Flexibility

I’ll admit, by posting a photo of my ‘out of office’, ‘WFB’ (Work From Beach) setup, you’re well within your rights to tell me to “Get ……”. However, it does symbolise a theme that I’ve been trying to make a priority in recent months which is flexibility. 

No, I haven’t taken up yoga. Although that might not be a bad idea. But flexibility is an area that I’ve used to experiment with when it comes to enjoying the work that I’ve been doing. Recently I wrote about my dealings with patience and how I’ve had plenty of idle time to convince myself that all of the worst work scenarios could be coming true much faster than I would have liked. I wrote about the realisation that I had when I decided to spend this time doing something meaningful, rather than just appearing productive. 

I’m never someone who’s been able to take inspiration from an office space, even if that office is a home office. So it made perfect sense to me to move a portion of my time to somewhere comfortable where I could go about my tasks in a more natural environment. I find this is where I can think more clearly, I’m more creative, and it gives me somewhere to go that is a visibly, and experientially different place. If you’ve read Cal Newport’s ‘Slow Productivity’ as I have just done, some of this will make sense to you but I must say, if you do have the opportunity, and the scope to try something similar, give it a go!

I do realise that I’m probably sounding like a burgeoning ‘productivity guy’ so I’ll spare you the depth of my processes that make this approach work. The best thing about it is that it’s made me realise that different jobs require different settings, and I can see this evolving as time goes on. The excitement of getting to spend time somewhere like the beach has added to my excitement for the work that I do. Therefore, adding to the results the work is producing. 

I found that if it becomes a way of ‘being’, the friction of the ‘doing’ is massively reduced. And this approach has symbolised this perfectly.

But what is that work? 

To put it briefly, a whole heap of writing. 

To put it a little less briefly, writing the beginning of a book, and writing for some upcoming presentations.

I don’t have any details I can share that are any less brief than that at the moment but I can confidently say that during the quiet time I mentioned at the top of this I've been able to come through with some real momentum. Despite the tests of patience and confidence, I feel like I’ve used this downtime to build towards what will be a strong and meaningful back half of the year that I can’t wait to share with everyone. 

You can trust that I’ll keep working away at all of this stuff, sometimes in a conference room, sometimes in the home office, and preferably, sometimes at the beach.