I had quite a bit of back trouble this last week, to the point where I have had to rethink not just my work set-up but also how much time I spend working.
At first, I was absolutely gutted that I was in so much pain from sedentary work and bad posture but actually, I have come to see it as a little gift wrapped in pain.
It has allowed me to take a step back from my work life and reassess it a little.
For me, work has always been a balance of enjoyment, income, productivity, and service. If I focus too much on one of these things then one or more of the others would slip. So I spent my time making sure all of these things were doing what they should.
I have, however, been overlooking something else, a fifth element if you will; my health.
I have been putting more and more hours into my work and less and less into my health and my back pain has been a painful reminder of this.
I am not saying that I am scaling back my projects or anything like that. Not at all. I am saying that I am going to make more time for my health.
This doesn't mean that I will be drinking green smoothies whilst I work long hours (although I do love green smoothies). It means that I will be making time to exercise in some form every day, using a standing desk, upgrading my office chair (which is currently my daughter's keyboard stool, and making sure I correctly prioritise my work and limit the number of tasks I do each day.
Recently I have fallen into bad habits of allocating time to achieve a task and if I get the task done with time to spare, instead of rewarding myself with time off I then work from next week's schedule and do that - continually loading myself with more and more work.
Not a great idea and I know it. I have preached about reducing your daily to-do lists and setting an hourly limit to your working day for a long time but for some reason, I chose to ignore my own advice and now I am paying the price.
So I want to help you too - are you neglecting yourself in some way? Is there something you can change this week to help you maintain good health and a good balance in your work?
The Quiet Whisper | Issue 46
Paying the Price
🎧 I’m Listening To…
Hollie Kenniff. As most of you already know, I am a huge fan of Keith Kenniff and what he and his wife do at Unseen Music. I have been loving Hollie's ambient output so much, a really nice take on a rather difficult genre to sound "original" in (think the use of her own voice is key here).
I’m Reading...
Finding Hildasay by Christian Lewis. A book about a guy who hit rock bottom and decided to walk the coastline of the UK to raise money for the SSAFA. Really easy to read and really inspiring. I found feeling quite lifted by this feel-good book.
📺 I’m Watching...
The Jurassic World Movies. Our son Noah is a massive fan of all things dinosaurs and we have had the pleasure of watching all the Jurassic World movies with him. It has been so much fun seeing how much he enjoys these big-budget action movies and it reminds me of when I was a similar age going to see Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves at the cinema (back when they had intervals halfway through).
🌟 New From Rich
Related to my last email about deleting content - If you haven't already, make sure you subscribe to my latest YouTube channel where I am releasing all of my trailer music back-catalogue - that's over 10 years of work 🥰 (fun fact, it is now my fastest growing YouTube channel)
🫶🏻 Sharing is Caring
Introducing another free pad VST, Brushed Violin.
❝ Quote of the week:
“Taking care of yourself doesn't mean me first; it means me too.”
– L.R. Knost
Want to learn more from me? Check out my online video courses
- The Ultimate Trailer Music Bundle → Learn everything there is to learn about Trailer Music
- The Trailer Music Course → The perfect course to get you started writing trailer music
- Trailer Music for Beginners → Learn to create trailer music with nothing but FREE samples
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