Pacing

Through work and life, you need to be able to pace yourself.

Visualize a bottle of water that’s full in the morning. Slowly water starts emptying out and by end of day there’s almost nothing left. In the night and during early morning of next day you fill up bottle again.  This cycle repeats itself every day.

Let’s visualize another scenario. Same bottle of water has an equitable inflow and outflow through the day. There might be slight variations in water level but overall water level remains constant. 

Which scenario is more sustainable?

I vote for second scenario. 

First scenario will work in a situation where you know that you will have enough time every day to fill bottle back again.  But that may be a flawed assumption – we may not have the dedicated time available every day.

Second scenario requires self-awareness- you need to know how to ‘pace’ yourself so that outflow and inflow rates more or less match. Secondly you need to know ways to ensure adequate inflow.

Both of these – self-awareness and skills at ensuring adequate inflow – can be worked upon by individual and hence are controllable by individual.

So how do you pace yourself through the day?

-

Sourav

 

Tripod of Life and Least Counts

The other day I heard a leader say- ‘You need to be able to focus on work, family, and self.  You need to focus on all 3 to achieve balance in your life’.

I found his concept interesting – especially the fact that he called out self as a different aspect. He subsequently elaborated on how he goes about keeping some time aside for himself also.

Do you need this tripod balance? I will contend yes!

How do you maintain this balance?  

First, periodicity may vary. You may strive for a balance over different periods - daily/weekly/monthly.

Second, quantity you may want to achieve in each period may be different e.g. – you may want to do 2 things for yourself every week while someone else might want to do 4 things for himself/herself over same time period.

So you need to be able to define the least quantity (least count) you want in a period. This is especially important for self-part of tripod – else this may get neglected.

We may use the term ‘quota’ for this.  Once you have finalized a ‘quota’ for a period you tend to work towards it.

Quota ensures that at minimum you meet it. On flip side, it can limit you from exceeding it. But then it also helps you to maintain energy and continuity. You finish the quota and if you still have excess time left – you can experiment/do something new with additional time.

-                                               

Sourav

Transitioning from Work to Home

You trudge back home in evening.

The mind's numb and body feels tired. 

You wonder  ´I have a few hours for myself in evening. But I feel energy drained.  At most, I could probably clear a few emails or watch TV for sometime before I crash. ´

And that possibly is what happens every weekday. By time  weekend arrives, you need space to recover from the tiredness of weekdays.  Saturday flies off and Sunday gets spent in doing a lot of things which could have possibly waited. 

Soon you get a feeling ´Where´s life beyond work and entertainment (in consumerist way we define it today)?´

Is it that you are short of ideas? Possibly not.

You may feel there is so much to do beyond work. You could write a blog, read a book, watch a movie, go out for a walk, hit gym, dance, listen to music, talk to people, etc. But over a period of time you realize you are doing none of these.

Is it that you are short of time?  Maybe not!

Think of extra hours that you decide to spend at work in evenings, as you don´t really know what to do with free time. Or extra hours in evening that drudge/while away, waiting for the day to end.

How do we make those extra hours more meaningful?

I find switching off from work and switching on to something else, in evenings, one of most difficult things to do.

By evening, mind feels still stuck at work. 

I´ve gone through such phases before and found my solutions. Over last month, I have been going through another such phase. I´ve tried previous solutions but they don´t seem to be working this time around.  That makes me wonder ´Is the block at how or at why?´

What are options I have to manage this transition?

My evening cup of tea does help. It´s a physical signal (taste, smell, etc) that tells me it´s time to switch off from work.

But I need some ritual that pushes me back from work to home. I´ve been trying some rituals but with limited impact.

I think there is this phase of uncomfortable forced practice one has to go through. 21 day rule for making anything a habit- maybe I should persist for 21 days with any ritual that I start off with.

Maybe, I should also try building a social network in Hyderabad beyond work and beyond industry crowd.

That´s what had given me sanity in Mumbai. That´s what might work for me in Hyderabad too.

What have your experiences been in transitioning from work to home? Do you find it a difficult transition?

-

Sourav