Comments on: Making It All Work – The Process

By: A

Thu, 14 Oct 2010 00:03:47 +0000

“I don’t mind taking a break or anything like that, but when I’m just sitting there doing nothing for the sake of doing nothing, I know there’s a problem, whether I’m active in my personal life or in my work.”

Maybe you should try some meditation and I bet you’d feel differently about that. ;)

By: Chad

Chad — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 03:04:06 +0000

“Allen goes so far with this as to suggest that there really is no difference between “work” and “personal” when you are “in the zone.” Regardless of whether you’re at home or at work, you should strive to get into that zone – and when you’re in that zone, the line between work and personal disappears. You just get stuff done.”

My employer would love for me to be “in the zone” all the time… after all, he only has to pay me for a 40 hour work week. He’d love for me to draw no distinctions between personal and private time. He gave me a blackberry so he can call me whenever he wants, get email responses from me on the weekends.

My salary reflects a 40 hour work week, and so I’m only in “the zone” 40 hours per week.

By: valleycat1

valleycat1 — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 20:08:54 +0000

“Loss of control and perspective is the natural price you will pay for being creative and productive. The trick is not how to prevent this happening, but how to shorten the time you stay in an unsettled state.

Why are we worried about these things? Simply put, time spent out of control and without perspective is time lost. ”

Is it just me, or does this not make sense? Or did Trent edit this down too far? Even if it does make sense to everyone else, there’s a lot of need in the world for creativity and productivity.

I think a “loss of control” (how the author puts it) and “being out of control” (per Trent) are two entirely different things, and creativity does require letting go of control to a large degree.

Is the author saying that to be productive, you have to focus, so you lose perspective? If so, the trick is to make time to look at the big picture as well as to look at & take care of the details – which pretty much sums up my life as I live it.