I have a deep love for productivity systems. It seems like a weird thing to be passionate about but I also love organizing cupboards. So I guess I am just weird.
I am always trying out new ways to organize and plan. I change my systems frequently, always keen to see what works and what doesn’t. Also I think in part to keep myself entertained. As someone who craves change, staying grounded in weekly planning is somewhat of a necessary evil.
Despite frequent system overhauls there are two things that have stayed firmly entrenched. One is my Sunday planning sessions where I map out my week - I will write about that in a subsequent blog. I know, you just can’t wait can you? And the other is proactive procrastination, my term, where I start work on something and then actively ignore it for a period of time. Some might say I take a few liberties with the latter part of the equation.
Proactive procrastination seems to allow my unconscious mind to do some of the work for me. Whenever I return to the task it’s almost like the problem answers itself. Much like going for a walk when you are stuck on something or how you always seems to have your best ideas in the shower. By leaving a task it seems there is some magic that happens in the downtime.
Norman Mailer talked about giving your unconscious assignments as if it was your partner. I’ve always referred to it as background processing. Much like a computer. I feel our brains have immense capacity to do work even when we are not actively, well, working.
John Bargh is a social psychologist who studies the unconscious. His book “Before We Know It: The Unconscious Reasons We Do What We Do” is a brilliant exploration of the power of the “other” side of the brain. I can’t recommend it highly enough. He too uses the term background processing - yes, I felt immense validation - and he adds that it’s an adaptive quality. Our brain uses 20 percent of the energy we consume while we are awake so it is literally inefficient resource utility to consciously think more than we need to. So we brilliant humans have found a workaround.
Our brains, in fact, work better when we use both our conscious and unconscious mind. Actively working on something and then intentionally stepping away from it is a genius move. So much so that Bargh references Frederick Meyer’s definition of a genius as “someone who makes more and better use of their subliminal thought processes than the rest of us”.
Bargh’s overall treatise is that the true power comes when your conscious and unconscious mind work together. He suggests you always first prepare the subject through extensive conscious thought, then allow your unconscious mind to do it’s magic. AKA proactive procrastination.
The one note of caution is that our unconscious is wide awake all night. So we want to be careful what we feed our minds with before going to sleep. Bargh advises that your unconscious loves a plan so it’s less likely to pester you about an important assignment if you put a plan together before you go to bed. It also possibly explains a lot if you are more of a three-glasses-of-wine-and-some-netflix-binging-before-bed type of person. If you tend to wake up in a panic about things in the middle of the night, try creating a plan for your week - or your day - before you hit the latest season of Schitt's Creek.
Set and forget...well, maybe don’t forget! That might end in some very intense dreams.