I'm picky when it comes to reading "self-help" books, mainly because I feel that, implicit in most books in this category, the main goal is to tell the reader what to do (or not do to) with their lives. Of course, in and of itself, there's nothing wrong with this, but for me, it's all about the tone and approach — I hate the feeling of something being crammed down my throat (I don't care if it's something good or bad for me), which is why I can't stand books that are "overly preachy" in any way. This is also why I'm extremely wary when it comes to reading nonfiction books (that aren't biographies or memoirs), as the tone and approach can very easily derail an otherwise good reading experience for me.
I say all this because my initial expectation going into Oliver Burkeman's time management book Four Thousand Weeks was that it would presumably fall into the above-mentioned category, mainly because most books on time management that I've read over the years are written from a business angle and usually promote the idea of being "as productive and efficient" as possible at work. To my great surprise however, this book actually went the completely opposite direction — instead of encouraging people to "make more time in order to get more done" (the message I hear over and over again in most business books), this book embraces the concept that time is finite, humans are only on this earth for a certain amount of time (Burkeman uses "four thousand weeks" as a gauge) and because of that, we should face the fact that it's realistically impossible to get everything we want to do done. Expanding on this idea, instead of obsessing over how much time it will take to do something or worrying about not having enough time to accomplish what you set out to accomplish (whether it's a small task at work or a life goal), Burkeman advocates making the conscious (and often difficult) decision to do what matters most in that moment and accept the consequences of that decision, whether good or bad.
Many of the examples Burkeman gave were relevant to what I often struggle with, which I definitely appreciated. One personal example that especially resonated with me: I've always referred to myself as an "aspiring author" because my dream is to write and publish a book at some point, but given my chaotic and busy work + family life, I've been putting off starting that book I've always wanted to write until a "more opportune time" when work is less busy and family life is less chaotic (which to me, pretty much means when I reach retirement at work and my family is self-sufficient enough where I don't have to worry about making sure their lives are comfortable). This book posits the idea that the "most opportune time" might never come, which is something I honestly never thought about until now. It makes sense though — for me, work will always be busy (especially in my field of work — which I will loosely define as "trade and commerce"…unless the world suddenly comes to a halt and stops functioning, which we of course know will never happen, I will always have an infinite amount of things to do at work) and when it comes to family life, the reality is that it will always be filled with one crisis or another (since that's how life works) — so why not accept the fact that work and life will occur the way it does and instead of trying to "control" time (by assuming that work and family will fall into place to the point that the "most opportune time" will come for me to start my book project), just make the decision to start writing a little bit each day and go from there.
Much of Burkeman's advice in this book actually runs counter to traditional time management advice (which focuses a lot on productivity and efficiency) that we often find in most business books. Not only that, I like how his book doesn't just focus on work — much of what he writes about can be applied to personal life as well, which also makes it stand out from said books.
With that said, structure-wise, there were actually quite a few flaws in this book, which is what prevented me from being able to rate it higher than I did, despite finding some of the concepts personally resonant. At times, I felt like Burkeman was all over the place with his ideas, and there were moments where he seemed to contradict himself — or perhaps these moments were just him, as a former "productivity guru", trying to work out his own changed philosophy toward time management on the page. And I also agree with what a few other reviewers pointed out — that there is a fair amount of repetition in the book, which made the reading a bit tedious at times.
Overall, despite not being perfect by any means, this was a good book with quite a bit of food for thought as well as many examples that I felt could be applicable to my life. While I didn't necessarily agree with every concept presented in this book — and admittedly, there were moments where I felt that Burkeman got a bit too philosophical, almost to the point of losing me in the process — I did appreciate the different angle to time management that he explored.
This book will mean different things to different people, which is reflected in the wide spectrum of ratings for it on Goodreads (I saw one star to five stars and everything in between). I decided to go the "happy medium" route, which I feel is most appropriate for my experience with this book. If you choose to read this one, know that your experience may be vastly different from mine and that's perfectly okay — if you are able to glean at least one resonant concept from this book like I did, then it will be time well-spent reading it.
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