On Taking Breaks
The last weeks have been busy as hell.
Here's my list of things I do daily:
- 30+ minutes to write a blog post
- 30 minutes on Twitter
- 1.5 hours of gym
- a walk to get outside
- 8 hours on my day job (Mo-Do)
- 2-9 hours working on AlbumCoverAI (2 hours Mo-Do, 9 hours Fr-Sa)
- 30-60 minutes of reading
- Journaling
- Meditating
- E-mails, Administrative stuff, ...
Yeah. I can't compete with Elon Musk's 100-hour workweek, but it's a lot to me.
Normally, Sundays are reserved for spending time with my girlfriend. In the past weeks, I did spend time with her, but I also used every. short. moment. to be productive: Learn marketing, read a book on entrepreneurship, or tweak a feature of my app.
But this post won't be me complaining about my workload. Rather, it's about taking breaks.
I love working a ton and being productive. It's in my nature to spend my time productively (often, it's busy procrastination). If I have time to spare, I crave reading a book, not playing video games. So, I will continue to have a high workload.
But the more I work, the more I add to my schedule, and the more often my subconscious demands to "use my time productively". Whenever I sit on a couch, my brain fires, "You should be productive right now!".
This becomes stressful since there's always a more productive alternative. You can always work on features instead of watching a movie. It's hard to find arguments for relaxing.
A few weeks of this and I start enjoying work less. I become annoyed by the people around me or little things that weren't annoying before. My fridge is too full (it's normal). The apartment is too messy (it isn't really). The flowers take up too much space (they don't).
Whenever I catch myself being unreasonably frustrated by ordinary things, or when I find a lack of joy but only duty in work, I take a break.
Honestly, I'm unsure what'd happen if I kept hustling. But I know that, after a short break, after two days of doing nothing, I'm craving to be productive again. Life is good, and my good mood is back.
My goal for the break is to be bored. When boredom strikes, I know I cooled down. The subconscious task list is gone.
I recommend you do the same. Look for the signs. If somebody's breathing too loud, or the book on your desk is overly annoying, step on the brake. Take a few days off. You'll get to make it up with renewed energy.
That's what I'm going to do. Tomorrow, I'll only write a post, and nothing else.