Parkinson's Law is the concept that the amount of work required adjusts to the time available for its completion. This idea was originally introduced by Cyril Northcote Parkinson in a satirical piece for "The Economist" in 1955.
In his essay, Parkinson illustrates this principle with the anecdote of a woman tasked with sending a postcard, a chore that would typically take a busy person about three minutes.
However, this woman takes an hour to select the postcard, another half hour to find her glasses, an additional 90 minutes to write the message, and 20 minutes to decide whether to bring an umbrella to the mailbox, thus consuming her entire day with this single task.
Work expands to the time available.
This is true for software projects, the home repairs you’ve been putting off, and in my case my creative work now that I’ve quit my job at Amazon.
I’ve been gone nearly a month now, and I’ve noticed that I’m as busy as I ever was. I’m also behind on a lot of tasks.
I have plenty of excuses. First it was planning and having my retirement party. I was taking care of the most recent cohort of my course, Speedrun to Promotion. Then my brother and his family came to town for a week and stayed with us. I rented a work loft and I have a dozen contractors and vendors giving me quotes so I can turn it into my dream video studio and creative space.
Really though, when you have two little kids do you ever really have any spare time?
The reality is that I should have more free time now that I’ve quit my corporate gig. Where did those 40-50 hours a week go?
I had to look no further than the device in my pocket for the answer.
With all of my “free time” I’ve been checking my email, watching YouTube, TikTok, and my time-waster of choice, Reddit, more than ever before. To the tune of four hours a day on average since I quit my job according to the screen time stats on my phone.
I realized in my month of retirement I’ve turned into the woman that takes all day to mail a postcard because Reddit won’t check itself.
When I had a full-time job I just didn’t have the opportunity to waste the time to get all of my stuff done and so Parkinson’s law worked in my favor. Once I had more free time it was devoured by my phone.
This week I’ve decided to deploy my favorite productivity app, Airplane Mode, and made a conscious effort to not use my phone. Lo and behold, I’ve gotten back on track and I have free time again. But I know it won’t last forever.
My relationship with my phone and other digital distractions is a lot like the battle with weeds in my garden and lawn. When I spend the time to eradicate them, I look out over my yard and get a sense of accomplishment and pride.
But they come creeping back in as I let my guard down until they overrun the place.
I’d rather they never come back at all, but to date I haven’t found a method to keep the weeds at bay, nor to keep my phone usage to under half an hour per day, for good.
If you have any ideas for how to maintain this habit, let me know by responding to this email. Note, however, that I’m not looking for techniques to detox from my phone, but to make those changes stick for good.
Until I let my guard down again, I’ll be enjoying my newfound free time.
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