2020 Reading Challenge: Midway Mark Lessons

As 2020 rolled around the corner— I set a goal of reading 15,000 pages, or about 35 books, with no expectation in mind for how this simple new habit would alter my daily productivity and life outlook. Especially, I didn't expect the lessons and principles that I've garnered to be critical cornerstones of sustaining a goal-oriented, healthy lifestyle amidst quarantine chaos. At the midway mark, here are five lessons that have most profoundly shifted the way I think:

1) SLEEP MORE, LIVE BETTER.

Coping with high-pressure exams and workloads, fueled by caffeine-induced study sessions, university students are ubiquitously sleep-deprived— and to add fuel to the fire, there is the popular urban myth that we can "catch-up" on sleep when we have more time. Sleep is often treated as a currency, something that can be saved up (time-permitting) and invested during periods when we're busy. In reality, sleep can't be averaged— if I sleep 10 hours on Monday and 6 hours on Tuesday, my body won't react like it's received 8 hours of sleep a day, rather, it will suffer the full brunt of Tuesday's sleep deprivation. We need 7-9 hours of sleep every day— meeting this increases prefrontal cortex responsivity, hence improving our academic performance (learning, memory, and creativity, mainly) and mediates amygdalae, improving emotional regulation. Overall, routinely meeting our body's sleep need is a simple method of sustaining high productivity levels for the long-run.

For more information, check out: Why We Sleep (Dr. Matthew Walker).

2) ADOPT MINIMALISM TO DEVELOP HABITS THAT STICK

As minimalist videographer Matt D'Avella satirically portrays, minimalism isn't achieved by replacing your spoons and forks with a spork— rather, it is mainly by introspectively listing what is most important to you, then filtering out distractions so you keep only that list within your life. Similarly, developing new habits is not a game of addition, but subtraction— in other words, we should not be looking to gain more motivation, energy, favourable external conditions, etc., but remove distractions such that the only possible direction is towards our habit that we want to build. For example, when developing my 30-page daily reading habit, I placed my phone on the opposite corner of the room and my book on my nightstand; further, web-based applications (namely Freedom) to restrict Netflix and other binge-sites help me to focus during "productivity hours", ultimately adding resistance to help my habits stick.

For more information, check out: Atomic Habits (James Clear).

3) STIMULATE FLOW FOR SUNSTAINED PRODUCTIVITY, WITHOUT BURN-OUT.

How can Elon Musk sustain 120-hour work-weeks, or surgeons perform 16-hour procedures continuously, and not burn-out? Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi answers this in one word: FLOW.

FLOW is described within an Olympic runner sprinting down the final stretch of their 1,500-metre race, with lungs burning and eyes zeroed-in on the finish line, a musician playing for a theatre, allowing the musical rhythm to take full control over their consciousness, or student at 2:00 am with no other thought that finishing their report by the following morning. FLOW is the psychological state of being so immersed within an activity that the rest of the world seemingly melts away— and is when we are most creative, productive, excited, and deliver our best work. As shown above, FLOW is achieved by our skill and challenge levels being balanced; as infants, we all start at the low-skill and low-challenge origin, and gradually, we increase our skills, inspiring us to tackle more challenging tasks. Too much challenge for our current skill set creates anxiety, and too little challenge creates boredom, but if we can keep growing and taking on more complicated or higher-quality objectives, balancing skills and challenges, we can sustain a lifestyle that is rich in productivity, growth, and impact.

For more information, check out: Flow (Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi).

4) "80/20" RULE AND PARKINSON'S LAW

We often idolize the "hustle" culture, where the less we sleep, the more we work, the busier we are, the more we praised as goal-oriented, resilient role models— however, the more we sacrifice in the name of achievement, the more susceptible our lifestyle is towards burn-out. The "80/20 rule" suggests that 80% of our results (outputs) are created from 20% of our time (inputs); Parkinson's Law suggests that "our work expands so as to fill up the time available for its completion". Thus, rather than hyper-fixating on the remaining 20%, list the five most important core values, tasks, or deadlines that are in your life— and by Parkinson's Law, we will become rewired to complete the most essential elements of all five assignments within the same block of time when we'd originally have completed only one. The key to long-term productivity is a balanced lifestyle, through setting aside enough time for what's important.

For more information, check out: The 4-Hour Workweek (Tim Ferris).

5) WALK THROUGH THIRD DOORS, AND TAKE A LEAP OF FAITH

We've heard the story of Edison creating 3,000+ lightbulb designs before he found one that was successful; Musk, who failed his first three rocket launches with SpaceX, had invested his last pennies into the do-or-die fourth launch; and countless other individuals overlooking the precipice of failure to achieve what they believed to be important. These people, as Ray Dalio coins it, are shapers— those that significantly shift their work culture or even industry for two main reasons. Firstly, they have the ability to grasp psychological extrema: they are both big-picture + granular-detailed thinkers, they have passion for excellence + intolerance for suboptimality, they are both assertive + open-minded. Secondly, they have the propensity to set audacious goals, not be deterred by what others think about it, and find their own way to achieve it— the "third door". Imagine a club: there are usually two doors at the front, (1) for most people, who cross their fingers and hope to get in, (2) for the VIP, millionaires, and executives, but there's also the option of (3) sneaking through the kitchen, breaking through a back window, or any other way in that you craft, comprising the third door. With this door, you have no idea if it will work, backfire, or how it will pan out, but if you are truly passion- ate about it, take a leap of faith— and you will be able to pursue your most audacious goals. Even if you don't make it, you can always try again at other third-doors, and at the very least you'll end up with a great, unique story.

For more information, check out: Principles (Ray Dalio), The Third Door (Alex Banayan).

THANKS FOR READING

If you have any comments about these points, I'd love to hear them! Also, if you want book recommendations, check out my articles before this, or reach out to me via direct message or email at [email protected]. Cheers.