An observation drawn from my practice is that leaders love puzzles. So do many people, of course, but typically as an absorbing hobby. In my experience a disproportionate number of leaders exhibit an almost obsessive need to tackle and solve complex problems, and this trait is one of the factors that drove them to seek out (or create) a leadership role, which reliably presents them with any number of "puzzles" to solve on a daily basis.
This is particularly true of entrepreneurial founders and startup leaders. In their case the new venture is a potential solution to a massive unresolved problem, and the business itself is a multi-layered puzzle, the real-life equivalent of a video game in which completing one level allows you to keep playing at the next level, usually with increasing degrees of difficulty.
Sociologist Thomas Henricks, whose research explores the role of play in human life, identifies the mechanisms that make puzzles of all types so engrossing to pursue and so fulfilling to solve:
Different puzzles have much in common. They produce similar sensations in their players: mixes of frustration and anticipation as the hunt advances followed (ideally) by the end-pleasure of solution. Sometimes that end--and the steps required to reach it--is apparent, but often it is not. In that latter case, success features a series of "aha" moments, the sudden revelations we call discovery. [1]
The process of solving a puzzle also engages the human fascination with "stories," in the broadest sense of the term. As we navigate the world around us, we automatically craft a series of explanatory narratives that help us make sense of our surroundings and predict what will happen next, a process I've called "the narrative engine." [2] This drive helps to explain why so much of the media we consume presents us with a story in the form of a puzzle: mysteries, thrillers, romances, adventure tales. Nearly every story is a puzzle, and nearly every puzzle tells a story.
These dynamics are at the heart of what makes leadership roles rewarding. The status, compensation and other perks are pleasurable, to be sure, but their power as sources of motivation inevitably diminishes or even disappears. A process psychologists call "hedonic adaptation" ensures that we adjust to our circumstances and eventually take them for granted. [3] I see this constantly in my practice--leaders may strive mightily for years to obtain a certain position or achieve a given financial goal, and when they do the feeling of accomplishment is frequently less fulfilling and more ephemeral than they expected.
In contrast, the satisfaction to be derived from solving puzzles is endless, in part because in business resolving any problem usually creates new ones. [4] And for many leaders in my practice this is both a blessing and a curse. It makes work intrinsically motivating and helps to provide the stamina needed to pursue complex challenges for long periods of time. But it can also make it very difficult to stop working, switch off, set limits, and take time away--or even get a good night's sleep.
If this sounds like you, what can you do about it?
Increase Your Self-Awareness
Awareness is rarely sufficient on its own to drive change, but it's the necessary first step. Your healthy drive to solve puzzles in the business (or the puzzle that is the business) turns counterproductive when you no longer make an active, deliberate choice to work but instead work compulsively. You compound the problem when you fail to prioritize your tasks, allowing what's urgent (or simply at the top of your Inbox) to dictate your agenda. Instead...
- Invest in a mindfulness practice, not because it will mitigate your stress--it won't--but to help you notice where your attention is going.
- Treat your attention like a precious resource, and try to maximize the return on your investments.
- Understand the difference between urgency and importance, and be discerning in what you choose to attend to--and ignore.
Manage Your Emotions
Emotions, both positive and negative, are at the root of your inability to stop working. The fulfillment and pleasure that are rewards for successfully solving a business-puzzle go hand-in-hand with the frustration that arises when a puzzle resists your best efforts, the anxiety evoked when time or other resources grow short, and the fear that you may someday fail--and thus lose the right to keep puzzling. We can't control our emotions, nor would we want to, but we can regulate them and their impact on our behavior:
- Learn more about the role emotions play in reasoning, and their potential to disrupt your intentions.
- Note that the difficulty of disconnecting from business-puzzles is likely driven not by strong emotions but by weak ones.
- Explore the relationship between emotion and attention.
Find Other Puzzles
It's profoundly difficult to stop thinking about something, so attempts to simply disengage with work will likely fail--the business-puzzles are just too compelling. [5] But if you keep working right up until bedtime, your brain will continue to try to solve those particular puzzles, which may diminish the quality of your sleep or even wake you up in the middle of the night. The solution is to substitute other puzzles, while taking steps to ensure that they remain healthy distractions and don't become unhealthy obsessions:
- Most media you consume takes the form of a puzzle, but your laptop and phone make it all too easy for business-puzzles to interrupt you, so manage the flow of business data, and note that multi-tasking can be harmful.
- Video games, social media, and any form of "news" [6] offer a perpetual supply of alternative puzzles, but they're also meticulously engineered to hijack your attention, so engage them with care.
- Consider the benefits of a much older form of "puzzle technology"--paper. A good book will provide you with a fulfilling puzzle without interrupting you with notifications, and research suggests that reading a book in bed results in a better night's sleep. [7]
Footnotes
[1] Why We Enjoy Puzzles: The View From Play Studies (Thomas Henricks, Psychology Today, 2022)
[3] Early research on hedonic adaptation dates back to the 1970s--for example, see Lottery Winners and Accident Victims: Is Happiness Relative? (Philip Brickman, Dan Coates and Ronnie Janoff-Bulman, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1978). More recently, UC Riverside Sonja Lyubomirsky provides what I find to be the most useful descriptions of the concept:
Although we may achieve temporary boosts in well-being by moving to new parts of the country, securing raises, or changing our appearances, such boosts are unlikely to be long-lasting. The primary reason...is that people readily and rapidly adapt to positive circumstantial changes. (The How of Happiness, page 63, 2007)
The more we attain, the happier we become. But, at the same time, the more we attain, the more we want, which negates the increased happiness. (The Myths of Happiness: What Should Make You Happy, but Doesn't, What Shouldn't Make You Happy, but Does, page 120, 2014)
[5] Why You Can't Stop Thinking About Something
[6] The scare quotes around "news" reflect my opinion that the vast majority of information presented today via any and all news media comes in the form of puzzles intended to arouse anxiety and distress, while fostering the illusion that further passive consumption is a form of constructive puzzle-solving. I've had many clients who successfully stopped working on business-puzzles at a reasonable hour only to find themselves obsessively doom-scrolling late into the night. In this sense there's no distinction among video-games, social media, and most "news"--but the latter comes wrapped in a veneer of pseudo-productivity and virtue, making it all the more insidious.
[7] Does reading a book in bed make a difference to sleep in comparison to not reading a book in bed? (Elaine Finucane et al, National Library of Medicine, 2021)
Photo by freebie.photography.
