Introduction

A few years ago, I wrote a tweet where I explained my understanding of the famous Eisenhower Matrix. However, it looks like I didn’t do a good job at explaining the correct usage of the fourth quadrant. In this article, we’ll dive deeper into this prioritization strategy and understand why completely discarding everything in the fourth quadrant may very well be a bad idea.

The Eisenhower Matrix, popularized by former US President Dwight D. Eisenhower and later Stephen Covey, is a powerful prioritization tool. While many dismiss the fourth quadrant—non-urgent, non-important activities—as mere distractions, this article argues that embracing these activities can enhance our overall well-being and productivity.

Eisenhower Matrix: The Basics

Quadrant 1: Urgent and Important

Here you’ll find stuff that has to be done right away, these kind of things can’t wait, and it’s usually the stuff you don’t want to deal with. It’s emergencies that usually come from neglecting other areas of your life, or unexpected situations that come from the randomness of life. The goal is to decrease these items to the very minimum. Examples of items in here:

• There’s a server outage at your company and you need to deal with it immediately as users can’t access your services.

• Your taxes are due today.

• Urgent health issue or emergency.

• Time-sensitive client request that, if unattended, would break an important deal.

Quadrant 2: Important and Not Urgent

Things here are stuff that make an important and essential part of your life, otherwise they would not be important. Areas of your life that don’t necessarily require immediate attention right now, but if neglected, can become Quadrant 1 items. Examples:

• Planning and strategizing the next quarter of projects at your company.

• Working on your personal and professional development.

• Spending quality time with your loved ones.

• Exercise, Meditation and anything related to physical and mental wellness.

Quadrant 3: Urgent and Non-Important

Elements in this list may seem urgent at first, but upon closest inspection, you’ll find that they don’t actually move the needle on your long term goals, and they are generally relevant to other people’s priorities, not yours; it’s generally advised that you delegate these items whenever you can. Examples:

• Some emails and phone calls.

• Unplanned meetings.

• Peer interruptions.

• Last-minute requests from colleagues of managers.

As you can see from this quadrant, uncontrolled activities on this group can be highly disruptive of your focus and will greatly derail you from your ability to focus on the highly important and relevant Quadrant 2 activities.

Quadrant 4: Non-Urgent and Non-Important

And here comes the usually known as the biggest offender: elements that seemingly bring no value to you at all. Things that are neither important nor urgent are known as just time wasters and distractions, and must be eliminated whenever possible; but as we’ll learn in this article, that’s not always the case. Most common examples of Quadrant 4 activities:

• Time spent in social networks.

• Netflix or any other streaming service.

• Playing video games.

• Random internet browsing.

The Significance of the Fourth Quadrant

Tasks you execute in the fourth quadrant are usually considered the kind of stuff you must totally eliminate from your life; if you think about this advice, it sort of makes sense, right? You are not going to advance in your career, or achieve your spiritual goals, or save for your dream house, or (insert that big goal you may have right now) if you just keep zapping on Netflix or grinding to rank up in that video game you love so much.

Contrary to common belief, fourth quadrant activities can serve as essential stress-relievers and moments of relaxation, crucial for mental health. Finding a balance between productivity and leisure is crucial for maintaining overall well-being and preventing burnout, so it's important to approach the fourth quadrant with a nuanced perspective rather than outright elimination.

Harnessing the Power of the Fourth Quadrant

Redefining Productivity

Taking breaks and allowing yourself time to recharge can help you accomplish more in the long run, preventing burnout and improving focus. When we're constantly working, we risk burnout and decreased efficiency; this has actually happened to me so many times I can’t count, go into hyper productivity for a long period of time and I feel like every single one of my waking hours ought to be used in some productive activity, what ends up happening is that my performance in these productive activities drop drastically and I feel less energized throughout the day, I even feel like weekends are not long enough and start feeling stagnated at my work. This all changes when I start spending more time in leisure activities that get me off of the hyper focus mode.

By incorporating regular periods of rest, we give our minds and bodies the chance to recover, leading to improved focus and energy when we return to our tasks.

Strategic non-action can also lead to better decision-making. Sometimes, stepping back from a problem or situation allows us to gain new perspectives. By not immediately reacting or trying to solve every issue that arises, we create space for more thoughtful and effective solutions to emerge. The most common example I can give you is when I'm tired at the end of the day going in circles over a problem (I'm a programmer) and not being able to figure out exactly what is going wrong with my code, then I go to sleep and the next day within 5 minutes I have already figured out and fixed the issue and had me on my nerves the night before.

But how do you do this? by setting boundaries

Setting and maintaining boundaries is crucial for creating space for fourth-quadrant activities and achieving work-life balance. Here are a few things you can experiment with — you don't need to apply all of this at once, start slowly and incorporate one or two things at the time.

Tip #1: Learn to say No

Understand Your Priorities: Clearly define what matters most to you in both your personal and professional life. Knowing your priorities will help you identify which activities and requests align with your goals and which do not.

You know the saying that when you say yes to something, you're saying no to the other things? Think about those other things you are saying no to. Are you saying no to your mental health? your tranquility? your finances? etc. It's highly important that you keep a balance between all the aspects of your life that matter most at the moment.

Practice Saying No Gracefully: Develop polite and assertive ways to decline requests that do not align with your priorities. For example:

• "Thank you for thinking of me, but I won't be able to commit to this at the moment."

• "I appreciate the opportunity, but I need to focus on my current projects."

This, I must say, is the most difficult thing for me to do; because by nature, I always feel a desire to please everyone, and this is problematic, because sometimes I'd even go as far as even sacrificing my own leisure time in favor of someone else's wellbeing, that makes me a good person to others, but a bad person to myself.

Avoid Over-Explaining: A friend once told me the following: "Yeiner, you need to remember that you do not owe anyone a lengthy explanation for your decisions. A simple and polite refusal is sufficient" — his argument, resonated a lot with me, because due to my will to make people happy, I would feel anxiety for not doing what they wanted. I started practicing this a bit more, especially as I stopped drinking alcohol and started caring more and more for my wife, kids and dogs; at the end, nobody makes me happier than them.

Tip #2: Communicate Your Limits

Be Clear and Consistent: If necessary, communicate your boundaries to colleagues, friends, and family. For example, let them know your preferred work hours and when you need uninterrupted time. At my job, I usually do this by blocking my calendar at certain hours so that I can move forward with a project; at home, I usually negotiate the "me time" with my wife, so that I can relax while knowing that I'm not leaving anything else of a higher importance behind (I have a terrible memory), this is beneficial for both of us, because my wife also needs her "me time" and we're both very permissive with each other's hobbies, i.e I don't judge her for scrolling over her Instagram feed and she doesn't judge me for playing on my PS5.

Use Technology Wisely: There are several things you can do in both your personal and work environment:

• Set up automatic responses for emails to manage expectations. For example, you can use an out-of-office reply stating your availability and response time.

• If necessary, uninstall Slack from your phone or any messaging app you use at work. This is something I personally don't feel the need for, but some people find it very useful to separate the personal and work context. If I don't have Slack on my phone, I won't be tempted to read any work-related messages until the next day when get online for work. For this to work, your team needs to be aware of your unavailability to respond messages after work hours.

Tip #3: Prioritize Your Tasks and Commitments

Create a To-Do List: List your tasks and optionally categorize them based on their importance and urgency; I’ve read advice that you must categorize all your tasks, and what I’ve learned all these years of being a productivity geek is that this isn’t always necessary and could be quite overwhelming if you obsess over that habit, if that technique works for you, definitely go ahead (it will help you prioritize better), but don’t force yourself into that. Regardless of the form, the To-Do list can be extremely useful. Don't make my mistake of obsessing over using the most sophisticated app or productivity method to handle all aspects of your life. As I learned the hard way, just keeping it simple is better than overcomplicating your setup with a super creative strategy.

Use Time-Blocking: Allocate specific blocks of time for different types of activities, including fourth-quadrant tasks. Stick to these time blocks as much as you can, and try your best to keep a balance between productivity and leisure time.

I have sort of started theming my days, where Tuesdays and Thursdays are my most productive and with the longest work hours, and Mondays and Fridays are my least productive with lower or regular work hours. Within these days, there are also blocks of focused and not-so-focused (i.e "shallow") work, I understand that I'm at my peak productivity in the afternoon, whereas in the morning I'm mostly only able to do work that doesn't require deep concentration.

Some people find the Deep Work framework by Cal Newport an excellent resource for this, however, I'm not that kind of person as I feel like this strategy is mostly for the neurotypical. If you want to give it a try, I recommend you take a read to Doist's write up on this topic.

I will go deeper into time-blocking in a future article. But for now what I'd like to share is: look at your calendar of choice and create as many event blocks as you need, use color codes to identify the types of events, and even go further and create several calendars for each aspect of your life, for example, my four main calendars are: Work, Personal, Family (shared with my wife and daughter) and Parents (shared just with my wife). In these calendars, I usually include the blocks for my productive and my non-productive time, with this approach, I can be completely guilt free during my leisure time. However, this approach may not work for everyone, so if you feel like you're overwhelming yourself over planning and scheduling every aspect of your life, then keep a simpler approach and let improvisation kick in, no judgement on doing that at all, you should definitely follow what feels natural for you.

Another aspect of time blocking is making sure you're setting aside enough time for breaks throughout your days; the good ol' Pomodoro technique is still relevant, and you can combine it with apps like Forest (my favorite in this regard) to have a visual cue of your productive and break time.

Tip #4: Recognize and Respect Your Own Needs

Listen to Your Body and Mind: Pay attention to signs of stress and fatigue. When you notice these signs, take a step back and allow yourself the necessary time to recover. This applies to everything, not just work; you can get burned out and even get some nasty emotional triggers by obsessing on a hobby or anything else that's supposed to make you happy.

Practice Self-Compassion: Be kind to yourself and acknowledge that it's okay to take breaks and prioritize your well-being. Avoid self-criticism for engaging in fourth-quadrant activities. Self-Compassion is something I've started to practice more this year, while valuing a lot my daily achievements (no matter if they are small) and always thinking of myself in terms of my worth as a person; meditation has definitely helped a lot in this front!

Overcoming Challenges

Prioritizing fourth-quadrant activities can be challenging, especially if you are in a hyper-productive season, or if you're working hard to achieve your next career move. Let me list a couple of the most common challenges and their solutions:

Feeling Guilty for Taking Breaks: Remind yourself that rest is productive. Taking breaks is essential for maintaining long-term productivity and preventing burnout. Reframe downtime as an investment in your overall success, not as a time waster.

Fear of Missing Out (FOMO): Focus on the quality of your activities rather than the quantity. Understand that constantly being busy doesn't equate to being productive. Prioritize activities that align with your values and goals. Remember that your life and your career are a marathon and not a sprint, so you don't have to learn or experience everything at the same time, if you want to make a plan for something, let it cook and wait for the opportunity to arise, but following an order that will not overwhelm you.

Conclusion

In summary, the fourth quadrant of the Eisenhower Matrix, often dismissed as non-essential, holds significant value for our overall well-being and productivity. By redefining productivity to include rest, embracing mindfulness, and setting boundaries, we can harness the power of the fourth quadrant to prevent burnout, enhance creativity, and improve our decision-making.

Balancing productivity and leisure is crucial for sustainable success. Instead of completely discarding fourth quadrant activities, we should integrate them thoughtfully into our lives to achieve long-term mental clarity and focus.

Call to Action

I encourage you to reflect on your current use of the Eisenhower Matrix and consider how you might better integrate fourth quadrant activities into your routine. Share your experiences and thoughts in the comments below. For further reading, explore resources on mindfulness, productivity, and work-life balance to deepen your understanding and practice. Let's strive for a balanced approach to success, where productivity and well-being go hand in hand.

As a software engineer, one of my main struggles used to be whenever I had to give feedback to someone or hold a difficult conversation; e.g., in our retrospectives, I would find myself expressing what was on my mind, and this leading to unproductive arguments that let my feedback receivers to getting upset and the original message I wanted to deliver getting ignored or taken the wrong way.

I figured that I had to use different words to express my feedback, then I got into what I called a great idea! Giving feedback through a specific structure: saying a good thing about the person, then giving critical feedback and finishing with a good thing about this person again; this way, no one would get upset with me because, ultimately, I was saying more positive things about them than negative ones. I still had issues with my feedback being well received; sometimes, my message wasn’t well understood, or people were more focused on the good things I said and ignored the critical feedback. Little did I know about this form of feedback strategy and its popularity; it actually has a name: Feedback Sandwich, and its use is discouraged. I’ll speak more about this in the next section.

Then, I became an Engineering Manager, and giving feedback became one of the essential parts of my job. People want to know what their X, Y, and Z coordinates are, how well they are performing, what their areas of growth are, what their strengths are, etc., and without a proper feedback strategy, things were going to be a little bit problematic.

—

Enter the SAID framework and why “Feedback Sandwich” is a bad idea

Through some training at the company, I learned the concept of Feedback Sandwich and immediately had some flashbacks of my past life as a software engineer.

But what’s wrong with Feedback Sandwich? I hear you say, in the end, it’s an excellent way of giving feedback without being too focused on the negative side of what we want to express. Though feedback sandwich might have a few positive things, the negative ones make them a not-so-good framework. Let me list some of the aspects of this strategy:

Positive things of Feedback Sandwich:

• The feedback session could end with a positive and engaging attitude.

• In some cases, the impact on the feedback receiver would be softened.

• It’s easier to deliver feedback using this framework; you don’t have to overthink it.

The Dark Side of Feedback Sandwich

• In most cases, the message you want to deliver in your critical feedback won’t be clearly understood. “Was that a positive or negative feedback?” — people wouldn’t know!

• The positive things you say wouldn’t be taken as honest feedback; hearing things like “Hey, I think you are a talented Engineer, but…” would make people more focused on what you are about to say after the “but…” part, and ignore that you just said they were a sound Engineer. Thoughts like “Ugh, what did I do wrong now?” Are the ones that will take over your feedback receiver’s mind at the moment.

• What’s the impact of the feedback I’m receiving? Expressing the implications of why I must change whatever behavior you want me to change could help me embrace your input more engagingly than doing it just because “my manager said so.”

An alternative approach: SAID framework

It is unknown to me who came up with this framework. It was taught to me by one of my former managers at Skillshare: Mike Sherov. (Hi Mike!).

Upon further investigation, I found similar frameworks like Lara Hogan’s feedback equation. I still stuck with SAID, as it’s more familiar to me.

SAID stands for Specific, Ask, Impact, and Decision. Let’s look at them in detail!

Specific: You need to be clear about the behavior you have observed in the other person; being specific is highly important, otherwise, your feedback will be received as too broad and generic, which the person can respond to with defensiveness or counterarguments.

Ask: Once you deliver your message as to what’s the specific behavior you have observed in the other person, ask an open question so the other person can express the source of their conduct; that way, you can have more context and this turn into a two-sided conversation where both parties understand each other’s perspectives on the situation.

A note about open questions: whenever you ask while giving feedback, make sure the response to your question is not a “Yes” or “No”; those are closed questions. Open questions usually start with “What…”, “How..” or similar, and the response is an extended explanation that leads to an engaging discussion. Example of open questions:

• “What have you tried so far that isn’t working as expected?”

• “How do you see this incident from your perspective?”

Impact: Once both parties understand the source of the behavior, it’s time to explain how it affects you, the team, the organization, or anyone else. Making the connection between your behavior and the impact this is making in people’s lives helps you be more engaged when making the changes necessary to fix whatever is not working correctly, or if you are receiving positive feedback, reinforce that good behavior through different strategies.

Decision: After delivering the feedback, it’s time to decide on next steps. I was taught that a good way to approach the decision part was to plan on a SMART goal to help you and your teammate agree on a realistic way to measure progress toward improving the behavior in question. However, as I’ve learned through my experience, action items don’t always need to be SMART goals; they can simply be new agreements you are making with the other person, with the commitment that you’ll follow up on these later on (hopefully you discuss the frequency of these follow-ups during the feedback session). It could even be a small change the person can make in handling their day-to-day.

—

Takeaways

• Feedback sandwich, though it’s usually well intended, it’s deeply flawed as a feedback framework. It leads to confusion and anxiety and blurs the message you want to deliver. You should avoid it and use proper frameworks instead.

• Ask open questions: if the answer to what you’ll ask is either yes or no, rethink it.

• SMART goals are an excellent way to plan action items but use whatever works in your context.

As a child, before I developed my reading skills, I remember that I loved to look at magazines and brochures. Usually my stepfather would carry catalogs of appliances (he worked in a furniture & appliances company) and left them in the dining room for whoever wanted to read them. Usually I was the one who took the brochures from him and got ready to “read.”

I remember looking through the magazines and looking at the photos, I used to wonder how those artists did to “draw” humans to make them look so real. I still did not know what a photograph was anyways. One day I tried, and as best I could, I “drew” one of those people who appeared in the magazine, in fact, I tried to trace the lines perfectly, one after another, but I did not achieve perfection. My question remained! How good those cartoonists have to be to make people look this real!

I think that at some point I got frustrated and decided to ignore my path as an artist, because I didn’t feel that I could “draw” as well as the artists they hired in those magazines. Maybe I just needed time to find out that everything was done through a device called a camera, and that the artists or cartoonists were actually Photographers.

I decided to continue enjoying the magazines as a spectator. What I found in them wasn’t very interesting, and I usually didn’t understand anything, but it kept me distracted.

When I was 10 years old, after finishing elementary school, I moved to another town to live with another family; I didn’t have many friends in this place. In the house where I lived, I noticed that they had a small library with books of all kinds, from science, history, geography, to medicine, stories and novels. I was surprised that this library was more used as an ornament or decoration to make the house look “smarter”, and that its content was mostly ignored by the people who lived with me. Where everyone saw one more piece of furniture, I saw a sanctuary, a place of fantastic travels through which I could not only enrich my knowledge, but also allow me to let my imagination fly to the farthest reaches of the universe.

I had only one good friend at school, with whom I could not spend much time, because the adults who took care of me did not consider him a pleasant person for my life. They considered him a rebellious boy, who did not study, and that he would only teach me bad habits and make me a bad person. It was very sad that my tutors did not take the time to at least meet my good friend, perhaps let him visit me to realize that it was not what they thought. Sure, we weren’t the wisest kids; and we did sometimes played in other people’s yards, or distract other friends while they were in their classes at school. Sometimes we might play dangerous games, like climbing very tall trees, trying to grab the furthest fruit; roll his bike at full speed in the middle of a busy street; or getting into fights with other people who wanted to challenge us to the fists (which sometimes makes me laugh to remember, considering how of a coward I am today). Still, I think none of this defined us as people. We were just a pair of tweens with all the energy and creativity to imagine fun ways to spend the moment. And this was especially important to me, since arriving home meant entering the cold, hostile and painful environment in which I lived at that age. For me, going out to be irreverent with my friend from school meant moments of infinite joy that I was never going to get at home.

However, the time came when they forbade their friendship. Because my friend “did not give them a good feeling”, “that boy is going to get you in trouble”, “if he keeps on the streets it is because his mother does not want him.”

In the midst of despair, and questioning on what to do with my free time since I could not leave the house. In the midst of all the dilemma of being an educated pre-adolescent and of which my tutors were proud, in the midst of that I rediscovered my great passion for reading. At that time, I already knew how to read very well, and I was very interested in knowing everything the world had for me. I went to the sanctuary of knowledge that I had discovered in that house, the “ornament” that contained thousands of secrets that only I would go to discover — because no one else saw books as something to which you have to spend a little time.

My afternoons started to be reading afternoons. With the incessant heat and deafening silence of the town, at the time when people usually took their naps and everything went into a moment of trance, time seemed to stop for that space of two hours; in those moments when the trees were only heard when the breeze blew, or when a dry leaf fell, or when a lizard walked through the grass; in those moments when it was easier to perceive what you usually did not perceive, when it was easier to notice the stain on the patio wall, the semi-erased letters of the white shirt hanging on the wire, the voice of the person selling mangoes two blocks from where I lived, the breeze swaying in different directions, the sunbeam moving through the shadows of the tree that covered me. It was said ray of sunshine that gave me clues that my moment of silence and happiness was about to end.

It was during these fleeting moments that I took the opportunity to read. I always had a favorite subject that I was obsessed with at certain times.

I read about geography and learned about the rivers of Colombia, the great mountains and the famous cities. I read about world records, I learned that the Nile River used to be the longest river in the world, but our Amazon surpassed it at some point. I read about history, I understood that Tupac Amaru was the Aztec emperor (wrong, actually I think he was Inca, but not sure anymore), and that apparently the Spaniards murdered him by beheading, I don’t remember the clear details, I only remember what I felt while reading all this. There was a drawing of Tupac Amaru, I watched it for many minutes, trying to understand what happened.

I read about the independence of Colombia, I learned about the Beatles and their members, I read about Marilyn Monroe and about Abraham Lincoln. I read a lot of grammar books in English, I learned the pronouns, the conjugations, the possessives, the different tenses. I learned about anatomy and understood the systems of the human body before anyone in my class. I studied rope knots for tying animals on farms, dozens of knots both easy and impossible to loosen. I identified names from the history of Colombia although I never studied why they were famous, such as Rafael Uribe Uribe and Policarpa Salavarrieta. I learned what a catapult was and what a guillotine was, in fact, I tried to make one to “decapitate” insects, but my experiment failed. I tried to study chemistry and physics, but both subjects were very difficult for me. I read about home medicine, I learned how to make a tourniquet, I learned about the Heimlich maneuver (although I did not memorize its name at the time), I learned about mental illness — I was fascinated by the idea of ​​suffering from vertigo and especially hallucinations so that I could have imaginary friends . I read and memorized stories by Rafael Pombo, Aníbal Niño, Aesop and Oscar Wilde. I read novels like “El Túnel” and “The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Eréndira and Her Heartless Grandmother”. I started reading “Love in the Time of Cholera” and “100 Years of Solitude”, but I never finished them. I read “Juan Salvador Gaviota” and started reading “The Rebellion of the Rats.” One day I started reading the Spanish dictionary from the beginning, words like “abacus”, “abad”, and “abel” are the first that I remember having studied; halfway through the “a” I gave up the mission of reading the entire dictionary, as it seemed unrealistic. Likewise, I always wanted to ask my Spanish Language teacher if they were forced to learn the dictionary in order to obtain their degree; I never asked her. Then I started studying botany, and I wanted to put together my own notebook with samples of plants that I would discover; but the task became difficult for me and I abandoned it.

At the age of 11 I had developed a skill for reading, which would later become my most valuable habit, and through which I would begin to find meaning in life and the world.

When I was 15 years old, in 2004, I was already living in Medellín with my mother, and I usually spent every afternoon alone at home trying to watch something interesting on TV. Since watching TV was not my thing, and I felt that I wanted to acquire more knowledge, I walked to a bookstore and saw a Chess book; this book cost the equivalent of about 50 cents of a dollar. I begged my mother to please give me the money, she noticed the emotion with which I asked for the book, she immediately gave it to me. I still have it, and I still remember how exciting my afternoons were when I was studying techniques, repeating games, even playing against myself!

At the same time that I was practicing Chess, I was also training Taekwondo at a local club. Those were my two hobbies.

When I finished the Chess book, I began to spend my afternoons in two libraries that were close to my house. I remember reading about psychology and sports — especially martial arts; I tried to memorize self defense techniques, or tricks to get better at Taekwondo. I also read magic tricks, and I imagined doing several of these in a presentation at school; I wrote down several on a sheet, but I never practiced them, and I think that the sheet where I had my notes was thrown away by my mother when she didn’t know what it was. The library where I went had a quiet environment, I used to read under the umbrellas, listening only to the voices of people who whispered so as not to disturb, and at times I was distracted when a pretty girl passed by me, or when someone accidentally opened the door. I used to go to the library with my younger sister, who used to look for Lazy Town or princess books; Sometimes she would get bored and she would ask me what I was reading, I would try to explain to her, to which she responded with a mock of “I didn’t understand but if you like it that’s fine”. One day I saw a Taekwondo book that I found very interesting, so much so that I wanted to take it home. I asked to make photocopies of the entire book! I still remember what it was like to bring so much emotion with me to my home.

My mom had a job with a somewhat difficult schedule. She used to leave at 3 or 4 PM, and she would come home almost at midnight. I almost always waited awake for her; sometimes I would cook something for her to eat before sleeping, sometimes we had conflict, so I preferred not to talk to her.

Maybe it was my passion for reading that made me a freak at school. And while I tried to have fun like everyone else, I actually didn’t do it like everyone else. For me the fun consisted of being at a party for certain hours and then going back to babysit my younger sister, or spending some time playing Chess or Monopoly with my best friend, training Tae Kwon Do alone, or reading something interesting. My definition of fun clashed with that of other boys my age, at 16 I had become a boring guy in the eyes of my friends and girls my age. I think I never learned to dance like the boys of my generation did, only as an adult I learned to dance salsa with my wife, and maybe a bit of Champeta in my own way. People say that I know how to dance very well, what they don’t know is that I don’t dance, I just follow the beats very well and that makes it seem like I dance well; Over time, several of the invented movements have become steps that I incorporated into my routine when I want to do the show in front of my family and friends, you know: Fake it till you make it

My love for books was what led me to be self-taught when one day in June at the age of 20 I began to reconsider my life. I had a daughter and a home, and I had a job I did not love. I exposed my life to the dangers of the night as I returned home, and I slept very little. I decided to study to be a Software Engineer, and independently I used internet manuals to read in my spare time.

My goal of changing careers was achieved, and through it I got closer and closer to each of the dreams that I traced for my life. However, reading became my job rather than my hobby. Because of this, it became a habit for me to quickly read documentations to find a solution to my problem, instead of studying the topics in depth to understand the basics. My knowledge was getting flat, and my ability to read was slowly fading.

I spent at least 10 years starting books and then not finishing them. I remember starting readings always with the highest motivation, and then being distracted by something else, especially desperation to “do something productive” rather than sitting “doing nothing” — my subconscious was misleading me by telling me that reading was wasting time .

In 2019 I changed jobs, I made a definite career change from Software Development to Engineering Management. It has been a very positive change for my career that has brought me so many good experiences and has helped me to know myself as a professional and understand even more clearly that I know absolutely nothing about anything. At the same time, family challenges were presented to me, the COVID-19 crisis occurred and all this brought many conflicts.

In the midst of so many challenges, between defining if I could be good as a Manager and if at the same time I could overcome family situations; In the midst of the indecisions and confusion I began to read again. I learned that proactivity generates much more value than reactivity.

From there my passion for books was reborn. Due to pressure to understand my work in the best way, and due to pressure to be the best Engineering Manager I could be, I started to read a lot more. In addition to the pressure to be a better person, better understand conflicts and be able to bring my interpersonal relationships (wife, children, friends, extended family) to success.

So far these months I have read more books than I have ever read in my life. And I feel that my ability to read is improving little by little. The side effect is that my own reading ability and comprehension has improved a lot and this has been reflected in my work. I feel like I was being very negligent in that area.

I am rediscovering that beautiful passion I had for reading, and now I feel that I will finally be able to read 100 years of Solitude, after postponing it for more than 20 years.

My greatest achievement is that I can transmit the love of reading to my children by setting an example, and that I can begin to cultivate the spark of creativity through such a valuable hobby.

One book at a time.

¡Sólo tenía 17 años cuando te conocí! Se podría decir que tenía mis sueños bien claros, y las metas bien trazadas. Era claro que a nivel profesional quería ser profe de Matemáticas en Estados Unidos, y a nivel personal quería ser campeón olímpico de Taekwondo.

¡Te conocí entrenando Taekwondo! Tuvimos que dejarlo cuando la vida dió un giro de 180 grados, y de la noche a la mañana nos encontramos con la noticia de que tendríamos una hija. La vida cambió completamente, y las prioridades se convirtieron en otras. ¡Pero quizás algún día volvamos a entrenar!

Hoy, 14 años después (en el 2020), hago recuento de las cientos de victorias que hemos tenido juntos (tanto grandes como pequeñas), mas las cientos o miles más que vendrán. No solo me regalaste 2 hermosos hijos que han transformado mi vida para siempre, si no que también me has enseñado el verdadero valor de una familia, gracias a ti no solo soy un buen padre y buen esposo, también me he convertido en mejor hermano y mejor hijo. Siento que mi relación con mi familia extendida es mejor, gracias a tí, pues has sido tú quien me ha hecho ver mis errores y el mal trabajo que estaba haciendo al no cultivar mis relaciones con las personas que amo.

No solo me has dado lecciones de vida que han fortalecido mis principios, si no que además has sido una compañera incondicional; contigo mi esfuerzo no se duplica, ¡contigo mi esfuerzo se multiplica por diez! Tú me has ayudado a mantener mis sueños y aspiraciones altas, pero siempre teniendo los pies sobre la tierra, cuestionando mis ideas locas y ayudándome a convertirlas en cosas más realistas.

Tú me apoyaste más que cualquier persona cuando yo solo tenía sueños. Cuando yo no tenía empleo, ni conocimiento, pero sí mucha motivación para salir adelante. Cuando nadie “daba un peso” por mí, la persona que metía sus manos al fuego eras tú. Sin ese empujón, las cosas habrían sido más difíciles, entonces, estoy eternamente agradecido contigo por eso.

¿Y cómo describir el sentimiento de celebrar estos logros contigo? Ver nuestras metas familiares, financieras y como padres hechas realidad; ver a nuestros hijos lograr sus pequeñas victorias, comprar ese artículo pequeño que deseábamos hace mucho, estudiar en la U, meditar… estas celebraciones estarían faltas de cierto espacio si no estuvieras tú en ellas. Pequeñas victorias que significan demasiado gracias a tí.

La vida puede tornarse desafiante, difícil, estresante; la vida puede llegar a parecer un conjunto de callejones sin salida y sin esperanza de mejorar. En medio del desafío de formar una familia llegan los problemas de pareja, los problemas con terceros, las deudas, las disputas con familiares. En estos momentos de absoluta crisis es cuando las personas se deben centrar en sus principios y tomar las mejores decisiones guiados por los mismos. Sé que contigo siempre podré tomar las mejores decisiones, pues tus principios se alinean con los míos, y siempre pensaremos en el beneficio de nuestra familia y nuestros hijos cada vez que demos un paso.

Me siento orgulloso de tu papel como consejera. Es impresionante ver cuántas personas simplemente luego de conocerte sienten que pueden confiar plenamente en ti para expresarte sus vulnerabilidades y pedirte un consejo ante ciertos desafíos personales. Yo te sugerí que estudiaras para ser Terapeuta :-), pero parece que prefieres hacerlo con el fin de ayudar a las personas y no para que sea tu "trabajo".

Me encanta la pasión con la que te esfuerzas por ayudar. La manera como te esfuerzas por conocer las situaciones de la gente y darles siempre el mejor consejo. Cómo les dedicas tu tiempo de manera desinteresada simplemente por ver felíz a quien te pide ayuda. Tu desinterés al ayudar te hace más grande y más valiosa como ser humano, y por eso estoy inmensamente orgulloso y agradecido.

Pusiste en pausa tus objetivos profesionales por criar a nuestros hijos. Has hecho una labor perfecta como madre, eres una madre de admirar. Te enfocaste en nuestros hijos para darme a mí la posibilidad de escalar profesionalmente, para que yo me enfocara en mi trabajo y poder trabajar con disciplina en mis objetivos. ¡Pusiste en pausa tus sueños por los míos!

No te imaginas cuánto te agradezco que hayas hecho tal cosa por mí y por nuestros hijos. Sé que no te lo pedí, pero igual hubiera sido más difícil lograr muchos de mis sueños si esta no hubiera sido tu decisión; y nuestra hija no sería igual de felíz si no te hubiera tenido de manera incondicional como te tuvo durante su infancia. Ahora es tu turno, y ahora seré yo quien hará absolutamente todo sacrificio cuanto esté a mi alcance para que seas tú quien pueda seguir sus sueños profesionales. Te juro que todo lo que sueñas lo podrás lograr, y siempre, absolutamente siempre tendrás mi apoyo. No importa si debo renunciar a proyectos o ser flexible en mi trabajo; afortunadamente tengo el trabajo soñado, y tengo bastante flexibilidad. ¡ES TU TURNO y lo voy a honrar! Cuando nuestro hijo requiera atención y estés ocupada con algún asunto de la Universidad, no te preocupes, yo me ocuparé de él para que no te desconcentres.

Tu faceta como estudiante de Arquitectura me ha demostrado y confirmado lo que siempre sospeché de tí: Tienes un talento innato para la disciplina y el trabajo duro. Admiro tu resistencia a las adversidades y tu capacidad de adaptarte ante entornos contrarios a tu zona de comfort. Admiro la manera como simplemente luchas y luchas sin siquiera considerar la opción de rendirte. Cuando te pregunto ¿Y por qué no buscas una alternativa? Tu respuesta es “Por que esta es mi meta, y es lo que voy a lograr” — tienes una tenacidad admirable, y eso me encanta, por que me veo reflejado en ella. Sé que te convertirás en una Arquitecta admirable, y que yo seré quien se tendrá que esforzar para estar siempre a tu nivel :-) — leeré estas notas en unos años cuando hayas empezado tu carrera profesional, y validaré mis predicciones, de esto estoy seguro.

Gracias, gracias por todo lo que me has enseñado, por seguirme sorprendiendo con tus energías interminables, por siempre tener “algo que decir” cuando estamos debatiendo, por siempre apoyarme en mis hobbies y ayudarme, de hecho, a dedicarle tiempo a las cosas que me divierten por fuera del trabajo.

Gracias por brindarme tantos momentos relevantes, gracias por decir que estoy completamente loco y al mismo tiempo decir que eres felíz conmigo. Este loco es inmensamente felíz contigo también, y este loco tiene demasiado que agradecerte, más de lo que este loco puede escribir en un solo día. Este loco espera que de 14 años juntos pasemos a llevar 70 años juntos, y que a mis 90 yo pueda decir: “¿ves que sí eras el amor de mi vida?”

Estoy inmensamente agradecido de tenerte a mi lado y que me hayas dado el “sí” en matrimonio dos veces. Se puede decir que estás doblemente casada conmigo, y difícilmente te podrás librar de mí :-)

Te amo inmensa e intensamente, Shirley Villa. ¡Y espero que juntos podamos lograr miles de pequeñas victorias cosas más!

P.D: Gracias por leer!

Aprovecho esta oportunidad para hablarles de mi esposa y su trabajo.

Mi esposa es actualmente estudiante de Arquitectura en búsqueda de prácticas, anteriormente graduada como técnica en Decoración de Espacios interiores. Su mayor habilidad está en el manejo de simulaciones CAD (Autocad, Sketchup Pro y Revit). Además de excelente su habilidad innata para liderar proyectos de construcción. Su sueño es ser Arquitecta constructora !y vaya que tiene madera para ello!

Quienes quieran conocer más sobre su trabajo, en estos momentos estoy ayudándole a crear su portafolio, también estaré mejorando su perfil en LinkedIn incluyendo mucha más información sobre su trabajo, ella es una estudiante muy talentosa y enfocada. Trabaja duro ¡y es bastante multi-facética! Ella estaría interesada en trabajos de tiempo completo en el área de Arquitectura. Le pueden escribir en LinkedIn o me pueden escribir a mí y yo con mucho gusto haré la conexión.

I am a huge fan of meditation, it’s been a life-changer for me, it’s made me aware of my feelings, help me make decisions about them, and not creating a story when a thought arises.

I meditate every day using a mobile app. After each session, this app would ask me what my feelings are; and more often than I like to recognize, my answer is not positive; when this happens, the app would tell me “It’s okay to not be okay” and then recommend a few meditation sessions to help me alleviate my feelings.

What happens in our minds when it’s easy for us to be hard on precisely the person we should care for the most? — ourselves

Why is it normal for us to speak in these terms and still feel relatable?

We live in an era of guilt. You just need to look around, in social networks, in news, blogs, etc, and you will find tons of people that, like me, are dealing with tough fights against what I prefer to call “our demons”.

Our demons are those thoughts and feelings you don’t enjoy hanging out with, and yet, they insist to come back without your approval. It’s like when you were a kid and you didn’t want to go to bed, because you were scared of potentially receiving an unwanted visit by some horned creature with crazy eyes; with the difference that now I do receive that visit in the form of thoughts, every day, and I don’t even have to wait until bedtime to meet them.

Analogies aside, what’s these thoughts really about? Most of them can be memories of things you did bad and deeply regret, or perhaps something you did well and still feel like you could have done better, or even things you didn’t do and feel bad for your inaction.

These feelings of regret do not go away even if you get to “fix” what you eventually did bad though. And your regret doesn’t even need to be related to a really bad thing you did.

To illustrate my point, let me share a silly story with you.

—

My hungry friend:

When I was 15, I finished classes at school and invited my best friend to my house so we could finish homework together. We arrived at my house, and my mom was there, getting ready to go to work. I was hungry, so I went to the kitchen, served my meal and started eating.

At that moment, I was telling to myself “Maybe my friend is hungry as well, but I am ashamed to offer food to him because my mom is here, and I don’t know what’s she going to say”; I decided not to invite my friend to eat.

I finished eating and went to help my friend with our homework. He told me: “Hey buddy, I’ll be right back”, and left my home. I thought he was going to make a call or something; perhaps he was going to call his mom about being late because we were finishing something important.

15 minutes passed and my friend didn’t come back, I went out to look for him; I found him around the corner, eating some juice with cookies because he was very hungry and couldn’t stand it anymore. He yelled at me: “Hey buddy, I’ll be there in 5 minutes!!”, he was not angry, he was not upset, he was completely fine with me, and yet, I felt really bad about this.

Life did a complete turnaround and 10yrs later I found myself being my friend’s bigger support. He was in a serious financial crisis, not even having money for food while having to provide for his wife and two kids.

I decided to support him for as long as it would take him to learn a new skill and find a better and stable job. I remember I was giving him a “monthly salary” so he could pay rent, buy food, pay utilities, etc. I did that for several months.

As of today, my friend is still extremely grateful for everything I did for him during that time.

—

You would think I did amazing and the little event that happened when I was 15 is nothing in comparison to what I did for him 10yrs later. Heck, not even my friend remembers that day when he had to head out to eat some cookies and juice.

Unfortunately, that demon is still here. It comes to have tea with me from time to time. And it wouldn’t leave forever even though I’ve clearly stated that it’s not welcome here anymore (it actually never was). This is a silly example, but it is true. Now, imagine a case where you’ve done things that are far worse than just not giving food to anyone at a certain moment.

Some people can go around their lives completely ignoring their demons, or even realizing what the source of their suffering is. The reality is that you can’t just fight your demons and ask them to go away, instead, you can try finding what their birthplace is, and burn the nest. And here’s where things become really hard.

Guilt can have so many triggers, most of them you won’t notice until you do a serious introspection of your habits, track your feelings through the day, and pause a moment to think about what’s happening. With practice, you may learn to identify those feelings when they come, but not let your mind create a story with them.

Perhaps it would be easier if I threw these bits of advice while also being able to eliminate my hungry friend demon? That’s the contradictory part of living with pain. You want the other to do better than you actually are. The truth is: I’m not a therapist, I’m just one more person with mental pain and with hundreds of regrets. Heck, I feel guilt at even writing these words, and sharing them with the world triggers some extra levels of anxiety, but I learned to embrace that.

You can learn how to embrace and befriend your anxiety. In the end, everything is impermanent, and the unexpected visit you are receiving now, will leave soon; don’t get used to the visit, instead, be mindful that it’s going to go away any moment.

Don’t let your mind create a story out of the visit you’re receiving. It’s easy for people to be swallowed by rumination like traveling back in time and do the right thing. That’s not only unhealthy but also makes you feel even worse when you are back to your reality. Instead, when your mind is falling in the trap, notice what’s happening and label it: “ahh, here’s my old friend visiting again”.

We all travel in time. Either to the future or the past. That actually used to be my favorite hobby when I was having a hard time getting back to sleep in the middle of the night. I would have countless fantasies about places I wanted to visit, people I wanted to speak to, apologies I wanted to make, good things I wanted to do and obviously past events I wanted to eliminate or do better.

In my busy and guilt mind, I am the best person ever, and all my personal problems went away a long time ago, and I’m just full of happiness. When I am back to reality, I feel guilt at having spent time in unrealistic fantasies.

Don’t be harsh on yourself. Be kind to yourself. Value yourself, speak to yourself in the mirror and say: “You are awesome!”.

The reader would notice that I’m using a lot of analogies, and perhaps you might think I don’t want to call things by their name. The reality is that I just prefer to name things differently as this helps me befriend the feeling and make it smaller.

Ultimately, when I’m meditating, during those important minutes of silence, I am, almost always, completely guilt-free. And that’s when I find that I love myself the most. During those important minutes of silence, I am accepting myself as I am. This new reality has slowly started to become a part of my daily life as well, helping be less harsh on myself, helping stop hating the person I used to be or the person I am now, understand that change as part of our lives.

Perhaps it’s time I call things by their name. We all suffer from our demons, most of us have to deal with Anxiety and Depression at least for a tiny period of our lives. And this has been my struggle since I am 13. To the point of giving more value to external matters than my own life; to the point of feeling like I will never change, or feeling stressed because I did something that was not perfect (a speech, an interview, a discussion, a donation, a phone call …) and feeling like I want to get back in time to do it right this time.

—

It’s time for some time traveling:

I had a happy childhood, some problems here and there, but happy overall. Things turned into a completely different story when I turned 10 and I was told that my dad was actually my stepdad.

As a teenager, I started having a very difficult relationship with my parents; I found myself in the middle of a broken relationship and having to understand life from an early age, while also having to respect my new dad and my stepmother. I actually loved my stepfather, but as a teenager, I was the worst with him. Also, I was not able to do well with my stepmother. There were oh-so-many-things I did wrong and could’ve done better to have a good relationship with them! I just didn’t think that was going to be important for me. I’d like to travel in time and tell my teenager self: “You should try to be kind to your parents, your future adult self will thank you a lot”

Therapy has shown me that this is the biggest source of my pain. My teens were the worst! But also, at the same time, I realize that the adults I was surrounded with when I was a child didn’t have the best attitude towards this situation, and their actions — most of them — were just full of ego and arrogance. Ego and arrogance towards each other, without thinking or realizing that there was a child in the middle of that stupid fight. And yet, I think about this, and I don’t see any sign of guilt on either of them, except, perhaps, my stepfather, who passed away a couple of years ago, leaving me with the biggest pain I’ve suffered in my life; I miss him, and I still cry when I remember him.

My biggest source of guilt right now is, precisely, my stepdad; because he’s not here anymore, and anything I didn’t do for him when I had the chance, I won’t be able to do any time in my life. To be fair, I was able to do a lot for him, but the demon still haunts me. Why did I let my stepdad go back to his hometown where people were not taking good care of his health? He could’ve stayed in my home as much as he wanted, but he was stubborn, and I never insisted. Why didn’t I insist? We could’ve found a better doctor for him, deep inside my heart I feel like he would still be alive if I insisted, but I didn’t. Why can’t I just travel back in time?

—

I can keep telling stories about my past life forever; I would never stop! Sharing stories is therapeutic! Writing and letting out your feelings can help you deviate your energies and avoid your mind from going deep and deep into time travel and rumination.

But I think this is enough for a single post.

When I have trouble getting back to sleep, I try to do a body scan meditation to get into a relaxed state that would help me drift back to sleep; but I need to be honest and accept that this doesn’t always work and sometimes I find myself spending hours and hours (sometimes until down) thinking about work, relationships, time travels, or even sounds I can’t stop hearing inside my head. It’s very often one of my demons that comes to visit, and yes, sometimes I’m very welcoming with them, I probably shouldn’t.

I still need to find what their birthplace is, and these words are my ways to make progress on that. Eventually, I’ll be able to burn their nest, and then, that day… only that day… I’ll be completely free.