The Four Burner Theory

File this post under “you learn something new every day…”

Chris Guillebeau is a very good and interesting writer.  He is one of those lifestyle designers I talk about often who love to travel to exotic places.  Chris’ goal is to visit every country on the planet by the time he’s 35-years old.  That’s a rather audacious goal, especially considering that he only has three years to go. 

As you know, I’m not one of the travel fanatic lifestyle designers.  My goals are different than Chris’ or the other lifestyle designers who set up their life to travel or even expatriate.  I wouldn’t mind doing some traveling, but it’s not what drives me.  Even so, I love reading Chris’ writing.  It informs and inspires me.

In a recent post on his blog, Chris told the story of an interview he did with The99Percent.com.  There’s the first new thing I learned.  I had never heard of The99Percent.com before, so I took a quick look.  It looks like the site was started by Scott Belsky, the founder and CEO of Behance, a company I have never heard of before.  Looks like I need to do a little more research.  Belsky is also the author of the book Making Ideas Happen, a text I have also never heard of, but which looks very interesting.

Anyway, during the interview, Chris was told about the four burner theory; a theory put forth by David Sedaris (a hilarious and thought-provoking writer) that suggests that we have four burners in our lives.  They are 1) family, 2) friends, 3) health, and 4) work.  Sedaris says that you have to cut off one burner to be successful, and two burners if you want to be really successful.  The question to Chris was, do you believe that is true?

In his blog post, Chris says that he didn’t know what to say, so he did the best he could and then the interview moved forward.  However, Chris says that he has been thinking about that question ever since and he shares his thoughts in the remainder of the blog post.

Chris never really does come up with an answer.  He waffles a bit, which is fine because I don’t think there is a definitive answer.  The answer is probably different for everyone.

Initially, Chris seemed to dismiss the notion that we should suffer in one (or two) area(s) of our lives in order to be successful in the other areas.  He says:

“I’ve said all along that life-work balance is overrated. If you’re not happy with your life, you should change it like plenty of other people have done. If your job sucks and you’re miserable, you should quit.

“These ideas always strike some people as offensive, as if we should be grateful for bad jobs and unhappy lives. Maybe things will magically get better! Meanwhile, other people are somehow able to embrace change and pursue lives of meaningful adventure.”

However, he did then compromise a bit by saying that success is what you define it to be.  So you may have very large goals on one or two burners that you have to achieve in order to be successful, while other burners may only require small goals.  In other words, you may have huge goals to achieve when it comes to your work, but very modest goals for your health or family.  It may take little time to be successful when it comes to one burner, but take a lot of time and hard work when it comes to another one.  Sort of turning up your nose to work/life balance without actually cutting off a burner.

I have to admit that my initial reaction to the four burner question was an immediate, “You don’t have to cut of a burner.  You can have it all.”  Of course, I tend to be a “you can have it all” kind of guy.  It’s my default position.  But if I look past my knee-jerk reaction, I think I come to the same uncertainty Chris exhibited in his blog post.

Do I know anyone who really “has it all?”  Honestly, no I don’t.  I know people who are very successful at work, but who are miserable at home.  I know others who are unhappy at work, but who have close, loving relationships with friends and family.  Yet others work like dogs to get the financial rewards they seek, but all of the time, effort, and stress is ruining their health.  I also know people who strive for balance in all areas of their lives, but who end up living mediocre, semi-successful lives in the process.

At the moment, I think I may fall into this last category.  My relationships at home are good, but not as good as I would like them to be.  I have good friends, but over the years those friendships have suffered from lack of attention.  My health has probably suffered the most over the years.  I’m focusing more on my health these days, but it often suffers when I turn my attention to the other burners. 

My work life is set up great, but I don’t find the work very satisfying.  Truthfully, my business simply pays the bills.  It doesn’t make me happy.  I’m working on that, but it’s a struggle.  There are other things I want to do in life (write, race, work on my Goddard list), but I have to put food on the table.

Wow, this really was a thought-provoking exercise.  It was actually a bit painful to apply the four burner theory to my own life.  I’m not sure I like the answers I came up with.  I think they are accurate and truthful.  I just don’t like them.  Which means I have some more thinking to do.