Life: Designed

One of the goals I set for myself when I did my digital detox from Instagram and TikTok was to finish my work before 11 PM. That didn’t happen once. I think one night I was up past 2 AM reading, trying to retain as much information as possible for my quiz the next day. 

I needed to do well on this quiz, but it was so difficult. There was so much to read. Over 40 pages of an information-dense textbook. There was so much and so little time that it felt impossible. As you could expect, I didn’t do nearly as well as I hoped on that quiz. 

I’ve been reading my textbook the day before the quiz in hopes that the information will be fresh in my mind. That’s an issue when the day before is packed. Multiple classes, multiple meetings, and so much homework to do. Reading the textbook takes twice as long because I’m taking notes, hoping I will remember more. 

That late night, I was working to my limits. I had no time to continue reading the next day, but nothing was left in me to keep going. Nothing in me wanted to keep reading that night. All I wanted to do was sleep. All I had time to do was work. 

Living the American Dream

Working as much as humanly possible has become so normalized. It’s become the expectation. You’re hardly doing anything if you’re not staying late at the office, putting in those extra hours. 

It’s the American Dream, the “ideal that every citizen of the United States should have an equal opportunity to achieve success and prosperity through hard work, determination, and initiative,” distorted. 

When you look up “the American dream definition” on Google, the sentence it gives you under the definition is “a workaholic lawyer who seems to be living the American dream.” 

I’ve got that mentality. I’d say I’m a workaholic student and a workaholic graphic designer. My boyfriend would confirm it.

As you saw from my lovely textbook debacle, I tell myself to work till I’m done. That there’s no time for breaks. I’ve hardly got time to be working on this after all. Why would I have time for a break? 

Work hard, play hard, right? Or is it more like work hard, get 5 minutes to relax before you have to go to bed. 

There has to be a better way. 

Does it Even Work?

I force myself to sit down and get my work done. I tell myself I can’t do anything else until I can check that assignment off my to-do list. 

But is that really the most effective way to work? My attention is drifting. Drifting to the plants on my windowsill. I’m looking at the book I wish I were reading instead. I inspect the new tattoo on my arm, seeing how far along it is in itshealing process. I’m forcing myself to sit down and just do work, but that’s not what I’m actually doing. 

I’m so stressed about how I will do on the upcoming quiz that I’m not paying attention to the one thing that will help me do well on it. 

In Stolen Focus, Johann Hari explains that a little stress can improve your focus for short-term instances. I know this to be true; I’m a performer. I’ve done dance and theater all my life. No matter how stressed I am before I go on stage, once I’m in front of an audience, I focus. I remember my steps, and I don’t flub a line. However, Hari explains that according to a study, “if that stress is protracted? In those circumstances, even mild levels of stress “can significantly alter attentional processes.”

I’m stressed all day about a quiz. I’m more stressed because I really don’t have time today to read it. I’m getting even more stressed because reading this textbook is taking me so long. I’m not allowing myself a break. And my attention is drifting away from the textbook. 

Just Take a Break

So if brute forcing my way through an assignment is counterproductive, does just taking a break really work?

“Time, and reflection, and a bit of rest help us make better decisions,” said entrepreneur Andrew Barnes. That’s why you’ll be told to stop looking at whatever you’re working on and come back to it later and look at it with fresh eyes. 

According to EricTM at Medium, “Each time a creator revisits their work after a longer pause, their mind is more focused and engaged, eager to finish or improve upon what was left incomplete.” Your brain has time to sit with a problem and work through it, making the solution easier to find after your break. 

Last year, I was working on a project for my typography class. The project: an event calendar design. My problem: I couldn’t figure out a good way to effectively fit together the date and other information. I was out of ideas, and I wasfrustrated. Then I went to get dinner with some friends. After relaxing with them for a couple of hours, I came back to my project and almost immediately saw a solution. 

We need to abandon the notion that we must work till we have nothing left to give to be productive. We need to get rid ofthe idea that there’s no time for breaks. We need to focus on our mental health in order to reduce stress and give rise tocreativity and productivity. Change, while clouded by our current culture of burnout, is not out of reach! 

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I’ll be diving deeper into this topic in my upcoming white paper about burnout and flow states in the graphic design industry. Stay tuned!