Last week’s post chimed in with the half-way mark of the year and we looked at 5 things you can do to make this half-time reflection point work for you. Point 1 on that list was to take a break, so this week, I thought it would be helpful to share some pointers I learned, from one of my mentors, on how to use holidays and downtime to get an unfair advantage. [Note- this is a bit of a lengthy post but for those who choose to read to the end, hopefully one that’s packed with value you can take away and implement.]
I am one week into our holiday in Spain and having an amazing time with my family so far.
It’s probably fair to say that many of us subscribe to Rob Moore’s philosophies in his book Life Leverage (if you haven’t read it, I encourage you to) – we all want to work less and succeed more. However, it’s all too easy for us to fall into the mode of trying to ‘outwork’ the next guy and keep pushing through with grit and a string of late nights at the desk. This is OK at times but the longer term result is willpower depletion, motivation depletion and reduction in overall effectiveness.
This is where summer holidays can really come to the rescue.
[As a quick bit of back context it’s important to understand (I’m sure many of you do) that our mental energy and willpower is a like a tank of finite resource that gradually depletes over the course of the day/week/month.
Our ability to solve problems is inversely related to mental energy depletion. Specifically, our ability and strength in these 4 key areas dramatically reduces:
-thought control -i.e. rabbit holes, bright shiny objects
-emotional control – i.e. positive thinking and mood control
-impulse control- i.e. resisting temptations
-performance control – i.e. focused problem solving, perseverance]
So now you know a bit more of the neuroscience behind what’s going on with the grey matter, what can be done about it on holiday?
Here’s the one-two punch suggestion from my business psychologist mentor:
Punch #1: How to come up with bold ideas over the summer – this might be ideas to do with how you find that first JV partner, how to double your SA portfolio in the next 6 months, or something unrelated to property.
- Read (holidays are a great time to give yourself permission to read for way longer than usual, so use the time to fill your head with the right “ingredients”)
- Have conversations with interesting people (you never know who you’ll meet through travel, events, dinners, sport, picnics etc so look for opportunities to tap into smart people, be open to alternative expertise outside of your industry, you may not have to look any further than a family member at a BBQ!)
- Be open to tangential connections (mull things over, give yourself permission to think creatively and laterally- new holiday environments are great for helping with this)
- PLAY! (literally, feed your mind the problem, go have fun being where you are fully engaged in the activity (tennis and snowboarding are great for this) then leave it alone for your subconscious to get to work on coming up with some solutions.)
Punch #2: How to replenish your energy tank and build the discipline muscle:
- Sleep (holiday is the perfect time to let your body wake up naturally in the morning)
- Get your diet right (yes enjoy your food and drink but use the luxury of time during the holidays to choose and prepare healthy meals/snacks that don’t peak and trough your blood sugar like processed foods and refined sugars)
- Don’t make big decisions (i.e. put on hold big decision making that may stress you out until you have replenished the tank)
- Spend time on “Implementation Intentions” (if/then planning – these are v powerful but a whole post in themselves, if curious learn more here http://99u.com/articles/7248/how-to-use-if-then-planning-to-achieve-any-goal or here http://www.developgoodhabits.com/if-then-plan/ )
- Transmute R&R into motivation (if you truly let yourself indulge in some downtime, you’ll probably find you naturally become motivated to get stuck into some meaty work again)
- Give your Inner child gratification (this is a big one. In other words, if you’ve been pushing through and working hard for weeks it’s means you’ve probably been suppressing your inner child i.e. that part of you that just wants to go outside and play. This uses up tremendous willpower. So, let your inner child out, kids are great for helping you with this ie get out and go boogie boarding with your kids.
I’m conscious this is quite heavy material so kudos to those who read the post through. I’m personally fascinated with this behavioural science/human performance stuff so I do hope it’s useful to others out there and I’d love to hear from you if it is.
Until next week, happy holidays!