# All or Nothing By:: [[Ross Jackson]] 2023-02-05 There is a tendency to be willing to work hard with the hope that one day won’t have to work at all. There is certainly a logic to this approach. If one can work, stay focused, and earn a surplus of money, eventually one can retire and live off that accumulated savings. There are a couple of issues with this approach. First, one tends to consume a significant amount of time pursuing the amount needed or desired. Second, one tends to do some amount of damage to oneself and one’s life during this phase of the project. Third, one becomes good at the execution of work and becomes increasingly unwilling to walk away from that which one has become relatively proficient. Lastly, and here is the kicker, once one does stop, one finds that doing nothing is boring. The “all and nothing” approach to work is misaligned with human needs. An alternative is to find a way to work some of the time as soon as possible, and then continue to work some of the time for as long as possible. Instead of working sixty hours a week for twenty years, which is fatiguing, work twenty hours a week for sixty years, which is energizing. This would allow people to experience the changing joys of free time as they age and sustain the sense of accomplishment that comes from being productive and valued into one’s later years. The thought of doing nothing is only attractive when one is doing too much. #### Related Items [[Work]] [[Time]] [[Strategy]] [[Money]]