What is the Most Effective Day?
Deep work, prioritisation, and feedback.
I would like to be more effective, which means I need to do more with my time. If I do that, I can spend more time eating apple crumble and watching TV.
So I asked myself: what is the best schedule that maximises my output on a given day? What is the perfect day? Trying to strive for an ideal can’t hurt, right?
Robert M. Pirsig — 'You want to know how to paint a perfect painting? It's easy. Make yourself perfect and then just paint naturally.'
Well, effectiveness is just doing high impact tasks. I think I’m confident to muster up the willpower to do pretty much any task (stupidly cycling on a truck highway for three hours is evidence of this). But what makes a task actually effective? I guess it’s three ingredients - strong emphasis on guess:
prioritising what the best task to do is,
doing the task, and then
But prioritising things take time. Actually doing things takes time. And… getting feedback on those things takes time. So much time!
I hate planning large projects that span days. So I thought, why not try to fit those three things into a perfect day? If I can do that, then the main thing to solve for was the right mix of time spent doing each.
But then I realised I couldn’t accurately measure how changing the mix affects my output or effectiveness. So in the absence of experiment, I did the lazy thing and just ended up uniformly splitting my day into thirds: prioritisation, doing stuff and feedback. I also ordered them to match the best time of day to do those things, based on heuristic essays and studies below.
I’m still thinking about how to measure and optimise the mix, but the strongest thing I can say is that all the essential components are here. It's not complete, but it's a mental scaffold to work with. I usually fail to stick to it, but a bad system is better than no system. I also don't expect this to work for anyone but me, but I still wanted to share it (if only to get people thinking about how they might get some leverage out of their day).
Without further ado, here's my current best schedule. It’s kinda boring eh?
My Best-Guess, Best Schedule
7:30am: First order of the day: I do a small task from my task list, no matter how small.
Doing a task in the morning gives me initial momentum to get the ball rolling. The point isn't to do anything big, or spend too long deciding what to do. Rather, I just want some activation energy to get on with the rest of my day.
The task needs to be a 'create' action. Usually, it's editing a draft of a blog post, or fixing some code. I do this first thing to benefit from the morning writing effect - I still think that I write best in the morning.
I do not read WhatsApp or do any emails.
8:30am - 10am: I aggressively prioritise the most important things I need to do.
Prioritising the best thing to do is the main way I get higher impact per hour. Right now, I am looking at biosecurity projects.
This involves thinking about neglected-ness, personal fit, and potential upside, and continually sorting a whole lotta lists. Over and over again. Just like, endless sorting.
Often I stare at the same tasks lists over and over again. I don't really get into flow state, but I think this is fine when dealing with hard-to-measure goals.
I try to write down why I think those projects are important, which end up being products themselves.
I use Obsidian and the Tasks plugin to do this.
To build a cognitive reward system, I tend to have coffee after doing this. I love coffee.
After this, I try to figure out what's the most important thing I could do today.
Rest of the morning: I do the most important thing, whatever it is. It should be a 'build' or 'do' action, which means either
This is where I want to be in flow state.
I try to do some writing, coding, building, or 'intentional meetings'.
This involves working on my Substack, youtube, or doing the hard science for my chemistry projects. Or building ways to have higher pressure rooms.
A large chunk of this is also just incorporating feedback from others, which I usually get the evening before.
How do I decide when to stop? Well, usually, it's just until one quantum of improvement is accomplished when doing the task. Stopping means doing a github commit, finishing a paragraph, or logging a build.
Finally, I eat lunch.
In the afternoon:
My main goal is to try and get feedback on stuff I've built, engage with my communities, and try to speak to people.
I write and respond to emails, following up with people on what I've done.
It also involves going on my slack and discord and asking people what they've been up to. I try to be intentional about this, and set reminders to follow up. I try to give feedback to others if they ask for it.
I've recently started to use Superhuman to do this, so thanks David for the suggestion if you're reading this.
At some point, I take a break to exercise. I usually go running, do calisthenics, or go on a long cycle.
In the evening
Have dinner.
Hang out with my girlfriend, friends and family. Try something new.
Thank you to my girlfriend for having to witness this painful process for 3 years.
Def taking some inspo to add it to my daily routine