2144: The Stable Mucking Method: A Freestyle Approach To Keeping the Annoying Little Stuff Under Control by Cal Newport on Productivity Habits

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[00:00:30] This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales, using automation, analytics and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify.

[00:01:00] This is Optimal Work Daily. The stable mucking method. A freestyle approach to keeping the annoying little stuff under control. By Cal Newport of CalNewport.com. The cost of focus. Here's a problem I've faced recently. My obsessive focus on a small number of important projects causes me to fall behind on the annoying little administrative stuff that pops up on a daily basis.

[00:01:25] I'm not talking about the regularly occurring minutia like cleaning my apartment or working out. These can be easily handled with an autopilot schedule. I am referring instead to the random, unexpected productivity lint that regularly clogs my inbox and emanates a powerful aura of procrastination-inducing annoyance. Over the past year or so, I've tried several failed strategies to rectify this situation, including 1. Dedicating one day a week to administrative tasks. This failed for two reasons.

[00:01:56] 1. I didn't have enough stuff to fill a full day. 2. The thought of handling such a large quantity of annoying small tasks scared me, so I tended to morph the day into a pseudo-vacation during which little got done. 2. Choosing a reasonable number of important administrative tasks each morning that I have to accomplish that day. I was still procrastinating. I would work until I was tired, then declare it impossible, in my current mental state, to tackle such terrible, worthless tasks. So I wouldn't.

[00:02:26] And 3. Scheduling mosquito dashes of fixed duration at fixed times each day. I found that it was very hard to shift from my focus mindset to an annoying task mindset, then back to a focus mindset. The stable mucking method. Finally, I stumbled across a technique that, for some reason, seems to work for me. I call it the stable mucking method in honor of the annoying, terrible daily task that afflicts stable hands, mucking the manure out of the horse stables.

[00:02:55] If you skip a day, the manure will pile up, causing an unhealthy situation for the horses. So, as any stable hand will tell you, every day must end with at least some mucking. They also have a much more popular, similar-sounding axiom, which will have to remain unsaid. I adopted this same mindset for tackling my annoying administrative tasks. That is, at the end of each day, I require myself to do something administrative, even if it's really small.

[00:03:21] Because the work could conceivably involve only the easiest, smallest possible task on my list, it isn't scary. This, in turn, diffuses the urge to procrastinate. Indeed, some days I do hone right in on the minimum amount of work. Think sending a single email, and then clock out. But, on an increasing number of days, once I get started down an administrative track, I get inspired to knock off a decent amount of tasks. In the end, enough gets accomplished each week that I manage to stay afloat. Not for everyone.

[00:03:50] If you have a job, then stable mucking probably won't work. People who work for a living are required to accomplish a large amount of administrative tasks every single day. I know, I hear it sucks. But for students, like us, mucking tends to be enough. Our administrative load is light and non-urgent enough that a little here and a little there keeps us stress-free. The return of freestyle productivity. Last week, I introduced freestyle productivity. The motivation?

[00:04:18] Our brains are terrible at remembering everything we have to do, which is why good capture and organization systems are necessary. And our brains are wonderful, by contrast, at coming up with short-term plans that balance the subtle demands we face in the near future. Trying to force a one-size-fits-all action plan to our lives constrains this natural ability. The implication? We should deploy good systems to capture and organize tasks,

[00:04:44] but rely on creative strategies crafted on the fly to plan how we actually tackle the work in the short term. In other words, your brain knows what you need to do. Give it a chance to make a plan, and it will make a good one. The stable mucking method fits beautifully in this framework. Instead of relying on some constrictive set of rules for accomplishing the small tasks in your life, it's just a simple reminder that each day you should face your task list and do something. Your brain will figure out what's important at the moment.

[00:05:15] Trust me, it works. You just listened to the post titled, The Stable Mucking Method, A Freestyle Approach to Keeping the Annoying Little Stuff Under Control, by Cal Newport of calnewport.com Queen Carvana stood haloed by the morning sun. An army hung on her every word. My champions! I have sold my chariot on Carvana!

[00:05:44] T'was a lovely SUV, an inexplicably queenly offer. They're even coming to the castle to collect it! Tonight, we feast! An offer you can feast on. Sell your car today on Carvana. Pickup fees may apply. This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales,

[00:06:13] using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Well, less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify. And a big thank you to Cal Newport, who is a popular writer with a book out there that's being talked about just about everywhere, it seems. That is called Deep Work, and it's one of six different self-improvement books that Cal has written.

[00:06:43] He completed his undergraduate studies at Dartmouth College in 2004 and got a PhD from MIT in 2009 in computer science. He was a postdoctoral associate in the MIT computer science department for a couple years after that. Then in 2011, he joined Georgetown University as an assistant professor of computer science and was granted tenure in 2017. His work focuses on distributed algorithms in challenging network scenarios. You know, basic stuff. But that is a wrap for today's episode.

[00:07:12] I hope you enjoyed it. Thanks so much for being with me. And I'll be back again right here tomorrow, where your optimal life awaits.