My work life is overflowing with stuff. If there is such a thing as an effective executive, I ain’t it.
(Side note: The Effective Executive is in the house, ready to read. It’s time to read the classics. The Lindy books. And it’s time to read them slowly. Reading as rumination.)
I choose to get small.
How? And what does “get small” mean?
At a high level it means to 10X my results by shrinking my input actions by 10.
This seems like an absurd way to approach life and business and all that. But I don’t think it is absurd. I think it will yield qualitative improvements. Stripping away one behavior at a time, one resource at a time, one thought at a time will remove friction and distraction.
This does not mean less work. It does not mean less risk.
It means less confusion. or to put it in a “focus on what you want more of” way, it means clarity.
Just remove. If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out. Etc.
Why? Here is the testable hypothesis behind the idea of getting small. Everything I do, every belief I have exists for a reason. It’s a load-bearing cope. I interact with people the way I do in order to cope with life in a way that is acceptable to my soul.
Let’s remove one load-bearing cope at a time and see what happens. Rather than flit from one place to another in writing, let’s just marinate in this one theme. Via negativa. Remove the obvious. Be sensitive to the impact as the psychic load shifts.
Let’s stare into the abyss, shall we?