E151 - Are you really resting?
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Beth Buffington: [00:00:00] Recording
~Hello, my creative friend. Welcome back to another episode of Create Today with Beth Buffington. Oh, wow, that sounds really boring. Okay. We'll try this again. ~
Welcome & Story
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Beth Buffington: ~Hello, ~So hey there again, my friend. Welcome to Create Today. I'm Beth Buffington, and today we're talking about something I think a lot of us have been quietly puzzling over, and that is, why is it that sometimes you can rest, like sometimes all weekend, but still feel tired on Monday?
So today we're gonna explore what real rest actually is, and I'm gonna give you seven ways, seven swaps, to get real rest so that you can get your energy back. And this is real heart, mind, body, and soul
A Note on Tiredness
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Beth Buffington: rest that you're going to love.
~That you are going to love. Now, quick note before we start. There's a type of being tired. Now, now a quick note before we... Bleh, don't say that. My creative friend. Welcome back to another episode of Create Today with Beth Buffington. So~ today, ~uh,~ I wanna share something that I've noticed about [00:01:00] my energy.
~So~ on Monday, I finished editing a podcast episode, and I decided I needed to take a break. So I popped on my bike shoes, and I went on a bike ride with Tom. And we biked around a nearby lake, and we just looked at the trees. I mean, they're really getting super gorgeous right now. They're unveiling their best autumn colors.
~And we talked about what we were gonna have for dinner and laughed about some funny Raspberry stories. And for new listeners, Raspberry is my Westie pup.~ And we were gone for, oh, a little over an hour, and I came home from biking, ~uh,~ just a little shy of 14 miles. And I felt super chatty and strangely perky and lighter, and actually excited to go back in the office and start my next project on my to-do list.
And then ~today, ~today, I was uploading some social media content and finished a, a project that I had been working on, and I decided I was gonna take a break. And I suddenly became intrigued about a video that popped into my feed ~before I left the content platform that I had uploaded some videos to.~ And I watched the video, and that video [00:02:00] led to another and another and another.
~And I'm not exactly sure how long I was entranced by, um, this shell game that is the algorithm on, well, YouTube. And I'm not exactly sure how long I was entranced by the shell game that is the algorithm on this platform, but I, um, I looked at recipes I know I'll never make. I, I saw a lot of... Wait.~
~I'm not exactly sure how long I was entranced by the shell game that is social media feed.~ I saw recipes I'll probably never make, ~um,~ things I have got to buy for the fall, politics that, well, shocked me and terrified me, dances that I probably should learn, and animals that were crazy adorable. ~And my brain kept sorting all the time, oh, that's a reel reel, that's an AI video.~
And when I finally yanked myself from the feed, ~and literally had to pull myself away like, like I was stuck, um,~ I, I did not feel rested. And I felt slightly guilty for the time I spent looking at all these videos, 'cause that was time I would never get back. ~And now I know that the algorithm is going to show...~
And now I know the algorithm is gonna show me more recipes I probably won't make, more politics that scare me, more ~fake~ animal videos and dancers, ~and I did not ~
Understanding Real Rest
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Beth Buffington: ~feel charged by any of this energy. And the, uh, creative inertia that I brought home from my bike ride, that did not happen when I took this break and allowed myself to scroll on videos.~
And here's what I thought. It seems strange that riding a bike for 14 miles would make me feel ~more renewed and~ more energized than sitting in my super comfy [00:03:00] chair scrolling cute animals. But it did. And then it got me wondering, and searching for the reasons and the treasure of what I consider real rest, because isn't that why you take a break, right?
You need to get some rest. ~We're talking about that kind of tired and how you can get energized from that, okay? So this is a tired that, you know, leaves you dragging in the afternoon, but the right kind of refueling brings back your energy.~
~So understanding this kind of tired provides important clues about how you have been resting, and that's the kind of tired that we're gonna talk about today So~ understanding this kind of tired provides important clues about how you have been resting and the kind of rest that we're going to be looking at today.
Now, a quick note ~before we start.~ There is a type of being tired, ~a kind of tired ~that hangs on ~for weeks ~no matter how much you sleep or how good your days are, and it often shows up with other changes in your body and in how you feel.
My friend, that kind of tired needs a visit to your doctor. Today, we're talking about the kind of tired that lifts when you allow ~yourself to do something fun, when you allow~ yourself to be slightly challenged.
So a, a couple of weeks [00:04:00] ago, in episode 149, we talked about analog creativity, and this is, you know, paper and yarn and glue sticks and clay, ~or even bread dough being kn- kneaded on the counter,~ or even bread dough being kneaded on the counter. We talked about what analog means for us today, and why analog or creative activity that involves your hands and your brain, why it feels so good.
~So today we're going to ex- ~so today we're going to explore creativity from another facet, and that is your energy. Because here's what I've noticed. When people tell me that they are reaching for their knitting or their paintbrush or their bread dough, they don't usually say, "Because I felt like I needed to be creative."
~They say, "I needed to do something that makes me happy and makes me feel more energy," or makes me... They say, "I needed to do something that made me..." Mm-mm. They say, "I needed to..." Well.~ They say, "I needed to do something that makes me happy and feel more energetic." And my friend, you're
The Word 'Rest'
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Beth Buffington: not alone in the search for renewed [00:05:00] energy.
~Okay. They say, "I needed to do something that made me happy and renewed my energy." And my friend, you are not alone in that search for renewed energy.~ Google searches for no energy, or how do I refuel my energy, or how do I find my energy again, they have grown about five times over 2021. That's a whole lot of us typing the same thing into a search bar.
So let's talk about energy. You know I love understanding words better, so today's word that we're going to look at is rest. And here's some fun history that I discovered. About 1600 years ago, the word for rest was tied to distance. Back then, an ancient people who spoke Gothic language used the word rasta, meaning a mile.
~Word historians think that the wor- ~And word historians think the early sense of rest was the stretch of road you travel before you stop and refill. So it was all [00:06:00] combined together, the journey and the refuel, or that rest. And I love that. Because rest was never meant to be the opposite of a journey, it was part of the journey.
It's the stop to refuel that keeps you going, right? So let's talk about what kind of stop to refuel we are making that isn't helping us refuel. Because I think these days there are actually three kinds of rest. There's the drain, the pause, and the refill, and only one of them actually fills
The Drain
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Beth Buffington: up your tank or fills it back up.
~The first type of rest that we're gonna talk about today is called, it's what I call, the drain. The first type of- The first type of rest we're gonna talk about today is what I call the drain.~ It looks like rest, but it's all smoke and mirrors. You're on the couch, you're cozied up, you got fuzzy socks, you got warm blankets, and you're binging on whatever you [00:07:00] wanna watch that's streaming, or you're watching reels, or you're letting that next video play, and then the next one, and the next, and the next.
Whatever gets served up, you're entranced, and time, it just drains away. And here's the sneaky part. The drain still gives your brain little hits of reward, so you feel like you're resting. "Ooh, a funny video. Oh, another funny video." Well, that's dopamine, and scientists say that dopamine is less about enjoying something and more about wanting the next thing.
"Well, that's good, but what else~ do you got? What else~ do you have?" So you keep reaching for ~the next one, ~the next thing, the next video. It's kind of like eating potato chips. You can't just have one potato chip, right? Nope, you gotta have the whole bag. So there's no resolution to this. There's no solution.
There's no puzzle to solve. [00:08:00] Nothing gets figured out. You've not made anything. It's just reward without satisfaction, ~kind of like a present that just is an empty box.~ Kind of like a beautifully wrapped present that is just an empty box. ~And here's the thing, your brain never actually gets to rest because...~
And here's the thing, your brain actually never gets to rest, even though you might be on the couch with your blanket and your comfy socks, but your brain's not resting because it's always reaching for what is next. It's chasing that next thing. ~"What's next?" ~And there's no reward. ~It's just, again, "What else is there?~
~What else is there?"~ And it is really hard to pull away from rest that is draining ~because the ~
The Pause
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Beth Buffington: ~suction is all about that downwards... ~Because there is suction in a drain, and it's all about staying in that downward spiral that is not lifting you up. It's just pulling you down the drain.
Now, the second type of rest is the pause.
Now this is, ~uh,~ the quiet kind [00:09:00] of rest. Sitting on the porch with your coffee, a long, warm bath- ~Swinging on a swing, staring at the sky, laying in the grass,~ sitting on a park bench with no earbuds. A pause is good, my friend. We need it. It's like waiting in the car for a friend and turning off the engine ~to conserve your, ~to conserve your gas.
Your body gets to save energy, and your busy mind gets a chance to, well, pause. So pauses are good. Keep your pauses. But here is the thing about the pause. It's wonderful for stopping ~and turning off the engine. That, well, that keeps you frunning...~ And turning off the engine, that keeps you from running that tank any lower.
But turning off the engine doesn't put gas back in your tank. So if you've been running on fumes, you need to do more than just conserve your energy, okay? You need to refuel. And that brings us to the third kind of rest, and that is [00:10:00] the refill. This, my friend, is real rest, the kind that actually ~puts gas back in the tank, the kind that actually~ puts fuel back in the tank, and it comes in two forms.
The first one
The Refill
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Beth Buffington: you already know about, and that is sleep, and you know that's really important. ~A good night's sleep isn't just a pause. It's your nightly fill-up. Scientists have found that while you sleep, your brain is busy sorting and storing and reimagining what you've learned during the day. And during deep sleep, fluid washes through your brain, a little like a nightly rinse cycle.~
~And that rinse research started with mice-~
~Okay~ A good night's sleep isn't just a pause. It's your nightly refill, ~okay? ~Scientists have found that while you sleep, your brain sorts and stores what you've learned during the day, kind of organizes the chaos, right? And during deep sleep, fluid washes through your brain like a nightly rinse cycle. All of this is so important.
So sleep isn't your body switching off. It's your body refueling, and protect it, please. And here's why I say protect it. 'Cause you see, the drain loves to steal your sleep. Do you know that feeling of, "Oh, just one more glance at my phone before [00:11:00] I go to bed," and the pull that you might get for, "You know, I'm just gonna look at one more video," and it's like 10 o'clock at night?
That time is usually coming straight out of your sleep. You are robbing sleep time. One survey found more than 40% of people scroll social media right before they go to bed. Oh, that's not good. So the drain doesn't just fail to fill you up, it is sneaky. It's sneaking in, and it's taking a bite out of your best refuel time.
Sleep refills you overnight, ~but there's a second kind of refill. So sleep is a very important kind of rest. And so refilling sleep is one of the important parts of rest that refills.~ But there's a second kind of refill, one that you can reach for during your day, and it's the one we're gonna talk about today.
~The daytime refill is when your hands and your brain get to pray. Uh, no.~ The daytime refill is when your hands and your brain take a break, ~and they get to play, ~and they play with ~puzzles or ~easy games or challenges or motion. And this ~is all something that you can touch and turn to and figure out, and you get a good feeling, but this~ time it's something you've [00:12:00] earned and learned and figured out.
There's a neuroscientist named Kelly Lambert who has made a name for this, and she calls it effort-driven rewards. Her idea is really simple. When you use your hands to put real effort into something that you can see and touch, your brain pays you back with a sense of wellbeing. Think about, ~um,~ pulling a warm loaf of bread out of the oven or finishing ~that last row of knitting or crochet on a scarf, or finish- finishing~ that last row of knitting or crochet on a scarf.
That little, "Oof, I did that" glow- That's the reward that Kelly Lambert is talking about, and you only get it when your hands are doing some work. ~And much of her research, do, do, do, do, do~
Now, I talked about this kind of effort-driven rewards back in episode 149 when we were talking about analog activities, and it fits the refill perfectly. The drain hands you the reward for free, but it doesn't last, [00:13:00] and it doesn't give you solutions. The refill asks for a little effort, and then it pays you back with a reward that makes you feel good.
Now, I am not here to take away your favorite TV shows or videos. I love a good streaming show, and I enjoy plenty of television. ~But here is the difference that I want you to notice. Did you choose this show, or did you get lost in the show? Did you choose the show, or did you... But here's the, but here's the difference.~
~But here's the difference I want you to notice ~But here's the difference I want you to notice. Did you choose this show or did it choose you? And when you started to watch it, did you get lost in it? Can you stop ~once the sto- can you stop once the show is started? And how do you feel, hmm- Can you stop~ once the show is started?
And
The Algorithm Spell
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Beth Buffington: how do you feel when the show is over? ~So here's another... ~Now, here's another tricky thing about the drain. It casts a spell, the algorithm spell. Before digital life, I want you to think about how things used to end. The last page of a book, the credits at the end of a movie, [00:14:00] the bottom of the popcorn bowl.
Those were signals that said, "Okay, this is done, and it is time to do something else now." A professor at NYU named Adam Alter calls these stopping cues, and he points out that an endless feed basically erases these stopping cues because there's no bottom. There's no last page. Nothing ever ends. And the next episode ~of a, ~of a video or, ~um,~ a television show, well, it starts before you've even decided whether you want to watch something else.
And how many of you have thought, "No, I'm only gonna watch this ~one last~ episode," and then the next one starts, and you go, "I'll just watch a little bit of it"? And before you know it, that episode is over, and dang it if you're not in that third episode. I bet you can imagine how the drain does grab you and then gently suck you into that downward spiral down the [00:15:00] drain.
~Now, when you're in the drain, you never reach the end of what you think is rest.~
Now when you're in the drain, you never~ get to what you feel like is the end of your break or your rest. And this is faux rest that has no end, and it isn't~ really rest. It's just a loop that is keeping your brain chasing around, and there's no way out. ~So getting stuck in the drain, that's not a character flaw, my friend.~
~We all do it. All, we... ~Getting stuck in the drain is not a character flaw, ~my friend.~ A lot of us do it. A lot of us. Me too. It's designed to be sticky. It's ~very clever ~design that sucks you in and keeps you there, and many giant companies have spent a lot of time and money to keep you swirling in the current in the drain.
But here is the good news. Once you can see that there is a spell holding you, ~it gets a lot easier to break the spell and to step out of it. ~It gets a lot easier to break the spell and step out of it. So let's solve the mystery from the top of the show. Why can you spend a whole weekend on the couch thinking you're resting, and still wake up on [00:16:00] Monday strangely tired?
Here's why the drain fools us. Your body was still, you were comfy, your calendar was clear, ~the hours were off of the work schedule, ~so it sure felt like rest, right? But while your body was parked on the couch, your brain never was still. It was constantly chasing and looping the next thing and the next thing and the next.
~It's like plugging your phone into a charger that really isn't plugged into the wall.~ It's like plugging your phone into a charger that isn't plugged into the wall. So it sits there all weekend, and it looks like it's charging, but Monday morning ~you pick up, but Monday morning~ you pick it up, and the battery is still in the red.
~So research-~ researchers have looked at this, and one team followed more than 200 working adults before, during, and after their weekends. What they found was~ what people did on the weekend helped explain how they were going to how... What people did on the weekend help- ~What people did on the weekend helped explain how they felt going into the next work week.
The kinds of experiences that actually mattered were things that helped them switch off from work and [00:17:00] engage in an activity that was new or fun and had a little challenge to it. So it's not just how many hours you rest, it's what kind of rest you choose. And real rest doesn't need to be horizontal. It doesn't require a blanket and comfy
Science of the Refill
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Beth Buffington: socks.
~When you enjoy... And when you enjoy a little fun challenge when you're resting, well, that sounds a whole lot like Puzzles in Motion to me, and that sounds like creativity~
~So it's not just about how many hours you rest, it's what kind of rest you choose. And real rest doesn't need to be horizontal, doesn't involve blankets and comfy socks. And real rest also allows you to enjoy a fun challenge, and that sounds a whole lot like puzzles in motion to me. And that sounds like creativity.~
So what makes the refill work so well?~ I'll give you a few quick examples, because I'd much rather you go and try this than listen to me talk about research. But first, ~a study from the University of Otago in New Zealand.~ You'll see these researchers ~asked more than 650 young adults to keep a diary every day for about two weeks, and each day they wrote down how much time they spent doing something creative and then how they felt.
~And here's what popped out. ~On the day after people did more creative things than usual, they felt more energetic and more enthusiastic, ~and it didn't work the other way around. Feeling good one day didn't lead to more creativity the next. ~The creativity came first, and the energy followed.~ So that's a pattern, um, and it's pretty encouraging.~
~The creativity came first, and the energy followed. Second, there's an idea from two psychologists, Ra- Rachel and... Second, here's an... ~Second, there's an idea from two psychologists, Rachel and Stephen Kaplan, and they call this [00:18:00] attention restoration,~ and that's thinking... The thinking goes like this. Okay. Second, there's an idea from two psychologists, Rachel and Stephen Kaplan, called attention restoration,~ and the thinking goes like this.
The kind of focus that you use all day gets tired, like a muscle, so it recovers best with what they call soft fascination, things that hold your attention gently without demanding a lot from it. ~So clouds moving, leaves in the wind, w- water flowing, a flickering candle. Your eyes are busy, but your brain gets to breathe.~
~The Kaplans studied nature, but researchers have also found that art museums can do the same thing. ~And so here's what I've noticed in my own studio. A lot of gentle hands-on hobbies feel the same way to me, ~like watching clouds in the sky or watching leaves fall. Watercolor blooming across wet paper, yarn that loops over a needle or a crochet hook.~
Your attention is held softly, and your mind has room to wander while your hands are busy.~ Nobody... I don't know if anyone's put that in the lab, in a lab to study yet, but I bet you've felt it and felt that same sort of curious energy bubbling up. Third, I want to talk about puzzles. Researchers in Germany worked with hundreds of adults that were over 50, and they found that doing jigsaw puzzles draw on eight different thinking skills at one time.~
~Seeing shapes, turning things in your mind, memory, reasoning, flexibility. That's a whole workout, but it feels like play. And then finally, motion. Hands love rhythm and re- and repetitive actions. So kneading dough, blending with a paintbrush, or coloring with a crayon. The repetitive movements in knitting and crochet.~
~One study found that just 10 minutes of mindful coloring a few times a week helped lower stress and anxiety. 10 minutes. You get just 10 minutes. That's shorter than most episodes of pretty much anything on Netflix. That doesn't take long, and it does good things for your brain. So here's what I want you to take from the science we've talked about.~
When you are resting using the refill, it gives your brain something to solve, something to complete, and it gives your hands something soothing to repeat. And then you pair that with a good night's sleep, ooh, that's a combination that fills the energy tank back up to the brim. And in my going forwards, ~uh,~ [00:19:00] framework, that
Going Forwards Clubhouse
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Beth Buffington: is the revive stage in action.
~And speaking of getting real wes- And speaking of getting real rest, let's pause for a moment and let me tell you at a b- ~And speaking of getting real rest, let me ~pause for a moment and~ tell you about a place that's full of playful rest. The Going Forwards clubhouse is where you go to find your next fun activity, ~and then you go do it with your actual hands.~
~And, uh, I want you to think of this as opposite of an algorithm, because nobody's serving you the next thing. ~You get to pick out what sounds fun, and then you get to have fun doing it. ~You get matched.~ Inside the clubhouse, you can get matched with a pen pal and trade cards through real mail. You can play with your food in the recipe exchange.
You can turn real pages in Beth's Best Book Club. And every quarter, there's a creative challenge that you can enjoy. You can go for the prizes that are offered, or you can just play along for fun. Plus, we get together every month to meet ~all~ the creative people that are mingling inside the creative clubhouse.
There's never any deadlines. ~There's no budgets you have to follow.~ There's no new technology that you must learn. [00:20:00] Just fun. Your first month inside the clubhouse is just a dollar, and then it's only $9 a month after that. That's less than a couple coffee drinks. ~So come and find the creative clubhouse at [email protected] So come and find the creative clubhouse at www.bdi-create.today/going-forwards-membership.~
~There's a link in the show notes that will take you straight to joining the clubhouse.~ And there's a link in the show notes that will take you straight to the registration page ~Okay, here's the fun part. We're going to talk about seven refill swaps that's going to replace, um, something that you might feel will be draining ~
Seven Refill Swaps
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Beth Buffington: ~in rest, and it'll give you something that we- it will, mm, mm, mm, mm.~
~Okay, here's the fun part. We're gonna talk about seven refill swaps. Each one is for a moment when you'd, you might actually be... No.~ Okay, here's the fun part. We're gonna talk about seven refill swaps. So each one of these ideas is for when~ you have a moment when~ you feel yourself reaching for something draining.
And each of these ideas is going to give your hands and your brain something to play with. You don't need to do all seven, but listen for the one that makes you think, "Ooh, I can actually do that." And then get busy, my friend
Okay, ~number one, the paper and puzzle lunch. Remember when you, uh, used to actually take a break at lunch? Let's do that again. So I want you to put your phone in a drawer and go to lunch~
~Number one, the paper and puzzle lunch. Remember actually taking a break at lunchtime? Let's do it again. So I want you to put your phone in a drawer and not look at it, not across the table. Um, okay. Remember actually taking a break for lunch? Yeah, let's, let's do that again. So I want you to put your phone in a drawer for your lunch hour or your lunch half hour.~
~Oh, dang it. Remember actually taking a break for lunch? Let's do that again. So I want you to put your phone away, not across the table. Put it away. And then bring a paper puzzle book, a crossword, a word search. Goodness' sake. Why is this so hard, Beth? Remember actually taking a break at lunchtime? Let's do that again.~
So I want you to put your phone away, not just across the table. Put it away somewhere in a drawer, leave it in a different room, and then I want you to get out a paper puzzle book, a crossword, a word search, sudoku, something in a puzzle book. Bring it to [00:21:00] your lunch. Then your brain is going to get to play while you nibble on whatever it is you brought to eat, and your brain is gonna get a real break from whatever it is you're doing at work, and all at the same time you're eating and enjoying a fun puzzle.
~And bonus points, and And, and bonus points, my friend, if you move away from all computer screens and eat by the window. ~Number two, the jigsaw in plain sight puzzle. So I want you to set up a jigsaw puzzle somewhere where you walk by it every day. The dining room table, maybe a card table. And here's the rule.
You don't have to sit down and work on the puzzle for hours and hours. You just~ get to ~do a few pieces here and there, now and again, whenever you pass by it. So organize the corners, find all the edges, sort all the colors, and then start piecing them together, just five pieces at a time or just one at a time as you walk by.
That's it. A little at a time. ~It's a little like a drink of water that you need when you're exercising, so small sips,~ that's gonna top off your energy [00:22:00] levels. Number three, the window sketch.~ I'm gonna tell you right now that everyone, anyone can sketch. Trust me. And~ here's how, yes, even you, someone who thinks you can't draw even a stick figure, how you can have fun sketching.
I want you to choose a window with a tree or a mailbox, a bush, a lawn chair, ~w- w- ~something that you can easily see from your window view. And then have a sketch pad, and just for a few minutes, I want you to draw the shapes you see. Do you see some squares, some circles, some triangles? And then add some loose details to whatever those shapes are to see if you can get it to look like your tree or your mailbox or your bush or your lawn chair.
You're not drawing for a masterpiece, so you don't have to worry about making it good. ~Just put your eyes and get that soft fascination of~ concentrating on objects, ~and your hand just~ will get into that motion of sketching. Very good for your soul. Number four, 10-minute coloring. My friend, I just want you to get a coloring book.
Yep, just like when you were little. Find a [00:23:00] coloring book that ~just~ interests you. And also choose a box of crayons or colored pencils, and then set a timer for five or 10 minutes. That's all. It doesn't take a lot of time to reap the benefits of a refill session. And here's a little secret. Nobody is going to check whether you colored inside the lines, so just color with abandon.
Have some fun. Number five, the button jar game. So do you have a jar of buttons somewhere, or maybe a jar of beads or old keys or seashells from three summers ago? I want you to get that jar, that container, and just pour them out onto a table ~Pour them out onto a table,~ and then sort them by color or by size, or shape them into something, a face, an animal.
You see, this becomes a puzzle for your brain that has no right or wrong answer. It's just straight up creativity, and it's going to make your hands [00:24:00] and your brain so content. Trust me. Number six: play, sing, or dance to a song. So I want you to pick up an instrument, ~uh,~ and play one song, or find a song you love to sing along to, or even better, that you can dance to.
Music is motion and a puzzle all at one time. So movement with your fingers or your vocals or your dancing body will make music a spectacular way to ~refuel and~ refill your energy. ~Number seven: the creative... crap~ Number seven, the creative prepare. So what do I mean by that? This one is especially good for evenings when you~ know you're going to~ have free time, and then before that algorithm spell starts to capture you ~around that bewitching hour that is maybe, like, 10:00, maybe 9:00, I want to...~
~I want you, ~I want you to reach for what you've prepared. So you're going to set up a project that is going to be in progress, one that you can just pick up and [00:25:00] begin again. So knitting or, ~uh,~ a drawing that you've started, ~a small painting.~ Get out that coloring book. Have stationery and pen handy so you can write to a friend.
So before the drain starts to pull and suck you in, you pick up your prepared creativity instead of the remote. This is something that's waiting for you that you actually wanted to come back to. And so the fact that you don't have any setup makes it super easy for you to start. ~Uh, ~you don't have to search for supplies.
You just enjoy the doing, and then you soak in that refill. So there you go. A paper puzzle lunch, a jigsaw in plain sight, a window sketch, a few minutes of coloring, the button jar game, one song, the creative prep. Each one of these ideas gives your hands something to do and your brain something to play with, ~and that's a refill that will benefit your heart.~
~And that's a refill that will benefit your energy in heart, mind... Jeez. Raspberry, come here. Come. And that's a refill that will benefit your energy... Raspberry, no.~ And that's a refill that will benefit your [00:26:00] energy in
Curiosity Returns
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Beth Buffington: heart, mind, body, and soul. ~Now, there's... Now, now~ here's something~ sneaky~ that happens when you start resting for real, and this is my favorite part.
~Once your tank has a little fuel in it and you're not running on fumes anymore-~
Once your tank has a little fuel in it and you're not running on fumes anymore, something comes back that you might not have felt in a while, and that is curiosity. So let's say you're sorting buttons and you suddenly think, "Huh, what would these look like on a jean jacket?" And then all of a sudden you're sewing.
Or you're sketching that branch and you think, "You know, I used to love drawing trees. Why did I stop?" Or you're playing an instrument or you're singing a song and suddenly you want to learn a new song. ~There's research behind this too. Researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, gave people a creative puzzle and then they gave them a break.~
~During the break, some of the people, um, were given another hard task to complete. Some had a simple, easy task. Somebo- some just quietly rested. And some had no break at all. Then when everyone And then when everyone tried the creative puzzle again, only one group came up with new and more ideas. And believe it or not, the ones who did the easy task were the ones who came up with new ideas.~
~That's fascinating, right? I thought so. The simple task let their minds wander, and their minds wandered somewhere interesting, and that was the real rest. It was rest that refilled their energy.~ In my Going Forwards framework, this is the realize ~phase. This is the realize~ phase in action. ~It's when your brain goes off autopilot.~
It's when your brain switches autopilot off, and then finds out that it is hungry for fresh ideas, [00:27:00] and those ideas start to show up because you're looking for them, because your curiosity has been refueled. So when you're enjoying real rest that includes a bike ride or a jigsaw puzzle, that little spark of curiosity is going to start popping up while you're refilling and resting.
So don't brush it off ~as a distraction, ~because curiosity, it's a clue. It's pointing you towards something you might want more of
Your Next Step
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Beth Buffington: in your life. So revel in that new energy. Now, here is what I hope you take with you today. You don't have to give up any of these three kinds of rest. The drain, the pause, and the refill, they can all have a place in your week.
'Cause I'm not asking you to take away your Friday night movie or the time you spend just kind of scrolling, ~um,~ looking at cat videos. No, ~I'm not, ~I'm not taking away any of that. [00:28:00] But it is about proportion. Do you remember a couple of weeks ago in episode 149, we talked about digital time and analog time?
Digital time is spent on a screen, your phone, your TV, your tablet, your computer, and analog time is spent on activities that you do with your hands. You know, cooking, gardening, knitting, painting, pottery, jigsaw puzzles. So we drew a pie chart of our days, and we asked ourselves a simple question: proportionally, how much of my day is digital and how much is analog?
And we didn't judge, we just noticed. So today, let's draw one more pie chart. This time it's going to be about your rest. The drain is one slice of your pie, and so is the pause, and so is the refill. So in your pie chart, if the drain takes up most of your pie, and the pause and the refill are down to ~little sliver slice- ~little sliver slices, that's when your tank stops getting refueled.[00:29:00]
You think you're resting, but you're just running low on energy. You're running on fumes because the rest that you're giving yourself isn't real rest. And that's when you hear yourself say, "I don't get it. I rested all weekend, and I'm still tired." Understanding how you are resting, this isn't about judging yourself.
It's not about feeling guilty. ~It's about understanding the information that you can see now that you know. It's about finding out how you need to slice your pie to have the best energy.~ It's about giving the pause and the refill bigger slices. Resting, it is so important, and you must revive your spent energy.
Revive is not the opposite of productivity. It's the engine underneath it, ~and it's an engine that is fueled with good amounts of energy, and it's an engine that has a full tank, okay? ~When you revive, you refill your energy tank. So here's your one small thing for this week. Three words: pick it, plan it, practice it.
So first, pick it. Go back to our list of seven refill swaps, and I want you to pick one, just one. And [00:30:00] then plan it. Choose a time in your day when you usually find yourself reaching for that drain, and that's where your swap comes in. And then I want you to practice it. During the week, when the drain feels tempting, do your swap instead.
~Do it a few minutes a day just for one week.~ You're not gonna be perfect, but adding even a swap or two during each day, ~each week~ is going to be a win. And then on Monday morning, I want you to check in with yourself. How full does your tank feel? Is there a little more energy in your tank, more than, say, last week when you weren't practicing swaps?
You, my friend, have spent enough Mondays wondering why you are still tired. So this next week-~ So this next week,~ let's find out what happens when you actually refill your energy. And if you'd like a plan ~for keeping your energy full~ so you can really understand how to monitor your energy tank, I want you to [00:31:00] grab my free Going Forwards guide at www.bdi-create.today.
Tucked inside, you're gonna find your invitation to the clubhouse. And remember, my friend, everyone is creative, and your creativity is a tool to keep your energy levels topped off. This means that understanding how to get some real rest, well, it's how you stay creative, my friend
