Speaker 1: Sometimes you can be productive, but it doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: you're effective. Productive means you get a lot of things done.
Speaker 1: Effective means you get big, important things done. And I
Speaker 1: find that when I'm exhausted and I'm tired, I struggle
Speaker 1: to do those effective things, even if I'm able to
Speaker 1: do a lot of things and check them off. Hey, everyone,
Speaker 1: welcome back to On Purpose, the number one health podcast
Speaker 1: in the world. Thanks to each and every one of
Speaker 1: you that come back every week to listen, learn and grow.
Speaker 1: Now I'm going to be honest with you. It's nine
Speaker 1: fifteen PM and I have been working around fourteen to
Speaker 1: fifteen hours a day this past week. I am tired.
Speaker 1: I am really, really tired. And today's episode is inspired
Speaker 1: by that. The truth is, if you've been overworking, get
Speaker 1: some sleep. If you're on the verge of burnout, please
Speaker 1: please please speak to a doctor, speak to a medical professional,
Speaker 1: take a break. The reason I'm recording this episode and
Speaker 1: podcast is because I often think that we sometimes get
Speaker 1: into these situations where we've overworked a little bit. We
Speaker 1: need to push through that last little step. But I
Speaker 1: would say that if you can get sleep right now,
Speaker 1: if you can get rest right now, please please take it.
Speaker 1: This is for those of you who know that you
Speaker 1: just need to push a little bit further, and I'm
Speaker 1: going to give you some advice that will help you
Speaker 1: push through. But I still want you to get some sleep. Now,
Speaker 1: Why am I tired? I flew to Egypt for twenty
Speaker 1: four hours. Just so you know, there is a connecting
Speaker 1: flight from la to Egypt. It takes in total, door
Speaker 1: to door, probably around twenty six hours. I was in
Speaker 1: Egypt for exactly twenty four hours, and then I came back.
Speaker 1: I went for work, I came back, went to a
Speaker 1: work dinner. The moment I came back, showered, went to
Speaker 1: that dinner, came back, woke up the next morning, and
Speaker 1: started a full work week. And then, because it's the
Speaker 1: week before the Oscars, had a lot of events to attend.
Speaker 1: In the evening work dinners, i'd client meetings, lots of
Speaker 1: different things going on, and in the daytime, I was
Speaker 1: recording podcasts, interviewing amazing guests. It's been a fulfilling week.
Speaker 1: It's been an amazing week. I feel so grateful that
Speaker 1: I've had this week. But the reality is also to
Speaker 1: accept that I'm tired. Now. I know you can relate
Speaker 1: to this. I know so many of you listening right
Speaker 1: now a feeling like Jay. I am tired too, I
Speaker 1: am exhausted too. Maybe you've had too much on at
Speaker 1: the weekends. Maybe your family was just in town, maybe
Speaker 1: you've been going through some personal stuff, whatever it is,
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you chose to be here, and I'm
Speaker 1: so happy that we get to try and talk about
Speaker 1: this together so that I can share some insights that
Speaker 1: help keep me going when this is going on in
Speaker 1: my life. So studies show that around fifty percent of
Speaker 1: people report feeling tired between three and seven days a week.
Speaker 1: The results also reveal a gender gap. Women were sleepy
Speaker 1: on an average of three point four days a week
Speaker 1: and men were tired two point seven days on average. Now,
Speaker 1: only sixteen percent of respondents reported not feeling sleepy at
Speaker 1: all during a typical week. Sleepiness cited by fifty eight
Speaker 1: percent of all respondents. Most commonly affected respondents mood, followed
Speaker 1: by the willingness to go out in the evening, ability
Speaker 1: to focus and exercise, and productivity. Now, the most common
Speaker 1: coping strategy, studies say is to shake it off and
Speaker 1: keep going. Sixty two percent of respondent said that, followed
Speaker 1: by getting fresh air which was thirty five percent, drinking
Speaker 1: coffee with thirty three percent. You know who you are,
Speaker 1: and those are not the strategies I'm going to be
Speaker 1: sharing in today's episode. Why because I believe that there
Speaker 1: are a different set of habits that I practice, that
Speaker 1: I look upon, that I try and embody when I
Speaker 1: am in this position now, I don't allow myself, I
Speaker 1: would like to say, to get into this position very often.
Speaker 1: I'll make sure that I rested the weekends and I'll recoup.
Speaker 1: I make sure that I get some extra early sleep
Speaker 1: the night before. So this is a rare occurrence for me,
Speaker 1: but nevertheless, I have a plan for when this happens.
Speaker 1: I've been working every weekend for the past month, and
Speaker 1: so I've been a little out of sync with my schedule,
Speaker 1: and therefore I have to have a plan now. The
Speaker 1: reasons that people say they are struggling with their energy
Speaker 1: is long work hours fifty three another thing, obviously during
Speaker 1: the lockdown, we're staying indoors, too much screen time is
Speaker 1: tiring for people, and a lack of regular routine. These
Speaker 1: were the leading causes for prolonged feelings of exhaustion. So
Speaker 1: today I'm going to share with you the habits and
Speaker 1: practices I use to help me when I need to
Speaker 1: get work done, even when I'm tired or exhausted. The
Speaker 1: first thing that I do is that I'm genuinely clear
Speaker 1: about how much energy this is truly going to require.
Speaker 1: I ask myself how much energy is this truly going
Speaker 1: to require? Because when I'm tired, often we're not able
Speaker 1: to properly associate time and space. How many of you,
Speaker 1: when you're tired, feel you make bad decisions? Right when
Speaker 1: we feel fatigued, when we feel exhaustion, we make poor decisions.
Speaker 1: How do we make better decisions by actually trying to
Speaker 1: get accurate by thinking about how much energy this task
Speaker 1: that we need to accomplish is genuinely going to require,
Speaker 1: and we have to base it on how much energy
Speaker 1: it's taken in the past, if we've done the task before,
Speaker 1: and when we're honest about the energy, we can then
Speaker 1: check in with ourselves and ask ourselves, can I rise
Speaker 1: to that energy level? Can I bring it to that
Speaker 1: energy level? And the question even more succinctly is what
Speaker 1: is the minimum energy required to do this? Often when
Speaker 1: we're tired, we're thinking this thing's going to take maximum energy,
Speaker 1: but it's not what is the minimum energy that this
Speaker 1: thing is going to require from us to complete? Because
Speaker 1: can we rise to that minimum energy is really the
Speaker 1: question that you have to ask, Now, what do you
Speaker 1: do with that? Chances are you too tired, so you're thinking, oh, well,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm probably not gonna give the right answer,
Speaker 1: and I'm probably not going to make the right decision.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite things is this time is to
Speaker 1: go and grab a couple of dates. What I love
Speaker 1: about grabbing a couple of dates is that dates are
Speaker 1: high in natural sugars. So if you need a quick
Speaker 1: burst of energy, instead of going for a second cup
Speaker 1: of coffee, go for a handful of dates. And if
Speaker 1: you don't like them playing, you can actually make some
Speaker 1: energy balls or put them into oatmeal bars. The thing
Speaker 1: about dates is that they have an excellent nutrition profile,
Speaker 1: says Healthline. Since they're dried, their calorie content is higher
Speaker 1: than most fresh fruit. The calorie content of dates is
Speaker 1: similar to that of other dried fruits such as raisins
Speaker 1: and figs, and they're high in fiber, with almost seven
Speaker 1: grams of fiber in a three point five out serving.
Speaker 1: Including dates in your diet is a great way to
Speaker 1: increase your fiber intake. So for me, grabbing those dates
Speaker 1: before I make a decision to assess the amount of
Speaker 1: energy I have is a fantastic way to know how
Speaker 1: I'm going to feel when I take on this next
Speaker 1: task that I have in front of me. The reason
Speaker 1: why this is fascinating is that they found this research
Speaker 1: in a study of judges in a courtroom. They found
Speaker 1: that judges gave more lenient sentences after lunch than they
Speaker 1: did just before lunch. When judges gave sentences just before lunch,
Speaker 1: those people received the harshest sentences because judges were likely hungry,
Speaker 1: thirsty and waiting to eat. They had lost their energy,
Speaker 1: they were feeling a sense of fatigue, so they made
Speaker 1: poorer decisions now when they were able to go and
Speaker 1: get lunch in them. When they came back, now that
Speaker 1: they were feeling fresh and alert, this sentences changed. Now
Speaker 1: that's obviously worrying to hear in a courtroom, but the
Speaker 1: same thing applies to us. If we're doing decision based activities,
Speaker 1: we need to make sure we've eaten, We need to
Speaker 1: make sure we have some energy. If we're trying to
Speaker 1: do discipline based activities. We need to be careful about
Speaker 1: knowing how much energy we need so that we don't overexert. Now,
Speaker 1: another thing I'm going to say is how do you
Speaker 1: get work done when you're tired or exhausted? Is that
Speaker 1: you perform easier or harder tasks. Now, this is something
Speaker 1: I want you to think about, reflect on, and understand
Speaker 1: about yourself. Some of us get energy from doing harder
Speaker 1: tasks first, and some of us get energy from doing
Speaker 1: easier tasks first. We all feel different ways of momentum,
Speaker 1: and you only know this by observing yourself. I use
Speaker 1: someone who feels like, yes, I've got the first task
Speaker 1: of the day done. It was easy, it was simple.
Speaker 1: I'm done. Now I feel confident to move on. Or
Speaker 1: you say to yourself, you know what, if I accomplish this,
Speaker 1: I can do anything right. So you're going to start
Speaker 1: with the hardest. Neither is right or wrong. There used
Speaker 1: to be a time when I thought either raw, But
Speaker 1: I've started to realize that everyone's mind works so differently
Speaker 1: that it's so important for us to be aware. So
Speaker 1: I find that I like to start my day doing
Speaker 1: something difficult. It may be a cold shower. It may
Speaker 1: be a cold plunge, something that makes me feel like
Speaker 1: I can accomplish the rest of the day. I did
Speaker 1: say that you could start with easy or harder first,
Speaker 1: because we are all different, but studies do show that
Speaker 1: doing the easy thing first can be less productive. The
Speaker 1: idea is reinforced by behavioral research that shows that starting
Speaker 1: with easier tasks first is not helpful overall. Studies say
Speaker 1: that the data shows this is the case, even though
Speaker 1: it can initially feel good to take the path of
Speaker 1: least resistance in an attempt to get the ball rolling.
Speaker 1: The human brain is wide to feel positive about short
Speaker 1: term rewards, so we're more inclined to take actions that
Speaker 1: result in gaining those short term rewards, and hardest tasks
Speaker 1: require you to be more patient, to be more resilient.
Speaker 1: The stress of putting off a difficult task negatively affects
Speaker 1: productivity towards all other tasks performed. So because you keep
Speaker 1: putting off that hard task and you keep trying to
Speaker 1: get these quick wins, these quick dopamine hits, you can
Speaker 1: often set yourself up for just stress and pressure of
Speaker 1: putting something off again and again and again. The other
Speaker 1: thing we have to realize is that studies show that
Speaker 1: after a fifty hour work week. Scientists have found that
Speaker 1: the work output of an employee workforce drops off a
Speaker 1: cliff once the number of hours passes fifty five hours,
Speaker 1: work output is almost nil due to exhaustion. So we
Speaker 1: really have to take a look at our whole week
Speaker 1: and ask ourselves, are we really pushing too far too often?
Speaker 1: The study is going to say that the impact of
Speaker 1: this decline in being effective is that people who work
Speaker 1: seventy hours a week are achieving next to nothing in
Speaker 1: the extra fifteen hours they choose to work. Now, I
Speaker 1: can relate, and I would debate that also, I feel
Speaker 1: like I can be effective and productive. Actually, let me
Speaker 1: explain that sometimes you can be productive, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: mean that you're effective. Productive means you get a lot
Speaker 1: of things done. Effective means you get big, important things done.
Speaker 1: And I find that when I'm exhausted and I'm tired,
Speaker 1: I struggle to do those effective things, even if I'm
Speaker 1: able to do a lot of things and check them off.
Speaker 1: We've been getting so many amazing reviews for The Daily Jay,
Speaker 1: my new daily guided meditation series on the car map.
Speaker 1: You might have heard a couple of snippets on the
Speaker 1: podcast for a few weeks, so in case you haven't
Speaker 1: had the chance to check it out, I just wanted
Speaker 1: to share this review from Caitlin, an elementary school teacher
Speaker 1: from New Jersey. He's what she had to say. I
Speaker 1: have over nine years of experience in the American public
Speaker 1: school education system, including teaching throughout the pandemic. Over the
Speaker 1: past two years, I've seen extreme cases of anxiety in
Speaker 1: my students like never before. Many of these children have
Speaker 1: never experienced these feelings before, and most are not even
Speaker 1: sure of what they are feeling. My school district has
Speaker 1: spent a great deal of time focusing on social emotional
Speaker 1: learning SEL through this school year. We try to teach
Speaker 1: coping skills and focus on teaching kids how to deal
Speaker 1: with their feelings and become the best version of themselves.
Speaker 1: As someone who has also been experiencing the many anxieties
Speaker 1: of the world today, I have recently downloaded the car
Speaker 1: mapp thanks to my mom. My mom and I are
Speaker 1: big fans of yours, and once she heard that you
Speaker 1: will have seven minutes of daily Jay each day, she
Speaker 1: encouraged me in doing this. Your meaningful ideas and meditation
Speaker 1: have quickly become part of my daily routine, so much
Speaker 1: that I've begun incorporating some of them into my sel
Speaker 1: morning meetings with my third graders. If you've ever wanted
Speaker 1: to meditate with me, join me on the car map
Speaker 1: for the Daily Jay, a daily guided meditation where I'll
Speaker 1: help you find calm in the chaos, plant beautiful intentions
Speaker 1: for a happy, abundant life and simple steps for positive
Speaker 1: actions to get you closer to the life of your dreams.
Speaker 1: Meditate with me by going to calm dot com forward
Speaker 1: slash Jay to get forty percent off a Calm Premium
Speaker 1: membership that's only forty two dollars for the whole year
Speaker 1: for a daily guided meditation experience the Daily JA only
Speaker 1: on Calm Now. One of my other habits that I
Speaker 1: love to do when I'm trying to get work done
Speaker 1: when I'm feeling tired is get a shower. I remember
Speaker 1: turning up to an event and I'd been asked to
Speaker 1: go on stage at nine thirty pm. That is my bedtime.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine I get to an event, there's thousands
Speaker 1: of people in the audience, I'm asked to go on
Speaker 1: stage in nine thirty PM and in my head, I'm
Speaker 1: thinking it's going to be my bedtime. How do I
Speaker 1: wake up? And sometimes I'm jetlagged two the other way
Speaker 1: where I'm really tired at that time. One of my
Speaker 1: favorite tips so this time is to take a shower.
Speaker 1: I know it sounds obvious, but a cold showers. Wow.
Speaker 1: Taking a shower can refresh you in the best way.
Speaker 1: So the studies say that, aside from boosting your mood,
Speaker 1: research suggests that bathing can reduce inflammation, help you sleep better,
Speaker 1: soothe muscle problems, and help with depression. There's a reason
Speaker 1: that a cult shower wakes you up in the morning,
Speaker 1: studies say, as the lower temperature increases oxygen intake and
Speaker 1: heart rate to release blood through the body. So taking
Speaker 1: a shower can be a huge wind towards working even
Speaker 1: when you're feeling tired. Now there's also a habit element here.
Speaker 1: You're used to taking a shower at the start of
Speaker 1: the day, and now you're able to perform. When you
Speaker 1: take a shower, it's almost like a mental note or
Speaker 1: a mental rewiring to say, let's start again, Let's start
Speaker 1: the day again. This has been a huge tip and
Speaker 1: trick for me that has helped me when I'm really, really,
Speaker 1: truly feeling exhausted. Now, the next tip that I want
Speaker 1: to share with you is the music that you listen to.
Speaker 1: I remember learning about something called the Mozart effect, which
Speaker 1: is listening to classical music, and it's incredible. You think
Speaker 1: this would put you to sleep, but actually it can
Speaker 1: help you be more productive because it can help you
Speaker 1: become more focused. And one of the biggest reasons is
Speaker 1: because classical music doesn't have lyrics, which means you can't
Speaker 1: sing along, you can't get distracted. You can actually just
Speaker 1: move at the pace of the music. Nature sounds, again
Speaker 1: have been sown to remove distraction. When you listen to
Speaker 1: nature sounds, you still feel like you're attentive, but you
Speaker 1: still feel like you can focus. Often we don't realize
Speaker 1: that you can build your own distraction right. Music is
Speaker 1: like building your own distraction. Your mind is enough to
Speaker 1: be entertained by, but you actually are able to focus. Now.
Speaker 1: Some reasons suggest that it's not the type of music
Speaker 1: that it's important, but it's actually music between fifty and
Speaker 1: eighty beats per minute. Doctor Emma Gray, a cognitive behavioral therapist,
Speaker 1: worked with Spotify to research the benefits of certain types
Speaker 1: of music. She found that listening to music set in
Speaker 1: the fifty to eighty beat range puts the brain into
Speaker 1: an alpha state. Now there's an interesting one that's next,
Speaker 1: and it's exercise. I missed the first day of the
Speaker 1: week this week for exercise because I was too tired.
Speaker 1: Rarely do I allow myself to do that, and I
Speaker 1: was so happy when I got back to it. Now,
Speaker 1: how did you make that decision? Everyone's thinking, Jay, how
Speaker 1: did you decide to either go to the gym or
Speaker 1: not go to the gym? And here's how I'm going
Speaker 1: to tell you. I made the decision. If I'm feeling unwell,
Speaker 1: when I'm exhausted or tired, I will choose to do
Speaker 1: low intensity workouts. I'll choose to do workouts that are
Speaker 1: not stressful on my nervous system. If I'm just feeling lazy,
Speaker 1: and then I'll force myself to go and continue on. Now,
Speaker 1: how do you know if you're feeling tired, exhausted, or lazy?
Speaker 1: How do you truly know that. I've been trying to
Speaker 1: ask myself this question. I know that I'm lazy when
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about how I feel right now, not how
Speaker 1: I'm going to feel after I go to the gym,
Speaker 1: and I'd say more often than not, I know I'm
Speaker 1: going to feel great after the gym. Now, the difference
Speaker 1: between tiredness and exhaustion is that you're feeling in your body,
Speaker 1: not just your mind. So how is your body feeling
Speaker 1: is how is your mind and head feeling? Are your
Speaker 1: muscles aching? Is your body feeling heavy or tense? Now
Speaker 1: that does mean you shouldn't go to the gym. I'm
Speaker 1: just saying that when you're on that verge of being
Speaker 1: truly exhausted, it is important to give yourself good sleep.
Speaker 1: But the key to that is sleeping earlier. Right, the
Speaker 1: human growth hormone also known as HGH is more active
Speaker 1: in the early hours of sleep and ideally before midnight,
Speaker 1: so that earlier you can get to sleep tonight, the
Speaker 1: better you're going to feel. The next tip is something
Speaker 1: that's become trendy recently, which is using standing desks. But
Speaker 1: the idea to stand and John Paulson talks about a
Speaker 1: twenty eleven study by the CDC that noted a fifty
Speaker 1: four percent decrease in musclo skeletal pain among workers who
Speaker 1: alternated from sitting to standing throughout the day, and John
Speaker 1: Paulson also talked about another study in twenty fourteen by
Speaker 1: the University of Cincinnati that reported significant decreases in shoulder
Speaker 1: and back pain when participants varied their postures. He went
Speaker 1: on to say that when we sit for too long,
Speaker 1: everything in our bodies slows down. John Paulson said it's
Speaker 1: harder to clear fats from blood, to process insulin to
Speaker 1: keep muscles active and spines flexible, leading to soreness and
Speaker 1: possible organ damage. He went on to say that even
Speaker 1: our mental functions slow because we're not moving enough to
Speaker 1: pump much blood to the brain. So even while I'm
Speaker 1: doing this podcast right now, I'm stretching upwards, I'm raising
Speaker 1: my hands above my head and pushing my hands behind me.
Speaker 1: I'm rolling my shoulders. The idea of moving when we're
Speaker 1: tired is counterintuitive, but it can be so powerful to
Speaker 1: grasp the energy to increase more energy in the body
Speaker 1: when you are feeling tired. The next tip is something
Speaker 1: I'm going to share that I'm experimenting with right now.
Speaker 1: It's something I've never done in my life, but I'm
Speaker 1: starting to realize that it may be something to play
Speaker 1: around with. It's the idea of napping. So studies show
Speaker 1: that naps lasting ten to twenty minutes are considered the
Speaker 1: ideal length. They're sometimes referred to as power naps because
Speaker 1: they provide recovery benefits without leaving the nap of feeling
Speaker 1: sleepy afterward. Now, some of the benefits of napping, study
Speaker 1: show include reducing sleepiness, improving learning, aiding memory formation, and
Speaker 1: regulating emotions. Again, that decision making is improved through napping,
Speaker 1: so the Sleep Foundation shared some really great tips on
Speaker 1: how to get an ideal nap. The first is to
Speaker 1: set an alarm. Studies show that the best nap length
Speaker 1: for most people is about ten to twenty minutes. This
Speaker 1: provides restorative sleep without drowsiness after waking up. The other
Speaker 1: thing is to nap early. Sleep Foundation says napping late
Speaker 1: in the day can affect your ability to fall asleep
Speaker 1: at bedtime. Try napping around halfway point between the time
Speaker 1: you wake up and the time you plan to go
Speaker 1: to bed. Usually you might think, well, that's a waste
Speaker 1: of time, like, oh my gosh, if I fall asleep
Speaker 1: and then what if I don't wake up again, that's
Speaker 1: gonna be hard right. But here's the thing. You've got
Speaker 1: to remind yourself that it's not just about being awake,
Speaker 1: it's not just about getting it done. It's again going
Speaker 1: back to the first thing I said, what energy do
Speaker 1: you need to make this decision or complete this task?
Speaker 1: If it is something that requires your best energy, that
Speaker 1: requires your focused approach, all going to be required to
Speaker 1: take that rest. Do not ignore this advice because it's
Speaker 1: so easy to think, well, I just need to get
Speaker 1: this done, Jay, I'm so busy, I just need to
Speaker 1: make this happen. Sometimes taking a break and a pause
Speaker 1: can be the best thing you can do. One of
Speaker 1: my favorite things is to create a five minute gap
Speaker 1: between each of my meetings. In that five minutes, So
Speaker 1: if my meeting finishes at ten thirty, the next one
Speaker 1: starts at ten thirty five. If my meeting finishes at eleven,
Speaker 1: the next one starts at eleven h five. Or make
Speaker 1: all your meetings fifty five minutes. I don't know who
Speaker 1: invented this idea that your meetings had to be an hour.
Speaker 1: They could be thirty minutes, they could be seventeen, they
Speaker 1: could be twenty five, they could be forty five. But
Speaker 1: we've become these people who set thirteen minute or sixty
Speaker 1: minute meetings. Make them fifty five minutes, make them twenty
Speaker 1: five minutes, and in that five minutes, do these five things.
Speaker 1: Stand up, walk, hydrate, look out into the distance, and stretch. Right,
Speaker 1: those are the five things you do in five minutes.
Speaker 1: Notice how pulling out your phone was not one of them.
Speaker 1: Stand up, walk about, hydrate, look at the distance, and stretch.
Speaker 1: These are five habits that you need to do in
Speaker 1: the five minutes between meetings so you don't carry the
Speaker 1: baggage of the last meeting into the next meeting. That's
Speaker 1: one of the most unhealthy things that removes our productivity,
Speaker 1: that makes us even more tired because it just keeps
Speaker 1: challenging our ability to think straight. And I'm going to
Speaker 1: share one final thing that I recommend we all do
Speaker 1: when we're feeling exhausted and tired but we need to
Speaker 1: get some work done, is do it and then reward yourself.
Speaker 1: Get it done, Do it, and then reward yourself with
Speaker 1: an early night's sleep, Reward yourself with a relaxing weekend.
Speaker 1: Plan out the reward. Not only does that give you
Speaker 1: excitement that you have something planned for after getting this
Speaker 1: work done will actually give you the relaxation you need.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for listening to today's episode. Make
Speaker 1: sure you pass it on to someone who needs it,
Speaker 1: and come back next week for another episode of On Purpose.
Speaker 1: Thank you everyone,