The procrastination cure you don't want to hear
Summary
TLDRThe video discusses the common issue of resistance to doing what's beneficial, suggesting that the solution lies in embracing boredom. By eliminating distractions and focusing on the task at hand, individuals can find motivation and productivity. The speaker shares personal experiences and a study on the effects of boredom, emphasizing the need to restructure life to prioritize important tasks.
Takeaways
- 😌 The common problem people face is not a lack of knowledge about what to do, but an inability to bring themselves to do it due to resistance.
- 🤔 The feeling of resistance is often associated with tasks that are genuinely good for us, which can seem unfair.
- 🧐 The speaker suggests that life could be better if we naturally enjoyed doing difficult things, such as being creative or completing chores.
- 🔑 The solution to overcoming resistance is boredom, which is ironically also the problem. By eliminating distractions, the task at hand becomes more appealing.
- 🌑 The brain perceives entertainment relatively, not objectively, which means that the lack of other options can make a task seem more interesting.
- 🏠 The key strategy is to remove all distractions and create an environment where the only option is to do the task that needs to be done.
- 🧠 A study mentioned shows that people dislike boredom so much that they prefer self-electrocution over sitting idle, indicating the power of eliminating distractions.
- 📚 The speaker's personal experience in a limited environment without distractions led to increased productivity and creativity.
- 🛑 Eliminating distractions is an immediate solution that works because the brain seeks to avoid boredom and will find entertainment in the only available option.
- 🌱 The disparity between the entertainment value of tasks and distractions affects how agonizing the task will feel, and reducing distractions can make tasks more appealing.
- 💪 Living with fewer distractions can lead to a more fulfilling and empowering life, contrary to the belief that it would make life less entertaining.
Q & A
What is the most common problem the speaker identifies that people face in moving their life forward?
-The most common problem is not knowing what to do, but rather knowing what needs to be done and being unable to bring oneself to do it due to resistance and avoidance.
What does the speaker suggest is the root of the feeling of resistance when people think about doing things that are good for them?
-The feeling of resistance is rooted in the avoidance of tasks that are genuinely beneficial, which often feel boring or daunting to the individual.
Why does the speaker believe that people might not enjoy doing difficult things naturally?
-The speaker suggests that the natural inclination is to avoid difficult tasks because they are perceived as boring or less entertaining compared to distractions.
What is the 'nuclear' strategy the speaker refers to for overcoming procrastination and getting things done?
-The 'nuclear' strategy is using boredom as a tool by eliminating all distractions and leaving oneself with no option but to do the task at hand.
How does the speaker describe the human brain's perception of entertainment in relation to the strategy of using boredom?
-The speaker describes the brain's perception of entertainment as relative, comparing it to the way our eyes adjust to light in different environments, suggesting that the brain will find the only available option entertaining when all distractions are removed.
What study does the speaker reference to illustrate the aversion to boredom and its effects on human behavior?
-The speaker references a study published in Science in 2014, where participants chose to electrocute themselves rather than endure boredom, highlighting the extreme dislike for being bored.
What percentage of men and women in the study mentioned chose electrocution over boredom?
-67% of the men and 25% of the women chose electrocution over boredom.
How does the speaker use personal experience to support the idea that eliminating distractions can lead to productivity?
-The speaker shares a personal story of living in a small basement suite with few distractions, which led to increased productivity and creativity in editing videos.
What is the role of the sponsor Athletic Greens in the video, and how does it relate to the main topic?
-Athletic Greens is the sponsor of the video, and it is mentioned as a supplement that helps with energy, focus, and overall well-being, which indirectly supports the main topic by suggesting that feeling good physically can enhance one's ability to tackle tasks and overcome boredom.
What advice does the speaker give for structuring one's life to make necessary tasks more appealing compared to distractions?
-The speaker advises eliminating distractions by removing back doors, such as turning off the phone, removing gaming devices, and hiding toolbars, to make the necessary tasks more appealing and easier to focus on.
Outlines
🤔 Overcoming Procrastination Through Boredom
The speaker discusses the common issue of procrastination and the avoidance of tasks that are beneficial but perceived as boring. They argue that the problem is not a lack of knowledge about what needs to be done, but rather the resistance to take action. The speaker introduces the concept of using boredom as a tool to force oneself to do the necessary tasks. They explain that the brain perceives entertainment relative to the available options and suggests eliminating distractions to make the task at hand more appealing by comparison. A study from 2014 is referenced, where participants chose electrocution over boredom, highlighting the human aversion to inactivity. The speaker concludes that by removing all other options, one will naturally turn to the task that needs to be done.
🛠️ Embracing Boredom to Boost Productivity
The speaker continues the discussion on the power of boredom as a productivity tool. They emphasize that by structuring one's environment to minimize distractions, the tasks that need to be done become more appealing in comparison. The speaker shares personal experiences of living in a limited environment that forced them to focus on video editing, leading to a highly productive period. They suggest that by removing distractions such as phones, gaming PCs, and other entertainment sources, one can create an environment where the only option is to engage in the task at hand. The speaker also mentions a product, Athletic Greens, as a way to maintain energy and focus throughout the day, promoting overall well-being and productivity.
👋 Wrapping Up With a Call to Action
In the final paragraph, the speaker thanks the audience for watching and invites them to engage with the content by liking the video and subscribing to the channel. They also mention their presence on Instagram, where they share light-hearted and humorous content. The speaker ends on a positive note, encouraging viewers to look forward to the next video, and the paragraph concludes with a gentle music outro.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Resistance
💡Self-improvement
💡Boredom
💡Distraction
💡Motivation
💡Productivity
💡Environmental Conditioning
💡Nuclear Strategy
💡Contrast
💡Stamina
💡Supplement
Highlights
The common problem is not a lack of knowledge about what to do but the inability to do what is known to be beneficial.
People often feel a strong resistance to doing what is good for them, which is paradoxically absent when considering less beneficial activities.
The author suggests that self-improvement advice often overlooks the fundamental fact of life that people tend to avoid doing what is good for them.
A 'nuclear' strategy is introduced that involves embracing boredom to force oneself to do necessary tasks.
The brain perceives entertainment relatively, not objectively, which is key to understanding the power of boredom as a motivator.
Eliminating distractions and creating an environment with no alternatives can compel one to do the task at hand.
A study from 2014 showed that many people prefer self-electrocution to being bored, highlighting the aversion to inactivity.
Solitary confinement is considered inhumane due to the extreme boredom it induces, which is a form of mental torture.
When given only one option, the brain will make that option seem entertaining to avoid the pain of boredom.
The author shares personal evidence of how a lack of distractions led to increased productivity and creativity.
The author suggests removing all distractions from one's environment to force productivity.
By eliminating distractions, one can find fulfillment and empowerment in doing what is necessary.
The author promotes the use of Athletic Greens as a supplement to support energy, focus, and overall health.
Athletic Greens contains a high concentration of vitamins and nutrients sourced from real food, making it bioavailable for the body.
The author offers a link for viewers to try Athletic Greens and receive additional benefits with their first purchase.
The author encourages viewers to like, subscribe, and follow on Instagram for more content.
Transcripts
- I think one of the most common problems that people have
is not that they don't know what to do to dramatically
move their life forward in a substantial way.
You know exactly what you need to do right now.
There's probably something that you've been avoiding
like the plague,
but the problem is not that you don't know what that is.
The problem is that you just can't bring yourself to do it.
And that's the common theme every single day is
that when you sit down to do this thing,
you feel a feeling and it almost seems unfair
how potent this feeling of resistance is
because it's usually only present when you think
about doing things that are genuinely good for you.
So it's like, what's the deal with that?
Why does it seem like life is set up that way?
Wouldn't it be better
if you just actually enjoyed doing difficult things?
Wouldn't it be better
if you actually had the motivation to be creative
or to write a paper or to do your taxes?
You probably want nothing more
than to be someone who genuinely enjoys
and looks forward to doing the things that are good for you,
doing the things that empower you.
Recently I've been thinking.
There is one strategy that I have
that works every single time.
It always makes me do the thing that I need to do.
It's not very flattering. It's not very sexy.
We don't want to believe that this is the answer.
And I feel like there's so much
self-improvement advice out there that
kind of ignores this fundamental, not even tactic,
it's almost a fact of life.
And when we ignore this fact,
we'll try to do little tips and tricks like, oh,
set a timer for five minutes
and just really try, try really hard to do the work,
or try to think more positive thoughts about your work.
But all those strategies,
they're kind of throw away strategies.
Yeah, they might work here or there,
but they get old really quick.
This strategy is nuclear.
So if you need to do one particular thing,
then if you do this, you will do it.
You will have no choice.
The solution is boredom.
Ironically that's also the problem.
The solution and the problem are the same thing.
You don't wanna do that work
because it's so boring to your brain,
you want to gouge your eyes out.
All of these distractions that you have around
sound so much more entertaining than doing that thing.
So you always have a backdoor.
Why in hell would you write an essay
when you could be checking Instagram?
When you could be watching YouTube videos like this one?
But the key realization is
that your brain doesn't see objective entertainment values.
It's always relative.
A good analogy for this is when you're spending all day
outside in the sun, it's a super bright day,
and then you walk into a dim room or a store,
that indoor space feels super dark.
You're like, I can't see anything. What is this?
And then you see that weird
fake sun in your periphery that starts to fade.
Everything looks weird and purplely.
And in a very similar way,
if you've been asleep for a couple hours
and you have to get up and go to the bathroom,
you turn the lights on and it's just blinding.
It's not that that bathroom is any more bright
than it was before you went to bed
when you were brushing your teeth,
it's just that your brain interprets things using contrasts.
It uses comparison.
So the key is to utterly delete the back doors.
The key is to strip away every single option,
to sit in a blank room with nothing in it,
no phone, nothing.
Eliminate your ability to do anything other
than the thing that you need to do and you will do it.
And now you might be thinking, oh, it's not that simple.
I can just do nothing.
Well, you actually won't do nothing.
And there's studies to prove it.
There is a really weird study published in Science in 2014.
That was a mouthful, it's not.
What am I, a freaking Neanderthal?
That's not a mouthful.
That was really hard to say.
So in this study,
they got a bunch of undergraduate students
to sit in a empty room by themselves
with absolutely nothing to do
and be alone with their own thoughts.
But they had one other option.
And that was to electrocute themselves with a shocky button.
And it turns out 67% of the men and 25% of the women
decided that electrocution was better than boredom.
And some of the students
electrocuted themselves multiple times.
Even the ones that didn't electrocute themselves
either strongly considered it or at least lamented as
to how miserable the quiet time was and how boring it was.
You might have heard about this study before,
but I think it's a great example
as to how much human beings dislike being bored.
And so the reason why solitary confinement is considered one
of the least humane forms of torture imaginable.
There's this ancient torture method where they
basically just throw somebody down a hole under the castle
and forget about them for their entire lives.
Number 15, the oubliette.
The last thing you'd want after stealing a cup
of buckwheat is to end up in one of these mother (bleep).
That sounds terrible because it's so boring.
If you were put in an empty room with nothing to do
except one thing,
unless that thing is like chop off your hand,
you're probably gonna do that thing.
And while you're doing that thing,
that thing will feel so much more entertaining
than doing nothing.
So you have to ask yourself,
what are you constructing your life around?
How are you structuring things?
Are the things that you're supposed to do entertaining
in comparison to the things that you use as distractions?
Because the larger the disparity,
the more agonizing that thing will be.
And you'll find very quickly that if you delete distractions
as an option, it works right away.
It's insane.
This isn't like some dopamine detox
that you gotta do over weeks and months and years,
although that will help you get used to finding
the entertainment value in difficult things.
This is something that works right away
because your brain needs to to survive.
It hates feeling bored.
So it will make whatever your only option is
as entertaining as it needs to.
I even have personal evidence for this.
One of the most productive, social,
and energetic times in my entire life
is when I was living in a little 900 square foot
basement suite in the middle of suburbia
with absolutely nothing to do except edit videos.
So here's Alex looking in the pantry for stuff to eat.
These guys cooked us
our only good meal that we've had in several days.
And basically this whole video is basically just
to show off what we have going on in our fridge right now.
(roommates laughing)
Ketchup, a little bit of milk, some Korean honey.
Three pickles, salsa, and water.
I was absolutely broke.
And to edit these videos that I had to do
for my very few corporate freelance videography clients.
I was sitting on an upside down laundry hamper
because I couldn't afford an office chair,
but this was deeply motivating to me.
Although I did live with my friend, Alex,
he was hardly ever around so I had these long periods
of loneliness,
but that sting of loneliness made me social.
It made me make plans.
It made me seek opportunities.
My lack of money made me seek money.
And most importantly,
the lack of things to do in there,
the lack of distractions that I surrounded myself with,
made me extremely bored,
bored enough that editing videos and being highly creative
and doing what I love actually felt entertaining as well.
So there's a perfect example
of my environmental conditioning
helping facilitate a mindset
of creativity and attitude of productivity.
It's because I had very few other options.
So in summary,
if you have something you need to do right now,
then eliminate all your back doors, turn off your phone,
remove your gaming PC from your room,
remove your Xbox.
Auto hide the toolbar
so when you're thinking of the next word to write,
you don't look at Safari and automatically click on it.
And in living life this way
and treating productivity this way,
it's not that you're going to live a less entertaining life.
In fact, you might find it far more entertaining
and fulfilling and empowering than you ever knew possible.
And if you're looking for an excellent way
to have more stamina throughout the day
so that when you are actually doing the things
that you need to do, you can do it for longer,
then it will probably help to feel good,
mentally and physically,
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Optimize your health, feel fantastic.
And as usual, have a great time.
If you liked this video,
then if you actually hit the like button,
that's a huge help
because the video will rank better,
shoving my bald head into other people's homepages,
helping them out, which also helps me out.
So it is a win-win for everybody involved.
If you've seen my face a couple of times
and you like my videos,
consider subscribing and hitting up the Instagram.
Sometimes I post some memey silly shit on there.
And it's just fun.
Other than that, though,
thank you so much for watching
and we'll catch you in the next video.
(gentle music)
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