I’ve always had a pretty strong work ethic. And when you couple this with the fact that I’m your quintessential mix of millennial + Twitter enthusiast + pesky perfectionist, you’ll see how I was always going to be the ideal candidate for recruitment into the deceivingly dreamy world of hustle culture.
And that’s precisely what happened last year. I got hooked on the hustle. Obsessed with optimising. Optimising my time, optimising my creativity, optimising my routines. Even optimising my energy — if I ever had that (very, very rare) solid night of sleep, you’d almost certainly find me milking it for its productivity potential, ready to activate default mode: whip open the laptop and ‘do something productive’.
Of course, as with any frenzied, furious fire, I found myself fully extinguished of all energy last month. As it turned out, my very own productivity paradox had come to pass: constantly ‘hustling’ had made me less productive and creative than ever.
Somehow, somewhere down the line, my passion projects went from those fun things I did when I had the time, to a bunch of chores I had to be executing perfectly all of the time.
How did I get here? What happened to the fun? To the spontaneity and the serendipity? That’s where the real creativity is born, blossoms — not in the artificial world of optimisation. I knew all this, and so I knew I had to get back to my initial mindset, stat.
The good news is that I (think I) have. I’ve learnt to relax a little.
And, at the very least, I’m fortunate to have learned a thing or two from my tumultuous ride on the productivity rollercoaster.
So, if you relate to my words in any way, here’s your antidote to the toxicity of hustle culture.
Pay attention to your intentions.
The single best way to extract yourself from the hustle? Learning to respect and protect your energy — fiercely.
The past year of home confinement had confined many of us to believe that we must be constantly busy; that all this extra free time must be squeezed tight for its productivity potential.
But productivity without purpose — that is, being productive for the mere sake of it — is, in fact, counterproductive. And that’s because mindlessly saying yes to everything just to bloat up your to-do list and keep up some arbitrary productivity streak and therefore feel worthy of being a human on this hustle-hungry planet? It’s not sustainable or strategic. It just simply pushes you further, faster, towards burnout — and then you won’t have the capacity to focus on the things that truly matter.
So, the next time you find yourself evaluating yet another hustle, ask yourself: will this thing be fun? Will this thing be a thing that serves me in the long-run? Will this thing be worth my valuable time?
Be intentional about everything you invest your precious energy in. And remember: it will always be okay to say 'no' and do absolutely nothing.
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Find the brand of ‘relax’ that works for you — and practise it.
‘Fish don’t know they’re in water. They’re so surrounded by it that it’s impossible to see.
They can’t see it until they jump outside of it.’ — Derek Sivers
When you’re deep in the hustle, you forget what life was like before you worked all the time. You forget how to relax. How to do nothing. How to resist the urge to ‘just keep going’.
My first attempt at slowing down was, naturally, a flop — simply because I was doing what everyone was telling me to do. My attempts at early morning cardio were fuelling my anxiety (don’t ask me why), while meditating was frazzling me (I know, I’m not doing it right).
And then, finally, I decided it was time to do what I wanted, not what I ‘should’: starting every morning with a paperback, a fresh cup of coffee, and my trusty brown noise. It was only then that my mind started to slowly, quietly, remember what it meant to truly disconnect.
The fact that waking up at 5AM to lift weights works for your colleague or journalling at midnight is your best friend’s secret sauce, doesn’t mean it’s for you. And that’s okay. Find out what works for you.
And once you have, it’s about carefully carving out artificial relax zones — because learning to relax again is a muscle that needs retraining, a habit that needs sharpening. It will almost certainly feel unnatural at the outset. You will feel anxious. You will feel restless. You will chastise yourself for not ‘being more useful’.
However, if you do what it takes to push through and stick with it, soon enough, letting go will become status quo. You will, eventually, find yourself calming down.
For me, it helps to remember that, as creators (or, well, simply as humans), downtime is a critical component of our process. Some of my best ideas for blog posts, newsletters, and work projects have come to me during my evening walk or playtime with the cat — not from extra hours sat at the laptop.
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Just have fun, for Pete’s sake.
Who’s Pete? Who knows. But if not for Pete’s, then for yours: don’t forget that the reason you’ve taken on your passion projects is to experiment, to play around, to just have a good time. That’s why you’re here. That’s why it’s called a passion project.
This blog was born out of a pure passion for writing — just pure, unadulterated joy. A quiet space to retreat to after a trying day, with no (self-imposed) pressures, no blown-out-of-proportion targets. Just blogging and sharing and learning and enjoying and leaving self-doubt and anxiety far, far behind.
But then, at some point, I went from relaxing with chamomile tea and a blog post draft to caffeinating as quickly as possible to get into the ‘optimal writing zone’ as my favourite YouTubers were instructing me to. And if you, like me, juggle your side projects with your day job, treating the former as a ‘have to do’ is only going to build a breeding ground for avoidance and, ultimately, resentment.
So, if you don’t want to get stuck in toxic habit loops, you need to be enjoying it. Of course, the best way to do this is to simply remember why you started.
While I can, and have, blamed self-isolation on the need to quickly fill all pockets of time with ‘productive’ tasks, the blame can only go so far. The major culprit is — surprise, surprise — me and my mindset.
But now I (and, I hope, you) know that extra time does not need to equal extra productivity.
It’s okay to have a day or week or month or year where you’re not actively ‘achieving’, but instead just being. Just living life.
So, go on: challenge yourself to step away from the hustle and indulge in your brand of relax.
Everything you’ve been working on will still be there, waiting for you — if and when you’re ready to come back to it.
Until next time,
S
Cover image captured in North Goa, India.