I’m Mike Vardy, and I help people build a better relationship with time — not by controlling it, but by working with it. Through my writing, courses, and community, I explore how intention and attention shape a more meaningful life — one rooted in the original idea of productiveness over productivity.
If you’re around this week, I’d love to have you join me...
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The Practice of Productiveness
I’m Mike Vardy, and I help people build a better relationship with time — not by controlling it, but by working with it. Through my writing, courses, and community, I explore how intention and attention shape a more meaningful life — one rooted in the original idea of productiveness over productivity.
Hello Reader, I’ve been thinking about John Lennon again — not the icon, but the man who kept reminding us that time isn’t something you conquer. It’s something you learn to move with. There’s the line everyone knows: “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” Quoted to death, sure, but only because it keeps proving itself right. Lennon wasn’t warning us; he was inviting us to loosen our grip. But the line that hits me most now is this one: “Time you enjoy wasting was...
The Lantern by Mike Vardy Vol. 1, Issue 41 | December 6, 2025 Hello Reader, You may be familiar with the phrase “it is what it is.” A shrug dressed up as wisdom. A way of stepping back when life doesn’t bend. But there’s another line — harder, steadier — that Robert De Niro delivers in The Deer Hunter. Holding up a single rifle round, he says:“This is this.” Not resignation. Recognition. Where “it is what it is” lets you drift away from the moment, “this is this” places you squarely inside...
Hello Reader, Every December seems to carry a strange kind of whiplash. One moment we’re rushing — to wrap things up, to get things ready, to tend to the endless little pieces that somehow all become “urgent” at the same time. (If you were paying close attention to my emails yesterday you might've caught a glimpse of me falling prey to that too.) And then, almost abruptly, we’re supposed to pivot into rest. Into stillness. Into presence. It’s a familiar tug of war. And if we’re honest, most...