(Laura’s note: This post originally ran at Vanderhacks, my Substack newsletter. There’s a new post every weekday morning, with the general cadence of M/W/F being publicly available and T/Th being behind a paywall. Please check it out! Also, if you’re looking for any good listening today, I am interviewing Charles Duhigg over at the Before Breakfast podcast. Hopefully that makes your commute more pleasant!)
We’ve all been there. Maybe you had an intense morning and after lunch you’re struggling to stay focused. Maybe you work a Monday to Friday work week, and by Friday afternoon, you’re sliding toward the weekend.
It’s understandable. But before you write a day off completely, consider this: Even if you can’t work, you can plan. Your current self might not feel like doing anything, but you might be willing to think about what Future You should be doing. That can turn what might be wasted time into something far more productive.
Using low-opportunity cost time
I began planning my upcoming weeks on Friday afternoons years ago when I realized that these post-lunch hours were the ultimate in low-opportunity cost time. Starting anything new felt almost impossible. But I was willing to think about what Monday Morning Me, who would no doubt have more vim and vigor than Friday Afternoon Me, might be willing to do. I’d dream up the next week’s priority list and figure out what to tackle Monday morning. Then, a funny thing would happen. Even if I didn’t have tons of energy on Monday morning, with clear marching orders, it was often easy to get things done.
This was a life-changing practice for me, and I know it has been for many people who’ve tried it (though I have now moved my weekly planning to Thursday — think of it as pre-Friday!).
But the truth is that any low-energy time can be repurposed for planning. Perhaps you find yourself waiting for something, and unable to do much until it comes back. Perhaps you’ve just returned from a demanding trip but for various reasons you need to be in your office. If you’re the sort of person who reads productivity books, it is frustrating to feel like you are just watching the clock.
So why not use this time to plan something else? Yes, planning takes some energy, but it is much easier to write “call three potential clients” on next week’s priority list than to actually make those phone calls. You could plan your upcoming week, or you could refine your to-do list for tomorrow. You could plan your upcoming weekend.
Dreaming is a form of planning
Or here’s an idea: You can do some longer range planning. Sometimes I make seasonal fun lists — think a “Summer Fun List” or a “Holiday Fun List” — with things I’d like to do that are unique to the season and would help me make time-specific memories. You could work on your List of 100 Dreams. This exercise, which was shared with me by career coach Caroline Ceniza-Levine years ago, is basically a long, unedited bucket list. You can put items like “travel to New Zealand” or “sing in Carnegie Hall” on there, but you can also add going for a hike in that nearby state park or trying that new gelato place. A List of 100 Dreams has space for even modest goals, like replacing a leaky coffee maker, or buying a stapler that’s a pleasure to use.
If a List of 100 Dreams feels oppressive, try planning something random, like next year’s Christmas vacation, or a hobby-themed vacation you want to pitch to your best friend. Or, if you’re like me and have to come up with lots of ideas for content, you might plan November’s podcast topics now.
One of several things might happen if you plan when you can’t work. First, sometimes people find planning energizing. As you picture yourself writing a collection of seasonal sonnets, and visiting Iceland, and going on a fall bike ride through the Grand Tetons, you might start to feel more excited about life. Maybe you’ll even be excited enough to make a tiny bit of progress on whatever project you’ve been putting off.
But even if that doesn’t happen, now you’ve got a plan for next week, or next weekend, or November’s podcasts, which is something you didn’t have before. You may not feel like doing anything today, but tomorrow’s schedule is a work of art, with time allocated to all your priorities. You’ve planned some fun weekend get-togethers from now until August. You’ve picked out which operas you want to listen to in your car on your commute, and studied the Wikipedia pages for those operas so you understand the plots.
When you plan when you can’t work, you are, in fact working. And in many cases, you’re doing higher value work than you would have been doing anyway. The satisfying life is all about turning intentions into reality. If you plan when you can’t work, you are one step closer to that happening.