When Is It Time To Rest From Work? | Deep Questions With Cal Newport

00:00:00.000 | So we haven't done a call in a while.

00:00:02.520 | - Yeah, it's time for a call.

00:00:04.160 | - Yeah, let's hear someone's voice.

00:00:05.520 | - We have Kevin from Minnesota.

00:00:08.140 | - Excellent.

00:00:08.980 | - Basically asking about when's a good time to rest.

00:00:13.040 | - When you're dead, Kevin.

00:00:15.840 | - This is Kevin from Minnesota.

00:00:17.680 | I'm a bit of a writer and a teacher and a learner

00:00:21.160 | and love the Deep Questions podcast.

00:00:24.200 | And here is my question.

00:00:26.360 | I always appreciate how you put hard edges on topics

00:00:29.360 | and nuances that help us improve.

00:00:33.400 | And my question is, how do you know when it's time to rest?

00:00:37.200 | And I mean, in terms of the work itself.

00:00:38.720 | So sometimes you get a little fatigued

00:00:41.360 | and whether it's writing or some other piece of work,

00:00:44.200 | and I don't know whether I should push ahead

00:00:46.400 | and get it done, or it's time to just put it aside

00:00:49.360 | for a day or two and let it kind of percolate a bit.

00:00:53.400 | So love to get your nuances.

00:00:55.360 | And if you will, a little more edge on thinking

00:00:57.040 | of the question about how do you know

00:00:58.680 | when it's time to stop, pause on something

00:01:02.600 | versus push through and get it done.

00:01:04.480 | Thanks.

00:01:05.320 | - Well, yeah, Kevin, there's a couple of facets to this.

00:01:09.520 | So how do you know when to take a break

00:01:12.400 | from a particular thing you're working on?

00:01:14.000 | There's a physical facet.

00:01:15.240 | So know your body, know your mind.

00:01:17.940 | I mean, if you're feeling, if you're tired, if you're sick,

00:01:21.360 | you can just feel that you're not getting traction

00:01:23.320 | even that you do your rituals, you get into the work,

00:01:25.360 | it's time blocked and not much traction's coming on,

00:01:28.040 | then you need to give your brain a break.

00:01:30.240 | All right, so I think there's the physical aspect to it.

00:01:33.440 | There's also the, I would say the non-physical

00:01:36.120 | sort of creativity aspect to it.

00:01:38.120 | I'm not quite sure what the right word to use here.

00:01:39.720 | So let's just use creativity, which is you feel fine.

00:01:42.700 | You're not sick, you're not tired,

00:01:45.360 | but you're not rolling, you're not making traction.

00:01:48.700 | Like for me, what this looks like

00:01:50.720 | with let's say article writing

00:01:52.400 | and I have a relevant story that just happened to me,

00:01:56.760 | I think it's relevant to this,

00:01:58.200 | is I feel fine, so I'm working, I'm writing,

00:02:02.200 | but it's not gelling.

00:02:03.920 | It's just I'm going through the motions of like,

00:02:06.640 | I need to get this done by this point.

00:02:08.320 | That's my weekly plan

00:02:09.480 | that's part of this bigger strategic plan.

00:02:10.860 | I need to get this article draft done

00:02:12.200 | and I'm writing, writing, writing,

00:02:13.260 | but I know it's not working.

00:02:14.480 | And for me, I feel it as a physical unease.

00:02:17.360 | This is how I am with writing.

00:02:18.280 | If it's not completely, if it's not working,

00:02:20.560 | it just doesn't feel right.

00:02:21.820 | So there's this creativity, cognitive aspect.

00:02:24.760 | And again, without giving too much details

00:02:27.280 | about things in progress,

00:02:28.360 | which I always try to be very careful

00:02:30.800 | about keeping private,

00:02:34.760 | I've been working on an article

00:02:36.960 | and I was just locked in, like I need to get this done

00:02:40.080 | because I have this whole strategic plan

00:02:41.920 | of finish it this week

00:02:42.840 | so I can start on this next week, et cetera.

00:02:45.080 | I grounded out, I felt fine, so I grounded out

00:02:47.520 | and the thing ballooned 7,000 words

00:02:50.920 | and it's for a magazine, right?

00:02:52.320 | And it just, it wasn't working.

00:02:55.200 | It just wasn't working, you know?

00:02:56.480 | And I, at some point I said, okay,

00:02:59.580 | I got to pull the rip cord on this,

00:03:01.000 | take a couple of days off, take a weekend off,

00:03:02.960 | come back to it fresh.

00:03:03.960 | I came back to it fresh

00:03:05.120 | and hand-grenaded the thing in the fragments,

00:03:08.100 | took the fragments I liked, rewrote it from scratch,

00:03:10.680 | took me an extra week,

00:03:12.520 | but it's much closer to where it should be.

00:03:15.280 | So that's the other fear is like, I have energy,

00:03:18.160 | but my mind's just not there.

00:03:19.760 | And there, that's another instance where you say,

00:03:21.340 | I need to step back, take a couple of days,

00:03:23.560 | come back, come back at this fresh.

00:03:25.040 | And in this case, it was a walk.

00:03:27.880 | I took two days off and in one walk, 20 minutes long,

00:03:30.700 | I just, the structure, the structure fell into place.

00:03:34.920 | It was like, oh yeah, cut that, cut that, cut that,

00:03:37.180 | start on this, intertwine this, make that shorter.

00:03:39.820 | 20 minutes, the whole thing was redone.

00:03:42.480 | But I think without the 48 hours before that 20 minutes,

00:03:46.060 | I wouldn't have been able to have the insight.

00:03:48.200 | So Kevin, that's what I would suggest.

00:03:50.960 | Physical fatigue, you gotta, you know your body.

00:03:54.060 | You're not gonna get anything by forcing it through

00:03:55.760 | except for more tiredness, prolonged sickness,

00:03:58.920 | and work you're not proud of,

00:04:01.180 | but then also creative fatigue.

00:04:03.020 | Give yourself a couple of days, come at it,

00:04:06.180 | come at it fresh.

00:04:07.660 | All right, so good luck.

00:04:09.660 | Good luck with your writing.

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When Is It Time To Rest From Work? | Deep Questions With Cal Newport

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