Give Yourself a Break Today And Boost Your Productivity

You can’t have it all, at least not at the same time. You can’t be a great mom, great businesswoman, and champion housekeeper all at once.

So let yourself off the hook.

Before you do anything else, stand outside and look at something pretty for about 60 seconds. Yes, even though you have stuff to do. Don’t we all have stuff to do? But this is your only life. 

What do you see? Does it smell nice, like flowers or cut grass or cookies baking? Can you hear the birds? Take a nice deep breath and let your shoulders drop. (I spend a lot of my time with my shoulders up around my ears, I have to admit.)

The cool thing is, not only did you give your eyes a break by looking at the computer, and your body a break with that deep breath… you actually refreshed your brain a bit. And that makes you more productive when you get back to your computer.

You’re not a computer or a machine, you’re a human, and your operating system (OS) requires things far different from what a computer’s OS needs. 

There are companies and systems that benefit from your hustling and grinding… but you don’t. Your brain doesn’t, and your family doesn’t. Patriarchy and white supremacy benefit from you trying to juggle three major jobs and feeling like there’s something wrong with you because you can’t – when in reality no one can.

Giving yourself a break is both radical (during these times) and necessary. Resting when you need to helps you fill up your productivity tank so that you can be more effective at work.

The “hustle and grind” is toxic

When you’re busy, you don’t have time to notice what’s going on in the world around you. You don’t have time to notice, for example, that the Secretary of Defense has fired high-ranking women and people of color so that only white men are leaders. 

You might be too busy to get news instead of propaganda. For example, if you only watch a certain news channel, you might be under the impression that our nation’s capital is experiencing a giant crime wave that requires (unconstitutional) military intervention. Not only has DC’s crime rate fallen in the past few years, but there are many cities that have much higher crime rates – but they have white male mayors so they haven’t been attacked.

You also might not have noticed that income inequality has risen sharply ever since the 1980s. Or that women still – still – do the majority of childcare, eldercare, and housework (in hetero households) in addition to the hours they spend at work. 

It’s when you start to realize these things that you might want to speak out. Go to some rallies, marches, sign petitions, and so forth. But when you’re hunched in front of your screen all day and working all the hours because that’s what you’re “supposed” to do, you don’t have time to speak out, even on issues that might be important to you.

Hustle and grind culture also doesn’t allow you to have the impact you want. If you’re always doing all the things and not recharging yourself, you’ll just wear yourself down and experience burnout. You have to put on your own oxygen mask first before you can help anybody else. 

If you have a mission to help others, as many women business owners do, you’re not just hurting yourself when you grind away. You’re also hurting the people you want to help because you are not in a position to give of yourself once you’re spent.

The hustle and grind is also bad for you personally. This culture encourages you to get up at the buttcrack of dawn – even if that is not a good time for you. Rising early is not a virtuous endeavor, contrary to popular belief. Either you’re genuinely an early riser, or you’ve had to make adjustments to get the kids to school (or whatever the situation might be), or you’re just torturing yourself.

You have a human brain, and human brains work best when they get breaks after doing some hard work. Human brains also like socialization; us introverts just need less people time than extroverts, but we still need some. Your body needs you to move it on a regular basis (and your brain needs the oxygenated blood from physical movement.)

Hustle & grind culture tells you to just power through, even when your brain is fatigued. You’d be much better off taking a break and letting your brain recharge instead. This kind of culture focuses only on work, but humans need more than work to flourish. Even if you love your job, you still need other pursuits and activities.

I myself absolutely love my work and can talk to people about improving their work so they don’t have to spend so many hours at work. But I have other interests too: playing cello, participating in community events, and next month I’m taking an improv class.

If you want to be more productive, you need to focus your attention

You can’t be the best spouse, parent, businesswoman, and housekeeper all at the same time; these jobs are too big! You may need to focus on one and ease up (or ignore) the others. And sometimes, you’ll probably need a break from all of that too to just be.

Remember, also, that your life is really your own. It’s not your spouse’s or your parents’ to live, and you don’t have to nullify yourself to raise good kids. In fact, your kids will benefit by seeing you take time for yourself. You may want to stay home with your kids when they’re young, and then take on more work as they get older and learn to be independent.

If you’re trying to do everything at once, then you’re half-assing everything. (There are times when you may need to half-ass just for general mental health, but it shouldn’t be a constant thing.) If you’re taking calls from your kids while you’re working, you’ve got half your mind on the work and half your mind on the kids. Same for all the other tasks. Human brains cannot multitask and you’re kidding yourself if you think you can.

But if you could focus on work when you’re at work, then you’d be able to get a lot done pretty quickly. Focus is your superpower (and this is especially true for certain flavors of neurodivergence.)

Then when you get home, be at home. Be present with spouses and kids and parents and what all you’ve got going on. That means no work during this time. (If you want to work when the kids are in bed, fine – just no work when you’re with the kids.)

It’s so draining to constantly be rerouting your attention, and that’s why people feel so exhausted at the end of the day. When you’re splitting your attention between home and work and family and chores and everything else, you wear out your brain’s ability to think and make good decisions.

And when you’re resting, REST. Rest does not mean checking work emails. It does not mean texting colleagues (or even friends – talk to them instead.) It does not mean scrolling through social media. Paradoxically, rest isn’t always about just sitting down and doing nothing; rest can include a satisfying workout or art-making or your favorite hobby.

Boundaries for the win (and improved productivity)

To be able to rest when necessary and focus intensely at other times, you do have to set boundaries. For example, when you’re onboarding clients, let them know that the day ends at 5 or 6 (or whenever) and that any emails or phone calls after that will be dealt with the next day.

You can explain to anyone who asks that you’re trying to set things up so that you can focus on your clients when you’re in the office. Most people don’t need emails answered right away, as long as they know you’ll get back to them. When you’re rested, recharged, and refreshed, you can deliver much better value for your clients. Don’t allow beliefs about what clients want to prevent you from taking care of yourself.

At home, you may need to negotiate with your spouse about who does what. I think the easiest job to get rid of is that of housekeeper. Your spouse can clean and do laundry, and so can your kids. Same with prepping meals – kids need to know how to feed themselves when they grow up so you might as well have them start. Not to mention that you can hire a cleaner and/or buy a robot vacuum to free up some time.

Also, bear in mind that the cleanliness obsession is largely driven by P&G and other consumer companies that just need people to buy their stuff. It may even be bad for kids to have an entirely germ-free house, because their immune system needs a little exposure to build antibodies. 

Obviously, there is some amount of cleaning required so you don’t have bugs or critters in your home, and you may be more or less tolerant of stuff just lying around. But Joan Crawford isn’t coming to your house with a white glove to see if you properly cleaned your bookshelf either.

Set boundaries for times when you will focus at work and what times no one is allowed to check their phones at home (including you and your spouse.) If you don’t want your kids spending all their time on screens, then you can’t spend all your time on screens. 

Making sure you have time to recharge your brain is important. Boundaries aren’t bad and you’re not a mean person by setting them, even if you haven’t had them before. They’re there to help you do your best work without burning out.

Recap (tl;dr)

The hustle and grind is not only bad for you but also helps prop up systems of oppression. Instead, take care of yourself as a radical act of love for not only yourself but the people you want to serve.

Afraid that if you give up the hustle and grind that you’ll lose your business? We can determine your energy and time leakages at work through a quick review. Pick a time here for your free call.

Photo by Roberto Nickson on Unsplash.