Why I Work on Weekends

Hey friends,

Last Friday night I was meant to host a dinner party for nine friends at my flat (part of my ongoing quest to get better at cooking).

But then Storm Eunice hit London, and only 3 people could still make it. It was an interesting mix:

1. Nathaniel Drew – A fellow productivity / lifestyle YouTuber (1.5M subs)
2. Hasan Kubba – author of The Unfair Advantage
3. Safwan AhmedMia – aka SuperSaf, a tech YouTuber (1.8M subs).

We had a cosy creator / tech nerd chat into the late hours, with the wind going mental outside.

And I realised that with other creators, I get a level of conversation and mutual understanding that I never get anywhere else. Me, Nat, Hasan and Saf are all on the same wavelength because we have so much shared experience: putting our work out there, growing an audience, making a living online.

If you were a fly on the wall, you’d have heard us talking about:

So the four of us sat there, chatting until midnight. I felt pretty alive.

The next day (Saturday), Hasan and Nat came to my London studio for an all-day brainstorm of Nat’s secret new project 🤫. We busted out the A3 paper pads and sharpies and got to work. Bhav, one of my team members, even decided to travel 2hrs to hang out with us.

She said it was 100% worth it because being around creators and feeding off that energy raised her own aspirations. It’s always worth going out of your way to hang out with people doing cool stuff.⚡

⏳ My Reality Check

From the outside, it might’ve looked like we were all ‘working on the weekend’. But this was literally the most fun thing we could do that day.

This is a regular check-in I like to do. I ask myself ‘would I do this for free or on the weekend?’

If the answer is yes, then I feel like my work life is going well. Obviously this doesn’t apply to tangential tasks that keep the business alive (like hiring accountants or playing calendar Tetris). But my main work – writing video scripts, working my book, doing sick collabs – is fun anyway, and I’d be doing it on the side even if I didn’t get paid.

I know some startup founders / workers who dread going to work on Monday. I’ve only ever had that feeling a few times, and never since leaving medicine. If it ever comes back, that’ll be a sign for me to drastically change things up.

I dunno, maybe my ‘work on the weekend’ approach is unhealthy? Should I have more separation between work and leisure time? If you’ve got any thoughts, let me know by replying to this email 💌

Have a great week!

Ali xx

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♥️ My Favourite Things

📚 Book – Every Time I Find the Meaning of Life, They Change It: Wisdom of the Great Philosophers on How to Live, by Daniel Klein. I’ve been getting into the history of philosophy recently, reading this book to get the broad overview. I’d also recommend the History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps podcast.

🎙️ Podcast – Alex Hormozi on My First Million. About this guy Alex’s journey to being a millionaire by being a consultant + marketing coach for gyms. He’s strongly on the side of “don’t let people tell you that it’s ‘bad work hygiene’ to enjoy your work and have it spill into your life”.

🎬 YouTube Video – Performance vs Trust, by Simon Sinek. He talks about running a team, and making decisions about exactly who should be on your team. Specifically, how high-performers can still be toxic if they don’t have anyone’s trust. Worth watching if you’re an employee or manager. Thanks to Steve Hewitt from Gymshark for the recommendation.

🎙️Podcast – Deep Dive with Logan Ury. I re-listened to my podcast with Logan Ury, author of How to Not Die Alone. We were both pretty authentic and vulnerable, though I say so myself. 😁 I’d like to do more podcasts like this.

✍️ Quote of the Week

Whenever you can in life, optimize for independence rather than pay. If you have independence and you’re accountable on your output, as opposed to your input—that’s the dream. – Naval Ravikant

From The Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson and Jack Butcher. Resurfaced using Readwise.