Month / October 2022

by Ricardo Sanchez

Working remotely

Many people have experienced working from home for the first time in the past few years due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and many want to continue doing it. I don’t blame them. I am lucky to have had the opportunity to work from home (or remotely) full-time since 2014. Before that, I worked from home a few days a week as a software engineer for HomeAway (acquired by Expedia.com) in Austin, TX.

Working from home has enabled me to save time by not having a commute and having fewer meetings to do more things that I enjoy, for example, writing posts like this and many more that I never published—going for long walks, taking road trips with the family, and even traveling abroad for more extended periods. However, not everything has been perfect. I do miss the in-person interactions with colleagues and even strangers. Going out to lunch with co-workers, having to wear more than shorts and flip-flops every morning, and having a clear separation between home and work.

Having a clear separation between home and work was probably the hardest thing to do initially, but it is under control now. It is too easy to end up working endless hours with the excuse of how important work is, and continue doing it all of the time when you are home. The truth is, your personal life will always be more important than any job, but understanding this and separating your work from your personal life requires a lot of discipline when working from home.

Some people are not qualified to work from home, and I am not talking about the people who are needed to be in a place physically to do their job; instead, I am referring to the people who are easily distracted and can’t focus on their work and end up slacking off instead. Working from home and doing it successfully requires discipline and effort.

Working from home is feasible and probably the best way for some people to work nowadays. If you can do your job from a computer, then I don’t see why a company wouldn’t let you work remotely if that is what you desire. At the same time, some people enjoy going to an office, working with others, having in-person meetings, etc. The ideal situation is to have a balance, but it is essential also to be part of a team where there is general agreement about the work location and hours.

I am unsure if I will continue to work from home forever, but I know that it has been a positive change in my life for many years. It has made me more productive as I can focus on my work better, and it has also helped me financially as I don’t require a second car, and I save some money in gas and food by not going out to lunch as often as I did when I worked at an office.

In addition, I am trying the four-day workweek, and so far, it’s been positive for me, my team, and my company. I feel more energetic when I am working, I feel happier, and my work-life balance actually exists. When I am not working, I use the time to pursue my hobbies, which also benefit my job. I like keeping up with technology and changes in programming languages, architecture, etc. And more importantly, I feel that I am no longer in this rat race.

Even when I still have a work routine, it is well-balanced, and I have enough time to decide what I want to do with it.

My ultimate goal is to wake up every day and do what I want, where I want, in the terms I want. That is happiness for me.

person holding many books
by Ricardo Sanchez

One book every week

It’s not about reading fast. It is about reading more often.

How many hours do we spend looking down at our phones or watching a show weekly? Ironically, the same technology that keeps us distracted can give us this valuable information. Unless you actively track how much time you spend on your phone, you’ll likely not realize how much it is. It is always more than you think, trust me.

To most people, reading one book every week sounds unattainable. And it can be unless you decide to cut off time from other activities, for example, looking down at your phone or streaming the latest show. I am reading one book a week not because I want to break a record but to get the habit and replace bad habits with it. If I can spend more than one hour looking at my phone every day, then I can spend that same hour every day reading a book.

The average reader snails through prose at a rate of about 250-300 words per minute, roughly equating to about one page per minute.

The Guardian

That means that if I read one hour every day, five days a week, I can easily read a book of about 300 pages, every week!

When wondering how many pages a book should be, it is notable that the average book length is between 200-400 pages. 

https://gatekeeperpress.com/how-many-pages-should-a-book-be-to-publish/te

It’s been almost five weeks since I started this, and I am about to finish reading the fifth book. Reading has always been something I enjoy, but I am not going to lie. Unfortunately, my book queue has been increasing in the past several years due to not having enough time to read. Imagine that!

I’ve come to understand that time is not something we lack. Most of us have it, and we can claim a lot of it back if we prioritize what we do with it. This reading project is a way for me to claim time away from other activities and spend more of it reading.

Reading one book a week is working for me now, and I want to apply the formula to other aspects of my life. Time I have, all I have to do is find a way to spend it wisely.