The Hidden Secret of Wellbeing For Business Owners

What if I told you that there was a secret to being more productive that also made you mentally and physically healthy? You’d want to know it, right?

And yet, everyone knows this secret… but they dismiss it. Ain’t nobody got time for that, people think.

Yet being productive doesn’t mean that you should follow what everyone else is saying and thinking. Especially when everyone else is steeped in the hustle-and-grind culture. In fact, when you follow that herd, you’ll be less productive than ever. 

So you will need to put on a little bit of a rebel attitude if you want to be productive, and if you want to put this secret to good use. And when I tell you what the secret is, you might be mad or annoyed that it’s so banal, so fair warning.

However, I will say that when most people think about this secret, they get it wrong when they try to implement it. The popular way of executing on it doesn’t really do what it’s supposed to, because most people don’t understand how the human brain actually works. (No judgment here about that by the way – we didn’t get this information in school.)

So when I reveal the secret, and after you hurl your iced coffee across the room in disgust, or roll your eyes, or raise your fist in protest, or facepalm, take a moment to breathe, gather yourself, and find out what the secret really means. How you can actually use it as a force for good, instead of another way to indulge in consumerism.

Are you ready to find out one of the best ways to boost your productivity at the office and stay mentally and physically healthy?

Are you sure?

Just going to note here, in case you were wondering, I do have a slightly sadistic streak. This is fun for me, writing a real shaggy-dog-story intro. If only I could figure a way to work a pun in here, my joy would be complete.

Ready?

Seriously, this might be the best intro I’ve ever written.

OK. Maybe the date of July 24 gives you a clue, but maybe not. 

It is, drumroll please, International Self-Care Day.

Yes, one of the most powerful productivity boosters is self-care. Hear me out though – remember, the popular conception of self-care isn’t the one that helps you be more productive and healthy.

Self-care is a necessary ingredient for improved productivity in the workplace

When you’re hustling and grinding and pounding out those 80+ hour workweeks, you might look at self-care as a luxury. Women, who in American culture are supposed to put literally everyone and everything before themselves, often think of self-care as yet another task on an impossibly long to-do list.

As a female business owner, depending on your family situation, everything that comes before you includes your business, your spouse, your kids, your pets, your elderly parents (instead of a safety net, Americans have women!), possibly your neighbors, and definitely your charitable organization(s).

That’s a long list. How could you possibly have time for yourself? Because after all, isn’t the phrase “self-care” awfully close to “selfish”? And what could be worse than people thinking you’re selfish? (Lots of things, actually.)

Plus, look at computers. They work all the time as long as they’re plugged into a power outlet.

So, you’re thinking self-care is a luxury, and honestly that’s how a lot of supposed self-care/well-being products are marketed. We’ll get into that a little later. But first, let me ask you this.

Is oxygen a luxury?

Hopefully, your immediate reaction is “no”, and if it’s not, I need to have a word with your science teacher.

You need to breathe, right? Oxygen being one of the important elements in the important act of staying alive. And when you’re depleted, like after you’ve been sick or been in an accident, the docs strap a mask onto your face and start pumping more oxygen into you to help you recover.

When you’re on the plane and the attendants are giving the safety briefing, what do they tell you to do when the oxygen masks come down? To put yours on first before you help others.

Because when you can’t breathe yourself, you can’t help anyone else. Now, let me ask you if you think that’s selfish. To help yourself so that you can help others?

No, it’s practical. You have to be able to breathe so that your mind is clear and you have enough oxygen in your bloodstream to be able to think about how to help others. And to have the strength to pull the mask down for your child or elderly parent (or whoever) and secure it so they can breathe too.

Self-care the right way is the same as putting on your oxygen mask. It’s not selfish, nor is it a luxury. It’s practical and gives you more opportunity to help others than if you don’t have enough oxygen or you’re barely surviving with everything you have to do.

How self-care makes you more productive

I stopped using the phrase “self-care” most of the time, because of the way people think about the phrase. I like to talk about recharging instead. When you don’t charge your phone or laptop battery, they draw down power until they’re useless to you. 

You can’t get anything out of a dead battery. Periodically charging the battery makes the device useful again. Charging a battery is not a luxury. When everything’s fully charged, you’ve got the opportunity for peak performance.

Same with your brain and productivity. Charge that baby up and you’ll be able to accomplish a lot more than when your productivity tank is drained. And when you’re operating on a battery that’s low, you’re not getting the performance you want.

Still, the human brain isn’t a computer. Working all the time and stuffing it full of information (that doesn’t actually help you make better decisions) drains it and makes it less likely that you’re making good decisions.

Working all the time gives you permission to do anything and everything that’s in front of you. Even if it’s not the highest and best use of your time, and even if someone else could and should be doing it. You spend more time going down rabbit holes on your feeds, and probably answer every email as it comes in.

I know for me for a while it was almost a badge of honor to answer emails within a short period of time. I thought it made me look like I was on top of things.

But most emails are busywork. Plus, very often you can’t answer them right away (especially when you’re a legal or financial business owner) because you need to think about or research the answer anyway. 

However, when your productivity tank is full and your battery recharged, you can take the time to look at what’s truly a priority, and delegate, outsource, or automate the rest. That means you spend your valuable time at work doing what’s only highest and best for you.

Not whatever comes across your desk or whatever is “faster” for you to just take care of. It might be faster the first time, but what if it occurs regularly? Maybe it’ll just take you 5 minutes to do. But if that happens every day for a couple of weeks, that 5 minutes has turned into about an hour. 

Shouldn’t you be doing something that only you as the business owner can do for an hour? That’s your time to focus on working on your business instead of in it, if nothing else.

The reason that self-care is one important way to make you effective at work is because your brain is not a computer. All that cognitively demanding work (spreadsheets, number-crunching, legal briefs, tax returns) takes a toll on your prefrontal cortex, which only has limited hours of peak operation a day.

Once you've blown through that limit, you’re mostly using the rule-of-thumb, emotion-based system that doesn’t allow for nuances or critical thinking. You need a full tank (or full battery, if you prefer) to max out the few hours a day we get for peak prefrontal work. 

And after that, your brain needs ways to rest. (This is really the basis for self-care.) 

But it’s not rest like many of us think.  It’s not all bubble baths and herb tea and stretching and yoga classes. Not that any of these are bad, and you should feel free to indulge as much as you like, but this isn’t the way to recharge your battery.

Nor is the answer to plop down on the comfy sofa with a glass of wine to binge on screens. That’s what a lot of people end up doing because they’re so tired from the day. And while it’s fine every once in a while, that’s not going to recharge your battery either.

Instead, human brains need something more like active rest, if you’re familiar with that term. Athletes who are preparing for an upcoming event or competition don’t train as hard as they can every single day. That leads to burnout and often injury. (Just like working all the time!)

But they don’t just take days off and do nothing but lounge around on the sofa. They include periods of active rest, where they’re moving their bodies, but at a slower pace. Someone who’s training for a marathon might go for a nice walk on their active rest days, for example.

Your brain wants something like that too. Not turning it off completely, but doing something different that you (and your brain) enjoy.

We live in a consumer society, so a lot of the stuff marketed as “self-care” doesn’t really have anything to do with your brain recharging, but does have a lot to do with the company’s bottom line. (The same way “social” media has nothing to do with you making connections but does have a lot to do with the platform’s bottom line of advertising dollars.)

In fact, a lot of self-care is free. You don’t have to pay anyone to give your brain active rest or to enjoy yourself. 

How to develop self-care for yourself that keeps you productive and healthy

OK, if buying sh*t (I’m drafting this on Prime Day) isn’t self-care, and bingeing your fave shows and drinking booze isn’t self-care, what is?

I’m just going to remind you that I did tell you in that magnificent intro that the secret was actually pretty banal, so bear that in mind. No reason. (Ahem.)

Sleep (seven to eight hours), plenty of physical activity each day, and nutrition are cornerstones of self-care. Invest in whatever you need to in order to make these things happen.

Can’t sleep? First of all, get your phone out of the bedroom permanently. Use that room only for sleep and sex (partnered or not). Make it cool, dark, and quiet. Got something that’s nagging at you when you’re trying to go to sleep? Write it down, and by write, I specifically mean WRITE, not type.

If you’re struggling with getting enough physical activity, think first about what’s stopping you. Schedule? Safety? Gear? Then work around it. Got kids? You can join mom groups that work out as group training, try a gym that has child care, make your spouse care for them while you exercise, or work out at home. 

Home workouts are good if you’re worried about safety or judgment or schedule. You can get all kinds of workouts on YouTube. I broke my foot during COVID and I found YouTube videos specifically for people with a broken foot so I didn't have to give up movement even when I couldn’t walk.

You can find workout gear pretty much anywhere, depending on what types of movement you want to do. You need a good sports bra – and trust me, if you have bigger boobs they’re not going to be cute, but good support is necessary. Big box stores carry athletic equipment. I got my latest set of hand weights at Target.

When it comes to nutrition, there’s no shame in making it easy. You know eating out all the time isn’t good for you, even when you skip the fast food. Get precut veggies at the grocery store. Grab one of those rotisserie chickens to take home. 

A lot of the prepared stuff that you find from big names have a lot of preservatives and extra stuff in them. Fortunately, what your grocery store makes is usually pretty decent because they expect turnover on the food so they’re not made to sit on the shelf for days on end.

Sleep, food, and movement isn’t especially countercultural. But going home to play board games with your family is. Or playing games with your friends, or playing softball in a rec league, or even creating some artwork or crafts. 

Imagine going home from your job and indulging in something that isn’t work that you enjoy! Gasp!

The thing is, this work-all-hours BS is even more of a recent invention than personal computers are. Business owners up until the past decade or so always closed up shop and went home to do other things. In the mid-1900s (ha ha ha) people would come home from their jobs and have dinner parties and go bowling or whatever. 

People had time after work to do other things, especially before TV was invented and became popular. 

Nobody really talked about self-care back then, because people weren't burning themselves out working all day and then coming home to look at work emails. Work didn't take up all your waking minutes, so you had plenty of actual leisure time that gave your brain a break and allowed you to recharge.

Protect yourself and your time by doing things that you love outside work. It makes you more productive and reduces the risk of burnout.

Recap (tl;dr):

I love a shaggy dog story. 

Self-care is critical for peak performance, but it’s more like active rest for your brain rather than trying to tune out completely. It means doing things that you enjoy that engage your brain in a different way from work, and in turn, helps you get more accomplished at work.

If you’re ready for some countercultural support in being more effective while you’re at work so you can enjoy your whole life, schedule your free consultation here to see how I can help.