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You Can Stop Wasting Your Time Now

A simple, useful matrix for making better decisions, understanding risk, and spending your life on what really matters.

I have an unfinished essay in my drafts folder called, appropriately: “Quitting is Underrated.” It’s been there since 2017. You can bet your ass I’m never completing it. In fact, hold up just a sec while I delete it … because this is that essay’s ultimate form.

Today, we’re going to talk about giving up. Every day, we’re inundated with tales of people in film or on the news who gave it their all, never gave in, kept showing up and persevered in the face of unimaginable rejection. I’m here, flatly, to tell you: they’re exceptions rather than the rule, and if you strive to be one of those people, you’ll probably be wasting your time.

I hate to be the one to spill juice in your single-malt, but they’re not making a biopic about you, you don’t have a cheering section, and the news crew ain’t knocking on your door. Your current crush won’t be your soulmate. You’re not repeatedly betting the house on green and coming away with fat stacks of cheddar. Your life will, in all likelihood, reside in the fat part of the great bell-curve of human potential. I’m not saying that’s what you aim for. I’m managing your expectations.

However, you might be capable of rising to the top quintile in most of the key areas of life that matter: health, love, impact, wisdom, wealth, joy, your vocation. You take care of that, and you’re probably going to be just fine. I know a lot of folks who are earning solid B-plusses in everything.

The B-plusses are my brand of human. They’re content, witty, kind, and they’re making a difference. Most of the folks I know who are at the very pinnacle in a select few areas, or pushing maniacally for perfect scores, are secretly miserable, sociopathic, or severely lacking in other key areas.

Why? Well, let’s set aside the elephant-in-the-room answers of privilege and/or trauma for now (because that explains 95% of them). Folks who aim for the stars tend to make life harder than it needs to be, stack their own decks against them, and hold themselves to militant standards no mortal can reach. You kittens don’t need to do that. Your life’s not a GaryVee video. It’s C-SPAN IRL. So go easy on yourself.

Earlier in the pandemic — so, like, when I was 13 — I was casually dating someone. She was awesome, and a longtime crush, but sometimes awesome ain’t enough.

For context: I have an omnipotent and omnipresent strain of asthma, and my body doesn’t make IgG. She was local and had 3 roommates with 3 boyfriends (who all flouted social distancing and mask protocols and came down with COVID!), so when we arranged a couple of dates, we arranged them over zoom, or through my front window, or in long socially distant walks in the park. We never held hands, hugged, touched or kissed.

On top of that, we had seemingly weekly DTR convos during what I call my “90-Day Trial Period.” That’s a boundary I set to prevent things from getting too serious, too quickly. No matter how much I dig you, you’re not my official partner until the next fiscal quarter. Those talks were a giant drain on my mental and emotional capital, on top of the pandemic, which was already exhausting enough.

First I needed a break. Then I broke it off completely. I reasoned “this pandemic could last for bleeping ever”— oh, lord, how right I turned out to be! — and I didn’t want to frack for love when solar and wind are available and less taxing on my environment.

When I broke the news to her that this was too difficult and the pandemic was weighing on me, she was less than pleased. She asked, in harsh terms: “So, you just want to do things that are easy?” I said, “Yes. Yes I do.” I gave up.

Now, you might be thinking, “John, aren’t you supposed to do hard things? Aren’t they the things that are worth it?” No, comrades. They’re not. Just because something is difficult doesn’t mean the reward for doing it is automatically better. If you’ve already won — or even finished — the race, the extra mile is meaningless. If you’re already showing 19, you don’t need to hit.

There’s a fine line between taking on a challenge, and taking on unnecessary stress. Now, you might be wondering, “John, how do I know if the stress is unnecessary?” Good question: The body can’t tell the difference between types of stress, or even the difference between excitement and fear. Only the heart and the mind can. Their physical manifestations are identical, but if you train your mind, you can suss out the particulars. Per The Atlantic:

… anxiety and excitement are both aroused emotions. In both, the heart beats faster, cortisol surges, and the body prepares for action. In other words, they’re “arousal congruent.” The only difference is that excitement is a positive emotion‚ focused on all the ways something could go well.

We’ve all done stressful things. We’ve all done exciting things. Sometimes we avoid stressful and exciting things to avoid the sensation of losing control. We assess our tolerance for risk, and we boldly forge ahead or wilt in the face of pressure, or binge-watch Superstore while stuffing your face full of pizza — which I highly recommend doing, because that sitcom is highly underrated and pizza is a divine manifestation and very properly rated.

So, how do we decide what to do? How do we decide what risks are worth taking? How do we decide if we’re taking too big a swing, or playing too small? How do we know if we’re setting ourselves up for failure, or sticking with Sisyphean tasks long after their expiry date?

Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present to you, The Gorman Decision Matrix.

The Way We Calculate Risk is Wrong

All courses of action fall upon two continuums: what we expect the outcome to be (outcome), and how much that outcome matters (stakes). These combine to form the risk of the decision.

Now, you may be automatically asking: “Isn’t decision making about balancing risk v. reward?” No. Risk is uncertainty, which means it’s a derivative variable. For clarity, I’m nixing the word “reward” to instead be “most likely outcome,” because a reward is something we calculate post hoc. We’re strictly talking about ante hanc calculations here. As you’ll soon see, high risk isn’t necessarily the same as high stakes.

Every day, we do things with low stakes: share dank memes, brush our teeth, make our bed, eat lunch.

Every day, we do things where we expect a poor outcome: check our emails, answer calls from unknown numbers, cheer for the Atlanta Falcons. But none of those are high risk.

The takeaway here: most likely outcome and stakes are important. To illustrate, let me go ahead and post a blank version of the Matrix. Here it is:

In the chart above, I’ve broken out in yellow the three buckets of “most likely outcome.” They’re quite creatively named: “success,” “unknown”, and “failure.” Success means a near-guaranteed chance of success. Failure means a near-guaranteed chance of failure. Unknown means something in the nebulous middle.

In green, I’ve categorized “stakes” by how much the given course of action matters to you. I’ve named these, creatively again: “high,” “medium” and “low.” High means it matters a great deal to you. Low means it barely matters at all. Medium means it matters enough.

Every course of action you take falls into one of those nine blank buckets. Let me drill into these nine areas a little further, to give you some extra clarity. We’ll start in the upper left and work our way down, and then over.

Box №1: “North Stars.” Likely success, high stakes.

In the upper-left, we have our “North Stars.” These are our Big Wins. These are our must-haves. Our “Born to Run.” These are the courses of action we take that capitalize on our own greatness. These are your tentpole productions — your Marvel Cinematic Universe. This is marrying your best friend. Sure, there’s a lot on the line … but you’re more than capable of rising to the challenge.

Box №2: “Moonshots.” Unknown outcome, high stakes.

In the middle-left, we have our “moonshots.” These are our COVID vaccines. These are our Apollo Program. This is Taylor Swift’s “Folklore,” or Kanye West’s “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.” These are the gamechangers, the paradigm-shifters. Everything’s riding on it, but it’s anyone’s guess whether or not it’ll work. When it does, though … oh my lord.

Box №3: “Waterloos.” Likely failure, high stakes.

In the lower-left, we have our “Waterloos.” What’s the №1 rule in warfare? Never invade Russia. Didn’t work for Napoleon (from which this cell gets its name). Didn’t work for Hitler. Waterloos are massive strategic blunders that leave you licking your wounds for a long, long time. These are sunk-costs and time-sinks. These are unhappy marriages and Jean Van de Velde taking driver on the 72nd hole of the Open Championship, needing just to card a double-bogey to win the Claret Jug. He didn’t.

Box №4: “Confidence Boosters.” Likely success, medium stakes.

The top-middle is your strike zone. This is your wheelhouse. This is me writing copy for apparel companies, or (by my standards) straightforward Medium columns. This is Season 2 of Chappelle’s Show. This is almost every Tom Petty record between Damn the Torpedoes and Wildflowers. This is your swim lane. These are your get-right games against the New York Jets in 2020.

Box №5: “Growth Opportunities.” Unknown outcome, medium stakes.

These are the most pivotal decisions on the board. That’s why they’re in the center. They’re more common than moonshots, less guaranteed than confidence boosters. When you’re trying to make a change in your life, you’re likely in the center square. If you succeed, you might raise the stakes. With enough repetition, these might become confidence boosters. If you don’t, it might dissuade you from continuing down that road. These are fitness programs, new side-hustles, dietary changes, new relationships or anti-depressants.

Box №6: “Demoralizers.” Likely failure, medium stakes.

In the lower-center, these are the things that leave you crestfallen. When someone tells you things like “you’ve set yourself up for failure,” it’s because you’ve entered this box: these are often used as measuring sticks. Applying for jobs you really want, but aren’t qualified for. Getting rejected by someone you’ve been crushing on. Burning the turkey on Thanksgiving. Or, as I once did: offering to help someone swap out their garbage disposal and leaving them with a kitchen floor full of water. This box is when you’re in over your skis, and it can feel like the end of the world … but it usually isn’t.

Box №7: “Layups.” Likely success, low stakes.

In the upper-right, we have “layups.” Here’s a prime example: I used to host an open mic night in Downtown Austin, and one time, Gary Clark Jr. showed up to just rip through a few songs he was workshopping. Gary Clark Jr. plays arenas and theatres and has no business showing up at my open mic. But he did, and he crushed it, and I felt really sorry for the poor sap who went next. (Me.) These are your classic “big fish, small pond” moments. This is setting the game to “beginner” mode when you should be playing on “All-Madden.” This is me mailing in a self-published Medium piece just to have some “fresh content.” (Maybe like this one!)

Box №8: “Heat Checks.” Unknown outcome, low stakes.

If you’re not familiar with the “heat check,” I’ll let fellow all-star Texan, basketball enthusiast and Internet GAWD Shea Serrano take it from here:

A heat check is (mostly) a basketball term. It’s used to reference a shot attempt, specifically a difficult one attempted after a handful of easier, wiser shots have been made. Think of this: you make a layup, then you make a wide-open midrange jumper, then you make a wide-open 3-pointer. That’s great. Those are smart shots. You’re feeling very good about yourself and all the decisions you’ve made in life that have led you to that point, so the next time down court you receive the ball and then chuck up a 29-foot fadeaway. That’s the heat check. You are literally checking to see if you are figuratively hot.

This is when you take Joe Rogan’s advice — which I would not ordinarily agree with — and “try elk.” This is a casual micro-dose on a weekend. This is your first time trying literally anything that can’t kill or embarrass you.

Box №9: “Fool’s Errands.” Likely failure, low stakes.

And, finally, in the lower-right, this is repeatedly subjecting yourselves to energy vampires. A second date with a dude who yells at the waitress and sleeps on a mattress in the kitchen. This is calling your mom because she asks “why you don’t call me anymore” when you know damn well why you don’t call her anymore. Doing these things won’t ruin your life or career, they’ll just put you in a bad mood. I almost called these “Einsteins” because of his definition of insanity, but I realized that some “Einsteins” can have much higher stakes. This is mostly telling your kid “no more iPad for the evening” when you know damn well an hour later you’ll be handing it over to shut that demon-spawn up for the night.

Common Time Management Errors

Time management and procrastination gangsta Nir Eyal gave a tight presentation at a Quartz membership masterclass called “How To Be Indistractable,” based on his book of the same name. One of his mantras was “people tend to over-emphasize personality, and under-emphasize context.” This is what psychologists refer to as the Fundamental Attribution Error.

As this applies to human decision making and time management, this causes us to do one of two things:

Procrastinate — because we doubt our capabilities and yearn to distract ourselves with lower-stakes actions where we expect a more certain outcome (usually success, but also failure, as we’ll see in a minute)
Overextend — because we ascribe too much of our previous successes to ourselves, and therefore see ourselves as infallible (see: “approach life with all the confidence of a mediocre white man”), we constantly measure ourselves

His top-line solution is to “adopt a growth mindset, and think about challenges and obstacles as context and problems to solve instead of as flaws.” The opposite of distraction, he correctly points out, is not “focus,” it’s “traction.” Traction pulls us toward what we want to do and who we want to become.

Let’s look into procrastination and overextending and see how they apply to our Decision Matrix.

Procrastination

Classic procrastination pushes our decision-making to the right of our decision matrix. This is a self-doubt issue. You’re going to see a lot more Layups. We substitute low-stakes activities because they’re less emotionally daunting. We play Tetris or order takeout instead of coding and cooking.

Yet, the hallmark of procrastination doesn’t just mean playing smaller or doing things that matter less. It also means seeking the reassurance of a certain outcome, which means we’ll be much more likely to engage in lower-risk activities that have a guaranteed sense of failure.

We’ll fill up our time with things like “demoralizers” and “fool’s errands” because they jive with our emotional state at the time: we’re doubting ourselves, and these decisions and activities align with how we see ourselves.

Overextending

Overextending is slightly different than procrastination, because it’s not a self-doubt problem, it’s a self-worth issue. That might sound like hair-splitting, but it isn’t.

Here, we take on too much because we feel compelled to — either due to our own hubris (see: Donald Trump, the President), or due to our own insecurities (see: Donald Trump, the businessman).

Overextension pushes our decision-making to the left of the box, because we’re trying to prove ourselves. Yet it also encourages banking on higher risk and therefore more toward the center. Since we loathe failure, we avoid it, but guaranteed success will always feel like small potatoes.

My Decisions: A Retrospective

Growing up, I was a fairly anxious person and easily defeated. I struggled with both self-doubt and self-worth. I empirically knew what I was good at and stayed in my comfort zone, and I also got a bit too big for my britches when I repeatedly did stuff that paid off and gave me that quick hit of dopamine to carry on through the day. I veered hard towards low-stakes activities. I also veered towards high-stakes failure. Going back to our matrix, this was how I approached decision-making:

Let’s break it down, box-by-box.

North Stars: I was scared to death of big successes, even though I knew I was capable of doing it and doing it and doing it well. I wilted away from sure-things that scared me. I punted on filling out the submission form for a national award I was nominated for. I didn’t date anyone I really wanted to. I didn’t pitch publications I knew damn well I could write for — places where I knew the damned editors. I wasn’t following my North Star.
Moonshots: I didn’t deal well with ambiguity, and stakes scared the shit outta me. Big risks? Pitch, please. I don’t swing for the fences. [More on these later.] Unless …
Waterloos: For whatever reason, I loved betting it all on almost surefire failures. Why? Because how cool would it be if I was, like, one of the three people in history to pull this off? This was me trying to attend the University at North Carolina against the approval of my parents and without sufficient startup capital. Or applying to showcase at SXSW when I had a rabid following of like six friends. This was sending my resume into Deadspin back when I was a mere commenter who was also managing editor of a website that disappeared from the Internet. This was me starting a business in the middle of a pandemic, and breaking up with my high school sweetheart.
Confidence Boosters: I was low on confidence, so anything I definitively knew I could do that could boost my confidence, I jumped at the chance. Signing up for half marathons. Romantic evenings with partners who I knew already liked me like that but with whom I wasn’t looking for anything serious. This was me hosting a showcase at SXSW back when I knew the owner of the venue and also every musician I’d put on the bill, or putting together a benefit concert for the Nepal Earthquakes back in 2015, or sending columns people who I knew would not say no.
Growth Opportunities: I have a strong aversion to ambiguity, as mentioned above. Yet, there’s so many of these kinds of decisions available to us that over time through sheer accident, I’ve attempted a whole bunch of these. Signing up for my first half-marathon. Public speaking. Podcast appearances. Earnestly trying to date. Dropping an album. Applying for jobs I was unsure I was qualified for, but that didn’t scare me enough to stop me from trying.
Demoralizers: I told you already I was low on confidence. I avoid these decisions at all costs, and it is probably the single best piece of risk mitigation I do. This is also why I’ve been largely isolated for the past 275 days. I really, really don’t want to get COVID-19. That would be … demoralizing (and potentially fatal).
Layups: Self-publishing on Medium instead of pitching to The Guardian. Going full Gary Clark Jr. on the open mics. Sex with exes. Doing favors for people. Discounting my rates for friends or people I want to work with. Going on a run for anything less than three miles, or a leisurely jog.
Heat Checks: Trying sea urchin, flying out to Phoenix to see Kendrick Lamar, dates for the sake of dating, posting first drafts of columns (like this one!) as captions to Instagram. Cold-calling editors to say “ayyyy lemme write for you.”
Fool’s Errands: Because these didn’t matter, I was always willing to “tough out” certain situations because I was under the impression that it was important to “pick your battles.” The number of times I engaged in 9s, man, if I could get that time back …

Rumored Events of the Recent Past

2018 and 2019 were momentous (in the literal sense of the term) years for me. Life kept getting, with rare exception, exponentially better for me in nearly every way. My health and mood improved, I found love, I left a jarring impact beyond my wildest dreams, and I quasi-mastered my craft. I was definitely earning my B-plusses.

Then, at the peak of my powers, I hit the eject button on my career. I quit my six-figure day-job at a corporation to strike out on my own, hoping to travel, give branding workshops and speeches, publish a book or six, and move to Lisbon. It did not go well.

Now, much of that can be chalked up to the pandemic, but a sizable minority of that misfortune can be even better explained by poor engagement. Since I was without a well-paying day-job for the first time since 2012 , I was immediately frightened. I retreated quickly to low-stakes activities and decisions, or the bare minimum necessary for survival.

As panic set in, I began overextending myself. Failing spectacularly on high-profile projects, whiffing on multiple chances to make a name for myself, and — most importantly — frittering away my money on nickel-and-dime pleasures because I immediately went into self-preservation mode and the thought of plunking down five-figures on startup costs during a pandemic scared the shit out of me. That was a big mistake.

Better Decisions, Visualized

If your goal in life is to “level up,” and maximize your likelihood of success in ways that leave a lasting impact, then your goal is to constantly strive in the direction of upper-left. There’s an prioritized order to it. Here it is:

You want to eventually spend the bulk of your time doing high-stakes work with a high likelihood of success. That’s why it’s №1 in the matrix. But the way you get there is important. You start in the lower-right, and move up the column before venturing into the next column to the left. You do this in as many domains of life — career, relationships, health, happiness, altruism, etc.— as possible.

Mastery is moving up the column. (Improving your odds of success.) Leveling up is moving over a column. (Raising the stakes.) Spend too much time moving over, and you’ll flame out. Spend too much time slumming it on the right and you’ll waste your time.

True excellence and optimal time management, though, means embracing uncertainty. The middle row is where you take your risks. You cannot reach the top row without first slogging it in the middle. If you’re experiencing self-doubt, keep going. It means you really want it, and that discomfort and fear means you’re growing.

If you’re experiencing annoyance, meaninglessness, misery or frustration, just walk away (if you can, and you can’t always). It’s futile, or you’re playing small, or the juice ain’t worth the squeeze. Knowing what to quit and what areas of life to immediately leave (if you can) are the keys to managing your time in a way that delivers good things for you and yours.

Final Words Before We Part

Most of what you do in life won’t be in the upper-left. Most of life is uncertain, and very little of what we actually get to spend our time on matters a great deal in the grand scheme. But we can get there, sometimes, and maximize the care we take in doing so. We can embrace that uncertainty, and know when to walk away from things that are too hard for us, or don’t mean enough. Give up. Really. It’s so much better.

All of you are definitely capable of rising to the top quintile in most of the key areas of life that matter, though: health, love, impact, wisdom, wealth, joy, your vocation. I know plenty of folks who are earning solid B-plusses in everything.

And you have full permission to grade yourself on a curve. What looks like success to you may not look like success to someone else, and there’s no need to compete or compare. For example: I run half-marathons in a shade under three hours. That’s not fast, but I’m doing it with lungs that work about as well as a $20 printer. That’s good enough for me because I enjoy it and it reminds me that I’m capable of more than I once was.

I walked away from a lot of bottom-row and right-column in 2020. Those decisions freed up space for a blockbuster 2021. And by blockbuster, I mean mostly middle-of-the-road with some occasional big wins that matter mostly by my own personal rubric. That’s okay. I’m not going to write the Great American Novel, I’m not going to crack the Billboard 200, and I’m definitely not on my way to a sprawling estate in Marin County.

All those things are not necessary for a meaningful life. Good enough is good enough, and arbitrary markers of success are just video game numbers deemed important by a warped society that’s profoundly sicker than either you or I.

To sum: Life is short. We should all be finding ways to make our lives easier, less stressful, and most importantly make sure we are happy. Especially now, when there’s so much out there making life hard, stressful and miserable. That’s how you get to the top quintile — that cozy little straight B-plus zone. You embrace uncertainty, mitigate failure, master new skills and habits, and funnel your life in the direction you want it to go. And if you find you get to where you think you want to be and decide it’s not what you had in mind, or it’s too hard, you can always just quit. I recommend it.

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