Rest and recovery is not a luxury. Guess what? It’s a necessity. So what our culture teaches us is that it’s badge of honor to work 24/7, 365. It’s a badge of honor to rise and grind and spend all your time working. But what science has shown, and some of the research from the energy project to give credit where it’s due, is that the best performers are not working in a linear way. They work in a cyclical way. And here’s what I mean by that. If you look at the best athletes, for example, it’s not what they do on the tennis court that makes them great. It’s what they do in between points, in terms of their recovery that allows them to win the championships. The key to world-class productivity is not working in a linear way. In other words, the key to really getting epic things done is not getting up in the morning and working until late at night. The key is to be much more like a sprinter versus a marathoner. The key is much more work in short bursts of intense productivity and then take the time to recover. So every day, work for a few hours and then take some time to go for a walk, then work for another few hours and then take some time to maybe take a nap. And then each week, take a day or take two days off. Every month, take a few days off. Rest and recovery is not a luxury. It’s an absolute necessity because otherwise if all you’re doing is working, you’re going to deplete the five assets of genius that you absolutely need to protect. What are those five assets? Number one, your mental focus. Number two, your physical energy. Number three, your personal willpower. Number four, your private talent. And number five, your daily time. And all you’re doing is working, then you’re actually going to erode those five assets of genius. So you really want to work for short bursts of time and then you want to take the time to rest, and that’s not only sleep, but resting can be meditating. Resting can be active recovery like walking. And you also want to make the time for fun. It’s like when you’re going for walks, when you’re hanging out with your friends, when you’re watching documentaries, even when you’re taking trips, please remember you’re not only recovering your assets of genius, but having fun is when your best ideas are incubating. SoI don’t want you to be someone who is only busy being busy. I want you to be monomaniacally focused on working hard when you work hard, and then I want you to have a lot of fun. And here’s the payoff for you. You’re going to actually work a lot less and you’re going to get a lot more done. You know how the empire makers really roll? They understand it is far more intelligent to release one piece of magic to the marketplace that stands the test of time and makes you legendary,than being like this rat on awheel, released, working all day long, all week long, all month long to pushout 1,000 mediocrities that never allow you to dominate your domain. Right? So work smart. Focus on that one Sistine Chapel ceiling project that you push out into the world and then people, so fall in love with it because it’s this piece of magic, they become your global marketing team while you’re relaxing versus doing what most people do. They put out minimum viable product, MVP. They put out a thousand pieces of mediocrity versus one project of magic, and then they spend all their time marketing the mediocrity, and they wonder why they never get any traction around their mastery. And it’s because people don’t fall in love with mediocrity. And so what I’m suggesting, just to be clear, is work very focused on one key project and then have a lot of fun versus spending all your day putting out all these pieces of mediocrity that never get any traction in the marketplace.
