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In entrepreneurship you often hear the advice: “work as much as humanly possible”. On the opposite side of the spectrum, Nietzsche gives advice like: “don’t specialize”. Which one is right? Should we sacrifice all of our free time to pour our efforts into our entrepreneurial ambitions, or should we take the middle road?

It is said that cross-domain professionals are more likely to discover innovations in the fields that they work in. In addition it is no secret that practices like meditation and exercise are beneficial even to the entrepreneur.

On the flip side, once a vision has crystallized, is it not the wisest to go straight for the vision?

Despite the fact that it comes from sci-fi fantasy, I think one of the most on point tidbits in answer to this question is Yoda’s expression of wisdom to Luke Skywalker: “Do or do not, there is no try”.

In my experience there are two types of entrepreneurs. The one who makes choices, and the one who flows. I.e. the scientific type and the spiritual type.

For the scientific type, which I am not, it seems the answer is to simply always make the choice to work. However for the spiritual type, it is not so simple. For the spiritual type it is the reward system that chooses, not the ego. However this does not diminish the inner struggle of wanting to work more and grappling with ideas that come from business leaders like Elon Musk (work every waking hour) and Mark Zuckerberg (move fast and break things).

However it is important to speak to Nietzsche’s advice, and concepts like cross-domain pollination and work-life balance. If one were the type of person who did a completely rote task. Such as a factory worker, and they were interested in being as productive as possible, perhaps working the complete maximum would increase their output. The crux of the matter in this situation is that us modern entrepreneurs are not that. We are engineers, marketers, and sales people. These are knowledge fields. If the founder of Uber hadn’t been abroad during the winter hailing a cab, they wouldn’t have thought of the idea of ride-sharing.

The work that we do in the modern meritocracy is complex, deep, and broad. There’s a saying: “the way one does one thing is the way that they do everything”. However this is only true if the person does one thing in a dominant fashion. If the person is dominant in multiple pursuits, then they learn the general form of the way they go about things, and the saying becomes: “the way one does many things, is the way they do specific things”.

There’s no real dispute that being good at multiple things is beneficial for pursuing one specific thing. The real argument is that we have limited time! If we don’t pour all of our efforts into our vision, then we can’t get as far! Sam Ovens teaches this on YouTube.

I have an answer to this, and it isn’t necessarily the most savoury, but I do believe in the long-term it pays off. It stems from the fact that many budding entrepreneurs go all in, work as hard as possible, fail, and then give up. Nobody ambitious dreams for that to be their story from the outset.

It is this: follow your curiosity. Follow your productivity. The French philosopher Rousseau suggests not forcing ones self is a wise path. I like this. Someone wanting to start something does not need to force themselves to grind away nonstop from the outset. A snowball rolling down a hill grows in size as it descends. As the individual curious about productivity proceeds over the days, months, and years, their work hours will grow.

It’s like in weight lifting: do not follow an advanced lifter’s workout plan. Start with a beginner plan.

Thanks for reading and let me know your thoughts in the comments.