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As someone with ADHD and no sense of real time outside of physical phenomena, it's refreshing to hear time talked about in a way that isn't productivity. I went tubing on a river with friends a week or two back and we spent 2-3 hours just floating down a river on innertubes with no cell phones and just relaxed outside and it was so nice to not be looking at a clock or a watch constantly and just being in nature.
I’m Autistic and have ADHD and I can definitely relate to what you’re saying! As someone who does like to be productive when I need to be, and use tools to help focus, I find that “riding the wave” of energy during the day, week, month, season, year, and not fighting it to squeeze out every single drop of energy 24/7, is a much better approach in living smarter and not harder when wanting to do anything. Awhile ago, I listened to the audiobook version of Laziness Does Not Exist by Devon Price (who is also on the Spectrum) and I highly recommend it! I’m also looking forward to listening to Saving Time by Jenny Odell soon too!!
Fellow ADHD person. Can def relate. The times I've been most stressed is when I have to monitor my time. Eg, I can't enjoy my breaks at work because they're monitored down to the minute by the system. But monitoring that myself to stay on time is really hard. I love coming back from work and letting go of all sense of time playing video games.
its all relevant to your time frame. Adam seems to just have time frames that let him live the moment, so every guest can be his favorite, in this moment 😃
You are rite. Watching more closely, he was giggly at a few inappropriately moments. However, he was still his enthusiastic, focused and intelligent self even if buzzed. N'est-ce pas?
I love that the end of the skit where they change it to "Human Season" and go to hunt down Elmer after he hands over the gun implies that in their universe there IS a Human Season that is legally recognized.
When you're preparing so much with limited time, some steps you can only afford 30 seconds on. 37 seconds instead of 30 is 19% slower, meaning if it's a tight schedule on a busy day, you might fall behind. That focus on productivity motivates me, and makes me feel proud of myself. Though I've always worked best under pressure, everyone's different
@baileescott401 I understand, lol I have a culinary degree, and we cover this. It also comes down to cost of convenience. A 10c sheet of parchment saves like, 5 minutes of dishwasher labor, etc. The Taylorism approach is just used to abuse those who don't know better. Those tight margins are one thing, and hustle is another. I still had hand/arm issues from rolling pizzas as fast as I could 10 years ago.. :/
"EVERY SECOND COUNTS" is one of the central motifs of FX's the bear in its current season. as a former culinary careerer, it's incredibly relateable and also terrifying how much that industry has warped my personal sense of time and enjoyment. i think i was always going to be prone to issues with time regardless of what industry i entered, but culinary (esp pastry) has made a really lasting, mostly negative psychological impact on me to this day. i can also relate to the physical pains that you have left over from it, as we were constantly pushed and pushed past our bodily limits hourly, daily, monthly and very often with seemingly no end in sight. spending on average 12 to 16 hours of my day in a place that became a psuedo home also STOLE time from me and my coworkers. i feel that i had become more ignorant because of it. the extra time that i had to spend at work meant that it was sapped from my free time outside of it -- time which i could have had to learn new things and become more educated, time that i could have spent keeping myself healthier instead of skipping meals and barely catching up on sleep. although i was good at my various jobs most of the time, and i certainly have the skills to show for it that i cherish, i had no context for things happening outside of me, outside of the multiple windowless rooms of the outlets and the bakeshops i worked in. clocks (and calendars) don't really register when you aren't allowed to see the natural rising or falling of the sun. the clock is only a reminder of how behind you are, of how you will never catch up, and that if you do catch up, it is a very fleeting victory amid the vast field of defeat and disappointment you are saddled with almost every shift. the saddest part is that i justified a ton of this to myself when i was in the deep of the industry. i felt that it was the only way to be, to work, and to live. that i was the one that had to get better and better, more efficient, not that the industry and industries like it should be the ones to change. i was never necessarily unhappy with the type of work i was doing, but looking back, the environments in which i and others had to do it in were abysmal, even at the high end. i've since left the industry completely (the pandemic basically pushed me to that, having been laid off) and i think i am reclaiming some of my time, even though that itself is going to... take time lol.
@@rdg3747reminds me of a quote from Steven Universe (I know, I know, but hear me out) “You work away your whole life in a job and what does it get you? Cash. Cash that you can’t use to buy back what the job took from you.”
I'm a teacher in Germany. There is a lot of talk about how challenging the job is and it makes teachers prone to burn outs. What is weird to me is that it focuses on time. How many hours you teach, how long does it take to correct tests and exams, how many conferences there are, etc. However, one class might be much more exhausting that another class, even though they both take the same amout of time to teach. One mean email from a parent takes much more energy than correcting 50 multiple-choice tests. I look at my work in two dimensions - timewise but also how much of my energy it is draining.
During the conversation about Taylorism my thoughts went to how ergonomically harmful repetitive small task work is. It's an excellent example of how we don't consider small changes that we can't see day to day, which avalanche into disaster. Over time you end up losing more time, productivity, thus money because your workers are getting injured and you need to train new workers. I really wish that the philosophy of Taylorism, and its offshoots, would just disappear.
One thing I don't think they touched on from the natural world. Ants. The very model of Productivity in the animal world... who have basically been Maximizing productivity without regard for individual benefit for longer than there have been Mammals... They have Slack workers. Workers whose entire job it is to do absolutely NOTHING but sit around, and eat and just generally stay lazy for a bit... until Emergencies hit and they Immediately fill in for those who have been incapacitated or otherwise unable to do tasks vital to the colony. Even the ultimate natural model for work and time efficiency know you need some slack.
As someone with long covid who still takes covid precautions, time has been standing still for me since early 2020. That feeling that everyday is the same has never ended for me since the *ongoing pandemic* started. I'm almost completely disconnected from society's experience of time, since I'm now too disabled to work.
Re: planting store-bought stuff (1:12:39) I've always read and heard that grocery-store garlic cloves aren't viable for planting. However, after noticing more than a couple of green bits sprouting from various pieces of cooking garlic in my kitchen, I decided to give it a shot. I mean, if it isn't supposed to be able to grow into more garlic... I was like "where exactly along the line does it stop doing that?" Turns out you can totally grow more garlic than you want - in October, ideally before any freezing weather, just put a clove in the ground for every head of garlic you want to end up with (1 plant=1 head, usually), about 4-6 inches (100-150mm) apart. After they start sprouting, look out for any that are super close to each other, and pull up the smaller ones. It's better to have one plant get the nutrients in a given spot, rather than have two plants competing for them, as well as for space. I've always heard garlic does well when planted after summer is definitely over, and when it winters through a little bit of freezing temps. I'm definitely not an expert, so check that out yourself; don't be the person who refuses to let go of "a thing I read, from a TH-cam commenter who said _they_ heard a thing at some point..." Late next spring, you should find a couple more than you remember planting. If you plant stuff in the same spot again for the next year, you'll likely find some bonus garlic coming up!
Grocery store potatoes too! I've had many a potato start sprouting root buds if I don't get to them in time. Unfortunately I don't think my soil is super great for growing them. The ones I've planted as experiments came up small. Edible, but small, and not worth the work trying to keep them. For me it's just easier to buy a new bag of potatoes instead of growing them.
Wow. I’m turning 30 tomorrow and honestly, this is one of the best podcast episodes I think I could have chosen to listen to going into a new decade. It gave me so much to think about.
These discussions are so important today. Im happy seeing it proliferate. I have friends deep in that hustle mindset that get confused when keep questioning them about the end goal of it all.
If you really want to confuse them, ask them what a business is for. Why does business exist. And then when they say “to make money” say “why?” And just keep questioning it. See how far and long they go before they realize the point of a business is to provide goods and services to people who want and need them. Not money.
My wife is the planner. 2 College graduate. She's the giga-producvity-godess taking highlighters to calendars..and dunking on life. Me? I'm an art teacher. At a non profit. I teach at risk youth. Taking it easy. Going hiking with my dog, working on eccentric projects. Playing games, reading books, working out. We really balance eachother out. I live by the seasons. My perception of time flows, and slows.. When I really want to annoy her I tell her that nothing is something worth doing. To me, Much of these work-till- u-drop-efficiency hustle mindset is just tje leftovers of a country founded by slave owners, and a religion-based work ethic. The sooner we get rid of it the better. It is baffling to me that we have robots creating art, writing poetry, and doing philosophy, but making people work like drones and machines. Not the future I imagined.
It’s worse, AI doesn’t do art, it steals it, launders any copyright claims and then vomit something without paying a dime to the people whose art was taken to train it. Very dystopian for sure.
@@MaryamMaqdisiThe fact that the AI "art" is now getting worse because a bunch of the training data is now just other AI mulch is extremely funny I saw AI companies complaining to an art website that they needed a clearer marking to distinguish images that used AI... so that they can rip off *only* the fresh human-made material. Absolutely pathetic
I think it has more to do with digital clocks EVERYWHERE. On your phone, stove, microwave, dvr (or other device you have hooked up to your TV,) computer and even car radio. Everywhere you look you know exactly what time it is to the minute. Used to be with analog clocks when someone asked you what time it was you could say it's x:15 and they'd be fine with that even if it was x:13 or x:18. People were more relaxed because a few minutes here or there was no big deal because your watch might have a different time than everybody else's. Now everybody is obsessed with the 'exact' time because everything is connected to the atomic clock and every time keeping device has the same time.
Your an OG for calling the strike and supporting it still i can't imagine how bad entertainment would be were it not for writers rooms. I know you guys will win
Only 20 minutes in but I’m finding this so uplifting already. Duck season! I became much more aware of my local ecology during the pandemic, I learned a few new species on every walk I took in 2020-2021. It’s very grounding to become aware of the minutia of life around you. Thank you both.
This got real to me at about 37:00 when you talked about extreme productivity as self-punishment When I was in my 20’s I fell into the “productivity bro” culture (before that was really a thing - this was the late ‘90’s). My grandmother used the exact same language you did. She recognized what I wasn’t ready to see myself - that I was trying to punish myself for not being good enough. It took another 10-15 years for me to really understand shame and radical acceptance, but I’m thankful for the nudge she gave me.
I’ve been slowing down and taking public transit and biking instead of driving some days. It adds a lot of time but I get to see my city differently and enjoy the moment.
Same. I've noticed that train travel adds experiences to my vacation; some good, some bad, but always added experiences. Flying is quite the opposite, it is lost time. Airport time is time you kill instead of time you spend. I prefer spending my time to killing it, so I try to do things that are experiences instead of making time go away.
"It is what it is" is a totally fine sentiment ... for one to take regarding their own problems. Too often though it's something a real piece of work will say about a problem THEY caused for YOU.
Geologist over here geeking about your shout-out! 😆 It definitely gives you a different perspective. I travel a lot for work and pleasure, and one of the biggest perspective changes I noticed was how I see landscapes as dynamic and look for evidence of how the surrounding area formed everywhere I go. It makes travel so much more fun 😊
In Mexico theres a phrase exactly with that conotation, Chale. It embodies that same feel of accepting the not being able to do anything about something and let it out in a breath.
As an odd note, when she mentioned coming down to Australia for a sec in a conversation about flowers blooming. Down here, my university has a tradition to do with flowers blooming. In my city, we get these beautiful trees called Jacarandas. They flower with these beautiful purple petals, and they only last for a couple of months before returning to normal. But when they are around, it is a genuinely beautiful sight. For university students, these flowers bloom around the exam season. It is beautiful seeing these trees blooming amongst the sandstone buildings and bustle of students, all the while the underlying din of exams and assignments coming due marks the season. The tradition is that if one of the petals happens to land on you, you will fail your assessment. Nobody takes it seriously, but it's a cute little tradition that has been picked up and kept alive by successive generations of the students.
In terms of the niche festivals that mark a certain time of year for people in different areas, I always loved ending the summer (vacation) with my town's oyster festival. It's a little shore town, and I assume oyster harvest was mainly in the late summer, and they've just carried on having it even though the town's economy doesn't really depend on it. It's very much like we've created these local secular seasonal holidays, like how in Europe lots of towns or small areas had a local saint they celebrated.
I like to compare my relationship with all of my different 'clocks' the same way a conductor acts in relation to all of the musicians in an orchestra. While the conductor keeps the core tempo of the orchestra, every instrument has to play its own rhythm, and in a manner that is in harmony with the other instruments. I can't have too many instruments in one section such that other sections get overwhelmed. And of course, I have to make sure each part is being performed to the best of its ability, which means I have tot practice, not just wing it on concert day, which unfortunately a lot of us are pushed to do with how fast capitalism forces us to move.
This discussion couldn't be more perfectly timed and come at a more relevant time in my life. Literally bubbled over in frustration yesterday with my partner yesterday over the fact that I didn't want to keep working endlessly inside and outside of work on a daily basis, whereas she accepts that this is what capitalism forces us to do.
The "planting seeds" through use of your time, concept is profound and interesting. I will say however that we do this whether we intend to or not and the same can be said for what happens to us. Thinking in terms of "planting to growth to full bloom" is a very helpful and constructive way to think.
Connecting with time through nature is good for the soul, grounds you. The older you get, the more gratifying it becomes to learn about the seasons of local plants, birds, insects, and other beings.
This was such a beautiful listen, thank you. Observing small things about the plants and the sky is something that has given me tranquility and happiness for many years. I became a landscape designer because I wanted to give as many people as possible opportunities for similar observations. Physicality is such a beautiful and meaningful thing. But I also use silly little unsafe hacks to cross streets a bit quicker, to have a few more minutes to myself at the end of a long commute and a soul sucking workday. Every hour of free time, that is not spent at or getting to work where I am hassled to produce stuff as quickly as possible, has become sacred because such hours are scarce. At school my classmates and I were brainwashed to devalue our time and our work, to accept that we would be overworked and underpaid. At work I've been fired and reprimanded and disciplined for going home after my contractual hours, for staying hydrated and getting up from my desk to go to the bathroom regularly, for planing dates on weekdays. And I resent that. More than I can express. The writers' strike has been an inspiration. I can't wait to continue organizing within my own industry. Recently I read Sand Talk by Tyson Yunkaporta, who writes that the role of human beings is to act as "custodians" for the ecosystems and landscapes they inhabit. This would be a life similar to that of the rice farmer Jenny talked about. I can't think of anything more worthwhile.
When y'all were talking about the article that talked about genes as workers, it reminded me of an article I was reading about mushroom communication that bent over backwards to find a way to explain the relationship between mycelia and tree roots in a capitalistic way, I assume because either the writer couldn't fathom a non-capitalistic system, or they assumed their readers couldn't.
I literally got Jenny's book How to Do Nothing in the mail yesterday and then found this video today, and honestly these two books are exactly what I need at this time in my life it feels like. Thanks to both of you for all that you're doing to make the world better (or at least to help us look at it in a way that's less hopeless.)
ADAM! I cannot express enough how very proud I am of you're new format! I think you have been listening to your audience and finding that balance between passion and presentation and this episode was a true joy to watch. I have left criticism on your videos before, always in a kind and constructive way, and boy this was a treat to watch. Great job, can't wait to see more from you! 🥰
I've been really enjoying these podcasts. I need something to engage and entertain my brain, and this is the perfect form of educational content that's long and slow and not desperate for my attention, without being boring at all.
Time blindness causes someone with ADHD to have a weird relationship with time. Time can fly by in a blink of an eye or crawl at a painstakingly slow pace. It's hard to imagine the future and it's hard to remember the past. Sometimes it feels like I'm living moment to moment.
people who say they have adhd etc make me laugh. i think its kinda bs and we all have it in various degrees,i think its what being human is, different to everyone else, despite being billions of us. unless you all think we should be robots with no emotions etc
@PazLeBon It's true that everyone might struggle with attention or motivation (etc.) from time to time. But for people with ADHD, these symptoms are detrimental to their lives in some way. We lose jobs, ruin relationships, do poorly in school, are more likely to get into car accidents, or get badly hurt. The parts of the brain that controls executive function isn't as developed as neurotypicals of the same age, and people who have brain damage in those areas exhibit the symptoms of ADHD. Having ADHD isn't bad itself, but it becomes detrimental if you live in a society that is built with neurotypicals in mind.
@@PazLeBon This feels like saying because everyone has a spectrum of how long they can walk without getting tired, that there's no such thing as being paralyzed.
I don't think I have ADHD, but maybe? I did well in school and was never in a hurry, but these differences in experiencing time definitely apply to me. There is after all the saying "time flies when you're having fun" just like it drags when you are bored or in a bad mood. As far as memory issues I've never heard of that being associated with ADHD. All in all it sounds like what you're going through is pretty typical. I mean, Aren't we all living moment to moment. Not to discredit or disregard.
@@PazLeBon Some people have it in more degrees than most people, which is what makes it a disorder... and most of those people were diagnosed, they don't just say.
IT’S JENNY OMG!! I’ve been plugging her work in comments sections a lot lately, literally just did a few minutes ago for instance, and now she’s here!! Aaaa I love her stuff
I think the best thing i've done so far is keep my journals from elementary school. I can remember the feeling I had writing it when I read it and for a moment I'm 7 years old and writing who was nice to me at recess
Kairos is how some people mark their lives and how we all used to live. Kronos or Chronos is making time more important than the events that make them up. The two can work together. Making a concert in time to see your favorite artist perform. The ability to plan the treasured moments is powerful. However, it is counterproductive when stress is introduced by time. Gotta make a flight? Time is of the essence. Have a task to complete? Is there a hard deadline? Why? Where does quality come from if you are rushing toward an arbitrary number? I grew up in the Bay Area. It had seasons. Check the hills! If they are green, it's spring. If they are brown, it's summer/fall/winter. lol There were great wet seasons and giant stretches of terribly hot weather all year in different years. I grew up there and left after 35 years. It never snows there for more than a minute and it's wet plops of slush when it does. El Nino screwed the Bay Area several times. I live in the PNW now, in the temperate rainforest. I never worry about water. That was the best reason to move here, aside from the hiking, camping, and culture. Also, you live in a desert, Adam. The heat, the floods, the heat, the floods... XD
This is 100% geologist approved. LOVE that she spoke about McPhee! HIIIIGHLY recommend his Pulitzer Prize-winning book called Annals of the Former World, it’s a collection of several of his books in one. Beautifully written. Also, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Edward Abbey, particularly his book Desert Solitaire
This is interesting Adam….I live in Michigan and I have noticed that my sleeping patterns do go with the seasons. I’m up way earlier in the Winter and too bed way earlier than in the summer where I stay up way later…. By around 5 hours morning and evening🌎☀️💙
When the pandemic was in its first month I looked at my then girlfriend and quoted Steven Kings the Dark tower "Time is different in a world that's moved on" her anger and fear shook us both.
I grew up on farms and the sense of geological change became quite apparent to me when, in my early teens, I had revisited a path I had travelled often as a child. It was nearly unrecognizable and it was really jarring. Since I've noticed the structure of the farms I've seen and the landscapes I've had access to slowly change. The hardest place to recognize this is when I've been living in towns and cities. If you've only ever grown in a place that maintains the specific shapes created, or intentionally change it, its hard to understand the constant change caused by erosion. On the rolling hills of the prairies I grew up on where extremes of weather are a common occurrence every year that change grew into my understanding of living a life. The inert concept time created by man do such a poor job in relation to anything other than immediate productivity, but its the most accessible. Each are a language that you need to learn to honestly speak with other people about life and death.
I'm the opposite of these two. I cannot think of time in the toxic way they describe. And it's always been a consistent mark against me at work. I don't give a shit about crunch time for instance, you cannot bully me into working harder. But it does seem to be a lot more healthy like that, so that's good to know.
@GhostSamaritan My time blindness is a direct cause of me feeling a need to crunch. Because I can't evaluate how long something is taking / will take I end up completely botching every single deadline and basically living on constant crunch time.
When I was bullied into being more productive/working harder, I actually produced worse work and ended up burning out and quitting the company. Great way to keep your workforce healthy, bullying.
Moving to a rural mountainside area has seriously changed my perception of time, I just watch flowers bloom and fade. Multiple hostas on the property bloom at different times depending on when the sun is at their preferred angle. Beats my California hometown where I watched grass fade through colors in orange county or the humidity vs dry breeze up north. I really believe in observing and living with nature to feel the way plants go through time
"It is what it is" has become something I say often, just within the last few years. I def get some negative pushback about it but certainly say it with the mentality yall talk about here. Can't control everything so just keep moving forward
As an "introvert" I first thought that isolating due to COVID was going to be my JAM! But it turned out to reveal all the trauma, CPTSD, ADHD, Alcohol Use Disorder, and other mental health challenges that I had barely been holding together for my entire life. I was a high-functioning emotional mess masking my way through life and when The Pandemic hit, it disrupted all of the adaptive systems I had developed over time and I simply collapsed under the weight of everything.
omg. jenny is so awesome. Like 30seconds into her talking I was knew I was going to listen to the whole thing. she is absolutely adorable and I love how deep and existential you guys got on al your tagets.
That's why for me time saving is always seen through what it does for my friends/colleagues and myself. As a software developer that means looking into autoimating tasks I come across more than twice (with a high likelyhood that it'll return again and again) and as a hobby model builder, building jigs and other custom tools for something similar.
havent listened yet, but I recently read a book called 'Rest is Resistance' which helped me prioratize myself, especially in my prolonged time of unemployment.
enjoy it, I have been saving for that and i'm still getting bitched at for not having a job lined up after my current one. I have always been planning on having that time to breath.
@@banquetoftheleviathan1404 i made sure to enjoy it. it truly is nice to have time to think and reflect. im employed now thankfully as my bank account got quite low there at the end 😅
Are you kidding me! Next year's ice free Arctic, along with this year's ENSO will send temperatures soaring beyond the point of no return! We are already at 2.5c when taking into consideration the more than 40 heat trapping gases including water vapor, & we have triggered more than 60 self-reinforcing feedback loops. It's time to live life with urgency, which is how we should live anyway. Live each day fully as if it were your last, because it could very well be.
Being productive only helps if you do so to maximize your free time. People have been duped into efficiency to maximizing ALL their time rather than being efficient at work to maximize life. The problem is we do not work to support ourselves anymore. We work to support a company which in turn decides how much they want to compensate us for that time. That is NOT working to support yourself. Most are confused about this simple fact.
Hey Adam! I loved this episode! You mentioned having a geologist on the show. I recommend another you tuber named Houston Wade. He’s great and very knowledgeable.
As someone with ADHD who is also in college, I’m constantly battling with the capitalistic sense of time and alternative time scales. My internal desire is to just “vibe” and take the time I need to do what I want to do when I want to do it. However, in order for me to “function” in neurotypical society, I must schedule in every single thing I do in a google calendar, including things like food because I will fully forget to eat while being as busy as college gets. I want to escape the clock watching mindset, but I have no choice but to watch clocks in order to survive
I always find these talks of COVID time fascinating because I DIDN'T get to just stay home. I was one of the people who HAD to leave for work every day. It was strange for me because COVID didn't end up feeling as heavy as it should have because clearly I didn't matter enough to get to stay home and be safe (had multiple covid scares thanks to my roommates who ALSO had to work outside of the house).
As a Northerner living in the deep south, here we just have Summer and Summer Jr. And when I lived in the bay area there was Summer Drought, and the cold Rainy Season.
I don't see time and think what can i smoosh into that time. I see things i need and want to get done, then look at how i can get it done in a reasonable amount of time, but prioritizing being less stressed about it
I'm sure people have said this many times but Adam needs a "The Daily Show"-type show to host. I don't know if he wants to do "The Daily Show" itself because it's so heavily political but he deserves to have a great, provocative show that gets more global exposure.
This was a very interesting discussion. But I have a counterexample to the whole time as a commodity thing. My background is in computational chemistry… a lot of what I do is setting up simulations that may take several days to run… and then writing automated workflows to read through all of that data to learn about whatever system I’m studying… I always get a bit of a rush when I start my code and I know that the computer is doing all the hard work while I can just sit down and have a glass of wine. It makes me feel like I don’t have to feel guilty for skipping out a bit early. Does that make any sense?
Farmers had very uneven work days throughout the year. Some days it was work dawn to dusk, other days it was just chores, like making food or feeding the chickens
I thought your comment about Zoom, everyone logging on on the exact right time. That didn't happen at all in my work! All of us had back to back meetings, would get phone calls, etc. So people would always come in in a staggered way and we would generally wait a couple of minutes - as in about 7.
I have dyscalculia and because of it I have no concept of time. I understand time by major events so its mostly my births, deaths, Hollidays, and change of seasons.
interestingly, I have very little concept of times or seasons due to unfortunately being unskooled and then traveling from little town to little town every week or two and it's interesting as the seasons change and your locations change all every local always seem to have a story about how whatever the particular weather was there now was extremely uncommon and this and that or the winter was harsh or mild. and of course I know it's statistically impossible that that's the case so it's just interesting to me
My spouse is a Hydrologist for our state and has his Bachelors in Geography and his Masters in Geology (vs Me, who grew up Young Earth Creationist and now have a Bachelor’s in Anthropology). I think he’d love to come on and be a guest on the show Adam!
It's always interesting hearing well adjusted people talk about their pandemic revelations lol. To me, they're describing how I looked at the world for as long as I can remember🙃
I wouldn’t scoff so much at the idea that climate affects productivity! You guys mentioned the idea of seasons coming over from Europe. It’s no coincidence that people in countries where it got freezing cold in the winters would want to be extra productive when it was warm in the summers. Go further toward the Equator and life is much more laissez faire, generally, all over the world. It’s literally too hot in some places to think about being productive. Efficiency when it’s hot = relaxing.
I found that trying to manage time with adhd is hell. I just allow myself to shrug off some of the things I couldn't get done for the day now. The downside is that I feel guilt and shame from my family's influence, which 'freezes' my motivation to start tasks later. I just wish the world didn't demand so much of our time to simply exist. I have to call insurance rn, but i'm hiding in the comments because I'm too terrified I might get bored in the middle of discussion and end up sounding like an idiot because I speak too fast 😂.
A lot of this reminds me of a recent book I ended up listening to on audible... "Speed Limits: Where Time Went and Why We Have So Little Left" by Mark C. Taylor.
You See, Adam, it was a Popular Notion, Years Back (in the '70's or so, All Through the Naetion ENQUIRER & places like That...) "The Six Hour WORK DAY is just round the CORNER" (along with the Cure for Cancer & other Stuff...)
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As someone with ADHD and no sense of real time outside of physical phenomena, it's refreshing to hear time talked about in a way that isn't productivity. I went tubing on a river with friends a week or two back and we spent 2-3 hours just floating down a river on innertubes with no cell phones and just relaxed outside and it was so nice to not be looking at a clock or a watch constantly and just being in nature.
I’m Autistic and have ADHD and I can definitely relate to what you’re saying!
As someone who does like to be productive when I need to be, and use tools to help focus, I find that “riding the wave” of energy during the day, week, month, season, year, and not fighting it to squeeze out every single drop of energy 24/7, is a much better approach in living smarter and not harder when wanting to do anything.
Awhile ago, I listened to the audiobook version of Laziness Does Not Exist by Devon Price (who is also on the Spectrum) and I highly recommend it!
I’m also looking forward to listening to Saving Time by Jenny Odell soon too!!
Fellow ADHD person. Can def relate.
The times I've been most stressed is when I have to monitor my time. Eg, I can't enjoy my breaks at work because they're monitored down to the minute by the system. But monitoring that myself to stay on time is really hard.
I love coming back from work and letting go of all sense of time playing video games.
must be summat in the water with all these people with labels attached.. or they are just normal and adding labels is fkn pathetic
@@rachel_sj yeah anyone can work when it suits. in the old days )pre 2000 lol) we woulld call trhem shirkers, lets be straight
@@PazLeBonin the words of pre-2000s genre-defining pop-punk band Blink-182: “Work Sucks”
I love how every guest is Adams favourite :D It doesn't really seem insincere either, he just seems stoked to talk to good people.
its all relevant to your time frame. Adam seems to just have time frames that let him live the moment, so every guest can be his favorite, in this moment 😃
Adam seems very toked in this moment.
@@patcheskipp
Stoked, not toked.
@@Jean-JacquesZenger no I mean toked. Adam looked high during this interview.
You are rite. Watching more closely, he was giggly at a few inappropriately moments.
However, he was still his enthusiastic, focused and intelligent self even if buzzed. N'est-ce pas?
I learned at a young age about duck season. There's also a rabbit season, and there's great contention about when each occurs.
Duck season!
Wabbit season!
I love that the end of the skit where they change it to "Human Season" and go to hunt down Elmer after he hands over the gun implies that in their universe there IS a Human Season that is legally recognized.
Based on the amount of baby rabbits my cat catches and eats in summer, I'm going to guess rabbit season is in Fall?
Worked in kitchens - the obsession with time is unreal.
"You're taking 37 seconds to fill this parfait - we need that down to 30"
When you're preparing so much with limited time, some steps you can only afford 30 seconds on. 37 seconds instead of 30 is 19% slower, meaning if it's a tight schedule on a busy day, you might fall behind. That focus on productivity motivates me, and makes me feel proud of myself. Though I've always worked best under pressure, everyone's different
@baileescott401 I understand, lol
I have a culinary degree, and we cover this. It also comes down to cost of convenience. A 10c sheet of parchment saves like, 5 minutes of dishwasher labor, etc.
The Taylorism approach is just used to abuse those who don't know better. Those tight margins are one thing, and hustle is another.
I still had hand/arm issues from rolling pizzas as fast as I could 10 years ago.. :/
"EVERY SECOND COUNTS" is one of the central motifs of FX's the bear in its current season. as a former culinary careerer, it's incredibly relateable and also terrifying how much that industry has warped my personal sense of time and enjoyment. i think i was always going to be prone to issues with time regardless of what industry i entered, but culinary (esp pastry) has made a really lasting, mostly negative psychological impact on me to this day. i can also relate to the physical pains that you have left over from it, as we were constantly pushed and pushed past our bodily limits hourly, daily, monthly and very often with seemingly no end in sight.
spending on average 12 to 16 hours of my day in a place that became a psuedo home also STOLE time from me and my coworkers. i feel that i had become more ignorant because of it. the extra time that i had to spend at work meant that it was sapped from my free time outside of it -- time which i could have had to learn new things and become more educated, time that i could have spent keeping myself healthier instead of skipping meals and barely catching up on sleep. although i was good at my various jobs most of the time, and i certainly have the skills to show for it that i cherish, i had no context for things happening outside of me, outside of the multiple windowless rooms of the outlets and the bakeshops i worked in. clocks (and calendars) don't really register when you aren't allowed to see the natural rising or falling of the sun. the clock is only a reminder of how behind you are, of how you will never catch up, and that if you do catch up, it is a very fleeting victory amid the vast field of defeat and disappointment you are saddled with almost every shift.
the saddest part is that i justified a ton of this to myself when i was in the deep of the industry. i felt that it was the only way to be, to work, and to live. that i was the one that had to get better and better, more efficient, not that the industry and industries like it should be the ones to change. i was never necessarily unhappy with the type of work i was doing, but looking back, the environments in which i and others had to do it in were abysmal, even at the high end. i've since left the industry completely (the pandemic basically pushed me to that, having been laid off) and i think i am reclaiming some of my time, even though that itself is going to... take time lol.
@@rdg3747reminds me of a quote from Steven Universe (I know, I know, but hear me out)
“You work away your whole life in a job and what does it get you? Cash. Cash that you can’t use to buy back what the job took from you.”
@@baileescott401 its disgusting, people are not machines
I'm a teacher in Germany. There is a lot of talk about how challenging the job is and it makes teachers prone to burn outs. What is weird to me is that it focuses on time. How many hours you teach, how long does it take to correct tests and exams, how many conferences there are, etc. However, one class might be much more exhausting that another class, even though they both take the same amout of time to teach. One mean email from a parent takes much more energy than correcting 50 multiple-choice tests. I look at my work in two dimensions - timewise but also how much of my energy it is draining.
During the conversation about Taylorism my thoughts went to how ergonomically harmful repetitive small task work is. It's an excellent example of how we don't consider small changes that we can't see day to day, which avalanche into disaster. Over time you end up losing more time, productivity, thus money because your workers are getting injured and you need to train new workers.
I really wish that the philosophy of Taylorism, and its offshoots, would just disappear.
One thing I don't think they touched on from the natural world.
Ants. The very model of Productivity in the animal world... who have basically been Maximizing productivity without regard for individual benefit for longer than there have been Mammals...
They have Slack workers. Workers whose entire job it is to do absolutely NOTHING but sit around, and eat and just generally stay lazy for a bit... until Emergencies hit and they Immediately fill in for those who have been incapacitated or otherwise unable to do tasks vital to the colony.
Even the ultimate natural model for work and time efficiency know you need some slack.
@@HimitsuHunter Not just that they have medics, emergency surgery and different roles for ants who aren't as able
@@HimitsuHunter 'look to the wisdom of the ants' - King Solomon; Ancient COMMUNIST
"Bahala na" = let things be
@@HimitsuHunter hmm, maybe im some form of ant. there when you need me, otherwise hidden away with the plants and animals :)
As someone with long covid who still takes covid precautions, time has been standing still for me since early 2020.
That feeling that everyday is the same has never ended for me since the *ongoing pandemic* started.
I'm almost completely disconnected from society's experience of time, since I'm now too disabled to work.
Re: planting store-bought stuff (1:12:39) I've always read and heard that grocery-store garlic cloves aren't viable for planting. However, after noticing more than a couple of green bits sprouting from various pieces of cooking garlic in my kitchen, I decided to give it a shot. I mean, if it isn't supposed to be able to grow into more garlic... I was like "where exactly along the line does it stop doing that?"
Turns out you can totally grow more garlic than you want - in October, ideally before any freezing weather, just put a clove in the ground for every head of garlic you want to end up with (1 plant=1 head, usually), about 4-6 inches (100-150mm) apart. After they start sprouting, look out for any that are super close to each other, and pull up the smaller ones. It's better to have one plant get the nutrients in a given spot, rather than have two plants competing for them, as well as for space.
I've always heard garlic does well when planted after summer is definitely over, and when it winters through a little bit of freezing temps. I'm definitely not an expert, so check that out yourself; don't be the person who refuses to let go of "a thing I read, from a TH-cam commenter who said _they_ heard a thing at some point..."
Late next spring, you should find a couple more than you remember planting. If you plant stuff in the same spot again for the next year, you'll likely find some bonus garlic coming up!
Grocery store potatoes too! I've had many a potato start sprouting root buds if I don't get to them in time. Unfortunately I don't think my soil is super great for growing them. The ones I've planted as experiments came up small. Edible, but small, and not worth the work trying to keep them. For me it's just easier to buy a new bag of potatoes instead of growing them.
Wow. I’m turning 30 tomorrow and honestly, this is one of the best podcast episodes I think I could have chosen to listen to going into a new decade. It gave me so much to think about.
Happy belated birthday! My 30s were the best time of my life, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did. :)
Yeah, but ‘nothing ever happens’ - del amitri
These discussions are so important today. Im happy seeing it proliferate. I have friends deep in that hustle mindset that get confused when keep questioning them about the end goal of it all.
If you really want to confuse them, ask them what a business is for. Why does business exist. And then when they say “to make money” say “why?” And just keep questioning it. See how far and long they go before they realize the point of a business is to provide goods and services to people who want and need them. Not money.
My wife is the planner. 2 College graduate. She's the giga-producvity-godess taking highlighters to calendars..and dunking on life.
Me? I'm an art teacher. At a non profit. I teach at risk youth. Taking it easy. Going hiking with my dog, working on eccentric projects. Playing games, reading books, working out. We really balance eachother out. I live by the seasons. My perception of time flows, and slows.. When I really want to annoy her I tell her that nothing is something worth doing.
To me, Much of these work-till- u-drop-efficiency hustle mindset is just tje leftovers of a country founded by slave owners, and a religion-based work ethic. The sooner we get rid of it the better. It is baffling to me that we have robots creating art, writing poetry, and doing philosophy, but making people work like drones and machines.
Not the future I imagined.
Europe is way more chill with it. We're not afraid to go on the vacation we've earned over here.
@@GhostSamaritan Depends on the country in Europe.
It’s worse, AI doesn’t do art, it steals it, launders any copyright claims and then vomit something without paying a dime to the people whose art was taken to train it. Very dystopian for sure.
@@MaryamMaqdisiThe fact that the AI "art" is now getting worse because a bunch of the training data is now just other AI mulch is extremely funny
I saw AI companies complaining to an art website that they needed a clearer marking to distinguish images that used AI... so that they can rip off *only* the fresh human-made material. Absolutely pathetic
I think it has more to do with digital clocks EVERYWHERE. On your phone, stove, microwave, dvr (or other device you have hooked up to your TV,) computer and even car radio. Everywhere you look you know exactly what time it is to the minute. Used to be with analog clocks when someone asked you what time it was you could say it's x:15 and they'd be fine with that even if it was x:13 or x:18. People were more relaxed because a few minutes here or there was no big deal because your watch might have a different time than everybody else's. Now everybody is obsessed with the 'exact' time because everything is connected to the atomic clock and every time keeping device has the same time.
Love when Jenny brought up Master Cho's Do-Nothing Farming. His work is extremely influential amongst organic farmers
“What!! My peasants are lazing about!? Give them work to do, put them to work somehow!”
Farming without farming.
I hadn't heard of Master Cho. I thought she was talking about Fukuoka
@@phranek i taught cho any things many years ago. ask him ;)
Wasn't this created by Masanonobu Fukuoka
i've watched you since the start. I'm glad to see you doing your own thing. Adam C is the unsung hero of our generation. Thank you.
Your an OG for calling the strike and supporting it still i can't imagine how bad entertainment would be were it not for writers rooms. I know you guys will win
Only 20 minutes in but I’m finding this so uplifting already. Duck season! I became much more aware of my local ecology during the pandemic, I learned a few new species on every walk I took in 2020-2021. It’s very grounding to become aware of the minutia of life around you. Thank you both.
Rabbit season
"Only 20 minutes in.." sounds like something a capitalist would say! 😅
@@arronsmith8 duck season!
? that implies murder
This got real to me at about 37:00 when you talked about extreme productivity as self-punishment When I was in my 20’s I fell into the “productivity bro” culture (before that was really a thing - this was the late ‘90’s).
My grandmother used the exact same language you did. She recognized what I wasn’t ready to see myself - that I was trying to punish myself for not being good enough. It took another 10-15 years for me to really understand shame and radical acceptance, but I’m thankful for the nudge she gave me.
Your grandmother sounds very perceptive, as do you for realising that. It's nice to grow eh.
I’ve been slowing down and taking public transit and biking instead of driving some days. It adds a lot of time but I get to see my city differently and enjoy the moment.
Same. I've noticed that train travel adds experiences to my vacation; some good, some bad, but always added experiences. Flying is quite the opposite, it is lost time. Airport time is time you kill instead of time you spend. I prefer spending my time to killing it, so I try to do things that are experiences instead of making time go away.
Still doing exceptionally interesting stuff after all these years. Kudos, Adam!
"It is what it is" is a totally fine sentiment ... for one to take regarding their own problems. Too often though it's something a real piece of work will say about a problem THEY caused for YOU.
Geologist over here geeking about your shout-out! 😆 It definitely gives you a different perspective. I travel a lot for work and pleasure, and one of the biggest perspective changes I noticed was how I see landscapes as dynamic and look for evidence of how the surrounding area formed everywhere I go. It makes travel so much more fun 😊
"Note that the best universities are in the high-efficiency weather belt" is the rhetoric of the bad guy from Recess: School's Out
In Mexico theres a phrase exactly with that conotation, Chale. It embodies that same feel of accepting the not being able to do anything about something and let it out in a breath.
As an odd note, when she mentioned coming down to Australia for a sec in a conversation about flowers blooming.
Down here, my university has a tradition to do with flowers blooming. In my city, we get these beautiful trees called Jacarandas. They flower with these beautiful purple petals, and they only last for a couple of months before returning to normal. But when they are around, it is a genuinely beautiful sight.
For university students, these flowers bloom around the exam season. It is beautiful seeing these trees blooming amongst the sandstone buildings and bustle of students, all the while the underlying din of exams and assignments coming due marks the season. The tradition is that if one of the petals happens to land on you, you will fail your assessment. Nobody takes it seriously, but it's a cute little tradition that has been picked up and kept alive by successive generations of the students.
Paying closer attention to my menstrual cycles helps me plan projects around my natural energy cycles and mood
In terms of the niche festivals that mark a certain time of year for people in different areas, I always loved ending the summer (vacation) with my town's oyster festival. It's a little shore town, and I assume oyster harvest was mainly in the late summer, and they've just carried on having it even though the town's economy doesn't really depend on it. It's very much like we've created these local secular seasonal holidays, like how in Europe lots of towns or small areas had a local saint they celebrated.
I like to compare my relationship with all of my different 'clocks' the same way a conductor acts in relation to all of the musicians in an orchestra. While the conductor keeps the core tempo of the orchestra, every instrument has to play its own rhythm, and in a manner that is in harmony with the other instruments. I can't have too many instruments in one section such that other sections get overwhelmed. And of course, I have to make sure each part is being performed to the best of its ability, which means I have tot practice, not just wing it on concert day, which unfortunately a lot of us are pushed to do with how fast capitalism forces us to move.
This discussion couldn't be more perfectly timed and come at a more relevant time in my life. Literally bubbled over in frustration yesterday with my partner yesterday over the fact that I didn't want to keep working endlessly inside and outside of work on a daily basis, whereas she accepts that this is what capitalism forces us to do.
Kurt Vonnegut once said “We’re here on this Earth to fart around.”
(Or something like it)
I live by it.
The "planting seeds" through use of your time, concept is profound and interesting. I will say however that we do this whether we intend to or not and the same can be said for what happens to us. Thinking in terms of "planting to growth to full bloom" is a very helpful and constructive way to think.
I'm 57 and the way I look at it now is, there is always tomorrow and if tomorrow doesn't come then it doesn't matter.
Connecting with time through nature is good for the soul, grounds you. The older you get, the more gratifying it becomes to learn about the seasons of local plants, birds, insects, and other beings.
Loved the Bahala Na philosophy. I immediately imagined it being sung by a young lion, a worthog and meerkat. Love this topic too.
This was such a beautiful listen, thank you.
Observing small things about the plants and the sky is something that has given me tranquility and happiness for many years. I became a landscape designer because I wanted to give as many people as possible opportunities for similar observations. Physicality is such a beautiful and meaningful thing.
But I also use silly little unsafe hacks to cross streets a bit quicker, to have a few more minutes to myself at the end of a long commute and a soul sucking workday. Every hour of free time, that is not spent at or getting to work where I am hassled to produce stuff as quickly as possible, has become sacred because such hours are scarce. At school my classmates and I were brainwashed to devalue our time and our work, to accept that we would be overworked and underpaid. At work I've been fired and reprimanded and disciplined for going home after my contractual hours, for staying hydrated and getting up from my desk to go to the bathroom regularly, for planing dates on weekdays. And I resent that. More than I can express.
The writers' strike has been an inspiration. I can't wait to continue organizing within my own industry.
Recently I read Sand Talk by Tyson Yunkaporta, who writes that the role of human beings is to act as "custodians" for the ecosystems and landscapes they inhabit. This would be a life similar to that of the rice farmer Jenny talked about. I can't think of anything more worthwhile.
When y'all were talking about the article that talked about genes as workers, it reminded me of an article I was reading about mushroom communication that bent over backwards to find a way to explain the relationship between mycelia and tree roots in a capitalistic way, I assume because either the writer couldn't fathom a non-capitalistic system, or they assumed their readers couldn't.
I literally got Jenny's book How to Do Nothing in the mail yesterday and then found this video today, and honestly these two books are exactly what I need at this time in my life it feels like. Thanks to both of you for all that you're doing to make the world better (or at least to help us look at it in a way that's less hopeless.)
ADAM! I cannot express enough how very proud I am of you're new format! I think you have been listening to your audience and finding that balance between passion and presentation and this episode was a true joy to watch. I have left criticism on your videos before, always in a kind and constructive way, and boy this was a treat to watch. Great job, can't wait to see more from you! 🥰
I've been really enjoying these podcasts. I need something to engage and entertain my brain, and this is the perfect form of educational content that's long and slow and not desperate for my attention, without being boring at all.
Time blindness causes someone with ADHD to have a weird relationship with time. Time can fly by in a blink of an eye or crawl at a painstakingly slow pace. It's hard to imagine the future and it's hard to remember the past. Sometimes it feels like I'm living moment to moment.
people who say they have adhd etc make me laugh. i think its kinda bs and we all have it in various degrees,i think its what being human is, different to everyone else, despite being billions of us. unless you all think we should be robots with no emotions etc
@PazLeBon It's true that everyone might struggle with attention or motivation (etc.) from time to time. But for people with ADHD, these symptoms are detrimental to their lives in some way. We lose jobs, ruin relationships, do poorly in school, are more likely to get into car accidents, or get badly hurt. The parts of the brain that controls executive function isn't as developed as neurotypicals of the same age, and people who have brain damage in those areas exhibit the symptoms of ADHD.
Having ADHD isn't bad itself, but it becomes detrimental if you live in a society that is built with neurotypicals in mind.
@@PazLeBon This feels like saying because everyone has a spectrum of how long they can walk without getting tired, that there's no such thing as being paralyzed.
I don't think I have ADHD, but maybe? I did well in school and was never in a hurry, but these differences in experiencing time definitely apply to me. There is after all the saying "time flies when you're having fun" just like it drags when you are bored or in a bad mood. As far as memory issues I've never heard of that being associated with ADHD. All in all it sounds like what you're going through is pretty typical. I mean, Aren't we all living moment to moment. Not to discredit or disregard.
@@PazLeBon Some people have it in more degrees than most people, which is what makes it a disorder... and most of those people were diagnosed, they don't just say.
IT’S JENNY OMG!! I’ve been plugging her work in comments sections a lot lately, literally just did a few minutes ago for instance, and now she’s here!! Aaaa I love her stuff
To quote the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy time is an illusion lunch time doubly so
It’s more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey… stuff.
I think the best thing i've done so far is keep my journals from elementary school. I can remember the feeling I had writing it when I read it and for a moment I'm 7 years old and writing who was nice to me at recess
Cicero gives keeping journals as a tip in his book "How to grow old".
Another great video from factually and Adam and company. Much love and thank you for this important work!!
Jenny's description of time in minutes and hours reminds me of the Robert Anton Wilson saying The Map Is Not The Territory. lol.
all description is metaphor. there is no spoon. etc ... robert anton wilson was the mannnnn.
ego's got us all messed up.
googled wood duck. very cool
That kind of biphasic sleep is for the winter. In the summer, and specially in the hotter areas, the two phases were "night" and "noon nap".
A better phrasing than "It is what it is" is "I can only do what I can do"
Kairos is how some people mark their lives and how we all used to live. Kronos or Chronos is making time more important than the events that make them up. The two can work together. Making a concert in time to see your favorite artist perform. The ability to plan the treasured moments is powerful. However, it is counterproductive when stress is introduced by time. Gotta make a flight? Time is of the essence. Have a task to complete? Is there a hard deadline? Why? Where does quality come from if you are rushing toward an arbitrary number?
I grew up in the Bay Area. It had seasons. Check the hills! If they are green, it's spring. If they are brown, it's summer/fall/winter. lol There were great wet seasons and giant stretches of terribly hot weather all year in different years. I grew up there and left after 35 years. It never snows there for more than a minute and it's wet plops of slush when it does. El Nino screwed the Bay Area several times. I live in the PNW now, in the temperate rainforest. I never worry about water. That was the best reason to move here, aside from the hiking, camping, and culture.
Also, you live in a desert, Adam. The heat, the floods, the heat, the floods... XD
This is 100% geologist approved. LOVE that she spoke about McPhee! HIIIIGHLY recommend his Pulitzer Prize-winning book called Annals of the Former World, it’s a collection of several of his books in one. Beautifully written. Also, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Edward Abbey, particularly his book Desert Solitaire
This is interesting Adam….I live in Michigan and I have noticed that my sleeping patterns do go with the seasons. I’m up way earlier in the Winter and too bed way earlier than in the summer where I stay up way later…. By around 5 hours morning and evening🌎☀️💙
When the pandemic was in its first month I looked at my then girlfriend and quoted Steven Kings the Dark tower "Time is different in a world that's moved on" her anger and fear shook us both.
I grew up on farms and the sense of geological change became quite apparent to me when, in my early teens, I had revisited a path I had travelled often as a child. It was nearly unrecognizable and it was really jarring. Since I've noticed the structure of the farms I've seen and the landscapes I've had access to slowly change. The hardest place to recognize this is when I've been living in towns and cities. If you've only ever grown in a place that maintains the specific shapes created, or intentionally change it, its hard to understand the constant change caused by erosion. On the rolling hills of the prairies I grew up on where extremes of weather are a common occurrence every year that change grew into my understanding of living a life. The inert concept time created by man do such a poor job in relation to anything other than immediate productivity, but its the most accessible. Each are a language that you need to learn to honestly speak with other people about life and death.
I'm the opposite of these two. I cannot think of time in the toxic way they describe. And it's always been a consistent mark against me at work. I don't give a shit about crunch time for instance, you cannot bully me into working harder. But it does seem to be a lot more healthy like that, so that's good to know.
Same here. I have ADHD-induced time-blindness. Maybe worth looking into?
@@GhostSamaritan youre just a pillock,labels got nothing todo with it
@GhostSamaritan My time blindness is a direct cause of me feeling a need to crunch. Because I can't evaluate how long something is taking / will take I end up completely botching every single deadline and basically living on constant crunch time.
@@CthulhuBut2FeetTall Exactly the same here! That's how I got through high school. Seems like I can't get through college that way, though.
When I was bullied into being more productive/working harder, I actually produced worse work and ended up burning out and quitting the company. Great way to keep your workforce healthy, bullying.
19:02 I live in the high desert. We have two seasons, Hot and cold with a week or two of mild buffer between each season.
Moving to a rural mountainside area has seriously changed my perception of time, I just watch flowers bloom and fade. Multiple hostas on the property bloom at different times depending on when the sun is at their preferred angle. Beats my California hometown where I watched grass fade through colors in orange county or the humidity vs dry breeze up north. I really believe in observing and living with nature to feel the way plants go through time
"It is what it is" has become something I say often, just within the last few years. I def get some negative pushback about it but certainly say it with the mentality yall talk about here. Can't control everything so just keep moving forward
"even Siberia goes through the motion..." - Jon Anderson (Close to the Edge)
As an "introvert" I first thought that isolating due to COVID was going to be my JAM! But it turned out to reveal all the trauma, CPTSD, ADHD, Alcohol Use Disorder, and other mental health challenges that I had barely been holding together for my entire life. I was a high-functioning emotional mess masking my way through life and when The Pandemic hit, it disrupted all of the adaptive systems I had developed over time and I simply collapsed under the weight of everything.
Thank you, I really needed this. This is like therapy for me.
Blows your mind
What an interesting convo on a fascinating topic. Thank you Jenny and Adam.
omg. jenny is so awesome. Like 30seconds into her talking I was knew I was going to listen to the whole thing. she is absolutely adorable and I love how deep and existential you guys got on al your tagets.
That's why for me time saving is always seen through what it does for my friends/colleagues and myself.
As a software developer that means looking into autoimating tasks I come across more than twice (with a high likelyhood that it'll return again and again) and as a hobby model builder, building jigs and other custom tools for something similar.
havent listened yet, but I recently read a book called 'Rest is Resistance' which helped me prioratize myself, especially in my prolonged time of unemployment.
enjoy it, I have been saving for that and i'm still getting bitched at for not having a job lined up after my current one. I have always been planning on having that time to breath.
@@banquetoftheleviathan1404 i made sure to enjoy it. it truly is nice to have time to think and reflect. im employed now thankfully as my bank account got quite low there at the end 😅
Are you kidding me! Next year's ice free Arctic, along with this year's ENSO will send temperatures soaring beyond the point of no return! We are already at 2.5c when taking into consideration the more than 40 heat trapping gases including water vapor, & we have triggered more than 60 self-reinforcing feedback loops. It's time to live life with urgency, which is how we should live anyway. Live each day fully as if it were your last, because it could very well be.
That mindset is what caused the pollution that is killing us now, we need to be less efficient, not more.
Being productive only helps if you do so to maximize your free time. People have been duped into efficiency to maximizing ALL their time rather than being efficient at work to maximize life. The problem is we do not work to support ourselves anymore. We work to support a company which in turn decides how much they want to compensate us for that time. That is NOT working to support yourself. Most are confused about this simple fact.
I'm watching this at 1.5x speed so I can get through it quickly enough in order to watch other interesting stuff. Oh, the irony.
Hey Adam! I loved this episode! You mentioned having a geologist on the show. I recommend another you tuber named Houston Wade. He’s great and very knowledgeable.
I really like the way Adam says Duck! Excitement and emphasis on the D, as it should be.
As someone with ADHD who is also in college, I’m constantly battling with the capitalistic sense of time and alternative time scales. My internal desire is to just “vibe” and take the time I need to do what I want to do when I want to do it. However, in order for me to “function” in neurotypical society, I must schedule in every single thing I do in a google calendar, including things like food because I will fully forget to eat while being as busy as college gets. I want to escape the clock watching mindset, but I have no choice but to watch clocks in order to survive
Really loved this one. The current zeitgeist around time is really kind of heartbreaking.
I always find these talks of COVID time fascinating because I DIDN'T get to just stay home. I was one of the people who HAD to leave for work every day. It was strange for me because COVID didn't end up feeling as heavy as it should have because clearly I didn't matter enough to get to stay home and be safe (had multiple covid scares thanks to my roommates who ALSO had to work outside of the house).
As a Northerner living in the deep south, here we just have Summer and Summer Jr. And when I lived in the bay area there was Summer Drought, and the cold Rainy Season.
I needed this discussion. I'm 60, and lately the clock has been ticking more loudly.
Cant have a duck season without a wabbit season
Was looking for this comment! 😆
I don't see time and think what can i smoosh into that time. I see things i need and want to get done, then look at how i can get it done in a reasonable amount of time, but prioritizing being less stressed about it
I'm sure people have said this many times but Adam needs a "The Daily Show"-type show to host.
I don't know if he wants to do "The Daily Show" itself because it's so heavily political but he deserves to have a great, provocative show that gets more global exposure.
This was a very interesting discussion. But I have a counterexample to the whole time as a commodity thing. My background is in computational chemistry… a lot of what I do is setting up simulations that may take several days to run… and then writing automated workflows to read through all of that data to learn about whatever system I’m studying… I always get a bit of a rush when I start my code and I know that the computer is doing all the hard work while I can just sit down and have a glass of wine. It makes me feel like I don’t have to feel guilty for skipping out a bit early. Does that make any sense?
How To Do Nothing is a great read!
Great interview! I watched it at 2x speed so I could save some time
“Two sleeps” sounds like the schedule of rich people who didn’t just spend their entire day doing physical labour.
Farmers had very uneven work days throughout the year. Some days it was work dawn to dusk, other days it was just chores, like making food or feeding the chickens
I thought your comment about Zoom, everyone logging on on the exact right time. That didn't happen at all in my work! All of us had back to back meetings, would get phone calls, etc. So people would always come in in a staggered way and we would generally wait a couple of minutes - as in about 7.
Ironically, Britian gave everyone the 4 seasons, however we never have summer...
I have dyscalculia and because of it I have no concept of time. I understand time by major events so its mostly my births, deaths, Hollidays, and change of seasons.
This is reminding me a lot of the skeptic's Guide to the Future. So many themes of how to understand the future.
Adam, I always enjoyed your older "adam ruins everything". I just discovered you you tube channel. WoW gtreat stuff. I am now a huge fan
interestingly, I have very little concept of times or seasons due to unfortunately being unskooled and then traveling from little town to little town every week or two and it's interesting as the seasons change and your locations change all every local always seem to have a story about how whatever the particular weather was there now was extremely uncommon and this and that or the winter was harsh or mild. and of course I know it's statistically impossible that that's the case so it's just interesting to me
My spouse is a Hydrologist for our state and has his Bachelors in Geography and his Masters in Geology (vs Me, who grew up Young Earth Creationist and now have a Bachelor’s in Anthropology). I think he’d love to come on and be a guest on the show Adam!
It's always interesting hearing well adjusted people talk about their pandemic revelations lol. To me, they're describing how I looked at the world for as long as I can remember🙃
Here in Arizona we're always on standard time because we want that naughty hot Sun to set as soon as possible! 🌚
I wouldn’t scoff so much at the idea that climate affects productivity! You guys mentioned the idea of seasons coming over from Europe. It’s no coincidence that people in countries where it got freezing cold in the winters would want to be extra productive when it was warm in the summers. Go further toward the Equator and life is much more laissez faire, generally, all over the world. It’s literally too hot in some places to think about being productive. Efficiency when it’s hot = relaxing.
1:04:00 I actually think the sentiment has kind of reached the internet with the phrase "fuck it we ball" XD
I would love to see a joint project of Jenny Odell and Aubrey Plaza
16:57 fun fact: Bangladesh as 6 seasons (Summer, Rainy or Monsoon, Autumn, Late Autumn, Winter, Spring)
Absolutely great talk, getting her book right now
I found that trying to manage time with adhd is hell. I just allow myself to shrug off some of the things I couldn't get done for the day now. The downside is that I feel guilt and shame from my family's influence, which 'freezes' my motivation to start tasks later. I just wish the world didn't demand so much of our time to simply exist. I have to call insurance rn, but i'm hiding in the comments because I'm too terrified I might get bored in the middle of discussion and end up sounding like an idiot because I speak too fast 😂.
A lot of this reminds me of a recent book I ended up listening to on audible... "Speed Limits: Where Time Went and Why We Have So Little Left" by Mark C. Taylor.
Parent here : saving time is literally survival
You guys really crushed this interview.
You See, Adam, it was a Popular Notion, Years Back (in the '70's or so, All Through the Naetion ENQUIRER & places like That...)
"The Six Hour WORK DAY is just round the CORNER" (along with the Cure for Cancer & other Stuff...)
37:32 This Qoute made me imagine Adam in an outfit I cannot unsee 😂