Focused - 244: You're Holding It Wrong

Episode Date: December 2, 2025

Welcome to Focus to Productivity Podcast about more than just cranking widgets. I'm David Sparks and joined by my co-host, Mr. Mike Schmitz. Hello, Mike. Hey, David. How's it going? Excellent. I am here looking at your happy mug in the morning, ready to record another episode of the Focus podcast. That's right. We've got video. I'm not sure if we're testing this. We're using Riverside to record this episode. And hopefully we'll have a YouTube channel we can publish these two. Well, now we've said it.

I think we have to. So, well, the link in the notes, hopefully you can go and watch a show by video if you want. This isn't for everybody. I get it. But I know there's a lot of people on YouTube that like to watch podcasts. If that's you, we now have an option for you. And so there we go. This episode, we're going to be talking about feedback.

We've got a full feedback bucket here. We're going to be going through. but we've got a couple things to talk about first. Yeah, it's holiday gift time. And there's the Relay Gift membership, which I heard you and Stephen talk about on MPU. I figured we should probably mention that here on Focused as well. So if you want to save 20% on a Relay membership and support your favorite independent podcasts, you can go to GiveRelay.com, and you can either get this for yourself or for somebody that you know who would like

some podcast goodness in their headphones during their commute while they're at the gym, that sort of thing. Or if you have those people in your life who are always asking you what you want and you have no idea what to tell them, now you can tell them that you'd like a relay subscription. Yeah, gang, you get the ad-free extended version of the Focus podcast every week, well, every two weeks, actually. Also, another great gift guide you this year is the Focus Calendar It's not too late to get your focus calendar, get a nice big one, stick it up on the wall behind you. It's very convenient when you're setting up your plan for the year. When somebody calls you, ask you to do something, take a look at your big wall calendar,

and it will tell you exactly how much time you have. We have modified this over the years to really hone in on the ideal version of the wall calendar. We're working with, I think, the best vendor in the business, Jesse, who, puts these together for us. One of the nice things about this calendar is that it's linear. It goes straight through, you know, months, quarters, you get the whole thing in one nice few. And I love having mine, and you will love having yours.

Also makes a great gift. I got one for my wife because she is one of her jobs. I don't know if I'm supposed to say this. She helps make the maps at Disneyland. But they plan those things out months in advance and a big focus calendar on her wall in her office is very handy for that. Nice. Yeah, I always buy multiples.

We have one hanging upstairs. I have one in my office. I just got them both back from FedEx where I got them mounted on the foam core. So I've got mine on the wall already with all of the trips that I'm going to take next year. Yeah, they remember me now because I go in every year and they'll like, I bring it in. They're like, oh, yeah, I remember you. You did this last year. Yeah, that's me back this year.

Yeah, for some reason, every time I bring it in, they're like, well, I don't know if we have anything that big. And I'm like, you do. You did this for me last year. Yeah. Well, check it out. We've got a link in the show notes, Focus calendar. It's something Mike and I are real proud of what we love. And this is the time of you hear to get a calendar.

So do you just want to dig in on all this feedback, Mike? Let's do it. Okay. First we heard from Michael. And he says, are there any productivity tools or workflows we've discussed that you actually implemented in your own life. I wrote my back. I'm like, we implement all this stuff, Mike. I mean, this is not a hypothetical show. But yeah, there's most of the stuff we talk about. We test and some of it sticks with us and some of it doesn't. But honestly, by the time something gets on the show, it usually is something that

one or both of us has implemented. Yeah, we're at least experimenting with it. It's not something that we just talk about conceptually, we at least do try the techniques and the things that we talk about. I will say that there are a lot of things that I tend to get excited about in the moment, and that really is a poor indication of whether it will actually stick three to six months from now. One of the things that happened recently was the plus minus next for Anne Laura the Coomf, she talked about in her tiny experiments book. I got real excited. about that idea and I still do it kind of but if you were to ask me do you implement it do you not implement it I don't think I could in good conscience say oh yeah I totally do that still

but when we talked about it I was like oh this is the thing it's finally working well the shiny wore off and it's not sticking as well as I thought it would yeah I never actually never even experimented with that just didn't because I kind of have a system for the way I'm reflective and I do so much reflection I don't need anymore but I was thinking like one of those that didn't stick for me was we talked at one point this year about the timer clock. I forget the name of it, but they're on Amazon. They're very visual and you can put it on your desk. And it's like a countdown clock. And when you're setting your, you know, blocks or timers, which I do all the time. But I found I just never used it because I just used the one on my phone or my Apple Watch. And I just never used

it. And my daughter who's a teacher who said, hey, do you need that? And I'm like, nope. And she took it to school because you know with students even high school students a timer is is a good thing and so she took it there have been some things that have kind of disappeared that way from me over the year um any like any new stuff you picked up this year that's just really stuck with you hmm that I picked up this year um I don't know I was thinking about the thing that probably stuck with me the most was the whole idea of time blocking yeah I mean I do that every, every single day and I even built my own custom time blocking planner to go along with it. So I don't know if I have one this year. That stands out to me anyways. How about you?

The last couple months I've been using the field notes in lieu of the note cards, the ad work note cards. And the reason is because it just goes in my pocket so easily. And I kind of like laying out the beginning of the week each day. And then, you know, we talked about this in a recent episode, kind of that last mile of your task list is writing it down. And this feels to me like it's sticking. This is the third book now I've filled up doing this. So that's kind of a new one that I didn't know if it would stick or not, but I think it will. Nice. All right, Robert wrote in, Do you prefer episodes that are more philosophical about focus and productivity or more tactical with specific systems and tools?

Yes. I like both of them. They are very different. I'd be kind of curious what the listeners prefer because I think one of the things that is different about focused is we talk about the philosophical stuff as the why behind the things that we do and the tools that we implement. But a lot of productivity advice is very tactical, life hacky. And there's probably a reason for that. People are busy. So I could see an argument to be made for just tell me what to do. I'll try it and see if it sticks. But I really

don't want to feed that machine. I would much rather, instead of just helping people crank more widgets, help them be a little bit more intentional and follow through on the things that are really important. So I think they're both essential to this show for me, but probably I enjoy talking a little bit more about the philosophical stuff and the why behind the things that we do. Yeah, I have a definite answer here. I enjoy the philosophical. I think that people need to have a foundational motivation to do this stuff right. And while it's great, you know, to do the tips and tricks stuff, the life hacks, I don't think that gets you very far.

And in some ways, it can be counterproductive because if you get really good at life hacks, but you're not pointing your ship in the right direction, you're just efficiently going in the wrong direction. So I really strongly believe that if you want to be serious about, you know, getting the most from your life, you've got to figure out what that means for you and what are the things that you need to pursue for that and then do that efficiently. So I don't want to talk about just the philosophical here because you're right. I think there are tips and tricks and hints that can help people kind of get going and motivated on obvious wins. But I think underlying all of this, you really need to. to figure out the tough questions. And I say that from someone who didn't do that for a long time.

I mean, I still think about this because I was, you know, I was at that law firm for 30 years almost. I was at the law firm for like 24 years. I was a lawyer for 30 years. But from about, like I had real purpose getting through school, started my career as the lawyer, and I got into the muck, you know, of like going to, going to trial, doing in my cases, trying to be a dad, you know, just keeping up with the day-to-day stuff. And I wasn't thinking about the big picture stuff.

And I knew in the back of my mind I needed to. And from like 25 to like 40, I just didn't bother. You know, I mean, because I didn't really have a framework to figure out how to do it. I didn't want to figure it out myself. I mean, this is kind of before the Internet and that, you know, everybody had advice for you. So I had that you'd have to figure it out yourself. And I just found it easier just to not. And man, to me, those are like, that's like a decade and a half that's kind of lost.

So I guess that's a very long answer. But the philosophical, I think, is important. And we're going to continue to talk about that. But yeah, we'll get tips and tricks and life hacks in there, too. Yeah. Let me throw another episode type in there, which is the guest episodes. I think those might be my favorite because I always, get inspired hearing how other people are trying to wrestle with this stuff and the things

that they've done. Even the last episode with Tom Gibson, you know, we talked about journaling, we talked about planning, things that we have discussed so many times. But then you get somebody new on the show and they talk about it and they talk about it a different way. They bring a different perspective to it. And it's like, oh, I didn't think about it from that angle. I could totally do that you know and then uh it that that's the stuff that really ends up making the big difference those little things that that you implement and usually getting inspired by seeing somebody else do it that that's the trigger for me yeah and one of the things i like about the guest episodes is i mean i think one of the points here mike and i try to say repeatedly when we don't have all the

answers i mean the reason is because so many of these productivity gurus tell you they have all the answers. And they don't. I mean, I've worked with some of them, and I can guarantee you, they really don't have it together. And I think that hearing from other people that are making the soup with different flavors and ingredients and seasoning, just lets you know that we all got to make our own soup, you know, and we're all on this journey. So I really like that about the guest episodes. It's like they may have a different take on something that really works for them. And while it may not work for me, you know, it may work for an audience. I was just talking to a listener who is really into the plus minus next.

And that's because you talked about it, Mike. And I think for a lot of people, you know, you've got to find the pieces that work for you and pull it together. And you got to keep experimenting. So the whole idea with plus minus next, by the way, I really like that approach. And the thing that has caused it not to work for me is I built this digital system for doing it. then I moved all my planning to the analog planner. So I'm actually thinking about putting in a weekly review thing at the end, not a strictly plus minus next, but I think there's a perspective there that's helpful after you've gone

through the week of what went well, what could have gone better, and what am I going to do about it? So it's my own version of, I guess, plus minus next, but I'm hoping to add that to the personal retreat planner. The other thing I wanted to call out here balancing the difference between philosophical and tactical. I talk a lot about PKM, right? There's a lot of people who use obsidian because I talk about it. They're in my community. They respond to the YouTube videos in the comments, things like that. They collect a whole bunch of information. So they've got the philosophical stuff

down. Yeah. But they don't do anything with it. So one of the key frameworks, my big contribution to the PKM world, I feel like at this point, is the whole idea of the creativity flywheel and you've collected all this stuff. You have to have an output. You don't have to be an independent creator, but you've got to do something with all that theory and all that philosophy.

It's one thing to know how all this stuff fits together, but then you actually have to do something with it. The rubber has to hit the road at some point. Yeah, and I guess I would pile on to that, just to say the philosophical piece of this to me, is you have to have an underlying foundational kind of system that you're using to figure out. You know, I think, you know, as I've said before, so much of this just comes down to intentionality. Like, can you be intentional on the things that matter?

And you've got to decide what are the things that matter and how do you become intentional with them? You know, a lot of times it's based on other people because so much of our human experiences is about other people. But it's also about what you want to do with your life in terms of career and non-career part of your life. And figure those things out, you know, figure out what really blows your hair back.

And then figure out how to pursue that while you have time. Limento Mori. That's right. Lisa wrote in, productivity myths. She said, pick. I know this Lisa. She's so very clever. lady pick one productivity myth that's true and one that's false so mike let's start with the false ones

what's your false productivity myth oh man so what exactly is a productivity myth i think uh i i did some googling this morning prepping for the show like most common productivity myths and what comes up is the things like get up at 5 a.m because that's how you crush your day and I was looking through the list and I was realizing that there is a lot of nuance to all of these and I don't think I would label any of them just truly a myth this does not work but the framing of this question is a little bit different so this is what has been true or false and at least that the way I'm interpreting it for yourself right so one of the the productivity myths that is out there is that it is a myth, it's a myth, but there's research

behind it, whatever. I'm just going to say it this way. You cannot multitask, right? That is the standard productivity advice you get. You have to focus on one thing at a time. And I'm taking this from the perspective of like things that we would say. Because there's the other end of that out there. Well, you know, and this is the thing. I don't think anybody is truly saying multitask be more productive, at least not the people who understand. on productivity at all. So the general advice is don't multitask. And I agree with that in theory. However, I found that there is a specific way that you can multitask. You cannot switch back and forth and have your focus on two different things. That's context switching doesn't work. That's what

people are referring to when they say multitasking. But I think it is possible to do something that is sort of an automated activity while you are doing one focused activity. So as an example, a lot of times when I get the episodes back from gym, I listen to the whole episode before I publish it. I usually listen to that episode while I am at the gym doing a workout. And if I notice something while I'm listening to it, then I'll finish my set, put the stuff down, go back and grab the time code. Hey, we got to fix, you know, this little thing. But I can pay attention to the audio that is being played in my ears while I'm doing something with my hands. It doesn't have to be the gym. It could be yard work, whatever. So I think that's the

thing that came to mind was talking about the productivity myths. And I would say that that one is false, at least with an asterisk. Yeah. I struggle with the idea of myth, too. But one that you hear often, you know, from the productivity gurus is like, just follow my 10-step system. you can do it all. That statement, you can do it all, I feel like, is definitely a myth that people use to sell products. And I think the whole point of this stuff is to accept that you can't do it all. And it's up to you to figure out what you're going to do. I mean, again, this is kind of my last answer. But if you're going to, you know, make your dent, you got to figure out where you're going to put it and put your energy there.

And to the extent of productivity, people are telling you that there's some magic system, there's some way that you're going to combination of tools and software and fancy clocks on your desk and sand grain time table turners and whatever that you're going to suddenly become productive and able to do it all, then you should run because that's just not the case. as soon as you accept that, then it gets a lot easier to make some decisions about what's truly important. Yep. All right. So the ones that are true, and I'm going to put this as a myth, I think this is totally not a myth, but I've seen enough people push back against this that I think there's at least a narrative out there that it's a myth. And that is that you will get

more done if you plan your day using time blocking. I 100% believe this. And I know people who posted on Reddit or comments on my YouTube videos is like, you don't need to do this. You totally do. If you want to do more of what matters, you want to be more intentional. This is unavoidable, I think.

But I get that people have tried it and it hasn't stuck and I would say you're holding it wrong. You know, you just haven't found the implementation of this that really works for you. But planning my day is the best five minutes in terms of the return on investment

that I make every single day. Yeah, and honestly, if you're resistant to it, like I understand people being resistant to it because it feels like you're locking yourself in too hard and things like that. But if you struggle with time blocking, I would recommend looking at some of the options we talked about the show.

We talked about a concept earlier this year called soft block scheduling where it's a little softer, where you're just, you know, you're picking topics and hitting those or even just picking the hardest thing you're doing and blocking time for that, but nothing else as a technique just to kind of get yourself rolling. There's a lot of ways to get into this without going full in, you know, hyper-scheduling kind of stuff. I would also say that if you're struggling with it and you're like giving, you're blocking your bathroom breaks and so like, don't do that, you know, just, I mean, just to give you an example

for me, I was just talking about this in the Max Berkey Labs the other day. My block scheduling is not tied to specific tasks. I'll have like a three-hour block that says, as labs content or, you know, personal list. And then I'll just go through my task manager and pick off things in my personal list for two hours. I don't have like a separate block and down to the minute for each little item on it. And that is a, that is absolutely time blocking.

And it doesn't need to be harder than that. Yep. Agreed. One for me that, again, I felt like I struggled with it because I feel like if we believe it, and I'm not sure I can call it a myth, but a practice that I think that is absolutely true related to productivity that I think a lot of people don't think enough about is the idea of reflection,

just some sort of regular reflection on what you're doing. And we've heard a lot of different ways people do this. I'm a meditator, but I also do a lot of journaling. But I think finding some way to check it on yourself, every week or month or quarter and look at what you're actually doing versus what you want to be doing, you know, look at your philosophy and how you're holding up to your philosophy. That reflective practice, the more you do of it, the better you get at this stuff, and the more enjoyable life gets. It's just a, it's a huge payoff. The resistance to it, of course, is that it takes

time. It's like, spend all my day working. I don't want to spend another 20 minutes at the end of the day or another hour on the weekend reflecting on the week you don't understand i have tv shows to watch and things to do and and what i'd say is okay but you're you're really it's like such in terms of bang for your buck it's really hard to beat and figure out a reflective process that can work for you give it a test um the other thing about a reflective process i think the reason doesn't stick is it actually takes a while to to sink what i like to say to people is you have to have faith for the first six months and then you'll have evidence after that,

you know, just believe that it will help. And after six months, you'll see that it helps and then they won't have any trouble doing it. That's a good, good way to put it. This episode of the Focus Podcast is brought to you by Squarespace. Save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code focused. Just go to Squarespace.com slash focused.

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Once again, that is Squarespace.com slash focused with the offer code focus to get that 10% off your first purchase and to show your support for the Focus Podcast. Our thanks to Squarespace for their support of the Focus Podcasts and Olive Relay. Okay, Kevin has taken us to task and maybe rightfully so here. for sabbaticals and break weeks. He says, are you guys for real about sabbaticals? You've been talking about it for years. I don't think either of you have ever done it. Ouch.

Do you want to go first on this one? No. Okay. I can. I will if you want me. I don't want to. Well, I will say I have done this. So I've done it many times, not as an independent

creator, though. So I worked with the Blanc Media Team, which is where I first came across this idea. I can tell you this works and is amazing. I've got a link I'll put in the show notes where Sean talks through the eight-week work schedules. And essentially, it's six weeks that we plan for, one week which is a buffer, and then the eighth week the whole company takes off. And I can absolutely tell you that this is an implementation of the things that we talk about. on this show. If you really want to be more productive and get things done that really matter, this is a great way to do it. It is aspirational to me at this moment. And that is just basically the current season I'm in with the business. So I 100% intend to do this. I am convinced of

the effectiveness of this feel like I cannot do this right now. I don't have enough margin to create the systems to really do this. It's absolutely something I will build into the systems of the business. I'm still in scramble mode, though. I don't know. I don't need to get too far into that unless people really want to want to know about it. But I was going through the forum and I saw someone share about, you know, laying the foundation of the business and how that's going to pay off. Well, I can tell you transparently, that has not happened. happened yet. We've got momentum. We're building the YouTube channel. We're building the email list. I'm building the systems to sell Life HQ, the community. But I put myself in a real tight spot when I walked

away from the digital marketing agency that I was working for. I didn't have the runway that I should have. And I've spent a lot of time since then trying to get to the point that I should have been when I started. I feel like there's light at the end of the tunnel and no, it's not a train. Like there's enough signal here to know that this is going to work and we're going to keep going. But it's been hard. And even a couple months ago, I was looking for jobs because I was like, I don't know

that this is really worth it. We've talked about that in our calls, David. So I'm hoping this is not a complete surprise to you. But just for other people, you know, I just feel like I, am not at the place where I can do this and that's one of the tradeoffs I have to make because still hustling and I don't want to hustle I rail against hustle culture but when you're starting a business there's certain things you have to do sometimes and I'm still in one of those seasons yeah but the fact Mike that you have got to where you are now like in the last year

you've made tremendous progress I feel like you're going to pull it off if it would have crash and burned i think i probably would have already crashed and burned so i have faith in you i feel like it's going to happen hanging but i also get that right now you you're uh you're just dealing with the um you're dealing with the patients as they come off the ambulance and you got like you got to be there i i don't have that excuse i'm i'm doing well enough my kids are grown so i probably should have done one by now, Kevin. I had one of those reber moments just a couple days ago, Daisy and I went up when we watched, there's a play up here called Peter Pan Goes Wrong. It's very funny. It's like they do the Peter Pan play, but stuff is falling off. The lights are falling

out of the sets. It's just really funny. But the narrator was Kathy Rigby, who famously played Peter Pan like 3,000 times. She was an Olympic athlete. She's a tiny lady, but she's a a gymnast and she was like the perfect Peter Pan. When my kids were little, we went and saw her do it. And she was so good on the cable of flipping and doing everything. But now she's 72, you know. And so she was the narrator through the whole show. And then at the end, she came out and did a bow.

I hope I'm not spoiled for anybody. And then she, they had a cable attach her and she just flew over the audience. And she was doing these flips and back spins over us. and it was so uplifting, seeing this 72-year-old woman up there like she was 15, you know? And then Daisy and I were talking about on the way home, and it's like, she is like 14 years older than I am right now. You know, and I realize, you know, suddenly I never really thought about how close I am to 70, you know. And I thought, oh, my gosh, you know, I need to, you know. you know, enjoy my life, you know, too, and not just work all the time. And I was thinking about

this email from Kevin. And I'm going to really try. I mean, one of the things I did, the reasons I made the changes I did, I took a huge pay cut to do just as a max mark. But, you know, was to improve the quality of my life. And why can't I take a couple shop weeks and just play in the wood shop or go up into the mountains or something, you know? So Kevin, your, your email has inspired me. And as we get to the year, and I'm going to start looking at the calendar for next year, and I feel like I don't know why I couldn't just take a couple weeks off. So I'm going to shoot for two in 20, 26. And next year, I hope I don't report failure. I mean, it's not out of the picture because I just not good at doing these things. But I also feel the, you know, the Reaper. And so I do

want to go and enjoy myself with stuff like this too. So I am really going to try and do this. I know we've talked about it a lot. Some of our listeners don't like this talking about this stuff because it sounds privileged. It's like, oh yeah, you fancy podcasters. You know, I have a nine to five. I can't just take a week off. And I get that. At the same time, I can't if I could figure this puzzle out. So I'm going to really shoot for it. Thanks, Kevin, for giving me a kick in the pants. But that first line in the email, I read it and I just my heart sunk, are you guys really? I'm like, oh boy, here we go. Yes, I have, I have tasted and seen the goodness of the sabbatical. Christopher wrote in, what's the biggest struggle you're facing with focus right

now that you haven't adequately addressed? You guys really bring the questions. I wanted to say that straight to the heart. What's yours, Mike? What are you struggling with? that right now. I think the thing I'm struggling with is the boundaries and the shutdown routine specifically. It's on my calendar. It gets time blocked. It never happens because I've got more to do than I have hours in the day and I'm the only one doing it. Yeah. You know, I have the, as part of my quarterly reflective process, what should you start doing, stop doing, keep doing. So I'm forcing myself to say no to certain things, but I'm still trying to find the right mix. So I can't say no to too much. I've got to try stuff. I've got to recognize, you know, what really works. And so there are a

couple of things that are really working right now in the business. And I'm leaning into those, like the YouTube channel, trying to publish every week, which for the large part, this last several months I've been able to do. But there are other things that, you know, are kind of next steps for that. And I see those and I've got a, I've got to deal with things that come up with, I do have somebody who's helping me with some of the video production stuff. So, you know, getting back to people about things because they're trying to help me. It's real hard right now for me to compartmentalize all this stuff. I will say that it's not all doom and gloom, though, because the thing I have been able to protect time for is the really important stuff, like my oldest son is a senior in high

school. I was able to go to the national soccer tournament and see his last game. And my other son was in the fall drama production. And there's performances every night, Thursday, Friday, twice on Saturday. I was able to go to all of those. So the thing. that are important, I feel like I'm still showing up for, but basically everything else gets filled with work. Yeah, you know, I have a similar challenge. And I think a lot of people in the audience can understand is I'm just slightly too optimistic in my quarterly, monthly, and weekly planning. I'm picking up like a few more things that I think I can do in the week that I can actually do. And it's because I really want those extra things to be done. It's

not because you know i'm just being unrealistic um and this is where the reflective practice helps because i you bang into it every every sunday you're like ah i didn't do that thing again and it's like well looking back on the week was it because i spent the week goofy and off no it's not that i worked really hard this week i just didn't have time for it and it's like okay well then maybe you can't do that right now and just like um doing that one of the things i do lately i've been playing this game where I call when I do my plants for the week or the month I call these are the things I really want to do I put them in priority and then I have stretch goals or I say well if I if things go really well or fast I can do these extra things and that helps a little bit because when

you don't achieve a stretch goal it's just because you didn't have time for it and you don't not as hard on yourself but um this is a problem that I constantly struggle with in terms of the week if I had planned the week without the stretch goals I would have had felt great at the end of the week because I did everything that I could realistically do. And I've really been making an effort the last couple months to not even get to the stretch goal part just to say, okay, these are the three. It's not going to be five. It's going to be three.

And these are the three. And just do those well this week. And then, you know, you can only do as much stuff as you have time to do. And, but that, you know, that is such a foundational productivity problem. where we pick up too much. And it's not like the things I want to do that I'm missing aren't important or aren't things that serve my aurete and things that are important to me. But still, the realistic fact is, you know, I'm a human.

I have other humans in my life that are important to me. I have things outside of work that I want to do with my life. And there's only so many hours in the day. So I think we're both kind of on the same page with that one. Yep. All right. David, not you, David, asks about technology tensions. And how do you personally balance being tech enthusiasts while also advocating for focused intentional living? One of my labs members says I'm like a drug dealer. I just keep showing up with new apps. It's like I've always got something new and shiny for you. You're a dopamine dealer. It is a weird dichotomy that I talk.

about apps and productivity systems. Yet I also am a big into focus and intentionality. But I think I can square the circle with just the idea that I like to cover a lot of stuff because not everybody uses the same stuff. But I'm also very enthusiastic in telling people not to switch all the time. Like for me, one of the things I recommend is you only give yourself permission to switch tools in the week between Christmas and New Year. And like, I'm cognizant of that because right now I'm thinking about my 2026 stack and what I'm going to use. And like, oh, yeah, that's kind of fun. Like you've been testing some tools and maybe this year I will make some switches as I head into the new year or maybe not.

But like limit the time that you're allowed to do it. Be aware of what's going on, but also, you know, get your work done. You know, have the reflective practice. Do the time blocking, work on the things that matter to you. and then the other stuff isn't as tempting and shining them. Yeah, I was thinking about this, and I feel like my approach towards shiny new apps and objects has evolved a bit.

I think part of that is the state of the tools that we have in our current moment in time. Like I'm not really interested in AI being applied to every app that I use. So there's a little bit of, you know, it's not for me. But then also I feel I've really understood as my, as I've gone along this journey, the importance of sticking with what works. And so at the beginning, I was trying every email app, every task management app, you know, everything that I could think of.

and as a screencaster for screencasts online, I noticed the other day that I have trouble picking topics now because they're all apps that I continue to use. The most recent one that's been published as we record this, I think is one on updates to Mind Node because I use that all the time. But I think there's another angle to this which has influenced this thinking for me

and that's understanding how I'm using the tools. I really have gotten clear on what are the jobs to be done for the things that I use every day. I need an email app. I need a messages app. I need a note-taking app. And one of the things that I walk through in the practical P-KM course that I put together

is this concept of the P-KM stack and I have this whole big thing in Obsidian using Canvas where I slot in the apps I'm going to use for the specific purposes and understanding what I'm using this app for

instead of going into well what all can this app do kind of transforms the way that I use the apps. I'm not using most of the applications that I use to their full capacity and I am completely okay with that because I understand

what it's supposed to do for me, why that matters, how that aligns with my vision and values. And that eliminates the need to kind of constantly be on the lookout for something that's new and better. We do live in an era where there's an abundance of good tools. And that wasn't always the case. I feel like when I first kind of got into this racket, there was only a few apps that were like up to the task and now there's just so many and

just like you know finding your own soup for your philosophy you got to find your own soup for your tech stack and the one that mike or i use doesn't need to be the one you use just figure out what resonates and get on with it you know don't let the tools become the job yeah the limiting factor is no longer the technology yeah yeah exactly Sarah said, what's been your favorite episode or topic you've covered this year? And why did it resonate with you? I feel like this year we had some great guests on the show. I mean, looking back, you know, Donald Robertson was great.

Anlar LeCunf, you know, Paul Lumens. It's just like so many great, Derek Sivers was on the show this year. I mean, I really am really happy with the guests we got this year. I feel like it was that really elevated the show and gave the listeners some interesting perspectives. I like the other content we did too, of course. I mean, and I think you and I have settled into this show in the way that we kind of share advice. I think we found like where we fit with this. stuff. But, boy, I feel like 2025 was a great year for guests on the Focus Podcast.

I completely agree. You know, I was going back through the page that has all of the episodes, and there were a couple that I singled out as my favorites. You mentioned them already. One was the interview we did with Ann Lorre, the Kuf, and then the one with Derek Sivers. So with Derek Sivers, one of the smartest guys I have ever come in contact with, but also one of the most genuinely interested and curious humans on the planet, I feel. That conversation went places. I really didn't expect it to go.

And it just was evidence of the engagement that he had in the podcast. And similarly with Anne Lour, like one of the smartest humans you will ever come in contact with. Also one of the nicest. I got to meet her actually at Craft and Commerce, which was really cool. But there was a moment in that show, I remember, which absolutely blew my mind. I'm not sure if you remember this, David, but she had just moved.

So she was in a new location. She had her computer set up on a box. She had like a makeshift background, you know, behind her. She's like, this isn't how it's normally going to look. But just timing-wise, I just moved in yesterday. So, like, this is my setup for now. And by the way, they're still delivering stuff. So there's a chance I may have to leave in the middle.

of the episode, which is what happened. I was in the middle of asking a question. I had just gotten it out and she's like, oh, sorry, I got to go. And she left and she was gone for a couple of minutes. And I remember thinking to myself, how in the world am I going to pick up in that conversation, get back into the flow? When she comes back, how am I going to restate the question, basically? So she can pick up with it. She came back and just answered the question like she never left. I was blown away. A pro. yeah true pro i also really like the last episode we did on analog because i was struggling with to figure out how analog fit in my life and committing to do a show on it kind of forced me to

make some decisions and i i felt like that was personally useful yeah i i also like the uh we started doing occasionally these um quarterly planning episodes where we uh reflect on what happened and then we plan the next quarter, those are really helpful for me, just talking through those. Like, I go on my personal retreats and I do the thing, but then when I come back and talk about it with somebody, it hits a little different. Yeah. Murphy wrote in, how do you manage to deeply read when you have a job that involves a lot of reading? I love to read, but after a mentally exhausting dame or mental energy does not sound leisurely to me. Yeah. So, I guess the first question I would ask is, do you need to read for leisure? Because I remember

something Sean Blanc said when he was on the show about if you work with your head, you should rest with your hands. And I really like that dynamic. I don't work with my brain all day and then when I get done switch modes. But I do in the middle of my day, usually when I hit a wall, I can't think or create anymore. That's the point when I go for a run or exercise, get my body moving, and then it kind of like not, you know, coming back fresh. You have a limit on the cognitive resources that you have at your disposal. I believe that.

But you can kind of, you know, if there's a gauge, you see it depleting. And then when you go do something physical like that, it boosts it back. up. Maybe not all the way to the top, but that's sort of what it feels like. When you come back, you feel fresh and you feel ready to do it again. So if you really need to keep reading, I would just say interject something physical in between there and then pick it up again. But also understanding why you want to do the thing that you say you want to do. Maybe you're reading, trying to read more because somebody said that you should. But I think it's also perfectly fine to say, You know what? I read a lot at work. I'm just not going to read when I come home,

unless that's not the stuff that you really care about. Yeah, I had some experience with this in my years as a lawyer because there were days where I spent the whole day reading. You know, you're reading cases and writing briefs. And so you would read a lot. But I never really found that much difficulty in reading in off hours because it would be different topics. Like if you read, you know, legal cases during the day and philosophy at night, it's scratching different inches in your brain. Another way to do it, if you do want to read and you read a lot during the day, I would suggest get a fiction habit, find some good stories. It's fun to read stories, right? It's kind of relaxing. It's okay to read it by listening to it. That's another

acceptable medium. I used to find, as a lawyer, because there's a half-hour drive from my office to my house, that like getting a good novel, like at one point I went through the Patrick O'Brien novels, which were these sailing ships and the Napoleonic wars. And like, after spending a day dealing with clients and judges in the office, just going away to that fictional world for 30 minutes between work and home, it, like, would reset me. So when I'd get home, I wouldn't be thinking about work. So, you know, explore other venues of reading. And Mike's right, you don't have to read if you don't want to. But if you do want, just switch it up a little bit or try a book on tape work. There's a lot of options for you.

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is safe. Take your personal data back with Incogni. Use the code F-O-C-U-S-E-D via the link in the show notes and get 60% off an annual plan. Check it out now, incogny.com slash focused. Our thanks to Ecogny for the support of the Focus Podcast. podcast and all of Relay. All right. I've got one here from my friend Corey, who does the bookworm podcast with me. We actually talked a little bit about this, but I wanted to get your perspective on this

because I mentioned you in that pro show. And I feel like you've got an angle to this that neither he nor I really have. And so we were talking about how in November we were trying to write. Okay, so he was saying he has trouble sticking with his creative side projects. And his argument was that it's because he's doing this on the side instead of having it be part of his job, you know, side hustle versus full time. He's tried the public accountability, still has trouble writing consistently. And so he was kind of asking me, how do you create that creative momentum?

And the framing for this, before I hand this off to you, was he, he was, he was, you. He was saying that you, he framed it when he was talking to me as you get to create for your job. And I was like, no, I have to create for my job. It's the requirement. But you were Max Sparky long before you were not a lawyer. So what's the, what's the key here? Well, I mean, for me, it was something that I wanted to do. You know, it's like, I just had someone recently asked me in the labs.

It's like, how do you get the energy to create all this content? It's like, and just jump out of bed and I want to do it. So I have accidentally found my calling. You know, I didn't know that, but that's what happened. So it became a force of nature for me. But I did not start this whole thing with the idea to ever make any money on it or make it my career. I just thought I had some interesting stuff to share and the internet gave me a venue to do that. I mean, I remember when I was in college reading about like during the Revolutionary War,

everybody with a different political perspective had their own newspaper. Like Jefferson had a newspaper, Hamilton had a newspaper. They all had different newspapers and they would, you know, kind of put their ideas out in public. And at that time, there were three networks and a couple big newspapers. and there was no place for my voice. So when the Internet kind of showed up, I thought, well, now I've got that democratization. What do I want to talk about?

And for me, it's kind of the intersection of productivity and Apple Tech and my unique Mac Sparky take on it. But I just started doing it. And then what fed me was feedback, you know, hearing from people. I remember distinctly at one point when Mac Power Users was young and its run,

I talked about some tip. with Hazel to like file stuff and some lady wrote me she's like oh you know I was able to put that in at work and now I leave the office like an hour earlier each day and my kid loves it that I get home early and it's like wow I can like I can help people that way you know and it's like that to me was was the was the release of happy chemicals in my brain and so that was what motivated me to do it and I'm always trying to find ways to get people home to their kids earlier and find what's important for them. So it was just a thing that I wanted to do.

I don't really want to burst Corey's bell, but it wasn't work for me. It just didn't feel hard to do it. The struggle was for me just kind of making sure I didn't lose balance with my family at the same time, but it was all kind of accidental. I didn't really know I was going to quit me in a lawyer until basically the day I made the decision. And so I'm not really somebody to aspire towards because I didn't really have a plan.

Well, you're hitting on the same concept, I think, that I mentioned in that episode, which was that you've got to have the why. It's got to be important enough. And this is not a judgment. You know, you said you wanted to write a book and you're having trouble sitting down to write. You just got to wrestle with the reality that maybe you don't really want to write the book. and that's okay. That's completely fine. There's more things out there to be done than you can possibly do. So pick the ones that really work and the experimental mindset is important here.

You know, we talked about Ann Laar a couple times in this episode, but I really respect her for the approach that she takes with her experimentation. She started a YouTube channel at one point and it's like, this is what creators are doing. I should totally do this. World's biggest search engine makes sense, and she hated showing up on video. So she did it for a little while, and then she gave herself permission to pull the plug. You know, just because you said you wanted to do something previously doesn't mean that it's still the right thing to do. And it takes a lot of guts, I feel, to say, you know, I tried this and it didn't work. But if you keep doing that, eventually you'll find the thing that clicks. And I do think the element here that I want to,

I don't have proof of this, but my gut tells me that everybody has one of these. There's some, it doesn't have to be a side hustle thing that you make money off of, but there's some side project that pushes your buttons in a way that doesn't have to become a job, right? So maybe it's part of your calling, but it is not your only soul calling. there's an alternate scenario where Max Sparky loves being a lawyer and just as content publishing stuff on the side and this is cool. This is my dream life right here, right? And you don't know that until you try it.

Yeah. The other thing is, you know, it's funny because we always use writing a book as like the example of like I want to do some big project. And for some reason, in this productivity culture, it's always write a book. And as you were talking about, I was thinking, I don't think writing. Writing a book should be the goal. I think the goal should be sharing an idea that you think would be well shared through a book or telling a story that you really want to tell.

I think you've got to go a level deeper. And if you really want to tell a story, if you really have an idea that you think you want to share with the world via the medium of a book, I think you're going to have no problem writing a book. Yep, agreed. James, this was a good one too. I almost didn't include this, Mike. I didn't want to put you in a bad spot. Partnership Dynamics.

How has your working relationship and friendship evolved through doing the show together? Well, I think it's evolved nicely, Mike. Yeah. We were relative strangers when we started, but I really liked the spark I saw in Mike, and I was really happy that he was willing to come on the show when Jason left.

And over the years, we were just talking. We were almost to about 200 shows we've recorded together. Yeah. And we also are in our professional group together, the Creators Guild, and Mike's one of my best friends. Oh, thank you. Likewise. I'll say that when we started the show, we didn't really know each other. I didn't meet you in person until after we had been doing the show together for a while.

We had talked on the phone, but I think it was, was it Max Stock where we met for the first time? the Relay 5th anniversary show. We had a long relationship. Exactly, exactly, which seems to happen a lot for me. Some of my closest friends are people I meet on the internet. And it's interesting to me because I live in a fairly small town in the middle of the Midwest. And so that's a weird thing to do. Go meet somebody on the internet.

You're going to travel to hang out with somebody who you do a podcast with, who you've never met in person before? Like, is this person real? Are you going to come back? Are you sure you're not going to get thrown in a van taken somewhere? Like, that's sort of the, people don't say that, but that's like sort of what was going through their mind. And I think I would just encourage people to stay curious and get around people online, be a part of the communities and the groups that you want to be a part of, because that was kind of how I inserted myself into the mix was I was interested in productivity. I was interested in technology, and I knew no one around here that I could talk about this stuff with. So I went to Macstock. I got connected

with Don McAllister, screencasts online. I started writing stuff. I got connected with the people that I did stuff online with previously. So this question a little bit, I feel like, isn't it's, it's kind of hard to answer because it wasn't like, well, yeah, we were friends, we decided to do a show, and this is how the friendship changed. I feel like we really got to know each other through doing the show. Yeah, I think we started as colleagues and became friends. Yes, yeah, that's a good way to put it. And I feel like I reciprocate all of the feelings that you shared. And I feel like the show would not have lasted if that was not the If you're going to do 250 episodes with somebody, you got to like the person that you show up

every couple of weeks and talk to. I do remember the first time we met in person, Rachel, was with you. And I definitely felt like I was being sized up. It's like, I better be in my best behavior of Rachel because she doesn't like me. I think I'm in trouble here. Well, I had referred to you as one of my Internet heroes. for quite a while. So she heard me talk about this David Sparks character. And then you were sending me emails every once in a while because you're listening to Bookworm and I was sharing stuff. And you

were you were very encouraging as I was going through some stuff. And then I actually remember at one point she and I were out for a walk around our neighborhood. And I was like, wouldn't it be cool if someday, you know, I was able to do a podcast with David Sparks on the Relay Network. You know, long before we really got connected and focused was, was a glint in our eyes. And so, you know, she had this, this context going into it. And yeah, I think she probably was a little bit, I won't say hesitant, but there's a little bit of Mama Baron Rachel, you know. Sure. That came through when she met you for the first time. I didn't drool on myself or anything. So hopefully I passed the test. I get last question from Chuck

I put this one in for you Mike Chuck wrote love this show he's been a Max Parkey fan or a long time thanks Chuck he says I am a fountain pin fan I would love to hear what fountain pins you guys go to for given situations I use fountain pin to bring my intentionality

to my writing and prefer different feel nib depending on the situation keep up the good work with all your endeavors I think that's a very common thing where somebody gets a special tool and that helps them do this stuff. And Mike, let's keep you to three pens, Mike, because I know you could talk about 20, but what's your top three at this point? Yeah, so interestingly, the number of fountain pens that I use has significantly diminished. It's because I've found a couple that I really, really like. So I have one actually

on my desk here, which is a sailor, I think it's a king of pen. It's the one with the really fancy nib, the, I forget what they call it, the Naginata togi or something like that, where it's, if you hold it kind of vertically, it's got a real thin line. And if you hold it pretty flat, then you can get the really broad strokes. It's really, really fancy, and that's the one that I use most of the time. There is one other pen, though, that I think I really love to use, which is less expensive. And that is a pilot custom 912, but the thing that makes this one so great for me is I took Brad Doughty's advice and I tried the posting nib. You familiar with the posting nib?

No. It's basically like a very ultra-fine kind of curved nib. So it feels kind of scratchy if you write on it, right across certain papers with it. But that doesn't bother me, but you can get a really thin line with it. And so I use that one. That's the only one I use that has colored ink in it.

So I use that one with a, is it diamine? The name of the ink is called writer's blood. It's like a crimson, dark red that has a lot of shading to it. Even with that thin line, it's got pretty nice shading. So that one is really, really fun to use. And I don't really switch them based on context to answer the question directly. I just have these two fountain pens that I really, really enjoy. I will use them when I'm at my desk.

I'll use them when I'm writing on the note card, taking notes. You know, as we record this episode, I'll use them when I'm planning my day and my personal retreat planner. Other than that, though, I use a lot of ballpoint pens because they are just easier and more practical a lot of times. So, yeah, I don't use fountain pens as much as I used to, but I still love them. Yeah, I checked to answer your question. And my favorite fountain pins, because I don't have as many as Mike does, I flirted with fountain pins, but I didn't really dive in the way Mike did. But my favorite one is a platinum 3776.

I got it years ago, and it's got, the material is like an acrylic. It looks really nice. It's like a blue color. And what I did on is I had it ground to an architect nib. So that means when I go up and down, vertical strokes are very skinny, and so. side strokes are very wide. And just with the way I happen to write, it looks really nice. And I like it. So that is kind of what I want to be fancy with the fountain pin. That's the one I ink up. I usually use, I've got a couple things of Robert Auster Bondi blue ink. I like the Bondi blue

just because of the reference to the old max. But I usually use the blue ink with it in that pin. But I've really gone down the rabbit hole on pencils. I've got a ton of of pencils. And I had a box made of my own. It says on one side it says Max Sparky and the other side it says Materium superabat opus, which means the results are better than the ingredients, basically. And it's the way I try to think about my life. I've only got so much to work with, but if I put it together good, then I'm doing something. And so I use pencils. I sharpen them with my pocket knife. I sharpen them. I have a little hand plane. I can sharpen them on. And so I actually find the practice of writing with pencil and stopping the sharpen kind of a nice way to slow down.

So I generally use pencils, but I do love that platinum pin, and I'm a big fan of the platinum's because they're just really well made. Because I don't use it that often, but a way that seals when you close the cap, it usually doesn't dry out. So that's a good pin for that. Although I suspect that you already know that since you're a big fan. Mountain Pen Guy Check. But for folks interested in getting into that habit,

I would recommend Platinum's. They're nice. Are you a platinum fan? You got any of those, Mike? Yeah, I've got a Platinum 3776. I actually have one with an architect Nib also. Oh, nice. And it's a great pen.

It's not a cheap pen, but it's also not a super expensive pen. And I feel like it compares with some of those more expensive pens in terms of how nice it is to write with. All right, well, that's feedback. Listen, if you've got a feedback question, get it to us. We keep a running list of this,

and when the pile gets big enough, we do another show on it, so we'd love to hear from you. As you can tell, we're willing to take some difficult questions, so send them in. But don't just send the difficult ones and some easy ones, too.

That'd be nice, yes. Shiny new objects, Mike. You put something in here, and I actually want to know what you're up to. Okay, so. a shiny new object that I previously owned that is much better, and that is the Rolls MS-11 mic switch, which is this blue box. And I heard about this originally from Marco Arment as the only really hardware mute switch option. I had a version of this that basically died. I noticed that the

switch wasn't really doing anything. I could pick up my coughs and things in the background, and I was like, what's going on with this? So I ordered, a new one off of Amazon sort of anticipating I was going to return it when it just did the same thing because the previous one sort of worked. It didn't really fully cut the signal, but it brought

it way down so that you could mask stuff a little bit easier. So that's what I was expecting with this. However, this one completely cuts all of the signal, at least the way that I have it configured. So the mic

goes to the mute switch. Then it goes, to the interface and not actually directly to interface because I got this crazy, you know, DBX 286 channel strip that it goes through first. But basically before you amplify the signal, that's the key. And then by putting that in, it's got a little bit of a click, which maybe can be picked up occasionally when I engage it or disengage it. But other than that, it is a very, very effective mute switch that I can't tell, you know, even if I, if I turn it off and scream into this microphone, I'm confident that the signal is not going to come through. It's way more effective than the previous one was. I don't know why. I don't know if the previous one was just a bit of a

bummer. I don't know if this one was redone. It does feel different. The switch engages a little bit different. It feels a little bit more substantial. So they probably had some sort of revision to the product. But yeah, this has gotten a lot better. And it is very nice to have a physical mute switch on my desk just in case I have to, you know, kids are being loud outside my door or something and I need to cut my audio for a little bit. I can tell you because I have the rolls switch as well and I ordered one that just didn't work. And so it took me a while to get a working one. This is just kind of a podcaster. It's talking about podcasting thing, but it's nice to have the ability to meet yourself if you get sick or have a cough or the dog starts barking. Not that that

ever happens in my life. So Mike, what do you read in these days? I am reading a book called Toxic Grit by Amanda Gets. And I heard Amanda speak at Craft and Commerce. She gave an incredible talk. And then Quick had a thing at the end. My book's coming out in the fall. This book is nothing like the talk that she gave.

I feel a little bit duped. But that's okay. I think the concept is important and something that is relevant for our audience. It's kind of anti-hustle culture. What's unique about this book is that Amanda is basically speaking to women with this. So she has these different characters that you play. And kind of her point is you need intentional imbalance. You can't be all of these things all of the time.

And so I'm not really the target audience for this, but there's still a lot of good stuff that I've been able to glean from it. And honestly, the whole productivity space could use more female voices. So I'm glad this book is out there. I'm enjoying it, even if it's not really written for me. Nice.

In the Max Market Labs, we actually have a book club now about every six weeks we pick a book and read it and talk about it together. It's really fun, like old-fashioned. book club. Usually it's more philosophy or productivity, but this time we decided to do an Apple focus book. So I'm rereading Apple in China by Patrick McGee, which is a fascinating book about how Apple, you know, got itself into China to do its manufacturing and the story behind that and, you know, why that's good and why that's bad. And it's very well researched in good,

in good book if you're interested in Apple stuff. Apple and China is one to read. All right. Well, that does it for this episode. On Deep Focus today, we're going to be talking about the best books we read in 2025. That's the ad-free extended version of show that we talked about earlier in the show. We are the Focus podcast. You can find us at Relay.fm. Slash Focused. Thanks again. We'll see you in a few weeks.