A 10,000-word Guide to Four Thousand Weeks | Feifan 19

What this episode is about

If we count a human life as 80 years, it amounts to only 4,000 weeks.

The urgency of how short life is has given rise to our worship of “efficiency above all.” We instinctively believe that if we become more efficient, we’ll have extra time left over to enjoy life.

But as a former “time-management guru” myself, the author tells us from personal experience: the “days when we finally slow down” will never arrive on their own. Chasing efficiency too hard only makes us increasingly hurried and anxious.

In the end, the author arrives at a counterintuitive conclusion: what truly helps us relax isn’t taking control of time, but giving up control of time.

That doesn’t mean we should completely “lie flat” or “let everything rot.” The author presents 7 life challenges that require each of us to make hard choices. Try applying them to your own daily life and see how you can subtract from it at the source—and slow yourself down.

Those who are always in a hurry are forever being pushed along by life. Only people who feel relaxed are truly in control of their lives.

You’ll hear

• 1 “mind-awakening” perspective that lets you experience the limits of life firsthand and take another look at how you live
• 7 philosophies of life about “giving up,” so you can say goodbye to the anxiety of time management
• 8 clever life hacks to save you from endless rushing and help you gain a sense of relaxation

Quotes from this episode

“Life has infinite possibilities” is just a fantasy. Only when we give up that fantasy and make limited choices can life become meaningful.

What we call a life plan is, more often than not, less a carefully designed vision than a process of polishing and adjusting something built on chance.

“Trying hard to live in the present” is an overly forceful way of putting it, and it will make you place unreasonable expectations and demands on the present. The right attitude is that we should “experience the present authentically.”

The entire history of human civilization spans fewer than 100 lots of 4,000 weeks. The universe is about 170 million lots of 4,000 weeks old. Our 4,000-week lives, on the scale of the universe, are so tiny they’re practically 0.

About the author

Oliver Burkeman　Bestselling author and psychology columnist for The Guardian, long focused on discussing time management and techniques for improving efficiency.