Productivity is up 2%

Diary entry

I bought a weighted vest two weeks ago and have been taking long walks with it, slowly climbing hills in San Francisco and following winding paths through The Presidio. It felt impossibly heavy inside the box when it arrived—I could barely lift it. But once I put it on, I loved the pressure. There was a strange satisfaction in the weight; it gave my body something to push against in my simple ritual of walking through my neighborhood. I had to focus on my posture and core. I got breathless after ten minutes. I felt the strain in my right foot. I thought to myself: I’m glad I’m not 25 pounds heavier. And after a long walk, the reward was relief when I took it off.

This will be a new coping skill, I told myself.

When I’m not wearing it, the vest sleeps on a chair in my entryway, slumped like a dog with many folds.

You get so used to yourself that sometimes you don’t have new revelations until you reach a breaking point. I’ve been working for 21 straight days—it’s just one of those seasons. Most days, I stay focused until late into the evening; most weekends, I put in a few hours to set myself up for success on Monday. I know this season is temporary.

Overworking gives me a sense of control, and I’d rather do that than feel adrift. I knew this intensely busy stretch was cresting—just one or two more weeks at this pace, and I could return to homeostasis and find a new rhythm.

At the height of a focused workday, I read a study that reviewed hundreds of workplaces: on average, workdays now end at 4:29 p.m., more people are working weekends, and productivity is up 2%. I laughed.

Today, I am writing in HI-NRG, and it feels good to be back in my fiction and reflections. It feels like a reprieve, a signal that things are beginning to normalize.

But this past Wednesday, I was pacing my neighborhood, sending a voice memo to a friend—an update on my life: work, work, work, and the weighted vest. And so simply, I was able to articulate why I love it:

The weighted vest gives me a physical sensation of the mental pressure I often feel. And it’s satisfying to work through that pressure.

I stopped in my tracks.

I’ve become so familiar with myself that I forget how my mind works—strangely, intensely, constantly moving the goalpost. I recently told someone that the best mental hack for pushing yourself to new limits is to believe you’re always in second place—that you’re almost where you want to be. As it turns out, when you approach goals this way, you often exceed your own expectations.

And that tells me everything about my self-belief.

There’s a twisted paradox to not-enoughness—it fuels hyper-independence and hyper-competence, where doing more and more leaves you at a perennial third base. Whether conscious or unconscious, I overwork, overgive, over everything. I set high expectations and like it that way. But this mindset also leads to disappointment and disillusionment.

When I reach the goalpost, the goalpost moves. Accomplishment and productivity can feel like progress and momentum, but there are rare moments when only self-compassion can release the pressure.

I have a bad habit of taking on too much responsibility, believing that a mistake or miscalculation equals failure. Worse still, when someone mistreats me, I rack my brain, wondering why. Then, I turn their mistreatment into my burden—when, in truth, it has nothing to do with me. It only reflects their limitations and character defects.

The Psych 101 textbook, yellowing in my mind, would state it plainly: You benefit from the bad habit of feeling "not good enough." Because it’s familiar, and it reinforces the belief you still carry.

Here’s what I mean:

Not-enoughness → Hyper-independence as a defense mechanism → Hyper-competence → High expectations → Perfectionism → Not meeting unrealistic expectations → Not-enoughness.

And the cycle continues.

I don’t fully identify with this cycle when I write about it. Who is this? This is the cycle of ugliness I want to divorce from myself. It’s easier to intellectualize than to feel it—to recognize that I need a renovation of self-belief and to let go of this mental loop.

Years ago, deep in grief over a breakup, I told my sister how much I felt like I had failed. That the end of a relationship must mean something was wrong with me. Her response was freeing:

"You deserve self-mercy."

I didn’t know that was an option. I am relentless. I never let up on myself.

In 2018, I was brushing a horse in Sedona when a woman with long gray hair told me:

"Discipline isn’t about being punitive. Discipline is being a disciple unto yourself—knowing yourself and your path and following your vision. To always return to what is meant for you."

So this week, walking in my weighted vest, desperate for a release valve, I asked myself:

Can it be this easy? Can I just drop what doesn’t serve me at the side of the rode and ride off into the sunset?

I asked my acupuncturist.

Essentially, yes—you can. But it starts with one brave and honest question:

Who do you believe yourself to be? And who do you want to believe yourself to be?

Self-belief ultimately shapes identity. This idea stems from psycho-cybernetics, a concept coined by Maxwell Maltz—whose work has since informed some of today’s self-help gurus (slight groan). However, the principles are rooted in cognitive behavioral therapy and the mind-body connection.

This is all to say: I’m exploring new ways to foster a new self-belief that aligns with and propels me toward my dreams. I feel like I’m very close. But I still have some blocks, some familiar saboteurs—seasonal feelings of second place, the belief that losing weight must always be hard, that success comes from grinding, and I’m so good at grinding.

But what if I believed all my dreams were inevitable? That where I apply my focus and energy could be easy, valuable, and even a joy. That my self-belief could align with my dreams? That I could release the pressure.

As the week’s intensity culminated on Wednesday, I worked from home. It was a gray day—rain came and went until just about 5 p.m. I took a break from my computer to do some evening chores: taking out the trash, starting a load of laundry, and changing into my weighted vest for a walk.

I was standing in my dining room when suddenly, the gray clouds tore apart. A blinding sun blared through my bay windows, burning my eyes.

Maybe I had forgotten what light looked like after the recent time change. Maybe I was reacquainting myself with spring. Or maybe this really was the brightest sun I had ever seen. I could feel its heat beaming directly toward me.

I stepped outside. The sun blasted down Clement Street. I’ll never forget the luminance, the raw light. It honestly felt like the sun was attacking me in particular.

Later that evening, I called my mom, recounting the mounting pressure I’d been putting on myself. Then I mentioned the aggressive sun—how I had never seen anything like it. (see below)

Without missing a beat, she said, “Maybe God was telling you to lighten up?” What if it was that easy—to be open to this new belief and let all my light flood the room.