Return to Work Part 2: Health and wellness before all else
To create a future that’s better than the past, and to transition successfully to a new post-COVID world, we need to pivot from a state of tension and stress to one of calm, focused and energetic leadership.
The first step toward that is to focus on ourselves. It’s to counter this stress response in our individual lives. If we’re stressed, tired and tense, we will react to situations and make mistakes. If we’re calm and energized, we will perform to our potential and take care of others at the same time. We need to build our health and wellness to be the best we can for ourselves – to realize our own ambitions and dreams – and for our colleagues, teams and family.
I’m going to give you four strategies to use right now. Making room for these in your life will advance you well ahead of what we accepted as “normal” into a new future.
Photo by Tim Foster on Unsplash
1. Breathe Deep
This first step is about interrupting the stress cycle. The way that we do that is to take a few deep breaths. This isn’t a fluffy timewaster. This is science.
There's a structure inside the brain that controls breathing called the medulla. The medulla is linked to the stress sensor, called the pituitary gland. When we take long, slow, deep breaths, we actually relax and calm down the pituitary gland, which then stops the signals going down into the body to activate the stress system.
When we relax our breathing, we relax our brain, and then we can relax our body. So we eliminate tension through breathing. The other extreme of that, by the way, is evident if you've ever seen a tennis match and heard a player scream when they hit the ball. They’re exhaling as hard as they can to activate the stress center of the brain to increase their ability to fight. So breathing works both ways. If you hyperventilate, you get stressed; if you calm your breathing down, you relax.
Use deep breathing any time you feel tension or stress. It will allow you to lead, stay open to input, and respond instead of react.
2. Focus on focus
Before the pandemic, we had far too much distraction in our world. We were mentally pulled in too many directions, raising our stress levels, depleting our energy, and undermining our performance. Add in COVID-19, and it’s worse. There are even more avenues for distraction.
World-class performers eliminate distractions and focus on what matters. Athletes, for example, put everything out of their minds but their one purpose.
Remember José Bautista’s famous bat flip? It’s the seventh inning of game five of the 2015 ALDS between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Texas Rangers. A bizarre incident has just cost the Jays a run and tied the game at 3-3, leading to about a 20-minute delay as the Toronto fans went ballistic. Bautista comes to the plate with the two managers at each other’s throats, the rivalry between these teams that have always despised each other escalating, and 50,000 people in the stands pounding their feet. Bautista then hits a homerun and wins the game for the Jays. The bat, of course, was flipped.
What does Bautista say about that moment? That he couldn’t hear anything around him. That he couldn’t see anything around him. That everything was completely out of focus except one small item: the baseball that left Texas pitcher Sam Dyson’s right hand.
For world-class performers, as pressure increases, focus narrows. That applies to us too. When we need to get stuff done, we're eliminating distractions. We're turning off our email alerts, we're turning off social, and we’re getting focused. Otherwise, we’re burning through our reservoir of mental energy too fast while also getting less done.
3. Take micro breaks
Whether you’re working from home or an office, it’s important to add periods of recovery and regeneration throughout your day. I don’t believe we can work eight (or more) hours straight and maintain our physical, mental and work wellness. Bodies suffer, brains can’t stay focused and energized, and productivity declines.
Micro breaks throughout the day increase our wellness in all areas of life. Without them, we can easily fall into a state of chronic stress. Chronic just means regular and ongoing – day after day after day. Chronic stress increases our chances of contracting physical diseases like heart disease, cancer, Type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome as well as sleep disorders, depression, anxiety, and so on.
Acute stress is different. It’s in the moment, like an end of day deadline. Or it’s lifting weights, putting stress on our muscles, resting and then repeating. You’re stronger over time. So acute stress is not harmful and is often beneficial, unless we never release it and add in recovery periods. Then, it can become chronic. We can release in a number of ways, one of which is alternating work periods with recovery periods, which are those micro breaks. If we take an intentional approach to recovery, our minds and bodies stay energized and we keep chronic stress at bay.
In short, micro breaks enable us to turn stress into health and productivity. We get mentally stronger, fitter and faster.
Take a walk. Relax and listen to some soothing music. Make a cup of coffee or tea and stop the world while you sit and sip. Meditate for five minutes. I especially suggest getting outdoors a few times if possible. Exposing yourself to nature means you inhale something called phytoncides, which are released from trees and strengthen your immune system. There’s also clear research that immersion in nature – called forest bathing in some cultures – boosts mental health as well.
Micro breaks that involve any type of body movement, meditation and quality food will keep your stress down, your mood level, and your productivity high.
4. Eat nutrient dense foods
To take care of your health and wellness and to perform at your absolute best mentally, you need to eat as well as you can. That means foods that deliver the right nutrients all day long.
Here are some basic tips to follow.
1. Choose slow-digesting complex carbohydrates to provide a steady source of energy. Avoid refined and highly-processed carbs like white flour, white bread, white rice, pastries, sodas, pasta, sweets, breakfast cereals, fruit juice and anything with added sugar. These are fine once in awhile in moderation but can’t be the staple of a healthy diet. Instead, take in carbohydrates in more whole or natural forms: whole oats, brown rice, beans, legumes, whole fruits and vegetables.
2. Eat high-quality fats. Fats are used to build the structures in your nerves like cell membranes and the myelin sheath that protects the nerve and speeds communication between neurons. Fat is not the enemy, though it can come in an unhealthy form, like trans fats. Focus on less processed fats like butter, olive oil, avocado oil, cheese and other dairy, nuts, seeds, fatty fish and whole avocados.
3. You need healthy proteins to provide the amino acids that are the precursors for the neurotransmitters used to communicate between nerve cells. For protein, just stick close to natural, whole forms: meats, fish, eggs, beans, lentils, and so on.
4. You need vitamins and minerals from fruits and vegetables for the intracellular processes that enable the nerves to function and even prolong the survival of individual nerve fibres. Eat what you enjoy from this category, though it’s probably better not to consume only high-sugar fruits all day. Mix it up.
5. Hydrate well. Every single cell in your body relies on water. Water helps transport the carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals and other nutrients that your cells need to make energy. I’m just going to say here, drink water throughout the day. Add in some coffee, green tea or others teas in moderation if you like. I won’t give you amounts to drink – just drink deeply and often.
You can see the pattern here: to fuel your thinking, creativity, problem solving and health, your brain and body need whole, fresh, unprocessed foods. Fresh cuts of meat. Eggs. Cold-water fatty wild fish. Fruits and veggies. Raw nuts and seeds. Olive oil. Coffee, green tea and black tea. These are all good options.
So as we transition into a post-COVID reality – we won’t be there for awhile, but we’re slowly moving toward it – forget about getting back to normal. Normal didn’t put your health and wellness first. We’re not just focused on staying virus-free but on lowering stress, improving focus, and adding recovery periods and quality nutrition into our days.
