Are You Lifehacking Your Way into Wasted Time and Effort?

It’s time to revisit those shortcuts!

I have an immense appetite.

I want to read all the books, learn all the things, have all the experiences. I am seduced by novelty and potential. My pantry is filled with esoteric spices, my drawers with unused art supplies, and I am 100% sure I will die under an avalanche of unread books.

I am a clutter magnet, weighed down by unrealized potential.

So I try to make my life easier by collecting life hacks. One surefire hack I invented was not to delete any alarm I created on my phone. If I needed an alarm at 7:15 a.m. one day, I might need it another day, and so why not leave it? Think of all the setup time I would save!

One small problem.

I have a complicated relationship with time. My calendar reminders are not loud or stubborn enough to jolt me out of the flow or summon me from another room. So I set alarms for everything I have to do the next day or I’ll be MIA for my life.

In other words, I didn’t just have a handful of alarms on my phone.

Reading the entire New York City Yellow Pages would take less time than scrolling through my list of alarms. By year-end, I had one for every hour and quarter-hour. I was wasting So. Much.Time. scrolling through my alarms.

At New Year’s I hit the delete button.

Welcome to my new life hack — a “Zero Saved Alarm” policy.

Photo credit: Alexander Schimmeck on Unsplash