Rise and Grind

and

hello everyone uh let me know if i’m

audible by

say not a show of hands but a show of

thumbs up if possible

thank you i will now present my screen

and i really hope

that you guys relate to this because

it’s something that

i really want you to resonate with so

i am ankita chabla as the arushi has

given a very

generous introduction and my topic for

today’s

tedx this is my second telex and i

really want to take this opportunity to

talk about

something that i have like come to the

realization of

during the pandemic and i’m really glad

that i’ve done so

rise and grind and other lies around you

so you probably would have heard of the

badge of busy

you’re probably even wearing it right

now it’s when you wear and communicate

your business

as a badge of honor valuing a fully

booked schedule

the number of classes you have over the

free time that you actually deserve

we often think that busyness and

productivity go hand in hand

but the truth is taking time off is one

of the

best things we can do for our brains our

creativity

innovation and focus

uh you must have heard of uh phrases

like you have

as many hours in a day as beyonce wake

up

grind repeat five all nighter habits of

ceos

i’m pretty sure you’re familiar with

them right these

might sound like motivational slogans at

first but over the course of the last

few years

have become symptoms of a problem that

is deep rooted in our generation

neon signs demand us to hustle harder

and our instagram feeds want us to share

every moment

of our living and breathing day and

murals

spread the gospel of tgim and if you’re

wondering what’s tgim

it’s thank god it’s monday i haven’t

seen anyone

in my life being so excited about the

tgim and now i’m going to talk about

why the media wants you to listen to

this message in the first place

i know you must be wondering that what i

am talking about

is literally in my pen name so why am i

going against it

my short answer is no and my long answer

is going to be explained in the next few

minutes

of my talk uh

one second good morning everyone i am

ankita chawla or better known as hassel

rani

in the digital world i’m a visual

content creator and a marketing

professional currently working with the

big four

and today i will be asking for your

precious time to talk

about redefining what it means to hustle

in today’s world so getting things done

for me

has always been like you know my

approach to accomplish any task

say if it’s a dentist’s appointment like

i just want to get it done with if it’s

a difficult conversation i want to get

it done with

if it’s a simple mail that i have to

write but it requires me to think a lot

let’s just get it done with trying to

accomplish four years worth of

experience in two years of my career

let’s just get it done wait that doesn’t

really sound right

a lot of the pressure on us in today’s

generation and especially

with the pandemic is surmounting to a

level that is often not

achievable and the concept of people

both

young and old striving to be better

versions of themselves

be it academically physically

professionally

or socially is not a new one and it’s

completely okay to do so

as young people in schools colleges and

jobs

we have hundreds of papers to write

millions of assignments to submit

uh lots of instagram stories to be put

stories of sleep deprivation to be

shared

and so many handmade lunches made with

love to be refused

for you as students with the most

crucial times of your lives around the

corner i understand

how this pressure is mounting and i

truly empathize with your need to push

harder

but because it after all it’s all about

scoring some of the most important and

permanent grades of your lives

but hear me out i want to focus on three

topics today under the discussion of

hustle culture

the first one talks about why buying

into the hustle culture

is so easy second i will be talking

about the effect

on our mental health and third i will be

talking about

creating a rest ethic as strong as our

work ethic and trust me

it’s a lesson i’ve had to learn the hard

way after i went from my school to

college to job

process and while i have the opportunity

to talk to people who

like i have been in the shoes of i would

want you to know of this lesson

even before because the only reason why

we are here on a platform like tedx is

that we share our experiences so you

guys don’t have to make the mistakes

that

we did so let’s dive right into it

why buying into the hustle culture is so

easy

uh just to let you know all the

illustrations that i’m currently

presenting

are made by me and this illustration is

made by one of my friends called

prakriti bisht

and i just wanted to keep the tonality

of this slightly lively

so that this does not seem like a sermon

session to you

rather than something that you all can

relate to and take a lesson from

so let’s get to it why i feel getting

into hustle culture is so easy

why is it so easy to subscribe to the

idea of pushing our bodies beyond its

limits

and why is it that aggressive

motivational quotes on instagram

are only only present on pictures of

lions for some reason i mean leave the

lions out of this i do not have an

explanation

for why lions are used to motivate us

but i do have an explanation for why we

fall into this trap

it’s very simple we as humans we are

very driven to do good things

we are also quick to seek inspiration

from others good work

but social media wants to make sure we

talk about it 24

7. in the new work culture

liking your own job liking your own

school

liking your own hard work is just not

enough

it’s imperative that we have to promote

that love

everywhere we go it makes sure that we

measure our levels of work ethic

with our productive capability seeing a

heavily filtered version of someone

else’s career

of someone else’s life has given us an

unrealistic expectation

of what we should be achieving and to

put this sentiment in one

simple sentence there’s just a feeling

of having to accomplish

so much so quickly in such a short time

frame

and i know you of all people will really

relate to this

because i feel this pressure is like

quite excessive when it comes to gen z

the pressure of having to achieve what a

person three years older to you would

have achieved in say a span of six years

to achieve in a span of say two years

the pressure

is incredible and it’s overwhelming to

say the least

is it a good thing i mean it could be

sometimes

you know these uh like heavily version

heavy

heavily filtered versions of other

others careers often drive people to

reach their goals and sometimes they

eventually do

but is it extremely necessary to glorify

an

unhealthy work standard absolutely not

in a world where we’re always connected

it’s gotten so difficult to disconnect

this means it’s always easier for us to

keep working and never shut off

in competitive environments over

glorifying stress taking

is not uncommon but has this process

gotten out of control

social media for me personally has

inspired a creative journey that

i think no other platform has and i

would be taking away a lot of credit

from social media and especially

instagram

if i do not acknowledge the fact where

on days it has given me the inspiration

to create art

on days where like i have reached out to

other creators to help me create art

on days where other creators have sought

inspiration

and solace in my work and where people

like you

and me have looked at others work and

felt better about ourselves

but i want you to picture this scenario

you wake up

you check your phone you scroll through

your feed your messages

the explore tab oops now you’ve clicked

on the reels tab because instagram has

changed its user interface too many

times so now you’re watching reels

you get an email you swipe up you ignore

it you go back to instagram and now you

wonder

how has it been 22 minutes already

that’s the cycle i’m talking about we

have been called the addicted generation

we’ve been called the impulsive

generation we’ve been called the lost

generation

and now we are being called the burnt

out generation

and rightly so which brings me to the

second part

of my talk that is the effect on our

mental health

uh a google search for how to be

productive during the quarantine

yields over 10 million results in a

second

and it’s not that i’ve done a research

or something if you were to google that

right now

it’s something that google boasts about

that i have given you 10 million results

within these many seconds so here you go

the sky is your limit the world is your

oyster go crazy

so our hyper productive response to this

pandemic is a big sign of an

already looming mental health crisis in

our generation

and i’m talking about that especially

with respect to gen z that is you and me

the pandemic productivity guilt trap is

real

that has been heightened by tone deaf

messaging

like this now this extremely smart guy

jeremy haynes said on twitter if you

don’t come out of this quarantine

with either a new skill starting what

you’ve been putting off like a new

business

three more knowledge you didn’t ever

lack the time you lacked the discipline

i

hate to break it to you jeremy but not

everyone comes with the privilege to

access twitter

not everyone comes with the privilege to

have

uh say a 5g

internet in a stable mental health

during a world crisis

which is why tone deaf messaging like

this

is like the biggest trap it’s an evident

trap

where we are pushed to subscribe to the

idea of hustle culture

and believe that pushing our bodies and

our mental health

beyond limits is the only way to success

but i

am your to beg to differ

and i want to rewind to a little quote

that i mentioned earlier

remember i said this little quote in the

beginning of my talk which went like you

have as

many hours in a day as beyonce

now i have to use a pop culture

character to be relatable to you all

but beyonce if you’re watching this when

this video comes out

i want you to know that i really really

look up to you but

this quote really annoys me now and

as it should uh for the rest of you who

are watching this

uh beyonce i want you to know i might

have the same number of hours as you in

a day

but i also have different capacity for

stress i want you to know that i come

from a different place of privilege than

you

i want you to know that we have

different access to resources available

to us

and we have very different recovery

speeds as well

i will share a little personal

experience here cut to october 2019 i

was taking up projects

events talks anything that came my way

because an instagram post

on my feed told me that my 20s

are the time i need to be out there

hustle hard and life is going to be

sunshine and rainbows

and if you’re wondering yes i did save

that post

and i tried to implement that mentality

to

like it’s like furthest extent as i

could in my daily life

and cut to november 2019 it was not long

enough that i started to notice signs of

anxiety

cancelling plans had become second hobby

to me

photography or music and other tasks

that used to bring me joy

like were not uh capable to cheer me up

and i was almost too tired to do

anything at all

i realized i needed to take a step back

to focus on my own well-being

or risk a total burnout giving myself a

hard reset was the only way to get

myself back on track

and then the pandemic happened i’m not

that happy about it

as my expression might seem but it did

give us another chance to reset

the conversation around our work

routines our school lives our college

lives

our jobs and our mental health became

louder

and i’m so glad it did and this year i

took upon myself to teach small

businesses how to grow their instagram

profile to reach their customers and

create good content

now don’t get me wrong i still like to

help people monetize

strategize and optimize but i’m trying

to be more careful about using these

words

because i don’t want to do it at the

expense of my mental health

or someone else’s i aim to teach with a

creating mindset

as compared to a hustling mindset i urge

my students

and even you guys who are watching this

right now to work

at your own pace believe in your unique

ideas and most importantly

enjoy why you create learn and consume

which brings me to the last section of

my talk

uh that is creating a rest ethic as

strong as our work ethic

now this illustration is quite close to

me i made it day before

um there is a lot of uh there are a lot

of souvenirs that you will see

uh saying home sweet home but with the

pandemic being there and our work from

home retains

it’s become home sweet cubicle so where

exactly do we get

the home flavor in the cubicle when

exactly do we rest

which is what i’m going to talk about

right now everyone is kind of aware

of a work ethic and a lot of people take

pride them

like take pride in having a really good

work ethic there’s nothing wrong with it

a work ethic is really necessary to get

the job done

but it’s important that you supplement a

good work ethic

with an equally well established rest

ethic

think of your work ethic and your rest

ethic as

two simple processes like inhaling and

exhaling

let me take you for a little activity

all of you who are watching this right

now

uh we’ll do a little breathing exercise

i will take you through the mind and

body of someone who has a good work

ethic

so when i ask you to inhale you inhale

and when i ask you to exhale you would

say

simple is everyone with me with a show

of thumbs up

awesome okay let’s go through the mind

and body of someone who has a good

rest and work ethic inhale

[Music]

and exhale

inhale

and exhale now

pretty normal right that felt like

a very comfortable exercise that’s what

it like that’s what it’s like to be in

the mind and body of someone who has

an established rest and work ethic now

let’s go through the mind and body

of someone who does not have a good rest

ethic

so inhale when i say so and exhale when

i say so okay

three two one inhale

so

you can exhale so you get the point

right

the work ethic is to inhale and it’s

like getting things done

it is going down your task list but you

can only keep inhaling for so long

a lot of people have forgotten that they

try to keep inhaling

inhaling inhaling and that’s how you

reach burnout

especially right now the huge issue is

that all boundaries are disappearing

between

our work routines and our rest ethic

and a lot of people struggle as a result

resting well and taking your rest ethic

seriously takes a bit of work

it’s a conscious decision you need to

make until it gets ingrained in your

body

and mind uh just uh

it needs to be taken as seriously as you

would show up for an online class

as seriously as you would schedule a

work meeting for yourself

as seriously as actually submitting an

assignment

scheduled time even for resting that’s

how you can establish

a good rest ethic because otherwise it’s

not going to materialize

also good rest is not equal to relaxing

and being in bed all day and it’s

something that i’ve learned the hard way

uh there have been days where i have

just

churned out a 70 hour work week uh you

know

hustled from monday to saturday and been

in bed

all sunday only to wake up and you know

look at three screens at

like at the same time but resting

is not the same as relaxing because

resting means engaging in activities

that refresh you

and that rejuvenate you all over again

to engage in the same task with a fresh

mind

and from now on i want to challenge your

thinking as you move forward

i believe in all of you and how

dedicated you are to your passions

your studies your hobbies but when you

talk about

when what you have done on social media

or with someone else

i want you to know there’s nothing wrong

with it but when you talk about it i

want you to be real with it

talk about the good talk about the bad

and talk about the ugly of it

and when the time comes take a break and

if you see someone struggling with

boundary setting

i urge you to lend a helping hand and

help a friend out

because even if you have the same number

of hours in a day as beyonce

i trust you to use them while taking

care of your mental health

and i think with that we can make

resting

just as cool as working in a focused

manner during our working hours

thank you everyone i am ankita chawla

and thanks for coming to my tedx talk