Stop wasting time

(Transcript) Knecht to King Episode 023 “Wasting Time”

Halyo, welcome to episode 23 of the Knecht to King Podcast. Today’s episode is about wasting time.

[intro]

Hey everyone, I got a question from John, he asks:

Well thanks John for your question and your nice comment. Workflow and productivity is actually one of my favorite subjects to talk about and I will make many, many episodes on this podcast about that because what creative people sometimes forget is that art is a discipline, right? It’s not enough to be creative and come up with ideas, but actually have the skills to materialize whatever you have in your mind. So if we want to get results, we need to get in tune with the more practical aspects of creative work. You know, the more conservative things like work ethic and how to get things done because uh, if you dwell on the potential too much and the intangible visions you don’t really get anywhere. But before we start with little techniques and tactics and how to use your time more effectively, we’ve gotta start with the very basics. So productivity 101: stop wasting time. I know it sounds simplistic, but not wasting your time is actually a very good place to start. If not the best thing you could do in your life. That alone will change everything. You know, people are trying to learn about a little hack or a tactic that saves five minutes here and there, but if you’re wasting 50 hours a week mindlessly scrolling through your feed, you’re kind of pissing in the wind. You know what I mean? So before we try and fix the sink, we gotta go back and fix the, well… Now how do I do that? How do I actually stop wasting time? Everyone knows that it’s a bad idea to waste your life, but how do I change my behavior? Because it’s really hard to change your ways. Right? Um, I found a great clip that illustrates first of all, the impact of wasting your time and your life for that matter. And they go into detail on how to identify your time wasters and what to do about it. So the key essentially is to first identify where and how you’re wasting your time, which is very painful but necessary. And then you work your way up incrementally. So this clip is from the Joe Rogan podcast with Dr Jordan Peterson, who’s a psychology professor and a clinical psychologist. And in this example he uses studying as an example, but you can replace it with music production or any other creative thing that you’re supposed to be doing. So enjoy:

How much time do you waste? So then I get the class to vote. How many of you waste 10 hours a day? It’s like 10% of the kids will put up their hands. And it’s interesting cause I don’t define what constitutes waste. I just asked the question. So there are diagnosing themselves, right? I’m not saying you’re wasting 10 hours a day, I’m just asking. It’s like given your own attitude, how much time are you wasting? 10 hours a day. It’s like 10% of the people put up their hands. Well, when you get to like six hours a day, 80% of the people put up their hands. So then we do the arithmetic. It’s like, okay, six hours a day, it’s 42 hours a week. So let’s call that a work week, 40 hours a week. So, so that’s, that’s a work week. Let’s say, what’s your time worth? You’re a university student or certainly worth minimum wage because obviously, but it’s worth way more than that because if you spend a productive hour when you’re 20 then you gain the benefits of that hour for the rest of your life. So there’s the compounding effect of time spent when we are young. So I say, well, let’s assume your time’s worth 50 bucks an hour, which I think is an underestimate, but whatever, let’s call it 50 we call it 25 but we’ll call it 50 that’s $2,000 a week. You’re wasting, it’s $100,000 a year. It’s like, how much better would your life be if you weren’t wasting $100,000 a year? It’s like, what is that? Over 40 years, $4 million? It’s like you’re rich. You don’t even know it. Quit wasting time by your own definition. It’s like people shake their heads like, oh, I never thought about it that way. It’s like, yeah, think about it that way. Don’t waste your damn life. And then you think, well, why would people be resistant to that message? It’s like, well, you really want to wake up and figure out that you’re wasting half your life. And you know when people do that kind of wasting, they actually hate it. You know? And I’ve had lots of people come to my clinical practice who are chronic procrastinators, you know? And so they’re watching youtube videos say, but, but not ones that are good for them, although sometimes they will do that. But just browsing and that kind of mindless way that you do when you’re not paying attention and you’re trying to kill time and people doing that, they feel bad. They get depressed, they feel anxious, they can’t get away from it. They feel kind of quasi-addicted.

That’s what they’re saying about social media now. It’s a huge issue with young kids.

Absolutely. But there’s this feeling of kind of internal rot and corruption that goes along with it. It’s like, yeah, well you’re wasting your life. It’s like, so it’s painful. It’s painful to recognize that. Then it’s painful to think, oh my God, look how undisciplined I am. I don’t know anything. I can’t use a schedule. I can’t, I can’t stick to a calendar. I don’t have any aims. I don’t know anything about the world. Right. And maybe there’s a part of me that’s bitter because I haven’t got everything already. And I’d like just like to say to hell with it. That’s the recognition of the Jungian sha dow. It’s like that’s what makes you a vicious and, and, and, and untrustworthy all of that. No one wants to look at that and no bloody wonder. But Hey, the alternative is worse.

So the problem is you say like just saying, stop wasting your life. Like I think that that’s not enough. I think this is one of the reasons why a book like this is so important, like the idea of discipline in most people’s eyes. It’s like if you’re not a discipline person, it’s uncomfortable. It’s, it’s going to be painful. It’s frustrating. The you, you have to force yourself into these things. It’s a muscle. It’s and it’s a muscle that it has to be developed and these patterns have to be developed in your own mindset.

Incrementally Yeah. Well with the, so you’re right, just telling people not to waste their lives is not enough, and this is another reason why I’ve so much enjoyed being a clinical psychologist because clinical psychologists don’t stick with high level abstractions, especially the behaviorists. They’re really practical. It’s like, okay, you want to get your act together. It’s like, well, how about if let’s say you’re not studying well, and so we do a real analysis of how much of your studying, you say, well, I go to the library four hours a day. It’s like, yeah, yeah. Okay. How much time do you actually study in the library? Well, you know, I waste time. I have to travel there. I look at my phone, it’s like, okay, well how much? 15 minutes. Half an hour. How much is real studying? While maybe we figure out it’s 15 minutes. Say, okay, so what are you going to do for one week is you’re going to study for half an hour. That’s all. You don’t get to go to the library for four hours. You have to sit down and we’ll figure out a time, 10 o’clock in the morning, whatever. We’ll put it in your schedule. Try to study for half an hour no more, and then just come back and let’s have a conversation about how well that worked. And people would come back and they say, well, you know, I managed it for days and one day I went over and one day I couldn’t do it at all. It’s like, okay, that’s better. Instead of 75 minutes of studying, you know, 15 minutes a day for seven days. What is that? 105 minutes.

You’ve managed about 210 minutes, so you’ve already produced an improvement of 50% and your bumbling, horrible way. He got a 50% improvement in one week. It’s like that’s deadly. It’s like so in, in the future authoring program. What we ask people to do is we’ll think about your life along six dimensions. What do you want for your, so the, the goal is this. You’re going to take care of yourself. You’re going to have a life in three years that justifies its suffering. That’s the goal. So you can invent the damn life, but you have to think what you would be satisfied with so you wouldn’t be all bitter and resentful. It’s like, okay, what do you want from your family? What do you want from your friends? How are you going to educate yourself? What do you want for your career? How are you gonna use your time outside of work?

How are you going to handle drugs and alcohol and other temptations like that? How are you going to keep yourself mentally and physically healthy? And these are open questions, like you get to answer them, the idea is: You can have whatever you want, but you have to figure out what it is. It has to be realistic. And you have to figure out what it is. It’s okay. So now develop a vision. What’s your life going to be like in three to five years? So you write it down, then we do something else, which is okay. Um, your bad habits and your resentment and your bitterness and all of that. Your procrastination gets completely out of hand and you auger down and you’re in your own personal version of hell in three to five years. What does that look like? Well, everyone knows that. It’s like everyone can look into the future and think, well, if I keep going on this dark path, this is where I’ll end up.

Well then you’ve got a little hell outlined for yourself to run away from and you got a little heaven outlined for yourself to run towards and then you’re motivated because sometimes, you know, you’re just hopeful. I would like a good thing to happen. It’s like, yeah, but you know, I’d like to drink half a bottle of whiskey tonight, too. It’s like, so, which is going to be, well, just being hopeful about the future might not be enough, but then you think, oh, I see. Like there’s that little health thing that I outlined. It’s waiting for me and maybe I’m afraid of taking the next step forward because it’s demanding and challenging. It’s like, yeah, I’m afraid of that, but I’m way more afraid of where I might end up if I don’t get my act together and people should be. That’s why there are conceptions of hell in so many religions, it’s like hell is real place. Whether it’s eternal. That’s a whole different question. Whether it’s waiting for you in the afterlife. That’s a whole different question, but if you’ve never met anyone in hell, you haven’t lived very long.

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