The Power of Digging

In this post, I want to go over two types of people; architects, and archaeologists.

No, I’m not referring to the actual professions. Someone who likes to dig around for buried treasure is perfectly capable of being an architect. Likewise, a person whose day job is to design and create technical drawings may just be the biggest archaeologist of them all.

Read on, and you’ll see what I mean.

The Architect

The Architect is someone who plans out every single step of their journey in advance.

I’m not just talking about car journeys or bike rides. I mean the journey of life, as a whole.

They know what their niche is. They have GPS coordinates for where they want to end up, and an ETA for how long that will take.

Each day of their week is meticulously planned and with work meetings, hair appointments and even exact mealtimes scheduled way in advance.

Of course, this way of life has its perks. Some of the world’s most ‘successful’ people are known to display traits akin to hardline architects. The CEO of Apple, Tim Cook, wakes up at 3:45 AM each day and proceeds to make every second count.

Elon Musk has a routine based on ‘time blocking’. His day is split up into many pre-planned chunks of time whereby he bounds from one commitment to another – every task is executed to perfection, might I add.

There can be little doubt that the architect method can be awesome when it comes to the classic productivity mindset. But is it for everyone? And if not, is there another way to go about it?

 The Archaeologist

The archetypical archaeologist adopts the complete opposite approach. Here we have someone who does not plan out everything ahead of time – in fact, they actively avoid doing so wherever possible.

They do not have a clear path, goal or destination that they would like to arrive at in a certain amount of time. And they most certainly don’t have anything close to resembling a niche – at least, not to start with.

An Archaeologist’s superpower is that they’re always digging for inspiration – chipping away at potential goldmines and waiting to uncover trinkets, treasure troves and other prized objects. Each big discovery is a tentative step in the direction they want to go in.

They don’t waste time with pre-laid out plans; that method would simply not work for them, even if they tried. Instead, each dawn brings a new day of exploration. Over the course of a year, they might unearth 100 objects, but out of those maybe only 30 will really mean something. and out of those 30, perhaps 10 will be the most valuable of them all.

Through the process of elimination -narrowing down their options, refining their passions from a wide array of input data, this will inevitably lead them to find a rut in which they can truly lose themselves. They find a niche in which they can burn with passion.

Downsides of being an Architect

The downsides of being an architect might mean that you set out too early on what potentially may be the wrong path for you.

In his bestselling book, Range, David Epstein makes the compelling case that those who tend to remain generalists for as long as possible end up finding more success when they eventually specialise as opposed to if they were ‘dead set’ on something from a young age.

This is not intended to dishearten people who’ve ‘always knowing what they want to do’, rather it serves as a reassurance for those who find themselves still searching.

Also, the lifestyle of an architect is heavily reliant – perhaps too reliant – on forward planning. Putting hour and minute hands next to every task would only be 100% efficient if the world were 100% predictable.

Oftentimes, some external force will leave a hefty dent in your prized workflow. Occasionally, you will be able to ignore some distractions provided they are really not worth your time.

However, if the matter at hand is in need of your undivided attention, you may find that simply pinning a KEEP OUT sign to your door and reaching for your best pair of noise-cancelling headphones falls rather short.

The effects of having been derailed from your schedule can range from minor to ‘immense slump where the mere idea of getting back to your desk fills you with baltic dread. Beforehand, you were bashing out work on a high. Welcome to the crash, my friend. Or, as you probably know it, burnout.

Downsides of Being an Archaeologist

The downsides of being an archaeologist are that such a method may lack a certain backbone. As you are not meticulously preening and scheduling, you have significantly less control over each moment of your time.

Some days you might not find anything of interest, some days you might not find anything at all. Trusting the process is difficult. human beings are known for their innate tendency to favour short term rewards over long term ones.

In scientific terms, this is known as Hyperbolic discounting. Hyperbolic discounting is when tasks with rewards that are further away, intangible almost, are intuitively assigned a lower value than the tasks with an almost immediate reward/feedback.

The archaeologist style can also boast somewhat negative ‘social’ connotations (if you care about that sort of thing). Society often likes to look the other way when people achieve success through a medium that did not involve them putting in the long hours everyone else had to reach that particular status.

We are very much a ‘hustle’ people – Sure, as the set of all possible ways to ‘make it big’ slowly grows, so too does acceptance for the wild and wonderful enterprises that emerge… But from a collective POV, we like things that add up. hard work + time = money + happiness. That makes sense. What does not make sense is how Bob from Ipswich earns well into the six figures yet wakes up at high noon and barely leaves his living room all day.

In our minds, couch potato ≠ millionaire. But it could. And it should.

It’s important to remember that what others might consider ‘unproductive behaviour’ may just be behaviour that is so efficient that it is practically autonomous. Herein lies a paradox; The more we can automate, the more productive we will actually be, but the more we automate the less we can actually do (so doesn’t that actually make us less productive?)

Well, unlike most paradoxes, this one can be resolved, but it requires you to take a step back from the archaic wisdom stating that productivity = output/time. That was the old model. The new model needs you to work ‘smart’ far more than it needs you to work ‘hard’.

But again, that might not be how others see it. And while the odd evil eye from your neighbour may not warrant losing any sleep, be wary of the image you are projecting onto prospective colleagues, bosses, and even friends. Living life one page at a time is fine, just don’t forget to maintain some semblance of control. Don’t become a slave to your whims

But hold on…There’s a Spectrum

That’s right. these days, it’s becoming impossible to shove anything into hard and fast categories. It’s the same here. Because similar to how you can exhibit a mixture of personality types, you also have both the Architect and Archaeologist living inside you.

You might like to keep things tidy and organised, but love to wait until the last minute to submit any pending assignments – indicating your life isn’t as orderly as you’d like to imagine.

Conversely, you might have a room where it’s impossible to determine where the wardrobe ends and the floor begins, but it just so happens that you are very particular when it comes to time.

We all have this battle raging within us. It’s not possible (or incredibly rare) to find someone who is 100% architect, or 100% archaeologist. but it’s all about which party belongs to the winning side.

Now, there are people who may argue that certain types are good for certain things; an archaeologist’s laid-back demeanour may cause them to be more welcoming towards new ideas (more creative) but an architect might just be very good at getting stuff done, and done well (productivity).

However, I wouldn’t buy into these schools of thought too much. Most experts maintain the opinion that, once you’ve surpassed a certain standard within your respective industry, creativity strikes because of that rigid schedule, not in spite of it. By force of habit, people become accustomed to doing their best work at a certain point in their day.

As Playwright W. Somerset Maugham once said, “I write only when inspiration strikes. Fortunately, it strikes every morning at 9 o’clock sharp.”

The bottom line is that it could not matter less whether you are more ‘architect’ or archaeologist’. Anyone who tells you otherwise is either lying or misinformed themselves. These things come down to a matter of choice. Our choice.

Closing Thoughts

So whether you’ve practically swallowed, digested and internalized David Allen’s Getting Things Done many times over, or are someone who is likely to run away at the mere mention of ‘itinerary’, take comfort with the knowledge that there are many other’s who share your mindset. The perks for both sides can be thoroughly immense.

If like most of us, you find yourself in the middle, this is fantastic since it means you can enjoy the best of both worlds. Please, invest in all the heavy-duty journals and calendars you want, but rest assured, you are not defined by these routines.

Be glad that all this high-maintenance efficiency can be dropped in the twinkle of an eye should you choose to pursue less pressing, yet just as important commitments.

We each have a bit of architect and archaeologist within us. And every day, we get to choose the side we’re on. Embrace whoever you are right now, and keep a memo for tomorrow.