One Christmas Eve, a lawyer friend of mine joined me late in the afternoon to begin the holiday. He bragged that he had billed 7 hours that day. He was proud of himself. Many, if not most, lawyers pride themselves on how much they can work. Well, I had a factory friend from my college days who said, “If a man can’t get his job done in 8 hours a day, its too big a job for him.” What the overworking lawyer doesn't know is that while he may be working a lot of hours, he is probably not being productive for a lot of hours and may also be shortening his effective work life.
According to The Power of Full Engagement, a book that applies athletic training principles to work, “we must learn to live our lives as a series of sprints–fully engaging for periods of time, and then fully disengaging and seeking renewal before jumping back into the fray...” “The long term cost is that toxins build up inside us.” Now that the holidays are upon us, take advantage of them and rest and renew for a better and more productive 2014!
