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Multitasking sucks

There were times when I loved doing several things simultaneously. I could make a soup and at the same time discuss another website layout, write a newsletter and watch a TV show. Over time I’ve realized that multitasking almost always sucks, and here’s why.

  1. Only few people in this world can multitask and deliver great results. There’re almost none.
  2. The desire to complete two different things at one is a pathetic attempt to buy some time. Both are likely to be done badly.
  3. Multitasking is often used in the wrong places. It leads to mistakes, sometimes fatal.

To figure out when it’s okay to multitask and when it’s not, I follow a simple method.

If the task doesn’t require thinking and analyzing new information—cleaning, washing dishes, walking through the park—it can be combined with another activity. For example, I make half of my calls and team meetings on the go, because I can move my legs without thinking about it.

However, if the task requires you to immerse yourself into the topic, to constantly assess the situation, to watch for safety—meeting with a new client, playing basketball, or driving a car—you'd better put everything else on hold and focus. Otherwise, you might miss a crucial idea of the talk or get hit in the face with a ball. And if you’re checking your phone while driving or crossing the street, you may die eventually.

I’m not a fan of multitasking, and I hate it when it is mispresented as a criterion for success. But at the same time, I love variety. I enjoy running several projects at once, meeting new people every day, and visiting different cities. The variety is in the spice of life! It inspires me and gives me food for thought. But doing several tasks at once — fuck this. It’s highly likely to turn out to be bullshit.

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One message, one idea

If you want to be heard, follow a simple “One message, one idea” rule in your texts, emails, websites, and presentations. Don’t overload your audience with details, keep it simple.

One sentence, one idea. One paragraph, one idea. One essay, one idea. One post, one idea. See, I just did it!

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The most important step in your life ★

We tend to plan everything, foresee all possible options, calculate all risks, to think about ways to retreat in advance. Most often in vain. This strategy is ineffective, 'cause most of our fears never come true. But there will always be something we couldn’t anticipate.

Our brain constantly wants certainty, otherwise, it begins to think we are in danger. But visualizing the future in detail is too costly for the brain. And when our expectations don’t match reality, it’s also painful for the psyche. Instead of trying to predict our future, we should focus on the next step. It’s a gentler approach, with no pressure and stress.

The most important step in your life is the next step. Not the one from five years ago, not the one you’ll take a year from now. Just the next step of yours.

If you have a big goal or task in front of you and you have no idea where to start, or how to approach it, try not to think of it as a big goal. Instead, think of what your next step might be and take it. This little trick will help you overcome the numbness and begin to act.

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Make a plan

Having a plan helps our mind avoid panicking and makes it easy to star acting. Stop wasting your time, make a plan. It’s the first step on the way to your goal.

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Being wrong

The hardest thing to do when you’re wrong is to accept that it’s only your fault and responsibility, but no one else’s. It’s incredibly difficult to admit when you’re wrong.

It takes a great courage to stand up and say, “Yeah, I failed. I am sorry for that. I was wrong.” Very few people are capable of taking such a step. If you can do that, you have reason to be proud of yourself.

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The value of life ★

The secret of happiness can be revealed with a simple thought. Life is always beautiful. No matter what shit may come and happen, life is good simply because being alive is better than being dead.

Our life is very erratic and inconsistent. You won’t have forever what you have now in your life. Someday it will end. All of it. And there will be nothing to enjoy, nothing to look at, and nothing to regret about.

Even though sometimes life puts us to the test it doesn’t make life less precious and amazing. To live is always good. Remember that both in the moments of joy and in the moments of grief.

The value of life is in life itself, not in how easy or hard this life is for you.

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Never be daunted

It’s hard to think clearly in difficult times. Fear paralyzes, impotence suppresses the mind, you feel dropped out.

The main principle that helps me keep my mind clear and sound is: “Continue going your way and don’t lose heart. Never lose heart.”

Not to lose your way, manage your focus and keep moving towards the goal when the world is on fire is an invaluable skill and strength. To remember that difficult times are not forever is a sign of incredible resilience.

Be strong and resilent. Continue on your way. Never be daunted.

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“So you want to be a writer?” by Charles Bukowski

If it doesn’t come bursting out of you
In spite of everything,
Don’t do it.
Unless it comes unasked out of your
Heart and your mind and your mouth
And your gut,
Don’t do it.
If you have to sit for hours
Staring at your computer screen
Or hunched over your typewriter
Searching for words,
Don’t do it.

If you’re doing it for money or fame,
Don’t do it.
If you’re doing it because you want
Women in your bed,
Don’t do it.
If you have to sit there and
Rewrite it again and again,
Don’t do it.
If it’s hard work just thinking about doing it,
Don’t do it.
If you’re trying to write like somebody else,
Forget about it.

If you have to wait for it to roar out of you,
Then wait patiently.
If it never does roar out of you,
Do something else.
If you first have to read it to your wife
Or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
Or your parents or to anybody at all,
You’re not ready.

Don’t be like so many writers,
Don’t be like so many thousands of
People who call themselves writers,
Don’t be dull and boring and
Pretentious, don’t be consumed with self-love.
The libraries of the world have
Yawned themselves to sleep
Over your kind.
Don’t add to that.
Don’t do it.

Unless it comes out of
Your soul like a rocket,
Unless being still would
Drive you to madness or
Suicide or murder,
Don’t do it.
Unless the sun inside you is
Burning your gut,
Don’t do it.

When it is truly time,
And if you have been chosen,
It will do it by
Itself and it will keep on doing it
Until you die or it dies in you.

There is no other way.
And there never was.

Charles Bukowski, 1920…1994

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Trends are a trap

Never follow trends. Any design should start with a blank canvas, any copy should begin with a blank Google Doc with a blinking cursor in it. Solutions are born in the head, not on the screen.

It’s no use aligning your work with trends or reading another top-10-design-trends-of-the-coming-year article. No one who walked a well-trodden path has ever invented or explored something new.

The only way to create something unique is to think out of the box, to develop your own thinking that will lead to ideas completely different from those that trends dictate.

Trends are a mental trap. They limit designers to a range of customary, safe solutions that don’t excite people. How else to explain hundreds of thousands of identical landing pages, dull logos, and Corporate Memphis illustrations. All this is the result of following trends.

I publicly declare that trends are bullshit, and I allow you to score on them. If you look for a novelty, swim against the tide.

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Circus with animals

Circuses and moving zoos are the wildest misconception in 2021. I honestly don’t understand why they still exist.

What is the point to look at a dancing bear that was trained and forced to dance? Who has ever laughed at clown’s jokes? Aren’t they the most pathetic and lousy jokes in the world? What is the pleasure to stare at animals locked in small cells, dying of thirst or frostbite?

I would prohibit circuses just for their absolutely disgusting “wanna-gouge-my-eyes-out” advertising and terribly vulgar costumes, that kills the people’s sense of beauty. Not to mention the fact that being a person who commits and supports violence against animals in the 21st century is completely fucked up.

Here’s a fresh poster by Tyumen circus — make my eyes bleed

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No Comments 2021