Dont forget to smell the roses!
A few months back, I went to see a cricket match. It is a rare privilege to catch a live game here in Delhi. So it was really good fortune to get those tickets. I had to leave really early in the morning to reach the stadium in time. It was a beautiful morning with a cool breeze and slightly cloudy skies. I had not woken up at 4 AM for a really long time. The road on the way was laden with beautiful flowers on both sides. So it was a picture perfect situation. VIP stand tickets, beautiful morning, nice weather, flowers lining the road. And yet I was not feeling the excitement. Even though I knew it was a lovely morning, I simply could not appreciate it. My mind, even at 4 AM in the morning, was completely clouded with work issues - client expectations, looming deadlines, month burn rate, tax filing, labour certification, office space expansion - the whole works! It was one big non-stop noise inside my head. I realized that morning that it is not supposed to be that way and I must be doing something wrong.
Entrepreneurship is, more than anything else, about passion. Starting and running a company is such a hard task that to take it up voluntarily requires you to have a very strong inner desire to accomplish something significant. That often translates into intense workaholism. At times your energy level is so high that you find it impossible to sit down and stop working. You have to work to keep the adrenaline in check! Work, as I have learnt, can be very addicting. Unfortunately, it can become a problem if work is the only thing you can enjoy. There does come a time when you realize that you are so deep down inside your work that you can see nothing else around you. That is not a good situation to be in. Because if you stop enjoying everything else, eventually you will stop enjoying your work as well.
So what is the solution? I am not sure but I think some the following things help (not that I myself follow all of them but hey, I am trying!)
1. Choose your battles carefully: You can't do everything. You can't take up every project that comes your way. You can't pursue every interesting product idea that sounds appealing. You can't attend every conference. You can't blog every day. When wise people say "learn to relax", this is what they are trying to tell you :) Its OK to be not doing something every living (or sleeping) hour of the day!
2. Don't sweat the small stuff: This is a mistake I used to make a lot earlier. Every little thing would be a reason to worry about - even something as trivial as getting business cards printed, or negotiating with the lunch vendor would be a important enough to discuss and negotiate. Every time you get worked up about something you think is wrong - you have to first see if it is worth your time, effort and energy to make that wrong right. It is sometimes OK to let somebody else take a small advantage off you because it is just not worth your time.
3. Delegate, empower and get out of the way: This is a very hard thing to do. To give up control is hard. Unfortunately not doing that is also the best way to make your life and everybody else's life hard! It is difficult to accept that you are not super human and you simply can't do everything yourself. But once you accept it, things become a lot easier. Having a great team that you can trust is important. Delegating responsibility alone is not sufficient. You have to be able to delegate a lot of decision making as well. You have to learn to trust your team and learn to get out of their way at the right time. If all decision making rests with you alone, not only does it hinder your team, it also makes your job that much tougher. Decisions taken under pressure of time and without understanding all the facts often go wrong. So don't be a control freak! Learn to let go and trust your team!
4. And finally, don't forget to stop and smell the roses: The joy is in the journey. You can't postpone life until your company is this big, or until you ship that product or until the big liquidation event happens. Work is never going to end. And if anything, it only keeps increasing. So it is really important to take everything and especially yourself less seriously. Its important to enjoy things outside of work. Its crucial to have friends outside of your office. Its imperative to read books. Its important to just not work on some days. Its important to stop and smell the roses!
What do you do to reduce stress? I would love to hear back more on this topic!
UPDATE: Thanks everybody for some really useful discussion in the comments. I guess the common message from everybody was that hobbies and activities outside of work are best stress relievers. Blogging, I feel, is also a great stress buster!
Comments
Thanks,This post gives good answer to some of my self queries.
Posted by: Nisarg | August 20, 2006 07:39 PM
Get married and it will all fall in place.
Posted by: Praveen | August 20, 2006 11:39 PM
I believe a spiritual inclination in life can make one more effective, relaxed and stress free.
There is so much content in our sacred literature (srimad bhagvatam, vashistha's Yoga etc) that talks about how to accomplish all the duties par excellence and being detached with the fruits of the act (essentially the root cause of stress and frustration).
Non profit Art of Living offers some very practical and valuable (non religious strictly spiritual and yoga based) tools that help you live in the present moment and be detached.
-my 2 paise
Posted by: Tarun Bhalla | August 20, 2006 11:40 PM
I sometimes wonder "how people do have such wonderful thoughts in their minds..."
I feel games are one of the best thing to reduce stress. If you get a time to play games like Badminton or Table Tennis for even half an hour, you will feel completely stress free. :)
Posted by: Amit Goyal | August 20, 2006 11:59 PM
A very subtle issue, explained with great wisdom :) It will be very useuful for a lot of people.
Posted by: Ahmed | August 21, 2006 01:37 AM
very perceptive points here. thanks!
I would second Amit: games truly are a stress reliever. Even exercise - swimming is a great one - can take your mind off for some time.
Watching TV (sans news/business channels) is another :-)
Posted by: sach1tb | August 21, 2006 04:03 AM
Good post, GB.
Posted by: Srini | August 21, 2006 08:51 AM
Praveen.
Just regarding your comment of getting married for solving issues related to work life balance. I think that is the worst thing you can do to yourself. Marriage is a difficult deal than work ( I can tell you that with my experience). You can screw up your product, your deadlines or your whole company but screwing up in marriage is fatal (almost). I think one should keep marriage and work separate and independent (as much as possible). Marry only when you want to marry, not when you want to work less.
Posted by: Pravesh | August 21, 2006 01:55 PM
Very nice post and very true, not only for entrepreneurs but many people in our hectic day to day life.
I have always found gardening very relaxing and engrossing. Look at the plants, the leaves, flowers.. anything small and alove from nature and can't help wondering about it. Although cities here don't have big home gardens, but even working with flower pots, water them, trimming the plants can be very relaxing and stress-relieving. Of course, also depends in one's interest. But as you have said.. take time to smell the roses.. in the literal sense as well.
Light reading (maybe light fiction), listening to music, travelling (for not official purpose) can also be very relaxing.
Posted by: Seema Kumar | August 21, 2006 05:32 PM
Dude.. you just echoed by thoughts :) awesome article.. I guess great men think alike :)
Posted by: Jeu | August 22, 2006 02:13 AM
Gaurav
Two things you can do.
1. Get up early and have some time for urself before u go to work (seems impossible for u :)
2. Go for a run. (This is possible..maybe you can get a treadmill or run outside)
Number 2 works for sure.
Posted by: Dheeraj | August 22, 2006 02:41 AM
The best stress reliever is doing something that gives you pleasure but not material gain of any sort. Many a smart people I know cook to release stress. I do try sometimes although I think I am more interested in the end product.
Cleaning my house is one way I turn my mind off. The other one which I have not had a chance to indulge in since I came to US is gardening.
Posted by: Ullas | August 22, 2006 03:08 AM
Great post Gaurav. I have personally fought this battle for the last many years. My previous job in a high paced retail consulting environment literally drained me. Life is a little more laidback now but I do get the mad craving for a faster life. I used to play a lot of tennis growing up and that channeled my negative energy in to positive energy. I am looking at getting in martial arts now because of it's mental and physical edge.
Posted by: Sunny | August 22, 2006 03:10 AM
Nice Post, Gaurav !
I feel sports keep u relaxed. Running and swimming brings back the energy.
And one must go out for a movie once a month(if possible more frequently !!! ) with friends. It actually makes you to think about something apart from work and life, it takes you (for sometime at least) into a virtual world.
And the time once gone.. never comes back. Responsibilities, worries and work keep on increasing with age.
So.. Enjoy.. :)
Posted by: Geetu Dhawan | August 22, 2006 05:30 PM
after years of trying to find the key to balance, a bunch of friends and I have concluded that the intensity is inborn, and trying to decouple that is suffocating and leads to more stress. Ironically, people like us feel most relaxed when the mind is intensely enganged into something - solving a business problem, figuring out design, or any other management issue. The trick, then, is to find another activity that requires intense, competitive, engagement yet is totally different from your work - another "outlet" if you will. This is what drives people to running, tennis, or golf. it seems blogging might do that trick for you :-)
anyway, just a thought.
Posted by: Gunjan | August 23, 2006 12:31 AM
Gaurav: Great Post! I especially liked the "smell the roses" part. In fact, this is what I also realized almost a year ago.
After running to catch up with life throughout school and then college, I realized that I was always living in the future; hoping to get that coveted degree, looking forward to making engough money and then living happily ever after.
I have stopped taking too much tension since then and things are much better. I am enjoying my present and guess what, my quality of work has also improved since I am much more relaxed. I guess the mantra is, work very hard but do not forget to put yourself off from work every once in a while.
To reduce stress, I just invite a couple of friends and cook for them. A well cooked meal gives me immense pleasure.
Posted by: Ankan | August 23, 2006 03:11 AM
Gaurav: Great Post! I especially liked the "smell the roses" part. In fact, this is what I also realized almost a year ago.
After running to catch up with life throughout school and then college, I realized that I was always living in the future; hoping to get that coveted degree, looking forward to making engough money and then living happily ever after.
I have stopped taking too much tension since then and things are much better. I am enjoying my present and guess what, my quality of work has also improved since I am much more relaxed. I guess the mantra is, work very hard but do not forget to put yourself off from work every once in a while.
To reduce stress, I just invite a couple of friends and cook for them. A well cooked meal gives me immense pleasure.
Posted by: Ankan | August 23, 2006 03:13 AM
THANK GOD you are thinking about this .
Posted by: Joy | August 23, 2006 08:59 PM
Great Post Gaurav . it really put things in prespective
thanks
Posted by: Prashant | August 25, 2006 02:36 AM
Dude, spend 4 yrs at IIT, u'll learn to either multi-task, or be comfortably numb!
On a more serious note, I totally agree with the bit about building a trustworthy team. At the possible risk of losing a penny today, you stand to earn a lot of peace of mind, maybe some pennies, and scope for scalability tomorrow.
Posted by: Abhimanyu | September 8, 2006 02:07 AM
I cant love a cuisine if its not spicy.I cannot(and by no means) not eat a meal thats not accompanied by a green chilli.
The stress that we want to get-rid-of is nothin but the chillies in our work cuisine.We eat n then grab a small bite.
I'm in the same shoes as you are.And I savour a project only if I've enjoyed these stress chillies to the fullest.And then I dont have to 'hunt' for ''stress-busters''.
If theres nothing we need to run away from, we'd not need to 'find' somethings to run into.
Basically, we all need to be comfortable with stress at work and at play and in life.Once thats done, we'd not need to find the 'time'n the 'activity' to-do, rather time and activity shall find us on its own.
So folks,jus take a chilly-pill:)
Posted by: RK Divya | September 27, 2006 06:47 PM