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In Praise of Negligence: How to Achieve More by Doing Less
I have on many occasions been called negligent by my mother and my siblings while I was growing up. I remember now how I used to forget things easily especially anything outside the scope of my interest.
If I was reading a book or thinking about how to solve a complex mathematics question, you dare not asked me to pass you the table salt. Countless times I have had knocks on my head because I misplaced a pencil for a spoon.
In praise of being negligent, it was my mind that made the decision then. It was mostly unconscious behaviors. Probably, my mind knew what was important and shut off or give less attention to other less important things.
I was not alone in this regard. Countless people are born this way. Others use this tactic intentionally to allow them to deepen their focus and create meaningful work and life.
As I grow older and studied productivity, I saw this play out among the successful artists and entrepreneurs. It is better one go back to the age of negligence where one only focuses on what matters.
It was reported that Napoleon Bonaparte would delay opening letter s during wars. He has learned that no matter what the letter might contain it could not change the course of his war. His hunch or belief turned out to be true most…
