Last night when I was watching the new Michael Jordan documentary, I had a revelation about why I would never want to “be like Mike”.
Which might sound strange.
Cause the guy is a God.
He won 6 NBA titles…
5 MVP awards…
Hell, my entire room growing up was nothing but Michael Jordan posters…
Yet…
I still don’t think I’d want to be like him.
Why?
Because it’s obvious from the documentary that none of this made him happy.
Michael suffers from what I call the “foot on the gas” problem.
Which means you’re always thinking “go go go”.
So there’s no slowing down…
No taking time to enjoy life…
His ONLY focus was on being the best basketball player in the world.
And you can’t argue with the results, that’s for sure.
It worked.
The guy is the GOAT.
But at what cost did it work?
Cause you can’t live the “foot on the gas” life without sacrificing important stuff.
Like your marriage…
Time with your kids…
Enjooying life…
This is one of the reasons I believe Michael had to retire in ’93.
He was simply burnt out.
Not so much physically…
But emotionally.
You can’t just “go go go” for 10 straight years and not eventually hit a wall.
It’s impossible.
Even if you’re Michael Jordan.
And like I said, this same thing happens with entrepreneurs…
I know, cause it happened to me.
My whole life in 2016 was work, work, work.
12 hours a day…
7 days a week…
And like Michael, it “worked” for me.
It made me rich.
But it also made me miserable.
I was Mr. “foot on the gas” all day, everyday.
I had no idea how to take a break…
Or how to slow down.
I had one mode…
“Go Go Go”
Point being…
If you see this in yourself at all…
I’d simply caution you that it’s not sustainable.
You can get away with it in the short term (and there’s nothing wrong with working super hard in the short term if you have a big project you’re trying to get done).
But in the long term…
The “pedal to the metal” mentality will burn you out.
Cause you can’t keep doing that forever.
You’ll wind-up having a breakdown.
It happened to me.
And I’ve seen it with 6-7 of my friends that are entrepreneurs as well.
Mentally and emotionally they just fell apart.
You could see the exhaustion on their face.
That’s what happens.
The key to beating this is to simply not be in “go go go” mode all the time.
Meaning you take time for other stuff you care about.
And you don’t live and die with your business.
It’s not easy to do (especially if you’re grinding for 12 hours a day, everyday).
But it’s a better life.
I can assure you of that.
Hopefully this was helpful.
It was on my mind all morning.
If you relate to what I wrote, feel free to reply to this and let me know.
– Justin
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