Why it is important to create a lifestyle which is both productive and enjoyable

Developers, designers or anyone creative has a nag to create. They are always busy creating something from time to time. And they must have built a few things in the past. Some with pressure and some without pressure or deadline. But those who did it without pressure could only do it because they were focused on only one thing, i.e. the product they were creating. And that concentration, clarity and passion led them to create something very beautiful/functional.

I believe to work without any obstacles, people should have different fields to concentrate, work, and enjoy on and not only one. When a person works on a particular object, may that be anything, he/she can not concentrate more than 45 min. on that work. This count may vary person to person. But the base essence of this fact is that even we love or don’t love doing a work, we need switching. Switching between different works. For example, Coding to gardening. Gardening to cooking. Cooking to coding; and so on. What I am saying here is: with pressure, no one has gone any far till today, nor he/she will. No doubt with pressure you will get the work done, but the person doing it won’t work with his/her 100% effort.

Now a days, startups or individuals move on a good pace in their development phase, which is best and acceptable. But many a times they start to think very fast. They fall in the trap of future possibilities and tries to pace up the development process. I acknowledge the fact that as start-up, people or organizations need to move fast and get into the market quickly to test their products. But the question is : aren’t we human first? Or are we robots?

I experienced and thus completely believe that without mental satisfaction no one can create anything full of mastery. And for that we need to be flexible. We need to understand that human emotion comes first when one is forging something full of mastery. As being the blacksmith of your workshop, you must not take pressure for product launch, marketing, investment or revenue. One must concentrate only on the product.

This one principle of not taking pressure may change or break any company/individual. Now a days, most of the companies get the job done with pressure and that is why the level of mastery is not achieved. Take for example the culture developed in Google. How their employees work. All they do is code, design and play. All without pressure. On the other hand, Apple has done it with an extreme level of pressure. Both inside and outside apple. This has cost the company its image in the market.

The best practice one can do when pressure starts to build is to take rest for 1 or 2 days. Give your mind the time it needs to recharge, not the time to build the pressure. Treat yourself and everyone else involved in the team with human emotion. Because before investment, revenue, market or product, humans always comes first. And in the end people will remember you on how you treated them, not on how big company you created.

Here’s a lovely quote I will leave you with from the book: The four hour workweek, written by Tim Ferriss “By working only when you’re most effective, life is both more productive and more enjoyable. It’s the perfect example of having the cake and eating it too.”

And by the way, it’s my mom’s birthday today. So cheers!

Have the cake and eat it too!