When it comes to gaining any skill, there are inevitably periods of tension.
There is also tension at work.
You could even say there's tension at play.
By tension, I mean periods of discomfort that may or may not be productive.
That may be healthy or unhealthy.
The key is being able to tell the difference.
An easy way to judge whether tension is healthy or unhealthy is the level of performance.
Most people operate under high tension with low performance. These are the people who are busy for the sake of being busy.
The music students who log hundreds of practice hours but accomplish very little.
The executives who put in 100-hour weeks because that's just what executives do.
The athlete who works out too hard and ends up with a severe injury.
Unfortunately, our culture worships this kind of work ethic. Inevitably, this leads to burnout. It's also not very effective.
High performance, high tension is also not sustainable, but is more useful. This is a period of focused tension geared towards building a specific skill or ability.
Setting a goal of walking 5 miles a day for 30 days straight could fall in this category.
Going on a juice fast could fall into this category.
In the summer of 2020, I challenged myself to create a video a day for 30 days. This isn't something I could do forever. But, by putting myself through a grueling temporary schedule, I drastically improved my video production skills.
Those skills still serve me today, over a year later.
The gold standard is to ultimately find a way to achieve high performance with low tension.
This is the individual who can get a week's worth of work done in two days.
Not because he decided to give up sleep for those two days.
But because he has prioritized what will be most useful, created a plan, and eliminated all distractions.
The musician who becomes so efficient with this time, he can learn a new piece of music in a week. And have fun doing it.
The executive who can claim a 25-hour work week. Because she outsourced the things others can do better, deciding to focus on the creative work only she can do.
By making a habit of recognizing healthy and unhealthy tension, we can do more. We can discover new abilities. We can become better people.
We can even have fun while doing it.