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September 30, 2004

Rotate and Balance Regularly

It has been a while since I read this post Financial Fitness for Entrepreneurs by friend Brad Feld.

Just by reading the title and before reading the post, I thought it might be something regarding physical fitness for entrepreneurs. Brad has become what I would call an accomplished runner and as I'm always interested in advice on the sport, I was disappointed when I realized I missed the word "Financial". Doh!

I guess my thought was that anybody, but especially entrepreuners and start-up types, should take great care to have physical and mental balance in their lives. As any entrepreneur or start-up venture participant can vouch, it can easily consume too much of your life.

As a Speech Communications major at Colorado State, I studied some classic discourse on rhetoric, argumentation and eloquence. I enjoyed samplings of Plato, Socrates, Cicero, Quintillian among others.

One professor lectured on the Greek concept of "arete". As I loosely recall, this is the idea of living your life with a balanced mind and body. The analogy was that of a chariot - this was you/your life. Your chariot is guided by two horses - one represeting physical the other emotional/mental elements. In order to most efficiently move your chariot through life, one would make sure each horse was evenly paced. Simple and makes sense. Probably other analogies from other cultures as well.

Of course this is no epiphany for many but for me it proved useful. It took several years, but I actually had reason to apply the concept to better my life.

At one point after we had taken Email Publishing from startup and through several mergers and acquisitions, becoming MessageMedia and then DoubleClick, I had definitely become much to focused on work. I had seriously lost any sense of work/life, physical/emotional balance. I was stressed all the time, eating the rest of the time, not exercising at all and going no where fast. It is amazing how when you spiral down, momentum carries you further away from achieving any success. No matter how much you "work", if you are out of balance, your "quality" of output probably sucks pretty bad. Mine was probably hurting.

Finally an encounter with my good friend Andrew Currie set me straight. After a friendly visit, Andrew finally looked at me and said simply, "You should really get some exercise". I think the comment referred to my chubby shape as well as my overly stressed demeanor. Andrew actually coached me at that point about managing stress, etc... It may be the best advice I ever received.

I took to the treadmill and found a wonderful way to relax (yes, while running), exercise, think, disconnect, reconnect, tune in, tune out, get in balance - all told vastly improving the quality of my life. Work output improves, home life improves, lifespan improves. How many other ways can you possibly win?

The difficult part, as with anything is maintaining. Since then I've found several other things to keep my life balanced. I have three wonderful children, AJ, Max and Jesse, ages 6, 4 and 2. They alone give me countless "todo's" that help separate work from home. I play pickup basketball in my church (pretty low competitive level, but good exercise value). Friends and colleagues George Bilbrey and Paul Buster got me into Ice Hockey. What a blast! I read for business and for personal pleasure, and so much more. The folks at ReturnPath are a well-balanced, optimized bunch that make it easy to keep on your balance game.

It helps to have friends who will tell you when you need help. You can't fix any problem you are not aware of. It is not like I have this mastered - I'm an extremely busy person, and I go up and down with things. But, as I said, knowledge is power - and the people you know can help make you accountable to yourself. Balance in and out of the office is ongoing, and you need good friends and family to help keep you in tune.

You should always look for ways to optimize your entire life - not just your business todo list. Yes, as Brad blogged, there is Financial Fitness for Entrepreneurs. And there is also Life Fitness as well. Practice them both.

Posted by gcrgcr at September 30, 2004 7:13 PM

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Comments

Thanks for this post Tom. I find the hardest part is practicing what you preach. For me, taking that "valuable" time away from work to sit quietly or work out seems to result in more efficiency in other areas of my life. Therefore, that "lost" time isn't really lost ('cause I don't need it anymore) and I'm also a lot less stressed.

Maybe I should buy a treadmill...

Posted by: Kevin Menzie at October 21, 2004 6:34 PM

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