What is time freedom?

Hey all, it’s John 👋

I’ve been reflecting heavily on 2023 and setting some milestones for 2024. It’s going to be a wild year ahead.

This newsletter is going to be sorta unfiltered and dense… but I hope it helps you map out 2024 with a new frame of mind. I might do more of these since it’s less structured and free-flow in my thoughts.

What is time freedom?

This is hard to answer because it means something different to every person.

It could mean having…

… control over one’s own time and schedule.

… no constraints by a strict routine or obligations set by others.

… no schedule at all.

or a mix of all of the above.

How I try to define it: autonomy over your time - whether it’s work, leisure, personal growth, or other activities - But this kinda runs into its own problems.

Freedom can be in the work, or no work at all. 

But as humans, our brains are wired to want to work on something. It neurologically craves deep work, flow states, and mastery in something. 

It’s those feelings of the high when you’re in the moment. Like playing video games, being present on a vacation/trip, in sync with a sport, or in the heat of the moment.

Otherwise, it’ll crave distractions and cheap dopamine hits. 

Even doing nothing, meditation, and/or going on a dopamine detox is working on reseting your brain and the baseline of pleasure.

How does someone obtain this elusive state of time freedom?

We set our own pace, but here are some examples on how people think freedom is obtained:

1) After completing/reaching… [INSERT thing/goal/task/mission].

2) Not doing the… [INSERT thing/goal/task/mission] …at all (skip entirely).

3) Doing the… [INSERT thing/goal/task/mission] …and making it fun, or actually enjoying it.

We all - sorta/kinda - intuitively know what these are for ourselves. It can be a mix of all of the above.

Typically, it falls within the premise of psychological safety or alleviating constraints. 

Both of these give us options to pursue the things we actually want to do. Having financial stability can alleviate some of these constraints. 

It’s challenging to pursue time freedom if you don’t have your basic needs met. Which is why money can be great at solving money problems, but then you have to face the problems that money can’t solve.

Constraints can be real or psychological.

What do I mean?

Real = Survival + Obligations + Commitments

• Survival = shelter, food, and safety

• Obligations = by law, promise, or moral responsibility.

• Commitments = financial (mortgage), a marriage, or a career path.

Psychological = Frame of Mind

EVERYTHING is a frame of mind (mindset).

Everything. 

We make 35,000 subconscious decisions (including 122 intentional/informed conscious decisions) every single day. People that develop their mindsets over time can filter these 35k decisions with positive frames or negative frames.

It can explain how books can reset thoughts because we get an open look into the author’s mental models, mindsets, and frames of thinking.

We get a momentary look at how they are connecting the dots to an ever-expanding plain. We then integrate their thinking into our own thinking and recalibrate the thousands of unconscious/subconscious decision making we take.

This could explain why change is hard.

And why habits and routines recalibrate us for new sets of behaviors to operate within.

And why habits and routines grant us freedom from needing to consciously do things because we’ve now transitioned it from conscious decisions to subconscious decisions.

They’ve now become a reflex and becomes apart of who we are.

But it’s hard to operationalize. And there are a lot of psychological barriers that prevent it from even happening.

We know changing can be a good thing. Either us or something else (typically, people try to change someone/something else - the thing out of their control).

Attempting to control something out of your control (politics, the news, other people [thoughts, behaviors, actions], etc.) is the best way to remain trapped forever.

People oppose change because they have conditioned beliefs that their survival will be threatened if their current structure isn’t maintained. How do you feel when someone else tries to impose their will on you? Not fun right?

It’s a violation of our being.

Again, most of the subconscious decisions are, again, subconscious. 

This is our default mode. 

Which has been….

• Built up over years

• Influenced by society

• Conditioned by beliefs

• Conditioned by habits/routines

• Influenced by your tribe (friends/family)

Trying to change this is nearly impossible overnight, however people have done it before.

You typically need something extreme to happen to you.

Like… really extreme. 

Like a “F*#K THIS” or an “OH SH#T” moment (death, catastrophic event, breakup/divorce, loss of job/stability, losing livelihood, the boss breaking the last straw, that client that made your life all more miserable, etc.).

These can be a good thing - if you see it as a good thing.

These can be a bad thing - if you see it as a bad thing.

The other side of this is the nectar. Something so good that sparks an immense desire - “I HAVE TO DO THIS!”. 

Something so bad that it kicks you out of comfort and stability to realize this isn’t what you want. Or something so desirable your entire purpose shifts to it.

Those are the overnight changes that flips us out of the subconscious/automatic thinking.

Everything boils down to problems and desires.

We are creatures of wanting to resolve problems and satisfy desires.

Every good business knows this. Their value is tied to resolving problems and satisfying desires - and why you hand over your cash freely or resentfully.

I like to think of myself as an elephant rider.

The rider knows where to go (conscious mind), but it needs the cooperation of the elephant (subconscious/unconscious).

If your elephant wants to sleep, eat, do its own thing, then it’s harder to control it. However, you can incentivize it enough, or have enough punishments, it’ll move - willingly or unwillingly.

Now imagine this with other people… everyone is an elephant rider. They each have either an elephant that is in sync with them, or the elephant takes control over them and does its own thing.

All elephants are different.

If it’s conditioned at birth, it’s easier to cooperate. 

If trying to tame a wild elephant, it’s incredibly hard. And will take time to uncondition and recondition behaviors.

My body (elephant) sometimes doesn’t want to wake up to the alarm.

It doesn’t want to work or follow a routine.

It doesn’t want to do certain tasks.

Even though we know that the work/tasks/projects are good for us.

But I know that when I’m in deep work, flow states, and mastery I get the most amount of satisfaction. I enjoy those moments of being totally in sync with my work - like writing this newsletter in an unstructured way.

So - how does this all tie into time freedom?

You probably see by now that time freedom is a chaotic and complex web of systems and your way of navigating through it. There are an underlying set of constraints (preventing freedom), and then also identifying things to spark the pursuit of freedom. 

I’ve adopted Naval Ravikant’s framework of 1) Health, 2) Wealth, and 3) Relationships. In 2024, I’m working towards optimizing these domains for happiness and making the game of life more fun.

Happiness = Health x Wealth x Relationships

Some questions I leverage to get to the core of deeper understanding on constraints:

• Can I go on a 90-day vacation tomorrow? (Write ALL the constraints on WHY I can’t do it to identify what’s holding me back: capability [can I do it and do I know where I’m going?], confidence [not wanting to go alone, I want to be with friends], commitments [financial, jobs, bills], etc.)

• WHO do I need to be to do this? (identity-based question on the type of person I need to become).

• If I had $1 Billion in the bank tomorrow, would I do what I do now - forever? (now until death).

What is freedom to you?

This question is entirely up to you to answer. And it’s diving deep within the realm of self-actualization.

Thanks for reading my brain-dump.

Have a wonderful New Year’s :) 

John.