TGIM: Stretched Thin

Welcome back to Thank God It’s Monday!
​

tl;dr We think we want a free calendar and fewer obligations. But an empty schedule can be just as much of a prison as an overfilled one. We thrive under some stretch, not too much, not too little.
​

Have you ever had a day completely free on your calendar that you’ve been waiting for all week (maybe even all month)? You can’t wait to kick your feet up, turn your notifications off, and be one with the couch. The long-anticipated day arrives, you blink, and all of a sudden, you’re wondering where the day went. It’s over, and you neither feel relaxed nor rejuvenated.
​

An empty schedule doesn’t provide the optimal stretch we need to thrive. Similar to a rubber band without any tension, we lack potential energy. The lack of structure we craved leads to an aimless day.
​

The reason we don’t feel well-rested at the end of one of these aimless days can be due to a few reasons. First, there is the endless dopamine cycle you subjected yourself to, consisting of social media scrolling, snacking, and thousands of micro-dopamine spikes that all inevitably lead to crashes, cravings, and eventually back to dopamine-spiking activities. These leave you feeling like you’ve had the soul sucked out of you, even if you spent the entire day in a horizontal position.

​

The second reason a structureless day leads to further exhaustion is the lack of boundaries you set for yourself. You’ve probably heard of Parkinson’s Law, which states that work will take as much time as is available to complete it. For example, during your wide-open day ripe with opportunity, you promise yourself you will at least empty the dishwasher. 12 hours later, you wonder why it’s taken you all day to empty the dishwasher. Without any boundaries set on your time, your work will get drawn out to oblivion.

​

I’m not trying to diminish the wonder that is having a free day on your calendar. Overcrowding your schedule with busy work and to-dos can also lead to creative blunting and exhaustion. But some responsibility can lead to an even more rewarding and refreshing day than having none at all. So what’s an ideal amount?

​

To demonstrate an ideal structure, we’ll reference another law, sometimes called the Law of the Heart, most commonly known as the Frank-Starling curve. One of the rare medical terms where both contributing parties are often acknowledged (usually one scientist gets gipped), this curve represents how well our hearts squeeze.
​

When more blood returns to the heart, the heart stretches and has a stronger squeeze to push more blood back out. Think of a water balloon with only a little water in it and how the water will dribble out slowly compared to a very full water balloon, where the water will forcefully shoot out.
​

The heart doesn’t function well if there is too little volume. The heart isn’t at its “ideal stretch,” so it cannot eject blood well to the rest of the body. It needs more volume (blood) to fill the heart to create an effective squeeze. More volume, more stretch, more squeeze.

​
The relationship follows upwards along this curve (more volume, more stretch, more squeeze) up until a certain point of diminishing return. When there is too much volume, the heart muscle gets overstretched and can no longer squeeze effectively. And as you can imagine, a heart that is not squeezing effectively can be very dangerous, even fatal.

​

Our schedules operate on a similar curve. When there’s not enough volume in our schedule, we don’t get our best squeeze. We aimlessly putz around and spend 12 hours getting one task done. We are not our most effective when we don’t have enough input to create structure. Similarly, if we are overloaded in our schedule, we will not be as effective because we are stretched too thin and still cannot get a good output.
​

You need to determine where your ideal stretch is to be your most effective.

​

Obviously, we don’t have control over our calendar every day, but keep this in mind for when you do have that glorious opportunity. Don’t go crazy scheduling yourself, but add in some boundaries. It may feel like you’re restricting yourself at first, but I promise you will feel that much better with an effective squeeze.

​

That could mean scheduling a walk with a friend in the morning or coffee with a colleague in the afternoon. Even scheduling time to cook dinner or watch a movie with your spouse can create that boundary, so you can have a deadline to plan around.
​

If you found some value in this, please share it with a friend you think would enjoy it! And let me know if you’d like to be added to get TGIM.

​

This week, my podcast recommendation is new from Science Vs. “Sugar: How Bad Is It Really?”
​

With that, let me know how you can add structure to get more out of your free time.
​

Until next time,
Shannon