The Work Fun Balance

Allow me to paint a picture for you…

It’s Wednesday afternoon. I just finished eating lunch with a friend, and now I’m “back to work” sitting on a beach in San Diego sipping my ice coffee, typing away. The weather is sunny and seventy two degrees right now and everytime I look up, I see the surfers gleefully riding the waves back home (ok, ok...there may be a few bikini clad college girls walking around too ;)

The picture I've included here is the view from "my office" that I just snapped with my phone.

It’s a tough life I live.

Seriously, there is nothing more satisfying than spending time out and about on a day like this, especially when I know that most of the world is inside somewhere working. Then, I think about what I would have been doing last month on a Wednesday afternoon – writing technical documentation on some engineering project on my computer in my windowless office – and I feel even better!

One temptation to resist though is the inclination to lose productivity. With so much free time, it’s easy to want to waste a lot of it doing frivolous things. The truth is, I have been more productive than EVER these last several weeks. In fact, I watch probably less than an hour of TV each day (if that!) and am constantly on the go.

Sure it takes discipline, but it’s well worth it.

In terms of work, I actually have four things on my plate right now. I have the ebook which requires constant attention especially since I've boosted advertising recently, I’m the Marketing Campaign Manager for another internet company, I do statistical analysis and trending for my friend who is a professional poker player, and I’m in the beginning stages of another book project (can't reveal too much yet!) that I'm working on with a friend.
I love being busy especially when, in the grand scheme of things, I’m working for myself (and on the beach!).

But with work, comes fun. (This is the part where I brag to you about some awesome adventure I’ve just been on)

So, as you may know, I am a self-proclaimed “Tennis Warehouse Legend”! Basically, I worked as a supervisor there for a couple of years and implemented a few new things that are still used today! I also happen to still know all of the managers, the President, and both owners. Since I left, Tennis Warehouse has just exploded in popularity and influence (all due to ME of course).

So, one of the perks is being able to enjoy the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells California (think Palm Springs). I went last year for a couple of days and got to meet James Blake, Ana Ivanovic, and Caroline Wozniaki.

This year was more of the same.

In fact, I got to see a tennis match with four of the greatest players to ever play the game! That’s right. I watched the Roger Federer and Pete Sampras versus Raphael Nadal and Andre Agassi match – from box seats no less! Totally amazing. Although Sampras is my favorite player of all time, Agassi just made the match with his constant joking around (the players were mic’d up).

So what else did I get to do?

Well aside from watching a lot of tennis and hanging out with some old friends, I got to meet and work autograph security for Maria Sharapova, Raphael Nadal, Caroline Wozniaki, and Kim Clijsters (sooo nice!). To be fair, the security thing is really just me standing next to the player as they sign autographs and nicely telling fans to “keep the line moving, no personal pictures, one autograph per person!’ and basically look tough (obviously why they chose me) to make sure nothing happens. All the while, I’m thinking of the one thing I can say to the hot tennis players that will make them instantly fall in love with me.

Nothing came to mind.

But Maria gave me a smile and a wink while we were talking, and last year, Ana Ivanovic said she would remember me (although I missed her this year!). Somehow, we’re going to have to figure out a way to make our long distance relationship work better than seeing each other once a year in Indian Wells.

As we did last year, Nick and I got a little adventurous and jumped onto one of the practice courts exclusively reserved for players and coaches, and hit some balls. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga was on the court next to us and watched us hit for a while. I think he must’ve been thinking “who the hell is that really good-looking Indian guy that’s really good at tennis! I hope I don’t have to play him!”

Don't worry, I’ll go easy on you Jo.

A little while later, Alana Bondarenko and her coach kicked us off because they had the court reserved. Oh well. I suppose I can give up the court to a hot tennis player.

To earn my way though, I actually did some free work for Tennis Warehouse including helping customers and stringing racquets. Afterall, I am still a certified “Master Racquet Technician” and several customers were ecstatic with my customer service.

As much as I wanted to stay longer than the five days I was there, I knew I had to come back to San Diego. I needed to preserve the Work-Fun Balance. I didn’t work at all while I was there. On top of that, I didn’t work out other than playing a little tennis, and was eating like crap.

So, I reluctantly returned, jumped back into my two-a-day workouts, and my “hard” work by the beach!

In fact, even though I don’t have any “regular” job that I have to be at, I still set my alarm and wake up early in the morning to start my day. I go to the gym and workout first thing in the morning, then do some work for a couple of hours. It certainly does take some discipline to go to bed at a decent hour each night and wake up early, but it’s a healthy sacrifice I’m willing to make to successful at the “non-regular job” lifestyle.

So far, I can’t complain ;)