+1: #240 Our Minds Must Relax

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Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another Optymize plus one. In our last plus one we talked about the Cal Newport inspired Shutdown complete first quick check in. Did you win that game? Get this Seneca was talking about the same thing 2,000 years ago. As you may know, Seneca was born around the same time Jesus was born. He was one of history's leading Stoic philosophers and in addition to being one of the wealthiest people of Rome and a statesman plus advisor to emperors, he was also a playwright and is considered the creator of the essay not bad. In one of his great books called on the Shortness of Life, Seneca talks about the importance of giving our minds time to rest. Specifically, he says our minds must relax. They will rise better and keener after a rest. Just as you must not force fertile farmland, as uninterrupted productivity will soon exhaust it, so constant effort will SAP our mental vigor, while a short period of rest and relaxation will restore our powers. Unremitting effort leads to a kind of mental dullness and lethargy. He tells us that back in the good old days of the Roman Senate, they couldn't introduce anything important after the 10th hour. Checking our math, we'll note that the 6th hour was for rest and as we discussed is the origin of siesta. That was at noon. So our 10th hour, that was 4pm the ancient Roman Senate didn't allow anything new to be introduced that would tax their brains after 4pm now, if that policy was good enough for the Roman Senate, I say it's good enough for our lives. Again, we've got to give our minds time to rest. End your days at a reasonable time, turn your brain off and and restore your power. Rise better and keener after a solid rest.

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