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 remind yourself to relax if you know
Speaker 1: you will need downtime after something stressful or intense. Don't
Speaker 1: set yourself up to forget and then be kicking yourself
Speaker 1: when you don't get the rest that you need. Today's
Speaker 1: tip was inspired by Sarah hart unger my co host
Speaker 1: on my other podcast, Best of Both Worlds. As a
Speaker 1: practicing physician, she takes call at her hospital system every
Speaker 1: few weeks. Her particular call runs from Monday morning to
Speaker 1: Monday morning, and during this time she needs to be
Speaker 1: available quickly and often in the hospital seeing patients. She
Speaker 1: then sees patients all day Monday at the end of
Speaker 1: her call week, since that is a usual clinical day
Speaker 1: for her. So needless to say, by the Tuesday after
Speaker 1: her call week, she is pretty tired. Of course, she
Speaker 1: has lots of stuff that builds up during her call
Speaker 1: weeks that need to be dealt with, so the obvious
Speaker 1: way this plays out is that Tuesday then becomes packed,
Speaker 1: but she knows that she will not feel like doing
Speaker 1: much productive, so recently she actually wrote on her calendar,
Speaker 1: don't schedule anything for the Tuesday after her next call week.
Speaker 1: Now we all know that this may not work perfectly,
Speaker 1: but if she does go to schedule something on that Tuesday,
Speaker 1: she will be reminded of this admonition. She will need
Speaker 1: to make a conscious choice, knowing that this will be
Speaker 1: time she would desperately like to have open. I think
Speaker 1: this is a smart idea. If you too know that
Speaker 1: you will be coming out of a stressful or intense time,
Speaker 1: you may need to remind your future self to relax.
Speaker 1: For instance, if I have just given a speech, I
Speaker 1: tend to need a little downtime afterwards. That means I
Speaker 1: wind up resenting my past self. If I have assigned
Speaker 1: myself some must do task for the flight home, or
Speaker 1: I just don't do it and I have to deal
Speaker 1: with the schedule realities of making that choice, it would
Speaker 1: be better just to acknowledge that all I will want
Speaker 1: to do is read a magazine and build my workflow
Speaker 1: around that truth. Or sometimes people who are very much
Speaker 1: mourning people decide that they will finish up a work
Speaker 1: project after they get the kids to bed at night.
Speaker 1: Then they are predictably exhausted, and can't make it work,
Speaker 1: or it takes twice as long as it should. Better
Speaker 1: to figure out another time, even if it means getting
Speaker 1: up a little earlier in the morning. You would think
Speaker 1: we would remember to relax, but we don't always. So
Speaker 1: if you are going to desperately want some downtime in
Speaker 1: the future after something you know will deplete you, don't
Speaker 1: rely on luck. Come up with some way to remind yourself.
Speaker 1: Put a giant block on your calendar or write a
Speaker 1: message on a paper calendar. Tell your assistant to check
Speaker 1: with you before scheduling things, even if he or she
Speaker 1: normally has the ability to make these decisions. When people
Speaker 1: feel unproductive, it is often because they have set themselves
Speaker 1: up to do work that is not a good match
Speaker 1: for the amount of energy they have. So if you
Speaker 1: can see a low energy time coming up, make a
Speaker 1: plan to deal with it. Remind yourself to relax, and
Speaker 1: there is a slightly greater chance that you actually will
Speaker 1: in the meantime. This is Laura. Thanks for listening, and
Speaker 1: here's to making the moose of our time. Thanks for
Speaker 1: listening to before breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback,
Speaker 1: you can reach me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com.
Speaker 1: Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts
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Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.