4,000 weeks
Use them or lose them – you choose!
Yesterday I was introduced to the idea of “4,000 weeks”.
It’s simple enough to intuit that this is the lifespan of an average human – I just hadn’t thought about our lives in weeks before.
Last week, for instance, I passed my unrestricted motorbike license in the UK. Before last Monday, I hadn't been on anything bigger than a 155cc scooter in Thailand. By Friday lunchtime, an examiner in Darlington thought I handled an 850cc touring bike well enough to take on the British roads and all their wonders.
I’m 33 and four months old. That’s 1,739 weeks down, 2,261 to go – and the crux of this week’s newsletter: I’ve either got more than enough time to achieve everything I set out to, or nowhere near enough.
The truth for me feels somewhere between the two, and the reality is I’ve wasted time on shite and banality and I’ve becomes much less tolerant of others' time wasting. If you read last week’s newsletter, you’ll recognise my want to maximise the weeks ahead of me, and in part that’ll come from saying “no” more often than “yes”.
Commit to what excites you
Entrepeneur and esteemed productivity bro Naval Ravikant doesn’t go to weddings. Nor does he promise to do things he’s not passionate about – even if it means saying no to people who conventionally might expect his presence. This approach leaves him with the time and space to say yes to things that truly matter to him. In their recent discussion, Chris Williamson described this as “fuck you energy” – but I don’t think it’s quite that.
Humans are inherently selfish – it’s probably rooted in survival. But there’s a difference between being rude and being sincere – you can be one without the other. I don’t get the impression that Ravikant’s a dick. His approach is brisk, sure, but not necessarily brusque.
Think of it like this: how many times have you invited your mates to something you really enjoy, and they just haven’t got it? Whether it’s a film, a gig, a restaurant, or just a stomp around your favourite park. How did that make you feel?
As someone with close to a hundred open mic nights under their belt as a performer and host, I always appreciated my friends showing up for me but I didn’t need them there for me to enjoy the evening. In fact, seeing how bored they looked during other peoples’ sets (and how bored many later confessed they were) I’d have rather just met them at the pub afterwards. I’m secure enough to know that their friendship transcended an event I was going to do anyway.
Look, I’ve been that person saying yes out of obligation – going to things that didn’t light me up because I thought I should. Or because I thought they’d be upset if I wasn’t there. But when those same people kept turning up two hours late to things, I got bored of their overpromising and underdelivering.
Can you see what I’m driving at? I’m more inclined to say no if it doesn’t genuinely fit and I’m not going to invite people to things who have a track record of letting me down. When my best mate gets married, I’m there – and I’m on time. When it’s someone I barely know? I’m not leaving the house, and I’ll politely decline without justifying it.
Brunch was the start of this
I’d never been to a bottomless brunch before I lived in London and I was genuinely excited to meet my girlfriend at the time’s mates. And it was utter shite. Afterwards, I said, “I think your friends are great, but honestly, I’d rather play a board game or go for a walk with them next time than spend money on finger food and watered down drinks.”
Sadly, she took that to mean I didn’t want to see her mates again – which was the first nail in the coffin of our relationship – but the truth was as simple as I’d stated it: I didn’t want to do that again.
And she kept going to those brunches and kept complaining about them – the price, the quality, the noise – “you couldn’t really hear each other”. As auld John Lennon averred, time’s not wasted if it’s enjoyed, and yet I likely had the better afternoon by opting out.
Are you just going through the motions?
Looking around the gym, I see a lot of people just moving for the sake of moving. They’re doing three sets of 10 on machines, barely breaking a sweat, not progressing session to session or week to week.
Some movement is better than none, sure, and there are documented benefits to exercising with and among other people. But if the average person gets 4,000 weeks on this earth, why wouldn’t you invest the time you’re already spending in the gym into learning good technique so you can extend your lifespan and/or improve the quality of it?
A lat pulldown benefits from you contracting your lats…
As a qualified strength and conditioning coach, when I observe many people doing something the same (wrong) way, I recognise it’s not just a technique problem. It’s copying.
People mirror what they see around them for a number of reasons. One of those could be a survival thing – avoiding poisonous foods, finding effective places to shelter, learning to start a fire and so on. Another sometimes more insidious reason is the fear of making a mistake – and yet just because everyone’s doing it badly, doesn’t make it right.
In my local leisure centre gym, for instance, I’ve counted over 10 different people with the same technique on the pulldown machine. Basically, what should look like a pull-up except you bring the bar to your chest from a seated position rather than your body to the bar looks, across the board, like the advanced form of a pull-up, known as a muscle-up. They’re leaned all the way back, rotating through their shoulders to bring the bar to their faces and then tricep pressing the bar below their chests.
From jogging with your heels flaying out to the side, or needlessly speedy reps with whatever amount of weight they can find, people are hesitant to question form, even if it doesn’t feel good. They don’t want to stand out. And their peers either don’t have the knowledge or gumption to call them out, so nothing changes and everyone hurtles towards less than what they’re capable of.
It’s alright to not know something, but it’s not alright to keep doing it if it doesn’t feel right. You’d be far better going for an hour-long walk than half-arsing or completely fucking up exercises and injuring yourself. If something doesn’t feel positive, comfortable, or worthwhile, why not question it? Why not ask a PT in the gym if your technique is correct? Or if that feels daunting, look the exercise up on YouTube and check out the top five videos – if they’re all saying the same thing, that’s likely closer to the approach to take and could help your lats to grow bigger and stronger in 10 weeks rather than stay the same for a lifetime.
Flow state: doing it well, not just doing it
Time expands and it contracts – you either know this or have felt it, I guarantee it.
Whether it’s in conversation or a game you’re playing or a project you’re working on, there’s a massive difference between being into it and being bored by it – usually perceived in how time seems to “fly” or “drag”.
“Flow” or “flow state” as it’s understood in psychology and well represented in mainstream culture is that sweet spot where challenge meets skill – where you’re occasionally out of your depth but engaged enough to stay in it – that perfect mix of stress, anxiety, enjoyment, knowledge, capacity to improve – not just going through the motions. And it’s hard to reach that if you’re just repeating the same unchallenging routine over and over.
4,000 weeks might sound like forever – or feel painfully short. Either way, it’s enough time to get really good at a handful of things. So why not push to understand a bit more, or be 1% better each time?
Just like those muscles, time’s something that we all have and something we can all lose. Look, I appreciate that not everyone is wired for constant growth – heck, it’s exhausting chasing it and knowing people who are!
But what if, instead of just filling the time, we actively chose what to fill it with? Whether it’s fitness, work, or relationships, being intentional with those seconds minutes and hours – even if that means choosing to do nothing – could mean the difference between a life just lived and a life better spent.
"Passing’s only the start", Uncle Jason chuckled as I asked him about his time riding bikes before sitting my theory test, "the real learning happens when it’s just you and the bike".
One intense week of my life to scratch the surface of riding and maybe a thousand weeks to master it – that sounds like an eternity I can’t wait to fill.
Enjoyed this newsletter? Drop me a like, leave a comment or send me a DM on socials @coachjackmann
Much love, and I’ll see yas in the next one
Jack x