Teri Holland (00:01.218)
Welcome back to another episode of Success in Mind where we dive deep into the strategies that connect entrepreneurs with their personal power for success so that you can thrive. I'm your host Terri Holland and today we're exploring the fascinating aspect of our biology that can revolutionize the way we work.
Teri Holland (00:25.654)
what Ultradian Rhythms are, their significance in our daily lives, and how you as an entrepreneur can harness their power for enhanced focus, creativity, and overall wellbeing. You're listening to Success in Mind, the show for high-performing leaders, change makers, and entrepreneurs ready to take your life and business to the next level. If you're ready for whole life success, keep listening. Now, I first became interested in Ultradian Rhythms
When I was noticing that I was getting really fatigued during the day and would hit these points of the day where I couldn't focus anymore, I would just crash. And I don't know if you've ever felt that way before, but I was having a really hard time being productive all day and I just felt like I needed a break or I needed to go lie down for a bit. And then I would do that and then often I would feel recharged and re-energized and I could get back into work mode. So I got curious one day about...
Why is this happening and why do I hit these lumps during the day? It didn't seem to matter if I was eating really healthy or not. Obviously it does help to eat healthy, but it didn't seem to be dependent on what I had eaten or how well I had slept the night before. I could have had a great sleep. I could be eating really good nutritious foods all day and still hit these same lows during the day. So I got curious and I started investigating it.
introduced to ultradian rhythms. So ultradian rhythms are recurrent periods or cycles repeated throughout a 24-hour day. And often these are associated with sleep cycles and wake cycles that happen during the night. You've probably heard about sleep cycles before. We go through stages of sleep between light sleep, deep sleep, and REM or rapid eye movement sleep.
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in a 90 to 120 minute cycle where we spend time going through these phases each night. The first cycle is a bit shorter but then they tend to get a little bit longer and they tend to average out to about 90 to 120 minutes and of course they vary person to person but that's what we see is the average. We spend most of that time or more of that time in deep sleep in REM and less time in a light sleep cycle. That's a good sleep. That would be...
that would characterize a good sleep. During the day we go through ultradian rhythms that take us through times of peak productivity and alertness and then down times of rest during the day. Now these are different than circadian rhythms and you might be familiar with the term circadian rhythm, but a circadian rhythm covers a 24-hour cycle. So we go through a complete 24-hour cycle.
And people talk about this 24-hour cycle in relation to our hormones, our cortisol levels, blood sugar, how blood sugar changes throughout the day. So circadian rhythms are the complete 24-hour cycle, but within that, ultradian rhythms are shorter cycles that we experience both at sleep and when we're awake. And we're going to focus on those wake cycles in this episode today.
When we're awake during the day, we experience what's called a brain rest activity cycle, or a BRAT. And this is a well-known cycle that was discovered first in 1920 in a study that was done on rats and observing their behavior throughout the day. So these are 90 to 120 minute cycles, and during each of these cycles there's a peak period of alertness, energy, productivity. We can call this peak performance.
and followed by a period of rest, where energy wanes and the body and mind need rest, they need to recover. And this becomes evident in the ebb and flow of attention, alertness, and cognitive performance throughout the day. So if you're like me and you find that you can focus for periods of time and be really alert and productive, and then you just crash and you can't do it anymore, you can't think straight, you need to walk away from your
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I would even find like my eyes would start defocusing on the screen and I wouldn't be able to concentrate at all anymore. And I thought this was an ADHD thing where, oh, I just can't be productive the way I should be. We shouldn't be productive all the time. That's not how we're designed to function. So we need these periods of rest. And if we learn to follow our own ultradian rhythms,
we can time out our day. As we learn to respect and to follow our ultradian rhythms, we'll find increased energy, improved productivity, it helps us to maintain physical and mental health, and encourages alignment with the body's natural cycles of activity and rest. The typical eight hour workday was not designed with this in mind. I think that's clear to see.
And so this idea that we're supposed to start work at a certain time, be super productive for every minute of the day, have a break for lunch, and then back to work and be highly productive all the time is counterintuitive to actual productivity. So we need to learn how to adapt and how to integrate these cycles into our workflow. The way I do it is I block my day into
90 minute segments. So I find I'm good for 90 minutes of productivity. I can sometimes stretch that to 120, but I will not do anything that's going to be more than two hours without a break. And then I take a 20 minute break. And when I say a break, I don't mean that I switch activities. I don't mean that I go and clean my house or do something else. I do something low cognitive function.
Like I will walk down the hall to my bedroom and lie down on my bed, set a timer for 20 minutes, close my eyes, and either take a nap or just go into a deep restful state. We need this period of rest because the brain needs that time to be able to organize everything that you've just been working on. We take in so much information each and every day. In fact, every second of the day. Each second of the day, we take in about 40 million bits of information.
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And that's massive. And that's certainly more than our grandparents' generation and even our parents had to deal with. And now we're taking in all this information. It's coming at us every second of every day. And your brain has to organize all of that. It goes through a process of deletion, distortion, and generalization. So we delete things that are not important to our experience, are not relevant to us. We distort things. You'll distort things that...
you haven't experienced before to make it like something you have experienced before for the purpose of understanding it and being able to identify with it. And we generalize things. So if you've learned it before you can you don't have to learn it again. Generalization is one of the things that make the human brain so much different from animal brains. We can label things. For example, there was a time in your life when you didn't know what a chair was. When you were
early in life pre-language or just developing language, and you would have pointed to something and said, what's that, what's that, what's that? And a parent or an authority figure said, that's a chair. And then maybe you pointed to another one and you said, what's that, what's that? And they said, that's also a chair. And through this repetition, you quickly learned the label of chair. And from that point on,
you didn't need to relearn what a chair is when you see it. You just know that's a chair. That's generalization. You have a label and you can file experiences under those labels without having to relearn that label or what it is. You just know, you know what it is. You already know it. You don't have to relearn it. You can build upon that learning. So now if you see a chair, whether it's like a big comfy wingback chair or if it's a small wooden chair,
It doesn't matter what kind of chair it is, you just know that's a chair. You don't have to think about it consciously. So we take that 40 million bits of information that's coming at us every second of every day. We delete it, we distort it, we generalize it, and we're left with about 134, 140 bits of information that we file away in our minds for future use. And the brain needs time to process all of this stuff that's coming at us constantly.
Teri Holland (09:26.87)
Think about it, if you're in a computer all day, and I don't know what kind of work you do, but I know I'm in front of my computer all day and I'm creating content for my business, I'm doing a lot of writing these days, I'm working with clients, and that's a lot of information and processing my brain is doing as I'm working with the client. So my brain needs that 20 minute recovery. We need that time for the brain to slow down, organize everything, file it away, and then we can go back into productivity mode.
So I will typically for that 20 minute break, I will go and lie down. I will close my eyes, I'll lie down. Sometimes I'll do a meditation. If I do, it's either no guided meditation, which means I'm just doing it on my own or doing some self-hypnosis. Or if I listen to something, I will choose a low guidance meditation. So there's not a lot of talking, it's low guidance. Just like it sounds. Other times I might go for a walk.
But some days I even feel like going for a walk on that 20 minutes is too much input for my brain. I find for me personally in that 20 minutes I really get the most out of that rest period if I can close my eyes. It's not safe to close your eyes and walk. So I don't typically do that. I will go for walks at other times during my day during a more productivity window, but I still take my 20 minutes to just shut down decompress.
So that's how I like to do it. And for each person, you need to find what's going to work for you in terms of this rhythm. Now I know that there are some of you who are thinking, I'm just fine. I just push through my day and I can be productive all the time. Can we override these natural rhythms? Absolutely. We are very flexible beings to a point, but there's a cost to overriding our natural rhythms.
So if you're someone who thinks I'm productive every minute of every day, and I just go, really take a look at what you're doing that allows you to keep that speed and intensity. So it is possible to override these rhythms, but it's not great for our overall wellbeing, for our mental and our physical health. So think of it as if you're never giving yourself those downtime, those troughs where you
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rest for 20 minutes and you allow yourself those 20 minutes to slow down, to shut down.
first of all, your body and your brain are burning through so much energy, going through oxygen, glucose, every fuel available, that it begins to deplete your fuel storage. So the brain is getting exhausted and tired. And the byproducts of this is there's all this data, information begins to build up in your brain.
clogging up the pipes, if you will, without being sorted or organized in any way. Imagine how your desktop runs or your laptop runs. If you have all these tabs open all the time and you're never closing anything, or if you're like me and you're terrible about shutting the computer off once in a while so that it can organize all that information and all that data. So just imagine how your computer runs when you have a bunch of cluttered files all over the desktop.
on your computer. You have a whole bunch of tabs open on your browser that you never close. You have programs running in the background you never shut down and you never turn the computer off. Your computer is going to get slower and less effective at doing its job and that's exactly what happens to our brains. They get this buildup of data and information that doesn't get sorted and organized. The effects of that is we begin to become absent
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show up late for meetings because you thought it was at a different time or you forget to complete tasks that normally you do and then we say oh my god I've been so forgetful lately I just need a break I need a vacation yeah you do but you need more than that you need little breaks every single day because when you get to that point that's a recipe for burnout that's when we're heading towards burnout and that's really the cost of ignoring our own natural ultradian rhythms
is burnout. So you might experience some signs of this. So when it becomes time for a break, if you're the person pushing through every day, you might find that you start to slow down mentally. You might start feeling more stressed throughout the day by over producing. Your productivity and your performance will start to decline. You might start to feel fatigued. That's what I was experiencing, fatigue.
spacey, groggy, it might start to affect your mood. Maybe you get a little bit grumpy or irritable. You might start to feel hungry when you know you shouldn't be hungry. Let's say that you've had a really healthy breakfast, you've had a great lunch, you've been feeding yourself appropriately, but now suddenly you have the munchies and if you work from home that might look like you start leaving your desk and going into the kitchen looking for things to
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Maybe you get fidgety, your attention starts to wander. And like I was experiencing, my eyes would go a little bit fuzzy, blurry, unfocused. You might even feel like your face is getting a little bit droopy or tired looking.
Maybe you start to crave caffeine or sugar or something to give yourself a boost because our brains run on glucose. So if your brain is never getting the downtime, it is give me more glucose, I need glucose to function. So you might start feeling like I need some candy right now, I need something sweet to help me get through my day. And if you're someone who's trying to watch your sugar intake and you're feeling like, oh, I keep failing at this, I can't get a handle on this.
Look at how you're spending your time during the day. Are you giving yourself down times to recharge and refuel? So you might be using caffeine. I know people who drink coffee all day, every day. I used to be like that, by the way. I used to constantly be drinking coffee. I don't drink any coffee anymore. I had the occasional decaf latte because I love a fancy coffee drink once in a while, but I will get a decaf now.
And if you're a smoker, you might start craving a cigarette and then you're out smoking. And really this is the body telling us it needs a break. And so we're finding, it's finding ways to take it really because if you're leaving your workspace and you're going into the kitchen to graze or you're going outside for a cigarette or whatever you're doing or going to make another coffee, you're not being productive anymore. So let's let go of that myth of productivity that's not productive. What's productive is
spending that 90 to 120 minutes of really focused attention and then shut down for 20 minutes. Give yourself 20 minutes to fully rest. You might even start to feel anxious too. I used to have a ton of anxiety. It's no wonder I was fueled on coffee all day. But here's the important thing, and this is what I really want you to get from this, is that this is your body working for you.
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All of these are signs, not signs that you're not strong enough, that you're weak, that you're incapable. These are all signs that your body is doing exactly what it is supposed to do. We can override the system, but we can't change the system. If you needed to be productive for longer, let's say you have a really important deadline and you just have to plow through, you could do it. Will it be your best work? I don't know. Possibly, but possibly not.
but there's a cost on your body to do that. And so when the body is saying, give me sugar, give me caffeine, give me something that I need, when you're getting that defocused feeling, your eyes are going blurry, you're getting tired. That is the body communicating clearly with you that I need to refuel. I need to regroup. I need some downtime. And I need to reorganize this brain because it is overloaded. The system is getting overloaded. And if you do this, if you keep overloading the system,
and you keep ignoring these signs from the body that it's time for a break during the day, eventually you just burn out. That is complete and total burnout. And having been there before, having gone through burnout, I don't recommend doing it. I recommend listening to your body. In fact, don't just listen to your body, just give the body what it needs. Because by the time you're getting those signals from the body, you've probably gone too far.
So instead of waiting for the fatigue to set in and the grogginess and the irritability, the cravings, all of that, just plan your day. Plan your day in these segments of 90 to 120 minutes of focused work, 20 minute break. I schedule in my 20 minute breaks and I can't be booked during those times. A client cannot schedule that time. It's blocked off on my calendar. Just like I block off my lunch every day. No one can get me from 12 to one.
No one can get me on my 20 minute downtime breaks. As I say, listen to the body. Don't wait for the body to tell you what it needs because chances are if you're waiting for the body to say, I need that rest, it's been too long because your body is going to work for you as long as it can. So it'll keep producing for a bit.
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Don't wait for that. Just give your body what you know it needs. If they give this as like a relationship, don't wait until your partner feels insecure in the relationship before you say, I love you. Say I love you so that your partner never has to ask if you love them. It's the same with your body. Give your body what it needs. Don't wait till your body starts asking for what it needs. Give it to your body first. When you're starting out,
by utilizing these ultradian rhythms, you'll probably wanna set a timer, something that signals to you that it is time to stop working and to go lie down. So you can use your phone for that unless your phone becomes a distraction for you. If you find that your phone distracts you during your 90 minutes of focused work, put the phone in another room, turn the phone off, put it in your desk drawer, out of sight, whatever is gonna work for you.
I find what works for me to avoid the distraction of the phone is I turn it to black and white mode. And in doing that, I'm not interested in looking at my phone. We get dopamine hits from seeing all the colors and the notifications and all the beautiful graphics on the phone. When you turn to black and white, it's not the same dopamine hit. So that works for me and that's what I suggest for a lot of my clients. But you find what works for you.
But if you can use the timer on your phone without getting distracted by your phone, by all means do that. Where you might wanna get another kind of timer and there are all kinds of productivity timers you can get where their only job is to time the cycles that you put into it. So you put in your 90 minute cycle, it tells you when it is time to stop working. Or for you that might be 120 minutes. And the way you're gonna know if you are 90 minutes, 120, 110, if you're somewhere in the middle,
is by testing it out. Try it out and notice, okay, if I go to 120 minutes, am I already starting to feel fatigued, groggy, unfocused? So maybe I need to dial it back and you'll find your sweep spot. For me, it really is about 90 minutes. I can go to 120, but that's where I start to feel fatigue. I know that if I cut myself off at 90 minutes and have that 20 minute rest there, I am so much more productive on the next cycle. So figure out what works.
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for you, what works for your brain, what works for your body, where you get the most productivity for yourself.
and find a timer, a tool that you can use that's going to tell you when time is up. Over time, you might not need that tool anymore, you might not need the timer. I don't set a timer anymore for my workflow because I have my whole day scheduled that way, all of my client appointments are scheduled that way, I don't block things into my calendar without having those breaks built in. What I will time though are my rest periods and that is in case I fall asleep.
So if you are someone who might fall asleep, make sure you set that 20 minute timer when time is up. Also, even if I just go into a nice deep meditative state or a hypnotic trance, there is a good chance I will stay in that state for longer than 20 minutes. So having that alarm set is a really good thing, but I don't necessarily need it anymore for the work phase. You might, however, when you're starting until you learn what 90 minutes of work
really feels like.
So I hope this was helpful today and I really encourage you to start to apply this into your life. Block off your calendar and if you already have clients or things booked in, start looking to where you can add this in. So maybe you look at where your clients are scheduled and then block off a break after you've had a set of clients. And then go forward into your calendar to where nothing is booked and start setting up your calendar in this way. I promise you will be more productive.
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far more output from your day and from your efforts, and you'll also start to feel more organized as well. And mentally and cognitively, I really find for myself this improves mental health and helps me stay on top of my mental health. So thanks for listening today, and I hope you found this episode valuable. I hope you found it useful. And if you did, by all means, please share it with someone who you think could also benefit from it.
And of course, leave that five star review on whatever platform you're listening on. That's what fuels me to keep doing this show and it makes sure that more people like you can find the show. So if you enjoy this show and you want other people to enjoy the show, leave that five star review. Thank you so much for joining me today. Next week I have a special guest coming on and you're going to see some more guests coming on in the future weeks because I'm sure you are
Teri Holland (24:29.73)
So we're going to go back into a cycle with some guests coming on. So stay tuned for that. Thank you so much. Hope you have an amazing day and bye for now.