Boundless #26: Darwin Was A Slacker
Happy October! I realized after sending last week that the mobile version was not the easiest to consume. Hopefully, this week will be a bit better formatted!
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DARWIN'S DAY
I'm working on an article about the history of our relationship with rest and how rest has come to largely mean "rest from work." Thousands of years ago, the Stoics saw rest as something that was active, but not filled with "busyness." Now it is common to hear the refrain "well I can't just do nothing!"
Alex Pang wrote a pretty amazing book looking at this called Rest and he looked at some of the most productive people in history. For example, Charles Darwin would likely be deemed a slacker in the modern world "no morning routine!?). Here is how his day looked:
8:00: Work
9:30: Read mail and write letters
10:30: Tend to his birds, greenhouse or perform experiments
12:00: Take a long walk
1:00: Lunch & answer some letters
3:00: Nap
4:00: Take another walk
4:30: A little more work
5:30: Dinner
Depending on how you slice it, he did about 2.5–5 hours of work, took a nap and a couple walks and seemed to have plenty of time to publish 19 books in his life.
One might take this as my sneaky was to argue with an anecdote that everyone should work less. I would argue instead that perhaps we limit our imagination when we are only able to imagine work as something we could do 5 days a week, 48-50 weeks a year for at least 8 hours a day. Perhaps like Darwin we should start with being able to be home for dinner 365 days a year and work backward.
How would you reimagine the workday, or even a work-month or work-year?
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Shayne Spencer on the “dumb idea project” and how failing econ helped him start his firm
Web • Itunes • Stitcher • Google Play • Overcast • Spotify • PlayerFM
While Shayne has built a successful marketing consulting firm, there was no “plan” to do this. His first exposure to marketing was out of necessity – his professor let students boost their low economics grades by joining the marketing group he ran. Shayne quickly applied the lessons to his DJ gigs on the side in college and became more interested in how to build real relationships with people through incredible experiences. He brings this same passion to his work today.
Shayne has had many “dumb” ideas, but he would argue that most ideas (good and bad) start out as dumb ideas. The difference is the people with the courage to keep moving and respond to feedback. He has called the entrepreneurship journey “one of the most humbling things he has done in his life.” From this humility and willingness to stay vulnerable, Shayne has been able to build a successful digital marketing firm.
Quotes
“Never do a good job at something you don’t want to do."
-Malcolm Gladwell
"People spend too much time doing and not enough time thinking about what they should be doing."
-A friend, to me
Reads
Boundless Reads Issue #92 - my weekly newsletter of five good reads every Sunday, going on almost two years.
Articles
A review of research confirms the “Peter Principle” which says people are promoted to their level of incompetence. The writer proposes the only logical solution: “If performance at one level of a hierarchy is uncorrelated with performance at the next level up, the best strategy is simply to promote the very worst people”.
Below The Dotted Green Line
(Links from the past, calls to action & tools)
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ICYMI - #WRITING
ICYMI - #BOUNDLESSPOD
YuTing Chiu on sounds across the globe
Laura Gallaher on leadership, humor & NASA crises
Andrew Taggart on how "total work" is taking over our lives
Tony Triumph on moving to NYC with $300
Rohan Rajiv on 3500+ daily blog posts
Candace Moore on building a global yoga brand
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