Books · Time & Meaning
Book summary and verdict
Meditations for Mortals
Burkeman says your life will never be under control, so pick what matters and let something else rot. Naturally, he gives you a four-week plan for accepting that plans do not work. Miss Wednesday and now you're behind on surrender.
Should you read it?
Read it if every bad day becomes a full investigation into why you are like this. Skip it if you can feel awful, do the thing, and spare everybody the podcast.
L.I keep waiting for life to calm down so I can start living properly. Burkeman’s bad news is that this stupid Tuesday is the finished product. Apparently acceptance takes four weeks and a schedule, which is exactly how I planned to stop planning.
The ideas
I · Unfinished
A completely controlled life is available immediately, provided you stop having relatives, plumbing, and a body.
We keep waiting for real life to start after the chores, and then it is 9:40, you have reset the router, and dinner is shredded cheese eaten over the sink. Big night.
An inbox rewards efficiency by assigning you more inbox. Answer one message promptly and the sender learns the dangerous fact that you are alive, cooperative, and apparently responsible for this now.
Burkeman’s argument is that the unfinished state is permanent. You are not failing to reach the peaceful part of life. This is the peaceful part. It just has laundry in it.
L.You are waiting for a day with no loose ends. That day is used mainly for funerals.
II · Tradeoffs
Something has to be neglected. Choose it yourself before your inbox picks your marriage.
The rest of this idea is in the app.
III · Action
Take one real step. The imaginary version of you has been employee of the month for six straight years.
The rest of this idea is in the app.
IV · Problems
You keep waiting for the chaos to end so your life can begin. You are the chaos, holding a fresh planner.
The rest of this idea is in the app.
What to actually do
Pick one thing you've been postponing until you feel better. Give it fifteen clumsy minutes tonight. Write the bad paragraph, practice the chord wrong, make the awkward call.
Smaller: Then stop. Write down what you actually did, and leave the rest alone until tomorrow.
L.Do not build a tracker, reward system, or whole new personality around it. You were supposed to make one phone call. Now you own twelve markers.
Pay yourself first with time. Give the important thing thirty minutes before the day’s administrative sludge begins.
Smaller: Do not wait for your schedule to clear. The schedule is not a temporary obstruction. The schedule is the predator.
L.Thirty minutes. Before email starts breeding.
Invite one friend over before the house is perfect. Move anything biologically concerning, provide some food, and let them witness the fact that you own objects.
Smaller: Scruffy hospitality can be one friend and takeout. They already know you wear clothes.
L.Nobody revoked a friendship over an extension cord.
Choose one thing you will not finish tonight. An article, an email thread, or some minor obligation sitting on your list like a dead rat demanding closure. Let it remain unfinished overnight.
Smaller: You will wake up tomorrow. Probably.
L.At two in the morning, you are not fixing your life. You are making tomorrow deal with an exhausted asshole.
Still in the app
- What happened when people tried them
- Bullshit?
- Where readers disagree
- The one thing worth remembering
The rest of this book is in the app.
Skip the Book reads the self-help books so you don't have to: what each one argues, what happened when real people tried it, which claims are exaggerated, and what to do tonight. 108 books and counting, new ones most days.
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