The word is everywhere.
“Good things come to those who hustle.”
“Hustle until you no longer have to introduce yourself.”
“Hustle until your haters ask if you’re hiring.”
“Hustlers don’t sleep, they nap.”
I know it started with good intentions. It can be motivating to realize that it doesn’t matter how talented you are at something right now, that if you work hard enough you will eventually get there. It’s just reality that if you want something great for your life you’re going to have to be focused and dedicated and you’re going to have to work hard.
However, in the process we encourage each other to work long days, we compete over hours worked in a week wearing our exhaustion like a badge of honor. We create complexes around rest and we forget that most people became self-employed so they didn’t have to kill themselves for a dollar.
Today, I want to encourage you to stop glorifying the hustle. Let’s not pretend like losing sleep, working 18 hour days, missing out on time with our family and loved ones is something to be proud of. With that in mind, here are my:
Top 5 reasons we should put an end to the hustle.
Choose consistency over inevitable burnout.
Do you know what follows busting your ass for 18 hours a day without taking weekends off? BURNOUT. Your body, your mind and your inspiration will eventually shut down. You’ll lose interest in your work and your concern with performing well will decline. I promise. It’s actually in some ways and for some personalities the easier route to just burst in everyday put 18 hours on the clock, not take weekends off and then crash in 6 months. These people (and I’ve been there) often find themselves not returning e-mails, providing lack-luster service, and just dropping projects because of overwhelm. Instead, I encourage you to show up in your healthiest form and in your best state of mind every day and do what you can as best as you can. It’s sustainable, you’ll have space to really know what you want to accomplish and people will know that you are reliable. Do you know what reliable people are more likely to receive? REFERRALS!
Hustling does not mean productive.
I don’t care how many hours you put on the clock. What I’m interested in is how productive you are in the time that you are using. Often I interact with people who are working 16 hour days and they are getting the same amount done as someone working 4! I have personally done the same amount of work in 4 hours that I would get done in a 16 hour day. It’s all about implementing systems and focusing techniques that support you in the work that you are doing. Don’t use the hours as a crutch for your feelings of accomplishment, just accomplish the tasks on your list and know that you are doing what you need to do to keep moving forward.
Choose Resilience.
Another symptom of the hustle is to overwork and then to find yourself discouraged about why you aren’t seeing results. When you bust ass and then get rejected it can be heart wrenching and you find yourself just wanting to crawl into bed and stay there for the rest of your life. However, the magic combination of consistency, perseverance and resilience is what real dreams are made of. Learning to show up everyday and keep pushing toward your goal with consistently high quality work and then not getting discouraged when things don’t turn out as you expected, that’s the most sustainable way to keep moving forward!
People need sleep to live.
I’m done with listening to memes and ‘motivational’ speeches that tell you to burn the midnight oil. That tell you to push yourself into the night and to not sleep if you need to. Our bodies literally require sleep to function properly. This isn’t a matter of personal opinion, this is biology. We use sleep to rejuvenate, heal tissue, grow muscle. Sleep helps you to retain information and to perform better mentally and emotionally. Did you know that you can’t pay back your lost sleep? If you miss two nights of sleep you can’t sleep for two days and make that back up. The way to properly receive the benefits of a nights sleep is to remain consistent in getting 7-9 hours of sleep per night, every night.
That’s not the goal.
If you are self-employed or you are aiming to be self-employed, you didn’t choose this path to work 18 hours a day and not take weekends off. You likely created this life because you wanted to pursue a passion or you wanted to work LESS and in my opinion it would be a combination of both. Yes, it is guaranteed that you are going to have to work hard to get there. We all are. But, I encourage you to see it as a season instead of the only way. Set an estimated end date to the high stress periods of your life. Promise yourself 3 months of consistently showing up and putting in 1000% everyday for 3 months and then give yourself a a month of showing up and only giving 100%. I promise you that you will find this much for sustainable, a lot more enjoyable and your loved ones will thank you.
With love and down with the hustle,
Sarajane
