Name: Opinion | I tried the Elizabeth Holmes schedule, and here is how it went
Brand: washingtonpost.com
SKU: washingtonpost-com-1465
Availability: OnlineOnly
Rating: 68 (1 reviews)

critic

Opinion | I tried the Elizabeth Holmes schedule, and here is how it went

preview

Among the documents to emerge from the trial of Theranos founder and noted turtleneck aficionado Elizabeth Holmes is a handwritten, Whatever you think about Holmes — — she was very successful for a brief time, at least at going up to people such as Henry Kissinger and getting them to hand her large sums of money. I thought this would be a useful skill to acquire, and maybe her schedule would help. So Friday morning I set out to replicate what Holmes apparently thought was a productive start to the day.I scramble to turn off my alarm. I have two goals this morning: replicate Elizabeth Holmes’s schedule down to the minute (“I am never a minute late” is among the mantras that appear later in the document) and avoid disturbing my husband while I do so, because he did not sign up to be awakened at 4 a.m.. Already (after thanking God that most things are not logical), I am beginning to regret staying up last night to watch “Below Deck” and “Watch What Happens Live with Andy Cohen.”I lumber to the bathroom. I have 15 whole minutes to wash my face and change, which feels like a long time. Usually what I do during this stage of the morning is make a lot of inarticulate grunts and visit the bathroom immediately — something I now am realizing with horror is not listed anywhere on the Holmes schedule. I can survive without the grunting, but I am not sure I can hold out on the bathroom. By 4:06 a.m., I give in to my bladder. I could brush my teeth, but this is yet another normal element of a morning routine that is not listed on the schedule, and I have already taken one liberty.I find a YouTube meditation that is 30 minutes; my mind is concentrated and empty of everything for six of them. I use the remaining 24 to copy out each of the rules for living that appear elsewhere on the paper, which feels like clearing my mind:“I do everything I say, word for word. I am never a minute late. I show no excitement. Calm, direct, pointed, non-emotional. ALL ABOUT BUSINESS. I am not impulsive. I do not react. I am always proactive. I know the outcome of every encounter. I do not hesitate. I constantly make decisions &amp; change them as needed. I give IMMEDIATE feedback, non-emotionally. I speak rarely. When I do — crisp and concise. I call bulls--- immediately. My hands are always in my pockets or gesturing. I am fully present.”OH NO, MY HANDS SHOULD HAVE BEEN IN MY POCKETS OR GESTURING THIS WHOLE TIME!There is a cat in the house, and I try to think of how I will encounter her without hesitating or reacting, and what the outcomes of these encounters will be. This seems unknowable, but maybe I am not trying hard enough.Story continues below advertisementAdvertisementStory continues below advertisementAdvertisementI am already exhausted from the effort of knowing the outcome of every encounter, but I unroll my yoga mat and dutifully go through 35 minutes of back bends, mostly following the guy in the back of the video doing gentle modifications with the aid of a chair. I know that next I will be expected to “change, shower, shave, perfect,” and I can only assume that “perfect” means “attain as closely as possible the standard Elizabeth Holmes herself set with her appearance.” This obviously requires a turtleneck, but I own just one, and it is somewhere in the dark room where my husband is still asleep.I decide to grandfather in some toothbrushing under the heading of “perfect” and hope, once again, that I am not overstepping. While I shower, I mutter the word “business” to myself, for inspiration. On my way downstairs, I almost trip over the cat — an encounter I have not anticipated.I don’t have any eyeliner, so instead I just put too much mascara on and sort of rub it over my eyelid, which makes me resemble a raccoon who also doesn’t know how to apply eye makeup. Next I work on my bun. I duplicate the Holmes side part and artfully pluck out a few strands.Story continues below advertisementAdvertisementStory continues below advertisementAdvertisementI am Episcopalian, which means I feel uncomfortable engaging in free-flowing prayer without a liturgy of some sort in hand, so I look something up. I should be expressing more gratitude for the lack of logic in the universe, but I am drooping and losing my élan. I am starting to feel a strange sympathy for anyone who had to do this multiple days!A problem presents itself: I have neither a “bannanna” nor a banana, and I have whey even less. (“You know,” my husband said the night before, “maybe this is the sort of thing you should have thought about in advance.”) At the time I insisted it was actually more authentically Theranos not to have a viable plan, and just sort of assume that some whey and a banana would manifest themselves as long as I told enough people they would be there.Then inspiration strikes. Years ago, I made the ill-advised New Year’s resolution to eat a fruit every day, which rapidly devolved into a daily scramble to find a banana before midnight, so I know Starbucks sells individual bananas, if you want to spend way too much money on a banana. Also, it is only a two-minute drive away. Having discovered this banana workaround, I start seeing loopholes everywhere. For instance, “I am never a minute late” could be “I am always multiple minutes late!” I get excited about this, which is expressly forbidden.I hasten to Starbucks, where I hope there is whey. I immediately seize a banana, then turn to an employee for assistance. Since I am holding the banana in my hand, I cannot put my hand into my pocket, so I have no option but to gesture with the banana as I ask, “Do you have anything with whey in it?”She asks if I can ask someone else. I ask a person making drinks, who requests that I spell “whey,” which the banana and I do. She says she doesn’t know. I apologetically purchase the banana and a snack bar that seems like the sort of thing that could possibly have whey in it, but according to its ingredients, doesn’t.It is at this point I realize that I have been across from a Safeway this whole time. At 6:44 a.m., I begin to nibble the banana so as to stay in the time window. By 6:50 a.m., I am lurching around a grocery store holding a half-eaten banana in one hand, muttering “whey.” (Crisp and concise.) I do not hesitate. Where is the whey aisle?I return to the car. Fortunately, I cannot drive to Theranos because it is no longer a company that exists because it was full of fraud, and instead of having realistic ideas and executing them successfully, everyone there was concocting half-baked solutions and convincing investors with mumbo-jumbo that they knew what they were doing. Based on this morning, they were very possibly sleep-deprived, too.Instead, I sit in the car with a bag of whey and eat a few unhappy bites while I finish the banana. At home, I write up my morning. I lie on the couch barely keeping my eyes open, and the cat looks at me with concern.I am emotionally and physically exhausted. I am all about business.Story continues below advertisementAdvertisementStory continues below advertisementAdvertisementAbout this storyElizabeth Holmes photo by Glenn Chapman/AFP via Getty Images; text by Elizabeth Holmes.The handwritten notes are excerpts from court documents. Comments

Among the documents to emerge from the trial of Theranos founder and noted turtleneck aficionado Elizabeth Holmes is a handwritten, Whatever you think about Holmes — — she was very successful for a brief time, at least at going up to people such as Henry Kissinger and getting them to hand her large sums of money. I thought this would be a useful skill to acquire, and maybe her schedule would help. So Friday morning I set out to replicate what Holmes apparently thought was a productive start to the day.I scramble to turn off my alarm. I have two goals this morning: replicate Elizabeth...

public

Blogs & columns for @WashingtonPost. No pun is beneath me. NOTHING IS WRONG AND HERE IS WHY is out now! http://bit.ly/2Kkv3ob

Opinion | I tried the Elizabeth Holmes schedule, and here is how it went

No article scores yet.

CRITIC REVIEWS

PUBLIC REVIEWS