Tim Urban on Procrastination
b'Tim Urban is a writer and the creative force behind the extremely popular Wait But Why blog and newsletter, which has over 600,000 subscribers. He has a book coming out in February of 2023 and has authored dozens of viral articles on subjects such as why we procrastinate, which is what we talk a lot about in today\\u2019s conversation. He writes about things in psychology and politics, and he even writes about why we haven\\u2019t encountered alien life forms. To say Tim has range is an understatement. He doesn\\u2019t consider himself to be an expert or a guru at one thing, but he lets his curiosity wander and it takes him to all kinds of different places where he researches and writes, really in long form, articles. His email list has people like Elon Musk as subscribers, and TED Curator Chris Anderson and Twitter co-founder Evan Williams. Tim also is a speaker; he\\u2019s got an incredible TED Talk that I highly recommend you check out. And, he\\u2019s also known for drawing quirky graphics and stick figures, and we talk about what it\\u2019s like for him to be an artist as well. So, this conversation focuses mainly on procrastination, and if you\\u2019re someone who struggles with that, I know many of us do, then you\\u2019re going to enjoy it.\\n\\xa0\\nTim had a number of amazing insights during our conversation. Some of them include:\\n\\u201cI like to frame things we all experience in a way that can help clarify what\\u2019s going on\\u201d (6:20).\\n\\u201cWithout being able to see the big picture, you don\\u2019t realize that the best way to achieve maximum happiness this week is to do this stuff now and be miserable temporarily and then much better later\\u201d (8:40).\\n\\u201cWe get older, our bodies get older, but it\\u2019s an uneven distribution of growth\\u201d (12:00).\\n\\u201cThe inner child in us is one of the best parts of grown-ups. It\\u2019s what a lot of times allows us to be creative and to have fun and to be open-minded\\u201d (13:00).\\n\\u201cThe goal is to grow up in all the right ways and stay young in all the wrong ways\\u201d (13:10).\\n\\u201cCarving out high-quality, guilt-free leisure time is very important. It recharges your willpower. It creates this healthy balance in your head\\u201d (16:15).\\n\\u201cWhat I\\u2019ve done when I\\u2019ve succeeded more is often, I will do something in that moment to force future Tim\\u2019s hand\\u201d (21:45).\\n\\u201cProcrastinators get in the biggest trouble when they don\\u2019t take their problem seriously\\u201d (24:00).\\n\\u201cI had macro motivation with micro help\\u201d (27:10).\\n\\u201cI thought I hated writing because I was doing mostly papers, and then I started blogging in 2005 as a complete procrastination side activity, just me having fun. And that\\u2019s when I realized that me having fun in the form of writing was catching on\\u201d (31:40).\\n\\u201cYou need to overpower your emotions with rationality when you\\u2019re looking at comments\\u201d (34:30).\\n\\u201cIf you let all of the negative comments get to you, you\\u2019re going to be too scared to write anything. If you ignore all of the negative comments and say that all negative comments are just haters, now you\\u2019re not going to grow or learn anything\\u201d (37:35).\\n\\u201cI don\\u2019t think the things that I produce require beautiful writing; they require good communication and authenticity\\u201d (42:15).\\n\\u201cKeep messing around with different mediums and different things until you find areas that you\\u2019re strong in, because everyone is strong in some areas\\u201d (48:15).\\n\\u201cThe best things I\\u2019ve written have been when I was in a mood where I felt like I was playing as I wrote it\\u201d (50:30).\\n\\u201cIf I\\u2019m having fun, it\\u2019s going to produce something good\\u201d (50:45).\\n\\xa0\\nAdditionally, you can access the Wait But Why website here, where you can find all of Tim\\u2019s writing. You can also subscribe to Tim\\u2019s email list on the site and follow him on Twitter. \\xa0\\nThank you so much to Tim for coming on the podcast!\\nI wrote a book called \\u201cShift Your Mind\\u201d that was released in October of 2020, and you can order it on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Additionally, I have launched a company called Strong Skills, and I encourage you to check out our new website https://www.strongskills.co/. If you liked this'