Preplanned meals can make you Money

But first, let's get some clarity in our thinking.

Sep 25, 2021

“Your weight is a lagging measure of your eating habits. Your knowledge is a lagging measure of your learning habits. Your clutter is a lagging measure of your cleaning habits. You get what you repeat.” - James Clear

If you are familiar with Cal Newport’s work, then you would have heard about his bestseller book ‘Deep Work’. The entire premise of the book rests on a simple formula i.e. High-Quality Work = (Time Spent) * (Intensity of Focus). It’s a simple one and you definitely has an understanding of what quality work looks like.

For an aspiring business analyst, quality work would mean an in-depth analysis of the industry, the business, management, and valuations. For a social media influencer, it would mean creating lots of content that educates, entertains, or inspires their audience. For a teacher, it would mean educating the students in the most effective manner possible that allows them to crack exams with flying colors.

‘High-quality work’ is an aspirational standard you want to elevate your game to. It holds you in awe when you see others operating in that zone. It may be difficult to exactly define it but you know it when you see it. This element makes up the dependent variable in the equation above.

As for the independent variables, most people have concerns with both i.e. they struggle to invest time in the requisite activity or they struggle with the umpteen distractions that throw them off their intentions to do deep work. And because our peers and society believe in the utility of motivation and willpower, you too might get seduced into this narrative and hence land up failing miserably.

Just in case you’d like to test this hypothesis, you can try stuffing your kitchen with your favorite ice cream, soft drinks, crackers, and chocolates. Once you have surrounded yourself with the goodies that you so crave, now try to use motivation and willpower for staying away from them. You will hold on for some time but in moments of hunger, your willpower will slowly fizzle away, leaving your commitment to healthy living looking like a no fizz-coke bottle.

And hence, you would do yourself a huge service if you depended upon systems, instead of motivation of any kind. Systems refer to automating or scheduling activities in a manner that your subjective opinion or state of mind isn’t influencing the work that needs to be done.

For example, we do not keep soft drinks/ice creams/fruit juices/chocolate bars at home. Since it’s never bought, it’s hardly ever consumed since none of us will go from our 40th-floor apartment to the supermarket on the ground floor to satisfy our craving. Since that ain’t happening, we will land up cooking a healthier option or munch on a vegetable salad or avocado or some nuts, which are always at home.

Another example is our intention to contribute to charitable causes. We feel the moral obligation to do so but unless automated, it may or may not happen on regular basis. In my case, 10% of all my income, from any source, gets sent to my MAD (Making a Difference) A/c with ADCB. In the last 3 years, a lot has been accumulated in this account and used for various causes globally. Since it’s been automatic, it doesn’t pinch while saving up for these causes, and it feels good to have resources at hand for helping someone out.

These systems are very simple in their nature but very effective in their execution. Just requires one to take away the human OS out of the equation, as much as possible.

“You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.” - James Clear

But to create systems, you need to get a grip on the concept of Time, which is a very fleeting phenomenon. Before you point at the present moment, it’s already become the past. You allocate certain hours for a particular activity, but it lands up occupying more than the time allotted. You chalk out goals and timelines but these goals do not come true as planned, and hence the goals get dragged on for months and years post the intended timeline.

In our busy modern lifestyles, time management is the key to getting stuff done. As cliched as it sounds, it is the truth. You don’t need to read umpteen books on this subject nor can you increase your day to have 25+ hours. What you do need to get clarity on what is important and what is critical.

I would define those things ‘important’ that fulfill your goals or make your desired future possible for you. ‘Living till 100 with vitality and good health’ is one of my desired futures. As for where I eat and what I eat, are means to an end, not an end in itself. This is as simple as it gets. If you don’t wrap your head around this concept, many of your important goals are going to be left unattended and eventually given up on. The critical things will get managed but you will still feel empty from not achieving what you truly desire. Few examples -

Just imagine spending 10 minutes every day deciding what to eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Looks very small and it is if seen in isolation. But if you account for 365 days of the year, this turns out to be 10 mins * 365 days = 3650 mins i.e. approx. 61 hours = 2.5 days in the whole year.

That’s a lot of time gone into thinking about critical things (what to eat/from where to eat) that are needed to fulfill your important goal of Eating Well. 61 hours in a year could finish you -

- 10 books (assuming 6 hours of reading time on audible for each book)

- 3 online courses (assuming 20 hours for completion)

- 40 productive meetings with professionals in the same industry (assuming 1.5 hrs for each)

- additional time spent with family or at work

Add to the mix, the benefits of not having drained your energy on deciding these critical but trivial matters on daily basis. Just ask yourself ‘does spending 10 minutes every day on deciding where to eat inspire me and uplift my mood?’ If not, then you are doing it wrong. Instead of using your time on activities that uplift and energize you or help you learn or produce quality output, you are letting time slip into activities that can be avoided or automated.

I took this pic early morning today to share with you. It’s been my daily breakfast for the last 4 years. It’s a Protein shake loaded with essential nutrients i.e. blueberries, strawberries, coconut milk, peanut butter, chia seeds, flax seeds, sunflower seeds, cinnamon, and whey protein. I have it at 5:30 in the morning and that takes care of me till 9:30. I feel satiated, focussed, and energetic till my next meal. Even that is predetermined with my cook i.e. Egg Burji or Omelet, alternating for 6 days of the week that he comes to cook. When he isn’t coming, I will boil eggs and enjoy them around the same time.

Even the lunch is packed for me at my gym around 7:45 am, which I reheat at work around 1:30 pm and enjoy. Kcal in Dubai does a fantastic job of their meal options and I enjoy the dishes immensely. I have a choice of 4-5 options to choose from, and I stick to one of these on a daily basis.

Some of you may think that this is a very regimented lifestyle, but to me, it frees up my time for things that matter to me the most. Not having to spend time on what to eat, not having to wait for the food to be delivered by Zomato, not having to travel to a restaurant/cafe provides me the freedom to use my time for producing quality work, building long term relationships, learnings skills to upgrade myself or creating memories with my family.

This incremental and judicious use of time goes a long way in your ability to invest your energy and resources on things that matter most. If you were to depend on your willpower on a daily basis and spend time on these critical things, it gets tiring after some time and drains your mental faculties. Maybe if you were to attempt the calculation provided above for all critical things mentioned in the table, it might just shock you with the realization that you are wasting days and weeks every year just thinking about stuff that doesn’t matter in the long term.

It’s not a surprise that Steve Jobs was seen in a black turtleneck almost always and Mark Zuckerberg is seen in his grey T-shirt. This just saves them time to ‘decide what to wear/why to wear/where to wear?’. Warren Buffet eats the same McDonald’s meal on a daily basis. It ain’t just about creating extra hours, it’s mainly about avoiding mental fatigue that 1000 small decisions in a day can create. This just creates enough physical and mental space to take on work that matters.

One also needs to realize the time of the day where one operates at peak capacity i.e. when you are most energetic and your brain is firing on all cylinders. For me, it’s from 4 am to 8 am. This is my zone and this is how I was always wired, but it took me 38 years to discover this. It’s only during my CFA preparation, that I started using my mornings for studying and I could sense that I am retaining more of the content I studied in the morning compared to the one in the evenings.

For the last 3 years, I have guarded this zone with zeal. That required me to cut down my social activities at night and crash early. And that led me to sleeping between 8 and 9 pm max. This meant no late-night movies, parties, get-togethers, networking, or binge-watching Netflix. Did I miss much in the last 3 years, not exactly. But did I gain much in this same time, yes I did, way more than the small price I had to pay.

Today, I have friends who have accommodated my schedule and take time out to meet in the mornings, afternoons, or early evenings. My family supports me in keeping my schedule and does not let things come in the way of my routine. My wife also feels the energy and vitality I bring to the conversations if I have slept well and used my morning well. My colleagues sometimes state that I am wired all wrong but they too can sense the urgency and professionalism that I bring to my work.

“Clarity about what matters provides clarity about what does not.” - Cal Newport

We can’t automate or schedule everything in life, but we can and should automate and schedule as many things as possible. My workouts are scheduled before I reach the office and hence it gets managed, 6 days a week. My blogs are scheduled for deep work on Friday evenings and Saturday mornings. I may look available but I am not, as I am typing on my keypad till the post is ready to be shipped. I won’t take any assignments or meetings in this period. Our podcasts are scheduled for recording on Wednesday evenings and the editing is outsourced to a freelancer in the USA.

Many things become possible when you free up your time and say “NO” to most things that don’t serve your long-term goals. Some things like attending a social dinner, reminding government officials to get the work done, following up on pending requests, handling manual errors committed by others, and many such cases are examples of nuisance or hassle you will need to entertain. We can’t have a Zero-Friction life, as that would be a utopian scenario.

What we surely can do, is eliminate as much as possible so that it creates room for a lot more to get done, “a lot more” of the stuff that matters for your long-term goals. So if preplanned meals allow you to focus on your goals or for creating quality output, by all means, go for it. It will cost you money, but it will serve you well.

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