I see a shift in myself and in people around me to two opposites of either too much grind or too much sugar.

I say the grind here in terms of the grind of building a business, raising a family, building a relationship. These things that genuinely take huge chunks of hard work.

In terms of sugar I see as partly the stuff that’s just fun; the beer, the trips out, ,the falling in love phases.

I see people get so involved with the grind that they lose themselves. There’s a kind of fatigue and cynicism. I’ve been in this space at different points myself.

Then there’s the over sugar. Everyone likes a bit of chocolate but the problem here is when that’s all life is built on. Life can’t be just built on sugar. The idea you can be a millionnaire over night without any work or a relationship would never have any issues. I’ve done this too.

The recognition that great things take time. The idea of building systems and structure is hugely important. Words like discipline and the principle of delayed gratification are important here and often come up in religious types of teachings too.

In ‘The road less travelled’ by Scott Peck he starts out by the statement ‘Life is difficult’. He goes into this and says how once we accept that we immediately transcend it. A lot of our culture seems based on sugar. The idea that life should just somehow be easy and if its not then theres something wrong with us or there’s just something wrong. The idea of really showing up and building something seems to fall away sometimes.

I’ve been working with my personal coach recently on ‘the grind’ as we called it and this being healthily mixed with sugar (because hey we all like a bit 🙂 ). It’s a great thing to work with. This idea of acknowledging stuff is hard (as it should be) and feeling the sense of commitment and at the same time taking the time to celebrate and to reward yourself and recognise the journey you’ve been on and where you’re heading.

So I want to ask how you’re acknowledging your journey. Are you in the grind and able to manage the grind with the bit of sugar?

My very hard working week has been good and successful and my sugar is going to involve a trip to the cinema I’m excited about. How about you ?