TITLE: Playing With Our Toys
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: July 25, 2005 8:58 AM
DESC: On habits, doing things, and tinkering our time away with the toys that promise to help us Get Things Done.
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BODY:
Merlin Mann says this about
running and running shoes:
My concern is that there's a big difference between buying
new running shoes and actually hitting the road every morning.
Big difference. One is really fun and relaxing while the
other requires a lot of hard work, diligence, and sacrifice.
He is so right. Have you bought running shoes lately? Ten
or so manufacturers. Ten or so models per manufacturer.
Prices into the $100s for an increasing number of models.
Going for a run each morning is much easier.
Oh wait, that's not what he meant. So I disagree with his
analogy after all. But I do agree with the real point of
his essay, which is better expressed in this analogy:
You can buy a successively more costly and high-quality series
of claw hammers until you've reached the top of the line, but
until you learn how to use them skillfully,
you're going to keep making ugly bird houses.
We can easily be so caught up in the excitement and fun of
tinkering with new tools that we never getting any real work
done. This separates the contenders from the pretenders in
every area of life. It is true of productivity tool contenders
and pretenders. It is true of runners and non-runners. It
is also true of programmers and the folks who would rather
tinker with their bash set-up and their .emacs file
than actually cut code.
We all know people like this. Heck, most of us are
people like this, at least some of the time in some parts
of their lives. Starting -- even finishing -- is much
easier than living in Ordinary Time. But that's where life
is.
Some people run as a means to an end -- to lose weight, to
"get in shape", to meet cute girls. For them, running may
remain onerous forever, because it's just a chore aimed at
reaching an external goal. Some people
run for the sake of running.
For them, getting up most mornings, pulling on the shoes,
and hitting the road are a joy, not a chore. They are a
part of the good life.
The same is true of productivity tool contenders and
pretenders. When playing with the latest tool is more
fun than getting things done, the mind and heart are in
the wrong place. The same is true of programmers and
tinkerers. When playing with Linux and .vimrc
are more fun than writing programs, being a programmer
isn't really for you.
When we find ourselves drifting into tinkerdom, sometimes
all we need is to work on our habits. We really do want
to write code, run five miles, get things done. But the
distractions of the world have become a part of our routine
and need to be put aside. Changing habits is hard...
As for the running versus running shoes analogy, I really
do find choosing running shoes more stressful than it
could be. Going into a shoe store or browsing through a
running shoe catalog is like going to K-Mart and stepping
into the shampoo aisle -- instant product overload.
New Balance, Asics, Saucony, Nike, Brooks, Mizuno, ....
Stability shoes, motion control shoes, racing flats, ....
I just want a pair of shoes! I do my best to avoid all
the indecision by sticking with the shoe that has served
me well in the past,
New Balance
766. Even still, that model number seems to change every
year or two... (When my local shoe store stopped carrying
766s, I bought a couple of pairs of Asics GT-2099s that
worked out pretty well.)
Now that I have the habit, running is relatively easy,
fun and relaxing. I miss it on my off-day.
Merlin closes with sound advice for choosing tools and
changing habits:
Making improvements means change and often pain along the
way. It's hard to get better, and good tools like these
can definitely ease the journey. I guess I'm proposing you
try to understand yourself at least as well
as the widget you're hoping will turn things around.
When you know yourself better, you will know your motivation
better. That makes choices easier, sometimes obvious.
I am reminded of a conversation from October 2003, when
I ran my first marathon. Several of us her in town were
going to run Chicago as a team, which was more symbolic
than practical -- we were all at different levels and
speeds, so we'd run the race itself solo. One of our
group had dropped out of training a month earlier. At
a party, three of us were chatting about our training
when the guy who had dropped out said that, while he had
wanted to do the marathon, he just didn't have time to
train -- work and family and outside activities and
nagging little injuries had pulled him away.
After this guy left the conversation, the third guy --
our most experienced runner -- turned to me and said,
"If you want to run..." He paused almost imperceptibly.
"You run."
I took great comfort in that. I was still a relative
beginner, and that statement stayed in my mind for all
those days when I might wonder what I wanted to do.
Maybe I should go buy a new pair of running shoes...
No, let's just hit the road.
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