Binge-reading productivity articles: The Cut

I love reading about ways to be more productive. Here are a bunch I read from the Cut that I think others would find interesting:

  • Everything Always Takes Longer Than You Think
    • Humans are really really bad at planning. Like, we exceed our worst case expectations bad
    • This is called the planning fallacy. One solution is to use a “pre-mortem”, detailed in the next article
  • To Reach Your Goals, Imagine You Already Tried and Failed
    • One way to get around that is to do a “pre-mortem”, pretend its some point in the future and the plan you put in place went horribly wrong – and write a retrospective detailing what happened and why
  • How Exercise Shapes You, Far Beyond the Gym
    • Exercise is really good for you for reasons other than physical health. It can increase your ability to handle discomfort, and improve your ability to self-regulate
    • Also see this podcast about dopamine, and how pain is necessary to feel pleasure
  • You Need a Schedule
    • You need structure – a schedule gives you peace of mind through order and predictability
    • People who use to-do lists get more things done, organized paper lists are better than digital or unorganized lists