Corey McComb - Productivity Is For Robots: How To (re)Connect, Get Creative, And Stay Human In The New World

Corey McComb is a writer and freelancer based in San Diego, CA, where he lives with his wife Ava and their pup Penny.

productivity is for robots

How to (re)Connect, Get Creative, and
Stay Human in the New World

COREY McCOMB

Productivity Is For Robots:

How to (re)Connect, Get Creative, and Stay Human in the New World

Copyright 2020 Corey McComb

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

Everything moves too fast now. The world is run by computers. The world is run by robots. And sometimes they ask us if were robots. Just cause were trying to log on and look at our own stuff. You spend a lot of time telling robots youre not a robot. Think about that for a second.

-John Mulaney, SNL, 2018

Table of Contents

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Can you feel it?

Thats the world spinning faster than ever.

Are you keeping up?

Are you doing enough?

If youre feeling overwhelmed, dont worry. This is the path to success.

If youre distracted, uncertain, or uninspired, those are only temporary bugs. Just press this button, well do the rest

Soon, youll be the hyper-focused, hard-driving machine youve been working toward. No more idleness, no more aimlessness. Just pure, hot productivity.

Whats important right now is that you stick it out. Winners never quit and quitters never win. While you were sleeping the competition was working. Youre falling behind and your to-do list is getting longer. But, again, this is nothing to worry about.

This is just the new world. If youre not stressed, youre not doing enough.

It kind of makes you wonder though

Will it ever be enough?

Click here to confirm: Im not a robot

introduction

I t was two years ago when I turned a slow-paced marathon toward mental and emotional burnout into a full-blown sprint. I cant say I didnt feel it coming. Those around me certainly did. But by the time I realized how far off the path Id strayed, it was too late to turn around.

From the outside, things looked better than ever. Id just landed a dream job with one of the worlds top marketing agencies. It was a remote team, which meant I could finally work from anywhere in the world. Id spent the last few years learning how to write and was steadily growing an audience through my blog. And just a few months prior to breakdownI asked the love of my life to marry me. I was working with great people, making more money than ever before, and my creative life was booming.

Between working full-time, planning a wedding, and stealing any extra moments to write, I was spread thin. Luckily, I had devoured plenty of productivity protocols and work/life balance hacks. I was well versed in the proverbs of millionaire mindsets and knew how important it was to hustle now so I could relax later.

My chronic state of busy left me anxious, but how could I complain? The pieces of the life Id dreamed of were swirling around me. Money, success, securitythe freedom Id craved for so long was there for the taking. I wasnt going to let it get away. I began making bargains with myself. More money now will mean more time to write later. You can do it all. You just need better systems. It wont always be this hectic, just keep going.

Its true that I could have managed everything with better systems, more intention, and a little more balance. But that wasnt the real problem. The problem was that no matter what I did or didnt do, I remained driven by an insidious feeling that I wasnt doing enough.

Before I knew it, my underlying anxiety swelled into waves of overwhelmcrashing over my head each morning, prying my eyes awake. My work bled into all areas of my life until both could only be described as frantic. My writing became infrequent, despite the constant guilt I felt for not writing more. By this time, I was spending 80 hours a week in front of a computer or a smartphonejuggling the riptide of emails, commitments, and self-imposed deadlines. Id peer over my screen with a bloodshot gaze and see my fiancs worried face. My bosses, friends, and family all told me to slow down, but I just couldnt stop.

I was obsessed with doing more. My creativitynow aching like a phantom limbwas thrown in the backseat while productivity rode shotgun. And yet, the more I focused on get ting things done , the more things slipped through the cracks. The long hours, mental anguish, and physical tension wreaked havoc on my body. I developed tendonitis in my arms, knots in my neck, and a sour stomach from gallons of caffeinated stress.

Each day, Id wake up and compete on the battlefield of productivity and go to sleep on what felt like a bed of hot kniveshaunted by the things I didnt get to, who I may have let down, and the countless ways I was letting myself down. The connection I once had to myself and the people around me had turned to static. My point of view was shrinking by the minute. Id become a broken clockconstantly being wound yet always losing time.

There was a rare moment of clarity where I sat at my desk, head in hands, and thought about a job Id had years before. There was a manager who would double my workload without warning. Hed say, If you arent in over your head, youll never know how tall you are. I thought back to that moment and realized that my head was now officially submerged and I was quietly drowning.

I could no longer deny what Id done to myself. Id become a burnt-out zombie with a Wi-Fi connectionsprinting through quicksand, repeating the mantra: If youre not stressed, youre just not doing enough.

Looking back, I see that the problem wasnt in the amount of work, my growing list of goals, or the hours spent. It was in my approach. Somewhere along the way, I stopped thinking about productivity as the vehicle and made it the goal. Id lost sight of the purpose and meaning behind the work I was doing. And every hour blocked off on my calendar, every task added to my to-do list, only tightened the vise-grip of pressure on my heart and mind.

I was competing with robots.

And as I peeled my tired eyes away from the mechanical life Id created, I realized I wasnt alone

click here to confirm your humanity

A s technology becomes more human in behavior, many people are terrified. They believe artificial intelligence will steal our jobs and rise up to enslave us. Other people watch in awe. They stand in line, ready to purchase the next model, the next breakthrough. Theyre certain that technology is here to make our lives better and create more freedom.

This isnt a science fiction story about robots. Its not about questioning whether we should embrace or banish technology. Its about something more urgent. A trend thatregardless of how you feel about technology or AI has become undeniable. That for each step technology takes toward becoming more human, we take a step to meet it halfway.

Speed, efficiency, optimization these arent just the traits we expect from our devices. These are now the qualities we demand from ourselves. Technology has given us incredible gifts. Its allowed us to automate the repetitive, outsource the mundane, and child-proof the dangerous. We have calendars that sync, maps that guide, and access to all the wisdom the world has ever known.

And what do we do with it all?

We fill our calendars with more. We stay on the fast track . And we hold our opinions tighter and with more fervoras if they were programmed into us. In our ongoing quest to become limitless beings, weve shifted our envious eyes away from the gods and toward something more quantifiable: output.