Hey, writers. There are trends that I see in friends and family. One that always bugs me is the idea that functioning on low sleep is somehow admirable. No… Just… No.

Hit the jump writers, and let’s discuss.

It dawned on me that I’m writing this outside of cold & flu season, but then it hit me, that makes this more important not less.

Have you ever been a part of this conversation?:

Guy A: "I get by on five hours of sleep."
Guy B: "Oh yeah? I get by on four hours of sleep!"

And my brain always thinks, “No guys. You’re going about this all wrong.” I mean if your job entails helping out orphans or something, then I can see how you’d want to pour more of yourself into your work. But let’s be real here, no one I know does anything even remotely that Noble. More than likely the two guys in the example conversation are the same two guys I know who play video games into three a.m. I am not anti video games, but I am anti throwing away sleep.

If there’s a thing that ambushes you and it’s important (hurricanes, anyone?) then hey, you do what you gotta do. Having said that, running low on sleep shouldn’t be a daily occurrence.

There’s a book, writers, that I try to live by. I’m surprised I haven’t mentioned it a thousand times already. Let’s talk for a second about two rich men: Micheal Jordan and Bill Gates. So what do they have in common? Well they both made their money from basketball. Actually, no. Well, they both made money from computers. Wait… That isn’t right either.

Okay a better question: What do they have in common? Then repeat that process for a hundred or so people. The author then found seven common habits that all these people had in common.

Cutting out a lot of information, I’ll skip to the seventh habit. It is called, “Sharpen the saw.”

“If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend six hours sharpening my axe” -- Abraham Lincoln

Writers, millionaires and billionaires make it a point to prioritize their rest. Don’t you think we should, too?

I’ll close on a simple question:

What is your favorite way to sharpen the saw?

Sound off in the comments and let me know 🙂

Aloha,
Alvin