Let’s be honest, if you search for productivity books in Amazon, the majority of titles shown in the results are written by men. Why is this so? It can’t be that men are the only ones worried about getting things done quickly and efficient. Also, what does this mean for our understanding of productivity itself? Is there something missing if only men are writing about it?

In a recent article at Forte Labs, Lauren Valdez explores this question. She believes one reason for this result is that books written by women are placed into the “organization” category. For example a search for decluttering books in Amazon produces almost the exact opposite result with women being the predominant authors. However, Lauren believes the truth runs deeper than just a matter of odd cataloging.

Productivity is not about optimizing every aspect of your life or being well-versed on the latest and most flashy new app. The point of productivity is to do what brings you pleasure and to have more freedom. We aren’t machines. We are humans.

To be productive, we all need to balance the logical, technical side with the emotional, intuitive side. These can be understood as masculine and feminine energies. I define masculine-energy as associated with logic, order, and the technical, whereas feminine energy is associated with intuition, self-awareness, and creativity.

Another way we can think about this is using the left-side and right-side of the brain. Most productivity advice lies on the masculine side, but you need the yin and yang balance between both these energies. No matter where on the gender spectrum you fall, we all can tap into our masculine and feminine energies.

Read the rest of the article on the Forte Labs web site.