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Most people do 7+ hours on "unpaid digital labor" a week
Minimize your unpaid labor hours
- Before you can start minimizing your unpaid labor you have to know how much of it you’re doing. And we're generally used to underestimate how long we spend on tasks thanks to biases like the Planning Fallacy.
- Set proper expectations. One of the main reasons unpaid digital labor happens is because people don’t set proper expectations. We assume that people know how to communicate and we don’t need to spell out specific rules.
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SIMILAR ARTICLES & IDEAS:
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Key Ideas
The urgency bias
We usually give priority to unimportant tasks when there is a sense of urgency around them.
We’re actually psychologically wired to put aside important tasks in favor of ta...
Why it’s hard to ignore urgent tasks
A few explanations as to why it’s so hard to reject urgent tasks:
- The completion bias. Our brains crave the reward we get from checking off small to-dos from our list.
- Tunnel vision: When we get overwhelmed by the things we have to do, we choose to act on those most available to us; these are usually emails, calls, meetings, and other low-friction tasks.
Urgency puts us into reactive mode
The problem is that we’re continually bombarded with urgent work: emails, meetings, calls, and instead of being in control of our time and attention, we respond and act on someone else’s priorities.
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Key Ideas
Digital minimalism
This philosophy is guided by the idea that we should be in control over what kinds of media we consume, not have our habits dictated to us by technology.
This applies to the office as ...
Taking Leisure Seriously
Instead of defaulting into the low-quality obsessions that leave us wondering where the time has gone, we should cultivate high-quality hobbies that lead to lasting satisfaction.
Re-evaluate your relationship to technology:- First allow for a period of abstinence.
- Follow this by a selective re-introduction of only those tools and technologies that pass a more rigorous cost-benefit analysis than you typically impose.
Addiction and Modernity
They go hand-in-hand.
Addiction seems to be the inevitable consequence of our culturally-created environment changing faster than our biologically-hardwired brains.
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Key Ideas
Cluttered digital lives
If people's physical lives were anywhere near as cluttered as their digital lives, their kitchen sinks would be full of dishes, their closets would be jammed, and their houses would be in chaos.
Become a Digital Minimalist
We can reclaim our time and our attention. Unlike a physical space, we can wipe the slate clean in our digital environment.
If you clear apps from your phone, nothing will happen. You can always reinstall the ones you use.
Digital Declutter
- Clear your browser history.
- Unsubscribe from newsletters, podcasts, blogs, and anything else you consume.
- Delete all the apps that are currently on your phone and desktop or laptop (as long as you don’t have to buy a new version of anything).