🩹Dying to Succeed - The Real Cost of Overwork

Hustle-culture tells you that there is gold at the end of the burnout rainbow but if you're reading this, you know that the end of the rainbow is never found. Every time you think you're getting close, it moves. Trapping you in an unsustainable cycle of burnout.

Deloitte ran a survey. 82% of CEOs have experienced exhaustion indicative of burnout. 96% feel their mental health has declined. But burnout goes beyond feeling tired, dusting yourself off, and marching once more, back into the fray.

The Burnout Impact

Here is what the research shows.

Significantly lower episodic memory (remembering what you had for lunch yesterday).
Significantly lower short-term and working memory (short term holding of stuff in your memory).
Impaired attention and processing speed.
Decreases in executive functions such as planning, problem-solving, and decision-making.
21% increased risk of cardiovascular disease.
84% increased risk of type-2 diabetes.
Reduction in quality of life measured across physical, psychological, and occupational domains.

Research from University College London shows that people working more than 55 hours per week have a 33% higher risk of stroke and measurable shrinkage in brain regions responsible for memory, learning, and executive function.

Stanford University neuroimaging studies show that people with chronic work stress have hippocampi (the region of your brain largely responsible for memory) that are 10-20% smaller than their unstressed counterparts.

MIT cognitive scientists found that people who don't allow adequate mental downtime show 40% reduced activity in the default mode network, resulting in diminished creativity, fewer breakthrough insights, and an inability to see big-picture solutions to complex problems.

University of Rochester research shows that people sleeping less than 6 hours nightly due to work demands accumulate brain toxins at rates 300% higher than those getting adequate sleep.

The mental impacts alone can be the equivalent of losing 1 day a week of productive work and that doesn't even consider the sick days, doctors' appointments, mental health days etc. from the physiological impacts.

This is a modern health epidemic. This has to change. But where do you find time to recover in your already overloaded schedule?

The Shift to the Workplace Athlete

If an Olympic athlete spent 3 days a week training and 2 recovering you wouldn't blink an eye - It's time to apply that same mentality (although less extreme) to knowledge work.

The rationale behind cycling recovery and training (work) is that evolution has given our bodies incredible mechanisms to repair the damage done and fortify the body part - better equipped in the future. This is no different for our brain.

Does an athlete feel guilty for having a contrast therapy session, some yoga, and a nature walk while training? Of course not, they will argue this is what enables them to train hard and push their limits. We need to normalise this in the workplace.

Let's assume you are losing 1 day a week of productive time to burnout related cognitive impacts. Assuming a 60-hour week that's around 12 hours a week lost or just under 2.5 hours a day. If we took 90 minutes of your day (45 minutes of extra sleep and 45 minutes of active recovery related activities) not only would you almost immediately get those 12 hours back but the work done in your dedicated work time would be of higher quality and volume (decreasing the hours required each week).

Of course we cannot go from our current overloaded calendar to freeing up 90 minutes tomorrow. We need to start bite-sized and work our way up. Here's your play-by-play for achieving that.

Cognitive Recovery Protocol

Week 1 - Start (ultra)small

Right now go on your phone and download or subscribe to a breathwork or meditation app (I use Next Step Collective (not affiliated)).
Find a time in the morning you can spare 5 minutes and plan a short breathwork or meditation in that time - Place a sticky note or phone reminder to remind you while the habit sets (when I get up I try and finish my drink bottle of water and do the ~5 minutes 'morning glory' breathwork on Next Step). For bonus points, schedule a downregulating session before bed, again post-its work a treat here.
If you normally do a working lunch, don't this week. Use this time to either catch up with colleagues or go for a walk. The productivity gains you'll get from a walk will far outweigh the 30-min eating/working combo you might have done otherwise.
Aim to get over 10 minutes of sunlight in the morning (or bright indoor light if the sun isn't up). This sets an incredibly powerful cascade of hormones and physiology in motion that gives you the foundation you need for the day. I suggest getting an indoor SAD lamp so even if it's bad weather or dark you can get the exposure. Pro-tip: to get genetics on your side, learn your bodies chronotype and use it schedule this time.
For every 60-90 minutes of desk work, try and go for a quick walk. This could be to the kitchen for a new glass of water or tea. Phone reminders are your friend here.
When spending time with friends, partners, or kids, place your phone in another room. Research has shown that just the presence of a phone (not the notifications) causes people to not be present. Social bonding is incredibly important for resilience and well-being.

This will actually start to do an unreasonable amount of good for your brain even in the first week.

Week 2 - Carving out time

We want to expand the space for the same activities from week 1.

Aim for 15-20 minutes of breathwork across the day. Do what works for you. 4 x 5-min sessions throughout the day or 1 x 20-min session in the morning before the kids wake up.
Look at your work calendar and find any 1-hour meetings that could be shorter. Shorten to 45-min (this has actually been shown to make meetings more productive) and use the remaining 15 for walking (preferably outside). Doing this just once a day will add over an hour of walking time to your week which will improve a range of health measures.
Try and expand your lunch break to at least 30 minutes (preferably 45) and try walking with colleagues/friends preferably outdoors. This is stacking the walking, social connection, sunlight, and nature exposure into 1 potent 30-45 minute slot.
Use your calendar to plan and schedule 2-3 x 30-min active recovery sessions where you can. For a breakdown of why active trumps passive and some high ROI protocols see my previous edition here.

Week 3 - Increase volume

By now you should feel the improvements from these small incremental shifts. You should feel comfortable knowing that these investments in time pay off quickly and they're not 'indulgent' or a 'waste of time' but rather an integral part of peak performance (or even if you're not after peak performance they're integral for optimal mental health). Now we up the frequency.

Aim for 30-90 minutes of active recovery per day. I spread this across a varying combination of exercise, sauna (I live near a community one which is great), breathwork, and dog walking.
Implement no screens for 60 minutes before bed. Use this time with loved ones, reading, and unwinding before sleep.

The takeaways are:

Start small, even one habit at a time if you're really time poor.
Track benefits. This helps with your own confidence in the time investment and also with conversations with others.
Reframe recovery as an integral part of peak performance no different from that of a professional athlete.

This is just the beginning...

For the geeks out there, here are some interesting papers: