#97: How to Practice Imperfectionism with Oliver Burkeman

Lead the People

Oliver Burkeman is the author of the New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller Four Thousand Weeks, about embracing limitation and finally getting round to what counts, along with The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking and Help! How to Become Slightly Happier and Get a Bit More Done. For many years he wrote a popular column for the Guardian, 'This Column Will Change Your Life'. In his email newsletter The Imperfectionist, he writes about productivity, mortality, the power of limits and building a meaningful life in an age of distraction. He lives in the North York Moors.

Top 3 Takeaways

1. Get real. While we may be more comfortable keeping ourselves in a state of perpetual busyness, our reality is finite. Accepting this is key to enjoying life for what it is.
2. Act out. Rather than ruminate over whether we’re accomplishing enough or are deserving enough, we should just do the thing already. Taking action is a creative force in itself.
3. Close the books. While the start of projects contains a certain amount of energy, we can be reluctant to experience the joy of finishing them. Find the energy in the beginnings and endings.

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From the Source

“When it comes to overwhelm, it's about understanding that there will always be more legitimate things, useful things that you could do with your time than you'll be able to do when it comes to not being able to exert total control over how time unfolds that will always elude us as humans, and I'm trying to argue that ultimately this is kind of good news.”

“I think we're seeking a kind of control, a kind of sense of security. It could be like freedom from problems, just a sort of state of existence that we're always chasing because we never get to it.”

“It kind of honors the actions themselves, right? You launch the business venture or write the novel or whatever it is, because that is a fun and meaningful way to spend a bit of your time on the planet, not so you get to this place where you can finally feel adequate.”

“Each of these little perspective shifts then has a chance to just sort of slide under the surface of your life a little bit and make a little tiny change, but in a way that might stick.”

“An awful lot of what we do in our lives, if we really ask when we're sort of doing it unconsciously, I think is often to sort of create a kind of emotional buffer so that we don't have to feel the reality that we're in.”

“My experience going way back is that there's something wonderful about a fresh start, about the idea that you're just diving into something new, and there's something really kind of aggravating about finishing it.”

Connect with Oliver

Website: http://www.oliverburkeman.com

The Imperfectionist (newsletter): https://www.oliverburkeman.com/the-imperfectionist