Focused - 141: You Never Arrive

Episode Date: December 22, 2021

David & Mike discuss the arrival fallacy and the importance of finding joy in the journey.

Welcome to Focus, a productivity podcast about more than just cranking widgets. I'm Mike Schmitz, and I'm joined by my fellow co-host, Mr. David Sparks. Hey, David. Hey, Mike. How are you today? Doing great. How about yourself? I have arrived here, and I'm ready to record a podcast. See how I did that? But have you really, since you never really arrived?

Yeah, I don't know. Maybe I haven't arrived. But I'm at least sitting in my chair right now and talking to my friend um yeah uh today's show is going to be about arrival which is i think an interesting topic as we get near the end of the year um a lot of people get hung up on these things we're going to get into it in deeper detail today but mike and i have some opinions on it. And I really like the idea of arrival and accepting that you never arrive. So here we go, right? Yeah, I was going to say, those are kind of two separate ideas, right? Because everybody, I think, loves the idea of arrival. That's kind of the inspiration for this episode, right?

Yeah. Is that picture you have in your head of, once I get this thing done, then I will have arrived. And then that's the point when everything is going to settle down and everything is going to become smooth, but it never really happens. Even if you get to where you think you wanted to go,

you just find that there's a different set of challenges awaiting you when you get there. Yeah. And also, I think that there is, there's like an insidious part of this. Like you think that when you get there. Yeah. And also I think that there is, um, there's like an insidious part of this. Like you think that when you get to that arrival point that like suddenly everything is easy and you're done. Right. And I guess another way to put this as you're never done, you never arrive, you're never done. And,. And the context of this for me, I know,

because I've made all the mistakes. I remember when I was in school thinking, man, once I get my bar ticket, you know, once I pass the bar, then I'm good. You know, all this is, you know, then it's just easy after that. Or I remember once thinking, man, if we just had enough money to buy a house, then everything would be okay. And you have all these weird arrival points that you create in your head that don't matter as much as you think they do, or they don't have the significance that you think they do when you get to them. Yep. I actually did some research before this episode, and there's a term for that. It's called the arrival fallacy. And it's basically the belief that once you get to a certain point,

things will just kind of click into place. But as you were mentioning, there's lots of different points, and they're probably different for everybody listening, but we can all identify a specific point where we thought, once we get to that, that is the thing that's going to make everything else easier. I'm kind of curious. You mentioned a few, but what are some of the other arrival points that passed you thought that's the tipping point where things get easy. The first one for me was, I think I was about eight and it was the Micronaut Christmas of like 1976. There was a toy called the Micronauts. I think I shared this story once on one of my podcasts, but I was a little kid and when I grew up, we didn't have a lot of money. Right. And, but there was

these toys called Micronauts and they were kind of like spacemen, but I don't know, it was the whole thing. Like, uh, but I wanted some and I had one and I loved it so much. Like my grandparents bought me one, like at the store one day. And I played with that thing so much and I just wanted more and, uh, Christmas came and that's all I said I wanted that year was Micronauts so you know the family got together and I got a Micronaut car and I got like several more Micronaut figures and a Micronaut like tank and I had like I remember sitting there on Christmas morning with like this abundance of Mic micronauts in front of me and feeling empty. Isn't that weird for an eight-year-old, right? But I started crying and my mom's like, why are

you crying? What's wrong with you? But I realized that like I had wanted that situation for so long, you know, and I got what I wanted, but I didn't feel any better. I don't know. Isn't that weird for an eight-year-old? But that was my first experience with that. Yeah, I think the biggest one I can think of was when I was in college because I was a business major. And a lot of my friends who were business majors alongside me, they were business majors specifically because that was the first step in getting their MBA.

And once they got their MBA, the skies were going to open and they were going to land a cushy job and climbing the corporate ladder was going to be easy. And I remember watching, that's not the path I took. I ended up working with the family business and we've talked about my career path several times on this podcast. So don't need to go down that road again, but watching from afar, I just noticed that there was always something else that they had to do or felt like they had to do to differentiate themselves from everybody else that was on the next level. And it's kind of ironic because I could totally see the, for lack of a better term, the sort of rat race sort of a situation that they were in from the

outside there, but then I would fall into it myself in different ways throughout the years. So it's kind of interesting to me how this arrival fallacy manifests in different areas of your life for different people. It wasn't professional for me, but there were several other things. I guess as I graduated from college, I just found some other thing to pursue. It was right after I got done with post-secondary education, I actually went to Bible college. And I can't give you really a reason why other than I wanted to. Not a pastor, have no desire to be in the ministry, but it was just kind of like, I got to find another challenge. And I think if I dig deep enough, and I'm honest

with myself, part of it is this arrival fallacy manifesting in its own way in my life. Yeah, I think there's a couple pieces to this, healthy and unhealthy. I think one of the healthy parts is it is a target. It is something to give yourself a focus on. And that's good. I think you need to have various points of focus. But the unhealthy part is the belief that once you get there, there's an end point. And I think that is the real insidious part of this. And people have it in different contexts. You have it maybe with if I get so much money or if I get this degree or if I get this boy or girl in my life or if I, you know, whatever, if I get this job or if I get partner or everybody has this thing that they feel like that's it.

You know, once you get there, you're done. And, and it's a strange concept because once you get there, of course, you're never done. And you don't want to be done. Like, do you want to be done with your life? I mean, no. I mean, you want to have more challenges and you want to keep going. But we kid ourselves to think that, man, I am going to arrive. I'm going to get to that thing and then everything is going to be smooth sailing and I don't have to work anymore. And I think it's a real problem if you're not aware of it.

I think even if you are aware of it, there are still situations where maybe you don't do a very good job of mitigating it. So if you're fixated on a goal, for example, then when you achieve that goal, there is a vacuum that must be filled by something else. So if you're going to invest everything that you have towards the achievement of said goal, there's pros and cons to that. I mean, achievement is not a bad thing, but it's undeniable that once you cross that finish line, it feels like the finish line just instantly moved on you. I did some digging into this as well. When you set a goal, what happens is as you're moving towards that goal, your brain releases dopamine, that's the pleasure chemical in your brain, in anticipation of achieving that goal. And each milestone that you pass along the way gives you a little dopamine shot. But once you actually achieve it, the dopamine disappears. So then you're left asking

yourself, well, what's next? Where's that feeling that I thought I was going to feel exponentially greater than all of the little dopamine shots I got along the way? And then you get there and you realize that that was the reward. It's almost like you have to enjoy the process because once you get to the end, it's basically over. There is a little bit of satisfaction that a lot of people get from the completion of a goal, and I think that's warranted. But in terms of what's going on at a physiological level, in terms of what's going on at a physiological level, you know, we build this up in anticipation of, oh, this thing is going to be amazing. And then it's not ever nearly as amazing as we make it out to be. Yeah. I mean, there's that crisis point when you get there. And if you don't

see it coming, it can really knock you for a loop. I mean, eight-year-old Sparky had a micronaut crisis, right? But it can be much more serious than that. What if you finally do make manager or partner your big company and you've been working your whole life for this and maybe you realize, oh, this isn't everything I thought it was going to be. Well, why did I do all of that? Why have I spent my whole life? Why did I make the sacrifices I did to get to this thing where I feel empty? And I think that if you're not aware of that going into it, that can really be troublesome. Absolutely. And the solution is not to lead, I would argue, a more balanced life. If you have a bunch of different goals that you're chasing at the same time, I guess that's one way to mitigate against the emptiness that

you feel once you actually achieve one of them. But I think the better approach is to find happiness and meaning in the present, to enjoy the journey, to foster that atmosphere of growth instead of being so focused on the outcome, focusing on the skills that you're developing and the person that you're becoming and stuff like that. There was a quote that I found that I really, really liked by William Pollard. It says, the arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow. But in some way, shape, or form, we've all thought that. Yeah, absolutely. And that's the fear, right? The hubris of it all. And I worry about that with myself. Like, okay, so I did this, but does that mean whatever I do tomorrow is going to help?

But the idea of arrival, I think that if you haven't, if you don't see it coming, it can be a real serious problem. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't, you shouldn't be on it. You know, you shouldn't be on a journey. You shouldn't be going through Bible school or trying to work your way through your career. And I think in some ways this is a mindset thing, but I also think it is really related to your own personal expectations. do in pursuit of a goal, those aren't necessarily negative things, but we feel like they can be when we get to the end and we don't get the satisfaction that we wanted from the thing. But the thing that causes that to happen is being so focused on the actual arrival, like a destination, like you're pulling into the train station and you're going to get off. That's not going to be the case. And so I think that term arrival, really that's the thing we have to recognize is we think this is like a one-way ticket. And once we get to the end,

then it's over. We'll be able to figure out what's next, but it's going to be easier because we've arrived. But when we change how we think about that and not view it as the be-all, end-all, and just a point in our journey, and yeah, we've arrived at this place, but it's only a temporary thing, we're going to get refueled, we're it's only a temporary thing. We're going to get refueled, we're going to get refocused, and we're going to get back on and keep going. That kind of changes the terms of engagement in a very positive way. When's the last time you got caught in an arrival trap? Oh man, the one that comes to mind, I know there's a more

recent example, but, uh, the one that's really easy is when I ran my first half marathon and I injured myself the week before because I was so focused on, I'm going to finish this half marathon. I've been training for a year and a half that when I crossed the finish line, I distinctly remember that feeling of, is this it now? What do I do? It's like, well, I guess I got to find another race to run, but I couldn't because I was hurt. I create this course. This is going to be the thing that just launches the business into the stratosphere. And even if it's really, really successful, it's not as successful as my wildest dreams. And honestly, if it was, that would almost be a bad thing. Because what it does is it forces me to deconstruct the things that worked and the things that didn't. And ultimately, that's been a boon for me. But probably every single time that I launch something,

there is this bittersweet feeling of like, there it is. I hope everybody thinks it's awesome. But then also the desire to go start making the next thing as well. I can tell you that I don't really experience that too much with like the field guides are the big things I produce these days, but the way the production pipeline works is that by the time a field guide is released, I am already deep in the next one. So that kind of helps me avoid that arrival kind of crisis because I've

already moved on by the time, you know, it actually finishes. And that's great for me. But I know the last time I got really trapped in the arrival, you know, what is it called? The arrival fallacy was when I left the law firm in 2015, you know, and went out on my own. And I thought, well, now then everything is just going to be easy and I'm going to be able to focus on the thing I want. And, um, of course it didn't work that way. And, uh, that was, uh, it required a lot of work. And as I look forward to further changes in my life, I, I'm trying to really keep that in mind that no, you're, you're never going to arrive, but you will have some nice way points. What's a healthy way to go at this, Mike? I think the best way to do it is kind of the way you described where you are having

something that is in the wings waiting, but also not being fixated on that as an outcome to be achieved, but just the next step in your growth process. I think the approach that helps me the most is focusing on who I am becoming and the skills that I am developing and putting forth my best effort, but then not judging the outcome, letting the score take care of itself, which is a lot easier said than done, but it's something that I'm learning to do. And ultimately, when it comes to a lot of the creative work that I do, the process and the habits are more important than any one outcome that I would achieve. So showing up every day and doing the thing, casting the vote for the type of person you want to become, proving to yourself that you are the type of person who can follow through

on the action without being on the hook for the result. Yeah, I think the answer is to take your joy in the work. I mean, just think about that for a minute. If you can get your satisfaction not from the arrival but from the work, then you feel satisfied every day instead of at one point in the future that is a fleeting moment. And honestly, it means that the work gets better, too.

Mm-hmm. This episode of Focused is brought to you by Timing, the intelligent time tracking app that you can trust. Whether you're billing by the hour, employed, or billing per project, you might

need to estimate how long a task is going to take. Or maybe you just want a better understanding of where your time is actually going so that you can make some of those positive changes going into this new year. Time tracking helps you stay on track with those estimates and make sure that you don't end up in the red with your projects. And it helps you make more accurate estimates in the future. But in today's work environment, work changes so quickly that it's hard to start and stop a timer for everything. You just can't do it. The good news is your computer already knows what you're doing,

so why not have it track your time for you? Timing automatically tracks everything that you do on your Mac without you having to lift a finger. You can trust it to always give you the complete picture. Timing will detect when you're in a video call, and it lets you record what the meeting was about afterwards. There's even more magic like this in Timing to make recording your time as easy as possible, plus you can enjoy the activities screen which presents your app usage, including websites, file paths, and window titles. And if you want to, you can start and stop timers from

within the main Timing app. And if you're collaborating with colleagues, Timing's Teams feature lets you share projects with them and record everyone's time in one central location, which lets managers get a quick overview of where their team members spend their time while preserving their privacy. Because which apps, documents, and websites each team member used stays private and it's not visible to the managers. Plus you get a super slick onboarding process so everyone will be up to speed in no time. What I love about timing is it takes all of the thought behind time tracking and removes it so you can focus on the task at hand. If you're just getting started in your time tracking journey, there's a good chance you're going to forget to start and stop timers if

you have to do it manually. I know that's what I did. I would start a travel timer, forget to turn it off, and then I look at my data and it says that I was in the car for the last 20 hours. I know that's not true, and at that point the data really doesn't help me because I have corrupted it with bad information. So you don't have to worry about any of that with timing. It automatically switches your timers whenever you switch apps or even documents. So for example, if you do a lot of writing in one particular app, but maybe I'm doing some writing for a newsletter versus some writing for some course scripts, but maybe I'm doing some writing for a newsletter versus some writing for some course scripts. I can separate those into different projects inside

of timing and track time against those different projects just by paying attention to the documents that are open. It's a really slick tool. Once you get it set up and you create some rules, you really don't have to spend a whole lot of time babysitting it, and it can provide you some really valuable information. I know one of the things that I noticed when I first started using timing was I felt like I was working a ton, but when I looked at the time that I was actually spending inside of my productivity apps, it didn't line up with my expectations. So it showed me that how I thought I was spending my time was not how I was actually spending my time, which is valuable because then I can make some adjustments and move the needle in the right

direction. And because it's so easy to use, it really makes it effortless. So if you want to take control of how you spend your time and improve your productivity, then download the free 14-day trial today by going to timingapp.com slash focused, F-O-C-U-S-E-D, and you'll save 10% when you subscribe. That's timingapp.com slash focused to try timing for free, and you'll save 10% when you subscribe. Our thanks to Timing for their support of the Focus podcast and all of RelayFM. So let's assume you can take your joy in the work, but you do get to these waypoints,

you get to these arrival points that do have significance. You graduate from seminary school, or you get the good job, or you get married, or whatever it is. How do you treat that event? Good question. I think the ideal would be to celebrate, but not too long and just keep moving. I kind of have this mantra that I use in all of the Sermon Sketch Note videos that I use in all of the sermon sketchnote videos that I make for faith-based productivity to keep going and to keep growing. That's kind of the goal for me. I don't think I've always done a great job of this. As I reflect through the lens of You Never Arrive for this particular episode,

I could identify those points where I thought, this is where I'm going to cross over into something completely new. And there are seasons in your life where you go from one thing to another. But the one constant is that you're constantly moving forward, I would argue. You know, if you're intentional, you can control that to a certain degree. You maybe can't control everything. So my advice to people would be to control what you can control. But as much as you can influence the intentionality that you approach your day with, how can you win the day? Focus on that. Yeah, I kind of have a checklist when I get to, I'm calling it an arrival point

for the show today because of our show title, but in my head, I think of it as a waypoint. When you get to a big move, when you get to that thing you've been working toward, it could be the release of a product or the launch of a campaign for a client or the obtaining of a degree, whatever it is, you know, the obtaining of a degree, whatever it is, I think you should stop and take a minute. You know, the first thing you need to do is be reflective on what got you there and take it, take a minute to give yourself the kudos you deserve. I mean, so often we are so critical of ourselves and we always are thinking about the distance between where we are

and where we're heading. I think when you get to a waypoint, you should stop to look how far you've come. I think that's an excellent exercise and so much healthier than saying, okay, I made it, now I'm done. How come I feel like terrible, you know, terrible. So, you know, be appreciative of what you've done and give yourself, you give yourself some credit. I think it's the first thing you do when you get to a waypoint. Agreed. And I like what you were describing there about measuring yourself against the ideal. That would be, Dan Sullivan would call it the gap. And when you get to one of those arrival points, I don't like that term. We should figure out something else.

Way stops. Way point is what I call it. I mean, that's... Way point. Yeah. Sure. When you get to one of those way points, measure where you are versus where you started, and then you focus on the growth.

That's really what journaling does. really what journaling does. And I have not specific reflection processes associated with these waypoints necessarily, although I guess you could argue that the quarterly review for the personal retreats that I do, that is kind of like a built-in waypoint. And that reflective process that I go through whenever I get there, that does help me sort through these things and recognize the progress that I have made. It also helps me to recognize the things that have been fighting against it. We were talking the other day about overwhelm, and I feel like that has a tie-in to this concept of arrival as well, where if you're moving towards one waypoint. And then once you get there, giving yourself permission to reevaluate things and go in a different direction if you, you want to, but trying to do all the things at the same time is,

is the path to madness. Well, I mean, it's interesting because my oldest graduated college last year. And, um, and so that was a waypoint, obviously, for her, but it was also a waypoint for me. And just to kind of go back to the way I celebrate a waypoint is, number one, I looked back. I mean, I remember when she was a baby in the hospital, my work FedExed me work to do at the hospital, right? I mean, that was the situation I was in at the time where, you know, they sent me to work at the hospital because apparently I wasn't working enough.

And I remember getting that thinking, I'm responsible for this baby. And if I don't do my work she doesn't eat right and that was my mindset at the time like I need to do this work in order to take care of her and then when I look back at her college graduation of raising her trying to teach her and getting her through school and we I'm very proud of the fact that I got her through college without her having to take loans out you know that was one of my goals for her. And so, you know, this is not her celebration or her waypoint. It's my waypoint in that sense. So I'm looking back on that. Then the next thing they do, the second thing I do is I celebrate that with people. And my wife and I were high-fiving each

other. Hey, we got this kid through college. She's got a degree now, you know, she's got a firm footing and she doesn't owe a bunch of money. And we were, we celebrated it. So that's the second thing I do. And then the third thing I do is I go back to work, you know, I'm like, okay, what's next? You know, she wants to go to graduate school. Let's figure it out, you know? So, um, and I think that's a real healthy way to deal with a way point as opposed to an arrival point you mentioned the celebrating your wins for lack of a a better term uh at what point do you celebrate your wins is it just big monumental things like getting a kid through college or are there ways that you celebrate smaller wins along the way? Uh, me personally, I celebrate any when I can, I can lay claim to,

honestly, it doesn't take much, you know, life's too short. Yeah. And I think that's a real important piece here is like one of the things I do when I launch something is I buy a new pen and I have a whole bunch of pens now, which I can look at them and I can recognize that, oh, this is the one that I bought when I launched the Obsidian course or whatever. that I bought when I launched the Obsidian course or whatever. And it's kind of like a trophy case in a sense, which as I grab a pen and use it every single day, it brings joy to the process of writing down the things that I'm going to do. And I know that's maybe a stupid, simple way since I launch a bunch of stuff. But I do think that whatever you accomplish, you need to take the time to celebrate the fact that you got to that waypoint. You don't stay there and you don't think that any waypoint is going to be the key to an effortless future. Like you said, you do get back to work. But I think there's a lot of value in more than just the ceremonial value of celebrating your wins. you when you celebrate the fact that you have reached a new milestone without relying on the dopamine hit on the path to pursuing a goal which is going to leave you feeling empty yeah but i do

think the most important part of that process is the back to work part you know it's like okay now let's turn the page and get back to work and find your joy in the work. You know, I mean, I think there's really something to that. I don't know if that's a separate show or whatever, but you have to be able to find joy in your day-to-day work. You cannot have to wait for arrival points to get it because that is an empty promise. You're never going to get what you want that way. You're not going to be happy, I guess I should say. So you have any, uh, practical advice on

finding joy in the day to day? I wanted to lean into this a little bit, you know, the whole thing, like, you know, follow your bliss thing. I'm not sure I buy into that. I think you have to just, kind of getting back to the title of our show is focused, right? I think focus and intentionality bring a joy with them, no matter what it is you're doing. If you have a job that you don't particularly like, but you bring intentionality to it, I think you can find joy in it. And that doesn't mean you shouldn't particularly like, but you bring intentionality to it, I think you can find joy in it. And that doesn't mean you shouldn't be looking for a better job or a better career or something that you think is a better fit for you. But I don't think it's an excuse to say, I just don't like it, so I'm not going to try. Seth Godin has that book called The Practice,

where he talks about if you're making something that you need to find your joy in the process. I thought that was a good book. It's a lot of small essays. It doesn't really have like a big through line, but there's a lot of small points that land with you. And I think one of the points he made is that you can find joy in your work. But I think that's something we all need to deal with. And if you are super unhappy with what you're doing, no destination or arrival point is going to fix that for you. And one of the things that stands out to me from that book is that more often than not, we don't feel like doing what needs doing, but we're attracted to the things that don't. So I think it's quite possible that even if you find joy in the process, focus is still a challenge for you.

Focus is still a challenge for you. And I think that there are ways that you can influence your environment to help you stay focused on that process. And maybe celebrating your wins is one small way to do that. I guess really the point of today's show is this myth of arrival. What if you can just really accept in your bones that you are never going to arrive? You know, what if you just do that thought experiment for a minute? Just think about what if you thought I am never going to arrive, just accept that. How would that change the way you're living your life right now? It's a good question. And I think even if you

picked one area where you would arrive, the thing that Oliver Berkman talks about in that book is that it's never enough. There's always more things that you want to do. It doesn't matter how many things you actually do. There's always a desire to do more. And so facing the fact that you are limited and finite and you will never arrive in some areas that are important to you is a key element to finding joy in the work that you do. For example, I want to be the best dad to my kids that I can. But if I were to arrive in that area, I am spending every waking moment with my kids and I'm not doing any work and we don't have a house to live in. So it's a constant give and take with these different areas. And that was kind of a revelation for me when I read this is no matter what area of your life you examine, there's always going to be this feeling that you could have done more.

Well, I mean, just for a minute on that, I mean, that means your definition of the best dad would be someone who doesn't take care of them. So, you know, that's not really, there's a problem there. But raising children, I think, is a good example of another element of this. I don't think we've really covered is that the dynamic nature of the world around us, like an arrival point, even if you get what you want, doesn't change the fact that everything else is always changing. I mean, the ideal parent to a five-year-old is not the same thing as an ideal parent to a 10-year-old, a 15-year-old, or a 20-year-old. And your children are changing,

and what makes the ideal parent and what is required of you is going to change along that process. So even if you arrive for a five-year-old, you are not there yet for a 10-year-old. And so you've just got to be willing to adjust. But I really want to kind of go back to this idea of just internalizing the fact that the arrival fallacy is a real thing. I'm guessing that every person listening to this show has crashed on these shores at some point. I have many times where you get to some destination and you think that's it and you feel empty and you start questioning all of these decisions. And you're

doing all this stuff to yourself with no good reason. And you don't need to. Instead, stop thinking about arriving, start thinking about the process, and start thinking about these waypoints as ways to do what a waypoint is. It marks your progress and it gives you an opportunity to rethink where you're going next. I like that. I do too. I also like the ability to hit the reset button in terms of the judgment for arriving or not arriving. I think it's easy to think that you should have arrived at a certain point and fall into that gap that we talked about a little bit earlier, which is a big reason why I really like the daily questions for the journaling, which I talked at length about before. But all that does is it's

a response by myself on my intentions from the day. It's not attached to an outcome. It's, did I do my best to? It to totally separate from whether I followed through on the thing or not. And the thing I like about this is that it doesn't matter what the scores were yesterday. Today is a brand new day. And I have an opportunity to win the day every single day. But if you're measuring it in terms of a specific waypoint, even like a quarterly goal, if you start off not great, you can feel like you're behind. And so you're constantly trying to catch up instead of focusing on the present and finding the joy in the process. Yeah. Just stop when you catch yourself doing it. Just stop and try and be

present today. But yeah, if you believe that you will never arrive, then you'll never worry about not arriving because you'll know you'll never arrive, you know? And we're all on our own unique journeys here. So why not be flexible and allow yourself to have waypoints to celebrate but also get back to work? pursuing options. I feel like it could be easy to fall into a trap if you think you are going to arrive that I'm not even going to examine any of the other things because I've already identified this right here. This is the thing. But if I reflect on my past, I can see where a lot of the most rewarding things that I do now even are kind of things that I had not anticipated. And as I was going along one path, I noticed something off to the side. I'm like, oh, that looks interesting. And I tried it and really enjoyed

it. Podcasting being one of those things that I never thought I'd be doing. Well, and that's why the problem with thinking you can arrive is so terrible, because you get punched in the face when you get to the arrival date, right? You get there, you realize it's not everything you thought it would be, and then all of those past opportunities, all those things that you turned away from to get to this moment where you thought you were supposed to be, you know, a okay, that comes back to you because you remember that, but you ignored it all at the moment because you were going to get to this arrival and now you're here and suddenly everything

isn't, you know, all perfect. Like you thought it would be. one platform to build your online presence and run your business from websites and online stores to marketing tools and analytics. They've got you covered. Squarespace combines cutting edge design and world-class engineering, making it easier than ever to establish your home online and make your ideas a reality. Squarespace has everything you need to create a beautiful and modern website. You start with a professionally designed template and use drag and drop tools to make it your own. You can customize the look and feel, the settings, the products you have on sale, and more with just a few clicks. And all Squarespace websites are optimized for mobile. Your content automatically adjusts so it will look great on any device. You'll also get free unlimited hosting,

top-of-the-line security, and dependable resources to help you succeed. There's nothing to patch or upgrade. They have award-winning 24-7 customer support if you need any help. They'll even let you quickly and easily grab a unique domain name. Plus, you'll have everything you need

for SEO and email marketing to get your ideas out there. You can use Squarespace to turn your big idea into a new website, showcase your work with their incredible portfolio designs, publish your next blog post, promote your business, announce an upcoming event, and much more. I love Squarespace because it's easy to use and super powerful. I've helped so many people set up Squarespace sites

over the years in my family and my friend groups, and they all love it because even if you don't have any knowledge about how to run a website, Squarespace has got everything you need to get it rolling. So head to squarespace.com slash focus for a free trial with no credit card required. And when you're ready to launch,

use the offer code focused to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's squarespace.com slash FOCUSED, F-O-C-U-S-E-D. And when you decide to sign up, use the offer code FOCUSED to get 10% off your first purchase and to show your support for the FOCUS podcast. Our thanks to Squarespace for their support of the Focus podcast and all of RelayFM. it was two months ago. And at the time I had read a book, you were reading some books and we talked about negative self-talk and positive self-talk. And I've been thinking a lot about that since we recorded that show. And I know you've been doing some further reading. Where are you on that at this point? Well, yeah, the further reading that I did

was The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale, which is definitely not a book for everybody, but I really enjoyed it. And I still am practicing this, probably not to the degree that Norman Vincent Peale would like me to. He has a very specific process where you say certain things into the mirror five times in the morning, five times in the evening. But one of the things that really stuck out to me from that book was this phrase, everything is always working out for me. He's got a whole story that goes along with it of somebody who thought everything was falling apart for them and on the surface it was, but as he dug into it, he realized there was a lot of stuff that was actually working out good for him. And I remember reading that right before I broke my hand. And my initial thought after I broke my hand was, well, I guess everything's

not working out for me. But then as I reflected on it, it actually could have been a whole lot worse than it was. Didn't require surgery. The tendons are in the right place. It was a pretty serious fracture, but the way it was aligned, it wasn't a serious recovery. So even as I reflect on that, I feel like this has helped me cope with this a lot better than I would have previously because it's totally disrupted everything. I had a cast on my hand for two weeks. I couldn't wear even the same clothes. None of my sweatshirts would fit around the cast. I have to type with a couple of fingers, just know, just stupid little things. Like I can't, you know, wrap the floss around my fingers, get my hands in my mouth, the floss, my teeth at night,

everything about my day-to-day routine was disrupted and became much more annoying. But as I reflected on it, that phrase stuck in my head, everything's always working out for me. And I was able to get the cast off in a couple of weeks, fingers healing fine. I still got to have them, you know, buddy tape together, whatever. But I, uh, I feel like that phrase has definitely helped me process this much better emotionally than I might have otherwise. So I, I'm a believer I'm sticking with this. Yeah. So where I was at, um, was the John Acuff book, the soundtracks book. I just read it when we recorded the show. And I guess my thoughts are complicated. I mean that you can go

back and listen to that episode if you want, but I still firmly believe that negative self-talk is a massive problem. I think it's kind of related to arrival talk, honestly. But the idea of all of us having this voice in our head tearing us down all the time, I think almost everybody has to deal with that. I think almost everybody has to deal with that. And, you know, my big goal of that episode was to get across the point that that negative self-talk is a liar who hates you and does not someone you should listen to. And what I was considering at the time, and I really still believe that I think this self-talk stuff is nonsense and you've got to really, really be vigilant about it. But what I was thinking about at the time is, can I hack this to positive self-talk, which is what the Soundtracks book is and what the book, what's it called again? Power of Positive Thinking. Yep. It's one of those classic books, which is going to rub people the wrong way, I know. I made fun of it during the episode about that SNL skit.

And I think that my gut reaction to positive self-talk has kind of reasserted itself. I tried some of the experiments from the Soundtracks book. But the more I think about it, the more I think that I just think self-talk is a bad thing, you know, in general. I don't think, you know, lying to yourself, whether you're telling yourself you can't do something or trying to, you know, pump yourself up with positive self-talk. I think that whole thing is a fool's errand. The more I think about it, I just don't buy it. think about it. I just don't buy it. I've been trying instead to just focus on when I hear the inner voice of just quieting it and just thinking about what's actually going on in the world. A dialogue between, I guess, me and my brain, the rebellious organ, is completely irrelevant

to anything. It never gets recorded. It never goes, you know what I mean? It's like, it's just a waste of time. And I'd rather focus my, my eyes and ears and brain on the external world and deal with it as it is. But I am, I'm just not a fan. That's what I've decided. Well, I don't think that you're wrong, but I also think that the self-talk, maybe it's impossible for me anyways to turn it off completely. I mean, the 4,000 Weeks book that I'm reading by Oliver Berkman is basically a form of perspective change via self-talk, I would argue, reminding yourself, hey buddy, you're going to die and none of this is going to matter. So I think there's some interesting stuff to unpack in that book and I'm not done reading it yet. But if you take all of the stuff that you hear about in the productivity space, especially around the goal setting and achievement, basically this book is saying temperacks, to borrow John Acuff's term again, that your

brain is going to manufacture regardless. If you can put a little bit of thought behind the song that's playing, you can use that to force yourself to look in a specific direction. And there's some to force yourself to look in a specific direction. And there's some value in doing that. And myself personally, I guess, my brain tends to go negative. There's a ratio in one of those books that talks about how you should shoot for three to one positive to negative.

And I'm not even close to that. So I need all the positivity I can get. See, I think maybe, and these terms are very easy to confuse. So like the fact that none of us are getting out of this alive, is that self-talk or is that just a fact that we all need to address? I think when I think of self-talk, I think the real part of it that's difficult is what I would probably call self-judgment.

And we are always reigning judgment on ourselves. And so often it is negative. John Acuff and the power of positive thinking is the idea of trying to turn that into a positive judgment. But I guess I'm just not interested in judging myself in that way, in engaging with that voice. To the extent I want to judge myself, I want to judge myself based on how I'm doing externally, not the conversation. I don't think I'm articulating what I'm thinking very well. I think I know what you're going for. I also think that maybe there's a tendency if you're focusing on the things that you're doing to fall into the arrival fallacy again, though, right?

Yeah. Which is why this is tricky because all this stuff is interconnected and it's going to connect in different ways in different people's brains. I don't view positive self-talk as judgment necessarily. I don't know the best way to describe it. I guess it's sort of like the advisors in my head that we talked about the pocket jury. So replacing that with a pep squad, which sounds

ridiculous. And do you really need somebody telling you you can do it? But sometimes I need somebody telling me I can do it. And if I've got somebody physically who does that, that's easy. But when you don't have someone who jumps in and says the right thing at the right time, I do think that you can rely on something internal to replace that. On the other hand, it also challenges me reading all that stuff and recognizing that sometimes just having somebody say, you know what, you can do this and I believe in you, you've got it in you, that encourages me to help as many people as I can to the degree that I have a platform in somebody's life. I want to use that for good. And I want to be the source of that

positive message so that they don't have to manufacture it themselves themselves and help by pulling people up i think part of it for me is that next year will mark my 30th year of regular meditation practice and mindfulness meditation is all about quieting your mind i mean at the you know that inner voice i'm actually pretty good at shutting it down and And I've got a few years of practice. And I think I don't really like the idea of enabling it even for planned positive self-talk. I just don't want the voice. Does that make sense?

I can see that. I don't know. Yeah, it does. But we talked about it on the show. I just read the book, and I was interested in giving it a try. And the more I reflected on it, the more I realized, you know what? This just is not for me. And I guess I wanted to set the record straight.

Sure. things that you use to change your perspective that aren't what you would describe as self-talk then? Am I asking that? Does that question make sense? A little. I mean, I still journal every day and that is, I guess, a form of self-talk, right? You're writing a journal to yourself. The inner voice to me is just such a wild horse. I just don't want it running in any direction. So I guess I would say intentional self-talk is something that I'm fine with and something I do regularly. But just letting my brain run wild and throw things at me is not something that I'm interested in. And positive self-talk to me feels like thinking you can tame a wild horse. And I just

don't think I can. I'm pretty good at what I do now in terms of the meditation practice and quieting the mind. I'd rather just leave it in the stable. Makes sense. I do think that there is another angle to this in terms of perspective shift to be examined where even if you are David Sparks having regularly meditated for 30 years, I'm sure there are situations in your life where you don't really trust your perspective on a thing. And so maybe you've got a trusted confidant who you ask and you say, can you help me see this thing the right way? Where are your blind spots and what do you do to combat that? Absolutely. I mean, I'm always afraid that it's not the stuff you know, it's the stuff you don't

know. But I have groups of people in my life that I routinely share things with and ask for feedback on. I mean, I'm not sure. How does that relate to self-talk? It doesn't really, other than it's talk, which I think comes from a different source. So self-talk, I remember hearing communication, there's two different aspects of it. There's intrapersonal and interpersonal, and I get them mixed up sometimes. talk than interpersonal is with other people. But the communication is still the sending and receiving of a message, right? So whether you are the sender and receiver or just the receiver and somebody else is the sender, you're constantly receiving messages which are reinforcing a perspective or a certain worldview. And the challenge is to make sure that you're seeing things from the right perspective, you're seeing them the right way. Because regardless of how many experiences you have or mental models you've collected, there's a pretty good chance

that you're not looking at the thing from the right perspective. And you need something, that you're not looking at the thing from the right perspective. And you need something, whether it's internal or external, to help you get a perspective shift and see things from a different angle sometimes. Well, by definition, you're not looking at it from all angles. And like Mike, as a friend, you know how much stuff I throw at you and some of our other friends when I'm looking for advice on something. Because I'm shameless about asking other people about their opinions on things I'm trying to do, because I feel like that's the way you get the other perspective. I mean, you can only see what you see,

and getting yourself surrounded with people with divergent views and having them look at what you're thinking is a very good way to make sure that you get more views. You get triangulation when you have more people looking at the problem. And then you've got to have the humility to be willing to say, oh, I was wrong. But you've also got to have the confidence to say, oh, that is a good perspective, but I'm still going to do it this way. What you don't want to do is get blindsided. You don't want to come up with something and never even consider the other perspectives because you weren't able to see them and you had too much pride to ask other people to weigh in. to weigh in. Yeah. And I think that's the tie-in to the you never arrive piece here is that externally it becomes a lot easier, especially if you surround yourself with people who have done the thing that you've, that you're doing, they can help you see this thing that you think

is the arrival point is actually not the arrival point. And they can help you see this thing that you think is the arrival point is actually not the arrival point. And they can help you temper your expectations and help you not spend so much time at the waypoint. Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, I do think that talking to other people about journey does help you, dissuade you of the lie that there is an arrival point. I was just talking to a young person who wants to be a lawyer, and I said, you need to get with lawyers. You need to get in some law offices and spend some time and see what it's like and get those data points so you understand that getting the degree is not the

arrival. This episode of Focused is brought to you by Setapp. Getting things done is a challenge that everyone struggles with. And one way to tackle it is to make sure that you have the right tools

for the task on your computer. That means having the right apps. And Setapp is on a mission to help users get more done. With Setapp, there's no more worrying about having to search for apps to solve a problem because Setapp packs over 200 apps for your Mac and iPhone into one place. There's an app for almost any task so you can stay in your flow and finish what you

started. So you can think about your tasks, not your apps. Having the right tools is really important. And I can't tell you the number of times that I have thought about something that I needed to get done on my computer, heard about some application that could solve that specific need for me, and then gone to Setapp and realized, because I'm a paying customer myself, that I already had access to that application. One example is CleanShot X, which I just discovered and I absolutely love. For years, I've been using the built-in screenshot tools

inside of macOS, but CleanShot gives me a whole bunch of more options like scrolling screenshots and the ability to upload to the cloud, which creates a instantly shareable link. Lots of great things that go above and beyond the standard tools provided in macOS that I didn't even realize how useful they could be until I gave it a shot. And that's what I love

about Setapp. There are so many hidden gems in the collection of curated apps that they have made available. Lots of apps that I have used for years that I use the Setapp versions now because it's a way that I can continue to directly support the developers of the apps that I know and love. For example, Mindnode is an app that I use every single day for mind maps. Ulysses, Better Touch Tool, iStat Menus, the list goes on and on. If you're looking for an app that can do a specific thing, there's a good chance you can find it in Setapp. Not only is it more convenient, it is also a great value because instead of paying hundreds or even thousands of dollars for separate licenses, you just have one flat monthly fee. And new apps are added to Setapp regularly. Updates are free. all the apps are the full featured pro versions so head over to setapp.com

slash focused f-o-c-u-s-e-d to try setapp free for a week if you like it you pay just $9.99 per month that is setapp.com slash focused our thanks to setapp for their support of the Focus podcast and all of RelayFM. All right, so we've been going pretty deep today. Mike has some new technology that he wants to share with us. What'd you get, Mike? Yeah, I wanted to talk to you about my new Remarkable 2 that I've got on my desk right here, which we heard about when we interviewed Jesse Anderson. And I can't believe that I had never really heard of this device before.

I know you have some experience with this, correct? Yeah. Yeah. And we talked about it on Deep Focus a couple of months ago, but I wanted to check in again, kind of on the main show. So explain what it is and what you're doing with it. It is a really thin iPad-like device with a single application, basically. It's got a stylus that attaches to the side of it a lot like the Apple Pencil, and the application is kind of like a simplified version of GoodNotes. It's an e-ink screen. So it's kind of like a Kindle. And essentially, it's a note taker, which I'm still experimenting with. But I think the place this fits for me is anytime I happen to be in a meeting with other people, this

is a way to take notes and then transfer them digitally. They have a feature where you can email the notes to a person, convert it to text, that sort of thing. But the thing I like about this is that it is a monotask device. But the thing I like about this is that it is a monotask device. And so even if I have my iPad on the table using GoodNotes to take notes, it feels weird bringing a tablet or a computer into a meeting. It just kind of changes the way that people interact. Have you experienced that with bringing technology to a face-to-face meeting? experience that with bringing technology to a face-to-face meeting? Well, I think in particular, it's a problem with laptops because a laptop is a wall between you and the other person.

You're literally erecting a wall. I think the tablets make that a lot easier. I mean, whether you've got a remarkable pad or an iPad, if you're taking notes on the meeting, they can see what you're doing. They know that you're not checking Facebook or whatever. So I would argue that a laptop is a very different thing in a meeting than a tablet. But yes, I understand what you're saying. Sure. I agree with you that the laptop is building the wall. And I agree that as long as the iPad is on the table, there's no question as to what you're doing. I guess I've seen it enough where people pick up the iPad and they're looking at the iPad in their hands. Everybody's looking at the person. They're looking down at the device

and instantly there is the disconnect. And maybe that's just the relationships themselves, and it's not the device's fault in that specific scenario. But I have not noticed that bringing a notebook and pen to a meeting, and I feel like the Remarkable is a good alternative for that. It's more on the notebook side and less on the laptop side than even the iPad is. Yeah, I think a remarkable, because I had one, I don't have one anymore, but I had one for a while. And to me, remarkable is a replacement for a pad of paper.

It's not a replacement for an iPad. And if you take it from that vantage point, then I think you can understand what's good and what's bad about it. Exactly. I completely agree. Having not had this one super long, just arrived a few days ago. But yes, it is definitely a notebook replacement, not a tablet replacement. Another thing I like about it, though, is the fact that I can take these notes and then instantly share them via email. And it uses the Remarkable service for that. You don't have to put in your own email address and compose a new message inside of a mail application. There are things I don't like about it, like the footer

in the email that it sends saying, this is sent from my remarkable want to get your own. You can't turn that branding off. But I do like the ability, if you were going to take notes and then you want to be able to instantly share those with other people, yeah, you can use a scanner app on your phone or things like that. For whatever reason, that never really clicked for me. I always felt weird taking out my phone to scan notes. I have trouble even remembering to take my phone out and scan receipts. Am I weird in that? Yeah, you are. I don't mind. I do all the time. Well, of course. Yeah, you're the paperless guy. But that always is like a point of friction for me. I don't know.

There's just something about taking out my phone in a group of people that just doesn't feel right to me. But like I said, there are still early days with this. We'll see if it actually sticks. But I anticipate a lot less friction going to a meeting, taking notes with the Remarkable, and then sending those notes immediately to somebody afterwards. A couple things that really stood out for me as positives with Remarkable is, number one, instant on. You press the button, and you're in the writing app. I mean, it's just not that there's almost no friction to get started with it. And the other thing I really liked about it is it is so thin and light.

I mean, compared to... An iPad is already thin and light, right? I mean, but this thing is maybe like a third of the width of an iPad. I can't get over how thin it is. Yeah, it is incredibly thin. The battery lasts forever. And I like the way that it just instantly uploads things to the, there's a cloud service that comes along with it. I guess you have to

pay for that as a separate service now, but I do like the ability to just instantly have that stuff synced. There's a desktop application which you can use to screen share. I have played around with this a little bit. I don't see myself using that all that often in application. But I guess if you're going to take live notes and you wanted to share that on a TV in a conference room, that would be a decent way to do it the uh the actual data transfer rate from when you write on the remarkable to what shows up on the application is there's almost no lag it's it's pretty impressive but just getting it connected to the remarkable app

seems like a little bit more cumbersome than a lot of scenarios would warrant. Another big positive for the Remarkable is the writing experience itself. It's not the same as writing on a piece of paper, but it's much closer to writing on a piece of paper than an iPad is, you know, the piece of glass. Absolutely. And the tools that they give you in the application itself are pretty decent there's different pen types and i think there's more flexibility there than some of the stuff that you have with with good notes they've got for example the the standard ballpoint but then

they've got the calligraphy tools and then they've got different types of pencils that you can use which i don't use the pencils all that often because you have to push a lot harder than I like to on the device in order to really get a dark stroke from those. But there's a lot of different options for you, and you can get quite an impressive variance in the appearance of the lines that you create. So I really like this device. I think it's going to stick for me. I just don't think it's going to have a real broad application. It's not going to be the thing that I take sketchnotes in, but it is going to be the thing that I bring to meetings when I need to take notes. I've already done that a couple of times. And it just feels a lot less intimidating for me walking into a meeting with this thing than it

does with a tablet. It's probably just a bias that some people don't experience at all. But I've been in enough meetings where you can just tell people are on their phones or their tablets or their computers and they're not paying attention that I just like to say, here's the ground rules going in here. We're going to set aside all the technology. But I feel like if I came in with a remarkable, even if that was a ground rule that was established, people would be like, oh yeah, yeah, that's fine. Yeah. I, so I, I sent mine back the, as much as I liked, but I talked about some of the positives, the negatives for me were, I guess, number one, it's one more thing, you know, it's like I have an iPad and I have an

Apple pencil and I'm going to be using that because it does so much. And so much of my workflow is iPad centric when it comes to writing. I write a lot of journal entries with the good notes in my Apple Pencil. And in good notes, it is trivial to add that entry to day one. Whereas with this device, it actually takes a bunch of extra steps. The other thing I didn't like about it, I didn't really care for the resolution of the image. You know, the image itself is kind of pixelated with the pin strokes. And it's not terrible, but I'm used to the precision of the Apple screens on the iPad. And this really doesn't hold a candle to that.

The e-ink kind of thing is, you know that's for the reason the battery lasts forever but it's not as responsive as a as a proper screen and one of the big disadvantages for me is i really like the thing in good notes where you can hit a button and then you can print kind of on a large size font but it automatically shrinks it onto the page. And while this device has the ability to pinch and zoom, it's really kind of difficult to use because of the ink screen, and it's not really what it's for. And then I guess some other points for me is I don't have a problem going to a meeting with an iPad, taking notes in the meeting.

I don't care what other people are doing with their iPad. If I'm using an iPad in a meeting with you, it's because it's for our meeting, you know, so you can think what you want. And, um, $600, that's the other problem. You know, it's just, it's just a lot of money, you know, and, um, I don't mind spending money on stuff, but if it's something that i'm not in love with i'm at six hundred dollars is a lot of money you know so that's uh that's legitimate yeah if you have an ipad already and especially if you use an application like good notes and you're looking for something to replace good notes this is not the thing you want to spend money on most likely however However, I do think this has a place. All of the things that you described are absolutely true. The E-Ink screen feels slow. There's no real Zoom text feature like in GoodNotes. And it does feel slow whenever you're changing screen. It kind of does the E-ink thing where it flashes and then

it'll load. In practice, in terms of just taking notes, that really doesn't bother me. But it is a very expensive note taker if that's all you're going to use it for. Like I said, you're definitely not going to do any sort of sketching. It's black and white, so there's no colors. I mean, there's a lot of reasons to use GoodNotes instead of this, depending on what the output is. But if you're just trying to take notes, I think this is a pretty cool tool. I can see why a lot of people really like this. Oh, yeah. I mean, I talked about it briefly on MPU and I got a bunch of emails from people who are using it. Some people like her and design work and they love it because they can sketch on it

and they love the experience of the pin on the digital link and doing rough sketches and they've got it on their desk and they don't have to have scraps of paper everywhere. I get it, but it's just not for me. That doesn't mean it's not for you. Yep. Yep. I really like it. I don't know how much I'm going to use it broadly. I've kind of identified the meeting notes, for example, as a specific application here. I don't think I would do my daily planning in this, you know, where I do my time blocking. I had that thought when I first opened it up because it's got the dot grid paper and my fancy paper actually is not dot grid. I kind of missed that. But it's not going to replace the feel of the fountain pen for me, but I'm also not bringing fountain pens into a meeting because it's just going to smudge and look like garbage. If I'm not at my desk, you know, this is a great thing to bring to a physical meeting.

Yeah, you talk about an iPad being a distraction in a meeting. Going in a meeting with a really fancy fountain pen is also a distraction. I have made that mistake. But this is a pretty cool device. I like the fact that you can put e-books on it. I was kind of hoping to figure out a way to get my Kindle books on here. It has support for EPUBs, not the Kindle books, unfortunately. But you can upload PDF files and e ebooks and things and mark them up you know you're not

going to have the ability to mark things in red like in in good notes but for basic annotations and things and reviewing pdfs that you didn't have to you know if you're not marking up things to send to somebody else and call out hey this is something i want to change you know you might want some different color tools for for something that. But in terms of just personal review and things like that, I could see this being a really handy device for reviewing and annotating PDFs as well. Yeah. And if you're someone who burns through pads of paper, this might be for you. Overall, two thumbs up for me. How does that Ferris Bueller line go?

Very choice if you have the means. Yeah. Like, it's expensive, but it's nice. Okay, that wraps it up today. But before I go, I just want to point you to another great RelayFM podcast, and that is Roboism. Roboism is a show by Alex Cox and Kathy Campbell exploring how artificial intelligence,

machine learning, and digital assistants are affecting our culture. Kathy and Alex are two of my favorite people, and they make a great show. With them, you can explore the humanity behind the bots that are quickly becoming a part of our everyday life at relay.fm slash roboism,

or search roboism wherever you get your podcasts. We are the Focus Podcast. You can find us at relay.fm slash focused. We've got that forum over at talk.macpowerusers.com. We've got a little section there of it. I want to thank our sponsors today, and that is our friends over at Timing, Squarespace, and Setup, and we'll see you next time.