Mental Pivot #40: Triggers, Narratives, Hobbies
A helpful list of procrastination triggers, George Packer’s four rival narratives driving polarization in America, and the trap of turning hobbies into hustles.
The sun's out, school's out, and I've started packing my bags to spend several weeks on the road in the Pacific Northwest, backpacking the Sierra Nevada, and visiting relatives in Hawaii.
In the interest of making this a true opportunity to recharge my mental batteries, I've decided to pause the newsletter for the next two months with plans to resume in August (I realize this is a 180° from my earlier plan to continue through the summer in Issue #38—apologies for the seemingly abrupt change). I hope to see you after the break, fully reinvigorated and reenergized with new things to share, read, and think about.
Now onto this week's recommendations…
Productivity:
A Project of One's Own: Paul Graham ponders the educational and experiential value of having fun and interesting projects to work on.
How to Be More Productive: A 2005 post by the late Aaron Swartz in his typically breezy and accessible style. Covers a range of thoughtful ideas like the myth that time is fungible, avoiding interruptions, and how to make daunting tasks fun.
"Just Say No" Is Bad Productivity Advice: Some jobs allow for greater autonomy and boundaries, and others don't. When it comes to the latter category, Nir Eyal suggests a strategy he calls "schedule syncing" as an alternative to the impracticality of saying no.
Procrastination Triggers: Eight Reasons Why You Procrastinate: Procrastination can be induced by tasks that are boring, frustrating, difficult, stressful, ambiguous, unstructured, unrewarding, or meaningless.
The Tyranny of the Faceless Other: "The Faceless Other is a group of people you’ve invented in your head who are going to use or judge things you do."
Trends:
Don't Let Social Media Think for You: A recent conflagration between a novelist and the Twitter mob is the basis for this critique of social media's failure to process nuance.
How America Fractured into Four Parts: This even-keeled longform piece by George Packer explores the four rival narratives of the past 40 years competing to shape America's moral and cultural identity. The four narratives are "Free America" (libertarianism and free market capitalists), "Smart America" (highly educated, professional, urban), "Real America" (working class, populist, rural), and "Just America" (identity, and social justice). All four narratives point to intractable socio-economic and class differences. The article is an excerpt from Packer's forthcoming new book Last Best Hope (link to review from Kirkus).
The Modern Trap of Turning Hobbies into Hustles: Creatives are frequently urged to make money from what they love, but this 2019 piece by Molly Conway reminds us that it's not always necessary to "monetize your joy."
Young Creators Are Burning Out and Breaking Down: TikTok and social media personalities face the mental toll imposed by around-the-clock scrutiny, cutthroat competition, and the incessant need to grow audience and drive attention.
Odds & Ends:
How to Become a World-Class Whistler: This is a short but delightful documentary film by Ien Chi. It chronicles his participation in the International Whistlers Convention in Louisburg, North Carolina and the quirky, niche-world of whistling. One standout in the video is the professional whistler Sean Lomax whose virtuosity is astounding.
How to Start a Novel: Novelist Jonathan Lee collects opening lines to books and shares some of his favorites. It’s astounding how captivating a good opening sentence can be.
Why You Should Quit Ranked Session-Based Multiplayer Video Games: A former Hearthstone and DOTA player drops some truth-bombs on the zero-sum time-sink that these types of games represent. As an on-again, off-again player of these kinds of games, I empathize with the author.
Thank you for subscribing to the Mental Pivot Newsletter. If you’re enjoying it, be sure to share it with your friends and spread the word.
I want to be able to deliver a top-notch newsletter to all of you. To that end, I’d love to hear your thoughts on what’s working, what doesn’t, and things you’d like to see more of. You can reach me by replying directly to this email or by adding a comment on Substack.
If this newsletter was forwarded to you, visit this link to subscribe.
Alternatively, you can also read the full archive of posts, book notes and link roundups on my blog: https://mentalpivot.com.