The Goldfish Principle

To grow, push the boundaries of time.

Kept in a tank or a bowl, goldfish typically remain around 1-2 inches in length, but they can grow to be nearly six inches in captivity. The goldfish is related to the carp, although the goldfish can be distinguished by its different body type. In the wild, a goldfish can grow to a foot or greater in length.

Essentially, a goldfish's size is determined by its environment. Given a bigger environment, the fish will expand, but when restricted in space, the goldfish remains small — a carnival-prize sized.

Time acts the same way. What I refer to as the Goldfish Principle, but is otherwise known as Parkinson's Law, states that a task will expand to fill the time allotted for its completion. The Goldfish Principle is most often used in reference to bureaucratic growth, which often serves as a caricature of wasted time. A project allotted a month will take a month to be done. Give a project a year and it will take all year. Have no deadline, and there's no telling how long it could take.

It took 17 years for the MTA's recent completion of the first phase of the Second Avenue Subway. A century earlier, it took just under five years to complete 28 stations.

California's bungled venture into high-speed rail has suffered postponement after postponement. Voters approved the project in 2008, construction began in 2015, but it isn't expected to be completed for another decade (optimistically). The cost has swollen to well-over twice the $40 billion estimate in 2008.

These and countless other examples illustrate how a missing deadline can be a death-sentence for many projects. Deadlines are helpful. They demand action. But when deadlines are too generous they're easy to neglect. It's easy to get hung up on little details right away, if a deadline allows it. It might not be shocking that massive infrastructure projects take so long, but it's surprising how much can be done so quickly.

Charles Lindbergh and Donald Hall designed and built "The Spirit of St. Louis" — the first plane to make a solo trans-Atlantic flight — in 60 days. The Empire State Building was raised in a mere 410 days, the Pentagon in 491 days.

Setting yourself tough deadlines is a good way to learn. It increases the rate of your feedback loops — I'm reminded of the parable of the pottery students, divided into two groups; one group told to produce a single, excellent pot, the other group told to produce as many pots as they can, regardless of quality. In the end, the quantity group produced more — and better — pots because they were receiving more feedback from their work.

I do the same thing with drawing. I set a timer and have to finish within that time. It forces me to focus on the big picture — getting the large parts right — and helps me avoid getting caught on little details. I often do the same thing when I write. By focusing on getting ideas out onto the page, rather than perfecting them, I bypass the internal critic and quickly get to the point of editing — where the real writing occurs. The first draft is fast, bad, and wrong, but what's important is that the first draft exists, is done, and has laid the foundation for a second draft.

Unless it hasn't laid that foundation. Maybe it's a bad idea or a bad piece. Even so, it's helpful, because I've not wasted large portions of time on it. There's less risk of trapping myself into doing something because I've already sunk so much time into it. If it doesn't have legs, I can scrap it and move on just as fast.

Go fast. Push your limits. Asking yourself for a quick turnaround is the best way to produce and to learn. When you're pressed for time, you can't dilly-dally with superfluous details; you have to get right to the meat of the issue. It's like the parable of placing large stones, pebbles, and sand into a jar. When we have too much time, we put the sand and pebbles in first, and by the time we need to focus on the large stones, there's no space left. Even if we know we need to put the large stones in first, pebbles and sand will sneak in with it. A hard deadline demands the large stones be put in first.

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