How do I manage my energy during times of stress?
A question I am hearing currently is “How do I manage my energy during times of stress?This question seems to be amplified in our current environment. Our focus is most often on managing our time due to workload, competing commitments, travel, and abundant activity. When stress increases we begin to notice that no matter how well we manage our time, our energy plays a central role for how we show up to and experience our life.
Time, we know, is a finite resource. This knowledge leads to our practices and habits around managing it, protecting it, and sometimes wasting it. Our energy, on the other hand, is less finite. It is a source of power that is generative and contagious. Energy is contained in our humanity - specifically, our mind, body, heart, and spirit - and it is a rechargeable and renewable force.
Our energy is about how we’re feeling in our life, it is a measure of what I like to call “aliveness.” It has a profound influence on our performance, our mindsets, and our relationships. It is essentially the fuel we operate from. Our energy, both positive and negative, also has a profound impact on those around us.
So, how do we manage this source of aliveness when stress abounds? I don’t have the answers, I do however have some experiences and thoughts around developing some skills to support energy management.
Find your feet - The primary house of our renewable energy is contained in our body. If you practice meditation (or have ever experienced it) one of the first things to do is “find your feet” (or seat, depending on your preferred position). Finding our feet brings our attention to the physical sensations housed in our body. In our fast paced world, it is easy to believe we are our mind, our thoughts, and our achievements. Finding our feet, especially during times of stress, reconnects us with our physical body as the source of our renewable energy. There are multiple practices we can leverage to increase our physical energy. Beginning with movement and expanding into fuel, care, and rest.
Some questions we might ask ourselves are : How are we fueling our body? What is our current sleep hygiene? How are we caring for our body’s needs? What are we doing to energize our body?
Feel your feelings - Once we have found our feet, it empowers us to feel our feelings. My favorite description of emotions is simply put “Emotions are energy in motion”. Emotions have had some bad PR for quite some time in the human race. They are judged as “good” and “bad”. They are discounted as “useless” and “distracting”. Emotions are an expression of our humanity and aliveness. They can be one of our greatest resources for connection, creativity, decisions, and performance. We have a false belief that emotions occur in the brain, when in reality our emotions are felt and received in our body. When we allow our body to feel our feelings (sensations like tightness in our throat, heat in our chest, etc) our nervous system is intelligent and can move that energy through in less than 90 seconds. This becomes a powerhouse of renewable energy! When we refuse to feel our feelings, that energy gets stored and we have a very long queue of unfelt emotions blocking our energy’s ability to recharge. By trusting our body to feel our feelings, the energy of emotion moves and flows through us and our aliveness is increased.
Some questions we might ask ourselves are : What sensations do we notice in our body? How do we allow the sensations to be in motion? What emotions might be waiting in the queue to move? How can I feel my feelings for another 90 seconds?
Find your "No's" - As we find our feet and feel our feelings, we have the energy to explore the space of our mental energy. One of the ways to recharge our mental energy is through the skill of mental focus, especially when stress is high. This requires us to find our “No's”. Our brains want us to believe we can do it all, be all things to all people. It’s intentions are good, but cannot deliver the goods. Our beautiful brains are such magnificent processors of data, information, and meaning. They have the ability to generate all kinds of outputs on a daily basis. They can run a million miles an hour, attempting multiple tasks at a time, and driving the intangible into tangible realities. They can also get very zealous and over commit thereby depleting our stores of energy. The skill of multitasking has been posed as a super power for many in the workforce for decades. Recently neuroscience has proven it is actually a kryptonite. Multitasking reduces productivity, focus, and the efficacy of our work. One of the ways to recharge our mental energy is through the skill of mental focus. This requires us to find our “No's”.
Some questions we might ask ourselves are : What do we need to say no to in order to focus? How do we say no to multitasking? What is important to focus on right now? How is my mental energy right now?
Follow the joy - Our final place of focus for energy renewal is the human spirit. Our spirit wants to ask big questions consistently in our day, especially in stress. The questions are usually a prompt to notice where there is joy, energy, flow, and aliveness. Learning to follow the joy is a great way to manage our energy in times of stress. It’s a bit like daily bread crumb droppings that, if followed, can renew our energy moment by moment throughout our lives. The human spirit is the wellspring of energy. This is the place that houses our values, what we see as important and what matters most to us. This is where meaning and purpose reside. The spirit is where our natural abilities and strengths are housed. The pace at which we live, work, and manage our finite resource of time, often does not provide the spaciousness needed for our spirit to lead the way for renewed energy. Building practices around noticing our strengths, honoring our values, and pursuing purpose on a daily basis is like keeping our energy connected to a recharger.
Some questions we might ask ourselves are : What is important right now? How do I honor my values with my choices? Where is my current energy level? How can I recharge?
Managing the renewable source of our human energy during times of stress affords us a significant amount of aliveness. This is my perspective on energy management and certainly not the only perspective. I would love to hear the skills and techniques you leverage to manage your energy in times of stress as my learning journey here is only just beginning!