title: 【Reprint】Where do we go after escaping the office?
date: 2021-07-06 11:13:30
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- Sharing
tags: - Reprint
- Escape
- Office
This article is reprinted from: Where do we go after escaping the office? ｜ Minority Report π+Prime
The cover story is the main article of each issue of the "Minority Report," usually discussing and analyzing the current theme, providing specific viewpoints or methodologies.
In fact, even earlier, I was a digital nomad, earning a salary above the basic line in Beijing, living in several second- and third-tier cities in China, and even spent two months living in Chiang Mai—during which I described to friends countless times that it was the happiest time since my graduation.
At that time, I rented a long-term apartment in Chiang Mai through Airbnb, with a monthly rent of about three thousand yuan, for a hotel-style apartment of about fifty square meters, featuring a separate bedroom, living room, kitchen, and bathroom, fully furnished and equipped with appliances, and even included weekly cleaning services with linen changes. It was only after moving in that I learned that if I rented through a formal agency for more than six months, the price for a similar apartment would usually be under two thousand yuan.
The cost of living in Chiang Mai was unimaginably low—I could have a half roasted chicken meal or a plate piled high with seafood noodles for under twenty yuan, and the quality of an eight-yuan iced coffee was no worse than that of specialty coffee shops in China that charge thirty or forty yuan a cup. In short, spending less than a hundred yuan a day was enough for me to enjoy meat dishes with milk tea and coffee at every meal. Compared to the same living conditions in Beijing, I needed less than a third of the expenditure in Chiang Mai. Moreover, Chiang Mai also boasts stunning scenery and a pleasant cultural environment.
During that time, due to a one-hour time difference with China and later sunsets, I had the illusion of "having more time every day." I volunteered at an elephant sanctuary, enrolled in a cooking school to learn Thai cuisine, and participated in various activities like jungle zip-lining and two-hour outdoor go-karting. But as I mentioned earlier, the joy of single-player games is not true happiness; the emptiness of running around "not knowing where I'll be tomorrow" was magnified, leading me to ultimately decide to return to my hometown, which I had once said I would "never return to."
My first participation in the Water Festival also made me experience "world harmony" firsthand. After returning, I retaliated by joining a traditional state-owned enterprise working nine to six for two years, then bought "a house I thought I would never buy," and switched jobs to Minority to start a new life of "working from home." When I thought about "Is this place home or an office?" in this state, the answer became much more complex.
Should work and life be separated?#
In my previous job at the state-owned enterprise, I was in a very typical state of "if the company collapses after work, it has nothing to do with me," but my actual feelings were not easy; instead, I repeatedly experienced pre-work anxiety and work-related stress every day, especially on the last day of each weekend, feeling a sense of "tomorrow I have to be a slave." This was not because I hated the job, but because no one in this world could truly like work. When "work" is confined to specific times and spaces, each switch between working and not working means I need to change my thinking, socializing, state, behavior, and even daily routine—there's always discomfort involved.
Apart from my colleagues at Minority, I also have many friends who work from home, and the most common topic we discuss is "how to separate work and life." This is because, without a clear "ritual" of going to and leaving work, we can easily fall into a chaotic state. For example, at this moment, as I write these words, it is two in the morning. Such moments are not uncommon; usually, due to the nature of writing, I may need to spend some time gathering information, reading, and brainstorming before I can start writing. Most of the time, even when everything is ready and I have a blank document set up, I can stare blankly for two hours without writing a word; however, at night, inspiration often flows, and I can write as if guided by a muse.
I have two typical friends: one is a product designer, and the other is a technical developer. They strictly limit their working hours; during the nine-to-five period, they dress neatly and sit up straight to start their workday, and after five o'clock, they return to their lives, whether it's going to the gym or meeting friends, trying to regain control of their time as much as possible. Of course, there are exceptions, such as having to handle personal matters during workdays or rare gatherings; they will temporarily shift their work hours to the evening or weekend.
I once tried to align myself with them for a while, but to no avail, mainly due to the unique nature of writing work. Whether in the preparatory phase or during the writing process, it is mostly a continuous activity, making it impossible to strictly stop working the moment the alarm goes off. Often, I might not have any thoughts to write for two consecutive workdays, but suddenly have a burst of inspiration on a weekend or at midnight, and at that moment, I must seize the opportunity.
So I gave up that obsession and looked at it from a different perspective: the reason for this issue is the fear that work and life will affect each other. What if we consider work as part of life? The biggest advantage of working from home is actually "flexibility." We try to plan the things we need to do in a day in advance—meetings, communications, writing, cooking, exercising, or even watching shows—calmly recognizing that each task has its importance and scheduling time accordingly. For example, if I have a deadline for an article in three days and by the next day, I have completed less than half, then I should refrain from watching shows that day and the next, and just order takeout to fill my stomach; if worse comes to worst, I can postpone a date. The next time, I finished my work before the deadline, and the extra time could be spent leisurely. I just need to adhere to one principle—if this work is collaborative, try not to affect others.
From my current practice of this set of principles, although there are occasional instances of losing control leading to overall procrastination, most of the time I can proceed step by step. I think for every person working from home, it might be necessary to adjust their mindset—this work model is inherently flexible and unique, and using traditional thinking to evaluate it will not yield answers. It is better to start from one's actual situation and plan a work style that better meets one's expectations.
Create your own workspace#
"Stepping out of your comfort zone" is a common phrase used by the media, often to motivate or praise those who bravely break rules in pursuit of a better life, to the point where "comfort zone" seems to have become a derogatory term.
The comfort zone is a mental state that leads people to enter and maintain an unrealistic mental behavior, which brings an irrational sense of security. Similar to inertia, once a person establishes a comfort zone around a certain part of their life, they tend to stay within that comfort zone rather than stepping out of it. To step out of a person's comfort zone, they must find new and different ways of acting in a new environment while responding to the consequences of these new actions.
Stepping out of the comfort zone increases a person's anxiety level, resulting in a stress response, which in turn enhances focus on work. This area is referred to as the optimal performance zone—in this zone, a person's work performance will improve, and their skills will be optimized. However, Robert Yerkes mentioned in a 1907 report that "anxiety can improve work performance, but when it exceeds a certain optimal motivational state, work performance begins to deteriorate." If a person leaves the optimal performance zone, they will enter a danger zone, where increased anxiety or decreased comfort can lead to a rapid decline in work performance.
Wikipedia has these two descriptions, which not only mention the comfort zone but also introduce two concepts—optimal performance zone and danger zone. Before discussing their definitions, I want to say that these are not fixed patterns but rather a lifestyle that can be dynamically adjusted.
Retain the comfort zone, create the optimal performance zone, and avoid the danger zone of overcorrection#
In simple terms, home is our comfort zone. For those who hope to work from home, it is usually because they feel they will be happier and more comfortable at home; and those who already work from home cannot deny that working at home is very relaxed, sometimes even overly so.
I believe that all remote workers, after starting this job, are also continuously planning and refining their workspaces, whether it's an independent space or just a spacious desk. Once they clarify that this is their workspace, they unconsciously make it increasingly "serious."
This is the "optimal performance zone," because we have realized that without such a physical barrier, work efficiency will decrease. It is similar to the principles we follow when designing an office, for example, the overall color should not be too cool, the lighting needs to be bright with a high color temperature, and there should not be too many decorations that distract the eye. It is also like when we design a bedroom; some people like to fill it with various items, such as chairs, small tables, and placing a TV or projector directly opposite the bed, calling it "creating a personal relaxation space," but the result is often a decline in sleep quality.
Although I hope the overall style of my office environment is simple and stark, I still use greenery to add a touch of life. When we project our lifestyle onto the physical environment, it needs to have a sense of hierarchy: the bottom layer is the comfort zone, which is a space where we can indulge freely; the middle layer is the functional area, which should have clear boundaries indicating that this place is for doing a specific task; and the top layer is the danger zone of negative examples, usually resulting from overcorrection leading to negative deterioration.
However, the danger zone is fluid; it does not have a fixed standard and often varies greatly depending on different people's living habits.
The brain gradually stops registering a sight, sound, or feeling if that stimulus remains constant over time. For example, most people are not aware of the sensation of clothing touching their skin. The body becomes "habituated" to the feeling, and the stimulus no longer registers in any meaningful way in the brain.
If this stimulus remains unchanged for a period, the brain will gradually stop registering a visual, auditory, or tactile sensation. For example, most people do not notice the sensation of clothing touching their skin. The body becomes "habituated" to this feeling, and this stimulus no longer registers in a meaningful way in the brain.
In 2011, the journal "Cognition" published an article “Brief diversions vastly improve focus, researchers find”: Many scholars have long believed that attention is limited and declines over time, but this article pointed out that when we gradually perform poorly, it is not that our attention is consumed, but that we have unconsciously lost focus on the task; however, we are always focused on something, which is not significantly related to the capacity of attention.
My danger zone does not lie in being too comfortable or too serious, but in "constraint." As someone who is easily "distracted," I need a fixed position and design to remind myself "when I come here, I should do this," to quickly get into the right state; but along with that, I also hope this space has a certain flexibility that allows me to be appropriately distracted. I even believe that timely distractions are catalysts for my creativity—how to say, they are flights of fancy that do not land, but if they are "work mode" ideas, I often come up with new topics or plans.
Although I have merged the living room and study into the same space, it is a state that is not easy to describe. However, in execution, I have integrated the comfort zone and the optimal performance zone into one physical space. Although the design appearance serves as a physical barrier between them, I do not feel constrained within it. This is a rational blend of self-examination and emotional insight; I hope you can also recognize your own inertia triggers while generously acknowledging the sources of your resistance.
The positive opposite of inertia is proactivity, but the opposite of comfort does not necessarily have to be "discomfort"; perhaps ease is also important?
Now, back to the first question: this place is home, and it is also an office; the two are not in conflict, and work can coexist harmoniously with life.
Is working from home harder?#
Working from home is not perfect; it can blur a person's work efficiency. From factories to companies, decades of development have made "work ability" increasingly difficult to quantify. In the past, we could calculate how much fabric a female textile worker could produce in a day, but today you cannot simply assess how many PPTs a clerk has completed in a month—whether in the office or at home, we have entered an era of multitasking.
The work distribution at Minority is actually clear yet chaotic. Taking the editorial department as an example, each editor, in addition to daily writing and reviewing tasks, also bears at least one other role, such as paid tutorials, software sales, or community operations. We have also fixed daily collective morning meetings and topic meetings twice a week. It seems orderly and efficient, but upon closer inspection, everyone's work often overlaps. For example, if one editor's topic requires collaboration from other colleagues, it is no longer just that editor's work; for other editors, it becomes an unplanned "overtime." Meanwhile, business colleagues frequently initiate new collaborations, often requiring editors from different fields to participate, but this is not overtime; it just comes unexpectedly.
I believe this is the norm for most companies and employees, so one mindset we need to overcome is: Did I work hard today?
In the past, when working in the office, regardless of how much output there was, "I sat there well" was a form of self-anxiety relief—don't worry about what I'm doing; I'm at work anyway. However, after working from home, since most of the time tasks are not completed on the same day, we often fall into anxiety on days when we are only pushing work forward without output—because no one knows what we did today—even worrying whether colleagues or leaders might have opinions about us. Fortunately, because Minority is a harmonious and friendly group, most of the time, this concern is just our unfounded anxiety.
Besides reasonable planning, regular reviews are also necessary#
Everyone has their own working style, but within Minority, there are two mechanisms to manage everyone's work results. First is work goals: we need to set and publicly disclose our work goals, which is not only for self-management but also for colleagues' expectations of us.
As a content platform, the primary output of Minority is articles, and the editorial department is the largest department in the company. We first stipulate the minimum number of articles to be updated on the homepage daily. However, this is a relative variable; it can be adjusted according to different workdays, weekends, and holidays. But under limited planning, it also promotes the workload and flexibility of each editor.
For example, during times of community article drought and topic scarcity, we need to "hurry up" a bit; but if we have a rich backlog of articles, everyone can take a little break.
Even so, we still need to customize a monthly plan based on our field direction, article sources, and work content. There are no strict requirements, but we should be self-aware and responsible like mature adults. "Whether the monthly article target is met" is the main method used by our manager, Old Mai, to understand everyone's work status.
We manage and publicly disclose our recent work content in Feishu, which facilitates collaboration and information equality, but planning is just the beginning; the end still requires a review. As mentioned earlier, our monthly work is unpredictable, and whether we exceed expectations or fall short is the norm, so at this time, we need to provide an account to ourselves and our managers. After all, low-quality excess is not excellent, and delays due to innovation are not entirely bad.
It is worth mentioning that you can "request" from Old Mai during the review, whether it is salary increases or reward distributions; you can reasonably and justifiably claim the feedback you deserve.
Many people hope to have good habits and high efficiency at work. In the radiation group of Minority, there is also a passion for so-called "quantitative management," but many people often overlook that work involves not only quantity but also "satisfaction" at both the individual and company levels, and satisfaction often comes from surprises that exceed expectations. Working from home allows us to shed a significant portion of "putting on a show" and "bearing humiliation"; we should use this ease to exchange for outputs that go beyond the routine, and this does not necessarily only come from output but also from whether we are responsible for ourselves and our work.
So, working from home is indeed harder; self-restraint, self-management, and self-coordination are still just the surface. The bigger issue is whether we are responsible for this freedom. As a new type of work model, working from home has overcome many bad habits derived from traditional office times, and progress should not only be used to praise the era but also be implemented in every individual.
The title raises a seemingly simple question: Where do we go after escaping the office? I believe the destination is not home, nor is it the benefits of geographical arbitrage; rather, it is the self who takes this action—self. Work has always been, and should be, a part of life, only diluted by the office and its derived office culture, which has mixed in some meaningless forms. What we need to return to after escaping the office is the essence of work itself and to gain a joyful life.