Focused - 195: The Productivity Field Guide

Episode Date: January 16, 2024

Welcome to Focused, a productivity podcast about more than just cranking widgets. I'm Mike Schmitz, and I'm joined by my fellow co-host, the man of the hour, Mr. David Sparks. Hi, Mike. Hi, everybody. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. I'm very excited to talk to you today about the Productivity Field Guide. I know this has been a labor of love a long time in the making. So before we get there, though, if you'll afford me just a brief diversion, I'd like to make an announcement about the Obsidian University cohort, since this is the last episode that'll happen before it goes live. Sure. All right. Awesome. So I am getting ready to start the third cohort for Obsidian University, and you can find out more details at obsidianuniversity.com slash cohort. The big changes this time around, I'm really leaning into the PKM stack concept. And I am including with the cohort itself, which is going to be Monday,

Wednesday, Friday, 2 p.m. Central. So let's see, I guess that's 12 different live sessions. It's going to go for four weeks. I'm including access to a life theme cohort because I realized that philosophy piece talking about personal mission statements and core values, we had quite a few people join the last life theme cohort from Obsidian University. So I'm building that in as we talk about the vision and values piece. And then I'm also creating this like starter vault. Essentially, it's going to have all of the queries and all of the settings and all

of the plugins pre-configured so as we talk about the the different lists that you need to have and the creativity flywheel you've essentially got something that you can just plug all that stuff into so like i said there'll be more details on the the website but that's going to kick off on January 22nd. Cost is $497. The Life Team cohort, I normally sell separately for $197. It's got access to a bunch of other courses. You can see all that on the website. But just wanted to let people know that if you were thinking about joining, then that is now available and I would love to have you jump on board. then that is now available and I would love to have you jump on board. Yeah. And you know what I will just say is a friend and consumer of Mike's content that you will get value for your money. If you sign up for Mike's courses,

he delivers the goods. Well, thank you very much. Speaking of delivering the goods, you have delivered the productivity field guide. Congratulations. Yeah, man, this is, um, this one feels really good to, to ship. The, uh, productivity field guide is a thing that I've been working on for seven years. I I've never, I've never had a project linger like this one, and I'm very pleased to be sharing it with the world. Well, I think you have done a phenomenal job with this. I know that this one was a long time in the making. So if you remember when we had Nathan

Berry on the show, when I was telling you about him and maybe we should talk to this guy, I shared this documentary with you. And the documentary starts off with the interviewer asking the same question I am going to ask you, what took so long? You know, for me, I looked at my original file on this because this started out as a book. It was seven years ago. And I'm a big fan of that seven year number. I've talked about it on this show you know how the science is that like your body grows a new set of cells every seven years and I I like to think about that as a rebirth like every seven years there's a different version of you and it's a great way to think about your life right you know when you think about something dumb you did

15 years ago you're like well that was two versions of me. I can't have to stop beating myself up over that. That guy doesn't even exist anymore. Well, the guy who started this course doesn't exist anymore because it's been seven years. But it's been an ongoing journey for me. I've always been interested in productivity since I was a kid. I started with Dale Carnegie books that I got from the library in 1984. And it's just been, you know, an ongoing thing for me. But over the last 15-ish years, I've really kind of put the hammer down on figuring out what it means for me and what the framework is that I want to use. You know, it's kind of like apps. You don't want to keep switching. You want to figure something out and then just use that to get work done. And I finally kind of got there. But then I realized I don't want to start writing about it and sharing it when it was

so fresh. You know, and seven years ago, I was still kind of finalizing what it meant to me and how I was using it. I wanted to use it longer. And then add in a sprinkle of imposter syndrome and a touch of career change. And suddenly, you know, seven years go by and you still haven't got it out in the world. And this was the year for me. Awesome.

Well, congratulations. First of all, I know there's a lot of hard work that went into this. You've given me access to it and it looks amazing. Talk us through the development process of the format for this field guide. How did you decide how to put it all together? Yeah, I mean, I've been making field guides for a long time. And, you know, it's a very defined format.

It's very intense and extensive video training. And this one didn't really fit that mold because it's more about, this one isn't about apps. It's about a framework and structure to figure out how to go forward with your life. Productivity is, I think, kind of an understatement in this sense. It's really a life system. And I think I needed to be in front of the camera a lot more because I'm explaining things to you.

But I didn't want them to be like hostage videos where you're just sitting there talking to the camera. So I took some steps. I kind of upped the game of the studio and two camera shoots. And I have the benefit of having an illustrator come in and make what we call stick sparky, which is like little stick character versions of me talking through, demonstrating some of this stuff as we walk through it. But there's also screencasting too, because some of the stuff you do need to sit down at a computer or with a notepad and write these things down. So it's a mix of videos of live video and screencasting. And it really required us to kind of reinvent how we make a field guide around here.

And that was kind of fun, too. Like, I've even got some top-down video when I'm writing a notebook. And I guess if that answers your question, it was a very different process to put this one together. Yeah, I know in the very first module of the productivity field guide, you're kind of explaining what it is. And then the first assignment, essentially, that you give someone, you've got a screencast, but you're using Apple Notes and you're just making a list. So that was one of the things that stood out to me is this is very different than a lot of the other screencasts, field guides that you have done, where you're diving deep and you're showing all the technical how-tos. I mean, it's helpful to see you making the list, but the benefit is not in, well, how do I use Apple Notes to do this? You still got to put forth the hard work of

thinking through these things for yourself. Yeah. I really wanted to be app agnostic with this field guide, and I wanted to be as simple as possible i don't want someone to say well in order to do sparky's productivity thing i need to master obsidian and omni focus and all you know and i use those apps for my implementation of this stuff but you don't need to i mean the trick of the the system I'm talking about is not in mastering apps. It's about mastering yourself. And you can do that with a yellow pad and a pencil. You really don't need fancy apps for the stuff I'm doing, which is different.

Like, you know, as we release this, some of the Max Barkey Labs members got early access to it. And they're like, wow, I thought there'd be more in here about apps. I'm like, this isn't about apps. This is about trying to figure out a way to get the most out of life for you. And that's why this is such a different one. And this is just, it's an itch I needed to scratch. I wanted to get this out in the world. I have found it tremendously useful in my life. And some of the early feedback I've got from some of the early customers has been very positive. But it's not the usual thing you get from Sparky.

You know, it's a different one. How difficult was it to take the mechanics of the systems that you've created in OmniFocus and Obsidian and all those other apps and create some sort of framework that was app agnostic and so simple that you could do it with a piece of paper and a pen. It wasn't that hard at all because the stuff that this course covers is the foundational stuff. This course really isn't tips and tricks about how to get 10 things done in a time it takes

five to take five. In fact, the focus of this course is that if you have 10 things, maybe you should just do five things. And that part of this for anybody, honestly, requires a lot of self-reflection and knowledge and figuring out what's important to you and making tough decisions. And apps, apps frankly can't do that for you. So once you get to the end of this course, then you can take your power knowledge of apps and then you can double down on it. You can make it even more efficient. That's when the tips and tricks stuff really kicks in.

But the problem of productivity, in my opinion, is that so much of it is about the tips and tricks. There's a book component to this one too, because I wrote a book along the way. So you get a book and you get the videos. And the analogy I use throughout the book is like a sailing ship. If you own a sailboat and you go out into the ocean, you can get really good at coiling rope and furling the sails. And you can get really good at coiling rope and furling the sails. And like, you can become an expert at that. And that's what productivity, you know, I'm holding up air quotes tells us these days, like you're here's 10 ways to get better at

coiling your rope. But meanwhile, your sailboat is at sea and what direction is it going? What direction is your compass pointing and where do you want it to end up? And unfortunately, a lot of people get so hung up on becoming the world's best rope coilers that their boat is just going in circles and they're not getting anywhere. And even though you have very well coiled rope, if you don't have a direction, you got a problem. And I think in the modern world more than ever, that is very difficult. So that's what my goal is with this is to give you a framework to figure out your compass and your destination. And then you can start coiling rope. ideal customer, who is it that this productivity field guide could really benefit? Who's going to get the most out of this one? Well, I think to look at myself as I was stumbling into these ideas, I felt like I was working hard but not getting anywhere. And if that's you, then this is for you. I think that that is probably the person that's going to help. It's somebody who knows that they've got the right intention,

but they don't know what to do with it. Somebody who's maybe good at coiling a rope, but they're starting to realize they're going in circles. This is for you. realize they're going in circles, this is for you. What was the tipping point for you? When did you realize that you needed to look somewhere else than rather than coiling the rope? Well, I mean, my life, you know, I have a whole separate career that happened along the way. And, you know, it's funny when I talk to all my creator friends, it's like, you forget, I practiced law almost 30 years. And the thing about that is you get into that career and it is all consuming. And I was a trial lawyer for most of it. So it's even more so like you have a case coming up for trial. That's all you think about. You go, you try the case, you win, you lose. But then there's the next one and you start doing that and you get on this cycle of working hard and, and doing good work, but not stopping to check in with your life and where you're going. And, and I realized kind of about my, I guess, early to mid forties, um, that, you know, I'm on this, I'm on this train here. I'm on this, you know, but I'm not really

giving much thought to what it all means, you know, and I never thought I had a midlife crisis, but maybe that was it. I was just thinking, well, what, you know, I'm doing good. I'm making good money and I'm winning cases, but is that what my life is at this point? You know, and, and I, I really didn't have a way to address it. And, um, that's when I started thinking seriously about it and kind of started to stumble into the ideas that, that this covers. How did you get over the, uh, you mentioned the imposter syndrome. Um, what was the point where you really just were like, you know what, I am qualified to share what I've figured out along the journey with, uh, with this stuff and maybe it'll help others as well.

Is there a specific tipping point there? A couple, like I did a couple of years ago, they, the quarterly retreat thing where I talked a little bit about roles in RTA and, and that got picked up by a few people and it really helped them. And then I shared it with a couple of friends who were struggling with these kinds of things. I said, well, look, this is how I do it. And they, it really helped them too. I stumbled into people that were receptive to hear the message and it changed their lives. And I'm like, okay, this is more than just something that works for me. I should share it more broadly.

And, and that, that's what kind of got me over the hump. And honestly, when you spend this much time with it, at some point there is a certain like momentum you get and you're like, okay, I'm just going to do this. Although I have to admit, I had a last minute minute panic i almost didn't release this one last month what happened a good trusted friend uh i sent it to him and he said you know this just isn't your thing i don't know why you're doing this you know you should be just talking about omni focus and obsidian you know this isn't your wheelhouse and um and i think he was telling me that from a place of love, right? But, you know, it's like, oh, man, have I just overshot the mark here?

Should I just get back to my lane? But, you know, there's so many people that gave me the exact opposite response. They're like, hey, you know, this really helped me. Thank you. But I decided, you know, heck with it. I feel like I need to, I need to ship this thing. And so, you know, it's like, I feel like, uh, I once saw a quote from Neil Gaiman was something like, when people give you general advice, it's usually true. And when people give you specific advice, it's always wrong. So I'm like, something to that extent, you know, and I, uh, I realized,

you know, I just have to to i can't just let one person talk me out of shipping this thing and i put a tremendous amount of effort into it and like i said i was already starting to get positive feedback i mean i just got an email from one of the labs members before but we're recording this before it ships saying that him and his wife went out over the weekend and they defined their roles in their arte and they both feel really positive you know and it's like a journey they're going on together and it was it was very heartwarming that he's using something i created to to make his life better i'm like yeah that's why i did it i mean mission accomplished that's all i wanted the comment about how it's not in your your your wheelhouse. Uh, I'd love to unpack

that a little bit because I feel like that actually is what provides the value. Um, I don't know, I guess having my own battles with imposter syndrome, the, um, the thing that, imposter syndrome, the thing that helped me get over it was realizing that there were people who I could help. The people who, you know, you look at the big gurus and that feels unattainable. But this person is doing something that I think maybe I could do. And it's inspiring to helping other people. So kudos to you for pushing through that. That doesn't mean obviously that like you just make whatever you want because there's somebody out there you do need to figure out

where do you contribute the most value. But I think with the productivity field guide specifically here, I have looked up to you in this sense for a long time. The fact that you were a lawyer, had a family, doing Max Parkey on the side. I think I even wrote about that in my book when I self-published it a while back. Everyone needs a hero. And I think it's sad if we leave that role open and just assume that somebody else is going to fill that because there are people that we can help along the way. It is going to be uncomfortable, but I think that's really the thing that makes it valuable and worthwhile. that makes it valuable and worthwhile. Yeah. I mean, if there's one thing that can be said about me,

it's that I ship, you know? And I've done it for a long time. I did a lot of work as a lawyer, but I've literally lost count of the number of field guides I've published. I publish two traditional books. I make three podcasts. I get stuff out the door. And this system is what makes it possible for me because it allows

me to make tough decisions and feel good about what I'm working on. And a lot of people have asked me over the years, well, how do you do that? I'm very curious how you pull it off. And to some extent, this course is my answer to that question. This episode of the Focus Podcast is brought to you by Factor. Get healthy, fully prepared food delivered to your door. Go to factormeals.com slash focused50 for 50% off. Get started on your goals with Factor so you're ready for this new year. Factor's ready-to-eat meal delivery takes the stress out of meal planning and sets you up for success in the new year.

Skip grocery stores, prep work, and cooking fatigue. Instead, get chef-crafted, dietician-approved meals delivered right to your door. With over 35 meals to choose from per week, including options like keto, calorie smart, protein plus, vegan, veggie, and more, plus over 55 weekly add-ons, you'll have a ton of nutritious and flavorful options to kickstart your year. So you can forget frantic lunch prep and rushed dinners. Factor's two-minute meals are your secret

weapon in the new year. Factor now offers loads of snack options like breakfasts, smoothies, Factor now offers loads of snack options like breakfasts, smoothies, juices, snacks, and more to keep you going. So my wife goes to work every day and comes home at night tired, and I work from home, so I like to have dinner ready for her whenever possible, but the trouble is it takes time to cook dinner, and it takes a set of skills that I don't particularly have. That's why I like Factor. With Factor, I can get a ready-made meal delivered and I can have it ready when she comes home so we can enjoy dinner together

with something delicious and without a lot of work. A couple Factor meals we've tried recently that I enjoyed. One was chicken pot pie pasta. It's like a chicken pot pie in a bowl, but it has pasta and veggies, and it's really good. Another one we enjoyed was herb cream cheese salmon with red pepper, cauliflower, grits, and broccoli. The herb cream cheese and salmon together was delicious. But the best part was it was just so easy to put together, and I had it ready when she came home. Skip the overpriced

takeout trap. Factor is cheaper and way more delicious than takeout. And when things get hectic, Factor is flexible. Change your order up every week with plans from 4 to 18 meals per week, or pause or reschedule your deliveries at any time. Factor has everything you need for a week of flavorful, nutritious eats. So head to factormeals.com slash focused50 and use code focused50 to get 50% off. That's code focused50 with no space at factormeals.com slash focused50. And our thanks to Factor for their support of the Focus podcast. All right, so before the break, you're mentioning this field guide is how you do it. Well, why don't you talk us through that? What's the tentpoles of your framework here?

Well, the beginning point for me is that it's a roles-based system. And no matter how you get through your life, you've got to have some foundational thing holding you up. And to me, it's my roles. And that was not an obvious answer. I mean, a lot of the, you know, if you look at the literature, a lot of it is project-based, like you should build your system around projects, but projects are temporary, you know? You know, you have a project to do something and then you finish that thing and then you're, what's holding you up at that point. And it didn't feel to me like important enough to make project the foundation. There's a lot of like core value.

What are your core values? And when I grew up, that was kind of a very common theme of a foundational system of productivity. But through a lot of journaling, I came to the conclusion that what really motivates me are the roles that I take on. But a lot of them, if you don't think about it intentionally, you don't even realize what the roles are that you've taken on and whether they are in line with what you want to do with your life. and whether they are kind of in line with what you want to do with your life. So I started just looking at my journal entries and realizing that I wrote a lot about certain roles. There's three general categories for me. And then of course, I walk through how to do it. And I recommend you don't copy mine, but that you go through this painful process on your own.

go through this painful process on your own. And the three for me are other people, roles with other people, like my wife, I'm a husband, my kids, I'm a father, my friends. So I have roles with other people. And that's a set of roles that I've adopted. Another one is my work. And for a long time, if you look at my kind of historical documents into the system, I had two, I had Max Sparky and I had a lawyer. And then when I first started doing it seven years ago, I had lawyer and then Max Sparky. It's kind of funny over the years, those, they flipped and then lawyer dropped off the map, but it was through kind of evaluating those roles that I kind of came up to the conclusion that I needed to get rid of one. And, um, but that's a role that I, that I serve. And, uh, and that's, you know, something that I voluntarily do, but it's something I need to be focused on. And then I have a series

of roles to myself and, um, you know, uh, I try to be healthy. I try to be spiritual. I try to, you know, I try to learn, you know, be a student and read books. So I've got different roles I've defined for myself that are kind of self-facing. So I've got kind of the out, the people-facing roles, the work-facing roles, and the personal-facing roles. And that's the foundation for me is figuring out what are those roles. And once you decide that those are roles that you have and that you want to keep, then you start building on that. Nice. How many roles do you think is ideal or how many is, is too many, not enough? Do you have any sort of sweet spot for you're making this list of roles? What should people be shooting for? I think too many is when you can't keep up with them,

and not enough is when you have a lot of extra time and you don't know what to do with it. I mean, it depends on the person and where you are in life. I've had retirees pick up this system. They don't have many roles, but they're killing it. And then I've heard from some people that are much younger using the system who are really deep in a lot of roles and they're making it work. But I do think that that is kind of the cold water you need in your face. Like one of the examples I use in the course is the idea of like, let's say you pick up a role, you decide you're going to be on the association for your apartment building or your homeowner's association.

So then that's a new role you've adopted. Is that something that you want? Well, maybe you're at a point in your life where you want to give back some time and do that. But a lot of times you're not. And acknowledging the existence of the roles, and I think that's the way the roles audit works for me, is first you say, well, what roles do I currently have? Don't judge whether you should have them or not, but just accept, okay, well, these are the roles I'm doing. And if you look at the work you're doing, it tells you and then say, well, how many of these kind of are in alignment with what I want to do with my life. And then maybe you'll find that some of the roles don't fit anymore. Or maybe you'll find that the role that you really want to be fulfilling, you're not,

you're barely given any time to, or you haven't even really formally adopted. So like when I first started doing this a couple of years into it, I realized I felt empty about something. I couldn't figure it out. And I realized wasn't donating enough time and and money to to worthy causes so then i i added a role for that you know and so you just gotta you just gotta kind of work with the system if that makes sense and this isn't a a thing where you spend you know an hour on it and you're good you have to go back and constantly revisit it i I mean, this is hard work, but you're only here so long. Memento mori. So figure out what is important, what the roles you want,

and then focus on that so when you get to the end of your life, you feel like you spent it wisely. All right, so people identify their roles. They've got their list. Then what? Yeah, this is the part where i start getting very woo the uh i love hellenistic philosophers i studied them in undergrad you know aristotle plato the whole gang you know and um and uh so let me just bear with me for a story here. The, um, when I was in law school, I got in on a, uh, on a scholarship, but the scholarship required that I stay in the top

percentage of the, of the class, or I would lose it. It was a merit scholarship. And I came, my dad, you know, worked in a lumberyard. My mom didn't have a job. We didn't have a lot of money growing up. So I, um, I really liked the idea of getting through law school without crippling debt. So I took the school that offered me the scholarship, and I got there and I had to worry about, can I get the grades to keep the scholarship? The way law school works, for those of you that aren't familiar with it, is there are no quizzes, there are no midterms. There is one test at the end of the semester, and that's your grade in the class. You know, there's no participation. There's no homework. It literally all comes down to how you perform in one test

at the end of the semester. So my first semester in law school, I'm sitting there with all these smart people. The guy next to me is from Harvard. I went to a state school in California, you know, all sorts of imposter syndrome, right? All these smart people around me and I need to be like up there at the end, or I'm going to have to owe a lot of money. And, and I was, I was worried about it. And the, the thing I struck onto was a very common term back in, especially Aristotle's writing, but it shows up in other places too. And it's called arete, A-R-E-T-E, arete. It's a Greek term and it's got a lot of different means. It's been translated several times. And the idea of it is a perfection a sort of perfection or what they often refer to as virtue arte is a hard word to look at now i feel like around like the victorian

era uh virtue kind of got this i don't know there's like a moral kind of you know you know virtue is more it's more considered considered like virginity or something than it is the classic definition of virtue was like you are living your best existence or something like the perfect version of you. And that's what they were searching for with Arte. Like I said, this is a, this is a hard thing to define because it's changed over time, but it's a form of perfection. I'm going to open up Obsidian and read my note about Arte. Arte has two layers. It can mean excellence in a particular thing, like playing giant steps on a saxophone, but can combine with apply to all elements of your life. It means something more like excellence of character. These are just words I've written over the years about Arte.

life, it means something more like excellence of character. These are just words I've written over the years about arete. To me, it means excellence of character, moral, mental, and physical. And it's a jumping off point for a lot of things like stoicisms for virtues. But it really goes back to Aristotle was the one who really gave it a role. In fact, if you read modern interpretations of Aristotle, a lot of times it's almost equated to habit and like perfecting habits. But arete for me, and this is back to my note here, is the bedrock of my life. I am working to achieve arete in all roles I choose to accept. So that's the answer. So I find the roles that I think are important to me, And then I define what the perfect version of those are via RIT. Now, going back to my story, when I was in law school, I was worried about not getting

the grades and I had no way to know. And you can sit around and worry about it the whole time, or you can try and be the best possible law student you can be. And that term RIT came to me at that point because I'd just been studying it in undergrad right before I started law school. So I wrote it down and put it on a sticky on my desk. And every day I thought, what's the perfect version of a law student? I want to be the perfect version of a law student. So I've given myself every possible chance to get good grades at the end and keep my scholarship. So I thought of RTA as a law student and it served me because I went to law school in Pepperdine in Malibu, which is a beautiful area here in Southern California. Well, all the people in law school, they'd like go to

the bar and they go to surfing. They did all this stuff every day. I'm in the library. I'm going back to my apartment studying. I, I led a very frugal monk-like existence through law school. And I got the grades and I kept the scholarship because I pursued my R.A.T. as a law student. But then I graduated and I kind of cast it aside for whatever reason. I don't know. But you get married, you have kids, you get on this treadmill of being a trial lawyer. And then suddenly you're in your 40s starting to think, well, what am I exactly doing with my life? How am I doing?

You know, how am I judging myself? And I went back and kind of discovered the roles. And I was thinking, well, how do I, you know, what's it matter? If I decide my role as a husband, how do I make that relevant? And then after a 15-year break, it comes back to me. It's arete. I need to go back to arete. But instead of just as a law student, I need to go back to arete in every role I have.

And that, to me, is the big thing, right? And so the course is about teaching you how to find your roles and pursue your Arate. And if you do that, then you live a life consistent with what it is that you want to be and do. And things get really easy. So you mentioned Arate as like the perfection of the habits. And I want to unpack that a little bit here because I think when you're describing arete, on the surface, it feels like that could actually contribute to the imposter syndrome if your definition of arete is somebody else who is doing an excellent thing and you don't measure up to that standard of excellence maybe a ridiculous example is you're an athlete and you see you're watching the players in the

nba and you can't achieve that level of success so you can get discouraged because you have arte as a an athlete um and that is just an impossible standard that you have set for yourself i don't think that's what you're describing here though because you yeah let me clarify yeah because because arete is entirely process and not results arete means that you're you're doing the best ever like as a law student arete for me wasn't someone who gets 95th percentile. A law student to me was someone who reads every case and reads every case referenced in every case and understands it thoroughly when I show up for class. It's a process. RIT as a husband isn't someone who has a happy wife. It's someone who every time he has a conversation with his wife, he looks her in the eye and listens to her words. And someone who values her well-being more than my own,

those are all process. And RIT definitions for me are process-driven. They are not results-driven. The results come. You get that. But the only way you get it is by a focus on the process. You get that, but the only way you get it is by a focus on the process. Yeah, you control what you can control and you're not focused on the results. I guess in the business world, this would be the difference between lead measures and lag measures, right? You're focusing on the things that you can do and you're going to do those to the best of your ability and then you're going to trust that the score is going to take care of itself. Yeah.

Well, or at least know that you couldn't have tried any harder. And the score doesn't matter. This episode of Focus is brought to you by Squarespace. Squarespace is the all-in-one platform for building your brand and growing your business online. You can stand out with a beautiful website, engage with your audience, and sell anything, your products, services, even the content you create. Squarespace has got everything that you need all in one convenient place. With Squarespace, you can take advantage of professionally designed website templates because Squarespace has designs for every

category and use case. You can customize your look, update the content and features to fit your unique needs, and you can make any Squarespace template do just about anything that you want. So your idea, brand, or business stands out on every device. You can also organize your content in the new asset library where you can upload, organize, and access all of your content from one place. So there's no more scrambling to find the right thing. You can manage all your files from one central hub and then use them across the Squarespace platform.

It's really cool. Another thing that's really cool is the Fluid Engine, which is Squarespace's next generation website design system, which helps you unlock your creativity more easily than ever before. You start with one of those templates and you can customize every design detail with a reimagined drag and drop technology for desktop or mobile. This is what I used for my Obsidian University site, and it is really cool. It makes it really easy to make a website that looks great on any device. I've used Squarespace to build sites before, but I was kind of blown

away by the results that I was able to get with that fluid engine. And I've gotten lots of compliments on my site and how well it's been designed. And people are shocked when I tell them that I built it all with Squarespace. But you can do a lot more than just host a website. For example, it's also the thing that I use to host the Intentional Family podcast that I do with my wife. If you have any sort of creative project that you want to get out into the world, Squarespace is the best way to do it. It's my go-to option whenever I have a new project, even though I have a bunch of web design experience. Squarespace just makes it so easy, and you know that what you create in Squarespace is going to look amazing. So if you've got an idea for a project that you want to build a website for, then you should check out

squarespace.com slash focused, F-O-C-U-S-E-D, for a free trial. You can build the whole site, and then when you're ready to launch, just go to squarespace.com slash focused and use the code focused to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. That's squarespace.com slash focused and code focus when you decide to sign up to get 10% off your first purchase and to show your support for the Focus podcast. Our thanks to Squarespace for their support of this show and all of RelayFM. I know the next piece of this is some sort of review process. How do you do that if you're not focused on the outcome or the score necessarily? How do you measure whether you are doing what you can do in terms of moving

towards your RTA? Yeah, it's not enough to sit down once a year and figure out your roles and write down RTA definitions. You have to live with this stuff. And frequent review is necessary. I think the only way you can do this is repetitions, you know, and review cycles. And you and I have talked at length over the years about how we're not fans of annual review, but like quarter review, because you get four of them a year instead of one. But I also recommend you do this monthly. And even to a lesser extent weekly, you want as many reps as you can. Once you decide what your roles in your RTA are to take a look at how you're doing. Like, you know, we had, as we record this, we're just coming off the holidays and I was

looking at last couple of weeks and I spent a lot of time with family, but that's okay because I have these family and family-based roles. And I put a lot of work into them, being intentional with them and spending time and enjoying that and giving them my full attention. And now that, you know, we're out of that and everybody's kind of going back to work, then I'm focusing more on my work role. But you should be always checking yourself out, making sure you're not losing track, you know, mindful of the process. And I believe that a frequent review process is, is key to making this work. So what, uh, I know mindfulness you, you brought up here and, uh, mindfulness

meditation has come up quite a bit over the years of focus. Where does that fit in here in your opinion? I mean, uh, journaling and, and meditation are two excellent ways to examine yourself in terms of these roles and what's coming up in the journal, what's coming up in the meditation that relates to these. I guess to take an example as the lawyer thing, as I slowly came to the conclusion I was going to stop being a lawyer, there was a lot of resistance to that. I mean, I had put at that point, I mean, I had almost 30 years as a lawyer, but I had seven years of education before that to get the job. And so you had that. It was attached to my identity because, you know, what do you do? I'm a lawyer. And then the income was useful.

I mean, it's nice having a job that pays well. So there's all these things involved with it. And then as going through kind of journaling and meditating on these things, you start to kind of work your way through them. So I find this, that's just one example, but I'm very familiar with the roles that I've chosen and getting better at those pursuing the RTA is a constant thing in my life. And so, you know, when the race is over, I'll be able to say, no, I, I gave it all my all on the things that mattered most. And, and that's all I can really ask for. Walk us through the reflection piece here. Um, because I know you mentioned like you have to define your own roles.

You have to define your own RTA. But when it comes to the review, is it is there some sort of framework for considering am I being successful, like thinking time questions with this? Or is it literally just taking a pause and thinking about these roles about the arate and whatever comes up that's useful information and helping you move towards it yeah i mean there's different time increments and you all have to decide what works best for you but i walk through mine in the course but at some interval of time i would recommend no more than three months you need to look at every role and every

RTA definition and say, is this still a role that I want? Is this definition still work? And like parenting is a good example because my RTA definition of parenting has altered quite a bit over the years because my kids get older and the ideal father of a, you know, of a college graduate kid is much different than the ideal father of a junior high school kid. And so their needs are different. You know, the actions I do to serve them are different. And you just, you know, by being mindful of that, looking at it and changing the definitions, it changes the way that you address it. Like one of the points in terms of parenting for me is like, as my kids have got older, I have to get better at not intervening

and letting them make some mistakes and get into some, you know, they need to bloody their nose once in a while so they can learn how to deal with that as they're grownups. I mean, eventually I won't be here to take care of them and they have to figure this stuff out like I did. And so that's a, that's a, that's a parenting skill of someone with my kid's age that might not necessarily be appropriate with a younger kid. So you've just got to look at that over time. So getting back, so you should look at the roles. You should look at the RTA definitions.

And then the most important part, I think, is going back and saying, OK, well, this is what I think an ideal father is. How did I do in the last month or the last three months or the last six months? What were my highlights and what were my lowlights? And for the parts that I didn't live up to it, how can I do better at that next time? What should I be more aware of? Are there new habits I should adopt or new projects I should adopt?

Then projects and habits come in to serve the RTA. But you have to, you know, don't take a project just for the heck of taking a project. Take a project because it moves the ball forward towards your RTA. And this process of looking at your success and failure allows you to get closer to the mark. Where does things like hyper scheduling or daily planning come in here because i know that those are separate sections in the productivity field guide they're topics that we've talked about at length on this podcast but how do you get from arete to planning your day in broad strokes yeah okay so the you know the, you know, the, the big thrust of the, of the field guide is the stuff we just talked about. I think getting that foundation set,

but then it's a question of tactical implementation. How, okay, if this is important to you, how do you make it happen? And that's when I get into more nuts and bolts, productivity stuff of hyper-scheduling and, and some of the other stuff that I use in order to, to actually make sure I work on these rules, because even though you define this stuff, it would be very easy to define this stuff, but then go back to just, you know, hanging out on YouTube and Amazon or whatever, and not actually making progress on them. And so the act of making progress on them requires these reviews, but it also requires that you turn it into actual work that, you know, you actually hold your hand on the tiller and point the boat the right direction and make progress.

And, and that's where that stuff comes in. Nice. Now the, the final section in the Productivity Field Guide has a couple interesting lessons in here. I'm kind of curious, what are the big things that people need to keep in mind as they're pulling this all together? Is there a parting thought you would leave somebody with? Or if they're coming to this and you have one opportunity to give somebody a final piece of productivity advice, what's it going to be? Wow, that's a tough question. I think it is that you have to figure out what's important to you. Because if you look at all productivity advice, I think it all boils down to do less, but the important stuff. I think in the modern world, it's very easy to do a lot and not have time for the important stuff. And so I think my big advice is you've got to figure out what's important. And then once you do that, then it becomes a lot easier to say no to the unimportant stuff.

And then you can do less but more important work. So you've got to figure that out. And like I said, then all the tactics come into play for good use. You know, coiling rope because you want to get your boat to the destination that you're pointed it in and having the best sails and the best rope. That's great because it's going to get you there faster and sooner and easier, but you got to have the direction first. And I just feel like so much of the advice, modern and ancient, um, is about coiling rope and not about the direction. So we got to stop and do that.

I mean, honestly, I think I spent 15 years avoiding the question. Like I knew that I needed to figure that out. And I kept saying, well, I'm too busy. I'm a dad. I've got these trials. This stuff will take care of itself. I didn't want to go through the process because I didn't even know how to get started. So I'm hopefully giving you a cheat sheet

with this field guide to get you rolling. Yeah, and I mean, the quilling the rope parts and we kind of glossed over a lot of the mechanics of the hyper-scheduling, the daily planning, the moving the needle, the shutdown routines. We've talked about that in the focus podcast a lot over the last couple of years. If there's anything specific you want to talk about in there, happy to do so. But I know like this last section, the final thoughts, I really like

this section. And you have one lesson in particular, I believe it's go easy on yourself, where this is kind of where like this is a message people need to hear I feel and this is kind of impactful where okay so you've got all this stuff you're trying to make it all work and then I feel like this last section you did a really good job of kind of bringing it in for a landing you know you mentioned you have to do less how do you make all this stuff work when there are other people involved who are going to mess up the plans? And then this go easy on yourself lesson in particular, it's like, okay, so you didn't hit the arete. You didn't achieve perfection this time around. It's going to be okay. That's a really important way to end it. that's a really important way to end it. One of the things, points of RTA, honestly, if you define it right,

you're never going to hit it. That's the, you know, and some people have given me feedback saying, well, that's frustrating. You mean I'm never going to achieve? I'm like, yeah, but it's the journey. It's the pursuit of it that makes you great. And that's, that's the goal, right? But I'm never going to be a perfect father. The definition of a father, I'm never going to be a perfect father. The definition of a father, I'm never going to hit that a hundred percent, but the fact that I'm striving for it makes me a better human. I'm never going to be perfect. Max Sparky or a perfect, you know, I call it Padawan learner as someone who's trying to teach myself new things as I get older, but I'm never

going to be perfect at any of these things. But the fact that I've defined them and I pursue them makes me better and it makes my life more fulfilling. So that's all. And just be comfortable with that. And yeah, that last, that is very hippie, the whole last section, but they were all points I really thought needed to be made that don't like fit into traditional productivity material. But I think there are points that if you don't realize, it's going to get a lot harder. I did the same thing at the beginning. I had some, I called ground rules at the beginning of productivity. Like, you know, none of this is new. You know, people have been talking about productivity. I found a quote from Marcus Aurelius that literally if you changed a couple nouns, it was a modern book on productivity. And then like,

there are certain things that, you know, you just gotta, if you're just coming into the idea of how do I become more productive, nobody tells you kind of like the ground rules. And nobody tells you the fact that it doesn't matter what system you have, you've got to do less. I mean, and so I just decided to, you know, to say the thing that nobody says at the beginning and the ending. And I'm glad you like that. Cause I, I really, that's another one I really went back and forth on. It's like, am I being too weird with, with saying this stuff? But I felt like it needed to be said. No, this is what makes it the max sparky productivity field guide. This is a, your, your brand. Uh, and I, I really like it. And I think it's something that a lot of people,

it'll resonate with a lot of people. I hope so. I hope it helps people. That's all. And it's very different. I mean, my next field guide is likely going to be the OmniFocus 4 field guide. It's not like I'm going to be making my usual field guides again, but this is a weird thing. And I hope it helps you. The plus edition comes with an extended webinar series. I'm not sure how many sessions it'll be. It looks like at least 12 as we do this, but I'm just going to go through the course of people that want to do it with other people and have a webinar. So, you know, it's going to, I feel like it's something I really want to, I want to spread the word on.

I don't know how else to say it. So after this one, back to the regular scheduled programming with the focus for a few guys. But I still like, I want to do updates for this and I want this to be an ongoing discussion. You know, I want to hear how people are using it. I mean, one of the other points I made in the ground rules is that no single system works for everybody. But I feel like what I've given in this course gives a lot of people a good jumping off point. The stuff with all the reference to kind of these ancient ideas of productivity,

I think for some people that's going to be off-putting. But the fact is, the ancient Greeks really did think about productivity and life in a way that I think is strangely appropriate to the modern world. Yeah, I think there's kind of a resurgence with this. I mean, everything that's old is new again. Ryan Holiday has written several books and creates a whole bunch of stuff around this idea of stoicism which as you pointed out is is very very old but it resonates with people so but even older than the stoics i mean i feel like some a lot of ancient philosophy i mean they they they thought

about science and all sorts of things but but one of the big pursuits they had was human happiness right it was something that they were interested in. And when you look at it at that time in history, they generally had stable governments and most people were able to eat and there was an economy. And in a lot of ways, it's somewhat akin to the modern world. And people are saying, well, I've got a roof over my head. I've got food on the table, but what makes life worthwhile? And they were thinking about that. And a lot of them, not all of them, I mean, the cynics are way out there, but a lot of them were thinking about happiness. And I think the conclusion a lot of them came to, starting with Aristotle and Socrates, but I think the Stoics also would be on this boat,

is that happiness, the formula for happiness is living the life you're kind of meant to with virtue, with arete, or with an ethical pursuit of your purpose is, in a lot of ways, what they concluded. Well, I think that's missing now. I think for a lot of us, we miss that first step of what is our purpose and what is the pursuit of that. And once you find that, then your life, it's like I tell people, it's the easy button. Like, oh, these are the roles I want to pursue. This is the kind of person I want to be. Now, it's just a question of executing on that. Well, that gets a lot easier and it's measurable and it's something that you can feel like you're doing. And I just think a lot of people need that. And it's just

funny to me that if you go back 3,000 years, the answer was there. This episode of the Focus Podcast is brought to you by Indeed. Join more than 3.5 million businesses worldwide using Indeed to hire great talent fast. Just go to indeed.com slash focused. We're driven by the search for better, but when it comes to hiring, the best way to search for a candidate isn't to search at all. Don't search, match with Indeed. If you need to hire, you need Indeed. Indeed is your matching and hiring platform with over 350 million global monthly visitors,

according to Indeed data, and a matching engine that helps you find quality candidates fast. Ditch the busy work, use Indeed for scheduling, screening, and messaging so you can connect with candidates faster. And it doesn't just help you hire faster. 93% of employers agree Indeed delivers the highest quality matches compared to other job sites, according to a recent Indeed survey. Getting the right person on your team is difficult. You have skills that you want. You want to have the right fit. Well, Indeed takes so much of the work out of it because as soon as you put in those needs, Indeed matches you with appropriate candidates. It's like jumping the line. It saves so much time and gets you really qualified candidates quickly. Leveraging over 140 million qualifications and preferences every day, their matching engine is

constantly learning from your preferences. So the more you use it, the better it gets. Join more than 3.5 million businesses worldwide that use Indeed to hire great talent fast. And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your job more visibility at Indeed.com slash focused. So go to I-N-D-E-E-D.com slash focused. So go to I N D E E D.com slash focus right now and support our show by saying you heard about it here on the focus podcast, that URL one last time, indeed.com slash focused terms and conditions apply. Do you need to hire you need indeed. And our thanks to indeed for sponsoring the focus podcast and all of RelayFM. All right, so in the last section,

you were talking about happiness and the value of these ancient ideas. And that got me thinking, there was another phrase that you used previously, which is really, I think, at the heart of all of this stuff and why maybe the productivity field guide is so unique. So I just want to ask you on the record, how do you be more productive? How do you define productivity and what does it mean to live a productive life in your opinion? The thoughtful pursuit and progress toward my R.A.T. It's all about R.A.T.

You know, exactly. So I guess the follow up to that, you know, someone's coming to this. Let's just assume, you know, 18 year old Mike is listening to this episode because it's got productivity in the title. How would you break that down even further? Someone who has no idea what RTA is, they haven't listened to anything else that we've talked in this episode. How would you condense productivity down into a single sentence?

Yeah, well, I think just as a preface here, my reliance on this term arete is really me. It's me indulging myself. I love the idea of these ancient questions that like some of these guys ask questions that there really were no answers to, and we still haven't answered. We never will. And that's kind of fun, right? That as humans, there are these questions that

don't have clear answers and we have to figure them out for ourselves. So by me using the term, I'm connecting myself to a very old idea, which makes me feel like I'm not alone. So that's why I use the word R.T. But you could really say, if you wanted to modernize it, you know, uh, the, the perfected version of yourself or the, the best, the best version of yourself, I think maybe that would be better if you don't want to say the word RTA. So if I were going to break it down to a sentence that I'd say, uh, uh, figure out, um, what the best version of yourself is and only do things that further that. I love it. You mentioned that this one was

cooking for a long time. What was the hardest point in the process of getting this field guide out the door? Just convincing myself to release it. for a long time, I went back and forth. I'm not sure if imposter syndrome was the right word for it. Cause I think a part of it was just like, okay, so you've got this weird thing that works for you, but I was fully aware that not all productivity advice works for everybody. And I wondered if I had a bit of a unicorn on my hands where this is some oddball way I figured out to deal with this stuff, but it really has no use to anybody else. And it was only when I started sharing it enough to have other people try it and get good results that I was able to kind of turn that corner. What was the most surprising thing from the process or what was the biggest lesson that you learned from getting the productivity

field guide out uh how easy it was to talk about it you know because this this is when it's a lot of of me talking to the camera videos but i mean i've thought about these things and written about them and journaled about them and meditated these things i'm so familiar with these ideas that it's very easy to talk about it. And I thought it would be more difficult because this is in a lot of ways the most kind of like vulnerable, intimate field guide, right? Because it's talking about my life and your life and how to make it better. And I could see myself getting hung up in that, but it didn't happen once I started like really getting the videos rolling, it just spilled out of me.

What is your favorite lesson from this field guide if you have one? passed over in this show because it is kind of the meat and potatoes of our show and not to beat a dead horse but i i think the pursuit of perfection in the things that matter is is just such an empowering principle if you can do it in the right way and uh i guess if there's one thing i'd like you to take out of it would be to figure out a mechanism to do that for yourself. What, if anything, in this field guide were you nervous about specifically? I know you mentioned the feedback and almost not releasing it because this is in your wheelhouse, but just like the content of the lessons themselves, is there anything in here that you're like, I'm not sure how people are going to respond to this one? I'm not sure how people are going to respond to this one.

Well, the whole last section was hard. Like I said, just kind of at the end saying, okay, let's get real about some of this stuff. And that's not something you normally see in productivity advice. And that's another one where a different person, but I had feedback saying, you should cut all that stuff out that's you know you know you make a field guide about productivity but then you tell them at the end that they just have to do less come on but that's the truth you know so i did not make this to become a national bestseller you know it's i hope that the people who are willing

to be real about this stuff and buy it can make progress. But it's definitely not written for the airport bookstore audience. Yeah, so I kind of got that feeling when you were talking about the stuff that was in here. And then once I started poking around in it, that this was intended to make a significant difference in the lives of maybe a smaller portion of your traditional Max Sparky audience. Maybe a different way to say this is you're going deep instead of wide. Is that fair i guess i mean i i would argue that this stuff would be useful to anybody regardless of their interest in technology um so i could see this i i you know as we record this hasn't released yet so i have no idea this could be a super niche title for me that doesn't sell real well because a lot of my traditional audience isn't interested in it and the other people don't find it.

I honestly don't know, but I needed to make it regardless. The feeling I get from watching these and reading because you got the EPUB version in there as well. the the epub version in there as as well um the the material that's that's in here is this is stuff that if you could go back in time and talk to 20 year old sparky this is what you would say make sure you pay attention to this is that fair yeah i wish that i had something like this when i was 20 yeah so what is the thing about this you know you mentioned that we're recording this a little bit before it's actually released. What are you most nervous about? You know what, Mike? I'm not that nervous. I'm at peace. For the longest time, this thing has been on the back of my mind that I wanted to release this. And I've gotten close so many

times. I was telling Stephen, I have driven up to the church on this thing many times, telling Stephen, like, I have driven up to the church on this thing many times, but I never seem to walk down the altar and down the aisle. And I'm finally doing it that I'm kind of at peace with it. And I know that there's going to be some negative feedback, but I also know there's going to be some very positive feedback. And I'm okay with all of that. And this is something that has made a huge difference in my life. And to the extent I can help people out with it, I hope that it does for them as well. And I am, maybe it's just a function of my age. I'm not that nervous about it. I feel like I have made my decision.

I have committed my boat and I have sailed in the direction I wanted to. And now the results can be whatever they are. So how does it feel to be done with this one? I'm at peace with it. You know what I mean? It does feel like a bit of a lift of the cognitive load because, you know, I was talking to a friend about, I recently had a friend who passed away and we were talking about death and and regrets and things and and she asked me what's you know what is do you have regrets you know and when someone in that position asks you that you you deserve an honest answer i was like i feel pretty good about what i've done with life i said you know there is one thing with work that i've

wanted to do for a long time i've never done and and this kind of like this is it right i wanted to get this out you know if a bus were to hit me today and i didn't get the next omni-focus field guide out it wouldn't be the end of the world but if i hadn't got this out i'd feel like i had i had um failed i had missed on something that is important so i feel good about it i'm sorry that's that's a very um kind of deep answer that's okay uh that's kind of what i was going for though because i know the last couple years getting to the end of the year this has been a recurring theme is like well maybe this is the year that i get the productivity field guide out. So if I'm in your shoes, I'm feeling probably a little bit relieved that I finally shipped this one.

My friend Adina Hurley, Mike's wife, she did Stick Sparky. She was the artist. And she told me that her and Mike had little jokes like, is this the year he's going to do it? Because she's been helping me out with this for years. Right. You know? And, uh, and I kind of liked that, you know, that, that, you know, my, my closest friends all knew I needed to do it, but it just took me a while to get there. And, uh, and you know, honestly, I, one of the reasons I built the studio was for this field guide. I wanted to have someplace that looked nice when I shot all these live videos.

And now I can use it for other things too. But in the back of my mind, this was one of the things. I mean, I actually shot most of the videos in this course two years ago. And when I was working out of a corner of the family room during COVID, I shot these videos already. I mean, I thought I was going to release it two years ago. And then I just felt like I just want a little more time with this and it's not ready yet. So it's, it's funny to me that I, I've made this one twice in a lot of ways, you know? Yeah. And, uh, I think that it shows to be honest. Uh, I, I feel like, uh, there's a, a level of, of polish here, which isn't related to the technical stuff, but just the amount of time that these concepts have had in the oven as you've thought about them. I think this is

definitely one that you should be proud of, and I will definitely recommend that people go pick this one up. Thanks, Mike, and thank you, everyone, who's helped me on this journey. It's been something else. Getting this out, I'm very happy. And you can get it now. There's a link in the show notes. It's at learn.maxsparky.com. There's two versions.

If you want the one with all the webinars and everything, it's $100. But you get 10% off if you use the code. We have a code for the show is called focused PFG, F O C U S E D PFG gets you 10% off. And then the it's $99 for the one with the webinar series. And then if you want it without the webinar series, then it is $50. So if you just want the basic materials, you can do that. So, and you get the 10% off CodeWorks on both of them. So feel free to check it out. That's time limited. And I'm very proud of this and very happy to get it out in the world. And I'd love to hear

your thoughts. And if it helps you out, let me know. I need all the positive karma on this one I can get. Well, this is definitely a good one. So kudos to you for an excellent release. I'm going to put my plug for the webinar series one. I've seen the webinars. I've been a part of some of the webinars that you've done for some of the other field guides. But every single webinar that I've seen that you have hosted has just been excellent. And I don't know what you've got lined up for this one, but if it's anything like the previous webinars that you've done, there's going to be a whole lot of good stuff that's in those webinars. Definitely worth the extra 50 bucks to pick that one up, in my opinion.

I feel like it's going to be a lot of practical advice on the material coming out of the course. And I think for a lot of people, the webinar series is going to be the way they actually implement it. Going through it, talking, hearing how other people have challenges, all that stuff I think can really make it work for you. And if you're trying to get into the new year and kind of find your arte and your roles and you want some help, the webinar series will be, I think, really good. Just like you, Mike, I plan on delivering the goods.

If you're going to buy the webinar series, you're going to get your money's worth. Well, congrats again on another great field guide. We are the Focus Podcast. You can find us at relay.fm slash focused. If you want to check out the forum, you can do so at talk.macpowerusers.com. There's a separate section there for the focus podcast will be a special post for this episode where you can share what your favorite lessons are from the productivity field guide. Thank you to our sponsors for this episode, which is our friends at factor, Squarespace and Indeed. And

we'll see you in a couple of weeks.