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Stop, That New Productivity Hack Won’t Change Your Life
Break your addiction to “productivity” and start actually changing.
Here’s my guilty confession: I’m addicted to productivity. I love reading productivity articles, I love listening to podcasts about productivity hacks, my passion is signing up to mailing lists that promise to alter my very being — for the better and for good. Half of the articles I read on this website are written by people swearing this one trick will make me a better and more productive person. And I believe it, every time.
This one, I tell myself, this hack will be the one to change my life!
Some productivity guidance, it has to be said, has definitely had a life-changing impact. Tom Kuegler’s course got me writing on Medium regularly, which I love. Optimal Living Daily taught me some long-lasting skills, like keeping up with a gratitude journal, or writing down the top three things I want to accomplish tomorrow, the night before.
The key difference, I think, is that those weren’t quick hacky fixes. Both those were habits that I worked to incorporate into my life. At no point did I believe I could simply take the productivity tip onboard and magically change my life within three to five working days. I understood up front that it’d be an ongoing process.
