A great many people have come up to me and asked me how I manage to get so
much work done and still keep looking so dissipated. Hundreds of thousands
of people throughout the country are wondering how I have time to do all my
painting, engineering, writing and philanthropic work when, according to the
get out ofrotogravure sections and society notes, I spend all my time riding to
hounds, going to fancy-dress balls disguised as Louis XIV, or spelling out
GREETINGS TO CALIFORNIA in formation with three thousand Los Angeles school
children. "All work and all play," they say.
The secret of my incredible energy and efficiency in getting work done is a
simple one. I have based it very deliberately on a well-known psychological
principle and have refined it so that it is now almost too refined. I shall
have to begin coarsening it up again pretty soon.
The psychological principle is this: anyone can do any amount of work,
provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be doing at that moment.
Let us see how this works out in practice. Let us say that I have five
things which have to be done before the end of the week: (1) a basketful of
letters to be answered, some of them dating from October, 1928 (2) some
bookshelves to be put up and arranged with books (3) a hair-cut to get (4) a
pile of scientific magazines to go through and clip (I am collecting all
references to tropical fish that I can find, with the idea of someday buying
myself one) and (5) an article to write for this paper.
Now. With these five tasks staring me in the face on Monday morning, it is
little wonder that I go right back to bed as soon as I have had breakfast,
in order to store up health and strength for the almost superhuman
expenditure of energy that is to come.  Mens sana in corpore sano is my
motto.
As I lie in bed on Monday morning storing up strength, I make out a
schedule. "What do I have to do first?"  I ask myself. Well, those letters
really should be answered and the pile of scientific magazines should be
clipped. And here is where my secret process comes in. Instead of putting
them first on the list, I put them last. I say: "First you must write that
article for the newspaper." I sometimes go so far in this self-deception as
to make out a list in pencil, with "No. 1. Newspaper article" underlined in
red. (The underlining in red is rather difficult, as there is never a red
pencil on the table beside the bed, unless I have taken one to bed with me
on Sunday night.)
I then seat myself at my desk with my typewriter before me and sharpen five
pencils. (The sharp pencils are for poking holes in the desk-blotter, and a
pencil has to be pretty sharp to do that. I find that I can't get more than
six holes out of one pencil.) Following this I say to myself "Now, old man!
Get at this article!"
Gradually the scheme begins to work. My eye catches the pile of magazines,
which I have artfully placed on a near-by table beforehand. I write my name
and address at the top of the sheet of paper in the typewriter and then sink
back. The magazines being within reach, I look to see if anyone is watching
me and get one off the top of the pile.  Hello, what's this! In the very
first one is an article by Dr. William Beebe, illustrated by horrifying
photographs! Pushing my chair away from my desk, I am soon hard at work
clipping.
One of the interesting things about the Argyopelius, or "Silver Hatchet"
fish, I find, is that it has eyes in its wrists. I would have been
sufficiently surprised just to find out that a fish had wrists, but to learn
that it has eyes in them is a discovery so astounding that I am hardly able
to cut out the picture.
Thus, before the afternoon is half over, I have gone through the scientific
magazines and have a neat pile of clippings (including one of a Viper Fish
which I wish you could see. You would die laughing). Then it is back to the
grind of the newspaper article.
This time I get as far as the title, which I write down with considerable
satisfaction until I find that I have misspelled one word terribly, so that
the whole sheet of paper has to come out and a fresh one be inserted. As I
am doing this, my eye catches the basket of letters.
Now, if there is one thing that I hate to do (and there is, you may be sure)

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