The Mask of Productivity || August

Real quick; Viki here and I'm on a personal mission to reconnect people with the masterpiece of themselves; as a coach, somatic guide, and facilitator. I'm from Jersey, half Irish, and living with a solid dose of ADHD, so you can expect long form, errant yet resonant thoughts, toolsTipsTricks, community spotlights + other goodies. I'd love to tell you that you'll receive this or that many emails from me in a month, but let's face it, anything is possible and I love writing to you as often as the thoughts arise! I hope you find impact, resonance, or entertainment within this newsletter!

Find the full version of these monthly musings within my email community, here.

The Journey

Greg McKeown said so poetically, if you don't prioritize your life, someone else will.

Touché.

Like many of my millennial brethren, we fell into the abyss of hustle culture as we stepped into the working world. The advances + sexiness of start ups, social media, and literally hoarding hustles are the culprits IMO. Then add in the Tim Ferrissy pathway of time/brain/body hacks and we have a recipe for high effectivity and lots of dis ease. If you know me personally for any amount of time, you'll recall my constant reframe sorry I'm just so busy; I'm busy but I'll try; wow IDK how I even got so busy!!

Without a thread of pride or self importance, I truly thought I was that busy. For years, I simply didn't understand how other people could manage so many plates in the air [think: building your own business, getting a certification, showing up in a relationship, having friends, being a parent!, eating well, exercise, etc].

It only hit me some time last year that maybe, just mayyybeee, 'productivity' is a scam. And I also learned about Parkinson's Law, which explained a thing or two. The law says, your work will expand to fill the time allotted for its completion. Like a goldfish in a bowl. Whoa.

I WAS THE BUSYNESS PROBLEM.

I'd cram everything into my Google Calendar by color [to designate a virtual call, or facilitation, or brain work] and I thought I really had something going there! Except, there was never any white space. Rarely time between calls or projects to even take a mini walk around the block, let alone cook lunch. I was beholden to my calendar and I also, kept it full to overflowing. Wondering constantly, damn why can't I catch a break?? #HamsterWheel

95% of those calendar items were not 'needle movers' but rather time consumers. Like, I could've spent a few hours working out a marketing strategy, since you know, I work for myself. Yet instead, I'd often find myself creating random things on canva because it was infinitely more exciting. Yes, adhd is involved but it was really, a habit of doing. A habit, of productivity. An identity cultivated around my capacity to do things.

But, without me constantly doing, what would I even be good for?

When I caught on [to myself], I put myself on a hibernation; you can read about it here. It was startlingly telling, mad difficult at certain points [like the whole month January when it seems the whole work is elevating their doingness]. But in that hibernation, I did find clarity, I did find the typical quicksands that I'd get caught up in, I did figure out where my dopamine is drawn and how I get distracted.

Productivity & busyness are a western capitalistic farce that kept me good and stuck for much of my professional life; stuck in the mindset that I AM WHAT I DO, stuck in the belief that every moment of an 8H weekday should be spent doing SOMETHING productive to either business or maintaining house, stuck in the emotions of guilt when I spent a few valuable hours reading or shameful when I chose to watch a whole season of a show on a Sunday [sue me #walkingDead]. I'm over it.

I am not what I do and I am not valued by my ability to produce. I am a glorious work in progress. I offer value in myriad ways like what I've learned along the way, like how I can positively affect how people feel, like what I love creating in canva :), like how I deliver boring messaging and make it seem highly lit. I get to choose OUT of the matrix, and I hope you might too.

Here's a great little diddy on the performance of busyness and a few ways to bring it down some notches.

Check my plan for the second half of 2024 below [which I made in the native iOS app, FreeForm]. I've chosen to go against my Productivity Mask until the end of the year, by doing no new things [think: another certification course or a new offering] and spending more time in: refining, clarifying, and prioritizing.

Even if this isn't your sort of thing to try, I implore you to tackle the allure of productivity and busyness over the next few weeks and see where it takes you. Dare I say, time for less doing and more being ??

Freebie || Try planning & prioritizing in this way!