Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning,
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is to avoid pendulum swings. Consistency tends to lead
Speaker 1: to better outcomes than going to extremes, and it also
Speaker 1: tends to be less stressful. So when something in your
Speaker 1: life feels out of whack, it can be easy to overcorrect.
Speaker 1: If you've had a really busy social season, you may
Speaker 1: be inclined to turn down all social plans for the
Speaker 1: next few weeks. If you are disciplined in January about
Speaker 1: saving money, you may wind up buying everything under the
Speaker 1: sun in February, And if you put in a week
Speaker 1: of really long days, you may find yourself phoning it
Speaker 1: in the next week. The problem is that these over
Speaker 1: corrections are seldom the right solutions either. Having zero social
Speaker 1: plans is the recipe for heading into work Monday feeling
Speaker 1: like the weekend never happened, which is depressing, so you
Speaker 1: overschedule the next weekend and feel out of sorts again.
Speaker 1: Saving money through deprivation doesn't help if you then spend
Speaker 1: everything you saved, and if you slack at work, you
Speaker 1: might need to put in long days the next week
Speaker 1: in order to get caught up. Pendulum swings like these
Speaker 1: can leave you feeling like you are never in the
Speaker 1: right place, even if your average social events per week,
Speaker 1: or spending per month, or sweets per day, or hours
Speaker 1: per week worked, or any other metric seems to be
Speaker 1: exactly what you want. If you are not within the
Speaker 1: range of what's best for you during shorter periods, you
Speaker 1: may end up feeling frazzled. I have certainly seen that
Speaker 1: with sleep. Even during the worst of the baby years,
Speaker 1: my time logs showed that I averaged seven point four
Speaker 1: hours of sleep per day over any longer stretch of time.
Speaker 1: But my time logs also show some awful days of
Speaker 1: being up three times in the night, or finally getting
Speaker 1: a baby down at one am, only to be up
Speaker 1: at five point thirty to catch a plane. I'd nap
Speaker 1: or crash other places in order to hit the average,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't a lot of fun with babies who
Speaker 1: don't sleep well. This is what it is. These days,
Speaker 1: my kids are older and I can be more consistent
Speaker 1: with daily sleep totals. I am still averaging seven point
Speaker 1: four hours per day, but it feels entirely different than
Speaker 1: those pendulum swings. When pendulum swings can be avoided, as
Speaker 1: with most other metrics that don't involve nursing babies, life
Speaker 1: will feel a lot less chaotic. So with any metric
Speaker 1: that matters to you. Spending exercise, hours worked, social plans,
Speaker 1: figure out what feels sustainable long term. Can you really
Speaker 1: bill forty hours per week or is thirty six hours
Speaker 1: more sustainable? Can you actually run twenty eight miles per
Speaker 1: week or is twenty more realistic given your other commitments?
Speaker 1: Will you feel overscheduled if you go out four nights
Speaker 1: a week or disconnected if you're home for seven nights
Speaker 1: a week. Is two hundred dollars per week doable for
Speaker 1: groceries week to week? Or will spending two hundred dollars
Speaker 1: on groceries this week lead you to ring up a
Speaker 1: hefty four hundred dollars bill next week. In any aspect
Speaker 1: of your life where you're feeling off kilter, pay attention
Speaker 1: to the actual time and money you spend week to
Speaker 1: week and figure out the amount that feels about right.
Speaker 1: Then aim to get pretty close to that amount consistently.
Speaker 1: If you do, you will be on track to meet
Speaker 1: your long term goals and you'll also avoid the stress
Speaker 1: and disorder that can come from pendulum swings. Not every
Speaker 1: week will be right at the ideal, of course, but
Speaker 1: you'll know to return to it as soon as you can.
Speaker 1: For instance, if you put in a really long week
Speaker 1: at work, perhaps you take a camp half day the
Speaker 1: next Monday morning, but then work at a normal pace
Speaker 1: the rest of the time. If you overindulge on a
Speaker 1: trip to New Orleans, you don't need to eat salad
Speaker 1: every meal for the next month. Just go back to
Speaker 1: your usual moderate habits. It will all be fine in
Speaker 1: the meantime. This is Laura, Thanks for listening, and here's
Speaker 1: to making the most of our time. Yes, hey, everybody,
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear from you. You can send me
Speaker 1: your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just connect with
Speaker 1: me on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram at Before Breakfast Pod.
Speaker 1: That's b E the number four then Breakfast pod. You
Speaker 1: can also shoot me an email at Before Breakfast Podcasts
Speaker 1: at iHeartMedia dot com. That Before Breakfast is spelled out
Speaker 1: with all the letters. Thanks so much, should I look
Speaker 1: forward to staying in touch. Before Breakfast is a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.