Hard or Smart work? The ugly truth is there is no OR. It’s AND.
“Extraordinary results happen only when you give the best you have to become the best you can be at your most important work.” — Gary Keller
When we should do our work.
This age-old debate is one that has been argued at length for decades.
Various scientific studies are now showing the role that our chronobiology plays in the timing of our energy peaking throughout the day.
Basically, our energy will is dependent on our sleeping patterns also known as our circadian rhythms, the time we fall asleep and the time we rise.
Studies have shown that for workers, energy rises from after the point of waking, tailing off around after noon time.
For those of us following a typical 8/9 AM starting time for our workdays, we’ll find that the late morning is when our logical, analytical capacities are at their strongest. This is the best time to do our hard, cognitively demanding work.
Whilst the very early morning may be a time to read, listen and absorb new ideas as we’re more alert and suggestible at this point, with our stress hormone cortisol reaching around 50% within the first 30 minutes of walking.
It’s here when we are able to be highly focused, saying no to distractions and maintaining strong filters.
However, for more creative thinking and forming new connections, the afternoon may actually be better when the brain isn’t operating in such an active, tightly wound state and is in a more diffuse state.
But how does this all apply to those of us that are self-claimed night-owls?
Well, so long as their sleep quality is sufficient (enough deep and REM sleep), they too will notice a similar pattern of energy is present when they wake.
Early peaks of cortisol upon waking and dipping after a few hours.
The point is not to argue which time is better, the point is to be aware of our own personal circadian rhythms.
When we’re aware, we can begin creating routines to be able to tackle specific tasks at the appropriate times.
Using our energy in this way, doing our logical work first and our creative work after is one of the smartest and most responsible uses of our personal resources.
When we act in this way, without question we’re acting in complete integrity with ourselves.
We’re doing the best we can to make sure we’re best able to keep our promises. And there are few better feelings than that.
As we explored in the intro, the late Kobe Bryant was a known workhorse. But it wasn’t just his hard training that paved the way for his successes.
It was his ability to think smart about his game, focusing on what to do as well as planning on how to do more of it, whilst maintaining the highest quality.
He would break down his daily work into multiple mini-blocks of work with specific focuses so he could deliberately practice something precisely for each block of time.
He would then carry out this block approach across the day and rinse and repeat, day after day, week after week, season after season.
Sounds tedious. But that’s simply what needed to be done.
High volumes of specific technique repetitions, under realistic conditions, as consistently as possible.
While his rivals would rack up a solid workout and one sweat-drenched practice session per day, he would more than triple their daily output with his cycling of various deep ‘on’ and deep ‘off’ modes.
Here’s how he explained it:
“Imagine you wake up at 3, you train at 4, from 4 to 6.
Come home, have breakfast. Now you’re back at it again from 9 to 11.
Relax, and now you’re back at it again from 2 to 4.
Now you’re back at it again from 7 to 9.
Look how much more training I have done by simply starting at 4.
So now you do that, and as the years go on, the separation you have with your competitors and peers grows larger and larger.
And by year 5 and 6, it doesn’t matter what kind of work they do in the summer — they’re NEVER going to catch up.”
Now before you moan, I get it. We all don’t have that luxury of committing our whole days towards our goals like this. It’s likely we have other obligations to attend to. But we can definitely take lessons from this idea:
- Plan specifically.
- Start early.
- Work deeply.
- Rest well.
- Work often.
