Productivity is Subjective. It Doesn’t Have To Make Sense To You.

Sometimes lying on a couch can be productive

Productivity is a subjective experience.

We live in a world where the structure of our childhood upbringing and foundational development muddles that fundamental understanding.

When we evaluate what is productive time spent versus wasted time, that distinction is uniquely determined by us as individuals.

Now, there are systems in place from birth and early childhood that set us up for long-term success and can often be problematic if allowed to persist in adulthood. We have childhood developmental milestones, we have educational grade school milestones, report cards, and academic parchment papers that give credence to our intellect. We have socioeconomic structures in place to judge and evaluate our success in life.

And these constructs ultimately are projected on others, our perception of others, and our perception of ourselves relative to others.

I judge myself for my own success in life relative to my family and friends on a largely economic sense and my lack of matching or exceeding them in that aspect stresses me out.

It gives me a significant level of stress because I feel inadequate, I feel less than, and I constantly need to actively remember and remind myself of the contrary. (I recognize the issue and am working on it 😅).

But I think it’s important to continue to actively remind myself.

Productivity is what it means to you and its a personal choice what you actively choose to do with the time.

It is defined by you as the individual.

It isn’t scored or gauged by a grade. There is no monetary value that deems something worthwhile or productive. There is no final evaluator that measures the productiveness of your life’s work.

There is no equation, no formulaic output, no sure-fire way to qualify whether your time spent on something was productive or not.

All we have is that subjective feeling for ourselves - that feeling in your head whether it was time well spent, looked back on fondly, or that feeling of regret and remorse.

PRODUCTIVITY FOR OTHERS - NONE OF MY BUSINESS

I was listening to a podcast with Matthew Dicks, an author, storyteller, marketing and storytelling consultant, speaking coach, and much more. Talking about Matthew Dicks’ story would in itself be another full blogpost but in summary, he recounts a coaching session with a client in which he encouraged them to laze on the couch with their partner — because it was productive.

Now, an immediate knee-jerk reaction would be WTF?!

But he went on to justify his rationale and explanation.

The idea behind the recommendation being that the client and their spouse were so busy in their professional lives that spending the time together lazing on the couch and watching a television show together was valuable time together.

It struck me that some people don’t have that time for each other.

And that in itself was surprising and interesting to hear.

And secondly, that in some cases, lazing around can be considered productive.

Productive in fostering connection with a loved one.

Productive in prioritizing time with a loved one over time spent on a career, time spent on a business venture, or time spent on a personal goal.

It is time prioritizing your partner, doing an activity you enjoy each other’s company doing.

It forced me to check my own biases, my own quick judgments and assumptions on the lives of others.

And it reinforced this idea.

Who (as a third party) is able to judge you or claim that the time you decide to spend on something is not productive or worthwhile?

Furthermore, if that third party is not you, your partner, or your loved ones, then why would you be willing to give them such sway over your opinion or perception of a decision.

It reiterated to me the subjectivity of experience and therefore the determination about whether something was productive time or not.

PRODUCTIVITY FOR ME: A HINDSIGHT STORY

As I evaluated my own life, there’s always things I could’ve done that would have impacted my economic success. But one’s life is more than just economic success. One’s life is an amalgamation of economic production, interpersonal production, personal production, professional production, fulfillment and all the rest.

Here’s one anecdote from my own life.

When I was in the early stages of dating my wife, I was also newly beginning my career. At the age of 23-24, settling into a new city, living on my own, and after work, I would walk home, hop in my car, and drive 40-50 minutes in traffic to visit her.

Nothing grand or special.

We weren’t doing anything.

No real plans most of the times.

Sometimes, just hanging out in the car at the local park.

Sometimes, grabbing dinner at a standard date spot.

Sometimes, planning around local events such as fireworks on the beach or friend group events.

Any individual interaction in isolation was pretty unproductive.

Can’t say I walked away from those interactions with more money, more time, honing a skill or feeling more knowledgeable.

But looking back at those individual moments as a collection clearly displays the entire body as the most important collective investment of time in my life.

These individual moments are the collective catalogue of my relationship with my wife - an immensely productive time in fostering my relationship with my significant other.

Without these seeming ‘unproductive’ moments, I wouldn’t have a relationship with my wife.

Under that lens, these were critically important moments for me.

Under the lens of someone who isn’t me, who isn’t now in a relationship with my wife, they may view that time as unproductive to their own lives. Because their lives and subjective experience do not receive production from that invested time.

With an empathetic perspective and ability to appreciate the impact on my life, third parties can at times empathize or understand the subjective production but it highlights the necessity for an empathic perspective, which isn’t always guaranteed.

As such, for individuals who do not share that empathic view, the subjectivity of that productive experience is not guaranteed.

Hence, the subjectivity of productivity

Of course, this seems obvious. It’s a DUH moment.

But at the same time, sometimes these truths need to be restated often. They need to be repeated because it is so easy to be swept up.

I don’t necessarily need to justify my actions, investments, desires, and priorities to others because they may not necessarily make sense to others.

And that’s okay.

They don’t HAVE to make sense to others.

As long as they make sense to me and as long as I see it as productive time.