One of the best habits to prevent overwhelm, overcommitting, and constantly rushing from one thing to another, barely having time to do a good job, let alone a great one - is a simple sentence:
“I need to think about it.”
That’s a response you’ll hear from me more often from now on.
Now more than ever.
With all the automations and AI tools that can speed things up, the temptation will be to say YES to even more. To juggle more balls. To stack more commitments on top of each other.
And then to be surprised that, somehow, you still don’t have more time. Probably less!
Because just like before with the telephone.
Just like before with email.
Just like before with remote work.
Convenience does not equal more thinking time. Or more of any time!
If you respond to more emails, you’ll get more emails.
Will more get done?
If you measure productivity by emails sent back and forth - sure.
If you measure it by finishing meaningful projects - maybe not.
As Cal Newport, the author of Slow Productivity, said on the Finding Mastery podcast:
“I might fear that productivity actually will go down. Because the noisy work will go up.”
We’ll see.
But when I look back at my past year, almost 3 years now in South Africa, the thing that got me into trouble wasn’t lack of opportunity, lack of consistency.
It wasn’t lack of ideas.
It wasn’t even lack of tools.
It was saying YES too quickly.
Yes, before thinking through how much work it would actually take to do something well.
Yes, before checking whether I had the energy, focus, and capacity to show up properly.
Yes, before asking whether this was a project that could change everything, or just another thing keeping me busy.
If we equate productivity with being busy, then yes, AI is making us wildly productive.
If we equate productivity with moving meaningful work forward, then a much better habit is this:
Think first.
Decide deliberately.
Commit only when you can do it outstandingly well.
So over to you, dear reader,
Maybe it’s worth scheduling not only time to learn new AI tools, but also time to learn how to think better about what’s actually worth doing.
PS Stay tuned. I’ll be running events soon where I’ll share practical frameworks for thinking and deciding well before doing.
