When I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong.
Buckminster Fuller, inventor and visionary
We can only ever do one of five things. Everything we do is an instinct, a response, a habit, a system or a project (and projects are what rock). This is a big idea. If you look at the model in figure 4.1, you will see a line through the middle of habit. To the left of the line is what all animals do (including us). It’s only humans, however, that occupy the ground to the right of the line.
It’s an interesting exercise to look at how much of your life is spent in each. How much time is purely instinctual (spent, for instance, sleeping)? How much time do you spend responding to external stimuli? Do you show up to work and respond to requests, emails, phone calls and meetings all day long? How much of your day is habitual and happens on autopilot? How much of your time is spent following systems and procedures? And finally, how much time is spent on your projects?
Let’s look at each of these in a bit more detail.
Figure 4.1: personal projects model
Instinct
We are born with our instincts, and everything else comes later. We have evolved to have instincts before anything else. A newborn baby placed on her mother’s stomach will instinctively wriggle up and start suckling.
Things that you do that are instinctual don’t require any thought. They ...
