It’s hard to recall that, not too long ago, people used to work full-time operating an elevator, processing telegrams, and redirecting calls on a switchboard.
Looking at the last decade alone, the evolution of jobs has been dramatic. Video stores and theatres have closed with the rise of streaming services. Travel agencies have folded when most people book their own flights and hotels. E-commerce has disrupted manufacturing and retail. The pandemic has further changed how and where we work. Many jobs have disappeared or become unstable gigs.
At the same time, new forms of work have emerged, and they go beyond tech sector jobs like software and data science. Healthcare work has ballooned with an aging population. Lawyers now deal with unprecedented data privacy and cybersecurity cases. Demand is high for engineers, architects, and designers who can build useful systems that are also sustainable for the planet.
Outside of traditional employment, many find opportunities in crafts that have regained popularity. There is a new generation of carpenters, beer brewers, and food truck owners. Others share music online, start a daycare, and organize cooking classes out of their homes (I know some personally). Many serve their customers with great products and services while building an honest, mission-driven business.
One thing is certain: work will continue to evolve. It always has.
For 40 weeks now, I have sharing three interesting stories/ideas in my newsletter. I plan to keep it up.
One challenge I consistently run into is that I don’t have the stories early enough in the week so the last couple of days becomes stressful. Sometimes my full-time job gets busy, and other things happens in the life. It becomes challenging to find time and energy to work on the newsletter stories a day or two before the ship date.
I am now exploring another approach. Instead of trying to find three stories last minute, I write one short blog post every day. It can be a random interesting idea or story or passage I come across. If I do it daily, I have at least seven stories every week. When the time to compile my newsletter comes, I have a collection of materials to choose from. Not all seven will be good, but it shouldn’t be hard to find three decent ones.
As I was thinking about this, I came across a quote from author and recovering alcoholic Sarah Hepola on slow change:
“Change is not a bolt of lightning that arrives with a zap. It is a bridge built brick by brick, every day, with sweat and humility and slips. It is hard work, and slow work, but it can be thrilling to watch it take shape.”
This past week, I organized my room and came across a stack of old notes from a decade ago. It appeared I journaled for about three months before picking it up again six years later.
I was taken aback by what I privately wrote, in Chinese, on August 23, 2014:
A blank piece of paper. Don’t know what to write. No plans. No goals. I must write. Translate my thoughts into ink. I don’t need a glamorous life. But I don’t want a suffocating routine of only making money and paying bills. I must leave here. Life has to be more than this.
Many aspects of me have changed in 9 years, but many have also remained.
In the last 20 years, I started many projects. I had a dozen blogs with less than ten posts. I had a podcast in 2006 with five episodes on computer-related topics. I lost count of how many journals I had bought.
These projects were nowhere to be found three months later (sometimes only two weeks).
Cantonese, my first language, has a lovely expression for someone like me: “having three-minute passions.”
While six months isn’t long, my weekly newsletter project is the most consistent creative pursuit I have ever done.
This time, I made a simple rule for myself: No matter what happens, the newsletter goes out on Friday at 6:30 am Pacific Time every week. No exceptions. Even if the week is a disaster. Even if doubt kicks in. Even if I cringe at my draft on Thursday night.
Let’s see if one change can break the patterns of two decades.
“Your life—who you are, what you think, feel, and do, what you love—is the sum of what you focus on.”
Winifred Gallagher
Many of us work hard everyday, but we are often unaware of what our time went. Did I spend time on the things that matter? Did I move an inch in a hundred directions, or did I make meaningful progress? Was the last day, week, and month well-lived?
Whenever these questions arise, I return to following three questions:
What are my four important domains?
How much time do I spend on each domain?
How will I spend my more time on what matters?
What Are My Four Important Domains?
Conceptually, your life is made up of domains. Think of your major spheres of activities: work, family, health, community, spirituality, et cetera. It’s like an investment portfolio, but instead of putting in money, you invest with your time and energy every day.
How important you view each domain reflects your values: that’s what matters to you right now.
How do you figure out your top domains? One place to start is your heart. Ask: what brings you the most joy? When gives you a strong sense of purpose? What activity is meaningful? Where, how, and with whom would you spend your time if you have a choice?
Once you have an initial list of activities, group the answers into domains. For example, spending time with your parents, partner, children and extended relatives can be under family. Your job, business, and side hustle can be under work. Church and volunteer work may be under community.
How you define your domains is up to you. Creative pursuits can be part of work or self-care. Exercise can be part of health or community. Meditation can be under spirituality or religion.
Limit your domains to no more than four. Take a moment to see if certain domains are more important than others. If you look deeply, you may see how these domains are interrelated. For example, if your family domain thrives, you are in a better mental shape to produce high quality work. When you have health, you will have more energy to dedicate to your friends or community. These domains may appear separate, but they are also one: they are all part of you.
My life domains in a 2×2 in 2022
How Much Time Do I Spend on Each Domain?
How you allocate time to each domain reflects your choices: that’s how you live today. What we value and how we spend our time are not the same. In fact, it may be shocking to see how the two differ.
One way to find out is to do a quick time audit. Spend a few minutes and roughly tally up where your time went last week. Look through your calendar. Review your projects, notes, and emails if they help to recall the week. How many hours went to work? When did you spend time with friends and family? Did you rest and take care of yourself?
Compare how you spend time versus how you value each domain. What do you notice?
When you allocate proper time and energy across your domains, your choices align with your values. Even when you work hard feel tired, but you will likely feel fulfilled because you know your time is invested in what matters. On the contrary, tension arises when your choices and values conflict. This happens when your time heavily skews towards one particular domain at the expense of the others.
Conflicts always exist. Each domain competes for your limited attention. We are human. We don’t make perfect choices. Circumstances can also be a challenge. Sometimes an imbalanced life is the only choice. We have to make ends meet. Accidents happen. Life has rough patches. That’s okay. But whatever the situation, we always have a degree of control over our choices. It starts with being aware of where we stand today.
While we should be compassionate with ourselves, it’s equally important to remember is that your important domains keep count over time. If you ignore your body for years, you will burn out. If you disregard your families and friends, you can’t do a big catch up years later and call it even. The more your values and your choices disagree, the more you are going to suffer over the long term. The wider the gap, the greater the damage. It’s fine to not water your plants for a day or two. But if you don’t water them for months, they will eventually die.
How Will I Spend More Time on What Matters?
If what you value and how you spend your time is perfectly aligned, congratulations. But if you are like the rest of us, we have some discrepancies to reconcile. For me, I tend to spend too much time on the computer for work and pleasure. That takes away time for health, family, and friends.
Since we have the same 24 hours a day, the only way to invest more in the top domains is to change the way we use our time. That means shifting time from less important things to the most important domains.
How can we find the time? It may be easier that you think. First, identify the activity we want to do less of. Some examples of what I have identified in the past:
Consume less entertainment (social media, internet, and TV)
Buy fewer things which reduces time on research and maintenance
Exit unimportant obligations (committees, community groups)
Resist perfection when 80% is enough
Decline social invitations that take away my prime time
Second, we must choose where the time goes. Again, my examples below:
You can even get creative by choosing activities that contribute to two domains at the same time. If your domains include friends and health, invite a close friend to go on a walk. If your domains include family and personal growth, invite your partner to read an inspiring book and have a discussion. The options are limitless.
Whenever we desire to make a change in our life, we often overcomplicate how to get started.
Say you have grown restless with your current job. You enjoy baking. A voice in your head tells you to make cookies and share with the world.
Yet, you are not so sure. Should you leave your job to dedicate to the craft? Should you go to culinary school? How much does it cost to buy equipment and rent a space? Can you survive with selling cookies?
You think three, four, and five steps ahead. All these complexities paralyze you. At the end, nothing gets done.
You are getting ahead of yourself. You don’t need to start with a drastic, permanent change to your job or lifestyle.
A Better Approach: Start Small
There is an easier way to experiment your career as a cookies chef.
You only need to do one thing: make cookies.
It means clear your weekends. Go to the grocery store. Gather ingredients. Make a complete mess in your kitchen. Watch free videos. Mimic the techniques, but make tweaks to create your signature flavors.
Don’t have the best oven at home? Who cares. Bake lots of cookies with your subpar oven. Share the cookies with your friends and neighbors for free. Ask for feedback.
Do this 4 weekends in a row. See how it feels. Write down your experience. Maybe you will love it, maybe you won’t. The only way to find out is to try, to get started.
Starting small gives you far more feedback than any planning or studying can offer. In only a few days or weeks, you will learn:
How does this change feel in real life? Are you exhausted but fulfilled? Frustrated but hungry for more? Or does it feel forced and draining?
How much joy do you get?
Does it seem like you can endure the pain that comes this change?
How to Start Small
Starting small means to use the resources you already have without additional commitment. All your need is time and openness.
Spend little to no extra money. Instead, find substitutes that are close enough. Learn to be resourceful. Don’t have a pencil? Use a pen. Don’t have blue? Use black. Don’t have lime? Use lemon.
Most importantly, get as close as possible to the actual thing you aspire to do in the shortest amount of time.
If you want to be a writer, don’t worry about getting an MFA degree yet. Instead, write. Open a blank document. Get your fingers moving. Borrow books from the library. Study how great authors tell stories.
If you want to be an interior designer, don’t apply for an expensive architecture program yet. Instead, offer a friend a free home decor design consultation. Treat them as real clients. Ask what is important to them. Pick out furniture, color schemes, and build an estimated budget.
If you want to work at a non-profit, don’t quit your corporate job yet. Instead, volunteer at a couple of non-profit organizations. Ask to shadow the staff on a weekend. Observe their challenges. Speak with the clients they serve. Be on the ground.
When you start small, it’s less scary. You get feedback quickly. You validate assumptions in real life. You will learn if your hobby should stay as a hobby, or it has the potential to become something more meaningful in your life. It’s less costly if things don’t work out. In return, you will gain incredibly valuable insights into what works and what doesn’t.
And you always have the option to fall back on your existing life.
