives. I was most interested in the story of how John Stuart Mill would take walks with his father daily and be asked to discuss his latest learnings with him. It made me want to create a similar ritual with my son once he's a bit older. A nice way to have daily bonding in nature, plus drive home the importance of learning and communication.

It's always a bit dangerous to take lessons like this at face value, but this piece had some really neat insights.

One Podcast:

Time Management for Mortals - On Being

Oliver Burkeman's Four Thousand Weeks was one of my favorite reads of 2022. Having had the pleasure of chatting with him over Zoom recently, I'm also delighted to report he is as smart and philosophical in real life as he comes across in the pages of the book.

This was a great discussion on the topics covered in his book:

• The tendency of high achievers to use personal time to re-prepare to do the same set of tasks tomorrow leads to burnout (see the Reitoff Principle above!).
• We often say we "have" time, but this is incorrect. We don't "have" anything other than this present moment. Anything could happen in the future.
• Recognizing your cosmic insignificance is often a useful way to refocus on things that really matter to you.

Listen to it here.

‍