Client name: Angela Tompkins
Website links: https://www.innovativehealthdesigns.com/
About page link or bio listed elsewhere: https://www.innovativehealthdesigns.com/about-us/
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Transcript of Our Interview:
Jess:
I encounter a lot of businesses that are in a state of overwhelm. There are a lot of people that are overworked. What are some common signs of being overworked and what are the implications of those symptoms that you see?
Angela:
It looks like several different things depending on the person because everybody’s a little bit different. Generally losing drive, focus, and motivation. Feeling really depleted feeling, unenthused, and disengaged both in your work, but also outside of your work, with your family, with your friends, with the things that you like to do. Because when we get burnt out, we don’t just stay burnt out in work, we kind of burn out all over the board. So also people will start to lose connections with other passions and purpose and really start to disconnect and then work becomes kind of a forced thing. Really everything does because it’s less organic, they’re losing connection with passion and purpose. And they are just depleted.
Jess:
I was just having a conversation with someone else about this, that when you are feeling it, you tend to just throw yourself in harder and not pay attention to the fact that this is happening to you and something needs to change.
Angela:
Right, because it’s almost like if we create this story, if we just get to this point, then we can rest. If we just get to this point, then we can start exercising. If we just get to this point, then we can take a breath and we’ve all been there, where we are just working so hard just getting to the next level to take a little bit of that stress off of us. But the problem is we don’t take care of ourselves when we’re doing it. We’re going to burn out on the way. And that happens a lot.
Jess:
What are some of the underlying issues that you see that may be causing this lifestyle – leading to being overworked?
Angela:
Well basically an influx of demand, pressure and stress, right? Whether its that you are pushed up against deadlines or you’re just in that part of your business or if you work in a company and you have pressures from your boss, or whatever it is. But really what it’s about is ignoring your personal needs and not holding boundaries, personal boundaries with yourself and your work. No matter what that looks like. And we try to keep pushing harder, pushing harder, pushing harder, just do more without proper self-care. And so that really drastically increases our stress. But that’s what leads to feeling depleted and burnt out. Like this can also happen when we get really, really wrapped up in the tasks and the to do list. That’s when we start to really become detached from our personal or our professional visions and dreams. Because we’re busy surviving the day, and then we start to lose clear intentions and become disconnected.
Jess:
On that note, what are some of the aspects that you see as the key components of healthy living and things to keep in mind to kind of keep that focus that you’re talking about?
Angela:
We are really busy all the time, getting wrapped up in all the doing and sometimes we forget that our bodies are vessels that allow us to do this and we are pleasantly reminded of that when we’re sick. Right? So we want to really hold ourselves with a lot of love and respect and compassion and hold ourselves priority just as much. So as with anything else, because without our health, without our body, without our focus you know, it’s going to be really hard if not impossible for us to make our businesses work. Right? Some simple components are just very simple; eating well, moving well, sleeping well, hydrating well, and eating well means clean – eating clean, eating regularly, not overeating, eating in a way that feels energizing and not like you want to go to sleep right after you’re done eating. Moving…Moving in a way that feels good for your body, that helps you relieve stress, that helps you feel like you’re making a difference in your energy and your physique. Sleeping well. I don’t know about you but I am so unproductive after a bad night. And hydration. We need hydration to keep our brain sharp and working and firing on its cylinders.
Dehydration is a really easy one that is often overlooked when it comes to living healthy and keeping our focus strong during the day. Keeping it simple and doing it well, just taking really good care of ourselves. I feel like a lot of people kind of look for like the magic way to do it, the magic way to eat and the magic exercise, you know? And the media thrives on it. It’s all over, eat this way, do this, eat this food, don’t eat this food. And it just confuses people and it gives people more stuff to do. But I think just the intention of holding oneself, yourself as a high priority and just taking quiet time, give yourself the same quality that you want to give your business and your family. It’s also important to do things that create joy for us and listen to your body, listen to the body’s signals that it’s giving you. Your body will tell you what it wants.
Jess:
Yes. I think that everybody’s a little different and in different times of our lives we’ll need different things. And a lot of it is being intentional about listening and seeing – am I actually thirsty, am I actually hungry or am I eating way too much because I’m having a hard time with something else or just listening to your body and see what it actually needs. I think that’s great. You mentioned finding a way to do it simple and I really like that idea. I feel like taking care of ourselves is this thing we all have in our minds that we feel like we should do and we have guilt that we’re not doing. It feels like this huge thing that we don’t have time to do. So I wanted to talk a little bit about incorporating healthy living in simple ways and small actionable steps that people can start taking.
Angela:
Awesome. When it comes to food, especially if you’re in a really busy schedule, it’s about really honoring that you are in a busy schedule and that you want to eat well. First being aware and sensitive of how food makes you feel – if it makes you feel sluggish and tired, like pain, pay attention to that. If you eat something and you’re like, wow, I ate lunch today and I jumped right back into work and I was just kind of buzzing with energy and full of energy, eat more of that and set yourself up for success. The night before, how can you set yourself up for success for tomorrow? Having readily made food preparing ahead of time. My biggest kick is the Instant Pot because I got it this summer and it totally changed my life. Because I live alone, I don’t really like to spend a lot of time cooking for myself or preparing food. When I bought the Instant Pot that was great because I bought a healthy Instant Pot cookbook and I planned ahead and it’s super easy. It’s super fast and then you have readily cooked meals in the fridge that you can have for lunch and just having healthy food on hand is key, especially in the middle of a busy work-day.
Before I dive into the specifics, something I do want to say is scheduling time for yourself, actually on your calendar. Because that’s something that I feel that often we struggle with when we have such a busy schedule. As you said, it’s this thing that we should do and it feels so big and then we have guilt for not doing it. That feeds into our mentality, our mindset and our cycle. And then we’re making decisions from a place of guilt. So really just actually scheduling on there really helps make it real. If you had a task or a meeting, you’d put it on your calendar. I had this on my calendar today. Right? You put it on your calendar and schedule time for it. It’s almost as though we wait until there’s anything leftover to take care of ourselves. I’m at the end of the day after I finish everything else, then I’ll start working out or I’ll start doing this or I’ll go do that. Take that class I’ve always wanted to take, but I’ve got to finish everything else first. We want to live vibrant, focused, healthy lives, but we’re not going to do that on leftover energy. So by scheduling it on the calendar, it helps you be a little bit more realistic with your expectations for yourself. But it also gives you the space to follow through. And you can move that around, especially if you’re using something like Google calendars or an electronic calendar. You can move it around and still protect it and still hold it super valuable even if you have to change the time, whatever it is.
Jess:
And I find the more that I carve out a little bit of time for myself here and there, the more time I feel like I have in general to do anything because I’m just more efficient and more focused and have more energy.
Angela:
Yeah, when we’re more focused and productive, it’s almost like buying time cause we get through things faster. So scheduling on your calendar, we went over the eating, taking breaks when you need to take breaks and that goes with listening to what your body needs. If you’re starting to really fade out in front of your computer, the time that you’re going to waste fading out in front of your computer versus just getting up and going for a walk or having a snack or lying down and closing your eyes for 10 minutes, or just walking away and coming back you pick back up on that time versus just lose it, staring into tired and burned out, but forcing yourself to sit there anyway. So taking breaks, eating well, and movement is another big thing that helps us with that instant burst of energy. It helps us raise our vibration. And when we elevate our vibration, we are bringing that into our work.
So through movement, through whatever it is that inspires us, like really tapping into what inspires us. And if you don’t know what that is, play around, feel, fight, try different things and see how things make you feel. When you find something that feels inspiring, do it regularly. That starts to elevate your vibration. Then you are coming into your work with that vibration and so you’re attracting more of that. You’re putting that energy into what you’re creating, which is really powerful.
Jess:
Absolutely. So for people who are really hesitant to carve out the time for this, who feel like they are too busy for it, how would you suggest that they get started as far as, should we just set one appointment on our schedule and just see how that one appointment goes? Should we try setting a regular time once a week or once a day? How would you suggest people kind of ease into this process and start to get more familiar with their health?
Angela:
It depends on the person and the schedule. You know, if you could do it at the same time of day, that is wonderful because then it creates a pattern and a ritual. So that’s super helpful. But it doesn’t have to be, mine aren’t the same time of day. Mine move around and at the beginning of every day I kind of look at my calendar. I’ll be like, you know what? I just ate, so I’m not going to want to work out right now and I really want to get this project done, so I’m gonna move this over here, and I kind of shuffle things around depending on how I feel that day and what needs to be done that day. But to answer your question, I would start with shorter time periods. Because like you said before, it feels like this big heavy thing to do. Keep it short. And the same thing with movement, like in exercise, you don’t have to go to the gym for an hour and a half, you can take 15 minutes and do yoga on the floor, or just do some bodyweight exercises, go for a walk or do some breathing exercises or some pushups or some yoga or go for a jog. Keep it short so it feels doable.
Jess:
Absolutely. And then it will just begin easier and easier, right?
Angela:
Yeah. I would say instead of blocking out one big chunk once a week, do smaller chunks throughout the week because then it becomes more of a habit and then it becomes easier to do.
Jess:
And then you can shift your whole lifestyle around it. Well, I think this is a lot of really great advice for people. Do you have any kind of summary that you’d like to say to the people that are going to be listening to this? They are really busy entrepreneurs and business owners. Any advice or inspiration that you want to share with them to kind of take these steps.
Angela:
Remember why are you doing it all for. Staying connected with your vision, your mission, your dreams, and your goals, and what does it take for you to be there? Really revisiting that a lot because we really get disconnected from that when we’re on a to-do list and trying to keep all the balls in the air and just really, really busy. Keeping a close connection with your values and who it is that you want to show up for in your business and your life and what that’s going to take of you. Nurturing yourself and respecting yourself and giving yourself the same care and love and attention that you’re giving other things, like your business, so that you can then give that high vibration to your business and your family and all these other things that are important to you and still feel fulfilled at the end of the day and not drained. Like everything took from you because you’re not filling your own tank. So it really is like I said, find what inspires you, no matter what realm that’s in, even if it’s not directly related to health or work. That will help keep you engaged in your health, in your work and your family and everything that you’re doing that you care about. Because we are the main, our bodies, we are the main drivers of our business, right? So if we want it to flourish, we also have to flourish with it.
Jess:
Yeah. It’s essential. It’s it. That’s the only way we will flourish. Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you so much for all of this.
Angela (17:08):
Thank you, it’s been fun.