Time is the new gold ! Why is important to have a life outside the job.

So what is tech twitter doing on Christmas ? Debating on if it’s good idea to work 40+ hours a week or you have to work more.

Tech twitter is dead ass debating on if it’s good idea to work 40+ hours a week rn. Toxic tech CEOs and investors are saying you won’t change the world like Gandhi or MLK unless you kill yourself for another ad tech startup you don’t own.

— Lex (@TheLexTimes) December 26, 2019

Toxic tech CEOs, founders and VCs are saying you won’t make an impact to the world if you do not clock more than 40+ hours. The Silicon Valley culture, that is mimicked by others all around the world, is to work like a slave for some VC funded start-up to “change the world” and make the VCs billionaires 🙂

Same culture talks of high growth targets and considers that a slow, organic growth of a start-up is a failure. Everyone is looking to be the next unicorn, disregarding that you need time for that.

Given this, when re-watching #AlteredCarbon I realized that it is definitely the best metaphor for the future. All the billionaires (Buffet, Gates, etc.) tell you that the most valuable thing, the ultimate currency is time. I am afraid of a future where this is no longer the truth, you can take Altered Carbon as a realistic scenario. Even in that universe where billionaires are virtually immortal, time is still the ultimate currency and owning your own time is what everyone aspires.

Not all founders are crazy workaholics. Tobi Lutke founder of Shopify a $ 50 billion company puts it very blunt:

I’m home at 5:30pm every evening. I don’t travel on the weekend.
…
Family and personal health rank higher in my priority list.

https://twitter.com/tobi/status/1210242205505462276

A similar sane attitude comes also from the CEO of Basecamp, Jason Fried:

If your company requires you to work nights and weekends, your company is broken.

If your company requires you to work nights and weekends, your company is broken. This is a managerial problem, not your problem. This is a process problem, not a personal problem. This is an ownership problem, not an individual problem.

— Jason Fried (@jasonfried) December 23, 2019

So do not sell your time for cheap. It is the new gold. Enjoy life, be lazy, relax, browse 9GAG, read a book.

To be creative you have to give your brain time to feed with information and see the world around, to enjoy thinking and sensing the reality.

True, sometimes you have to work at odd times, I had my share of support hours during Christmas or New Years Eve but always take afterwards that extra time to unwinds and be creative outside your work.

Try new stuff, learn a new language, write a blog , talk to new people. This helps your life and work more than clocking 80+ hours of mindless work, just to trick yourself or some CEO that you are more productive.