How to not hustle:
We all at some point have encountered the idea of hustle culture. Waking up at 5am, exercising, journaling, meditating, brewing coffee, having a smoothie bowl, taking 6 meetings before 8 am. This is what social media is projecting as ideal, but is it normal? Yes it might be achievable, only with incredible sacrifices which are actually not worth making in the long run. Overworking yourself is not the answer, but working in a smart way might be.
1. Sacrificing your mental and physical health
Life is not a sprint, it’s a marathon. Working hard, long hours, not taking vacations might be easy in your early 20s, but in the long run it’s not sustainable. Taking care of your body and mind from an early age and creating habits to cultivate that mindset will pay off in the long run. It’s actually simple, if you’re not healthy physically or mentally, you can’t be your best at performing in your business. Your goals are achieved mostly when you are in good shape to actually go after them. So, without your health automatically you have a lower chance of reaching your goals.
2. Only work, no play
You can’t just work, work and do more work. Yes, your responsibilities exist and you have to do them. But, if you go through life only taking care of responsibilities, what have you actually achieved? Yes, saying that you have to create balance in life is easy, actually doing it is incredibly difficult. But, avoiding to create balance in your life also will lead to failing at your goals. You aren’t helping yourself by working early hours and late evenings constantly. There must be a way for you to recharge your body and creativity, which can only be achieved by having some good old fun.
3. Not setting boundaries
Your business or your job isn’t your life. It’s incredibly easy to reply to an email at 8pm, because that means you’d make more money, or you’ll be on track for that promotion. But is it going to be the end of the world if you leave it until the morning and take that time for yourself? Defining yourself by your business or job will just lead to seeing and doing the same thing every day. After a while, that’s going to be more tiring than exciting. At the end of the day, working and providing for ourselves is enabling us to enjoy the things in life that we want. For that reason, we need to set clear boundaries between work and enjoyment.
4. Not setting up systems
Setting up systems will help you organize your work better and save time. It’s very important to organize the work that you have to repeatedly do every month or even every week. For example, make a theme for your instagram posts on Thursday. For example every Thursday you’ll be posting a motivational quote to your page. Simply, before the first Thursday of the month find four quotes that you’d like to post, and you’re covered! You can do the same with email marketing, finding leads, etc.
To sum up, being successful will take sacrificing the things you like or enjoy doing. But if you keep just sacrificing and not enjoying the fruits of your labor, you most likely will feel unhappy and unsatisfied. Set systems, create boundaries and work smart!
