An honest reflection on how I (don’t) Consume Content
UP: Knowledge Ecosystem
tags: [content consumption, self-awareness, productivity traps, digital minimalism]
status: 🌲evergreen
Welcome to my library of great intent and unread words. My content consumption isn’t just a habit — it’s a lifestyle, a religion, a never-ending parade of tabs, playlists, unread articles, and half-watched (Jason Bateman) pilots. If attention were money, I’d be bankrupt, living off a loan from the ghost of good intentions.
Books are bought, podcasts are downloaded, apps are installed… and then slowly buried under the weight of nostalgia and 1st party apps.
This isn’t a system for learning. It’s a performance art piece in procrastination.
🧠 Strategization to Avoid Consumption
Most people just read a book or watch a show. Me? I build a system.
I track everything in Notion, create custom tags, build taxonomies, and sync it all with Readwise. I’ve turned consuming a podcast into a workflow. But the joke’s on me — I spend more time setting up how to consume the thing than actually doing it or feel bad for not.
This isn’t “tracking,” it’s productivity cosplay.
Systematize Consumption Instead of Doing It:
- Most people consume content.
- I build a custom content-tracking architecture in Notion, tag it with Brainstorming (e.g. KLOs), sync it to Readwise, and log it in my next solo sprint cycle.
Problem? I rarely start anything. The system is more satisfying than the substance. Productivity setups that simulate progress without delivering outcomes.
🕳️ My Digital Landfill
Want to know what happens to content once it enters my “Watch Later” list? So do I.
I treat YouTube like TiVo — toss something in with the hope I’ll come back to it, fully restored, when I’m “in the right headspace.”
I’m never in the right headspace.
I use it like a deep freezer for ideas I don’t want to forget, yet never thaw out.
Content isn’t getting consumed — it’s being preserved.
⭐ Antipattern: Archiving everything to avoid the fear of missing out, while still missing everything.
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📚 Book Collector, Not Reader
“I have come to the conclusion that buying books and reading them are actually two entirely different hobbies.”
tweet by @theartsyreader1, posted on July 11, 2019:
Reading list? Try word warehouse. I collect books like my text messaging outbox— unique, full of promise, and mostly unread. Every few weeks, I decide that this time I’ll finally stick to my syllabus, “No self-help in 2025?” Bold. Too bad I’ve already read five summaries of Atomic Habits this month instead of opening the one new book that might actually change my mind.
But hey, I did highlight something meaningful in Readwise… three months ago.
I create syllabi. I buy the books. I even tag them “life-changing.” But they mostly gather digital dust.
Insight: Collecting isn’t learning. Curating a library doesn’t make me wiser — reading with action does.
“It is better to reread a great book than waste time on a mediocre one.”
— Unknown
🎮 Planning to Play Is My Favorite Game
I want to relax, strategically; there’s a fantasy version of me who plays Civilization VI to sharpen his mind, gets emotionally wrecked by Switchback VR, and revisits PS2 classics with nostalgic glee.
In reality, I spend 30 minutes pairing a controller to my iPad, get distracted by a new productivity app, and somehow end up shopping for a Pokédex app.
🧩 Pattern: Aspirational hobbies become totems of identity more than things I actually engage in.
🎧 Podcasts: Background Noise to Ambition
Every podcast I queue up has a purpose: learn dairy strategy, optimize my brain, or understand why Jim Ross still matters.
But once I hit play? Suddenly I’m vacuuming, creating 14 reminders, and wondering why I didn’t retain a single word. “Must have been shite,”I say ¯_(ツ)/¯” and move on. Listening is just a sound to me, not something I actively do.
It’s noise ― I listen passively, hoping osmosis will kick in.
Reality check: Multi-tasking kills insight. Listening (and doing everything) intentionally is the only kind that counts.
🧪 Apps Are My Playground — and My Poison
I treat new apps like magic spells. One will surely fix me.
I download tools to make me more productive, which I then forget about… until I need a new tool to remind me to use the first one.
- One to summarize.
- One to log the summaries.
- One to remind me to log the summaries.
Raycast is broken? Who cares. I’ll just replace it with five other apps I won’t fully learn.
By the time I’m done testing features, I’ve found a reason why “this will never work”.
a good plumber I have a good hammer, but a good hammer doesn’t make a plumber good
👌 Signal: I use tool exploration to avoid confronting the hard work of output.
⚠️ Final Diagnosis: Chronic Intellectual Hoarding
I am a content maximalist. I want to read like a monk, game like a teenager, and learn like an entrapaneur — all while operating under the illusion that setting up the system is the work/life balance I create..
I don’t have a an overwhelming backlog problem. I have a commitment problem.
“Never make fun of someone if they mispronounce a word — it means they learned it by reading.”
Source:
Yeah? Well never make fun of someone who has a thousand bookmarks.
It means they meant well. My Knowledge Ecosystem is only valuable when it’s harvested, not just planted.
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🧾 Takeaway
- 🔄 Weekly content review: What did I actually consume?
- 🧹 backlog pruning: If I haven’t touched it in 90 days, archive or delete.
- 🎯 Apply before adding: New content must serve an active project or question.
- ✍️ Publish insights, not intentions.
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Now excuse me while I add this article… to my “To Reread Later” list.