Delete Your Backlog

Delete your backlog. Unread books, unplayed games, unwritten essays, unwatched movies. They are all cognitive weight. You will experience an incredible lightness with them gone.

Most critically, you will suddenly be more receptive to new ideas than you knew was possible. Your mind will be completely clear of a previously unrecognized invisible burden. You will feel an exhilarating sensation of intellectual freedom.

I first encountered this idea reading Marie Kondo’s book. She advises you to get rid of all unread books. It was difficult, but when I did, I felt a shocking openness—shocking because it had been impossible to perceive that I had been closed before.

Try this if you can muster up the courage. Do it for your easiest category, the one to which you are least attached.⁰¹

As usual, James Somers’ rule on giving yourself advice applies:

… anyone writing a blog post advising against X is himself the worst Xer there is.

— James Somers: Speed matters

I’ve burdened myself with an essay backlog since at least 2020, likely way earlier. I’m starting a renewed attempt to the coward’s approach to deleting the backlog: racing through it as fast as possible.