Getting By: how to look busy while doing nothing — The Power of Negative Thinking

I hope you have enjoyed the previous 5 chapters that form Part 1 of The Power of Negative Thinking. Part 2 begins with this chapter, and is a more advanced look at key self-improvement behaviours that, while they may not lead to happiness, will certainly lead to an improved life.

Getting By is a notoriously hard game to play. It is even harder to describe as everyone might have different goals and interpretations of what sufficient success is. What’s important is to identify what success looks like to you, and to never do anything to succeed by any slimmest of margins more than your personal goal.

Setting A Goal

Goal setting is important, even for people who hate people who set goals. What differentiates this form of goal-setting is that the ends justify the means, insofar as doing as little as possible is a noble ambition.

Many people have the confused belief that they need to continuously reach a new level of success after accomplishing their previous target. This is patently false and is the same mentality of the tumor. While the illusion of a new promotion may be appealing, recall that it is just a mirage. A new job, though it may be better paying, usually nets no positive outcomes for you. Your increased salary will simply be divided equally among your existing expenses as your costs naturally go up. You will find yourself drinking more to deal with the added stresses of your day. Your old clothes suddenly need replacing as they all have been covered in sweat stains from the long hours you spent in the hot office with poor cooling. You find yourself with less time at home to prepare meals and so are now eating out more. You have to see a therapist to work through your issues. Your looming divorce is looking all the more expensive. All because you chose to get a promotion. I hope the lesson is obvious.

What you need to do, and as soon as possible, is to identify when you are satisfied with the things you have. Once you’ve attained that level, you must set a concrete plan to never exceed it.

Setting the Plan

Were it as simple as not showing up for work yet still getting paid you would not need my advice. However, barring certain union contracts, attendance is usually a minimum requirement. You need to find a way to be employable, unfireable, yet still incompetent.

Step 1. Obfuscate everything you do.

This is straight from Sun Tzu’s Art of War.

• Accidentally delete every documented process that outlines what you do. Recode every piece of work you do in a new language that no one else really knows. The more obscure the better.
• Delete every comment from every piece of code you have.
• Use nonsense formulas in every Excel sheet you have. The more sumproducts the better. Never do something simple if it can be done complex.

Step 2. Appear busy

• Use both monitors at all times, or the laptop and external monitor. Have code for a program you may or may not have written up on the external monitor. Change the background color to black and the font colour to something retro like neon yellow or plasma green.
• Book yourself for meeting in Outlook in random 30, 60, and 90 minute chunks throughout the week. Use different colours for each meeting so if someone walks by you look both very busy and very organized.

Step 3. Never volunteer

• Never, ever, offer to do anything for anyone. People will learn not to ask you for favours.
• Never, ever, volunteer information that you don’t have to give. If someone sends a mass email asking if you’ve seen their house keys and they are literally on your desk in front of you, say nothing.
• Send emails that no one can possibly answer. Schedule them to be sent when you’re sleeping. Ask questions that seem like you are working on something complex and important. “Hey guys, just wondering if anyone has had luck rehashing the Corinth algorithm lately? I’ve been at it for the past hour and my cycles keep targeting but I’m not really getting anywhere.”

Step 4. Enjoy mediocrity.

That’s it. By making yourself unlikeable, but not incompetent, people will never be able to see you in any job other than the one you’re currently in. This myopic view you’ve fostered will undoubtedly keep you from getting that next promotion. Congratulations!

Look forward to more chapters in my new book, The Power of Negative Thinking: by Who Would Publish This Press

Chapter 1: The Power of Negative Thinking
Chapter 2: The Downward Spiral
Chapter 3: Become genuinely uninterested in people
Chapter 4: Give constant and sincere criticism
Chapter 5: Frown
Chapter 6: Getting by: how to look busy while doing nothing
Chapter 7: Stop blaming your parents, blame yourself
Chapter 8: How to lose friends and influence your cat
Chapter 9: The Power of Later
Chapter 10: The Secret (there is none, you’re an idiot)