274: Restful Rest

* Rough Transcript *

Introduction

Hello. It has been a while since I’ve done a solo episode of the podcast. But the recording that I thought I was going to edit for this week. What missing? So I decided that I should talk a little bit about.

Something that’s been really on my mind a lot lately, as I recover from probably the worst burnout. Or at least the longest burnout that I’ve ever dealt with. And that is. What exactly is restful. Rest.

So. What I found the last couple of summers as I’ve been recovering. Is that. When I have time off to rest, oftentimes I just get sucked into laying around on the couch or. Not getting the motivation to get up and move and do something that might actually bring me energy. And so while technically I am resting, sometimes it doesn’t actually feel restful. So I thought I’d explore a little bit about what kind of rest. Is actually restful.

5 Areas of Energy Balance

And so I thought I’d start with looking at the five areas of energy balance that I talk about in my balancing, your time and energy workbook.

Those areas include.

Physical. Which are things that are calming to your nervous system rather than putting you into fight flight mode. Emotional, which are things that are motivated by a sense of assertiveness and doing things because you want to do them rather than out of anxiety or fear. Then there’s also mental, which is kind of similar, but it’s things that really drive. You. And excite you and bring you joy. Rather than things that you do out of a sense of duty. And then social. Are the things where you feel like you can be fully you.

So you’re making connections, but you’re making those real connections where you feel like you belong rather than just fit in. And you’re not worried about walking on eggshells or putting on a certain image. And then the final area is connection, which depending on the source, some of them talk about spirituality. Some of them talk about something called pro-social connection, which is that feeling of connection to others.

So when I looked at what they all had in common, it was connection.

And that can be connection to yourself, connection to other people, or even connection to the world around you as in some sort of spiritual connection, some sort of connection to the earth, that kind of connection. So, for myself, for example. Looking at those five areas. . . .

Physical

Physical. It can be very difficult to get me motivated to get up and moving.

But one of the things that has been really great for me has been going out for walks. Now. Sometimes, if I wait too long, I feel like I’ve kind of wasted my day away. I always do feel better after a walk, but sometimes it’s helpful for me to set up a time with a friend or make a plan so that I’m getting up and moving earlier in the day and not waiting for that motivation to get up and moving.

Mental

On the mental side of things, that actually has been one of the biggest things that I’ve had to make a shift in when it comes to the things that I do to help bring me energy because. There are some physical things like eating better moving, a lot of health habits.

Because I’ve dealt with chronic fatigue and pain for pretty much my entire adult life really starting in adolescence. I’ve put a lot of pressure on myself to be better with the physical things like eating better, getting in more movement, improving my health habits. And while those things definitely can help. Oftentimes those things have felt like a duty to me. And so because of that, it can be draining if that’s the thing that I focus on first. Because if I’m doing it out of a duty, because I think I should do something, then I’m less likely to continue doing it and more likely to resent it.

And in fact, it ends up having a negative effect on my energy. Because I feel like I have to do it. And then I get mad at myself when I don’t. Whereas if I focus on doing things out of a sense of joy and really enjoying how it makes me feel. Then I can do those things in a way That actually energizes me. Rather than getting disappointed in myself when I don’t do those things. So for example, when I started doing paleo about 10 years ago, I had more energy. I lost like 40 pounds. I kept it off for a couple of years without really even trying. And the big difference was that instead of focusing on eating the way I thought I should eat. I started to pay attention to how the things I was eating made me feel. And it became a lot easier to choose to eat the things that made me feel good. Instead of eating the things that made me feel tired. Now recently, well, More than recently the last. 10 years or so I sort of slid back into that bad habits of eating things that maybe don’t feel so great to eat. And so before I can get back to that point where I’m really eating to feel good, not just eating how I think I should eat. I really have been, trying to focus on the other things first to get myself to that point where I have the energy. For meal planning and for really getting back in tune with my body so that I can tell what is feeling right.

And what’s feeling. Kind of off. So the things that I’ve been focusing on have been more of the physical, getting better sleep. Getting more movement in getting more opportunities for peace.

Emotional

And on that note of peace, things that are emotionally energizing are motivated by a feeling of assertiveness rather than anxiety or fear.

So when we do things out of a sense of assertiveness asserting our needs, asserting what it is that we want. Rather than doing something out of fear. Then we can feel more at peace with the things that we’re choosing to spend our time on.

Social

Another huge thing for me when it comes to energizing, is that social connection, because that social piece is. Super important to me. I myself am an extrovert. However, When I spend time with the wrong people. It can be super draining. And it’s not even necessarily about being the wrong people. It’s also about, do I feel like I have to make some sort of an impression. So for example, Years ago I was completely exhausted. It was the end of my school year and I did a workshop thing for public speaking. And there was this mixer afterwards, where it was an opportunity for making social connections, networking. And I was completely exhausted. But I had a friend who had her 40th birthday and I didn’t want to miss it. So even though I was tired, I decided to go. And because all of the people at that event were friends of mine, or at least most of them. There were people that I could be super comfortable with.

Relax, be myself. And I felt my energy coming back, even though I hadn’t gotten much sleep and I was pretty tired. Because I could be fully myself and not have to worry about making a certain impression. Same thing with meeting new people, even if they’re great people. They’re brand new to me. So this last trip I went on with the family. And there was a lot of new family that I got to meet and they were all amazing and it was really great to connect. But I found myself needing a lot more downtime at the end of the day. Because there are people that I don’t know super well.

At the end of the day, I was able to get some downtime and relax and be on my own.

And then finally the connection piece. Definitely ties to the social for me, because that social connection is really where I drive a lot of my energy, but also connecting to the world around me. So being out in nature, And really stepping back and enjoying it and just enjoying the peace and quiet makes me feel more connected.

So one of the things I do every now and then that has helped me a lot with kind of narrowing down what it is I should be spending my time on or. What it is that I want to be spending my time on to help improve my energy, to really feel. Actually rested, not just. In that.

Vegetative state. Is. To kind of do an audit of the activities that I’m doing from day to day and looking at each thing as to whether they are energizing for me. Or draining for me. And by decreasing the things that are draining and increasing the things that are energizing, then I can have more energy left over to do those things that I know would make me feel better in the long run, but I don’t have the immediate motivation for. And you can actually find a whole thing on how to do that In my balancing your time and energy workbook, which you can find on my website. And it walks you through all the areas of stress and energy balance, and helps you do an energy audit of your daily activities.

Motivation

And on that note of motivation, the other thing that I’ve been really looking at when it comes to stress and energy balance Has been, what is it that motivates me? To actually get up and do the things that I know are going to feel good to do in the end, because even though I can intellectually know these are activities that are going to make me feel more energized. If I’m in that kind of vegetative state or that state of inertia where I don’t want to get up, and I don’t want to get moving, I have to look at what can I find that will be helpful to motivate me to actually take those steps and actually do those things that are energizing for me.

And so looking at those things, there are a few things that are highly motivating for people with ADHD.

A lot of neurodivergent folks who have executive functioning issues. And I think my favorite one is the acronym from William Dodson. INCUP, which stands for. Interest., Novelty, challenge, urgency and passion. Now for me, a lot of people say that people with ADHD have an interest based nervous system. And while that can be true, I can actually be interested in something and still not be able to motivate myself to actually do it.

I have a lot of things I’m really interested in. And sometimes it’s too much.

Urgency

And so the number one driving factor for me, when it comes to actually getting up and doing something is urgency. Urgency is pretty much what’s driven me, my entire adult life. And that’s a big part of the reason why I get burnt out so easily because I’m driven by urgency.

 If there isn’t that urgency to get something done, it’s really hard for me to get it done. Some of the things that have helped me to. push that urgency in a positive way. You know, in work settings, you’ve got the deadlines, you’ve got the expectations of people around you. You’ve got your job expectations.

You’ve got that urgency built in. To the system, but it’s exhausting. And then you get home at the end of the day and you have stuff around the house that you’d love to get done. There’s all sorts of things that would be good to do, but there’s no more urgency because you used it all up. In the work setting.

 I’ve had to explore, how can I introduce more urgency in a positive way when it comes to the things I want to do for me and for my business. And one big thing is some sort of public accountability. Whether that’s making an announcement that I’m going to do something, recording myself. I just recorded myself, cleaning up my room yesterday and I did it on, film so that I could motivate myself to do it.

And something I thought was going to take me all day to do ended up taking me barely over an hour because I had that urgency. and motivation by declaring that I was going to do it. And then doing it. On film.

Now there are definitely some things that I don’t necessarily want to make a public announcement about or do publicly. And for those things, it’s often helpful to find someone else who could use a little bit of accountability. And have an accountability partner meet up with them once a week, twice a week, have a zoom call, whatever, and say, this is what I’m going to do this week.

And maybe work things out with them depending on what it is that you have in common. Sometimes you can bounce ideas off each other. And set a plan for what it is that you want to get done and then report back as to whether you did it. That gives a little bit of accountability and a timeline. If you set a regular meeting time.

Challenge

So I’m going out of order on the acronym because I’m kind of going in the order that I use them. And so the next area for me, when it comes to the motivation is challenge. So one of the things that I’ve observed with a lot of people with ADHD or other executive functioning issues is that we hate work. But we love a good challenge. And so if we can shift our thinking on something that feels like work and make it a challenge. Then it can actually be more motivating to get it done. So again, for example, setting the challenge to myself, to film myself, cleaning my room, it became a challenge and I actually enjoyed getting it done. Whereas if I was just doing it on my own, just for the sake of doing it, because I know I need a cleaner room to actually get anything done around here. It would feel like work and it would have taken me forever to actually get it done.

Interest

Now for the interest part, like I said, I have a ton of interests. And so I can be interested in a lot of things and still not be able to get it done because I have to pick. What it is. That I actually want to work on or focus on at any given time. So finding a way to prioritize those interests can be helpful, but if you’re in that burnout mode where nothing is interesting you at the moment, which I’ve definitely been at a year and a half ago. I wasn’t interested in much at all because my brain was just so dead that I couldn’t muster the interest in anything.

And so one thing that can be really helpful for that is looking back on what are things that you’ve been interested in in the past? What is something that really got you going at one point, even if it’s not really exciting for you right now,

if we can connect to that interest, then maybe we can reignite that spark.

And if there’s nothing in your recent past, you can even look at what are things that interested you as a child or as an adolescent. What was something that you were really into that you hadn’t really paid much attention to in a long time? Getting back into those can be really rejuvenating.

Novelty

And then of course, there’s novelty.

How can we switch things up? Make things different. Do things in a new and more exciting way.

Passion

And then finally passion again, it can be hard to find what it is that we’re passionate about because. We’re so tired and burnt out all the time. And so, similar to interest. What is it that you got passionate about in the past? For me, helping others and creativity. Those are things that I’m passionate about.

Those are things that I can really get into if I have the motivation. And so connecting to what it is that you are passionate about or what you used to be passionate about. What do they have in common? Maybe you can find something new that has similar traits.

Conclusion

So in addition to my. Balancing time and energy workbook. I also have 11 more workbooks on my website. On all sorts of different categories, I have 12 workbooks On topics like building better habits and finding your purpose. And prioritizing. So.

if you’re looking for ways to explore what you should focus on this summer. Take a look at my workbooks also we have our next community call on the healing power of music with princess Fortiay coming up this Saturday. you can join us by joining the community at community dot, embracing intensity.com. I’ll also have the recording in our guests call library. So come join us. It should be a great conversation and we can talk all about the healing power of music.