Work-life balance: This is actually a false proposition.

My first full-time job after graduation was in a consulting company. Newcomers spend most of their time changing PPT. I remember a few times, because I had to give a report to my client the next day, I changed it until two or three in the morning, until my brain was numb, I felt depressed and wronged, and I doubted the meaning of my work. But as a result, I was tired and said nothing. I woke up the next day and found that there was still a problem.

Work-life balance is a frequently heard topic, which gives people the impression that work and life add up to 24 hours and it is a zero-sum game. Workaholics work 14 hours a day. Although they don't have a life at all, what they get is rapid progress in their careers. They became Ma Yun and Liu, married Bai, gave birth to excellent children and reached the peak of their lives.

But in fact, it's just like what I felt when I graduated as a child. It's not that I don't want to, it's that "male and female servants can't do it"-let alone change careers. A mortal like me has been working until the early hours of the morning. Workaholics can't just talk and do nothing.

Except for a few talented people, they only need two or three hours of nap every day, and most adults need about 7.5 hours of sleep. A brain that sacrifices sleep and works until the early hours of the morning is like a backyard swimming pool that has not been filtered all summer. There are toxic substances floating everywhere that can only be cleaned up by sleeping. It's strange not to make mistakes.

At that time, I didn't understand this. But I envy my boss. Why do I always feel refreshed after a day's work when I feel depressed? I am always ready to fight at work. Talking about life, I also savor the night in Paris, set foot on snowy Beijing, travel at home and abroad at least twice a year, run a marathon and participate in a triathlon. I have a good figure like a model, which makes people envy and hate from the inside out.

Later, after working for these years, I chatted with team bosses at home and abroad and found that this is really not special. Many people with good career development have this trait: excellent work and equally wonderful life.

Everyone seems to understand the importance of a healthy and energetic body to work, but in practice, it requires a lot of self-discipline. There are always all kinds of work to be done, all kinds of fires to be put out, and only exercise and sleep can delay until you are really sick.

The impact of illness on work is devastating. Even a simple cold will make you dizzy for a week, cut your work efficiency by half, and slow down the reflex arc by several beats. If long-term neglect of health leads to illness and hospitalization, then basically the cake promised by the boss will go up in smoke.

In the past few years, I have seen several such cases. The VP-level executives of the company rested for two months because of a stroke or a heart attack, and left their jobs soon after they came back. Although they usually broke up amicably, the company will not declare that they will be responsible for you for life because of the illness caused by your staying up late in the past.

However, in this case, the general parties also have many bad hygiene habits, which will affect their work efficiency, even if it is a temporary scenery, it is difficult to go on for a long time.

A lot of scientific research has proved the influence of healthy and energetic body on the brain. Just a few examples:

The importance of getting enough sleep. As mentioned earlier, the process of sleep can help to remove the free toxic waste between brain cells. If these substances are not cleaned up, their judgment will be greatly affected.

Although staying up late before the exam is still popular, it is sometimes difficult to completely avoid staying up late the day before handing in the report the next day. I can only order coffee and red bull the next day (the effect can't be equal to a good sleep), but basically I can only stay up for one day. People like me who need a lot of sleep, if they stay up late the next day, their brains will stop working completely. There is a lesson in the Harvard Happy Course about sleep and exercise. I recommend it (domestic friends can watch/movie/2006/1/8/I/m6hv755o6 _ M6I43FH8i.html, and foreign friends can go to Youtube).

-If the pressure is too high, people will enter the narrow-band mode, and the flexibility and openness of thinking will be damaged, which will affect creativity. People are more likely to have creative ideas when they are happy and relaxed.

Let's start with a few personal experiences. Nearly ten years ago, I traveled abroad alone for the first time. The train meandered along the tranquil Rhine. My eyes kept looking around, and my mind was full of flames. Reread Allen on the trip? De Botton found many songs in The Art of Travel, and wrote in his diary that "the changing scenery is easy to produce fresh ideas". Now that I think about it, it's a pity that I didn't seriously start writing and sharing at that time.

Many of the business elites we often admire are sports travelers. Those who have climbed Mount Everest, like cross-country motorcycles, climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, etc. They seem to have played a lot, but the time spent playing has not affected their work. On the contrary, it has given them a brand-new view of their career and life, and they have come back full of energy.

People who have a wonderful life will also swim and talk about things more, so that they will not talk about their work very well and become fools when eating and chatting. Although I haven't seen the research, I believe everyone knows it. People with rich experiences and hobbies are like magic, and chatting with them is more interesting. This kind of people bring their own aura, which makes people more willing to communicate and spark each other, which is wonderful for work.

Kenichi Ohmae has a book called "Leave study, play and succeed". Some people complain that there are not many dry goods in the book, but I think the ideas conveyed in the book are very good.

Life and work are not zero-sum games, but complement each other. People who can live often work well.

Work hard and have fun is a culture that many companies like to admire, but the focus is not clear.

Work from nine to nine during the day, and go to Karafor for three hours without going home at night? Except for a few talented people, many ordinary people who do well can work crazy and have fun because they can turn off their work mode and switch to play and rest mode.

So time itself is not the key to measure work-life balance. The point is to work hard and have a good rest when you rest.

Note that it is not to stop thinking about work after work, but how to avoid inefficient consumption. The brain is a magical tool. If you worry about it, it is easier to exhaust it than to solve problems for it. The more complicated the work, the more thoughts you need to consume. When work brings people a great sense of accomplishment, people will actively want to continue thinking about work after work. On the eve of the release of the first iPhone, Jobs had just rehearsed the conference for hundreds of times. At that time, Jobs was still nervous and swearing casually, but although he was worried about making mistakes at the press conference, he also spent more time rehearsing and thinking about ways to solve the problem. Worrying about staying up late is a worse mode than fighting all night to solve the problem.

So how can we turn off the worried voice in our heads and learn to turn it off? Exercise and meditation are very effective methods. I once wrote an article about meditation:

A good brain needs meditation, just as a sword needs a grindstone.

The first two points are about the positive influence of healthy body and good living habits on work. Finally, I want to talk about the impact of work on life from a negative perspective.

It is understandable that many women will shift their focus from their work to their children's companionship and education after their children are born. Accompanying and educating children is very important for a person's growth.

Parent-child relationship is a worldwide problem. Foreign parents have less obsession, so they look better than domestic ones. I was caught in the middle. I was abroad, but I was educated at home for decades. As a first-generation immigrant, I have a natural language and cultural gap with my children.

Last weekend, I went to my neighbor's house. A very hospitable family came to Canada from war-torn Iran three years ago to settle down. Two children, aged 6 and 7 when they came, began to correct their parents' English pronunciation in just half a year. Now they are fluent in English and often translate for their parents. China family, the situation is similar. In order to have a normal dialogue with children, we should not only let them know more about the language and culture of their motherland, but also learn more about British and American culture. How to learn? Obviously not staying at home, but going out.

The best gift that can be given to children is to constantly become a better self. Even if you choose to give up your job when your child is young, or choose a job with lower requirements, don't forget that when your child grows up, he needs not only companionship and care, but also the sharing and guidance of life experience. Twenty-five years after the birth of the Internet, my baby is less than 1 year old and has become obsessed with the iPad. The speed of change in this world is amazing. If I can't keep learning and making progress, I think it will be a problem to have a normal conversation with her in the future, let alone a close relationship.

Education is a big topic, which is worth spending more time talking about. In the future, I will continue to pay attention to books and theories in this field and share my experience and experience.