Source https://zenhabits.net/haiku/
By Leo Babauta
A decade ago, I wrote about “Haiku Productivity” and how limits can make us more productive, more focused, and better able to prioritize and simplify.
The idea comes from haiku poetry, in which the poet is limited to three lines and (essentially) 17 syllables. Such a crazy limit, and yet the poetry that can be produced is often very powerful.
The secret: the poet is forced to choose, forced to simplify, forced to find the essence of the message. The constraints are actually a very powerful thing, because constraints force you to be disciplined, to understand that because you have limits, every element in the container must be important, and you can’t just waste words.
Over the years, I would often lose sight of this wisdom, but I keep coming back to it: when a container is unlimited, you’ll just fill it with anything. When you have constraints, you’ll be more careful, be more appreciative of the limited space you have, and explore what’s important to you in more depth.
This applies to every area of life, including:
- Productive time: If you have a long list of things to do, and the entire work week to do them, it doesn’t feel that urgent, and you often fill your days with little things — answering emails, messages, group chats, or reading things online. But what if you only had an hour a day, and y…
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