Tiny frictions, better ideas

Today I worked outside. Which, from a productivity standpoint, makes almost no sense. No external monitor, no mouse, a screen you have to squint at like you’re reading by candlelight. Everything slows down. And yet, that’s exactly what made it interesting.

There’s a kind of work mode I fall into sometimes—maybe you’ve felt it too—where everything is frictionless. I sit at my desk, the setup is perfect, and I just execute. Ideas turn into interfaces with very little resistance. It’s satisfying. But it’s also easy to go on autopilot, to run with the first solution that comes to mind.

Working outdoors interrupts that flow. It introduces just enough friction to make me question things: Is this really the best way? What else could this be? I end up thinking more, not because I’m trying to, but because I’m forced to. And sometimes that’s where the better ideas live—just on the other side of a minor inconvenience.

I don’t think one mode is better than the other. They’re just different tools for different kinds of thinking. And let’s be honest: in Sweden, we only get about 20 golden summer days a year. I’m not wasting a single one indoors if I don’t have to.