rethinking "hard work"

“Later that same week, I chatted about this in a coaching session with Kristine Claghorn. I asked her, “Now that I am wiser and I know what happens when I burn out, how do I find joy in my work again?” And she asked me a question that changed my perspective instantly: “What would happen if you took the pressure off? What would work feel like then?”

When we feel that we are investing attention in a task against our will, it is as if our psychic energy is being wasted. Instead of helping us reach our own goals, it is called upon to make someone else’s come true. The time channeled into such a task is perceived as time subtracted from the total available for our life. Many people consider their

Effective thinking isn’t about ‘working hard’ in any brute or rote sense; it is about learning to spot, defend, nurture and grow our fleeting, tentative periods of insight.