Less Grind More Chill

[Music]

before i get started

by show of hands how many people are

good workers

okay

that’s good that’s good

all right

now by a show of hands how many people

are good resters

okay

okay well so if you weren’t able to

raise your hand for the second question

that’s fine

we’re not really taught how to rest or

in this case how to chill

and that’s really because we live in the

world

of the grind

the grind right the grind’s everywhere

it’s in movies

it’s in television we even make songs

about the grind

anderson grant into us early

we ask kids what do you want to do when

you grow up

right but what we’re really asking is

what kind of job do you want to have for

the rest of your life

we’re asking five-year-olds this

so we know about the grind

and there’s some virtue in the grind

right

but there’s some downsides to

what we know as grind culture that i

want to highlight

and so one the grind is not sustainable

all right you can have

a dedicated amount of time to the grind

to get things done right but

the nature of the grind is that the pace

of it is steady

but

it’s never ending

so if you don’t stop the grind it’s just

going to keep going until it just tires

you out

so it’s not sustainable

secondly it show it shuns any form

of rest

grind culture champions the idea of

i’ll sleep when i die

and wears it as a badge of honor

but that’s not really good

and it wears on us over time

and so

the idea that we sleep when we die

as a concept is just a toxic idea of how

hindering yourself with the rest

is the thing that happens when you rest

right

so it doesn’t really support that idea

and third

it doesn’t honor humanity

the grind does not care if you’re sick

the grind does not care if you’re

feeling bad today

and it doesn’t care

if you have some family issue the grind

wants you to work

the grind wants you to produce as if

you’re a machine right

but we’re not machines

but even machines need to unplug

so

with those three things combined

it can have us to feel like we don’t

have any ownership

of our time let alone of our entire life

and when we feel like that

that’s the perfect recipe for

the thing

the thing to happen right

now you probably wonder what the thing

is

well the thing happened to me

i was in college

i think it was junior year

and i had a full schedule

classes were intense

and every professor i had acted as if

their class was the only class that i

had

i don’t know why they do that

but i was up for the challenge

and

i knew that the grind that i had was

going to serve me in that situation so i

did good

for like two weeks

and then something about those classes

got even more challenging it got even

more demanding

and i knew what i had to do then

i had to turn the grind all the way up

and i had to put the chill all the way

down

and i was able to sustain that over a

certain amount of time but

eventually those long nights

those early mornings

not resting not eating properly caught

up with me and that’s when the thing

happened

i remember i woke up one morning

i could barely sit up

my face was broken out

my mouth was dry

i had a throbbing headache

and all i could do was just lay in bed

the thing caught up with me

and that thing

was burnt out

anybody experience burnout

that’s a lot of hands

so burnout is a part of

grind culture

unfortunately

and

when you’re burnt out

you’re not really good for anyone

you’re not really present

for anyone let alone yourself

so i was in that bed

and all i could do was sleep

and that’s when i realized that

when i turned the ground all the way up

i had no space for chill no space for me

and so

that’s when i realized that something

had to change

23 percent

of the working force

experiences burnout

all the time

or at least very often

while 44

feel burned out every now and then

meaning that over two-thirds of the

working force are burnt out right now

and like i said when you’re burnt out

you’re not good for anyone not even

yourself

so when i was in the bed i knew

something had to change

i need to have less

grind

and i needed some more chill

but the question came

how can i put more chill

into my life

i don’t know what that looked like i

wasn’t really taught that

but i had to figure out something

because i had the rest of the semester

to finish

so

i think that was the good thing if we

can see a silver lining that i’ve this

happened in college before i got into

the workforce so i had some time to

pivot and make some things work for

myself

what i found

was that doing these things

helped me to have some control over

myself and my time which was very

important

and that’s what got me through the rest

of that semester

and the rest of my academic career

and then for the rest of my life

i want to share a few things or four

specific things that help me

add more chill to my life

the first thing you have to prioritize

the chill

if you’re like me if you don’t put it on

the calendar it doesn’t happen right so

it has to be that important

your meetings

your lunch dates

and chilling

put it on the calendar that way it’ll

happen

all right

so one prioritize the chill

secondly you have to dedicate a space

for the chill a lot of times we don’t

chill because we feel like we don’t have

space for it

sometimes all we got is the car right

now the car is a great place to chill

you know before you go in the house or

go to work or wherever that is a great

place and sometimes it’s all we have but

that’s okay

it’s about having a place that is sacred

for that

and everybody doesn’t get to come in

that space you know not not your

children not your spouse not even your

mama

that space is just for you

so dedicate space for the chill

then three actually chill

don’t look on your phone don’t scroll

don’t try to check emails don’t try to

be productive literally do nothing

chill

that’s time just for you

and it’s hard to do that because we’re

not taught how to just stop and do

nothing

but this can start a pattern of being

okay with doing nothing

which gets me to my last point which is

point four

have guilt free

chill

don’t feel guilty

about chilling

or taking a break or stopping

i think we feel that way because

we have been taught that we have to be

productive

and we have to work and we have to work

hard and that’s where our value is

and so when we

don’t work

we feel

less valuable

sometimes we don’t even feel worthy

and so we have to learn how to undo that

type of thinking so we can actually have

really good moments to just chill

ironically

because we’re not taught that it affects

us in a lot of different ways and we

look at resting as a very lofty thing

something that

you only get

when you work hard enough as if we have

to earn

chilling

but you don’t

and it’s not a lofty thing you can take

a three-week vacation in the bahamas or

you can just take 15 minutes in the car

the point is to have space that is just

for you

a place to just stop

something that is just yours

and your time

and so

chilling helps us to not only reclaim

our time

but to reclaim ourselves

the grind is going to be there work is

going to be there it’s going to be there

it’s okay

but this is about having time for you so

carve time for you prioritize the time

make space for the chill

and then actually chill

and then don’t feel bad about it

because that time

is just for you

thank you