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In 2014, entrepreneur Phil Drolet gave a TED Talk explaining why the way most entrepreneurs work doesn’t help them achieve success. That hustle and overwork yourself mentality only sounds good, but the reality is, it doesn’t make you work better or help you achieve success.

He described entrepreneurs as passionate and driven people, yet also remarked on how out of balance they could be. He stated that “this combination can lead to world-changing innovation and incredible beauty … It can also lead to a lot of suffering and self-destruction.”

Entrepreneur Phil Drolet explained his 30-day ‘work less’ challenge and its unexpected results.

“For 30 days, I intentionally spent less time working and I reallocated the extra time to spending time with my friends, going in nature … As you can imagine, it was a very enjoyable month,” he said. The surprising outcome of working less? His business saw an increase in profits by more than 45%.

Drolet maintained that hyper-focusing on work was actually detrimental to success. In order to work well, we should shift the way we work completely. He detailed the reasons why working less was better for his business, including having more mental clarity, which let him see opportunities clearly and act decisively.

His creativity and productivity functioned “on a whole new level,” and he was able to come up with ideas he and his team could execute faster. “I learned to build systems, I learned to delegate more, and I learned to focus on a few things that actually mattered,” he said.

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Drolet’s ideas oppose the mainstream entrepreneurial narrative that our health, relationships, and emotional well-being must be sacrificed for success.

He saw even more opportunities coming his way, all due to taking time away from the daily grind.

Yet Drolet found himself falling back into his old patterns of overwhelming himself with work until he was so burnt out, he couldn’t continue. He realized that he needed to give himself permission to recover from working so hard and allow himself time to recharge. 

Drolet likened the way he worked to a high-performing, elite athlete training so hard that it led to injury. “Sometimes we can have the best intentions in the world,” he explained. “But the extreme pursuit of our dreams ends up destroying us, physically, mentally, and emotionally.”

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A critical shift in his mindset allowed Drolet to redefine what success meant to him and led to a more balanced lifestyle. 

He came to the second wave of his realization that he needed to radically change his approach to work, which he did by slowing down. He detailed the way he allowed himself to realign with his purpose, asking himself big, philosophical questions about what he truly wanted.

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“I decided to stop treating myself like a machine and accept the fact that I’m just human,” he revealed. He made the active choice to stop projecting toward the future and start appreciating the beauty of the present. He challenged himself to change his own mind, rethinking his assumption that working more hours meant he’d have more success. 

By championing the power of rest, reflection, and recovery as a pathway toward personal happiness and professional success, he’s working hard to shift the way we think of work by putting more emphasis on staying balanced to reach our peak potential.

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Alexandra Blogier, MFA, is a writer who covers psychology, social issues, relationships, self-help topics, and human interest stories.