Four Thousand Weeks. Time Management for Mortals. Oliver Burkeman. Summary

This text is a shortened version of Oliver Burkman’s book “Four Thousand Weeks: The Art of Time Management for Mortals.” We significantly reduced the length while keeping the key ideas. The average human lifespan is extremely short—only about four thousand weeks, if you live to eighty. Everyone knows there is never enough time. We are absorbed by endless to-do lists overflowing with email, the constant struggle to balance work and personal life, and the endless battle against distractions. Productivity tips and “life hacks” for optimizing time often make the problem worse by increasing the sense of urgency and postponing important moments of life to “later.” Yet we rarely connect our everyday difficulties with the main issue of time management—how best to use our four thousand weeks. Oliver Burkman, drawing on ideas from ancient and modern philosophers, psychologists, and spiritual mentors, offers an engaging, humorous, practical, and deep guide to time and time management. He rejects useless modern obsession with “getting everything done” and proposes tools for creating a meaningful life by accepting its finiteness. Burkman shows that our common beliefs about time are not unavoidable truths, but choices we can change both individually and collectively—and that it’s possible to do things differently.