I have been reading a lot recently in the realm of business and leadership, soaking in books from across disciplines in an effort to grow and learn as a CEO. I always tend to find myself in seasons with books in terms of content. And in seasons of having less time to review the books I have read, and put pen to paper (metaphorically) on what I am learning from these pages. I write reviews mostly for myself, if we’re being honest. They become a wonderful reference point to refer back to in addition to potentially helping to guide someone in picking up a title that I found particularly meaningful. And lately, I keep coming back to To Hell With The Hustle.
A while back (cue the pandemic) the thought of being able to clear my schedule for margin, and continue to eliminate hurry from my life sounded achievable. I was devouring books for seeking a life that is slow, simple, and good – and yet, I find myself being drawn back to the point where my life is none of those things. I’ve found myself revisiting reviews on several of the books I read during this time, and was surprised to see I had never posted a review for this book. Funny how getting lost in the hustle will do that to you – make you miss the very thing you are seeking for fear of missing out on the thing that really doesn’t matter after all. It also seems like poetic justice and a hint that perhaps I needed to revist these thoughts once again.
Reclaim Your Life in an Overworked, Overspent, and Overconnected World? Why yes, Jefferson Bethke, I’d like to do just that.
Our culture makes constant demands of us: Do more. Accomplish more. Buy more. Post more. Be more. In following these demands, we have indeed become more: More anxious. More tired. More hurt. More depressed. More frantic.
In a society where hustle is the expectation, busyness is the norm and information is king, we have forgotten the fundamentals that make us human, anchor our lives, and provide meaning.
We need to stop doing and start becoming. The very things the world teaches us to avoid at all costs – silence, obscurity, solitude, and vulnerability – are the very things that can give us the meaning, and the richness we are truly looking for.
I wouldn’t say there is anything revolutionary in this book, but Jefferson does a wonderful job calling us to evaluate our own lives. He talks about fear being frantic. Much of our ‘hustle’ is done in fear, not in faith. Fear of missing out. Fear of being judged. Fear of failure. And that might be the part that hits home the most. The part where my life has been so overcome by busyness that I feel like I’ve perhaps missed the point in why it’s necessary to create some margin. Perhaps we all have.
