Time is the Great Filter, The Busyness Trap & Reflective Embarrassment
Sunday Reset - Labour Day Edition: #5
👋 Welcome to this week’s Sunday Reset – where I provide you with 1 quote, 1 idea, & 1 article to either end your current week or start your upcoming week with something new.
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This week’s reset:
Quote: Reflective embarrassment
Idea: Time is the great filter
Article: The busyness trap
🚨 One quote:
Anyone who isn’t embarrassed of who they were last year probably isn’t learning enough.
— Alain de Botton (author & philosopher)
Key takeaway: Embarrassment over the mistakes we’ve made, actions we’ve taken, and the way we acted in the past is a good reflection on our personal growth.
💡 One idea
Time is the great filter
Lately, I’ve been thinking about the importance of delayed gratification.
Everywhere you look, society pushes us towards instant gratification.
Examples: fast food, social media, and video games. While each of these is okay in moderation, over-consumption is detrimental.
From this, I’ve realized that time is the great filter in our lives.
What do I mean by this…?
Time reveals a person to themselves.
We are not who we say we are, rather we are the accumulation of all of our previous actions.
You can tell others that you are an actor. But if you don’t practice your acting chops each day, are you really what you say you are?
If we overindulge in instant gratification, in time, this overindulgence defines who we are as people.
If we take part in delayed gratification and focus on small compounding actions of improvement, we are defined by the compounding improvement we’ve put in over time.
Time rewards those who put the work in.
Some further inspiration on this topic:
Watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.
— Lao Tzu (philosopher)
“well, well, well, if it isn't the consequences of my own actions”
Key takeaway: What will time reveal about you? Will time reveal the identity you desire?
🗞 One article
How to escape the busy trap
Sahil Bloom is one of my favourite online creators. Writing, podcasting, tweeting — you name it and he does it well.
Something I’ve struggled with myself over the summer is the “busyness trap”. Switching to a new role in a new industry, I’ve found myself in this “busy trap” due to the amount of learning I’ve had to do because of this role change.
Some of this is true, I have been pretty busy, but sometimes “being busy” can be a crutch. A form of self-protection.
There are consequences to this newfound busyness, that Sahil writes about, which I’ve really resonated with.
Failure to progress on the important (overarching goals)
Physical health
Mental health
Gratitude & enjoyment
Sahil writes:
Busyness is a boat anchor—it creates a drag that holds you back from reaching your potential.
Here is his three-pronged solution to escape.
Reframe the goal
Stop taking pride in being busy and instead focus on adding freedom to each day. Prioritize output in smaller batches of time by giving yourself smaller time blocks to complete objectives.
Focus
Ruthlessly prioritize tasks that are essential, and delegate/avoid tasks that aren’t (using the Eisenhower framework as an example)
Embrace boredom
Thanks for reading this week’s issue of my Sunday Reset.
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Hope to see you again soon 😊,