The Long and The Short Of It

Episode 155 - Think Week

Transcript:

Pete: Hey, Jen.

Jen: Hey, Pete.

Pete: So, I'm fresh off a Think Week. Do you know what that is?

Jen: No, but I love it.

Pete: I feel like you'd like the sound of this already.

Jen: I do.

Pete: I knew just by the name, you'd have a reaction. So I thought it would be worth explaining, unpacking, and sharing with you what I mean by Think Week- where I got it from, and what it looked like, and what I learned during the process, if you're up for it.

Jen: Oh, I am so up for it. This is The Long and The Short Of It.

Pete: Okay, so I'm sure that this originates in many, many different places. Where I picked up this was from Bill Gates, and the documentary (actually, on Netflix) about Bill Gates, which I find so fascinating. And I find him and his brain so fascinating. And they were talking about, in the documentary, that once a year, he does this thing called Think Week. Where he goes to...I think they have a, I don't know, he had a cabin or somewhere remote...and has no meetings, and takes a backpack full of books and note paper and Diet Coke. By the way, if you've watched the documentary, he just crushes Diet Cokes all day. And he sets time aside for him to think, to read, to learn, to connect dots, to just have space and stillness. And ever since watching that (this was like over a year ago), I have thought to myself and I said it to Tracy when we were watching the documentary, I was like, "One day, one of these days, I'm going to do a Think Week. That looks so cool. Just a week of learning, and writing, and noodling." And that just happened to come up last week. So, that's the context. Does that make sense?

Jen: Yes. And I am just loving the entire idea. I love it. Let me just ask this.

Pete: Please.

Jen: Is the point of a Think Week that you have no contact with other people? Or is it just that you don't have contact with your obligations?

Pete: It's a great question. Because I think this is where you get to decide. Like, there's not really...I just picked it up on a two-minute bit on a documentary. And I think based on that, you get to make your own rules. At least, that's how I've interpreted it. So for me, I can get to the context as to how I ended up in this position. But I am not in my usual home, with Tracy, my partner. So, she is here. So, I'm not alone. And because of a holiday that got canceled because of COVID and restrictions and a bunch of things, I basically had a week blocked out in my calendar where we were meant to be traveling, and we're not. And so, I just didn't happen to have any meetings whatsoever. Like, literally no obligations other than Tracy and I were together. So, I did have someone else. But I had, from a work perspective, no obligation.

Jen: Wow.

Pete: Yeah. Which is so rare. It's so wild.

Jen: I'm trying to imagine what that might be like.

Pete: Well, I spent so long crafting this week for this holiday and it didn't happen. Anyway, such is COVID. So what I did, how I approached it...which maybe is just worth sharing. So it was Monday to Friday, is what I said. It was, you know, a work week. And I got out a one-pager, like an A4 bit of paper on the first morning, Monday morning. And I wrote some like rules for myself in terms of what I wanted to focus on for the week, how I wanted to show up, what tactics and techniques I might use. So for me it was, I started with, "Who's it for?" "It's for me, and for my projects." And then I went to, "What's it for?" And I really thought about using Think Week as a chance to spend five days setting yourself up for twelve months. That was like the frame I was trying to think of it through. Is, how do you make the five days of work, of projects, of thinking, of reading set you up for success for the next twelve months? And because of that frame, my rules were like, "No email, or very little." I did have some pockets of time later in the day for email. "No Slack." Same thing. "No social media." And I used the Pomodoro Technique, which we've talked about. The reason I bring all of this up is because I think it's very, very relevant to the Time Blocking episode that we just did very recently. And I just, I tried to go full Jen Waldman and block my time, set some rules, not have distractions. And the results were pretty profound, actually.

Jen: Well, I would love for you to share for those who aren't familiar with it, what is the Pomodoro Technique?

Pete: Oh, the Pomodoro Technique. Of course. It's a time management, I guess, slash productivity technique. The way I did it...I know there are different amounts of time. But traditionally, my understanding is it's twenty-five minutes of work, five minutes of rest, twenty-five minutes of work, five minutes of rest. And there's a bunch of, I think, cognitive science behind why that's a good amount of time. Pretty much every time, what happened to me is after twenty-five minutes, I was like, "I'm in the zone." And I would set it for another twenty-five. And so I was kind of doing fifty and ten, fifty and ten, as opposed to twenty-five and five. And I had many learnings throughout the week, but one of them was that annoying learning of like, "Huh. I really should use Pomodoro more often." Even though I know that.

Jen: It is so effective.

Pete: Like, so annoyingly effective. Years ago, I used it really consistently. And I've used it kind of sporadically a little more recently. And I did it consistently for a full week, and I was like, "Oh yeah, that's right. This is super helpful, super beneficial." So, that's what the Pomodoro Technique is.

Jen: I have an app that I use alongside my Pomodoro-ing, called Freedom. I don't know if they have it for mobile, but mine is the desktop. And you set a Freedom session, so it's a twenty-five minute Freedom session. The added feature here is it blocks certain things on your computer. So like you try to, during the session, go somewhere else on your computer. And it's like, "So sorry, that feature is not available for the next seventeen minutes."

Pete: Wow, that is a good, good resource. We'll put that in the Box O' Goodies. Freedom.

Jen: Definitely.

Pete: So I didn't do that, but one thing I did do is I turned my Wi-Fi off.

Jen: Mmm. Smart.

Pete: Yeah, which was so effective. Because every now and then, I would like open up Google Chrome and nothing would happen. And I was like, "Oh yeah, that's right. Back to the whiteboard. Back to the Google Doc." And so it's funny, this idea of a Think Week. I think while it was unfortunate that our holiday got canceled, it was almost like the universe was sending me a message. So it was like so weird that all this just culminated in this five day week that I got to sit down, and noodle, and do some brainstorming. And yeah, it was quite profound.

Jen: So, you said that you were thinking of this week as being five days that set you up for twelve months. So you know me, Pete...and listeners, you know me too. Like, I love to be twelve months ahead. Give me two years, give me three years ahead, and I'll work backwards from there. I must hear about how you turned five days into twelve months, knowing that that is something in the past that you have been resistant...is that the right word...resistant to.

Pete: Resistant, or incapable maybe. So I would say, it remains to be seen if it was effective. And the reason I say that is because it was more of a mental model for me to get out of the weeds, and less of a, "On this particular day, I'm going to ship this thing," which I know is something you do really well and we joked about me being incapable of doing. So I didn't necessarily say, "On the 20th of July 2022, this is going to be ready." I didn't necessarily do that. Instead, I used it as a mental model to be like, "Don't worry about that thing that just is going to come in and you have to do by the end of the week. Instead, think about where can you invest your time in a way that will set the rest of the year up for success." One of the things we ended up doing, you and I actually. So I did end up having a call, which was with you. Because I said to you, "I have this like week. What if we hopped on and recorded?" I think we did three episodes in a space of like ninety minutes. And so, that was like one basic example. We didn't record twelve months of episodes. But it set us up for success I think, over twelve months, in the sense that we are building our can so that we have more flexibility and adaptability moving forward. So it was, I guess the twelve months was a little arbitrary. It was more just trying to bring my brain out of the day-to-day and into the strategic, I guess. Does that make sense?

Jen: Yeah. Okay, I'm having two ideas come up. So one is that, I think I accidentally have had Think Week. A couple years ago, I went on this writing retreat for a week. And I was basically, you know, in a hotel. All my meals were being taken care of. I was working in a cohort, but most of the day was spent alone, writing, and thinking, and walking around, and coming up with ideas. So, that probably could be considered a Think Week. And I told you this the other day, I'm applying to another writing retreat because I want to go away for a couple weeks (this will be Think Weeks) and just think about things and write them down. But the other thing that came up for me was that, if you're someone whose schedule is determined by someone else, meaning like your Monday through Friday schedule, is there a way to take principles of Think Week and apply them on the daily, instead of getting frustrated that your boss won't give you the week off? So I'm thinking about some of the things you're talking about. The rules, for example. "Have no social media. No Wi Fi. Working in the Pomodoro Technique. Finding a moment to detach from the to-do tasks and think bigger picture." Like, couldn't Think Week actually become Think Practice?

Pete: Yeah, I love that idea. I love that idea. Because one of the takeaways I had was, totally, "It shouldn't take me having to carve out a week to create some of this rhythm, or this momentum, or this flow." I guess really what I was chasing all week, and I ended up getting a lot of, is flow and momentum. And so, I think you're right. I think it's, what would it look like if you did that, or tried to do that as a weekly practice? You know, on Fridays at 4pm-5pm, can you have a Think Hour and you do two Pomodoros? I think that's a great idea. Because, I mean, it took a lot. It took a canceled holiday for me to have a week free in my calendar. And I, like, know how hard it is, especially if you're working for someone else, to just like all of a sudden have a week appear.

Jen: Okay, this is making me think of something else too. I do this thing at the end of each week, called The Week in Review.

Pete: Oh, okay.

Jen: Yeah. And basically, what I do is I just kind of look at the week that just passed and ask myself how that went. And then, I look ahead. And I look ahead at three weeks, and I look ahead at three months, just to make sure that the week I have coming up is in support of the three weeks and the three months.

Pete: Oh, so you do this every week? It took me a whole week to have that aha moment. You do this every week.

Jen: Well, this is less about big grand thinking and more about making sure my calendar and the way I've prioritized my time is setting the future up for success. Like, it's so interesting how many times we're referring back to the Time Blocking episode right now.

Pete: Yeah.

Jen: So, let's say I do my Week in Review. I look ahead three months and I'm like, "Oh, right, Pete and I have that big corporate workshop that we're delivering in three months time." And then, I look at three weeks and I'm like, "Interesting. Pete and I have zero sessions on the calendar the next three weeks to talk about the big corporate thing." Then I would reach out to you and say, "Hey, would you like to get something on the calendar sometime in the next three weeks to talk about the big corporate thing we're delivering in three months?" So, it kind of helps me make sure I'm not getting so bogged down by these immediate urgent needs that I'm forgetting about the things that I've already committed to.

Pete: I just am like so in awe of the fact that you do this every week. And it took me so long to finally get to the point where, "Oh, I accidentally have a week." And that was kind of the point of what I did. Is like, "Okay, so what are the things I'm doing in the next twelve months? How can I set those up for success in this week?" I just love that you do that every week. That's a call out on me, and an actionable takeaway.

Jen: Yes. And to be fair, mine's about productivity and yours was about creativity. So you know, they don't have to be mutually exclusive. You probably could do a combo platter,

Pete: Mmm. But I love the the simple example of like looking at your calendar in terms of the calls that you have. So like, one of the things that happened to me was, yeah, one of the projects I have with a big corporate client that I'm doing some work with. Because I was like, "Okay, so that's really the focus of the next kind of two or three months. And if I focus on that, and that only, it actually will help set me up for success for the rest of the year. Because I will have delivered that hopefully really well. I'll have a great case study. There'll be a happy client. It will have introduced me to a number of interesting people. And so, there's a whole lot of possibility that might come from that. So, what I really need to do is get back to focusing on this thing." And then I looked at my calendar, and I was like, "Oh, I've got to catch up with a friend, and this with the other person, and I've got this other thing in my calendar, which is probably not urgent." And so, there were a few things that I was able to just like tactically move based on the priority. It goes back to what you said in the Time Blocking episode again, which was, "Your calendar represents your priorities," which has been haunting me every day.

Jen: Yep. Because it's so darn true.

Pete: The other thing that came up, because I had a call. I spoke to my friend Josh, I guess it was Monday. Yeah, Monday after Think Week. And he was like, "How was your week last week?" Because he tried to call me and I didn't answer. I was like deep in the zone. I was like, "No. No time for calls. I'm in Think Week." I took it a bit seriously. And I spoke to him on Monday. And I was telling him about Think Week, and I was like, "You know, it's so interesting though, how I was able to be so productive, and think ahead, and strategic. And why can’t I do that more often? Why can't I find more flow, and time for Pomodoros more often?" And he raised something, which I think was worth noodling on and something I've been noodling on. Is, you know, "Would a weekend really be a weekend if we didn't have the weekdays?" Meaning, for most of us, weekdays are when we work and a weekend is when we might relax, or spend time with family or with friends. Like, there are differences in what we do on weekdays and weekends for many of us. And what I interpret him saying is, "If Think Week was every week, would it really be Think Week?" You know?

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: Like, you kind of need the yin and the yang. You need the busy, overscheduled, getting things done, jumping on calls, hopping over here, doing that, you kind of need a bit of that in order for the space to be truly appreciated through a thinking practice, through a one hour or a one week or a one day, whatever it is, for that to actually be valuable. Which then made me realize, "Oh yeah. I don't have to necessarily have this every week. I can't. I can't possibly have this every week."

Jen: I think this is such a rich insight, because...well, for many reasons. But one is that, just as you got into the flow of thinking, it's also really easy to get into the "flow of productivity". Where it's like, "I'm just getting things done, so I'm not going to stop. And I'm going to go, go, go, go, go. And who needs time to relax and refuel? Not I."

Pete: Again, I feel called out.

Jen: I love that you would make Think Week, or Think Day, or Think Night, or whatever it is, something that you intentionally put in your calendar, and then protect it.

Pete: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, which is probably the overall learning of all this, now that I think about it.

Jen: Yep.

Pete: So once again, Pete's been called out. Which has been a definite theme in the last few weeks.

Jen: Or the last one hundred and fifty episodes.

Pete: Every episode is like, "How can we call out Pete in this week's episode," under the guise of a different topic. But really, it's about calling Pete out. Yeah. So I'm taking away that I've been called out. And I can and need to intentionally schedule an hour, or a day, or a week, or all of the above into my calendar for thinking, for strategic brainstorming, for ideating. And then, to your point, protect that with my life.

Jen: And that is The Long and The Short Of It.