Stop giving yourself homework

A rule for life, not just for summer

I am very good at giving myself homework.

For a start, I choose to make my living as a writer. And I have never liked a tweet as hard as one circa 2017 that declared being a journalist to be choosing a life of constant homework. You complete assignment after assignment, always in the faint hope of glowing feedback (for the record, this almost never comes). Writing books is a similar sort of vibe: it sometimes feels like one, long ongoing essay crisis.

But, truthfully, I can find a way to turn any aspect of my life into a to-do list. A Iist for the year. A list for the season. A list of films to see. Jobs to do before the end of summer. Jobs to do before Christmas. Gardeners’ World’s ‘jobs for the weekend’.

Photo by Ferenc Horvath on Unsplash

Since 2010, I’ve kept a list of every book I’ve read – and every book I want to read. It’s currently 16 pages and 4,371 words long (the ‘books I want to read’ part being far longer than the section for books I have actually read).

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve flicked through a cookbook and thought: ‘I know, I’m going to work my way through every single recipe in this book, until I’ve made them all. Perhaps one a week?’ Or: What if I try to do every different Parkrun in England?

I’m a completist, by nature. I’m instinctively drawn to articles with headlines like: ‘50 activities to do with your children this summer’, ‘every pasta recipe you’ll ever need’, or ‘books to read before you die’.

But the older I get, the more I appreciate that this is rarely a formula for a fun and pleasurable life. And so, I try hard to resist the urge to turn things into homework. I let myself skip a podcast episode, if I don’t fancy it that week. I have a 100-page rule for books. (If I’m not actively looking forward to reading it every night, after I’ve given it 100 pages I can move on to something else).

This year’s Oscar winners are not another assignment to tick off.

A shortlist for a book prize is not a list of required reading.

Just because they made a second (third, fourth, seventh…) series of something doesn’t mean you have to watch it. [*cough* The Handmaid’s Tale *cough*]

Not everything has to be a project, schematic, rational, pointed in the direction of mastery and self-optimization. Pleasure, by its nature, is often random, unexpected, capricious. You make the most of it by rolling with its whims.

Which isn’t to say that working your way through every recipe in Dan Lepard’s Short And Sweet or reading all the past winners of the Women’s Prize For Fiction can’t be fun. But it is also a commitment. You can’t do it with every aspect of your life. There simply isn’t time and you are not a robot.

Which brings me to this newsletter – which you might think could very easily exacerbate this homework-ifying tendency of mine. In fact, it’s been a brilliant antidote. Several times, when I’ve recommended a book or an article here, I’ve gone to caveat it by typing something like: ‘I know everyone’s probably already read this’ or ‘like everybody else, I loved…’

But I’ve stopped myself. Possibly because I noticed other people doing it in their newsletters. And, actually, I’d almost never read or seen the thing that apparently everyone else has already read. Which then starts to feel like we’re setting each other homework, too.

So, a little while ago, I made it my policy not to apologise for ‘basic’ recommendations. I’m not striving to be one step ahead of the publishing cycle. That’s not my job. I want this newsletter to be a sanctuary for the things I’m interested in. Just me. Not the zeitgeist. Not an editor. Not a media brand. Whether that’s a beach read I enjoyed or an area of health policy I think doesn’t get enough airtime.

When I recommend or write about things here, I want to do it as a whole human – not a professionalised, trend-forecasting version of myself. I think the human-ness is the whole point of a newsletter like this, in an otherwise algorithm-led world.

Sometimes I happen to have read something relatively obscure because I found it in a charity shop or the bibliography of another book. Sometimes I’ve pre-ordered a book months ahead because it sounds so vital to the things I want to write and learn about. And sometimes I buy a blockbuster bestseller because it was 99p on ebook.

I try to resist reading things just because they’d be ‘good for the newsletter’. And I certainly don’t expect anyone to read all of the things I include here, any more than any magazine editor expects you to buy every item of clothing they showcase.  

I want this newsletter to be a homework-free zone – for me and for you.

One of the best pieces of advice I got about writing and freelancing was to follow your genuine interests. Even if they sometimes seem a bit tangential or ‘off-brand’ (🙄).

It’s turned out to be pretty good life advice, too.

It turns out you will read a lot more if you pick things you genuinely are excited to read, rather than what you think you should be reading.

And often, following your genuine interests, means accepting that you won’t read or do something else. I have time to read a 6,000-word long read on sperm health anxiety (as per last week’s newsletter links and reccs) because I give myself permission to not read the equivalent number of words about…God, so many things.

Because here’s the thing about any kind of self-imposed homework: there is no test at the end of all this. No marking scheme. You don’t have to hand in your work at any point.

Well, unless you’re a journalist.

(Class, dismissed).