The Energy Crisis
As teenagers in the 70’s, we heard a lot about the Energy Crisis. Oil prices went way up and it put a big squeeze the availability of gasoline for everyone. I remember sitting in line in my family car for hours, on an “even” day of the month, just to buy gasoline. Not that this was a problem, I loved listening to the radio and blabbing with one of my sisters as we waited. Time seemed to be a different thing back then.
I recently read an incredibly relevant article from the Harvard Business Review by Tony Schwartz and Catherine McCarthy called “Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time”. It is a fascinating read about how to manage four areas of your energy, The Mind, The Body, The Emotions and The Spirit. The article has a quiz to identify energy areas in your life, that you may be able to better support. The idea is to create habits to build and renew your energy throughout each day, making you more productive and your life more enjoyable.
I love the idea that we create our own energy and if we are paying attention to our energy, we can better support ourselves throughout the day, the weeks and the months of our lives. So often we tend to wait for outside circumstances to change before we believe we can feel good. For example, once a project at work is done, or once a crazy employee leaves, or when school gets out, or when school starts… certainly once Christmas is here things will calm down and we will feel better.
How much better would it be to put ourselves in the driver’s seat? To become aware of the quality of our energy during the day and renew it as needed? Feeling better is within our power. So is slowing down, reaching our goals and allowing our lives to unfold as we dream they might. It is all within reach with a surprising amount of ease. We don’t have to lose patience while we wait in line for things. We can turn on the radio and listen to the music and connect with someone we love. As it turns out…. we can do a lot of things.
I love the closing quote from this article “Rather than catastrophizing about the COVID-19 crisis, you can tap into your adult self, deliberately choosing to focus on what you have the power to influence and letting go of the rest”.
We’ve got this and if you want to be coached along the way, I’d love to work with you! Let’s go!
Check the article out here:
https://hbr.org/2007/10/manage-your-energy-not-your-time
Harvard Business Review
Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time
The science of stamina has advanced to the point where individuals, teams, and whole organizations can, with some straightforward interventions, significantly increase their capacity to get things done.