H.I. No. 3: Four Light Bulbs: Difference between revisions
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Grey: [laughs] I have, I have. All today I was like "don't blow it, don't blow it".
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Brady: Okay.
Grey: But I find that- that no other activity would do that, even if I preferred that it would. You know, if I took like a mini holiday with the missus, I would still be kind of thinking about, you know, "What are all the comments that are coming in?",--
Brady: Mm.
Grey: --"Where did it get linked to?", "How is it being received?"--
Brady: Mm.
Grey: --"Oh, God, what's the next thing going to be? The next thing, right?", which is always a huge concern. Um,--
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: Of course, now the very irony of this- this whole situation is that the games that I play are almost all a variation of some kind of work simulator, right?
Brady: [giggles]
Grey: So I do not play, like, first person shooter games,--
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: --right, I play a game that's in the sim category, right? You're in--
Brady: Oh, like CGP Gre- like "CGP Grey, the game" where you have to make a YouTube video before time runs out.
Grey: [laughing] Yeah, or it's like, you know, SimCity: "You're the mayor." Right?
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: Or Civilization: "You're in charge of this whole civilization. Now micromanage 100 cities." Right?
Brady: [chuckles]
Grey: Or, um, the one I've been playing recently, which is very good and I recommend is, uh, Prison Architect. It's like, "you're in charge of a prison", right? You have--
Brady: Oh, that sounds good.
Grey: It is- I have to say it's very good, um--
Brady
Grey: --it's one I found recently it's very engaging, but, that's- so my only escape from thinking about work to some extent at any time is basically by playing a virtual work game. Um, which I'm sort of aware is a- is a strange thing to do, but it really does- it just- it like- it absorbs that part of my brain completely, and is like "here's some pretend work, go play with that", and that's the only kind of way that I can get a break from thinking about my actual work to some extent all the time.
Brady: Let me ask you this then. I have to a- if it's too personal, just tell me, but it begs the question then: Those around you, you know, family, friends, loved ones and all that, what do they think about your work life balance?
Grey: So, I- I would say, speaking on behalf of my wife, um, she... is a great woman. And I think there is- there is no way that I could have gotten through this- this sort of period of trying to become self employed and working on YouTube, if it wasn't for her incredible understanding.
Brady
Grey: And, I am very lucky that I married a woman who is very perfectly happy with time to herself, um, and also is really aware of needing to- to kind of leave me be at certain very intense work periods. Um, so, for- for- I- I sort of referenced it earlier, but whenever a video comes out, the sort of three or four days prior to that are the busiest I ever am, because I'm just doing all the animation,--
Brady
Grey: --and those are usually- and this isn't- this is not an exaggeration, those are usually four days of: I wake up, and I'm animating or editing the audio until I fall asleep. And I sort of do that for days in a row.
Brady
Grey: And my wife knows she's just not going to see me during those times, and if she does see me, I'm not a very chatty person.
Brady
Grey: And, she's okay with that. Um, and, I think if I had- if I had married somebody else, I think that could be really bad for a relationship over the long run, so I- I think it depends a lot on who you surround yourself with and some people are going to be okay with kind of disappearing for long periods of time and sometimes it's- it's- it's not okay and I think, um, prob- uh- probably, I don't want to get into too in specifics, but, like, one of the more difficult times was that, I usually spend the- the summers with my parents in North Carolina,--
Brady
Grey: --so I go to the states and I visit them. And this last summer, the whole Subbable project, my sort of, uh, fundraising project,--
Brady
Grey: --uh, happened to coincide with the time that I was spending with my family, you know, for a dedicated several weeks.
Brady: Ooh, there's a big overlap in the Venn diagram here.
Grey: Yeah, and normally, you know, like, my parents don't live here, and so I'm very glad and I feel very fortunate that I can go see them for several weeks at a time, um, but that Subbable period just happened to be an incredibly intense period of work,--
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: --that just soaked up all of my time. And so I- I was in- I was in America, you know, maybe it was for- for six weeks. And, you know, four and a half, five of those weeks, I was not really available to the people around me. Um, and again, my- my parents are great. They sort of- they understand, but that's a- that is a totally difficult time, because in my mind, it's like, "Okay, well here I'm supposed to be turning up the family light bulb to, like, very high, right? I'm physically here. It's a dedicated strength of- stretch of time",--
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: --um, but such is the nature of work, that sometimes it will- it will invade those times and there's just nothing that you can do about that, and yeah, it's- it can definitely be very hard.
Brady: Do you ever wish you were back, you know, nine to five, or... something like that? Or...
Grey: [laughing] No, I don't. I don't. Um, I- even with all the- even with all the- the trade offs that I've had to make, I'm very happy to be where I am now. Uh, but it- it- uh, I think it just- it just- it has been difficult and it has shaken my faith in the existence of a- of a real work life balance, even though I'm sort of trying to even out those knobs to the best of my ability at this stage,--
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: --at least with regards to the health knob, uh, of turning that one back up a little bit. Uh,--
Brady: What do you do at the gym then? Lift weights,--
Grey: [laughs]
Brady: --run? I'm just- I can't imagine you in the gym. Just humor me for just a second.
Grey: [laughing] What do you- what do you think I do in the gym?
Brady: I definitely think you listen to podcasts.
Grey: I don't. I don't listen to podcasts.
Brady: Really?
Grey: Yeah.
Brady: You must have some kind of electronic device involved somehow in your workout.
Grey: Oh, of course, of course, right? I'm there with my iPhone and keeping track of everything on my iPhone and I'm listening- listening to terrible usually electronica kind of music. Um,
Brady: No!
Grey: Yep.
Brady: That surprises me.
Grey: Alright. So no- no, uh, no podcasts. Any other guesses?
Brady: I kind of imagined you as a kind of- I can imagine you--
Grey: [chuckles]
Brady: --getting into the weights.
Grey: Mm-hmm.
Brady: I can imagine you, like, lifting some pretty heavy weights.
Grey: Lift- lifting weights, yes. Pretty heavy, no. Um,--
Brady: Right.
Grey: [laughing] --not at this stage. But yeah, that's- that's what I'm- uh, I'm doing. I sort of, uh, as- as you can imagine, I spent a lot of time trying to research making changes in- uh, to a more healthy lifestyle before I decided to do anything.
Brady: [giggles] Of course.
Grey: Um,- [laughs] it's like, well, I don't know anything about this, right? Let- like- let me actually research stuff. Um, and I came- I came basically to the conclusion that, if you- if you want to try to turn around things in a relatively short period of time,--
Brady: Mm.
Grey: --the best way to do it is with strength training, which surprised me, right?
Brady: Hmm.
Grey: Because I would have been the idiot, uh, you know, being like, stupid sexy Flanders, right? Running on the treadmill. Um, right?
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: And it turns out like, no, that doesn't really help you in a shorter term, right? That might be good in long term, but not- not in the short term.
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: Uh, and then the second thing is- is- like there's all of these crazy diets all over the whole world of- of all of these variations of things that you can do, um, and so I'm like, "Well, what does- what does science have to say? What does science have to say about this?" And the thing that is common to, like, every crazy diet in the whole world is basically, "Hey, you know all those carbohydrates you eat? Don't eat them." Right?
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: They're- they're like the worst possible thing that you can eat. And so basically, those are the two changes that I've made. Like, I'm- I'm trying to do weights at the- the gym, very, very slowly.
Brady: Yeah.
Grey: Uh, and I'm trying to cut carbohydrates out of my diet, which is way harder than it sounds.
Brady: That is very hard, because they're also so yummy. But they're also everywhere.
Grey: That- yeah, that- that is- that is the thing is- is I never quite realized how much I eat that is basically pasta or bread. But that- but this is where, like, just to briefly touch on that analogy again, I am super aware this month that while I've been making this transition, my- my energy and my ability to do concentrated bursts of work is much lower.
Brady: Mm.
Grey: And that's partly- that's partly why I'm very happy to be doing this podcast with you, because it's a different- it's not as- as incredibly intense as making the videos is, and I've also totally cheated by picking an easier topic for myself to do, hopefully by the end of this month. But I'm again, I'm really consciously aware that since I have- I have upped the health percentage, one of the consequences of that might be: I might not get a video out by the end of January, which, if I had not made this decision, I'm pretty confident I would have a video out by the end of January. But there are- like, there are trade offs in life. And this is- this is one of those trade offs that I- like, I have to up the healthage- health percentage, and the- the only place to take energy from is work. Um, so that's- that's sort of where I am right now.
Brady: All right mate, I'll see you in the gym, yeah?
Grey: [laughs] Yeah, I'll see you in the gym.
Brady: All right.
Grey: [laughing] Take care.
Brady: [laughing] Bye.
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