Deficits, Disciplines, and a Resource Bank
Last weekend, I had the opportunity to take an Emotional Intelligence for Impact course on campus at Harvard. Selecting one thing to write about from that course has proven difficult as I once again walked away with many ideas, strategies, friends, and goals. However, there was one thing our instructor, Laura Wilcox, said when answering a question that has stuck in my mind. She said, “Many of us are operating at a deficit.” Meaning that there never seems to be enough time to do everything that we want to do and/or could be doing to operate at our optimal best. Whether it be sleep, nutrition, stress, or so on, we are often borrowing from one part of our lives to pay for the toll of another part. This wasn’t even part of her excellent curriculum, but I knew I needed to hear this phrase. When she said it, I realized that one of my goals in healing myself from burnout was to stop operating at a deficit. Additionally, when I am in a heated or emotional moment, I don’t want to be operating at a deficit either.
One of the concepts we played with in class was an “Amygdala Hijack” meaning, when we are in a situation that triggers our fight, flight, or freeze response, our amygdala takes over and our neocortex (the area of the brain we use for critical thinking) is no longer in control. Our teacher explained this with an analogy. Let’s say, when we’re in our happy healthy place it’s like holding 4 markers and in holding all 4 markers, we can see many options to solutions. (To illustrate her point, she had us think of it as 4 factor or 4x3x2x1=24 options). When our amygdala starts to take over, we drop a marker and now we can see far less options (3x2x1= 6 options). With even dropping only 1 marker, our ability to see other opportunities has now dropped by 75%. If we continue to let the amygdala take over, we drop another marker and are now stuck in a binary form of thinking (2x1=2) meaning we’ll now see things as yes or no, right or wrong, etc. If we drop yet another marker, we go into pure self-preservation mode and will most likely do something we will regret later.
She taught us some techniques about how we can stop an amygdala hijack in process and pick back up those markers (which I’ll most likely write more about next week). However, I was thinking about what happens when we show up already not holding enough markers. How much harder is it for us to operate from a deficit at the get go?
As I’ve been learning about stress, resiliency, and well-being, I’m noticing how important it is to implement daily disciplines that build up our capacity to buffer ourselves from amygdala hijacks and their resulting cortisol floods. If I have been using avoidant or passive coping skills for the many forms of stress in my world, I am setting myself up to enter acute stressful situations already at a deficit. For example, if I’m consistently not getting enough sleep, my ability to tolerate daily hassles, such as traffic, my kids whining, or not being able to find an important item quickly, will most likely escalate much higher than it needs to. I may yell, grit my teeth, and feel my blood pressure rise for instance. On the flip side, if these daily hassles hit on a day when I had good rest, I’m more likely to be resilient to those things and let them go. Similar things can be said about nutrition. For instance, when I’m under tight work deadlines, I tend to grab easy processed foods to simply fuel my body. Ironically, if I were to choose healthier foods in that moment that nourish my body, I would most likely have more energy and brain capacity for hitting those needed deadlines. In both of those scenarios, I’m operating at a deficit, and I continue to borrow against my resource bank in a way that can lead to energy bankruptcy -aka burnout.
“Resource Bank” is a term I coined earlier this year to help me think about investing in my energy. Every day we will have energy expenses. Some will be expenses that bring joy and others, not so much. Either way, these tasks of daily life will need energy to be completed. If I want a wealth of energy, or in other words, to not be working from a deficit, I need to consistently make deposits into my resource bank. We make these deposits through our daily disciplines. Some examples of wealth building disciplines are:
Good sleep (Recommended 7-9 hours)
Healthy nutrition (low in processed foods and high in fruits and vegetables)
Daily gratitude practices
Healthy movement
Practicing spirituality (prayer, meditation, scripture study, attending church/temple/synagogue, spending time in nature, etc.)
Setting healthy boundaries especially in support of work/life balance
Time-off and Time-outs – accepting time to recharge
Meeting with friends and family members who fill your cup
Cultivating a growth mindset (can be done through journaling, yoga/meditation, working with a mentor or therapist, and more)
When we’ve been stockpiling our resource bank with daily wealth building practices, our withdrawals for the costs of daily life are not nearly as taxing. Dealing with burnout has taught me to see that these wealth building practices are not just a luxury for the few, but a necessity for those that want to thrive in life. I’m hoping that I no longer glamorize operating at a deficit. Instead, I prefer to build a life that flourishes.
Thanks for reading with me today. I hope you find some time to increase your resource bank wealth today.