Interesting, Boring, Automation

I have been building my productivity system for over a year, and only now have I found this simple loop. Through tens of good habits and the rejection of tens of addictions, I have started seeing it.

Interesting: you start something – for example, morning exercises – and it's interesting because you feel something new, learning new moves and your own reactions. Awesome.

Boring: after a few days or weeks, it becomes boring. The novelty is gone. Time to drop it. Or, because we are great, add something new to our exercises and feel these awesome feelings again. Do we have other options?

Automation: don't change anything and just continue. It will be so boring, even for your body. Sometimes it's even painful. The same action again and again literally burns into your brain. Boredom dissolves. Feelings dissolve. Only the automation stays. Yes, it's a habit. The real habit is born exactly here. You don't need any attention for it anymore, any focus or energy. The simplest path now is just doing. You need energy only to destroy this habit.

It works in reverse too. You have an automation and you decide to destroy it. What will happen? Boredom, of course – like a wall between interesting and automation. So boring. But I guess here we have a hack: add something interesting to this shift.

Why do I call it a loop and not a line? Because automation gives you freed attention, and it pushes you to do something... interesting – and repeat this loop again. Now I am close to the art of controlling this freed attention to solve the exact problems I choose. I stopped choosing random habits and random automations in my life. But about that, I will write next time.

Three years ago I started journaling. I wrote down all my ideas, thoughts, and feelings in Obsidian. It was interesting. Then boredom came. I kept going again and again and started seeing a structure. I wondered: can I build a system? I have been building my schedule for over a year. In this schedule, I have a slot for content creation, and every time it starts, I feel boredom. I wrote this note during one of my daily tasks.

I close all the tasks I plan for each day – it's automated and the public reports prove it. Not 80%. Not most days. Every single task, every single day. If you think that's impossible, check the reports.