Rohan's blog

I love Seth Godin, he is a marketing genius. And my hero – much like he is a hero for millions of his fans. He writers blog post daily. That’s a lot and he has been doing this for a very long time. And that’s not his job. He does a lot of things all while putting a blog post each day.

It’s magic and often you want to know the secret of his success. And it turns out – it’s really simple. He made a promise to write everyday and don’t spend time on television and social media. Easy peasy.

But it ain’t.

The trick is known – you know how the magic is done. And yet neither you and I are doing a blog post each day.

Because no matter how many of your heroes reveal their super secret recipe – you aren’t going to suddenly copy them and crank a lot like them. And in many cases, you shouldn’t do it. Then why there is an obsession of how someone is so productive. There are countless of articles and videos where you see the magic hack of being productive. And also, the breakdown of how a certain legend does his magic.

What’s going on here? Let’s dissect everything we can about the productive routine.

Not The Real Secret

Dwayne ‘Rock’ Johnson is an amazing hero and former wrestler. He is huge – like HUGE. And many aspiring bodybuilders ask what is the secret of Rock.

And for a long time, you didn’t know what he ate or which exercise he does. But now, thanks to social media and celebrities becoming personal – Rock’s diet and exercise is public. You can do a simple search and find many sources telling you what Rock does. But then you don’t follow it. You dismiss it.

The reason is you were looking for a magical secret of success. It never occurred to you that the secret would be doing hard work.

You wanted something easy to do. Hence, you don’t like that the secret is doing hard work – so you keep on forever looking for the real secret.

But you ain’t going to find one. For most things in life, you have to grind, do the hard work and be lucky. And that’s how you end up at a great stage. Being lucky isn’t in your hand, but you do have to do the hard work. There is no escaping it. If you want to skip that then you will be forever looking for the real sauce and live in delusion.

Not For You

You admire someone’s work for variety of reasons. But often you don’t want what they have. Sure, you want the sweet things but not the sour.

For example, for Seth Godin to write blog post daily, he needs to create time by not watching television and doing social media. And then using that time to observe, learn and distill the nuggets in his blog posts. You want the daily blog posts but often you don’t want to cut down on Netflix. And it’s okay. Understand your value, promise and sacrifice you are okay to make.

And often your heroes are old – the things they did might not be so much fruitful for you. So, if your whole reason is to achieve something else by copying their habits then think again.

Rock was luck to get a break in movies and become huge. But not all wrestlers could do that. Seth Godin wrote daily blog posts and become a pioneer in writing blog posts. Now, there are thousands of blog post which writes daily. That’s not a differentiator as much and now because of competition – it doesn’t guarantees much.

Voyeur

The reason the productivity habit of successful people are on rise and viral is because you want to look how they work. It’s entertainment and amusing to see how their brain works.

And also, it’s like taking a peak at behind the scenes. It’s another level of intimacy.

And you love the contrast between two geniuses. The approach is fascinating. And you compare it with yourself. To see how you are same or different. And you give vanity points to yourself in your mind.

When all is done – you go back to doing what you have always done. And hope for another productive article.

You And Your Inspiration

Take inspiration from productivity articles. And enjoy your read. But remember – copying the exact tips won’t make you give the same results.

It’s your journey and you have to decide how you want to be productive. Your idea, routine and pet peeves will be unique to you.

For example, I like to write when the font is aesthetic and in mild noise around like television on and people talking. Silence isn’t the best place for me to produce writing. I don’t wake up early or read thousand books. But I read a lot of blog post everyday – at least 10. So read productive articles – take some things, try it and if it helps you with your value then keep at it. Or revise it or discard it.

Just because your favourite hero does a thing particular way, you don’t have to do the exact same thing. And you are unique. The goal is to do things what you want to do.

But don’t get addicted to productivity articles – because it’s like the new shiny thing. You like something and before you can test it for enough time, there is a new article. And you switch and accomplish nothing. One article says – wake up at 5 and another to start your day late. It’s a terrible mess out there.

There is no one holy grail. And remember sometimes you don’t want to achieve things like someone else. It’s your life and if you are satisfied then it’s alright.

No one knows and everyone is figuring it out. So, keep chill and enjoy the next productive tip. But take it with a grain of salt. And remember, do what suits for you. And if you end up being successful – whatever your routine will be published as the next productivity hack.