#scaling #business #personal development #stress #self-improvement #practices
You need to allow yourself to understand that relaxation isn't something to seek out, nor do you need to wait for vacations or holidays. Relaxation isn’t some miracle that just happens, and it doesn't cost money. Relaxation is always within you – you just need to allow yourself to feel it.
It's much better to set a broader goal and causal connection than goals like "how can I make sure I relax once a year?" or "how can I make sure I relax at all?", "how can I make sure I get home early from work?", "how can I make sure I don't get tired at work?" Instead, ask "how can I make sure my internal state is one of relaxation?" Here, I mean a state of freedom, awareness, and natural, free, pure living each day, each moment. This doesn’t mean every moment is idle or that you equate relaxation to your current understanding of it. For some, it's watching a show in the evening, for others, it's drinking with friends, walking in the forest, going to Turkey once a year, visiting a nearby lake every quarter, traveling during school breaks, or spending weekends in the countryside.
It's important to realize that relaxation is something different, a state beyond all of this. Relaxation is something you can have constantly within you, or at least quite often throughout the day.
Many comedy and educational videos show people traveling somewhere only to spend a lot of time working, sitting on their phone, telling themselves they won't check emails or get distracted by work, setting up all sorts of barriers. But can you make life in such a way that these barriers don't matter? The question is, how do you view each day? How do you view the events of the day? These are examples from my life happening right now. My wife is going on a four-week trip for the first time ever. In the 15 years of our marriage, she has never gone anywhere alone for four weeks. Who is resting? Her, me, or neither of us? For her, it's a new experience; she might see it as incredibly hard and stressful, spending all four weeks in a state opposite of relaxation. Or if she says she’s going on vacation, she’s implying her life is hard. But this isn't about her state, it’s about mine. Nine out of ten people who hear that my wife is leaving for four weeks ask, "So, you're staying alone with the kids? What will you do with them?" My wife and mom asked how I will feed them. Friends ask if we’ll have a nanny, what our plans are, how work will go. All of this can make the situation seem very hard. This isn't relaxation; it’s the opposite.
Or I can say to myself that for the first time in 15 years, I get to be alone with my four kids. I already spend a lot of time with them, but now I'll be alone with them. Isn't that incredible freedom, ease, relaxation, joy? But is it relaxation?
To me, it's just life. What does it mean that relaxation is just life? What kind of state is that? Do I have relaxation? Last Saturday and Sunday, I barely worked. Does that mean I was resting? Was working harder than strolling with my family on Saturday? Or when we went shopping, or had guests over for dinner – was that harder than working? Was that relaxation? If we watch a movie – is that relaxation? Or is it harder than work?
You can have a "state of not-working." Last week, I planted new flowers and trees on my property, dug holes, moved soil, did fertilizing – I felt really tired. And relaxation happened, a very natural, life relaxation – when your body is physically tired and you recover quickly. How do you do it? You go to sleep, wake up refreshed (I was as fresh as a daisy), and start doing other things.
If I compare, perhaps it’s easier for me to have a meeting with 15 people discussing a business strategy to make 200 million dollars than moving bags of soil in the garden. Or maybe moving bags of soil is easier because I'm alone with myself, alone with the soil, nothing else. My mom told me about some recent study where scientists found that people who connect with the soil get some components, enzymes, or state that brings happiness. Scientists are always trying to find elements of happiness.
So what brings happiness?
A good property, animals, nature, kids, a wife, a husband. Someone is locked away somewhere, watching the ocean. What brings happiness? You can sit and watch the ocean, and it could drive you mad.
Set the state of relaxation before yourself, something entirely different, and keep it under constant observation. Can you always be in a state of relaxation, "non-relaxation"? It's a state of life. Calmly. Just like I calmly consider that in two days I’ll be alone with four kids, needing to take them to school, watch over them during the workday, do thousands of things I don't usually do. I don’t even know how to do some of these things. Sometimes I fill in, but many things my wife does, I don't know how to do. Am I looking for this? Am I preparing for this? I'm not looking or preparing because for me, it’s just life.
To achieve an incredible state of relaxation, you need to do the most important exercise. This exercise might seem strange to you now. The state of relaxation and freedom comes from daily, monotonous, repetitive, real-life work. And in this work, serving others. When you truly understand that all your actions towards others allow them to relax, not to stress, not to fight, not to depend, not to be angry, not to worry, but to rest, to relax. When you bring a state of calm to others through your work, your relaxation and desire for relaxation don’t become a complication for others around you.
I know so many people whose relaxation brings complications to others around them. Someone plans to relax somewhere all year and just brings endless complications. Someone plans to relax on the weekend and constantly creates complications: for themselves, their family, parents, kids, husband, wife, friends, colleagues, relatives, boss, subordinates, partners – creating problems instead of a state of joy.
The first thing to start doing is to bring a state of relaxation to others in your daily work and life, even when you don’t yet feel relaxed. And when you want to create relaxation for yourself, strictly ensure it doesn’t become a problem for others. This is a huge, powerful key to a person’s life.