The problem with the 40 hour workweek⁠↗

Sitting around doing meaningless work, feeling as if you are wasting a third of your day that drains you (making it difficult to want to do anything in the second third), which makes you want to stay up late to “get the most out of your day,” which ruins the last third.

Charles Darwin wrote 19 books and created the theory of evolution, working 3-4 hours a day. Meanwhile, you’re trying to look busy for 8 hours because that’s what “real work” looks like to your boss and parents.

A pattern I’ve noticed in successful people (who didn’t sacrifice their life for success) is that they physically worked very little, yet people see them as hard workers. Mentally, they were always thinking, plotting, and scheming. They worked in their mind. And once they were clear on their idea, they executed with speed that others couldn’t compete with.

The new status symbol, in my eyes, is the ability to achieve more, in less time, and make it seem effortless. People shouldn’t believe you when you tell them that you only work 3-4 hours a day. You have the technology and access to knowledge to do this, you’ve simply been trained to need someone to provide you with a clear plan for your life.

Self-directed work requires people to control their own schedules and methods. It is skill-intensive and specific, meaning you will need multiple years of public practice paired with an apprenticeship (today, this comes in the form of courses and content from great thinkers, unless you find someone who is willing to dedicate time to you). It emphasizes craftsmanship. And last, the work moves at a leisurely pace. There is time for rest and thinking.

Those who come to me and say, “You know, I work 15 hours a day,” I say, “I am not interested.” I am interested in the quality of working hours, not the quantity. The brain of the human being. Do you think that during the first five hours of the day you are the same as you are in the last five hours? No way. You’re tired, and if you’re tired, you stop listening, and the decisions you make are risky.

• Brunello Cucinelli

AI solves utility so humans can transcend to meaning.

You do not need to work 16 hours a day to have a great idea. In fact, your brain will not allow novel ideas to emerge when you are in the narrow-minded “productive” state. It’s ironic, but constant work destroys how impactful your work can be.

Your level of skill determines the level of ideas you can have. If you do not acquire a unique and overlapping skill stack, you are limited to ideas that have already been exhausted. You must create a vision and trek through the unknown if you want to achieve any form of uniqueness.

In the morning, entropy is constrained. There are minimal distractions when the world is just waking up, so I place my most important tasks then.

The gym marks the end of my intensive tasks, and I do not work on those later in the day, because I know the quality will suffer. If I have an idea, I write it down and refer to it in the morning.

You live in the most permissionless time in history.