Our brain has been trained to control our body to do the things that maximize the positive feelings. The positive feelings can be either short-term rewards or long-term rewards. The training is so efficient that it feels like we don’t burn much energy to do the things even if, physically, doing these things consumes lots of energy. Sometimes, people call this muscle memory. Successful organizations also have their own “muscle memory” – the magic that make them successful.
It takes a long time and lots of efforts to train our brain and thus it also takes a long time and lots of effort to change an already trained brain. It is the two sides of a coin. Now, we need to be aware of one thing: what takes you here won’t necessarily take you to the next stage of life. The correct things to do 20 years ago may not be the correct things to do now. But it is so hard to change your muscle memory, isn’t it?
In my 10s and 20s, I was doing pretty well in schools, all the way from the primary school, to the high school, to the college, and eventually, get my Ph.D from a top university in U.S. I am not a smart person. Compared with my genius friends in the college, I am a pretty average person. So my secret to perform well in schools is working hard. The rewards of working hard felt good (positive feelings): I got into the best high school, got into the best university (I scored around 20th out of ~80,000 students), got the scholarship from a top university in U.S, and eventually got my PhD in about 4 years. You see, I have been training my brains for about 20 years, and the result is not bad.
After graduation, I got a job in a top Internet company in Silicon Valley, where most talented software engineers end up with. I applied my muscle memory again – working hard. I was willing to stay in office for more than 12 hours when I started my career, I was willing to learn or do anything my manager told me to do. Over time, I got promoted from a junior to a pretty senior engineer. You see, I continue training my brain in the same way as 20 years ago. Well, at the point, I don’t want to call it “training” any more, it is really a muscle memory, and I have been seeing consistent positive feelings.
Life moves on silently. There isn’t a big sign telling you “hey, you are entering a new stage of life”. Your muscle memory keeps working, because that is the “easiest” thing to do, even if, physically it becomes a burden, and economically, it becomes less efficient. But you are so addicted, you just do what your brain tells you to do. It is programmed in this way. It feels “easy” because human brain is lazy, it will consume a lot of energy if your brain needs to process unfamiliar information.
The above thoughts are triggered recently by a reflection on my work in 2021. It was a very tough year (2nd year working from home); and my company was experiencing some tough time, so is my project and group, because my team is part of the most business-critical function group. A lot of people are burned out, so am I. My body won’t lie to me, I feel very tired, the quality of sleep starts degrading. I started questioning myself: is it worth it? Even if I am still prioritizing career, the question is: does it make sense to work so hard? I did some reflection, and I started realizing: yes, I am working very hard, but a lot of time and energy were spent on low priority stuff. The cold fact is: had I not spent so much time working, as long as I still deliver one or two important projects, the performance review probably won’t be bad. I start questioning myself: why am I addicted to working?
It turns out it is my brain, I am controlled by my brain’s muscle memory. I don’t know what to do if I don’t work; I don’t think other things are worth doing if I don’t work. So I just keep finding things to work on, no matter whether its ROI is high or not.
My life has already entered a new stage. I am close to 40 now, I have a family, my kids are going to school. Work is not the only thing in my life now. In my 10s and 20s, school is the only thing that matters, I could spend all my energy learning and making progress. My brain learns this, and keeps applying the learnings in my 30s. I have to unlearn it now. It won’t be an easy thing to do, but it is time to try something new.
I have to tell myself “working hard” is an illusion. Even if I care a lot about my career, I shouldn’t “work hard”; instead, I should “work smart”. I shouldn’t spend 12 hours in office anymore, I should be a regular 8 hour 5 days a week engineer; however, this doesn’t mean I just become an average engineer. I should spend time evaluating if this is the right thing to do, or if this is the right thing to spend so much time doing before committing to it.
My 2022 goal: let me try this new mindset. I want to do another reflection in 2023 to see what I learn from it.