Rest and recovery is not a luxury. Guess what? It’s a necessity. What our culture teaches us is that it’s a 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 us 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. Every day, work for a few hours and then take some time to go for a walk. And 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 are going to deplete the Five Assets of Genius. 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 if all you’re doing is working, then you’re actually going to erode those Five Assets of Genius.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. 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.I 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 role, 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 a wheel working all day long, all week long, all month long to push out 1000 mediocrities that never allow you to dominate your domain.
