---
title: "49: The Rules of Enough #LifeWideLearning16"
date: 2016-02-29
url: https://learningischange.com/2016/02/29/49-the-rules-of-enough-lifewidelearning16/
author: Ben Wilkoff
categories: ["#LifeWideLearning16", "Blog"]
tags: []
---

# 49: The Rules of Enough #LifeWideLearning16

> 49. What rule for your life do you find yourself constantly revising? [#LifeWideLearning16](https://twitter.com/hashtag/LifeWideLearning16?src=hash)[@bhwilkoff](https://twitter.com/bhwilkoff) — Zac Chase (@MrChase) [February 18, 2016](https://twitter.com/MrChase/status/700288697246154752)

Doing my job used to mean arriving far before children arrived at school and staying far after for grading and guitar club. After that it meant setting up a half-dozen computers to edit HTML files in online courses for hours at a time. After that it meant traveling to conferences and standing in booths or facilitating sessions. After that, it meant making screencasts of wireframes of apps. After that, it meant meeting 6-10 times a day. All of those things are “doing my job”, but in each transition to a new role, I revised the rules for what was “enough.”

Enough effort, enough passion, enough change, enough capacity building, enough learning, or even just enough so that I feel good about my contribution to the world.

I revise my “rules of enough” every time I tackle a new body of work. I negotiate with myself for just how many hours I need to wake up before the children get out of bed. I try to parcel out the number of days in hotel rooms in another state it will require. I build up my resolve for making the change I want to see, ensuring I have enough in reserve for difficult arguments among would-be advocates.

Even thought they shift multiple times a year, my rules of enough are worth writing down. They provide a snapshot of my internal struggle with creating something that makes a difference.

The Rules of Enough:

- Wake up with enough time to do one thing you can be truly proud of each morning.
- Reply to enough email to sustain important conversations and for others to not assume you are dead.
- Communicate your work enough so that others can see their own entry points.
- Call enough meetings to build a coalition for change.
- Read enough blog posts, tweets, and white papers to stay informed and to inform others.
- Write enough to understand what you believe.
- Think out loud enough to understand what you have learned.
- Listen enough to understand what you don’t yet know.
- Play with your kids enough that they will have memories of their childhood with you.
- Stay awake with your wife enough to be truly together.

Those will change, maybe even tomorrow. But, for right now, those are the rules.