The surprising secret to sustainable rest

Tiffany Sauder [00:00:01]:

Welcome to scared confident. I'm your host, Tiffany Sauder. I just got introduced to the thinking of this guy. His name is Nick Petrie. He's, like, a leadership researcher and speaker from, like, the UK something. And so I was reading a little bit of his stuff. I thought this was really interesting. There's, like, a clue, I think, to rest inside of his work.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:00:26]:

So he's kind of going down this hole right now in his work, where he's really studying burnout. And he says in his interviews on high performing people who didn't burn out. So, like, people who are in really big jobs that are in it in a way that is, like, super sustainable, which to me is the holy grail of life, to get to a place where you're operating at a really high level. And what I mean by that is not, like, organizationally at a high level, but that, like, you know, you are executing against your gifts and talents in a really full way. That's what I mean by that. So he said when they went and did these interviews with these high performing people, people who. Who were not burnt out, there was an interesting pattern, and that most of them had what he called an “opposite world” outside of work. So it was like, an activity or a hobby that put them into a state, which was the direct opposite of the mindset that they have to work in.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:01:22]:

So I have said this before on my podcast, but my hairdresser said to me before, those people who work with their minds oftentimes rest with their hands, and vice versa. Those people who work with their hands rest with their minds. This is so interesting. So think about my work generally as a knowledge worker. So I love to cook and organize and putz around, do stuff like that to rest, because it's tactile. And it's not just my brain. I don't like sitting down to watch movies or read books. It's, like, not really a rest and recharge kind of thing.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:01:59]:

It very much looks like physical activity to me. I would say, like, exercising, taking a walk, that kind of thing as well, vice versa. Or, like, in contrast, I don't know. I don't think that's the right word. But in contrast, Alandra, she is working with her hands all day long, and so she likes to rest with her mind. Like, you know, get on her computer and do some research on, like, a project that she's working on at home. Like, things like that. Be creative in that way is a way that she recharges.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:02:23]:

So I thought this was, like, interesting. His work is in a researcher way beginning to have some evidence against, I feel like more of like a colloquial observation that we made that the way that you work and the way that you rest are oftentimes juxtaposed with one another. So what? Nick went further with this and said, okay, of all these, there's like 800 people that they researched. Their observation again, of these people who are in high capacity, high functioning jobs that have said, yeah, I am actually at a place where this is sustainable. I'm not burnout. People's opposite worlds fell into six like, zones or six key areas. And those six are this physical exercise, artistic, some type of a creative expression, like painting or something like that. Being in nature, being with animals, volunteering or home tasks, like handyman, you know, like fixing something, doing some construction.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:03:18]:

So again, I think this is interesting physical exercise, doing something artistic, being in nature, like hiking, being with animals, volunteering and home tasks, those are all physical activities. I think that is really interesting. And so if you're trying to figure out, like, how do I find rest? I think we can sometimes think that looks like being sedentary in some way, taking a nap, watching a movie, going out to dinner, whatever that needs to look like. But I have actually found that those don't always create rest. I mean, I'm a heck of a napper, so I do love taking naps. I'm a very good napper. So sometimes rest looks exactly like rest. But to find really strategic balance and strategic rest, we think we have to be really thoughtful about thinking.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:04:09]:

Think across these six zones. When I say these, there's going to be a couple that like, stand out to you. I think cooking probably falls underneath home tasks, but like physical exercise, yes. For me, that's definitely a creative outlet. Artistic is the next one. I love to get my sewing machine out, which is equal parts creative and kind of engineering and very tactile. And there's like a very clear finish. And to me that is like an important counterbalance to this, like, perpetual world of like, making the next one a little bit better that I live in, in my professional life.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:04:43]:

Like stuff like the podcast is never done. Like, an episode is done, but there's another one that has to happen. Like, social media is never done. There's another post has to, like, the website's never done, the presentation is never done like that. Never doneness. I have to have a counterbalance to that work reality, or I start to feel like nothing is getting done in my life nature. That's like, not really a deep one for me. Not that you're asking, but being outside, for sure, but, like, being one with the bears, not so much.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:05:15]:

But maybe I say the word nature and you're like, ah, that's my happy place. Animals, we don't need to say, I do people. Not pets or plants, but that's my own problem. So animals. And then the last two were volunteering and home tasks. I will say volunteering when I get a chance to include my kids is definitely something that can give me a sense of recharge. Like us focusing on things that are not our schedules, not our closets, like, just not us, you know, like, let's just please get the energy and focus off of us and get it into the outside world. And where there's need, that is certainly a place that I think we can find rest and recharge.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:05:57]:

And then the last one is home tasks. Again, mostly, I would say, high on outsourcing on this one, sort of like pets, but I love to cook, so I don't know, that falls into, that's almost like artistry to me. It's like flavors and textures and feels like artistic. It's just a different kind of canvas. But anyway, it doesn't actually matter to you what my rest formats are. I think what's important is that you, like, really think about how do you customize what your rest looks like? And maybe it doesn't look like a sedentary behavior. Maybe it actually needs to be a physical counterbalance. Or like Nick Petrie says, like, how do you create your opposite world? How do you create that world that you live in? I think that is really just so, so interesting and cool.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:06:44]:

Home projects. He has like a checklist here. Gardening, fixing things, mowing the lawn, working on cars, renovating, cleaning and washing dishes. Nope, those are not things that give me energy, but they might. You, you know, you get the point. So anyways, I think it's really interesting. You can google it. Nick Petrie.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:07:00]:

P e t r I etainde and opposite world. If you want to learn a little bit more. But I don't know, this is like a random thing that somebody shared with me today, and I'm not like, in a partnership with him or anything. I just thought it was really interesting. How do you think? Well, and how do you design well around this idea of rest, you know, especially in the season as we're going into, like, pre holiday season, you know, like, how do you rest? Well, how do you create a really sustainable format for that? And I also think this anchors to the idea of minimums how do you design what you want your opposite world to look like? And then how do you define minimums in a way that that becomes a really systemic part of the way that you live? And there's two things for me. One, obviously, I have minimums around my working out, which is, for me, the physical part. But I also have been, if you listen to my goals with Soul episode with Kate House, I was like, I need to replace the senseless scrolling time. Like, somehow I've fallen into this habit.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:07:56]:

So making the barrier of not having as much social media on my phone, moving it off of my home screen, shutting off all of my notifications and alerts so that I'm not, like, bing, bing, bing, bing, like, just getting distracted all the time and, like, making my sewing machine really easy to get out. And I, like, got some new colors of thread so that it was, like, easier to switch across different materials that I was working with. Like, I kind of, like, spruced up that hobby so that it was easier for me to access because I want to replace what was probably 30 to 90 minutes. Embarrassingly, I bet it's true, because it would be, like, when I was sitting to wait on a kid or six minutes between things, I would just, like, pick up my phone, and it's like, this is so much time that is just going into literally nothingville. How do I move this towards a thing that is going to be more productive for me? And so if you have a thing in your life that you're trying to replace, not a bad behavior, but when you're like, this is not serving who I want to become, thinking about your opposite world and making it a little easier to access that I think is, like, really smart. So, anyway, top of mind for me right now is I have to design my life in a way that is not just fulfilling other people's requests for my time, because I can get really empty in that world, you know, everybody can. That's not just a me thing. Just like, when do we need to leave? Who needs to be there? Who needs to be in the car? What needs to be fed? How do we plan for next week? Like, what groceries are in the fridge? Did I pay the people that need to be paid? Are the podcasts ready to go live? Have we approved the social media things? Did I make the phone calls I was supposed to do? I know what time it is.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:09:33]:

Like, it just can become this. Like, not in a bad way. It's just like, sometimes it's like, oh, my word. There's just an endless number of tasks that have to be done and so you do have to have a way that you can sort of like seasonally sit in these little moments of experiencing your opposite world. So the anyway I love this framework. I thought it was interesting and maybe it can help you find your formula for rest which is a critical part as we all build towards our individual life of and as always, thanks for listening to this episode. If it has been helpful, share with a friend it is the best way for the show to grow and I don't know. I'm on a mission to help people.

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Tiffany Sauder [00:10:07]:

Like literally you can have everything you want. You just have to figure out what you want to give up to have the thing you want more. So all right anyway thanks for listening. Talk to you later. Bye. Thank you for joining me on another episode of Scared Confident. Until next time, keep telling fear you will not decide what happens in my life. I will.

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