Environment Matters: Location, Location, Location

Always learning new things about yourself. Been seeing a therapist for the last  8 months now and it's definitely been a great investment in myself. You get to understand what really drives you, both in good and bad ways. One of the recent things I’ve discovered is how specific locations tilt me or push me to certain behavior. 

So for example, everytime i am in San Francisco, I find myself overbooking my schedule with meetings, calls and such even when I don’t need to. It’s like I find myself going back into the programming I have when I am there. Similar situation with Tbilisi, New York or Tokyo. Always busy and always overscheduled. This has personally been great for my career in the past and present. But it certainly has not always been great for my family life nor my physical and mental health. 

On the other hand, I find myself being way more relaxed and chill in Kyiv (Ukraine), Vancouver (Canada), Lisbon, Mexico and Taiwan in general. I tend not to overbook or push myself too much. I always have plenty of time to read and spend time with friends and family. I am far more present. Overall a good thing but on other hand, it does detract from getting stuff done. The goal for me is to find a better balance between these two states of high frenzy versus low frenzy. 

So what will I do with this information? Well, on one hand knowing this is the situation, I should be able to more consciously program myself and be aware of this tilt I get in each of these places. It will allow me to be more deliberate with how I manage my schedule when I am in a high frenzy environment versus a low frenzy one. This also gives me a new frame to look at my travel schedule as I split my time between each of these locations. 

The Lesson: the environment affects all of us and the more conscious we are of this and in designing our environments, the more likely we can take control of this and manage our personal lives and moods better.