Edition #27: The Morning Momentum Myth

The Velocity Trap

Silicon Valley sold everyone on "move fast and break things," which works great if you're disrupting payment systems but terrible if you're trying to build a meaningful life.

Speed amplifies whatever direction you're already headed. Point yourself toward something worthwhile, and momentum is rocket fuel. Point yourself toward busywork, and momentum just gets you to burnout faster.

The question isn't "How do I move faster?" It's "Am I even facing the right way?"

The Fake Productivity Epidemic

Your calendar is full. Your to-do list is color-coded. You're "crushing it" in three different Slack channels. You're also completely exhausted and can't remember the last time you finished something that actually mattered.

Welcome to the productivity theater, all performance, no progress.

The intervention: Scan your day for tasks that make you feel busy but don't move anything meaningful forward. The status meetings that could be emails. The reports nobody reads. The "quick syncs" that solve nothing.

Kill one. Today. You'll be shocked how much nobody notices and how much energy you suddenly have for real work.

End-of-day ritual: Don't make another to-do list. Choose one goal for tomorrow. Singular. If you accomplish nothing else, what would make tomorrow worth showing up for?

Derek Sivers' Clarity Protocol

The guy who built CD Baby and then sold it for millions starts every morning with brutal simplicity.

His one-question journal: "What's the next right move?"

Not ten moves. Not a strategic roadmap. Just the immediate next step that's worth taking.

Then he does that thing. Everything else waits.

The genius: He's not trying to optimize his entire day. He's trying to make sure his first move is pointed toward something real. The rest tends to sort itself out.

The Direction-first Framework

Think of your morning like aiming a rifle. You can pull the trigger as fast as you want, but if you never aimed properly, you're just making noise and wasting ammunition.

Aim first:

• Two minutes of silence to let your brain remember what matters

• One clear target for the day

• Permission to ignore everything that isn't that

Then fire:

• Once you know where you're pointed, go hard

• Speed and focus together are unstoppable

• But focus without speed is daydreaming, and speed without focus is chaos

Your Direction Experiment

This morning: Before you check anything, sit for two minutes and ask yourself what actually matters today. Write down one answer.

This week: Notice how much easier it is to say no to distractions when you're clear on what you're saying yes to.

Long-term: Build the habit of calibration before acceleration. Aim, then move. Every time.