WEBVTT - What's the Science of Perfect Timing? 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:02.960 Guess what, mango, what's that? Will? Actually wait before we 0:00:03.000 --> 0:00:07.280 get started. Let's let's high five? Okay five? Oh and 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:11.920 and fist bump and oh yeah and chess bump. I 0:00:11.960 --> 0:00:14.760 feel like you're just stalling. What's this all about? Well, 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:17.960 there's there. This is actually very relevant. There there's research 0:00:18.040 --> 0:00:20.360 from the NBA that shows that a good predictor of 0:00:20.400 --> 0:00:23.279 team performance is how often the team high fives or 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:27.360 fist bumps, chess bumps, and head slaps. So I feel 0:00:27.400 --> 0:00:29.440 like it might help us have a good show. I'm 0:00:29.480 --> 0:00:31.920 gonna draw the line of head slapping, but that is 0:00:31.920 --> 0:00:34.760 pretty interesting. I'm not a dent sure what the head 0:00:34.760 --> 0:00:37.120 slapping thing is, even though I watched a lot of basketball. 0:00:37.159 --> 0:00:39.720 But there's actually another basketball fact that I think is 0:00:39.760 --> 0:00:42.960 even more interesting. After looking at the results of tens 0:00:42.960 --> 0:00:46.480 of thousands of NBA and college games, these researchers found 0:00:46.479 --> 0:00:49.319 that teams trailing by a single point at halftime are 0:00:49.360 --> 0:00:52.040 actually more likely to win than the team's winning by 0:00:52.040 --> 0:00:54.920 a point. In fact, they found it was statistically equivalent 0:00:55.000 --> 0:00:58.040 to a two point halftime lead. That's crazy. So why 0:00:58.120 --> 0:01:01.080 is that? Well, it's all about amy. But the science 0:01:01.080 --> 0:01:04.080 of perfect timing is pretty fascinating and help us make 0:01:04.120 --> 0:01:06.360 sense of it. We've got Daniel Pink, the brilliant author 0:01:06.400 --> 0:01:09.360 of a brand new book called Win, The Scientific Secrets 0:01:09.360 --> 0:01:11.600 of Perfect Time, and he's here to explain it all. 0:01:11.720 --> 0:01:35.560 So let's dive in. Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:37.960 part time genius Samuel Pearson, And as always, I'm joined 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:40.080 by my good friend Man Guesh Ticketer and the man 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:43.160 on the other side of the soundproof glass playing Cindylopper's 0:01:43.240 --> 0:01:46.800 Time after Time very softly in our headphones. That's our 0:01:46.840 --> 0:01:50.160 friend and producer, Tristan McNeil. I didn't realize what it 0:01:50.200 --> 0:01:53.520 was until he slowly turned it off. Rascal. Anyway, Mango, 0:01:53.600 --> 0:01:55.960 are you ready to talk about perfect timing? I am, 0:01:56.000 --> 0:01:58.320 you know, I think what's so striking and reading Daniel's 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:00.600 book was just how little science we've put behind our 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:03.800 decisions on when to do certain things. Like we constantly 0:02:03.840 --> 0:02:06.440 analyze how to do things, how to take a test, 0:02:06.520 --> 0:02:09.120 how to organize a productive meeting, how to be healthier, 0:02:09.280 --> 0:02:12.080 But when it comes to the when decisions, we really 0:02:12.160 --> 0:02:15.160 leave that to a gut feeling. So I'm super excited 0:02:15.200 --> 0:02:17.280 to talk to Daniel Pink about his research because this 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:19.960 book is really fascinating. I'm with you on that, all right, Well, 0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:22.480 let's not hold off any longer. Today we're joined by 0:02:22.520 --> 0:02:25.600 the author of several books, including the New York Times bestsellers, 0:02:25.720 --> 0:02:28.919 Drive to Sell as Human and A Whole New Mind. 0:02:29.240 --> 0:02:31.680 But his newest book that just came out yesterday actually 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:35.840 is called When the Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing. Daniel Pink. 0:02:35.880 --> 0:02:39.840 Welcome to Part Time Genius. Thanks great to be here. Now, Daniel, 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:42.200 you open the book with a story about a study 0:02:42.200 --> 0:02:45.080 out of Cornell. There these two sociologists. They're doing a 0:02:45.080 --> 0:02:49.480 big data analysis of five hundred million tweets, you know, 0:02:49.520 --> 0:02:51.720 along with the other research that have helped find these 0:02:51.760 --> 0:02:54.480 patterns of the day. So can you talk a little 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:56.320 bit about that and how the heck do you do 0:02:56.360 --> 0:03:00.920 an analysis of five hundred million tweets? Well, fortunately I 0:03:00.960 --> 0:03:04.920 didn't do this analysis. Um, these guys that Cornell did it. 0:03:05.080 --> 0:03:07.520 And it's actually one of the interesting things about how 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:09.919 research has done these days and how we can use 0:03:10.240 --> 0:03:14.680 giant amounts of data to find hidden insights. So essentially 0:03:14.760 --> 0:03:18.440 what they did was this, so tweets remember our actual text, right, 0:03:18.800 --> 0:03:22.760 so their words or letters, characters, and um, there is 0:03:23.080 --> 0:03:26.480 a piece of software called LUKE. That's the acronym l 0:03:26.520 --> 0:03:29.600 I w C for the Linguistic Inventory Word count. This 0:03:29.680 --> 0:03:33.600 software allows us to measure what essentially the emotional content 0:03:33.639 --> 0:03:35.280 of the work. So if you if I look at 0:03:35.320 --> 0:03:38.240 a word like like bummed out and say, okay, that's 0:03:38.560 --> 0:03:41.920 someone who is a little bit low emotion, excited high emotion. 0:03:42.520 --> 0:03:44.320 And so what you can do is that instead of 0:03:44.320 --> 0:03:46.480 going through these things one by one. This is the 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:48.960 great thing about computers is ability to crunch these numbers. 0:03:49.040 --> 0:03:52.400 They throw all of these five million tweets into this 0:03:52.640 --> 0:03:57.600 program and their question is does people's mood as reflected 0:03:57.600 --> 0:04:00.680 by these tweets change over the course of a day. 0:04:01.040 --> 0:04:05.760 And the answer was heck yeah, and how so. Well, 0:04:05.840 --> 0:04:09.200 what they found was this really intriguing pattern. There was 0:04:09.240 --> 0:04:12.040 a peak, a trough, and a recovery. And again it's 0:04:12.080 --> 0:04:15.920 obviously controlled for time zone. Uh. Early in the day 0:04:16.160 --> 0:04:19.719 where people had a more positive mood. That positive mood 0:04:19.880 --> 0:04:22.960 was fairly steady until about noon. Then in the early 0:04:23.000 --> 0:04:26.200 to mid afternoon it began to dip. It dipped considerably 0:04:26.640 --> 0:04:29.760 over the afternoon and then rose again in the late 0:04:29.800 --> 0:04:33.679 afternoon early evening. And what they found were essentially three stages, 0:04:33.720 --> 0:04:37.120 a peak, a trough, and a recovery that as we 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:41.800 had positive mood in the morning, pretty strong dive in 0:04:41.880 --> 0:04:44.480 mood in the early to mid afternoon, and then recovery 0:04:44.560 --> 0:04:48.480 later in the day. It's very interesting. Yeah. So so 0:04:48.520 --> 0:04:51.640 obviously you know we're not all the same. And we've 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:54.279 talked a little bit about like circadian rhythms and in 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:57.040 our episode on sleep awhile back, but you talk about 0:04:57.160 --> 0:05:00.480 chronotypes and how do you use them to perform Can 0:05:00.520 --> 0:05:02.440 you tell us exactly what a chronotype is and how 0:05:02.440 --> 0:05:05.479 people identify themselves as whatever. So there's a whole field 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:09.640 is study called chronobiology and chrono for time biology for 0:05:09.800 --> 0:05:13.080 study of life, and it looks at exactly as you say, 0:05:13.120 --> 0:05:16.560 are daily rhythms. What it finds is that people have 0:05:16.760 --> 0:05:22.039 certain type, certain propensities. Some of us rise early, fall 0:05:22.080 --> 0:05:25.360 asleep earlier, some of us rise late, fall asleep late. 0:05:25.480 --> 0:05:28.719 Some people are larks morning people, some people are owls 0:05:28.800 --> 0:05:31.440 evening people. But the truth is that most of us 0:05:31.440 --> 0:05:32.800 are kind of in between what I like to call 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:35.920 third birds. And if you're a lark or a third bird, 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:39.080 you generally go through the day in that in the 0:05:39.160 --> 0:05:41.040 order that I just mentioned, a peak, a trough, a 0:05:41.120 --> 0:05:43.880 recovery that you have. In the mornings, you're generally at 0:05:43.920 --> 0:05:45.760 your best, both in terms of mood and in terms 0:05:45.760 --> 0:05:48.600 of vigilance. In the early afternoons there's a pretty significant 0:05:48.640 --> 0:05:51.800 deterioration and then some kind of recovery later in the 0:05:51.880 --> 0:05:53.760 day for the but the one and five of us 0:05:53.800 --> 0:05:56.240 were very strong owls nighttime types. These are people who 0:05:56.560 --> 0:06:00.320 go to sleep just naturally very late and wake up late, 0:06:00.680 --> 0:06:03.880 people for whom eight o'clock staff meetings are just a 0:06:03.960 --> 0:06:07.039 form of torture um those folks. And to go in 0:06:07.279 --> 0:06:10.560 more or less the reverse order recovery truck peak, and 0:06:10.600 --> 0:06:14.400 that would probably be you, mango, Yeah, yeah, what time 0:06:14.440 --> 0:06:15.880 do you Well, here's a here's the test. Let's we 0:06:15.880 --> 0:06:17.720 can test you right now. All right, we'll do we'll 0:06:17.720 --> 0:06:20.920 do the basically back in the envelope chronotype test here. So, 0:06:21.480 --> 0:06:22.920 so let's say it's a day where you don't have 0:06:22.960 --> 0:06:24.800 to wake up to an alarm clock, which for many 0:06:24.800 --> 0:06:27.680 people as a weekend. Okay, so what time would you 0:06:27.720 --> 0:06:30.520 usually go to sleep? Yeah, I mean, I think kids 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:33.839 have thrown everything off, but I think probably between three 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:39.120 and four. Oh, my lord, four am. Yeah, oh, I 0:06:39.160 --> 0:06:40.720 don't even have to do the rest of this time. 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:47.160 And what time would you usually wake up? I don't know, ten, 0:06:47.320 --> 0:06:50.480 I'd say ten. Okay. So so what we would do 0:06:50.520 --> 0:06:53.040 in this case was we would find your your midpoint 0:06:53.040 --> 0:06:58.400 of sleep. So if you if so your midpoint of sleep, 0:06:58.440 --> 0:06:59.720 if you can go to sleep at three and wake 0:06:59.800 --> 0:07:01.880 up at and your midpoint of sleep, would you, guys 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:06.400 be six thirty am, which would make you a pretty 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:11.720 strong owl. Strong about one out of five people are 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:16.480 pretty strong owls um and I I like the designation 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:19.880 of a strong owl. Yea's a very strong owl. Yeah 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:22.800 or uh so, yeah, that's that's that's that's pretty alley. 0:07:23.080 --> 0:07:27.680 How are you You don't be asking, I'm oh man, 0:07:27.720 --> 0:07:32.640 oh man, you're a serious owl then, yeah, yeah, well congratulations. 0:07:32.280 --> 0:07:34.880 He's been that way for a long time. In college, 0:07:34.880 --> 0:07:37.440 he was paired up with another owl, and so we 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:39.920 all had to be aware that they would just wake 0:07:40.000 --> 0:07:42.280 up at about what about two in the afternoon and 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:45.000 talk about what they were going to get for breakfast. Well, 0:07:45.320 --> 0:07:47.360 what's interesting is that is that that that's one reason 0:07:47.400 --> 0:07:50.160 I asked to your age is that most of us 0:07:50.160 --> 0:07:52.280 go through a period between about age fourteen and twenty 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:57.120 four when we become the owliest in our life. Um. 0:07:57.200 --> 0:07:59.560 And that has to do with hormones and whatever. So 0:07:59.600 --> 0:08:03.360 there's a pretty soon that they can shift, beginning basically 0:08:03.440 --> 0:08:07.280 post puberty, where people shift literally in some cases to 0:08:07.560 --> 0:08:12.080 three hours later into the day. Um. But then as 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:15.120 time goes on, they go back to their earlier So 0:08:15.240 --> 0:08:16.840 to what you have is you have like little kids 0:08:16.920 --> 0:08:23.920 is I think magnis is discovered are pretty large, pretty long, um. 0:08:23.960 --> 0:08:26.600 And we basically are are strong larks earlier in our 0:08:26.640 --> 0:08:28.560 life and then later in life. The older you get, 0:08:28.560 --> 0:08:31.720 the larker you become in general. Well, you talk about 0:08:31.720 --> 0:08:33.319 this a little bit in the book when you're talking 0:08:33.320 --> 0:08:36.319 about those teenage years, and we've heard this before, the 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:39.520 advocacy for a later start time, you know, in the 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:43.920 American Academy of Pediatrics actually issuing a policy statement urging 0:08:43.960 --> 0:08:46.440 schools to start I think it was no no earlier 0:08:46.480 --> 0:08:49.960 than eight thirty, and yet fewer than one in five 0:08:50.040 --> 0:08:52.959 schools actually follow this, as you indicated the book. Well, 0:08:52.960 --> 0:08:55.720 why do you think that is? Because they don't take 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:58.120 these time and questions seriously. They don't take questions of 0:08:58.120 --> 0:09:01.160 when seriously these schools. And I don't mean to pick 0:09:01.160 --> 0:09:03.719 on schools because I think it's true for all our institutions. 0:09:04.040 --> 0:09:06.600 We take very seriously, Okay, what are we gonna do? Alright, 0:09:06.600 --> 0:09:08.960 So they take curriculum very seriously. What are we gonna do, 0:09:09.120 --> 0:09:10.320 How are we gonna do it, How are we going 0:09:10.360 --> 0:09:13.400 to teach it? We have professional development days to improve 0:09:13.400 --> 0:09:15.360 our pedagogy. How are we going to do it? Who 0:09:15.400 --> 0:09:18.440 are we gonna do it with? They take hiring pretty seriously. Um, 0:09:18.760 --> 0:09:21.800 But then we take these questions of when, and we say, ah, 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:24.160 that doesn't really matter. That's like we we we take 0:09:24.200 --> 0:09:25.840 these questions of when and when we sit them at 0:09:25.840 --> 0:09:27.920 the kids table rather than at the groun ups table. 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:30.600 And that's a huge mistake. These questions of when, these 0:09:30.679 --> 0:09:33.559 questions of timing, as you're saying, with school star times, 0:09:33.720 --> 0:09:38.240 have a material effect on people's well being. School star 0:09:38.320 --> 0:09:42.240 times alone, Um, there is evidence that these early star times, 0:09:42.280 --> 0:09:47.120 again for people who are very ali who which teenagers 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:49.800 tend to be starting school at seven thirty in the 0:09:49.800 --> 0:09:54.120 morning is ridiculous. They're barely even awake. And consequence of 0:09:54.160 --> 0:09:58.800 that is dire the You have higher rates of depression, 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:02.840 higher rates of OBEs, the increased incidents of auto accidents, 0:10:03.160 --> 0:10:07.120 higher dropout rates, reduced performance on santidized tests, and schools 0:10:07.120 --> 0:10:09.760 that have done something about this, and again we're not 0:10:10.000 --> 0:10:12.880 we're not. We're not talking about like a Magnat schedule 0:10:12.920 --> 0:10:16.160 where you start school at three in the afternoon. We're 0:10:16.200 --> 0:10:18.200 talking about like starting it at like nine in the 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:20.520 morning rather than seven thirty in the morning. Schools that 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:23.320 have made those that that modest step that basically followed 0:10:23.320 --> 0:10:27.040 the recommendations of the American Accountmy of Pediatrics have seen 0:10:27.240 --> 0:10:30.200 low and behold higher test scores, lower dropout rate. If 0:10:30.240 --> 0:10:34.160 you just think about the workplace, time of day explains 0:10:34.200 --> 0:10:40.560 about twenty of the variance in our performance on cognitive tasks. 0:10:40.600 --> 0:10:43.520 So you know, so it doesn't mean the timing is everything, 0:10:43.880 --> 0:10:46.640 but it means it's a freaking big thing, right right right, Well, 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:49.560 we'll speaking of that material difference as you mentioned, you know, 0:10:49.600 --> 0:10:53.400 not just affecting teenagers but adults as well. You you 0:10:53.480 --> 0:10:56.679 talk about this Bermuda triangle of our days in the afternoons, 0:10:56.720 --> 0:10:58.800 and and we we all know that there tends to 0:10:58.800 --> 0:11:02.559 be that afternoon. We've all experienced that, especially after man 0:11:02.559 --> 0:11:05.280 guess and I have been downstairs eating ramen for lunch 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:10.680 and afternoon slump. But actually hearing from you and hearing 0:11:10.800 --> 0:11:14.520 the hard evidence of this, whether it's with standardized test 0:11:14.679 --> 0:11:17.240 or even results from juries, can you talk a little 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:20.440 bit about that impact. It's huge and it's terrifying. There's 0:11:20.480 --> 0:11:23.959 research from Denmark showing the kids score systematically lower if 0:11:23.960 --> 0:11:26.280 they take standardized tests in the afternoon versus they take 0:11:26.320 --> 0:11:28.840 them in the morning. Okay, so just think about that 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:31.679 in terms of the extent to which standardized tests affect 0:11:31.720 --> 0:11:35.320 the kid's fate, where they affect education policy. Again, time 0:11:35.320 --> 0:11:37.960 of day is having this massive effect, but it's invisible 0:11:38.000 --> 0:11:40.880 to us. If you look at something like you make 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:43.720 an interesting point about about juries or criminal justice system, 0:11:43.760 --> 0:11:47.559 there's some really good experimental evidence showing that if you 0:11:47.760 --> 0:11:52.079 have two defendants. That's a famous experiment, one one named uh. 0:11:52.440 --> 0:11:56.320 Some participants have a defendant name Robert Garner, some have 0:11:56.400 --> 0:11:59.960 one name ROBERTA. Garcia. And if you have the same 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:03.760 set of facts juries that deliberate in the morning, treat 0:12:03.800 --> 0:12:06.320 those defendants the same juries that have the same set 0:12:06.360 --> 0:12:09.560 of facts and deliberate in the afternoon during this trough period. 0:12:09.960 --> 0:12:13.599 Guess what they are more likely to convict Garcia and 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:18.640 exonerate Garner on the same set of facts. Right, but 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:20.760 but but wait, there's more, Because now we can go 0:12:20.800 --> 0:12:24.040 into healthcare. Doctors and nurses are far less likely to 0:12:24.040 --> 0:12:26.040 wash their hands in the afternoons and in the mornings 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:29.959 if you look at if you look at things like anesthesia, 0:12:30.240 --> 0:12:33.000 you're three times more likely to have an anesthesia error 0:12:33.040 --> 0:12:37.320 in an afternoon procedure than in the morning procedure. Uh. Yeah, 0:12:37.440 --> 0:12:40.520 the whole thing is terrifying and so over. Even even 0:12:40.520 --> 0:12:42.839 if we look at things like auto accidents, there's some 0:12:42.880 --> 0:12:45.520 good research out of the UK. You know, when do 0:12:45.679 --> 0:12:48.560 auto accidents peak? If you're just for how many cars 0:12:48.600 --> 0:12:51.240 are on the road? Big surprise, they peeked between like 0:12:51.320 --> 0:12:54.439 four and six am. Okay, because it's the middle of 0:12:54.480 --> 0:12:56.400 the night and it's really dark. But the second most 0:12:56.400 --> 0:12:59.040 common time is between two and four pm. It's perfectly 0:12:59.120 --> 0:13:02.680 light outside. Yeah. We don't take these kinds of time 0:13:02.679 --> 0:13:06.720 and day effects nearly seriously enough, and they have a big, 0:13:06.760 --> 0:13:09.480 big effect on literally in some cases of life and death. 0:13:09.679 --> 0:13:12.080 So these are so scary statistics. Now, we have several 0:13:12.120 --> 0:13:14.079 more questions for you. But before we get to those, 0:13:14.120 --> 0:13:29.559 let's take a quick break. Welcome back to Part Time Genius. 0:13:29.559 --> 0:13:32.040 We're talking to Daniel Pink, the author of When The 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:35.640 Scientific Secrets of Perfect Finding. Daniel, I, I know we 0:13:35.720 --> 0:13:38.280 talked about the fact that I'm not a morning person, 0:13:38.559 --> 0:13:42.079 but I was curious about morning exercise because that's something 0:13:42.080 --> 0:13:43.720 you talk about in your book. Can you tell about 0:13:43.720 --> 0:13:46.199 the benefits of doing it then versus afternoon and what 0:13:46.240 --> 0:13:48.120 it means for your body. Yeah, this is something that 0:13:48.160 --> 0:13:49.920 I was really interested in because I was trying to 0:13:49.920 --> 0:13:53.360 figure it out for myself. Um and so um. It's 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:55.319 pretty easy to figure out whether you should exercise in 0:13:55.360 --> 0:13:58.360 the morning or the afternoon. It all depends on what 0:13:58.480 --> 0:14:00.840 your goals are. So if you're also to lose weight, 0:14:01.040 --> 0:14:03.200 exercise in the morning, you're gonna burn up more calories 0:14:03.240 --> 0:14:05.600 than typically. If you actually in the morning, you're gonna 0:14:05.640 --> 0:14:07.520 get a mood boost for a bigger period of the day. 0:14:07.840 --> 0:14:10.040 Exercise later in the day you might sleep through some 0:14:10.080 --> 0:14:12.760 of that mood boost. There's some good evidence showing that 0:14:13.040 --> 0:14:15.360 morning exercise makes us slightly more likely to stick to 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:18.440 the routine and to stopster and levels actually peak in 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:21.360 the morning. If you're doing some strength based training, mornings 0:14:21.400 --> 0:14:23.680 can be good for that. On the other hand, afternoon 0:14:23.760 --> 0:14:27.040 late afternoon is good for other types of things. So 0:14:27.400 --> 0:14:30.920 one of the big things that affects our physiology over 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:33.040 the course of the day is a change in body temperature, 0:14:33.040 --> 0:14:36.040 believe it or not. And when our body temperature tends 0:14:36.040 --> 0:14:38.120 to rise to its highest point in the late afternoon 0:14:38.120 --> 0:14:42.240 in early evening UM, that makes our muscles warmer and 0:14:42.280 --> 0:14:44.640 so we're more likely to avoid injury. So if you're 0:14:44.760 --> 0:14:47.880 prone to injury, you're concerned about injury, afternoon exercise is better. 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:51.480 There's some really intriguing evidence showing that you might actually 0:14:52.080 --> 0:14:55.680 perform at a higher level during afternoon and early evening 0:14:55.680 --> 0:14:59.960 activity UM because mine function is the highest, your strength 0:15:00.080 --> 0:15:03.320 is higher, your reaction time is higher. There's some very 0:15:03.320 --> 0:15:07.840 intriguing evidence about athletic records, particularly in speed events, disproportionately 0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:12.240 being broken at between about four and seven local time. 0:15:12.760 --> 0:15:16.560 Really fascinating, and it's all about our you know, basically 0:15:16.560 --> 0:15:19.480 about a bye temperature is also again this is related 0:15:19.640 --> 0:15:21.840 up and this has actually ended up sealing the deal 0:15:21.880 --> 0:15:25.320 for me is that because we're doing a little bit better, 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:27.280 we're you know, our our lung function is a little 0:15:27.280 --> 0:15:30.800 bit higher muscles are warmer, we're not risking exercise, we're 0:15:30.840 --> 0:15:35.040 not risking injury as much. That people tend to um 0:15:35.160 --> 0:15:37.640 enjoy the workouts a little bit more in the afternoon, 0:15:37.680 --> 0:15:39.800 even if they're doing the exact same thing in the morning, 0:15:40.360 --> 0:15:45.000 they feel a little less taxing UM. And so for me, 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:49.120 I am an uh an afternoon early evening exerciser, and 0:15:49.160 --> 0:15:51.000 I think it's for that last reason. When I when 0:15:51.000 --> 0:15:53.760 I go do exercise in the morning, I hate it. 0:15:53.760 --> 0:15:56.040 It feels like it feels like torture. When I do 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:58.760 it in the afternoon, I actually enjoyed a little bit more. 0:15:58.880 --> 0:16:01.120 And so if I were trying to lose a lot 0:16:01.120 --> 0:16:03.400 of weight, I might change I might change things. But 0:16:03.760 --> 0:16:07.360 I exercise just so I don't go crazy. And so afternoon, um, 0:16:07.520 --> 0:16:10.200 afternoon works for me. And I think it's because of 0:16:10.600 --> 0:16:13.280 just that my body has warmed up. I'm performing a 0:16:13.320 --> 0:16:15.880 little bit of higher level and it's just it's less 0:16:15.920 --> 0:16:19.080 unpleasant than it is in the mornings. Yeah. Well, back 0:16:19.120 --> 0:16:21.800 to the idea of productivity and things that we can 0:16:21.800 --> 0:16:24.800 do to to be more productive. You talk about, you know, 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:29.720 the importance of or the value of of napping, can you, 0:16:29.920 --> 0:16:31.800 And I think we we've we've heard that before, but 0:16:31.880 --> 0:16:33.720 can you talk a little bit about, you know, what 0:16:33.760 --> 0:16:37.560 the ideal nap is and what we're looking for in 0:16:37.600 --> 0:16:40.640 that and and trying to be more productive. Yeah, the 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:42.880 ideal nap is a less shorter than I ever realized 0:16:43.640 --> 0:16:45.800 I was. You know, I'm not. I haven't been a 0:16:45.800 --> 0:16:47.880 big napper. And the reason is that when I woke 0:16:47.920 --> 0:16:49.960 up from a nap, I felt, I felt terrible. I 0:16:50.000 --> 0:16:54.360 felt you know, groggy and cobwebs in my head. Um. 0:16:54.480 --> 0:16:57.320 And what I discovered essentially is that I was doing 0:16:57.360 --> 0:17:00.600 it wrong. That the ideal nap is is very very 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:03.000 short maybe you know, usually no more than twenty minutes 0:17:03.120 --> 0:17:06.840 or so. Um. And what happens if we knap longer 0:17:06.880 --> 0:17:08.680 than that is that we begin to accumulate what's called 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:12.280 sleep inertia. That's that boggy, groggy feeling that we have, 0:17:12.960 --> 0:17:14.800 and it takes us some time to dig out of 0:17:14.840 --> 0:17:16.840 that to get the benefits of the nap. So you 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:19.919 basically start with a deficit and then have to climb 0:17:19.920 --> 0:17:22.159 out of the deficit. If you have a nap of 0:17:22.160 --> 0:17:23.600 twenty minutes or so, you get a lot of the 0:17:23.600 --> 0:17:26.760 benefit without any of the deficit. And so the super 0:17:26.760 --> 0:17:30.320 short naps literally between ten and twenty minutes, seemed to 0:17:30.320 --> 0:17:33.680 be the maximum bank for the buck when it comes 0:17:33.680 --> 0:17:37.439 to napping, which I I love because I'm from a 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:44.080 sistic culture. Yeah, but you know, there's something to be 0:17:44.119 --> 0:17:46.320 said for you know. What's what's interesting is that in 0:17:46.359 --> 0:17:52.360 the the blaze of westernization and American style capitalism, we've 0:17:52.400 --> 0:17:55.520 obliterated cs IS, when in fact, there's actually some pretty 0:17:55.520 --> 0:18:00.199 good scientific evidence for restoring some kind of modern the Yes, 0:18:00.359 --> 0:18:03.520 I mean, I'm not talking about taking three hours um 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:07.960 for lunch every single day, but basically taking breaks and 0:18:08.400 --> 0:18:13.280 pauses much more seriously than we take them. Right now. Well, uh, 0:18:13.359 --> 0:18:15.720 one of the things, because I'm so focused on mornings now, 0:18:16.280 --> 0:18:19.360 I want to ask about is breakfast and how important 0:18:19.359 --> 0:18:22.359 it really is and where meals play a role in 0:18:22.359 --> 0:18:25.800 in uh, you know, having the most productive days. Um, 0:18:25.960 --> 0:18:27.720 is breakfast is important? I think the answer from the 0:18:27.760 --> 0:18:33.320 research is a clear and conclusive maybe, um, some of 0:18:33.359 --> 0:18:35.919 the some of the and this has to do with 0:18:35.920 --> 0:18:39.040 some of the methodologies, which are observational studies rather than 0:18:39.119 --> 0:18:42.760 randomized control experiences. So you know, these observational studies found 0:18:42.760 --> 0:18:44.760 that people who breakfast are healthy but we don't know 0:18:44.800 --> 0:18:47.000 whether breakfast is causing their healthiness. It could just be 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:50.040 the healthy people like the breakfast, um, people who are 0:18:50.040 --> 0:18:53.600 already healthy, or eating breakfast and has no causal effect, etcetera, etcetera. 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:56.439 Some of these pro breakfast studies are actually funded by 0:18:56.440 --> 0:18:58.840 cereal companies, so that should make us raise our eyebrows 0:18:58.840 --> 0:19:02.200 a little bit. In terms of time of day and eating, 0:19:02.520 --> 0:19:05.320 there's some very interesting research, pretty new stuff right now 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:08.879 on what's called time restricted feeding. The showing that you 0:19:08.880 --> 0:19:11.879 could you might be able to get a certain greater 0:19:11.960 --> 0:19:15.440 weight loss if you restrict you're eating to a certain 0:19:15.800 --> 0:19:19.880 ten or twelve hour period um, and that weight gain 0:19:19.960 --> 0:19:23.399 could be a factor in weight gain, could be eating 0:19:23.480 --> 0:19:27.119 too late in the day. Um, that's it's it's as 0:19:27.160 --> 0:19:29.560 early stages now. It's pretty intriguing. I actually looked at 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:32.600 some of the research on lunch and it turns out 0:19:32.600 --> 0:19:35.119 that lunch is a pretty powerful Again here I'm not 0:19:35.119 --> 0:19:38.840 talking about physiology, I'm talking about psychology. The lunch ends 0:19:38.880 --> 0:19:41.639 up being a pretty powerful restorative for us, much more 0:19:41.680 --> 0:19:44.679 than I would have expected. There's a very strong argument 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:47.359 in the research for taking a lunch break. Uh, you know, 0:19:47.400 --> 0:19:50.760 not just having a tune of salad sandwich dripping onto 0:19:50.800 --> 0:19:55.280 your computer while you're trying to answer you know, but 0:19:55.280 --> 0:19:57.600 but but but you know, being intentional and taking a 0:19:57.680 --> 0:19:59.560 lunch break. It doesn't have to be massive, you know, 0:20:00.160 --> 0:20:04.480 taking half an hour and going outside and you know, 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:06.360 if the weather is right, you know, eating a sandwich 0:20:06.400 --> 0:20:09.760 on a bench and not working. Um, the evidence is 0:20:09.800 --> 0:20:12.960 showing that that is where stories are. Energy can boost 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:18.080 our mood, can actually improve our productivity and creativity. And 0:20:18.200 --> 0:20:21.600 the larger point here is that this is something where 0:20:21.600 --> 0:20:25.160 I've changed my own behavior, is that just in general, 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:30.640 we haven't taken breaks seriously enough. Um. We have thought 0:20:30.720 --> 0:20:37.080 of breaks as you know, soft or deviations from performance. 0:20:37.600 --> 0:20:41.240 I am as guilty as anybody about this. I I've 0:20:41.280 --> 0:20:43.359 never been a big break taker. I've always thought it 0:20:43.400 --> 0:20:46.360 was better just to power through. And it's actually not, 0:20:46.960 --> 0:20:49.520 um that that breaks all. We have to start thinking 0:20:49.560 --> 0:20:53.120 of breaks as not a deviation from performance, but actually 0:20:53.160 --> 0:20:56.919 part of performance and recognize that part of being a 0:20:56.960 --> 0:20:59.320 professional means taking a break every once in a while. 0:20:59.640 --> 0:21:01.439 So when I was reading the book, one thing I 0:21:01.480 --> 0:21:03.399 wasn't clear about, and I was just curious, from your 0:21:03.440 --> 0:21:06.679 own perspective, where does social media plan to that, Like 0:21:06.680 --> 0:21:08.679 when you're on a break and eating a sandwich on 0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:13.320 a you know, in nature at a park. How how 0:21:13.359 --> 0:21:17.439 does like looking at your phone influence that? The real answers. 0:21:17.440 --> 0:21:19.320 It depends, So it depends on what you're looking at 0:21:19.320 --> 0:21:22.359 in your phone. In general, though, what the research shows 0:21:22.560 --> 0:21:26.000 is that the best breaks you're fully detached, particularly from work. 0:21:26.280 --> 0:21:28.119 So social media is a big part of your work. 0:21:28.359 --> 0:21:30.320 If you're looking at things, oh, what are they saying 0:21:30.320 --> 0:21:33.480 about my product or um, you know what's in the news, 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:35.879 and that it's going to affect my business, then it's 0:21:35.880 --> 0:21:37.880