WORK LESS WEDNESDAY
WLW #51
🎥 1. 3 Pieces of Long-form Content I Loved This Week
It’s been a while since I shared a nice piece of long-form content.
This week I’ve got three.
These are all podcasts that are also available on YouTube.
🎙1. Dr. Gabor Mate on Tim Ferriss – The Myth of Normal, Metabolizing Anger, Processing Trauma, and More
Extremely powerful episode covering trauma, healing, indigenous medicine, parenting, authenticity, and more.
Inspired me to pick up Dr. Mate’s new book, The Myth of Normal.
🎙2. Ron Baker on TheFutur Podcast – What Makes People Buy? Price & Value Masterclass
I shared this with the How To Work Less Community the day I watched it.
Absolute masterclass on pricing, value, and why you should charge more.
If you’re self employed, you should watch this.
🎙Steph Smith on My First Million – 5 Business Ideas With High Demand & Low Supply
Really fun exploration of some bizarre business ideas, including:
A/B Testing Menus, Breakup Businesses, Anti-Cheating Businesses, and more.
📱 2. Highlights From My 500 iPhone Tabs
Last week I got the new iPhone 14 Pro Max.
I’m amazed by how smooth the migration process was from my old iPhone.
But there’s one thing that didn’t make it over to the new phone…
My 500 Safari browser tabs. 😅
In honor of the retirement of those tabs, I took the time to sort through them and pull out some highlights for you:
📱 Apps I Haven’t Tried Yet
📰 Articles
Should you eat the frog? – RADReads
What if you didn’t need the money or attention? – Derek Sivers
Revisiting the 4 hour work week – Cal Newport
Never use pure black in typography – UxPlanet
💊 Supplements I Didn’t Buy
🤸♂️ Random Health / Fitness Stuff
Swing Logic Home Golf Simulator
📚 Books I Haven’t Bought Yet
Psycho-Cybernetics – Maxwell Maltz
Internal Family Systems – Dick Schwartz
Make It Stick – Peter C Brown
The Sparrow – Mary Doria Russell
🎲 Random Stuff
How to check if your turkey is cooked to the right temperature?
⛵ 3. A Procrastination Hack Used Since 8th Century BC – Commitment Device Database
Yesterday I shared a post on my Instagram which featured 3 advanced procrastination hacks.
My favorite is the Commitment Device.
What is it?
Let’s take a journey back to the 8th Century BC.
In Homer’s The Odyssey, we have a perfect example:
On a long boat trip home, Ulysses was meant to pass the island of the Sirens.
The Sirens were famous for the beauty of their singing, which would lure sailors to their deaths.
Ulysses wanted to hear their song, so had his crew lash him to the ship’s mast under strict orders not to untie him.
This is a Commitment Device.
A Commitment Device locks you in to a new behavior ahead of time, giving you no choice but to change.
It is making one decision that removes 1,000 future decisions.
By tying himself to the mast, Ulysses had no choice but to not give in to the siren’s call.
So how can we use this in our life to build great habits?
Some examples:
- Set screentime restrictions and give someone else the password.
- Snack less by buying food in single servings rather than bulk sizes.
- Set up an automatic payment to your savings accounts.
If you want to build a new habit or change your behavior, a Commitment Device is a great option.
Want more examples of Commitment Devices you can try?
Check out this incredible Commitment Device database I found from Habit Weekly.
✍️ 4. This Online Writing Tool Is Like Cheating – Quillbot
If you haven’t been paying attention, the AI world is evolving like wildfire.
Today’s tool I’m experimenting with is called Quillbot.
It is an AI-powered writing tool that allows you to effortlessly paraphrase text with the click of a button.
It can rewrite entire sentences and paragraphs in seconds.
The implications for this technology are enormous: copywriting, SEO, marketing, you name it.
📬 5. Help Me Help You Get This Email
⬆️ I shared this message on Twitter, but wasn’t able to fix it.
My open rate for WLW strangely dropped about 10% last week, after being highly consistent for months.
If anyone knows anything about email deliverability, let me know!