Laziness Does Not Exist

By: Devon Price PhD

Narrated by: Em Grosland

From social psychologist Dr. Devon Price, a conversational, stirring call to “a better, more human way to live” (Cal Newport, New York Times best-selling author) that examines the “laziness lie” - which falsely tells us we are not working or learning hard enough.

Extra-curricular activities. Honors classes. 60-hour work weeks. Side hustles.

Like many Americans, Dr. Devon Price believed that productivity was the best way to measure self-worth. Price was an overachiever from the start, graduating from both college and graduate school early, but that success came at a cost. After Price was diagnosed with a severe case of anemia and heart complications from overexertion, they were forced to examine the darker side of all this productivity.

Laziness Does Not Exist explores the psychological underpinnings of the “laziness lie,” including its origins from the Puritans and how it has continued to proliferate as digital work tools have blurred the boundaries between work and life. Using in-depth research, Price explains that people today do far more work than nearly any other humans in history, yet most of us often still feel we are not doing enough.

Filled with practical and accessible advice for overcoming society’s pressure to do more, and featuring interviews with researchers, consultants, and experiences from real people drowning in too much work, Laziness Does Not Exist “is the book we all need right now” (Caroline Dooner, author of The F*ck It Diet).

©2021 Devon Price. All rights reserved. (P)2021 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

this is amazing

this book was really surprising. i expected it to go surfice level and explore only the pressure to not be lazy at work, but i was delighted to notice that the author decided to explore the capitalist and protestant roots of the concept of laziness and how it permeates into every single bit of our lives. a must read! specially if you are an overarching person who believes that exhaustion is virtue. great book!

I needed this book

Dr. Price helped me understand that all the negative feelings I have harbored from quitting my chosen career in early 2019 are and were valid. I am valid in embracing my “laziness”, yet the book helps me to pause and reflect on why am I feeling less-than or lazy. What a fantastic read! Well done, Dr.!

Perspective Changing

I will be listening to this book again and again. I was presently surprised by the historical connections between the laziness myth and slavery. This was a well researched and presented book, with ideas that have changed my perspective on things that I once took for granted.

unironically life-changing

This book has changed the way I judge myself and how I judge others. Reading this, I felt more contentment in my life than I have felt since I was a young child. The author makes a point to acknowledge the privilege she has that made it possible for her to make many of the changes she's made in her life. She also gives examples of things anyone can chance. Ex. we can change how we judge others.

I'm so glad my therapist suggested this to me

I listened to this an hour every day while going for a walk and it was just so profound, I talk to EVERYone about this book. Amazing in helping me put words to my discomfort on why I became burnt out. Helping me communicate and evangelize to my coworkers, managers, friends, family, random strangers, anyone on WHY we have terrible preconceived notions on productivity.

I do really love the narrator and since reading this, have been following the author on Medium. They have a lot of great articles on there too. But really, I think this book was so well thought out. After the Introduction, hanging on every word, I thought "how are there even more chapters, didn't they say everything that needed to be said in the intro? I can't possibly learn anything new from here on out." and boy, was I wrong. The entire rest of the book I also hung on to every word.

I'm writing this review months after listening, so I can't remember the details, but there was one piece of info in the last chapter I remember wanting to push back on. My task for myself now is to go back through all the places I put bookmarks and look up the researchers the author interviewed and the various activities listed to help myself. Maybe when I do that I will come across that piece and update my review to state what I disagreed with and why.

I think this should be required reading for every hyper-capitalistic society, truly.

Wish I read this 5 years ago

So helpful and down to earth. I’m rethinking how I talk and feel day to day.

So therapeutic for me

Every time I’m feeling productivity guilt, listening to some section of this book, helps pull me out of it. Just the title helps me so much. I tell myself. Laziness does not exist. It has made me so much more compassionate towards my students and spouse, and even my daughter and dog (the latter two do nothing to “earn their keep” :P). I hope that I can help counteract the laziness lie in my daughter, and I’m grateful my dog will remain unaffected by it in his lifetime. I aspire now to live my being as compassionate to myself as I am to my dog, whose very existence I think is enough.

Revolutionary

I've been fighting the laziness lie all my life. I have ADHD, narcolepsy, and depression. I've been labelled lazy by others and myself for as long as I can remember. This book helped me clarify my experiences and my hunch that I'm not actually lazy.

Wonderful guide to a more holistic approach to life

This book brings together a lot of the concepts about appropriate boundaries and self-compassion that are important to keeping work and "productivity" in perspective across many aspects of our lives. It offers potential solutions and questions we can ask ourselves, rather than only describing the problem. I found several tips that will help me right away, and I'm feeling less anxious and more optimistic about my life after listening to this book. It's also well paced, with thought-provoking anecdotes.

It's not just our jobs

Our whole way of life is twisted around to serve our masters. We in America and her hegemonic sphere of influence are slaves, owned by capital, and they have indoctrinated us with a pernicious lie: that we are lazy.

This book is a full throated argument that laziness is never the reality. That doing less is higher quality, and the quality is for the self, regardless of whether anything is produced. You need this book. This is the good news you need to hear.