The young guns reading this will probably wonder at the title (kids, it was a song) but regardless I will today speak of the effects of coffee and TV on the work of a freelancer. We have grown to become a coffee nation and we seldom wonder at the effect it may be having on our health and work-life. The same applies to Television, where as a nation we have become reliant on Television as the true source of information and spend an average of two non-stop m0nths a year watching TV on average (that is if you add up an average of 4 hours a day). This all leads a sensible mind to explore how these things may effect us and will show you why I gave up both.
Coffee
Coffee contains caffeine, which is really the culprit here. A small amount of caffeine consumed by a healthy person will not have many adverse effects, however making a habit of drinking coffee or tea on a daily basis causes dependency on caffeine. If you are a heavy coffee drinker and don’t have your coffee on time you can begin to experience a headache, laziness, excessive sleeping. This is fatal to your work as a freelancer as you can not just work when you want, rather you work once your caffeine dependency allows you to work.
Sleep, however, is probably the worst part of drinking caffeine containing beverages. There are 5 stages of sleep and “deep sleep” is in stage 5 where you are getting a real rest. Drinking coffee will rarely allow you to pass stage 4 and you will never enter stage 5 for your real rest. If you drink a cup of coffee, there is still a considerable amount left in your blood stream twelve hours later to disturb your sleep pattern. This just means that when you wake up you will need more coffee and will slowly be edging toward a full addict with only minute differences from a addicted smoker.
High caffeine intake can lead to anxiety and other psychiatric disorders. This is because high levels of caffeine suppress “dopamine” which is a substance which gives us pleasure. Suppressing dopamine means we spend our caffeine high day being dull and depressed and hardly enjoying ourselves. This translates immensely onto our work where if we can not enjoy 
our work, we will not be creative with our work and being dull will not make your clients enjoy their conversations with you…meaning less chances of referrals or of them returning.
Caffeine consumed excessively can cause unwanted side-affects for people with heart-problems, diabetes, or people with stomach problems. As a summary, coffee is less of a friend and more an enemy and helps us only by zombifying us.
I spoke in this article about coffee, but to be correct I mean every beverage containing caffeine and even those drinks which do not but effect your health such as alcohol. The sensible approach is to stick to water, which actually stimulates your brain, is food for your body and has no side-affects (until you hose-pipe your mouth)
Television
Similarly to when I spoke about Coffee I meant all those beverages which affect your ability to work, here I do not solely mean Television, but all social-networking sites, youtube and anything which will waste your time. The fact I mentioned above is true and it does translate into 9 undisturbed years of a 65-year-old person’s life watching TV. It is the greatest time waster which has ever existed and has ensured the break down of families worldwide and consumed the lives of the potential future Einstein’s of this world. I recently read of a case where a man returned from work and would watch Television for 5 hours non-stop and if his wife or children tried to disturb him in this time he would beat them. Understandably this man is a fanatic and doesn’t translate what is happening on average, however, it shows what Television can do to a person.
Many freelancer friends of mine will spend so many hours watching TV or playing Halo that when they come back to work they will be thinking about their next game or what is going to be coming on TV tonight. Imagine if these people didn’t watch so much TV and actually worked instead of wasting their life. They would progress their skills and would take their business to the next level (and stop using words like “pwnage”!).
Conclusion
I suppose an alternative title for this article could be “Why caffeine and wasting your time is bad” but I think you will get my message anyway. Now that I have expressed myself, why don’t you express your feelings on this topic. I am now off because a film is on TV tonight and I need to make some coffee before I start watching!
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January 26th, 2010 at 1:50 pm
Isn’t it great that caffeine is a legally addictive uncontrolled substance. For the most part coffee, along with many substances if abused can be detrimental to your health. In South America and other countries a small amount of coffee after a meal is consider great for digestion.
January 26th, 2010 at 2:01 pm
Any man who as you stated “watches Television for 5 hours non-stop and if his wife or children tried to disturb him in this time he would beat them.” is not a REAL man at all.
He could do something productive to secure his family’s future rather than take out his hostilities on them because of his shortcomings.
January 27th, 2010 at 4:57 pm
You stay away from my coffee!!!! ;) I’m not an addict! I can stop anytime I want… Really I can… :D :: grabs coffee and taps arm ::
January 30th, 2010 at 8:50 pm
haha…so true!
the more you realize that the more you can’t get away from it, well… at least for a while, LOL!
try replacing coffee with fruit juice like orange juice, it works on me :p
February 5th, 2010 at 8:56 pm
@ Jordan: My doctor’s surgery actually has a pamphlet which encourages you to drink 4 cups of coffee a day!
@ Jose: spot on. I think alcohol may be a problem here as well. People need to learn to control themselves!
@ Allen: LOL!
@ Ari: A very very sensible alternative!
Thanks for your comments!
February 8th, 2010 at 5:10 pm
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February 12th, 2010 at 4:28 am
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February 12th, 2010 at 9:39 am
As a Coffee drinker I enjoy drinking coffee everyday and night. I use only my Burr Grinders to grind coffee. I believe every coffee lover deserves that. :)
February 13th, 2010 at 10:54 am
As always superb post bud. I’ve had a blast reading your posts and have found them awesome. Keep up the posting!
February 13th, 2010 at 6:38 pm
Hi, nice post. I look forward to your next topic. Thank you, Zoe
February 13th, 2010 at 11:40 pm
I have been a reader for a long while, but this is my first time as a commenter. I just wanted to let you know that this has been / is my favorite update of yours! Keep up the great work and I’ll keep on checking back. If you’d be interested in swapping blogroll links with me…
February 15th, 2010 at 6:59 am
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February 16th, 2010 at 4:39 am
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February 17th, 2010 at 1:57 am
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February 17th, 2010 at 9:02 pm
No matter what everyone say, a french press is absolutely tastier than any other brew of coffee I’ve ever tested. If you have a bit of time, take a visit over to the how-to guide we’ve assembled at frenchpresshowto.com. Thanks a lot for the post!
February 18th, 2010 at 12:27 am
thanks, this will really help me a lot, just what i needed!
February 18th, 2010 at 5:57 pm
Man, this is the most truthful, depressing article I’ve read all day. You are so right. I have to chill on the coffee. Although, I imagine decaf could also work, if you like a hot beverage… or hot tea? The caffeine in green tea I hear is different than in coffee.
You must have a hobby right? I agree about T.V. and the video games, but those things just don’t interest people. I’m sure they struggle with something they could consider a time-waster other than T.V. and gaming. Of course, your point here is not to let anything at all consume all of your time or inhibit productivity, but for those of you who play games/watch T.V., it’s about discipline, and moderation, not quitting entirely. (Unless that’s just not possible for you.) I would even say the same about coffee. I have ALL of the symptoms mentioned in this article from coffee, and it was an eye-opener, so it’s time for a break. But, I love gaming, and I’m fairly productive, so no cold turkey on gaming for me.
Great article. Motivating. (And I’m not even a freelancer…)
February 18th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
Correction above** “I agree about T.V. and the video games, but those things just don’t interest **SOME** people.
February 18th, 2010 at 6:02 pm
Hi Jon.
You are absolutely right. There are many alternatives, such as Green Tea, Camomile etc. Regarding hobbies, again, you put it perfectly, a hobby is needed and moderation is key and if it works woohoo!
The site maybe called FreelanceApple and the reader base are majority freelancers, however some of the advice we give is business-y and therefore fits many different fields.
Thanks for your comment. Please subscribe to our RSS!
February 19th, 2010 at 7:53 pm
Although running a business sounds cool and all that. But in fact, I think you have to form a schedule so that you don?t get too involved. I liked that stuff you talked about ?life is balance?. Maybe hiring someone do your work is a smart idea.
February 19th, 2010 at 11:31 pm
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February 20th, 2010 at 6:48 am
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February 21st, 2010 at 7:40 pm
Good points raised here, (at least the bits I could make out easily). I am color blind (protanopia to be precise). I mainly use Opera browser (no idea if that is important), and a lot of this site is a little difficult for me to read. I don’t wish to whinge, and I know it is my problem really, nevertheless it would be cool if you would bear in mind color blind surfers whilst carrying out your next web page redesign.
April 21st, 2010 at 8:35 am
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November 11th, 2010 at 3:27 pm
Usefull post would it be OK if i translate into French for our blogs readers? Thanks