Recently, I met with a client of mine in the marketing and tech industry who was feeling overwhelmed.
🌴 Her last vacation proved to be anything but restful.
💻 Her work environment has become more stressful and ambiguous.
😐 She feels “stuck” in her personal and professional life.
As a result, her mental and physical health are in a rough patch.
Interestingly, she mentioned that she felt like she should “push herself” to get back on track.
That may strike you as odd given where her physical and mental health are right now, but ya know what?
Her experiences and thought processes are NORMAL – especially for clients I work with in the tech industry.
I should know: I’ve worked in tech for over a decade. I understand how we think and what our lifestyles are like!
We’re ambitious, we’re measured, and we love to optimize everything – from our projects to our health metrics. We wear WHOOPs, we ship code, and we drive business growth. When we hit a roadblock, damnit, we find a way around it!
That’s all fine and good when… well, everything is all fine and good.
The reality is, making time to exercise, invest in rest and recovery, and eat healthy meals regularly feels downright impossible when you’re overwhelmed.
What “works” when your stress is low usually doesn’t work during when your stress is high.
It’s okay – and dare I say better – to adjust your workouts, nutrition, and recovery to fit your CURRENT circumstances. Not your ideal ones. Not the ones that COULD work if a few meetings get cancelled this week and maybe this project wraps up and… you get the picture.
In fact, you’ll probably be doing MORE for your health by relaxing your expectations when stress is high, rather than trying to force your “normal” routine to work.
As for my client, we agreed she would do LESS over the next few weeks in her program – not more.
We removed 3 things from her daily habits and zeroed in on the ones that will make the biggest difference in helping her rest, recover, and get back to baseline.
When you’re feeling overwhelmed, don’t try to do more to get yourself out of it.
Figure out how to get MORE out of LESS until you’re back to normal.
Hope this helps. Have a great week.
Love you lots,
❤ Ian
Ian Estabrook 