hey friends welcome back to the channel
this is going to be a bit of a chit chat
rambly video where i talk about my
feelings with a cup of chamomile tea
so if you want to grab a tea we can have
a bit of a chat and i want to talk about
my toxic relationship with productivity
this is something i
very recently realized and it was it was
a real shock to me as well as
as i'm sure it is for you guys uh
watching this if you've kind of been
following the channel for any any length
of time
the way it happened was a few weeks ago
i started feeling like i was in this
like real
kind of productivity slump in that when
it came to like filming videos
for a period of about three weeks every
time i filmed a video i just
sort of i really couldn't be bothered
and i was just like oh do i really have
to film this video but
because i have like you know hammered
the mantra into my heart that
consistency is like the most important
thing in life and
this fear when you're a youtuber that
all youtubers have that you know i
i can't possibly take a break from
youtube because if i do then the
algorithm
is going to be mean to me and everyone's
going to stop following my channel and
then my career is going to go downhill
and then i'm going to have to
have to end up being a doctor again that
thought process was on steroids
basically for this period of three weeks
and every time i filmed a video it was
like a real
yeah it was like an uphill battle every
time and the way i usually approach this
stuff it's that like
you know not everything has to be fun
100 of the time
there are times where we do have to push
through and do stuff but generally
the secret to my productivity for the
last i don't know 15 years of my life
has been that everything i do
i broadly enjoy and like 90 of it i
enjoy and maybe if i have to push
through the final 10
or usually the first 10 in in terms of
getting started that's just a bit that
takes a bit of pushing
but in this in this period of three
weeks it was like every aspect of these
videos needed that
that like you know uphill push and it
really wasn't a nice feeling to do
something that i was actively not
enjoying
but doing it because i felt like i had
to because of the algorithm for example
and then on top of not really
and then on top of not really filming videos anymore which is
filming videos anymore which is
unusual for me uh i also had this like
in the mornings
i would often have like a call a phone
call or like an art lesson or a workout
scheduled at like nine or ten o'clock in
the morning
and i'd sort of wake up bleary-eyed you
know i i set my alarm for 8 30 and then
i kind of sleep again and then like
three minutes before the call i'd wake
up i'd hop on the call i'd like
you know pretend to be bright and alert
and like awake and stuff but
i had this like seething resentment
inside of me that why do i have to you
know it's weird in a way because it's
it's not like anyone was forcing me to
do this like i am completely in control
of my own schedule
and i had chosen to book in art lessons
and workouts and these phone calls and
chats about my book and team meetings
all the stuff in the mornings
thinking you know a few weeks prior that
oh this will be good this will get me
out of bed
and then when it came to that it was
this feeling of like like hating my
former self
for booking in these things in the
morning and again
that's unusual because i've like never
really had that feeling before and then
after a few days of this i i'd also do
that thing
uh which apparently there's a word for
it it's called revenge bedtime
procrastination where
where this thing that we have where
you're like you know it's past your
bedtime
but you're you don't want to go to bed
and you just like continue to
procrastinate
and so i was like spending tons of time
just scrolling through instagram and
twitter
just for absolutely no reason until one
o'clock two o'clock sometimes even three
o'clock in the morning and later my
housemate sheen told me that this is
called
revenge bedtime procrastination where
which is a phenomenon whereby
you feel like you don't have control
over the rest of your day and so the
only bit of your day that you do have
control over ie night time that's when
your brain suddenly decides you know i'm
the boss i'm not gonna go to bed
and you end up screwing yourself for the
next day and then the final piece of the
quartet as it were was this like
ever every day i would have this chronic
feeling of dissatisfaction at the end of
the day being like oh
i didn't do enough today i woke up too
late or
i'd you know that that meeting wasn't
productive enough or i only filmed one
one video when i should have filmed
three videos and i should have shot
eight thumbnails and i should have done
four videos for my course but i ended up
only doing one thing and i'm not really
a stranger to this feeling of
dissatisfaction like this is
often how i feel but it's like i don't
like
it's it's rare for me to feel it
it's it's rare for me to feel it sort of multiple days in a row and there
sort of multiple days in a row and there
was this period of like two or three
weeks where it was just
sort of sort of stacking up i i sort of
feel like that time passed in a bit of a
haze and that i don't really remember
what hap like what i actually did in
those days like i looked back on my
calendar
from like you know a few weeks ago in
that in that period of three weeks and i
just think damn
i just don't remember any of this i just
don't really remember it happening and
that is also
a little bit of a scary feeling and so
all of this stuff
maybe it's burnout i've never really
experienced burnout before i don't
really know what that's supposed to mean
but maybe that's what that feeling is
like
where you feel like you just can't be
bothered to do anything and like the
work that you're having to do
is like a real a real struggle maybe
that's what burnout is but
uh i was like psychoanalyzing myself
earlier and i came up with a few
different reasons as to why this was
happening and then once i
discovered the reasons behind why it was
happening i found some solutions to it
so let's talk about those and the
biggest reason
is outcome dependence like i was fixated
to certain like
outcomes that were outside of my control
now this is normally something
that i very much rail against i don't
believe in setting output goals
i.e i don't believe in like if i make a
video i don't
believe in the concept of having a kind
of view count like oh i really want this
video to hit this many views or i really
want to hit this many subscribers
because that's just dumb
because that stuff is outside of my
control in almost every aspect of my
life i set
input goals instead like i'm just going
to make two videos a week and because
that's entirely within my control and my
team's control but
a few weeks ago i i think it was like
around about the start of january
january 2021. we dropped down from three
videos a week to two videos a week and
because of that drop down i was thinking
oh okay cool so now we're doing
fewer videos therefore all of these
videos need to be absolute bangers and i
kind of had that in my mind that i want
every video to be a banger and on
youtube when you want every video to be
a banger like
there that there is only so far that
particular thought process can go
because maybe you get a bang when you're
lucky and then maybe you get another
banger and you're lucky and then you get
a video
as youtube studio shows you which is
like 10 out of 10 on the analytics 10
out of 10 meaning that in your previous
10 videos
it's the 10th worst performer and so
that's a real feeling of like oh my god
and
basically every youtuber i've ever
spoken to has this feeling when they see
a 10 out of 10 on youtube studio being
like oh my god my life is over like
what's the point my youtube channel is
going down the drain i think it was
because for some reason i set this
intention in my head that hey i want to
make banger videos every time and that
intention made me fixated on the outcome
of the video like how well is the video
performing so then i was becoming like
obsessed with the youtube analytics and
thinking oh my god
this video's only got a thumbnail
click-through rate of like 9.8 percent
we need to get it up to 13
let's change the thumbnails let's go and
shoot load of thumbnails and essentially
this
loop of trying to optimize the numbers
whereas for the last like three and a
half years on youtube
i have broadly not really cared about
the numbers like i couldn't care less
once a video comes out how it performs
generally i try and try and operate like
that and so that outcome dependence on
the youtube channel was one thing
and then like alongside i had a lot of
outcome dependence
on sort of writing the book that i'm
working on i actually have this book
here by uh
draft number four john mcphee on the
writing process which is helping me
learn how to write but i'll i'll put a
video up there
that talks about how i feel i've wasted
the last six months of my life in in
terms of writing the book
and that stuff was happening around the
same time whereby
you know just for a bit of background
i've got a book deal and i'm writing a
book
there's sort of two goals that i could
have when writing the book one of them
is i want to write the best book i can
and i want to write something i'm proud
of which is very much an input goal
which is very much up my street and the
sort of goal that i normally have but
then there's the external goal which is
that i really want this book to hit the
new york times bestseller list
and it's such a dumb stupid arbitrary
goal to have because it's completely
outside of my control
and it's just it's just stupid but
for some reason i kind of fixated on
that as a goal that i wanted to reach
for
and so when i was writing the book
anytime i'd write something i'd be
thinking oh my god this is total junk
this is not very good
and i sort of be hating myself as i was
trying to write knowing that my work
wasn't very good at all and really
overall that entire problem was just
around setting outcome goals rather than
input goals the second cause of this
kind of toxic relationship with
productivity that i discovered is that
i often do this it's like i i don't pay
enough attention to my emotional state
and what i mean by that is that
often if i don't feel like doing
something i will
do it anyway and like push through the
pain and like you know i'm gonna do it
anyway
especially when it comes to making
videos like you know i think we've put
out like 350 videos or something on this
channel so far it's been on average two
point something videos a week since june
of 2017
and to get to that level of consistency
while hopefully keeping the quality up
uh to get them to get to that level of
consistency it's not like
every time i sit down to film a video
i'm like oh i'm really looking forward
to filming this video
in fact for the most part i have to kind
of force myself to get started
and then once i get started with filming
it's actually quite fun because i love
the sound of my own voice and it's quite
fun talking to a camera in a way but i
think there's a
there's a sweet spot when it comes to
this this thing like if
if you're a complete waste man and you
spend your entire life playing playing
world of warcraft
for example more on that later if you're
a complete waste man then there is a
level at which you have to tell yourself
i am going to do something even if i
don't feel like it i'm going to get off
the sofa get off my chair playing world
of warcraft and i'm gonna
go for a run even if i don't feel like
it i'm gonna study for my exams even if
i don't feel like it
i'm gonna ignore my emotional state
which wants me to just sit and play
world of warcraft
and i'm going to do the thing that is
better for my long-term
long-term future i'm gonna do the hard
thing that i know i should do and that
like if you're a total waste man it
makes sense that
you know often you should disregard your
emotional state because it's not it's
actively not serving you but
i think given that i'm really not a
waste man uh
i think i probably swing too far in the
opposite direction and i have a lot of
friends who are
sort of traditionally high achievers who
are also in this boat whereby
we will often do things whether or not
we feel like it because we know it's
they're a good thing to do but
just sort of take that to the point of
extremism almost where
even if i've had like you know i'm in a
bit of a slump and my emotional state is
a bit like oh i'm not really feeling
inspired to write or i'm not really
feeling inspired to make a video
i'll think you know what no you have to
be a professional and
actually we've got a video coming out
later this week or next week about
overcoming procrastination
that is all about like tackling this
thing of the resistance that we have but
i think a
big part of at least for me this kind of
verge of burnout if we want to call it
burnout a big part of this was just
ignoring my emotional state and pushing
through and doing stuff
regard like even even though i wasn't
feeling like feeling like it and
obviously like you know these are these
are like two extremes and there is some
kind of sweet spot
which i'm trying to get closer to which
is something along the lines that
yes there are some occasions in which we
do have to force ourselves to do stuff
but it's also okay to take a break this
is a very roundabout way of saying it's
okay to take a break sometimes
and if i am feeling like you know i i
don't feel like filming a video this
evening
even if there's a sponsored video
deadline coming up i could just email
the sponsor and be like hey guys
i wasn't really feeling it i wasn't
really inspired can we delay this video
by a few days and then normally like
they're so nice they'd be like yeah sure
take your time do whatever you want
basically it's so it's okay to take a
break but i think i had in my head that
i had to be productive at all at all
times
regardless of how i was feeling and that
i think contributed to this
weird relationship that i have with
productivity and thirdly i think a big
contributor was just the fact that my
calendar was way too busy a few
i think a couple of months ago i
discovered calendly this app that lets
you like
send a link to someone and they can book
a time on your calendar uh and so
anytime people would email me like i get
sort of
hundreds of emails each day and often
there are some very interesting
opportunities people running startups or
people doing
interesting youtubers type things or
creative things or just wanting to have
a chat and
there was a period of a few weeks where
i was very trigger happy with my
calendly link i would just be like if
someone would be like hey can i pick
your brain about x i'd be like
you know what this might be fun sure
here's a calendly link book a time
wherever you want
and i'll rock up on a zoom call or if
someone would email be like hey i'm
running this startup and i'd love to get
your thoughts on something and maybe you
can help marketing i mean i'm sure a
book of time on the calendar and i ended
up with like a ridiculously packed
calendar
where like every half an hour from like
9 30 in the morning until like 6 pm some
days i would just have a different zoom
call
um and this would be sort of amongst uh
sort of live
live sessions of my part-time youtuber
academy which has been running for the
last six weeks it would be alongside
uh coaching sessions and workouts and
art lessons and there were so many days
where i was
like having lunch on a zoom call being
like look i'm really sorry i've been in
back-to-back zoom course for the last
five hours
i'm gonna stay in back-to-back zoom
course for the next six hours do you
mind if i eat on the zoom call my
housemate sheen would often be like like
why the hell
don't you take a break to eat dinner
like what's the point of you being on a
zoom call is that hour really going to
make a difference
but because i'd been so trigger happy
with my calendar link i felt bad and
cancelling on these people and
just had a ridiculously packed calendar
which is good
i feel it feels very first of all
probably but i think
given that like book writing and
youtubing and stuff most of the stuff i
do on the internet is quite
a kind of creative art i've realized
that i probably do need a lot of time
blocked out
to actually make a video and to actually
write something
because in my head i was thinking well
you know if the video is
20 minutes long it should only take half
an hour to film because you know i'm a
professional i've been doing this for
four years and so
i can set the camera up i've eliminated
friction in my life i can film in half
an hour
and i just didn't take account of the
fact that i am a waste man sometimes
when it comes to this stuff and often it
like
it takes me three hours to get into the
mood to then film a video
i just didn't really count that i sort
of assumed that i was better at this
productivity thing than i actually was
and that meant that i overlooked my
calendar sort of i i basically had no
margin
built into my my schedule margin being
sort of
gaps like empty gaps where you can just
sit down and think
or if something runs over overruns then
you can you can fill it in the gap
or if you want to have lunch you
actually have a gap for that and so
and so all of these different things i
think were what contributed to this
overall feeling of like you know oh i
cba
i can't be bothered to do any of this
this youtube stuff can't be bothered
with a book it's too much effort
the goal is too hard this is never going
to happen i'm a terrible writer i'm a
terrible youtuber people look around
follow me blah blah but
thankfully in the last couple of weeks
this has improved because having
figured out what the problems were i've
now sort of actively started to address
those problems so
firstly i have made it a point to not
set output goals
uh outcome goals rather and so even
though in the back of my mind i do
really want this book to be in new york
times bestseller
that's anytime i have that thought i try
and squash it away and think instead no
if i had to choose between that and
writing a book i'm proud of and that i
like
i would definitely choose writing a book
that i'm proud of and that i like and
even for
videos like like this on youtube
videos like like this on youtube you might have noticed past past few
you might have noticed past past few
weeks
i've been doing more of these sit down
and have a chat with a cup of tea type
videos
i really like doing these videos because
i can just sort of speak from the heart
i can talk about my feelings it feels
like the camera is in a way a sort of
therapist
um and it's always nice reading the
comments and i actually prefer doing
these sorts of sit-down chatty
these sorts of sit-down chatty than a very well produced here are the
than a very well produced here are the
18 ways to be productive
type video which takes a lot of a lot of
actual effort to put together and a lot
of like
mental effort to you know bring myself
to sit down and make
which is why partly i've been doing more
of these videos and what i'm telling
myself is i actually don't really care
how these perform if people want to
watch them that watch them if they don't
they don't people will find something to
do with that time regardless
i don't need to be fixated on what that
number is telling me on youtube studio
on the youtube analytics
secondly i now have a much emptier
calendar which is great i have modified
my calendly links and i have now
like my assistant elizabeth who has her
own youtube channel link below um
elizabeth keeps keeps on telling me like
why the hell are you saying yes to so
many people
because i feel like i'm a i'm a chronic
nice guy in that if someone emails me or
messages me or especially if like a
friend
intros me to someone else who they know
and they ask for a meeting
i'll often just say yes to it and it was
this thing of saying yes to too many
things and
booking them in the calendar way too
often that meant the calendar was
overloaded
so now i've changed my calendar link so
like no one is allowed to book meetings
with me before two o'clock in the
afternoon
which gives me the whole morning
basically free to do creative stuff and
then an hour for lunch
and then i can have calls from like two
til like six pm but i'm only allowed to
have like two or three calls each day
and so it's like a system solution to
a people problem my people problem is
that i'm too keen to say yes to things
but now
the link doesn't the link itself does
not let
me over book myself and so if you've
been emailing me in the last couple of
weeks and you haven't had a response or
haven't you know
got a meeting arranged with me apologies
but it had to be done i was just trying
to say yes to too many things
it's weird because like when you start
off doing stuff on the internet you
think like any time you get a comment
anytime you get an email you're like oh
my god someone's like watching my stuff
someone wants to talk to me hell yes
i'll give you like an hour of my time
but then as you become
more more more more famous then you
start getting way too much inbound and
there are literally not enough hours in
the day to actually be able to
say yes to all the things you want to
say yes to and and even if there were
it wouldn't make sense to use up kind of
18 hours of my working day to just
have meetings with people because the
reason people follow me in the first
place is because i
make the time to make videos and without
that like empty blocks of time in my
calendar
i don't think i would be serving my
long-term interest or over all the
long-term interests of my audience uh
which feels a bit grandiose but oh well
thirdly i have found that
i've tr i'm trying to become a bit more
aware of what my emotional state is
at any given moment i've spoken to a few
friends who are sort of like me i.e
weird productivity nerds
and they've said that getting a
therapist has really really helped
because
even though they don't have mental
health issues per se it's still
helpful to be able to speak to someone
that just encourages you
and in a way forces you to actually
address what your emotional state is
around stuff and so i'm trying to get
more okay with asking myself how do i
you know how do i feel right now and you
know therefore
do i really want to do this thing that i
know i should do or should i just kind
of give in to my feelings
for not viewing that as a bad thing so
i'm still a work in progress
i wasn't really feeling like filming
this video right now but my housemate
talked me into doing it and i'm kind of
glad i'm doing it now because it's like
most of these things like most of the
friction most of the activation energy
is just in getting started
and once you get started it's actually
quite fun fourthly i've actually resumed
playing world of warcraft
um i'm actually doing a 30 day challenge
where i play i play video games for 30
days so
i won't say too much about that but i've
been streaming basically every day on
twitch if you want to follow me
twitch.tv
bell that's been fun and finally the
thing that i realized that i really
should get better at doing is
that basically at the end of the day i
can just choose to be satisfied with
what i've done there was a great blog
post i read my friend
neil nanda who featured on our podcast
once i put i'll put a link to the video
below yeah
he's got a great blog post that talks
about this just that as productivity
type people
like we always think you know you wake
up in the morning thinking oh i didn't
get enough sleep and then you know you
get back from work or from school or
whatever and think i didn't i didn't
perform well enough at work and then you
do your side hustle you're like oh i
could have been more productive in the
side hustle
if you have a family you're like oh damn
i wasn't present enough with my kids or
my housemate and all that kind of crap
and then at the end of the day you go to
bed thinking oh my god i've gone to bed
too late and i'm going to get not enough
sleep and then the whole cycle is going
to continue and a real big part of it is
just in choosing to be satisfied with
the thing so
what i've realized i can do is at the
end of the day i i could just think to
myself you know what
today's been a good day of work i could
think that or i could beat myself up i
could think oh my god i've been so
unproductive today what is life i'm such
a waste man but like either way it
doesn't change the fact that i've done a
certain amount of work i filmed one
video i shot a thumbnail i did a thing
for my youtuber academy the story i tell
myself about it after the fact
does not change the actual reality all
it does is make me feel bad about myself
when i'm when i tell myself i'm a waste
man and it's it's 10 p.m but i haven't
done enough work for the day therefore i
should be doing something productive
rather than i don't know playing world
of warcraft or something
so what i'm trying to do is trying to
tell myself that it's okay to choose to
be satisfied with what i've done at the
end of the day because ultimately it
doesn't really change anything
all it does is make me feel better about
my life and then i can
play world of warcraft while streaming
on twitch and do it guilt-free
rather than hating myself every step of
the way as i level up my protection
paladin and so that is my toxic
relationship with productivity it's
still a work in progress
it's been a while since i've been in a
relationship with anyone or anything so
it's kind of it's kind of novel in a way
but it's not
the sort of relationship with
productivity that i would like and i'm
you know she and i are working together
to improve things
if you go to this point in the video i'd
love for you to leave a clover emoji in
the comments i'm always very curious to
see how many people reached the end of
this video if you haven't subscribed the
channel you definitely should and if you
enjoyed this sort of video we'll put a
little playlist over here
with more chit chat rambly type videos
over a cup of tea if you're into that
sort of thing thank you so much for
watching really appreciate you guys are
actually watching these videos like it's
it's it's genuinely nice having like a
people who
have my back and as like a therapist on
camera so thanks for that if you have
any tips on how to solve this problem
let me know but otherwise click the
links over there
and we'll see you in the next video good
night