Hey there! I’m Sam and this is The Deliberate. It’s a newsletter about the intersection of attention, productivity, time management, organization design, and anything else that is bouncing around my noggin. I’m glad you’re here, but if this isn’t something you want to keep going with, please feel free to unsubscribe at any time.
In Praise of the Deliberate Administrative Task
Several months ago I decided I wanted to buy a road bike. Even before then, in the throes of the pandemic lockdown, I bought a Peloton and had been riding it consistently for a while (even doing several 2+ hour rides!). This felt like evidence enough that cycling was something I had the potential to enjoy and doing it outside surrounded by the splendor of nature, rather than the corner of my living room, would be a major upgrade.
Excited to more fully embrace my identity as a member of a DINK couple, I started buying cycling apparel and looking at Craigslist for a new (to me) road bike. Riding high on my inevitable entrée to Cycling Guy culture, I had a minor, yet glaring, realization: “Wait. How the heck am I going to get this bike home? I drive a Camry.” Realization thus had, my research pivoted to bike racks rather than bikes. Momentum momentarily interrupted, but not yet extinguished, I bought the rack. A week or so later it arrived at my apartment and I excitedly unboxed it.
Hands on my hips, dissected cardboard box strewn about my feet, the rack looked like a giant insect curled into its version of the fetal position. A quick glance through the instruction booklet didn’t magically fill me with motivation to figure out how to install it. My motivation was fleeing my body like a toddler fleeing bedtime so I put it in a closet and told myself I’d install it once I found the bike I wanted to buy. As a surprise to nobody, I never ended up buying a bike because every time I thought about it I’d remember the expensive contraption sitting in my closet waiting for me to install it on my car.
Thus ended my brief foray into becoming a road cyclist.
Around that same time I became curious about what sort of gyms were around my apartment. My building has a basic fitness center but I missed having access to free weights and was even becoming a bit curious about getting into swimming.
There was one that seemed kind of interesting but I wasn’t 100% sure where it was located. I could see where it existed on a map but I had walked by that location multiple times and I didn’t remember seeing a building that screamed “I’m a gym!” Also, gyms are expensive and can quickly transition into a guilty millstone around your neck if you don’t use them enough. Plus, going in to get a tour and talk to the manager about getting a membership always made me feel like I was going to be scammed. Shouldn’t I be able to just run outside and do bodyweight exercises in my apartment fitness center anyway? Do I really need a special location to do these things?
Thus ended my brief foray into getting a gym membership.
Yesterday, I decided I couldn’t stand looking at that bike rack in my closet anymore. I’m a man who can put together Ikea furniture. I can put together a moderately complex Lego set. I can figure out how to put a bike rack on my car that is specifically designed to be easily installed and uninstalled. And figure it out I did. It took about 25 minutes from dragging it out of the closet and power posing over it to build my confidence to cinching down the last of the straps and giving it a good tug to see if it was actually attached to my car (it seems to be!). Bike rack installed, I perused Craigslist, found a great bike, and picked it up only minutes ago.
Riding the high of actually putting the rack on my car, I decided to walk over to where I thought the interesting gym from my original batch of research was and see if I could a) find it and b) see what the membership options are. It’s about a 15 minute walk away, which is kind of a perfect distance for a pre-workout warmup walk or run, right? I even managed to find it! And the manager I talked to was a nice guy with kids who play hockey, the gym itself has everything I was looking for, and it costs less than I worried it would with no egregious “gotchas” (other than the additional $45 annual ‘facility improvement fee’). It took maybe 30 minutes from walking into the facility to walking out with a membership.
I don’t know what the lesson is here. All I know is that two open loops that I’ve had hanging over my head for the better part of eight months were both closed in a matter of a couple hours yesterday, and I now feel lighter and better than I have in a long time. Also somewhat chagrined. What else have I been avoiding because I’ve built it up into some kind of arduous test or epic tribulation in my mind? What other administrative tasks I’ve explained away as distractions are actually the key to unlocking the conditions or motivation to pursue what matters?
Deliberately closing open loops is intoxicating and, whew, brains are weird.
For Your Attention
Max and I hit a milestone -- 50 episodes! This one is a lot like all the other ones: Max talks about what’s going on at the farm, I make some dad jokes, and then I talk about something silly I tried. Here’s to fifty more!
Somehow this article hits three of my favorite topics all in one go: long walks, productivity, and using an operating system as a metaphor. I’ve shared Craig Mod’s work in this newsletter many times before so it’s interesting to hear how he uses the structure of his long walks as a platform for creating all the stuff that he creates.
I’ll be honest, I haven’t read this one yet. Given the topic (productivity tools and existential angst) and who is writing it (Clive Thompson), I’m sure it’s worth our time though. Stowe Boyd’s rebuttal, which I have read, is a worthwhile companion piece, too.
And a couple Twitter threads to round out what caught my attention recently:
Tom Critchlow pulled together a Twitter thread of articles freelancers have written reflecting on their independent journeys.
Erin Westgate shares a Twitter thread breaking down some research she has done about living a “psychologically rich” life.
Until next time!
