Extreme Outsourcing

Is nothing sacred? Nothing at all? Is extreme outsourcing really necessary? There are some life hackers and other outsourcing gurus who now pretty much recommend outsourcing just about everything, nearly every task, almost every life activity. Is this not taking things just a teeny tiny bit too far?

Life hacker and blogger Tim Ferriss admits that at one point he even outsourced his dating. Yes, you read that right. He is a busy fellow, but he gets lonely like everyone else, so he did not want to completely neglect his human need for companionship. He simply outsourced his romantic pursuits (or at least the planning of his dates; he went on the actual dates himself).

Now, this was a pretty tongue-in-cheek experiment that he was running. As a matter of fact, he runs a lot of fascinating life experiments, using himself as the primary guinea pig and documenting the results on his blog. (Speaking of his blog, you might want to visit it to find out more about this little dating outsourcing experiment and several others that he has run, including several that involve manipulating his own body weight, in rather strange and perhaps even dangerous ways.)

Whatever you think of Mr. Ferris and other life hackers, he certainly has discovered an interesting way of living his life, whether you find his experiments interesting or off-putting or a little bit of both. He seems like a true original. In many ways he is kind of emblematic of the still young Internet Era.

But back to the question at hand: Is extreme outsourcing of almost every task in your life a good idea?  Or do we run the risk of stripping away a few layers of our own humanity if we don’t roll up our shirt sleeves and do some of our own “dirty work” from time to time?

I can understand outsourcing certain work-related projects that you find tedious or that you simply don’t have time to do yourself. I also understand that time is an extremely precious commodity, even more precious than money to many people, which is what makes outsourcing (and perhaps even extreme outsourcing) so appealing to some individuals.

And yet….and yet…I still can’t help but wonder if this idea of extreme outsourcing is crossing some kind of a line. Maybe I am just being too limited in my thinking on this subject, and perhaps I simply need to start thinking “outside of the box” a little bit more where outsourcing is concerned.

I can grasp the fact that people like Mr. Ferriss are not necessarily arguing that the rest of us should do exactly as they do. His level of extreme outsourcing is probably not for the faint of heart. And I think sometimes people like him (and other life hackers) take projects and experiments (such as outsourcing) to an extreme simply to prove something to themselves more than anyone else. After all, when all is said and done, outsourcing is just another tool that we all have at our disposal to use (or not use) at our discretion.