Would telling a buddy my to-do list was done – before I’d done it – really make it more likely to happen? But leaving her a voice note every day has increased my productivity, and deepened our friendship
W
hen my friend Rosamund suggested we try a productivity technique of leaving each other a voice note every day, I immediately said yes – even if I suspected, deep down, that we might not keep it up for long. I was circumspect because we both lead busy lives, 3,500 miles apart. She lives in London and I’m based in Brooklyn. It is hard to keep in touch sometimes. Even talking on the phone feels tough, what with the time difference and our schedules. Adding another thing to do every day, even a small, two-minute task, felt like a challenge.
The technique is simple enough. You send a friend a voice note in the morning saying what you “did” that day. You always speak in the past tense for accountability. The theory is that once you tell a friend you have “done” something, you will be more likely to follow it through.
There is a manifesting element, too. Because, while making the recordings, we are also talking to ourselves. As a freelance journalist who works from home I’ve told Rosamund that I “went” for a walk even though I was on deadline, and felt so much better afterwards, and that I “wrote” a complex feature efficiently, without changing the intro 17 times. Once I have verbalised such saintly behaviours, I have discovered that I’m more likely to carry them out.
