I recently watched a video that Alex Becker posted regarding if you can drink and take drugs and still be successful. I thought it was an interesting topic so I wanted to give you my point of view. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while you’ll know I used to be a web designer for a few different companies (and advertising agencies). Back when I was 24-25ish I would go out both Friday and Saturday night, be hungover all Sunday (obviously) and then get up and go to work on Monday. Even back then I always found Monday was a really hard day of work for me. My creativity was non-existent as was my productivity and problem-solving abilities. It would take all the focus I had just to get through the day, and it was still really hard and mentally tiring day. Maybe it’s because I don’t sleep well when I drink, I don’t really know.
That’s fine when you are an employee but you can’t be doing that all the time when you are an entrepreneur/business owner. A day where you do no work is a day when your business slows down (and in some cases stops if you don’t have any VAs).
Even with passive income from businesses such as Kindle Publishing, Merch By Amazon, and Dropshipping your business is not making any positive strides forward while you are a hungover mess lay on the couch eating a pack of Flaming Hot Monster Munch because it’s too difficult to walk to the supermarket to buy food (this has been me more than one if you can’t tell). Now I’m not saying going out and getting wasted when you’re young is bad because I think it’s a big part of growing up and everyone does it.
I don’t have an opinion on doing drugs affecting work because I’ve only taken drugs a few times in my life (it’s not my thing). I tend to drink once a month these days so the hangovers are nowhere near as bad as they were back in the day but Monday is still a struggle. So what I do is when I know I’m going out at weekend is I save tasks that do not need a lot of critical thinking such as uploading t-shirts, communicating with VAs, and ordering books covers for my work on Monday when I know I won’t be at my best.
Alternatively, you could always take Monday off and do an hour extra the other 4 days to make up for it. That way you’re not falling behind in your business. Or you could just take Monday off and not worry about it and chalk it up to having fun and enjoying life. I wouldn’t suggest taking days off willy nilly if you are new to running a business. When you’re new you need to build up a habit of consistently doing work so it becomes a habit and your progress and income can compund over time. The last thing you need to be doing as an internet marketing newbie is finding any excuse to slack off and not do any work.
Finally, I’m not here to judge you if you want to drink, take drugs and get fucked up that’s fine. I’m a pretty liberal guy and as long as you’re not hurting anyone else you should be allowed to do whatever you want. So I’m not telling you to never drink or take drugs because at the end of the day that is down to you. What I will say however is that you should try to limit it to a few times a month so it doesn’t impede your progress too much. From my own experience when I drink it’s like the momentum I’ve built up and the groove got into with being able to get work done gets reset to zero and I have to start all over again.
But, if you’re already making a decent living online and are happy with where you are in life then go nuts. You only live once.
Thanks for reading. If you have any questions please leave them in the comments below. Cheers!