The world of research has gone berserk
Too much paperworkBob Dylan
Let’s start by stipulating that you are busy, very busy, very, very busy even. What with the kids and that damn dog and your nagging boss, not to mention the sheer number of tasks you are expected to complete in a given work day. You’re busy. I get it.
Let’s also stipulate that there is no inherent virtue in being busy. Can we all agree to that? Take a deep breath here before you react. Think. Just because someone does lots of stuff does not mean they are doing good or even doing good work. Just doing more stuff is neither a moral imperative nor a sure means toward effectiveness.
By extension, you therefore do not have to compete with your co-worker, neighbor, sibling, or even spouse over who is the busiest since busyness is — wait for it — meaningless in itself. Besides, count on it, you’re really busy. Really, really busy. So what?
What if I told you that busyness is as much as mindset as, well, any other mindset you might have? By mindset, I mean a deep-seated inclination, a set of unquestioned assumptions and all the habits and paradigms that accompany them.
Mindsets can be wonderful. If you truly believe that you can indeed learn new tricks no matter how old you are, you will tend to keep learning. If you truly assume that you will meet your personal goals, it is likely you will succeed.
Mindsets can also be debilitating. If you tell yourself you are bad at math, well, guess what. Even if there is no intrinsic reason or evidence that you have a math deficiency, every time you encounter a math problem you will tend to freeze up. Similarly, if you imbibe the notion that you, your family, or your organization simply lack the resources to get ahead, you will, indeed, lack the resources to get ahead. We call that the scarcity mentality, and it’s a killer.
Educators, following the work of Carol Dweck, tend to divide mindsets into two categories: growth mindsets and fixed mindsets. An example of the latter is the belief that my intelligence level is set, that I cannot grow smarter no matter how much I try. In contrast, a growth mindset would tell you that you can, indeed, improve your mind and increase your intelligence. By the way, can you guess which one of those is accurate?
Let’s try another. A fixed mindset will tell you that it’s all stacked against you. That the income you have now is about all you can ever expect. Sure you may get raises and promotions, but those will be incremental. You will never achieve your financial dreams and will wallow in scarcity. On the other hand, a growth mindset would tell you that what you make now has little bearing on what you will have in the future, that your income can increase exponentially. If you really believe this, both your attitude and — this is important — your behavior will change for the better.
So, let’s play with this idea that busyness is a mindset — something we believe without any doubt, an assumption, a habit. Is it a growth mindset or a fixed mindset?
Got your answer? Go ahead and just shout it out there.
Well, I can’t hear you anyway, so I will just tell you. It’s a fixed mindset. Much like the scarcity mindset, the belief in the need to stay busy embeds you in a permanent state. You are busy for two reasons. One is that you have lots to do or perceive that you have lots to do. In this respect, you are not so unique. The other is that you are busy because you think you should be busy or, perhaps unconsciously, want to appear busy to others.
To compound this silliness, we even compare our levels of busyness, like it’s some sort of contest. I am sure you have chuckled over the notion that whoever has the most stuff when they die wins, right? That’s just stupid. (I’m looking at you, Musk and Bezos.) Well, the busyness mindset, that lame competition we all endure, similarly suggests that whoever is doing the most when they die wins. Wow! Just wow! If my calendar is full of upcoming appointments when I shuffle off this mortal coil, then I am a winner!
Yay, me.
I’ll bet that you have, many times, tried to impress someone with how busy you are. I know I have. I’ll also bet you have done so more than once in the past week. Maybe, even more absurdly, you tried to compete with someone over who got the least sleep.
I long ago started prioritizing sleep (not always successfully), and I cannot tell you how many times I was in a conversation where people were comparing their lack of sleep as if competing to see who could bottom-out first. It’s like a drinking contest where the winner is the first to get carted off to the hospital with alcohol poisoning. Whenever I dared to chime in with “I try to get eight hours,” the reactions ranged from disbelief to actual revulsion. People thought less of me.
These folks would usually respond with something like, “I could never get eight hours! Not with all the things I have to do!” Saying you are merely trying — just trying — to get eight hours is regarded as though you just announced you never wash your hands after using the toilet.
Let’s shake on that.
The source of the problem with this competitive busyness/sleep deprivation nonsense is not the individual. We have all been swept up in a cultural phenomenon that imposes this debilitating mindset on us.
That said, the solution does lie with the individual. Each of us can opt-out of the mindset. Again, I am stipulating that you truly have much to do — you are way too busy — but that fact does not mean you have to maintain the busyness mindset.
There is something called Parkinson’s Law, which states, “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.“ In other words, you will use whatever time you have to complete a task. This is why we rarely finish work early … unless we resolve to do so.
That last point is critical. We somehow can fill our every day with toil deep into the evening except when we have a four o-clock tee time or when tea time is at four o’clock sharp.
I became aware of the notion that we take all the time we have to complete a task when I first started teaching as an adjunct professor. I realized that no matter whether I had one, two, or three courses a semester, I was just as flustered and harried by the workload. Initially I assumed that when I had only one course to teach, I was just putting in extra work. Or maybe I was skimping on the work for each class when I had more courses to teach. Over many years, though, and with ever-increasing workloads, I realized that I performed roughly the same amount of work for each course no matter the number, but I was somehow expanding that work when I had fewer courses to fill the time I had.
To be sure, I don’t mean that I was taking undue breaks or goofing off. Somehow, as per Parkinson’s mystical law, I was expanding the time on task it took to get the same quantity of work done. Eeek!
Eventually, I made some adjustments to how I viewed work, and my time-on-task reduced. In short, I shifted my mindset. Mind you, it isn’t easy to do this in our society, and I have reverted many times, even recently. The siren-song of the busyness cult is quite powerful.
So yes, you have lots to do. You are truly, truly busy.
But are you really?
Yes, yes. Of course you are.
But, really?
What steps can you take to prioritize your important work over your busy work? How can you shift your mindset to resist the lure of busyness?
You can strike the balance in your work and life that you deserve, and I can help. Click below for your free consultation.
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