Many of us are interested in how to work better, but we don’t think very much about how to rest better. Productivity books offer life hacks, advice about how to get more done, or stories about what CEOs or famous writers do. But they say almost nothing about the role of rest in the lives or careers of creative, productive people. When they do mention rest, they tend to treat it as nothing more than a physical necessity or inconvenience. - Location 65
In reality that quote sums up the thrust of the book well. We spend so much time worrying about how to get more done, often sacrificing any type of rest we could be getting. One of the hardest things personally I deal with when talking to my cycling coach is that I love riding my bike, and sometimes that extra ride I can sneak in isn't good for training because I really needed to let my body recover.
In this book, Alex Pang, explores what it means to rest well and how society traps us out of getting the rest we need to be excellent at our jobs and lives.
- Many of us are interested in how to work better, but we don’t think very much about how to rest better. Productivity books offer life hacks, advice about how to get more done, or stories about what CEOs or famous writers do. But they say almost nothing about the role of rest in the lives or careers of creative, productive people. When they do mention rest, they tend to treat it as nothing more than a physical necessity or inconvenience. ([Location 65](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=65)) ^b3ecf5
- Measuring time is literally the easiest way to assess someone’s dedication and productivity, but it’s also very unreliable. ([Location 100](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=100))
- Rest is not something that the world gives us. It’s never been a gift. It’s never been something you do when you’ve finished everything else. If you want rest, you have to take it. You have to resist the lure of busyness, make time for rest, take it seriously, and protect it from a world that is intent on stealing it. ([Location 179](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=179))
- But for those of us who work in teams on complicated, open-ended projects, long hours are an expression of our identity and proof of our seriousness. They don’t necessarily make us more productive; they make us look more productive. For bosses, it’s an easy way to see who’s really committed and who isn’t—even if it’s a terrible predictor of who’s going to be good. ([Location 263](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=263))
- If you recognize that work and rest are two sides of the same coin, that you can get more from rest by getting better at it and that by giving it a place in your life you’ll stand a better chance of living the life you want, you’ll be able to do your job, and your life’s work, better. ([Location 289](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=289))
- Figures as different as Charles Dickens, Henri Poincaré, and Ingmar Bergman, working in disparate fields in different times, all shared a passion for their work, a terrific ambition to succeed, and an almost superhuman capacity to focus. Yet when you look closely at their daily lives, they only spent a few hours a day doing what we would recognize as their most important work. The rest of the time, they were hiking mountains, taking naps, going on walks with friends, or just sitting and thinking. Their creativity and productivity, in other words, were not the result of endless hours of toil. Their towering creative achievements result from modest “working” hours. ([Location 689](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=689))
- Deliberate practice isn’t a lot of fun, and it’s not immediately profitable. It means being in the pool before sunrise, working on your swing or stride when you could be hanging out with friends, practicing fingering or breathing in a windowless room, spending hours perfecting details that only a few other people will ever notice. There’s little that’s inherently or immediately pleasurable in deliberate practice, so you need a strong sense that these long hours will pay off, and that you’re not just improving your career prospects but also crafting a professional and personal identity. You don’t just do it for the fat stacks. You do it because it reinforces your sense of who you are and who you will become. ([Location 891](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=891))
- Those who research world-class performance focus only on what students do in the gym or track or practice room. Everybody focuses on the most obvious, measurable forms of work and tries to make those more effective and more productive. They don’t ask whether there are other ways to improve performance, and improve your life. ([Location 958](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=958)) ^9dd5bc
- when your habit is to work steadily, a day when you fall behind isn’t fatal. ([Location 1156](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1156))
- In order to keep rest from being invaded by work or crowded out of your day by a long to-do list, you need to use your routine like a fortification to protect your time. ([Location 1160](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1160))
- When she examined the data, she found that she could tell from their brain waves when people were walking through parks and green space and when they were in busy commercial areas: their minds became calmer and less aroused when they turned from the high street into a park. They didn’t zone out completely, though. Natural scenes engage some of our attention without requiring much conscious effort: they provide just enough diversion to occupy the conscious mind, leaving the subconscious free to do its own thing. ([Location 1265](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1265))
- Sleep scientists have found that even a short nap can be effective in recharging your mental batteries. Naps can even provide an opportunity to have new ideas. Their work shows that you can learn to time your nap to increase the creative boost that it provides, make it more physically restorative, or probe the traffic between the conscious mind and unconscious. Napping, in other words, turns out to be a skill. ([Location 1432](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1432))
- short nap of around twenty minutes boosts your ability to concentrate by giving your body a chance to restore depleted energy. ([Location 1465](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1465))
- IN MUCH OF the world today, naps have fallen out of favor. They’re now something that young children do on kindergarten mats, not something for adults, least of all leaders and serious minds. ([Location 1626](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1626)) ^fe2276
- We assume that constant, ceaseless effort yields high performance and that people who are constantly busy must be getting more done. Today’s workplace respects [[overwork]], even though it’s counterproductive, and treats four-hour days as “contemptibly slack,” even though they produce superior results. ([Location 1728](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1728)) ^b7b8b9
- Sleep deprivation has immediate effects on your ability to focus, make good judgments, perform under pressure, and be creative. Long-term sleep deprivation can affect your mental health and physical condition. ([Location 1746](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=1746))
- Over the course of decades, across professions, in one industry after another, Sonnentag’s findings have been consistent. Workers who have the chance to get away mentally, switch off, and devote their energies elsewhere, are more productive, have better attitudes, get along better with their colleagues, and are better able to deal with challenges at work. They’re also better able to focus intensely on work tasks. ([Location 2055](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2055))
- Less well-rested programmers, in contrast, didn’t follow the same pattern: their flow levels started low and steadily got worse. ([Location 2062](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2062))
- The most creative and most productive workers are the ones who are able to unplug from the office, recover their mental and physical energy, and return to their work recharged. ([Location 2165](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2165))
- studies now show that for people of any age, gender, or athletic ability, exercise can increase brain power, boost intelligence, and provide the stamina and psychological resilience necessary to do creative work. ([Location 2296](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2296))
- We shouldn’t be surprised that people manage to be physically active and do world-class work. We should recognize that they do world-class work because they are physically active. ([Location 2441](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2441))
- Under the right conditions, hobbies and physical activities become what anthropologists and psychologists call “deep play,” activities that are rewarding on their own, but take on additional layers of meaning and personal significance. ([Location 2474](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2474))
- Unlike efforts to achieve work-life balance that end up smearing the two worlds together and lead to your multitasking your way through children’s activities, deep play demands exclusive focus. ([Location 2720](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2720))
- Sabbaticals improve employee satisfaction, give returning workers a greater sense of clarity about their jobs and future, and improve retention levels. ([Location 2801](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2801))
- Too often busyness is not a means to accomplishment but an obstacle to it. ([Location 2991](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=2991))
- Today, we treat being stressed and overworked as a badge of honor, a sign of seriousness and commitment; but this is a recent phenomenon, and it inverts traditional ideas of how leaders and professionals should behave under pressure. ([Location 3000](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B01IMZ5DR4&location=3000))
