Energy vs. Time: Manage Your Energy if You Wish to Boost Your Productivity
You work so hard, but it never feels enough.
You’re fed up with feeling depleted, so you do a quick online search on ‘how to better manage my time’ and you find a list of time management tools and apps to better optimize your day.
So you give them a try, but the cycle continues: You’re always short on time, and you’re always low on energy.
Here’s the thing you don’t realize:
You can be the best time manager in the world, but you’ll get nothing done as long as you continue to neglect the management of your energy.
Why?
Because while you are aware that time is a finite resource (we only have 24 hours of time per day), you might’ve forgotten that time is continuous: it simply resets every 24 hours. Time, then, in and of itself, does not alter your state of being—it does not fuel your energy or deplete it. And you do not control time. What you do control —and what matters—is what you do with it.
Whether you make use of it or not, time simply is.
Energy is a different story though.
Energy is also finite, but energy isn’t something that’s continuous, energy is a resource that needs to be renewed every single day. Unlike the continuity of time, energy is a resource that depletes and withers with the day. And what we do with our energy does matter.
Whether you make use of it or not, your energy will deplete.
So, given the above, let me ask you this:
Why is it then that you are so obsessed with managing time? Instead, shouldn’t you manage what you have control over—your own energy?
Look, you can optimize your daily schedule and fine-tune it to the most minute detail, but at the end of the day, your productivity will plummet and you’ll get nothing done if your energy is low.
Think about it:
If you’re physically tired because you slept late last night, you’re not going to have the energy to do your work today. And research has proven that poor sleep translates into poor productivity and performance.
If your mind is consumed with information and worries about whether or not your new project will succeed, your mental energy will take a dip and you won’t have the mental capacity to fully focus on the task at hand.
If you’re feeling angry or frustrated because your co-worker keeps making the same mistakes over and over again, your emotional energy will take a toll and that will certainly harm your productivity. That’s why (as explained in this article), procrastination isn’t a time-management problem, it’s an emotional one.
It’s not proper time management that boosts your productivity. It’s proper energy management that does.
The 5 Energy Buckets You Need to Manage
There are five areas that we need to pay careful attention to when it comes to managing our daily energy:
Physical: This involves getting 7-8 hours of sleep every night, exercising 3-4 times per week, and eating healthy meals. If you don’t sleep well, you won’t feel refreshed the next day. If you don’t exercise, you’ll feel tired all the time and if you don’t eat well, you won’t be nourishing your body with the right nutrients to function. All these factors contribute (or don’t) to your productivity in life.
Mental: This involves having a clear, focused, and present mind. If you’re always complaining, overthinking, and aimlessly scrolling on your phone, then guess what? You’ll rarely ever find the mental clarity to be focused and productive. (Journaling and meditating really help in boosting your mental energy).
Emotional: Emotional energy is interesting because this is where emotional intelligence plays a role. You need to be aware of your emotions. Anxiety, anger, sadness, or even overjoy, none of them will be conduits to getting things done. The message is simple: Manage your mood and emotional state if you wish to be productive.
Spiritual: This involves any activity that nurses your soul. It might be praying, or being in nature, or even travel.
Social: Whether you see yourself as an introvert or an extrovert or someone who lies somewhere in between, socializing can have an incredible impact on your energy—we are social creatures after all. I noticed for instance how my energy was a little low throughout May. And it was low due to the social restrictions quarantine placed on us. It had been two months since I had a social gathering with friends, and my productivity certainly plunged. This is an example of how a lack of social interaction can lead to a dip in your energy.
The Energy Evaluator Exercise
So now that you know what the five energy buckets are, here’s an exercise for you.
Step 1: Evaluate
Answer this question:
On a scale of 1 to 10 (1 being low energy and 10 being high energy), how would you evaluate your energy levels in each of the categories below?
The Energy Score Card
This step will offer a holistic view of what’s holding you back.
For instance, if you’re feeling tired all the time and you circled a 3 for physical energy, then you now know that you need to give it more attention. Perhaps you should consider scheduling two yoga classes per week to help you manage it better. Or maybe you already exercise, but you just need to allow yourself the necessity of sleeping 8 hours a night.
Step 2: Take Action
Once you complete your energy scorecard, then you need to ask yourself these two questions:
What activities or habits drain my energy?
What activities or habits energize me?
And the goal is simple:
Eliminate the activities or habits that are draining your energy.
Do more of the activities that energize you.
If you’re scoring low on mental energy, and it’s Social Media that’s draining it, then perhaps you can cut down your usage to one hour per day rather than three. Do you feel overwhelmed and unfocused? Then perhaps you should start a journaling habit to help you think better.
If you’re scoring low on spiritual energy, then maybe you can prioritize being more in nature. Perhaps committing to going on more weekend hikes would help.
The message is simple: Find out what drains you and what doesn’t. And then, do less of what doesn’t energize you and more of what does.
What it Means to You
Stop trying to manage time. Optimizing your schedule won’t change a thing.
Instead, learn how to manage your energy.
When you look inward and ask ‘what’s draining me and what’s energizing me,’ you’ll raise your awareness of what’s holding you back and thus hindering your productivity.
More importantly, you’ll surface what activities energize you, which gives you a chance to do more of them.
And isn’t that the idea of life? To do more of what we enjoy.
But there’s one more silver lining:
Manage your physical energy and you will have a healthy body.
Manage your mental energy and you will have a healthy mind.
Manage your emotional energy and you will have a health mood.
Manage your spiritual energy and you will have a healthy soul.
Manage your social energy and you will have healthy relationships.
Do you see it now?
Managing your energy is what leads to a healthy life. And a healthy life is what facilities a productive one.