What charges and drains your battery?
We’re halfway through September and spring is in the air in most parts of the country. You can sense the emergence of new life all around, which always has an invigorating effect on me. I’m definitely not a winter person!
One of the biggest benefits of the change in season is the earlier sunrises. This is handy for somebody that does a lot of cycling and running in the early hours of the day. It happened a couple of times over the past winter months that I forgot to charge my cycling light, having it run out on me in the middle of a ride on a dark stretch of road. I don’t know when last you tried riding a bike without being able to see two meters ahead of you, but I can tell you it’s damn scary!
This got me thinking about what I’m doing to charge my own personal battery – that unseen source of life that gives me the energy to deal with the ups and downs of life. More particularly, I’ve started paying careful attention to the avoidable things that drain my energy, with the aim of cutting them out completely.
Let me explain.
We know that there are things that we all need in order to energize and recover properly: sleep, good nutrition, movement, healthy and caring relationships, a well-maintained spiritual life etc. These are the big things. I try to keep these as healthy as possible and pay daily attention to them. But I’ve tried to be more mindful of the smaller, almost invisible micro drains and energizers that we come across every day. And these are likely to be more specific to you as an individual.
Small things I find energize me are for example, a tidy home environment, playful interactions with my family of friends, specific bands and music that I like, watching technical analysis videos of rugby matches, watching sport (especially when my team is winning 😉), reading about or listening to discussions on topics I find fascinating, spending time with my son and talking about shows we enjoy watching together. You know, everyday, simple but very specific things. I do my best to include these as much as possible, because it allows me to have more energy for the less enjoyable but necessary parts of life.
On the flipside, there are things that drain me which I avoid purposefully as much as I can: certain discussion topics, malls, eating things I don’t like, comparing my life, wife or body to what I see on social media, the Aussie scrumhalf Nic White, people that complain a lot, Twitter and comments sections on news pages or other platforms, talk radio and the news in general, music, movies and TV shows I just don’t enjoy.
We need to place a premium on our attention – not everything vying for your attention is worth paying attention to. But this requires each of us to slow down just long enough to actually be mindful of what causes these micro deposits or withdrawals. Only once you are aware of it will you be in a position to choose more purposefully. The idea is not to live in a bubble, but rather to save your energy and effort for things that really matter.
Thank you for spending some time with us at the end of this week, we really do appreciate it. If you found this helpful, please share with anyone you think could benefit from it.
Have a great, purposeful weekend!
At PurposeWorks we are all about Making You and Your Work Rock. Our focus is on Organisational Health and Design, Employee Centered Culture, Leadership Development and Performance Coaching. For more information on how we can help you create a work environment that rocks, develop a great team, become an inspiring leader or unlock your personal excellence talk to us at info@purposeworks.co.za.
