Hi friend,
In The Rise of the Meaning Economy many of the tectonic shifts reshaping our lives and work are, in fact, positive. Yet they are not easy to navigate or implement.
As the pressure mounts to do more, if you can master the art of slowing down and successfully implement shorter work days, you are more likely to rise to the top in this new era.
You would think this is cause for celebration, yet ironically, for those of you who aspire to amplify your impact, I understand how daunting this can be.
It’s remarkably easy to get caught in the exhausting cycle of overwork—a pattern that’s hard to break.
Trust me, I get it. There's a lot to juggle to pull this off successfully—and by "this," I mean "influence and impact at scale."
With the demands of social media and long-form content creation, it's a lot to manage, and burnout among content creators is on the rise.
That’s why I’m serious about taking actionable steps to create an intentional roadmap for restructuring my days to work less, not more.
Mindsets for Making the Shift
The traditional 8-hour workday has long been the norm, but research reveals that our brains have a limited capacity for intensive cognitive effort.
Once you understand that you can engage in only 3-4 hours of truly productive, mentally demanding work before facing diminishing returns, the structure of your workdays starts to shift.
Solopreneurs, teams, and organizations that are breaking free from the constraints of the 8-hour workday are reaping significant benefits.
Here Are 3 Studies to Back This Up:
- Microsoft Japan: Experimented with a 4-day workweek, giving employees Fridays off without pay reduction. The result? A remarkable 40% increase in productivity, along with improved morale and work-life balance.
- Stanford University: Found that productivity declines sharply after 50 hours of work per week. Working beyond 55 hours leads to such a drop in productivity that those extra hours become virtually wasted.
- Iceland Trials (2015-2019): After reducing the workweek down to (35-36 hours with no pay reduction), the trial was deemed an “overwhelming success.” Workers reported enhanced well-being, and productivity either remained the same or improved.
From my experience, I know that the quality of my work suffers when I exceed 4-6 hours of work day.
This is the shift in my daily routine that I've been experimenting with for the past 3 weeks:
- 5:30 AM: Wake up (naturally!)
- 7:00 AM: Morning practice.
- 7:00 - 11:00 AM: Deep, focused work. This is the work that moves the needle. (With a 20-minute movement break.)
- 11:00 - 12:30 PM: 90-minute "shallow work" flow. (Check emails, respond on social media, etc.)
- After 12:30 PM: The rest of the day is truly off—no catching up on less pressing tasks.
Consistently showing up to create a meaningful body of work requires not only the commitment to be at your desk but also the dedication to honoring rest as an essential part of that process.
In other words, "working" includes resting.
This is the power of leveraging intentional lifestyle design to help you live and leave your legacy.
Choosing to abstain from work all afternoon requires discipline. I constantly have to quiet the incessant voice reminding me of the tasks lingering on my to-do list, the mounting DM's and unanswered emails that await my attention.
When I hear my inner "do more" voice, I turn to helpful reminders like this one:
Highly creative people structure their days to have time for both intense, focused work and downtime. These activities help them to develop more creative solutions to problems and to find those solutions more rapidly and with less effort.
This is one of many helpful reminders from the book Rest:Why You Get More Done When You Work Less by Alex Soojung-Kim.
After 3 weeks of working less, I'm already noticing the cognitive, emotional, and physical benefits.
Words of Encouragement For Working Less:
- Nothing is worth sacrificing your health for: When you commit to working less and start seeing the quality of your work improve, you can gradually reclaim more hours of your life.
- You can still burnout doing what you love: Loving what I do has been a tremendous blessing, but it’s also led to work habits that are not sustainable for the long haul.
- Choose rest, or it will choose you: If you don’t intentionally choose rest on your terms, it will choose you at a much less convenient time.
- Burnout is an amateur move. To operate at a level of mastery, you must recognize the importance of rest as an essential component within the creative process, not merely a bonus you receive after completing tasks.
- Move at your own pace. As the saying goes: slow and steady wins the race." As I shared on Instagram this week:
With that said, I’m about to close my computer for the day and enjoy some time at the beach. But before I go...
Here are 3 more small but significant shifts I’m making:
- Moving my newsletter from Sunday to Saturday morning so I can be 100% offline on Sundays.
- Experimenting with shorter, more concise emails—like this one! I’d love to hear your thoughts.
- Committing to one 4-day weekend per month with my partner, Mark, where we completely unplug from our computers.
Time for Some Self Reflection
What small but significant shifts can you make to work fewer hours and create more efficiently, allowing you to enjoy more leisure time in your life without sacrificing the impact you can make?
Is working less a growth edge for you? Feel free to hit reply and share what's on your heart and mind.
