The less time you give yourself, the more meaningful your results might be.
Think about exercise.
When you only have 20 minutes, you walk in with a plan. No wandering. No scrolling. You push hard, hit your heart rate, or zero in on the muscles that matter. Intensity goes up as the time goes down.
But on the weekend?
Or on those days when you’ve “got all the time in the world”? Suddenly the workout stretches to 90 minutes. You still sweat, but often you spend more time being there than actually training.
Parkinson's law
“Work expands to fill the time available for its completion.”
The real problem isn’t the time. It’s that we stop asking what the goal is in the first place.
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In fitness: we measure time, not progress.
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In business: we let projects bloat, chasing vanity "more" metrics instead of clearly defining “done.”
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In daily work: we keep sitting at our laptops until a certain hour instead of setting clear parameters for completion and calling it a day once done.
I catch myself there too.
Designing a workshop? I’ll sometimes “do the hours” instead of asking what actually needs to be in it, and stopping when the outcome is produced. More somehow feels better.
Reaching out to clients? More emails don’t always equal better results. Like in the gym, not all reps will get you winning your top physique.
And it’s not just time. Parkinson’s Law creeps into money, space, and energy too:
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As income rises, spending rises. That’s how millionaires end up broke. (And why Warren Buffett is such a profound exception.)
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Bigger teams dilute focus of a growing startup.
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Bigger houses fill with more stuff that you barely use.
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Bigger storage? Just means more forgotten files you'll never look at again.
Left unchecked, it all leads to clutter. Busyness. Bloat. Waste. A heavier life you can't "just change".
The antidote? Define your criteria before you start:
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What does “done” look like?
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What do I actually need before asking what I can afford?
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What’s the real outcome I’m chasing, and how will I know I'm done besides time?
And every so often, throw in an outrageous constraint.
Cut the time in half. Slash the budget. Reduce the team. Shrink the storage. You might discover the task wasn’t as demanding as you thought and life feels faster, lighter, sharper.
Over to you dear reader, what could you cut in half today and still win?