Fire and Knowledge

I have onset insomnia. I lie awake at night for a couple hours thinking about all the things I’m going to do or what I did that day. I think about new ideas. I think about new businesses I could start, projects I should do, essays I should write. It’s ridiculous, but I’ve done it ever since I can remember.

I was browsing Tim Ferris’s blog and found out he has the same thing. Here is what he does about it:

I have — as do most males in my family — what is called “onset insomnia.” I don’t have trouble staying asleep, but I have a difficult time falling asleep, sometime laying awake in bed for 1-2 hours.

There are two approaches that I’ve used with good effect without medications to address this: 1) Determine and set a top priorities to-do list that afternoon for the following day to avoid late-night planning, 2) Do not read non-fiction prior to bed, which encourages projection into the future and preoccupation/planning. Read fiction that engages the imagination and demands present-state attention.

I’m often guilty of reading non-fiction before bed. The worst is if I read something about business or entrepreneurship or new ideas. I’ll end up thinking about it for hours while I stare at the ceiling.

Writing a to-do list the day before is a great idea. I’ve been trying to do that simply because it helps to have a focus as soon as I start my day. But this gives me another reason to do it.

Autonomy, complexity, and a connection between effort and reward are, most people agree, the three qualities that work has to have if it is to be satisfying.

—Malcolm Gladwell, Outliers (2008), p. 149

Audible.com has the audiobook of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey available for free for a limited time. I found the book helpful, even though it’s a little dense in parts.

If you’re into audiobooks, you should definitely get it for free while you can.

If you don’t make mistakes you’re not working on hard enough problems. And that’s a big mistake.

—Frank Wilczek, as quoted in Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek (2007), p. 279.

Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up.
It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed.
Every morning a lion wakes up.
It knows it must outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death.
It doesn’t matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle.
When the sun comes up, you better start running.

—An African proverb as quote in Thomas Friedman, The World is Flat (2005), p. 114.

If you’re into productivity blogs, be sure to check out What’s Best Next. The author, Matt Perman, was my boss for four years — and he’s the most organized guy I know.

A task will swell in (perceived) importance and complexity in relation to the time allotted for its completion. It is the magic of the imminent deadline…. The end product of the shorter deadline is almost inevitably of equal or higher quality due to greater focus…. Identify the few critical tasks that contribute most to income and schedule them with very short and clear deadlines.

—Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek (2007), p. 75.

Being overwhelmed is often as unproductive as doing nothing, and is far more unpleasant. Being selective—doing less—is the path of the productive. Focus on the important few and ignore the rest.

—Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek (2007), p. 73.