Do the unimportant, low-priority work.

Yeah, I said it. Go ahead, cancel me.

Before you do, hear me out. We're not so different, you and I. We've both fallen prey to the evil of omni-optimization, to a cultural zeitgeist that demands we make the most of every single moment and channel it into some distributable product for our personal brand and economic output. No moment should be spared, nor should we focus on anything but the highest-leverage tasks for our time and goals.

I get it. Time is scarce. We're in a tough game. Our moments, our energy, and our focus do matter. Working on what’s most important takes priority over urgency and method.

But we're forgetting something—something very important. We're not machines. Our lives aren't math problems. We're not some algorithm that must be polished into elegant perfection.

We're spiritual animals.

We have physiological needs and metaphysical attractions that must be tended to. These human embeddings are not optional, nor are they logical. They are imperatives, directives, and parameters that guide our life path.

They do not always play nicely within the glorified café of optimization.

I feel the scarcity of time deeply, and because of that, I’ve developed an intimate, perhaps sometimes toxic, relationship with optimization. I do want to make the most of my days. I use Pomodoro techniques for my work. I try to do my most important work during my peak energy hours. I've spent time rehearsing morning routines, experimenting with different schedules, and reading more self-help literature than I'd like to admit.

Here's what I've learned: not every moment can—nor should—be optimized. The platonic ideal of a perfectly optimized life, whether expressed or implicit, is an illusion. It denies the multivariate nature of not only our circumstances but also our humanity. The beautifully color-coded calendar with one event stacked against the next betrays our need for slack, margin of error, and rest.

Not every day can be for the most important work. Sometimes, unimportant work needs tending to. If all I did was the "important" work, my home would be in a constant state of disarray—cleaning would only become important when it was taking away from my "truly" important tasks. My little errands that nag at me—copying a key to have a spare, organizing my fridge, refactoring code on a pet project, organizing my closet, planning a small trip—would escape me forever. They would never get prioritized because there would always be something more important. Hell, I would never write a blog post because it's not "important" enough.

Now, maybe that's just me, with my flaw of overvaluing music and money-making work over little errands. But I'm willing to bet I'm not alone, especially living in the Bay Area, where we learn to optimize by osmosis.

Today, on the first day of the Bahá'í Fast, where my routine has changed and my energy is limited, I decided to permit myself to do whatever I wanted. I allowed myself to do all that low-priority work—the organizing of cables, the copying of keys, the vacuuming of my car, the testing of an old iPad to see if I can make it work again. It's all unimportant, at least conceptually.

I get that we can do some mild, low-level intellectual acrobatics to justify the prioritization of these tasks in the context of my life, but let's not miss the point. Sometimes, it can feel really good to just do boring, unimportant stuff. It can be a form of rest. It's the unsexy tending of the garden of one’s life.

So here's my invitation: the next time you find yourself in a go-go-go season of life, overwhelmed by all that you have to do, ask yourself: when can I schedule a day to do unimportant work? What would I do, if anything at all?

You may find yourself enjoying all those boring, unsexy tasks when you finally get to them.