[00:00] Do you feel great? Some days like productive high energy focus and then just sluggish and off track. Other days are there certain times of the day when you feel like you’re just locked in, and then others where you’re distracted by, I don’t know, watching squirrels out the window or something. Do you want to show up every day at the top of your game where you’re focused and productive and locked in?

[00:20] And this episode is. Welcome to another episode of Success Through Failure. This is your host, Jim Harshaw, Jr. and today, I’m bringing you a solo episode. We’re talking about managing your energy, and you may have heard about this or read about this out there on the interwebs. You know, people talking about how you manage your energy, not your time.

[00:42] Well, I’m gonna give you my version and what works for me. What works for the Pathfinder community that. Clients in my Velia Path coaching program, who I coach and who my team coaches. And what works for us. So how is this a success through failure topic? Well, because we learn from failure. This is success through failure, and it’s about how you learn from things that don’t go right, how you learn from things that aren’t working for you.

[01:09] And that’s how we learn to manage our energy as well. We learn from failures. We learn what’s not working so that we can discover. Is working so that you can be focused and be productive and you can be locked in. And I talk about this topic of managing your energy often cuz you know, working with our clients, uh, and hosting mastermind group coaching calls, I’ve identified 10 critical tactics that will allow you to maintain a high energy.

[01:36] So you can stay focused, you can stay locked in. Some of these you may have heard before. I guarantee you there’s some you haven’t. Number seven, it’s probably gonna be a little bit weird and shocking to you, but this is one that I always use and it works like crazy, and I think you’re gonna want to use it as well.

[01:51] So keep this in mind. This is gonna be a success through failure process for you. You’re gonna try things, you’re gonna learn, you’re gonna fail, You’re gonna try some of these things and ideas that I share with you today, and some of them wouldn’t go to work for you. Some of them Aren, if you walk outta here.

[02:04] I don’t know if you’re walking out of anywhere. This is a podcast, but if you leave this podcast with just one or two ideas that work for you that make you more productive and you get more done, you have more focus, you’re getting more things accomplished throughout the day, you feel better when you’re at the end of your workday.

[02:22] It’s gonna be worth your time. So make sure you stick around to the very end, because I have a tip for you that really pulls all of this together, really is the glue that’s gonna make all of this work for you. All right, so. Here we go. We’re gonna dive into the 10 things here. The first three are what I call core habits, and I go deeper into this in episode 232, so I’m gonna go through this pretty quickly here today, but episode 232, I go more deeply into the core habits.

[02:49] The first core habit is this. Nutrition, like what are you putting into your body? If you’re putting crap food in, you’re not gonna be performing at your best. We’re talking about is performance. Just like athletes wanna perform well, you wanna perform well. Also, whether at work, being home with your family on the weekends, whatever it might be.

[03:05] Like this is about performance and if you put. Crap food in your body for breakfast, and you eat a huge bowl of pasta for lunch, guess what? You’re not gonna have high energy come the afternoon. It’s just not gonna happen, right? If you’re traveling and you’re on the road a lot and you’re stopping and getting fast food because it’s quick and it’s easy and you don’t have healthy food in your car, guess what?

[03:29] You’re not gonna have high energy. You’re not gonna have the performance that you want out of your. That’s just a fact. Staying on the topic of nutrition, coffee. Coffee is in adenosine receptor blocker. It just blocks, basically the stuff that makes you tired, gets blocked, and then whenever caffeine, the caffeine wears off, whenever the coffee wears off, you get fatigued.

[03:52] Now, I love to drink coffee. I drink coffee in the morning. I’ve scaled back a lot since I’ve learned more about how coffee works and how certainly it helps me with my energy in the morning. But as the day goes on, it’s actually has a negative effect for you. This is a risk that you just have to understand.

[04:07] I’m not telling you to stop drinking coffee. I’m just telling you if you’re gonna drink coffee, beware. We’ve cut our coffee back, We drink about two-thirds coffee, and I don’t drink coffee. I drink basically one cup of coffee and I drink it till, you know, sold to till about noon. And I try to make sure I’m not getting that caffeine later in the day.

[04:25] And I kind of have limited my caffeine intake since learning this. And I know there’s a lot of people that drink mushroom coffee and different things like that. But just be aware. This is part of your nutrition quick interruption. If you like what you’re hearing here and you want to learn how you can implement this into your life, just go to jimharshawjr.com/apply to see how you can get a free one-on-one coaching session with me.

[04:49] That’s jimharshawjr.com/apply. Now, back to the show and then the other one again, sticking with number one, nutrition. Water hydration. Are you hydrating enough? Almost everybody is not. What can you do to make sure you’re hydrating a lot more than you are? For me, the first thing I do, the very first thing I do when I wake up is I go to the kitchen and I drink a big glass of water because I know that when I wake up in the morning, I’m dehydrated.

[05:17] And if you don’t believe me, step on the scale before you go to. Wake up, go to the bathroom, jump on the scale again, and you will have lost weight. Even if you don’t go to the bathroom first, you will still have lost weight. When I was wrestling, we call it drifting you, you know, whenever you were sort of fully hydrated and eating a lot, normally you would just drift, I don’t know, two, sometimes three pounds overnight, believe it or not.

[05:41] And whenever you really got, you know, dehydrated and you were getting closer to, to weigh-ins, you would tend to only drift, I don’t know, a pound or a half a pound overnight, but. You lose a lot of that water overnight just through breathing, through perspiration. And of course, you know, urination, you’re gonna have to go to the bathroom in the morning, so make sure you’re drinking water first thing in the morning, right?

[06:00] So that’s number one. That’s the first of the three core habits I’m gonna start off with, and I’ve got seven more for you. Number two, exercise. I don’t know about you, but I feel way better on the days when I’m exercising and working out. Exercise is such a core habit. If you could list all the positive side effects of exercise and put that into a pill, everybody would buy it.

[06:24] You’d be a billionaire instantly, because there’s so many positive side. To exercise, you know, in terms of the things that it releases into your bloodstream, the focus, the productivity, all those things, you are gonna have higher energy and you’re gonna be able to manage your energy better and be more productive, be more focused.

[06:42] Through exercise, right? You’ve heard it before. I’m not the first person to tell you. Make sure you’re figuring out how you can exercise consistently. Figure out what works for you. You don’t have to do, you know, the same thing that the next person’s doing just because that’s the guru said to do, right?

[07:00] You don’t have to do the same workouts ass me. I’m doing a Spartan race. So actually tomorrow, as of when I’m recording this, I’m not saying you have to train for Spartan races or do the F three workouts that I choose to. Figure out what works for you. Back in episode 347, I talked to Kathleen Trotter.

[07:16] She wrote a book called Find Your Fit. It’s all about finding what works for you. All right, so exercise is number two again, the first three are the core habits. Number three, the third core habit. Sleep. Are you getting enough sleep? If there’s one habit, if there’s one thing that could help you manage your energy best, it’s this.

[07:36] It’s sleep. Get to bed on time. Stop scrolling, Turn off Netflix. There’s so many negative influences on us. Things that keep us scrolling. Netflix just rolls to the very next episode without you having to touch a button, right? These things keep us awake at night. They’re not good for you. Be disciplined. Be intentional with your phone.

[07:57] Use your watching of television in the evenings. It’s so critical that you get to bed on time because if you get to bed on time, you wake up on time, you get a good amount of sleep. Here’s the thing, if you go to bed 20 minutes later, You’re either going to sleep 20 minutes longer because you wanna get a certain amount of sleep, and now you start your day behind.

[08:14] You don’t get your exercise in. Maybe you don’t hydrate and eat as well in the morning cuz you’re rushed or maybe you wake up at the same time, then you actually get 20 minutes less sleep and now you have less sleep. So this is all about managing your energy. So number one was nutrition. Number two is exercise.

[08:30] Number three is sleep. All right, let’s get into some new ones here for you. Number four, get. Like, get outside. If you’re stuck in your four walls or in your cubicle all day long, get outside. It feels so good for me. I know that I’m, you know, I’m stuck here in my home office and if I’m just stuck inside and not getting outside, man, my energy just goes down.

[08:50] But if I get outside, I take the dog for a walk. Just go for a walk in the woods. We have some, some woods in nearby. I just feel so much better. Get outside, get fresh air. Right. So that’s number four, Number five. Zoom is ubiquitous, right? We’re all using Zoom or Teams. We’re doing these video calls all day long.

[09:07] That’s great. That focus, really focusing on the image of that person on your computer screen. Is fatiguing. So sometimes have phone calls, right? Don’t make all of your calls, Zoom calls if some of those calls can be converted into phone calls. I don’t know about you, but I certainly love Zoom because you get to interact with people.

[09:26] You see the facial expressions, the body language. There’s just a better connection happens over Zoom. But on the phone, you can be up, you can be walking around, you can be moving. I feel oftentimes even more creative on the phone as opposed to Zoom. So consider moving some of your calls from Zoom to phone calls.

[09:45] That was number five. Number six, change locations, right? If you’re stuck in the same location all the time, that’s fine, but that can be tiring as well. If you have a home office, sometimes go work in the kitchen or go sit on the couch or get out and go to a coffee shop or find a co-working space.

[10:02] Whenever I worked at the University of Virginia, primarily I was working in the office unless I was on the road meeting with donors. But I also had access to the luxury boxes. I, my office was in the football stadium, so sometimes I would shoot upstairs and sit in one of the boxes and just have quiet, focused time in a totally new environment.

[10:21] So find different ways to change your location, get into a different environment, and that will help you manage your energy better and be at peak energy when you need it. All right, here’s number seven. I told you number seven, it was a little bit weird, but man, this one really, really works. Are you ready?

[10:38] Do three burpees. Three burpees. Okay. Why three and not five or 10 Burpees? Three for me is the magic number. I’m 46 years old, so I’m not old, but I’m not a spring chicken either. And that first one, like it’s a little bit slow. My back’s a little, My back’s like always sore, you know, knees and hips and stuff.

[10:59] I work out a lot. So like, oh, he is got some kind of injury going on. And kind of overuse injury it feels like. And so that first burpee’s a little hard, you know, nice and slow. The pushups slow and then the second one, I feel a little better by the third one. I’m feeling good. My body’s moving, and my heart rate is up just a little bit.

[11:19] And any more than that, my heart rate’s gonna go higher. It turns into like, you know, your breathing hard, that sort of thing. Three is my magic number. I don’t know what your magic number is, but three burpees for me, just improves my energy and I often do this throughout the day. Just a couple times here and there to improve my energy.

[11:37] Like if I feel a little bit sluggish now, I have a standing desk also, so I’m not sitting down a lot of the day. I’m standing up as I record this right now and it feels good for me to stand up, but also man, busting out just a few burpees gets my body moving, right? So maybe that’s the same thing for you.

[11:53] Maybe you can find a five-minute or 10-minute stretching YouTube video that you can follow. That’ll just be like a good midday stretch. In some way, get your body moving. For me, three burpees is magic. All right, here’s number eight. That was number seven. Number eight, power nap. Power naps. These are magic.

[12:15] 15 minutes they say to anything longer than 20 minutes, depending on the research you read. It’s anything longer than 20 or 25 minutes and you start falling into a deeper sleep. For me, if I set my alarm any longer than 15 minutes, I’m going too deep into a sleep. I can fall asleep very quickly, especially if I’m tired and my energy’s getting low throughout the day for some reason.

[12:34] Maybe I didn’t put the right food in my body or didn’t get enough sleep, or I just had a really busy day and I’m on Zooms a lot, or something like that, or, Under the weather, whatever it might be, a power nap will put me on rocket fuel as a matter of fact. Yesterday I was, I was really tired and I didn’t have a whole lot of time, and so I laid down and I set my phone for just 10 minutes.

[12:55] I just set an alarm for 10 minutes and I woke up eight minutes into my nap, and I felt like I was like asleep for two hours. I, man, I fell asleep and I fell asleep hard, but it was only eight minutes. So it only takes a few minutes to snap right back out of that and just feel like I’m on rocket fuel. So those really short naps are super powerful for me.

[13:15] I mean, It can even be as simple as like three minutes, and that’s all you have, and you can just lay down and close your eyes, take some deep breaths and completely relax your body. Even those few minutes will just recharge your battery a little bit more and help you have a higher energy level. All right, that’s number eight.

[13:34] Power nap Number nine, Scheduling how you plan your day, schedule your cognitive tasks for when you feel most alert. For me, that’s in the morning. I like to do my heavy load cognitive tasks in the morning, and then I can do meetings in the afternoon. Doesn’t always work out that way, but I always enjoy having a larger block of time in the mornings when I can do.

[13:59] Cognitive tasks that require more energy. Right? So that’s number nine. And here’s the last one, number 10. And this, by the way, I still do have a final tip that’s gonna bring this all together, but number 10 is, Routines, like identify what works for you and make it a routine, right? I talked about success through failure.

[14:20] Figure out what of these things works for you. Then make it a routine. Reduce the friction for eating healthy food by doing your meal prep or going shopping. For me, I’ve got healthy snacks in my truck, and if I get hungry, I can put junk food in my body or I can put. Food in my body, and when I put that healthy food in my body, I have higher energy.

[14:42] It makes me feel better, and I’m not talking about having higher energy through your work day. Also, when you come home and you’re with your family or with your friends, or you wanna do things in the evening, if you feel like low energy, what kind of fuel are you putting in your body? Also routines.

[14:56] Talking about routines like changing location, like identify alternate locations or talk to your boss about working elsewhere at certain times. Create a routine. Maybe it’s every Monday or every Friday, or every Wednesday afternoon or Thursday mornings, whatever it might be. You find a different location to work.

[15:13] Reduce the friction to making that happen. If it’s hydration, you know, get a water bottle on your desk. It shows how much you’ve water you’ve drank, like. Find routines. Find systems that automate this stuff, that make it simple, that don’t require you to think and rethink and figure these things out over and over.

[15:31] Figure out what works, figure out what doesn’t work, and take action of those now. I’m sure that you have some ideas of your own, some things that I’ve not shared, and you’re like, I can’t believe Jim didn’t talk about this. Share those with me. Use the hashtag #STFpod or respond to one of my social media posts or post a screenshot on Instagram or Twitter where I spend most of my time on social media or interact with me over on LinkedIn or on Facebook, of course.

[15:58] But let me know, make a comment, take a screenshot. If you’re listening to this on your phone, take a screenshot, post it on Instagram or Twitter, and tag me and let me know, like, what did I forget? What are some things that you do now? I told you there’s a final tip that’s gonna help you bring all of this together.

[16:13] Here’s your final tip to help you manage your energy and be more productive, more focused, and have a higher energy throughout the day. Track it. Track throughout the day how you feel. Write it down. Here’s the easy thing to do. Take a notebook, take a piece of paper, and just put it on your desk next to your computer, kind of up and out of the way so it’s not right in front of you all the time, but it’s kind of within arms reach.

[16:34] Put a pen on top of that piece of paper or that notebook and just. Capture how you’re feeling throughout the day. Like if there’s a task that requires a, a lot of your cognitive energy and you really feel fatigued after it, write it down. Track how you feel throughout your day. Do this for a week or even do this for two weeks and notice the ups and downs of your energy pattern and.

[16:56] Adjust your routine accordingly. Notice like, Hey, I ate really healthy this morning. I ate a great breakfast or a light lunch, and man I feel really much better in the afternoon. Or, man, I feel really tired. That’s when you’re really gonna notice this. You’re gonna notice it less when you have high energy, cuz you’re just gonna feel like, okay, this is normal and I’m just zoned in.

[17:15] I’m focused in my zone. You’re gonna really notice when you have low energy. So really capture those times when you have low energy. And notice what you were doing before that, right? Did you eat unhealthy food, right? Did you eat, you know, some kind of junk food and put a lot of sugar into your system that gave you a crash?

[17:33] Did you not hydrate well, not get good sleep? Or do you need to do a few burpees, right? You need to do three burpees. So pay attention to. If you track this, you will learn. You’ll have a higher energy. Listen, what is the value of doing this? It’s not just like, Hey, I wanna be a little bit more productive.

[17:52] This is about living life the way you wanna live your life. Like do you have dreams? Do you have goals? You have things you wanna accomplish? It’s going to require you to be at your best, be your best for. Your work colleagues, for your clients, for your family, and for yourself. Take action on these things.

[18:09] Go ahead and download the action plan so you can print this out, have these 10 ideas at your fingertips, and if you like this, share it with a friend. Let somebody know. Tell them to check out the Success Through Failure podcast and to check out episode number. 377. You can also just text them a link, jimharshawjr.com/377.

[18:29] I can’t believe we’re almost approaching episode 400. If you have ideas for episode 400, let me know. Love to hear ’em. I’ve got some ideas, but I don’t wanna give you exactly what you want. Is there something that we’re not covering that you want to hear? Is there some kinda highlights? Do you wanna hear?

[18:43] Best of episode, episode 400. I can’t believe it’s almost here. Thank you for listening. Take.

[18:53] Thanks for listening. If you want to apply these principles into your life, let’s talk. You can see the limited spaces that are open on my calendar at jimharshawjr.com/apply, where you can sign up for a free one-time coaching call directly with me. And don’t forget to grab your action plan. Just go to jimharshawjr.com/action.

[19:12] And lastly, iTunes tends to suggest podcasts with more ratings and reviews more. You would totally make my day if you give me a rating in review. Those go a long way in helping me grow the podcast audience. Just open up your podcast app. If you have an iPhone, do a search for success through failure, select it, and then scroll the whole way to the bottom where you can leave the podcast a rating in a review.

[19:37] Now, I hope this isn’t just another podcast episode for you. I hope you take action on what you learned here today. Good luck and thanks for listening.

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