TED Talk: Stefan Sagmeister

Stefan Sagmeister: The power of time off

Every seven years, designer Stefan Sagmeister closes his New York studio for a yearlong sabbatical to rejuvenate and refresh their creative outlook. He explains the often overlooked value of time off and shows the innovative projects inspired by his time in Bali. (Recorded at TEDGlobal, July 2009, Oxford, UK. Duration: 017:40)

My Notes:

Sagmeister decided to disperse retirement throughout his life. He has a design studio which has done work for the Rolling Stones, Adobe, Lou Reed, and more. His TED talk above is pretty boring, I won’t lie, and I actually didn’t listen to the whole thing. What I like about what he does is take time to rejuvenate himself throughout his life (very Tim Ferriss like). Most people retire to enjoy themselves, and live out their calling toward the end of their life as opposed to doing so throughout it when we are more physically, intellectually, and emotionally able to benefit.

Time Distribution in Life

25 Years Learning
40 Years Working
15 Years in Retirement

Career Definitions

J

Job

Done for money, 9-5

C

Career

Advancement and promotion

C

Calling

Intrinsically fulfilling

Sagmeister is obviously brilliant at design as demonstrated in the video below. Look at what he was able to do with his book titled “Things I have Learned In My Life“. Simply amazing…

Things I have learned in my life so far by Stefan Sagmeister

Key Takeaway

“Don’t wait for retirement to live your calling. Distribute periods of rejuvenation and creativity throughout your life.”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes:

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>