Breaking the Chains of Optimization Culture: Uncovering the Roots of Our Anxiety and Boredom

Reader: I had it all figured out.

I would fly back from Chicago on Tuesday, giving me, realistically, Wednesday to write. On Thursday I’d do the three-hour round trip to London to take the dog to my ex, leaving Friday open for the four-hour round trip to our friends’ wedding. If I left there at 10 p.m. I could realistically be back home in time to get a good night’s rest, leaving Saturday and Sunday free to finish these articles for my Tuesday deadline. Which meant I could then do the two-hour round trip to the local theme park for my friend’s birthday on Tuesday, leaving the rest of that week to tie up loose ends and edits before going away for a work trip. Coming back from that, I’d have Sunday and Monday to finish off my work before getting into a big piece for another magazine. 

Reader: it did not go to plan.

I caught those flights, made those deadlines and then was struck down by one of the worst viruses known to man. Let’s call it the “EasyJet flu.” So I was laid up in bed for a few days, but not too sick to work. I still banged out some articles as soon as I was feeling better, then went out for a run in the middle of a heatwave, which went as well as you’d expect.

Now, any sane person might have created a little space for himself here. Turned down a trip, asked for an extra day on his deadlines. But really, would you do that? Or would you just suck it up, figure it out, move on to the next?

Optimization Is the Default

We are living in an era of optimization. An era where progress and productivity not only matter above simple things like peace of mind and happiness — they’ve supplanted these things as our key metrics of wellbeing. Tune into any self-improvement podcast (which is basically every podcast) and it becomes clear that the only way you can have any worth in this world is if you’re continually growing your business or founding another, perfecting your sleep cycle, shaving minutes off your 5K time, sharpening up your investment portfolio, keeping tabs on your variable heart rate, and/or using AI to upgrade your daily scheduling and your writing ability.

The only issue I have with this, apart from my own optimization attempts making me physically ill, is that it’s all very, very, extremely fucking boring. Bill Hicks once used some pretty strong language to suggest what people in marketing might do with themselves. Were he alive today, I’m certain he’d extend the same ire to the optimization bros, even as the bros — optimized for success as they are — seem to have all but taken over our consciousness. 

I’m not talking about the Liver King and his raw meat diet, nor the tech bros banging on about we all need to go “post-human.” No, I’m referring to a more everyday kind of lunatic, the type of person who can’t just enjoy something…but has to ruin it for others, too. We all know them. 

I have a friend who in the last decade has become obsessed with running. These days we can’t just talk about a nice run where we maybe saw some flowers and felt the wind in our hair. Everything is about training splits, about “mile pace” (I don’t have one). It’s exhausting. I like to run just for the feeling of running and what it does for my head. I have a daily route, and if the playlist is really hitting, I might run faster, but that’s as far as my goals go. 

There’s another guy, at my bouldering gym, who warms up with these pull-ups with a perfect little five-second hang between each rep. It’s probably fantastic for his rotator cuffs — but in public? Worse, another guy climbs in a weighted vest, which (I haven’t checked) is probably a crime against not just taste but against the Geneva Convention.

When did it become not enough to do a thing and enjoy it? Why are we always trying to outdo ourselves? And who’s keeping count? According to psychotherapist Eloise Skinner, our obsession with optimization is nothing new. 

“Striving towards self-improvement is definitely a well-established tendency in humans,” she says. “You can track attempts at self-improvement back thousands of years (you might even say texts like the Bible include elements of self-improvement and optimization, as well as philosophies like Stoicism).” And don’t the bros love stoicism? 

The Metrics Are a Mirage

Why we’re so obsessed with being more and being better right now, Skinner thinks, is partly do to the effects of capitalism. In this system, output, productivity levels and performance are highly regarded — and with wearable trackers and helpful apps everywhere, it’s easier than ever to keep score. 

“When we see self-optimization align so closely with the prevailing cultural values, we can end up feeling like our pursuit of ‘better’ is linked to our self-worth, identity and personal values,” she says.

“The narrative suggests that if we’re not diligently tracking our health metrics or meticulously refining our routines, we’re somehow falling behind,” adds clinical psychologist Dr Sarah Bishop. “Ironically, the more we struggle to meet these unrealistic standards, the worse we feel about ourselves, leading to a sense of worthlessness.”

Bishop points to Teddy Roosevelt’s famous quote, “Comparison is the thief of joy,” adding that all of this negative self-talk can create a vicious cycle. “The more inadequate we feel, the more compelled we become to optimize, as if we’re chasing a fleeting fix. It’s a paradoxical addiction, where the pursuit of perfection only deepens our dissatisfaction, pulling us further away from genuine fulfillment and connection,” she says.

You Don’t Have to Fix Everything

Is it just that the optimization bros need a hug and a pat on the back? Optimization culture feels like all the sporty kids at school just discovered they can actually apply effort to things other than exercise, and they’ve gotten a bit carried away with mainlining Diary of a C.E.O. as a result. 

Recently, I spent some time around some people who will remain nameless, but who were very much chugging the optimization Kool Aid. We were having dinner and they were all talking about their Oura rings, various studies they’d read on this and that, how to optimize your website’s landing page…

There was no alcohol around, so I was forced to listen, and by the end of it I had a good understanding of why my partner constantly rejects my unsolicited advice. At one point, someone began advising me on the data around the best time of day to sit and write. At another point, I was told how to upgrade my Instagram followers. Now, it would be nice to have more followers, and maybe more people would read my fiction as a result, but I explained that focusing on marketing myself leaves less time to actually be creative, and that the performative aspects of social media actually bum me out, so I try to avoid it — none of which seemed to compute because optimizers see everything as a problem to be solved and can’t understand why you wouldn’t immediately want to make everything “better.”

“This hyper-focus on constant optimization has led to a loss of perspective, where individuals feel pressured to achieve unattainable goals,” says Bishop.

We’re Not Robots

I agree — but my main problem with optimization is that it treats the human being like a robot. A machine where A+B = Desired Outcome. This may be true in some regards, but don’t we want a bit of looseness, a bit of spontaneity in our lives? Has any great writer ever sat down and said, “I must write now because my brain is experiencing Gamma brainwaves for the next 90 minutes”? No, they have not. To my mind, that sort of thinking is the enemy of creativity, of individuality. If that’s how you think, AI has already won.

And as an aside, if you’re having to Google “how to host a podcast” or having to use an app to help you write your book/blog post, maybe you shouldn’t be doing those things. Not everyone is cut out for everything, and that’s fine. It’s fine to admit you’re not great at everything, or don’t have everything figured out. I don’t care about my running metrics because I know I’m never going to be a great runner, and I don’t want to be. And yes, I know that I’d sleep better by kicking my dog out of the room, but then he’d be sad, so come on.

Getting the balance right can be tricky, because obviously as humans we do want to try. We do want to succeed at things and to be told we’ve done a good job. And it’s nice to earn money. So how can we do that, without punishing ourselves if we give less than 100 percent every second of every day?

Obviously, I’m not immune to these thinking errors. I’m literally in bed sick from trying to do too much. Skinner says this type of physical reaction to trying to do too much isn’t uncommon: “An over-emphasis on self-optimization can definitely have negative side-effects, including anxiety, exhaustion, burnout, overwhelm, restlessness, lowered self-worth, stress and a reduced ability to be present in the moment.”

There’s even a phenomenon called “betterment burnout,” which is exactly what it sounds like, and a study indicating that a relentless pursuit of change and self-development might actually lower your life satisfaction. 

One technique that can help is to write a big list of everything you love. It could be your dog, it could be country walks, it could be finishing a piece of work. Now, whittle it down to the 10 most important things. These are the things you value most. Now, ask yourself, how many of them do you get to do day to day? If you love reading and you work for a publisher, that’s pretty bang-on. If you love spending time outdoors but your career keeps you cooped up inside, you may be happier doing something else. Love swimming and the coast? You might be happier as a lifeguard than working as a realtor, even if the money sucks. This, I’d argue is true optimization; find what you love, then do it.

What if Growth Was Gentle?

Obviously this is easier said than done, especially if you don’t know what makes you happy, or you have mouths to feed. Balancing personal ambition with the need to earn a paycheck is something I discussed with my therapist recently, and he basically just shrugged.

I think Skinner has some good advice. “We could see productivity as a way to explore and enhance our sense of self, without seeing it as a necessary or essential part of our everyday experience. We could also let productivity be led by our sense of curiosity and passion,” she says. “We might also allow our quest for productivity to become more intuitive — seeing if we can listen to our body and mind before deciding what to adjust or monitor, rather than checking the data first, and then deciding how we feel afterwards.”

So it’s about going with the flow, seeing how you feel; pushing it where you can, easing off where you need to. In other words, being a human being and not a machine.

Bishop thinks that we should recognize that “sustainable growth comes from appreciating small, meaningful changes or even maintenance, rather than striving for perfection at all costs.” For example, you might not have run a PB today, but you ran, and maybe you felt less tired than last week. All of that is a win.

Like the values exercise I suggested above, Bishop says we need to live more authentically, finding voices that resonate with us, instead of just listening to the same influencers as everyone else. We also need to let go of perfection, simplifying our focus to excelling in the few things that really matter to us. Crucially, we need to embrace imperfection. Sometimes it really is about the journey. 

“It’s about shifting our perspective from relentless optimization to a more balanced and compassionate approach to life,” Bishop says. “True fulfillment isn’t found in tracking every metric or meeting every expectation; it’s about how deeply we connect with ourselves and others and how we honor our own experiences along the way.”

And that sounds like the right way to live. I’m definitely going to start doing it. Just as soon as I finish writing this next article…