Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Good Morning, This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is to be ready, not crazy busy. A
Speaker 1: ready state allows you to deal with life as it comes,
Speaker 1: without over complicating things or making yourself anxious and fearful
Speaker 1: in the process. Today's tip comes from a TED talk
Speaker 1: by emergency room Dr Daria Long. She discourages people from
Speaker 1: describing themselves as crazy busy. As Dr Long explains, you
Speaker 1: cannot afford to use crazy to describe your busy because,
Speaker 1: she says, in crazy busy mode, we are simply less
Speaker 1: capable of handling the busy. That's because when we are stressed,
Speaker 1: our brains don't work as well. The anger and anxiety
Speaker 1: areas of our brain are activated, while our judgment and
Speaker 1: impulse control weaken. We can't function at our best under
Speaker 1: those circumstances. So how do you avoid being crazy busy
Speaker 1: own the busy? She advises To do that, she proposes
Speaker 1: ready mode. Like in the e R. She identifies three
Speaker 1: ways we can move from crazy busy mode to this
Speaker 1: ready mode. First, triage in an e R, red is
Speaker 1: immediately life threatening, Yellow is serious, and green is minor.
Speaker 1: People who work in the e R absolutely know the difference.
Speaker 1: They do not treat minor issues before major ones, even
Speaker 1: if the person with the minor issue is not exactly
Speaker 1: happy to be waiting in the e R. When you
Speaker 1: are stressed, a Long explains, you respond to everything as
Speaker 1: though it's eminently life threatening, but it probably isn't. In
Speaker 1: ready mode, you don't mistake greens or yellows for reds.
Speaker 1: As doctor Long says in her talk, know your reds
Speaker 1: and do not let your non reds distract you from them.
Speaker 1: The second way to move from crazy busy mode to
Speaker 1: ready mode is to design your life to make your
Speaker 1: life easier. In a busy e R, it wouldn't make
Speaker 1: sense for supplies to be located in different places in
Speaker 1: each room, or to be hidden away and inaccessible. Likewise,
Speaker 1: you should make what you need readily available. You should
Speaker 1: figure out ways to use less mental bandwidth in general,
Speaker 1: such as automating meal planning. Taco Tuesday and pizza Friday
Speaker 1: means you are ready for anything. And finally, when you
Speaker 1: are confronted with a red need, get out of your
Speaker 1: head focus on what needs to be done. As an
Speaker 1: e R doctor, doctor Long focuses on the patient, and
Speaker 1: when she has focused on the patient, she is not
Speaker 1: stressed by her own performance anxiety. Likewise, if you need
Speaker 1: to deal with something, don't overthink it, dive in and
Speaker 1: get it done. Focus on it until the problem is stabilized.
Speaker 1: Then you can deal with everything else. I really found
Speaker 1: this an interesting way of thinking about life as I
Speaker 1: am going through a rather intense phase. Launching a book,
Speaker 1: which I'm doing next week, involves a lot of publicity
Speaker 1: activities that have taken a lot of time over the
Speaker 1: last few months. Fall is usually a full season for work.
Speaker 1: Travel plus five kids in four different schools creates a
Speaker 1: lot of moving parts, and so there is a reasonable
Speaker 1: amount of triaging. The other day, I was scheduled to
Speaker 1: be on a six am flight home from somewhere, and
Speaker 1: we then sat on the tarmac for three hours. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: we kept thinking we would take off, so I wasn't
Speaker 1: able to have my laptop out to use those three
Speaker 1: hours in a better way. All this meant I arrived
Speaker 1: at my desk at eleven am instead of eight am.
Speaker 1: I had various things that had to happen before my
Speaker 1: first scheduled publicity interview at two pm. And there was
Speaker 1: a hard stop with the kids after school, so as
Speaker 1: that available windows shrank from eight am to two pm,
Speaker 1: two eleven am to two pm. I had to figure
Speaker 1: out what were my reds. The yellows and greens were
Speaker 1: just going to have to happen over the weekend or
Speaker 1: get pushed to the next week. But when you are
Speaker 1: clear on the reds and focus on them until they're stable,
Speaker 1: they do get done and then you can figure out
Speaker 1: everything else. So how can you be ready instead of
Speaker 1: crazy busy? How can you make sure that even when
Speaker 1: things are crunched you are able to react rationally. Thinking
Speaker 1: of a busy e er might help. At least you
Speaker 1: will probably stay more calm in the meantime. This is Laura.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of
Speaker 1: our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to hear from you.
Speaker 1: You can send me your tips, your questions, or anything else.
Speaker 1: Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast pod that's B the number four, then breakfast
Speaker 1: p o D. You can also shoot me an email
Speaker 1: at Before Breakfast podcast at i heeart media dot com
Speaker 1: That Before Breakfast is spelled out with all the letters.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much. I look forward to staying in touch.
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast is a production of I Heart Radio. For
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Speaker 1: Yeah