128. Be “Ultraproductive” Without Burnout: The 90-Minute Method with Christian Poensgen

[00:00:00] How do you become fully confident and in control of your emotions and experience at work? It’s by mastering your own psychology and that of others. On this show, we decode the science of success, exploring how to get out of your own way and advance your career to new levels without becoming someone you’re not.

I’m Melody wilding, bestselling author. Human behavior professor and award-winning executive coach. Get ready and let’s put psychology to work for you.

Melody Wilding: Have you ever had one of those days where you’re busy from the second you sit down? You’re bouncing between meetings, messages, emails, tasks, only to get to the end of the day and wonder, “What did I actually accomplish?” I know I have been there more times than I care to admit, and to be fair, some of this is by necessity.

You are probably getting asked to take on more in your role with fewer resources and less time to get it all done. [00:01:00] But the other piece to this, especially for those of us who identify as lifelong gold star-seeking students, we can get so accustomed to operating in a constant state of urgency that everything starts to feel like a five-alarm fire.

And then we push through the fatigue. We squeeze one more thing in. We tell ourselves we’ll slow down after this deadline, this busy season, except there’s always another one, and through all of this, we end up more distracted, exhausted, and ironically, less productive, even though we are doing more.

This is exactly the problem my guest today, Dr. Christian Perskin, and his co-author Eric Partaker tackle in their new book, Ultra Productive. And their argument is simple, but it’s very powerful. You’re not a machine. You’re not an LLM where you can keep popping in inputs and get outputs. You’re a human, and the best, in [00:02:00] fact, maybe the only way to achieve max productivity is to work with your natural rhythms of your body and your brain.

So in this conversation, Christian breaks down their 90-minute method and explains how to protect your focus, recover your energy, and break the cycle of stress before it becomes chronic. We get into what to do when your calendar is slammed with meetings, why scrolling your phone does not really count as a break, and some surprisingly simple ways to reset your nervous system in just a few minutes at your desk.

If you have been feeling like you are constantly on, but you’re not necessarily doing your best work, this episode is going to give you a different way to think about your productivity. So let’s get into it.

Christian, thank you so much for joining me today on Psychology at Work. This is gonna be a great discussion all about your new book with your co-author Eric, [00:03:00] and I love the title. It’s called Ultra Productive, which I think is something everyone on this show is aiming for. We’re gonna get into how they do that in a moment. But I wanna start with how you open the book, because the story you tell is … it’s, it’s gripping. It’s also quite counterintuitive about more so how almost an obsession with productivity almost took you down. So, uh, bring us into that initial story you tell. How did it get you into this topic and wanting to explore the philosophy behind this book?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Oh yeah. Thanks, Melody. I’m really looking forward to this. And to, to your question, right? So when I started out, uh, like on my career path, right? The first thing that I did was co-founding a startup. Um, and I pretty much subscribed to Jack Welch’s idea of squeezing [00:04:00] the orange, right? Where you go to work and basically squeeze every last drop out of it, out of the day, and then basically you go home, you sleep, and then you s- you show up at work and do the same thing all over again.

And I found that this does work up to the point where it doesn’t, right? So, um, like about a year in, I was like working eighty-hour weeks and the writing was on the wall. The startup was failing, as startups often do, right? Um, and I was pretty exhausted, and I even began to, to like show up cynically in a way for the first time in my life.

And I was a bit puzzled, right? Because I worked hard, I slept seven to eight hours, and I meditated every morning. But as soon as like the the, the workday started, and it usually ended after many, many hours, I was like, really like exhausted and low on energy and, um, but when the startup eventually failed, right, [00:05:00] um, I really became obsessed with understanding what had happened, right?

Um, so, uh, after my PhD on the interplay between stress and performance, I had– I, I hit this wall during the experience that I’ve just, um, described, and then I be-became really interest– became really interested in what it is that actually allows us to become sustainably productive, right? To set ourselves up for like years and decades of being at our best, both at home and at work, uh, instead of just optimizing for uh, doing something for some, some months or maybe some years, and then eventually running into like A certain kind of exhaustion, which for me was mental.

I came close to burnout when I was working like this, and for my co-author, Eric, it was actually more of a physical, like, um, breakdown. So he… When he was thirty-six years old, he actually had a heart attack, uh, in, like, on a plane, right? So in, like, at [00:06:00] age thirty-six, he had a heart attack at thirty-six thousand feet, and then, uh, there was a doctor on board, and the, the pilot actually then landed the plane, and he’s…

He, he, he came out good. He came out good on the other side of this. But both of us actually subscribed to hustle culture, right? And then we got those, like, warning or these wake-up calls in a way. Um, mine was more mental, his was more physical. And then, uh, both of us started with, like, deeply researching and reading all the books about and basically experimenting with what it really takes to be sustainably productive or ultraproductive.

And eventually, our paths crossed, and we teamed up to, to pen, um, the book that, um, will be published later this year. So that’s kind of the story, story in a nutshell.

Melody Wilding: Oh my gosh. I, and b- I, I mean, both of you, what… It’s just truly life-changing experiences. And, um, unfortunately, I think people listening can maybe relate to either side of that. And yes, maybe they [00:07:00] didn’t found a s- a startup, but I think many people listening are accustomed to that feeling of, “I’m doing everything right.

I’m drinking the water. I’m trying to do my mantras. I’m, I’m managing my stress and my energy, yet I still feel mentally exhausted or top- tapped out, or just like I’m going through the motions.” So I would love to hear from you, because there’s, there’s three of sustainable peak performance that you talk about inside of the book. What are those? Set us up for the rest of this conversation, because we’re gonna look at elements of each of those.

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Amazing. Yeah. So the three domains that you alluded to are focus optimization, rest optimization, no- most notably sleep, right? And then thirdly, stress optimization. And I know that people kind of have to– have mixed feelings about this term optimization, [00:08:00] right? It also seems to be connected to that, like Jack Welch adage that I referred to earlier, right, of squeezing the orange.

But what we mean by optimization is not about like working longer, sleeping less, and then just like, uh, swallowing it, right? And just like stre– like, like hustle culture in a nutshell. So it… But it’s all more about a way of working and living that is aligned with the kind of way that our nervous systems and our bodies are set up to actually function, um, and sustainably so.

And focus, rest, and stress optimization are the three kind of most important levers based on our research and also based with– on what we’ve seen over the last like five years of coaching executives, leaders, and entrepreneurs. And to make it a little bit more specific, um, the subtitle of the book is The Ninety-Minute Method to Optimize Focus, Sleep, and Stress.

Um, and in some countries, there’s a bunch of publishers around the world. The sub- the subtitle is The [00:09:00] Ninety-Minute Method for More Focus, Better Sleep, and Less Stress. And I think the most important part here is the ninety-minute method be-because humans are not machines, right? We’re not made to basically kind of grind for hours or even days on end without a break, right?

And basically m-multitasking all, all day long. So we’re not computers, but instead, we’re made to basically oscillate between kind of focus and stress and rest, um, according to the so-called ninety-minute ultradian rhythm, um, which basically governs how we go about our days, how we go about our nights, and even how we should basically work with and not like work against stress.

So the ninety-minute method and the ultradian ninety-minute rhythm is really, really important when it comes to like being more productive, but also when it comes to, um, being able to po– [00:10:00] perform at our best without sacrificing our health and performance– uh, health and relationships, right? So

Melody Wilding: Mm-hmm.

Melody: Yeah, this is, uh, uh, there’s so many important points in there I want to underscore. Just going back to the optimization idea that, yeah, I think it’s really tempting to equate optimization with perfection and pushing at all times, right? Like, yes, hustle, push through, don’t be lazy, and many of us are brought up with that mentality.

And y- we were talking about how you are German. And, um, certainly in, in America, um, I grew up in more of a blue collar setting, as we would call it, which is more of the pick yourself up by your bootstraps, work really hard. If you’re tired, I understand, but things still need to be done. And I, for myself, what, what’s… I wanna hear a bit more about the 90-minute cycle and what that might look like. But what you’re speaking to, I’ve definitely found in my own experience where [00:11:00] Working for myself, and I’m sure you understand this now, it’s so tempting to feel like there is this mountain of things that need to get done. I just need to keep chipping away at it. If I’m tired, push through. You still have things to get done. It’s more of a, it’s more of a time management focus rather than an energy management focus. And when I realized, once I start getting cloudy, once my speed starts to turn down of how, um, quickly I can move through something, old habit used to be through, right?

Try, try to just buckle down, focus more, and there would be such diminishing returns from that. That instead, now, when I get that signal of the fogginess and… Now I know that is my cue to disconnect, to not try to just white-knuckle it through, because I will have a disproportionate gain if I [00:12:00] stop, I fully allow myself to disconnect, and I come back to the task with fresher eyes.

I’ll get it done in half the time, probably with better quality, versus something taking double of the time and likely having to redo it later because it was kinda crappy, frankly. So, uh, definitely matches my own personal experience. when you say the 90 minute method, what is behind that? What does it mean?

What is the actual method?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Yeah. So first of all, I would love to just like, uh, fully agree to what you just said, right? And to, to, to be very clear, this is not about like Not being ambitious or not being hardworking, right? We, we believe, and we also describe this in the book, that you do need a great work ethic, right? And most people, um, that are listening now are probably not having any pro…

trouble with that, right? But what is also very important is to not only have a great work ethic, but also to have a great rest ethic, right, and a great [00:13:00] stress ethic. And the n-ninety minute method is basically, like geared towards developing a great work ethic, rest ethic, and stress ethic with these three areas of focus, rest, and stress optimization.

And the ultradian rhythm that we were talking about goes back to research from the nineteen fifties. Uh, a guy named Nathaniel Kleitman came up with what he called the basic rest activity cycle, or BRAC, right? And he found that through, through, through the night, we go through different sleep stages over ninety minutes, from light sleep to deep sleep to REM sleep and back, right?

And later, he and also other researchers found that this ninety-minute kind of, um, rhythm not only plays out when we are asleep, but also when we are awake, like during the day as well, right? So what you were describing is, is exactly, is, is exactly this manifest-manifestation of the ultradian rhythm during the day because we tend to be alert and able to focus for about [00:14:00] ninety minutes before we need a break of about ten to twenty minutes.

And most people end up kind of pushing through those kind of low points that are natural, um, about every ninety minutes. Instead of taking a, a quick break, instead of like recovering, and we’re not talking about half an hour or an hour of a break, right? We’re talking about very, very simple and science-backed things that everyone can do that can recharge you in minutes or even seconds, and we can talk about this later.

But it’s all about aligning how we go about our days and our weeks and also our life with those ninety-minute rhythms or mid rhythm that basically governs how we go through the nights. It governs how we go through the days in terms of energy fluctuations. And it’s also very important when it comes to dealing with stress because we evolve through stress.

Stress is actually great if it’s acute short-term stress and not the bad chronic stress. And here also, the ninety-minute rhythm, the, what Nathaniel Kleitman [00:15:00] called the basic, um, rest, uh, activity cycle applies because up to ninety minutes of stress are, are fine, but then again, you better take a break, however briefly, before you kind of like focus and stress yourself again, um, if that makes sense.

And later, like this, um, basic rest activity cycle was b– kind of called ultradian rhythm. Ultra means beyond, um, dia means day, right? So these are rhythms that are shorter than the twenty-four-hour like daily rhythm, and the most important in us humans is the ninety-minute rhythm And it really, like I said, it really governs everything.

How we go about our days, how we go about, go about our nights, um, how we can basically deal with stress. And perhaps most importantly, and more specifically, there’s amazing research to show that during the day, all of us, and this is based on a study by McKinsey & Company from two thousand and thirteen.

During the day, all of us can actually double our productivity without m- working [00:16:00] a minute longer if we prioritize sixty to ninety minutes of deep work, of deeply focused work, ideally in the flow state, um, like once per day, right? So that’s one amazing opportunity during the day, and then during the night, it’s not so much about sleeping seven or eight or nine hours.

It’s, it’s more about getting plenty of quality sleep. And in nutrition, we have like three macronutrients, right? Protein, carbs, and fat. When it comes to sleep, there’s two, um, and in a simplistic way, there’s deep sleep for the physical recovery of the body and the brain, and then there’s REM sleep for the emotional recovery that all of us need.

And by getting ninety minutes of deep sleep and REM sleep, um, you can basically get all or almost all of the like nutrients that we need from sleep without necessarily sleeping like longer, uh, in many cases, right? So it’s not only that, that ninety-minute rhythm governs our days, our nights, and [00:17:00] our stress as well, but it’s also by kind of prioritizing sixty to ninety minutes of deep focus during the day and sixty to ninety minutes of deep sleep plus REM sleep during the night that we can get much, a lot more done and basically rest in a very effective and healthy way, um, and at the same time, basically avoid chronic stress, which again, is the type of stress that we definitely don’t want.

Melody Wilding: Yeah. Yeah, and that makes it feel so much more doable to, at least to me, to know, okay, it’s the, it’s the 60 to 90, 90 minutes of focus work, 60 to 90 minutes of rest, which, uh, as someone who, there have been periods of my life where I’ve, I’ve really struggled with sleep my entire life, but there’s been periods where it has been worse than others. And you can start to psych yourself out and get in your own head of, “Oh my gosh, I’m not falling asleep. Now the next day is going to be terrible.” And so even just h- if you’re someone who struggles with that, almost the [00:18:00] overthinking of, “Am I resting enough?” then ki- counterintuitively, then you rest even worse because you’re so preoccupied with are you resting enough.

That’s very reassuring that it’s really just that 60 to 90 minutes is, is, is like an optimal dose of what you need. Okay. So let’s talk about, I, I wanna talk about optimizing focus in particular because this is becoming more and more difficult today, where our senses are assaulted from every which angle.

We have so many, ugh, requests and demands and, uh, reels to watch and information to consume, and and on and on. So what are your best tips, especially for the person listening who is already incredibly busy and feels like, “My attention is splintered in a thousand different directions. I have 10 work projects that I’m juggling.

I think this colleague is angry [00:19:00] with me. I also have these things going on with my kid, and I have to take the dog to the vet.” So many different domains and splintering. can we do? Like, what are some practical strategies to optimize that focus when we’re just so distracted?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Oh, yeah, absolutely. So first of all, I don’t want to paint myself as a paragon of excellence in this regard, right? Back in my startup days, I was the worst when it comes to focus, right? So I would start my day with the best intentions, right? And then when I would arrive at the office, I would check email, um, which, let’s face it, is more of a to-do list put together for you by others, right?

Then I would basically react to everything that would come my way. I would spend most of my mornings in meetings, right? And again, uh, like taking care of what was kind of or felt urgent, but, but, but what, what was mostly not really important. And then after lunch, uh, the rest of the day would p- basically play out in a very similar way so that I would u- regularly [00:20:00] end up working late, late at night or on the weekends.

And with my coaching clients, I see this quite a lot, right? So, um, I work with clients on, like, sustainable peak performance. So, uh, we focus on all three areas and, uh, assorted other topics. But when it comes to focus, this is something that nine out of ten people that I talk to struggle with and where we start with.

And there’s also an… like a lot of kind of research to show this, right? So, um, Gloria Mark’s research shows that we, um, change tasks every forty-seven, uh, seconds on average, right?

Melody: Wow!

Dr. Christian Poensgen: half of that is self-inflicted, and eighty-five percent of the time, uh, or, or of the workday goes to collaborative work, meaning emails, uh, meetings, and, and, uh, messages and all of this.

Um, and I’m not saying that any of this is bad, right? Collaboration is amazing, and the reason that companies exist is that we can do things like as a team or as a [00:21:00] company that we could never do on our own, right? So I’m not making the point against collaboration and about… against working with others.

It’s more that if we do this basically twenty-four seven, it gets very, very difficult to, um, focus deeply and to make progress on the actual important and also hard, challenging work because it’s a little bit like junk food, right? So if you spend your entire day, like, replying to emails and hopping on meetings and, like, answering Slacks or team messages, you feel productive, right?

But then you end up, um, like, at the end of the day w– at a place where you fi- where you find yourself not having done the important work, and then, uh, you end up having to work late or, or on weekends or during vacations, right? So just wanna make the point that this is something that I’ve struggled with a lot, that I see a lot of executives, entrepreneurs, and leaders struggle with as well.

And the, the, the solution is not to change their entire day or calendar or schedule in our, in our [00:22:00] experience. The better way, as we see it, is to just start tiny, right? To think about one block, maybe starting with thirty minutes per day, maybe even fifteen, and then being strategic and proactive with protecting this block.

Um- We have a process for this. It’s called the ultra-focus process, and it has three areas, and I won’t go through all of the, uh, tips, but it’s basically about, first, t-um, timing and planning. Secondly, distraction minimization. And thirdly, focus maximization. And when it comes to the first one, timing, this is really important because what we’ve seen or also found or experienced is that for most people, it’s really hard to do focused work like between nine to five because from…

let’s face it, for m-most people, the time between nine and five is usually packed with meetings and emails and other kind of things that we need to do. And one way to actually get more [00:23:00] focused work done is to work on the edges of the day, right? Maybe before nine, maybe after five. And if you’re able to, like…

or if you have some agency about over your calendar, um, it might even help to try to push out the first meetings to later than, than nine and, uh, the last meetings to earlier than five so that you can actually work the edges of the day. Because, um, there’s actually three day, uh, three times during the day when we’re most able to focus deeply because our energy and motivation and ability to focus is optimal.

And this is not set in stone, but for most of us, it’s thirty minutes after waking up, three hours of-after waking up, and eleven hours after waking up, right? And of course, this is not exact, it’s not thirty minutes, three hours, and eleven hours sharp, but it’s a good, good kind of yardstick. And if you’re trying to think about when to do these focus, uh, focus work blocks or deep work blocks, um, the thirty-three-eleven rule, as we call it, is a good [00:24:00] place to start, right?

So, um, most people, and those are the people that are not night owls, have an easier time to do it early in the morning, right? So maybe thirty minutes g-after waking up or thir-three hours after waking up, but certainly before the meetings and the, like, the email marathon and all of the rest begins. So either s-blocking out some time early in the day to get some, like, deep work done or doing that later to…

later in the day, like towards the eleven-hour mark, maybe, um, like at four PM or five PM, like when the day has, is drawing to a close. This is what is, like, easiest for most people, just given the fact that our kind of biorhythm works that way. And it’s also something that’s, that’s doable with regards to the fact that, like, most of the meetings and the, the, the collaboration happens between nine AM and five PM, uh, at least in most companies.

So timing would be a first kind of tip and something that [00:25:00] we see, uh, like working very well for, for, for, for most people.

Melody Wilding: Yeah. Yeah. And it also, uh, stands out to me that this is also… This is great information to know for the other people you work with as well. Right? That j- even just generally speaking, if you understand other people’s rhythms may be optimized around this too, then that may affect when you hold certain meetings or have certain important conversations with them so someone is at their best, or what you reserve for a different time of day because maybe their decision fatigue and literal fatigue is, is higher.

So it’s instructive for you, but also how you’re, you’re planning your interaction time with others, too. Do you find that?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Absolutely. Yeah. So, um, while these three times are the, the natural energy peak times for m- most people, between 1:00 PM and f- and 4:00 PM-ish, there’s a natural trough in the biorhythm [00:26:00] of most people, and this is where most people kind of try to get some work done after lunch. But this is actually the worst time to, to, to work deeply on challenging things.

During that part of the day, it’s better to, right, um, like hop on a meeting or something because in meetings, even though you might be a little bit more tired, the fact that you are with others or talking to others really gives you some energy, right? It gives you the ability to, to be present and, and productive.

So, um, yeah, there, there are these, these peaks and troughs throughout our day, and it’s really important to, like, work with our energy and not against it, which is what many people actually unfortunately do. So yeah, couldn’t agree more.

Melody Wilding: Yeah. Th- that’s helpful too for the person listening because y- you’re never going to have full control over your schedule, right? There,

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Mhm

Melody Wilding: to be meetings you have to have that you can’t move or work that needs to be done at certain times. But I think what you’re saying or encouraging people is look for what you [00:27:00] can have some modicum of control over, whether it’s your own dedicated work blocks or it’s meetings you oversee and dictate.

Maybe it’s your one-on-ones with your staff where you have a bit more leverage to say, “You know what? We’re gonna, we’re going to move these to the afternoon, uh, moving forward because…” And I, I don’t think you have to reveal that, “Well, we’re doing it so I can optimize my schedule,” but it’s more of a, “I’m, I’m starting to batch how I do these to manage, better manage my time. Uh, and so moving forward, we’ll be doing it in this sort of cadence and sequence.” So I just wanna say that ’cause I think, uh, it’s easy for our minds to throw up the roadblock of, don’t understand. I don’t have that much control over my schedule.” What do you say to that person who feels like maybe their time is so constrained or dictated by others that they don’t, they don’t feel that they have as much control?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Uh, [00:28:00] yeah. This is a great point, and I, I didn’t want to make it sound like this is easy, right? It’s, it is not, right? Um, like personally, we, uh, I, we have two kids, right? Two daughters, one and two. So, um, I used to just spend the first hour at work, like between eight AM and nine AM, like doing some deeply focused work, right?

And then I would do meetings and emails and all of that like later in the day. But now I basically take care of our kids like, uh, uh, first thing in the morning, and then I get the older one to daycare, and then I start work at nine AM. So when, when that switch came, um, what I did, right, because I, I wanted to still have those…

these, those early morning sessions, is that I got up a little bit earlier, right? And before my kids, uh, would wake up, I just like took at least or n- now I t-take at least thirty minutes to, to plan the day, to get some work done maybe, right? And what I’m saying is that we… all of us have twenty-four hours in the day, right?

And I’m not saying that it is easy, right? But if like your [00:29:00] reality looks like you’re basically in meetings from nine to to five or nine to six, right? Then there’s still ways to basically work around this, again, early or late in the day. And most people think that if they bring up this topic with their bosses, right, or with their teams, that others would not be kind of empathetic or understanding in, in that regard.

But the truth is, or at least that’s what we see, is that most people struggle with this. And like for most people in teams, it wouldn’t be like a problem to like do the team meetings at half past nine or ten rather than, rather than nine. So this is actually something that can really work as a team if you– if someone starts talking about it and if you agree as a team that maybe the first thirty or eighty or sixty minutes are like reserved for getting actual work done, preparing the meetings, rather than jumping into meetings right away.

So what I’m saying, I guess, is that individually, we have more like [00:30:00] agency over the edges of our day than we might think. And as a team, if we like raise the topic and talk about this with a boss or with, with the teams, then there’s more leeway and more kind of possibilities than many th- people would think.

Melody Wilding: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Christian Poensgen: right

Melody Wilding: Yeah. That, that, that I think is very empowering, again, that we, we work within systems. You may have to work within that system, but you, you still have control. I love that idea of the edges of the day, and I, I definitely find that is, that is true for me. It’s those golden hours in the morning before everything really starts heating up and the messages come in that I feel like I can power through so much.

And then, and then I’m starting my day already feeling so accomplished too. So it creates this positive flywheel of motivation as well, which is great. Um, the other area I wanted to talk a bit about is because… [00:31:00] And not, not necessarily from the lens of sleep. We’ve, we’ve touched on that a bit, but I, I do wanna talk about rest or breaks during the day.

You were talking, you talked at length about the 90-minute cycle, the focused 60 to 90-minute block, but we need to take rest. W- could that look like? You, you talk about some methods in the book for people who feel like they have absolutely no time to take a break. What might that look like for the real person who is listening today?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Yeah, great question. And it ties well into what you said earlier, right? So, um, when I talked about the, the ninety-minute or sixty to ninety-minute like focus block during the day and then the, the, the, the idea of getting both ninety minutes of deep sleep and REM sleep at night, the missing piece was or is, and we haven’t talked about this yet, the kind of rest during the day part or the break, um, topic, right?

And there’s interesting [00:32:00] research by a company called Desktime, uh, and they did a couple of studies or surveys over the couple– over the last like decade, and, uh, one found that the m– the top ten most productive people kind of take breaks about every ninety minutes and for about ninety minutes in total per day, right?

So we call this the ninety minute break rule. And Of course, this is not about taking like, like one and a half hours, like out of your day, like randomly. But it’s more about trying to, like, work with that ninety-minute ultradian rhythm so that when you hit a trough, right? When you get into that ten or twenty minute like low point that we end up like, end up in a- about every ninety minutes, there’s different ways that we can recharge our energy very effectively, and it’s not about like being away from work for, for, for, for a long time.

Um, and the mo– the two most effective [00:33:00] ways to have a great break, um, and we also talk about this in the book, are working with your visual system, right? Your eyes in a way, and with your breathing system, the way that you, that you breathe. Um, and like to just give you an idea of the first part, the, the visual system.

When we are focused, right? When we are working on something and also when we’re stressed, we’re usually in like a focus, um, like where when it comes to our eyes. So visual focus follows mental focus. So whenever we are basically working hard on something, the eyes are concentrated on, on the screen, right?

We might be in a meeting with someone, so we’re in what scientists call focal vision. And whenever we are relaxed, right, we also relax our, our eyes. This is called panoramic vision, and fortunately, this relationship also works the other way around. So if you want to make a break effective and restorative, one of the most effective ways to do this is to make sure that you kind of [00:34:00] rest your eyes by defocusing, um, deliberately.

And I’m sorry to, I’m, I’m sorry to break it to, to everyone, but if you spent your breaks looking at your phone, this doesn’t count as a break for your nervous system. This is just more work because you keep in– y- you, you keep– you are stuck in that focus mode and very– a, a much better way to get more out of the, the five or ten or maybe twenty minutes that you might have in between meetings or maybe during, during a– the lunch break, is to actually get into panoramic vision.

So get out of focal vision, get out of visual focus, and get into panoramic vision. And the easiest way and the quickest way to do that is to take a walk That, that’s as e- as easy as it gets, right? Take a walk around the office. Five minutes or 10 minutes are plenty. If you can, take a walk outside. It’s even more effective.

If it’s possible, take a walk in a park. That’s, that’s most effective. And it’s not only a great way to recharge our batteries, [00:35:00] it’s also an amazing way to boost our productivity. There is Stanford research from about 10 years ago which found that we are 60% more, more creative when we, when, when we’re walking, right?

So it’s not only a great way to recharge and to kind of get out of the trough that we have been discussing, uh, today, but it’s also a great way to come up with novel ideas to things that we’ve been, like, working on, be it the last meeting, be it the meeting that is going to take place later that day.

It’s an amazing way to recharge and to set yourself up for the next work bout that is coming after the break. And again, it doesn’t have to be half an hour. Five minutes or 10 minutes are plenty. And again, a, a short walk either inside or outside is super effective, um, from what the research tells us and also what I– from what I’ve seen, uh, with– uh, from working with our, with our clients.

Melody Wilding: Hmm. Yeah. It, it’s, it’s funny that you say that. It does make, now that you’re putting those pieces together, it, I feel like it [00:36:00] does make such a big difference even… I mean, we always talk about step away from the computer, but as you were saying, you can’t then go to another close proximity device. You’re staying in this very locked mode. Uh, but when you step outside, your view is so much, is so much broader. And so sometimes in between calls, I’ll even just go sit outside in the sun and just kind of bask and look up. And you’re right, it is this mini reset. Uh, again, reassuring for people that this doesn’t have to take an extra half an hour.

I- is there anything else you would say for the person who, we’ve a lot of folks listening who will say, “I’m in back-to-back meetings all day. I can’t even get outside for a walk.” So for those people who are kinda back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back all day, on their bio break they have to be checking their email on their phone, is there anything they can do to be squeezing in a bit of a break or [00:37:00] restoration of, of focus for them?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Yeah, great question. So two parts to the answer. One, you don’t have to take a walk if you don’t have the time. The other thing that you can do to re- to re-relax your eyes is just to take a, to take a look out of a window and look at the horizon, and if there’s no horizon, just look at the, at the farthest building that is like, like at, at the building that is the farthest away from you.

Do that for twenty seconds, and it will also send like a calmness signal to your brain. Because whenever you get into panoramic vision, it activates the so-called parasympathetic nervous system, which is the rest and digest system in real time, right? And there’s evolutionary reasons for this, right? But if you can’t take a walk, just as funny as it sounds, look out of the window, look into the distance for twenty seconds or thirty, and you will effectively and immediately notice how your mind calms down and how you feel better after like thirty to sixty seconds.

It’s really, it’s really effective. Um, again, the, a, a quick walk would be [00:38:00] my go-to, but if that’s not possible, just like, like g-get into panoramic vision by looking at the horizon or at a, at something that is like, um, twenty feet away. That’s really super effective. If that’s not possible, the other way to actually re-recharge and basically restore yourself very effectively is the breathing system, right?

Um, as it turns out, the way that we breathe is really kind of closely and immediately like connected to our nervous system. So in general, whenever we are like stressed, we breathe in more than we breathe out. We inhale more than we exhale. And the extreme form of that is hyperventilation, right? So if people are having a panic attack, they hyperventilate, and that’s just like, um, like there’s the relationship between inhaling and, and stress, right?

On the other end, there is exhaling. So whenever we are very, very kind [00:39:00] of relaxed, right, we exhale more than we inha- than we inhale. Like a yawn would be an example for this. And there’s different ways that, that people kind of do things that sound like a sigh, which actually is something that happens when we’re relaxed, right?

So inhale emphasized breathi-breathing is associated with the stress response. Exhale emphasized breathing is associated with the relaxation response, right? And again, the cool thing is we can use this the other way around by deliberately exhaling more than we inhale. And there’s different techniques to, to actually do that.

The… One of the easiest ones is what we call three-six breathing, which would simply be to breathe in through the nose for three seconds, right? So you would basically inhale through the nose and count up to three in your, in your head like this And after that, you would breathe out through the mouth for six seconds, right?

And effectively, you breathe out twice as long as you breathe in. [00:40:00] And I don’t wanna go into the mechanism because it’s a bit, like, uh, geeky, but what you do when you exhale more than, than you inhale is that you effectively slow down your heart rate in real time. It works in like ten to thirty seconds.

And as a result of that, like, slower heart rate, that slower heartbeat, your relaxation response is basically activated. So your, your parasympathetic, um, nervous system, the rest and digest response is activated in real time. And three-six breathing, again, three seconds of an inhale through the nose, six seconds of an exhale through the mouth, and then repeating this a couple of times for thirty-six seconds, say, can really and effectively bring down your stress levels really fast, and then also be very effective as a, as a, as a, as a quick break or a breather, no pun intended.

Right? So that’s really, really effective when it comes to getting an effective break. And if you combine the two, right? If you combine a walk with some three-six breathing or just [00:41:00] looking out the window with some exhale emphasized breathing, that’s the most effective. So I would– If your listeners are able to, I would always try to do, to do both if they’re really stressed and they…

if they really need a break, but any of the two could, could actually work well. And if that’s, if that’s too complicated, the easiest way to bring down our stress levels and recharge quickly via exha-exhalation emphasized breathing is just to do a full exhale, right? Exhale all the air in your lungs because this will also give you this, like, uh, this relaxation response fairly quickly and without you having to learn anything, to learn any meditation or breathing techniques.

Exhaling is one of the fastest way to recharge and to bring down one’s stress levels in real time

Melody Wilding: This is so helpful because everything you were sharing, especially about the breathing, you can do that at your desk without anyone being the wiser. So i- it’s a great, tool to have in your back pocket when [00:42:00] you feel like, “I, I can’t get up and physically step away, but I can do this even within the conditions I have.” So Christian, thank you so much. This has been really helpful and insightful. I really appreciate how much you also took us into the science and the research, because that really grounds it for people. So I know they’re gonna wanna get the book, Ultra Productive. Where should they connect with you, Eric, and, and get their own copy?

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Uh, yeah. Thanks so much, Melody. I hope this was useful. And for anyone who’s interested, um, the book is up for pre-order now. It will be published in October. And at ultraproductive.com, you can basically, um, pre-order the book and then get nine infographics, like one-pagers on things like focus optimization, on things like better breaks, on things like stress optimization.

Pretty much everything that we covered today and a lot more. Um, you will get that into your inbox right after, uh, pre-ordering and submitting your order number on the, on the website. Again, [00:43:00] ultraproductive.com. And you will also get a free seat in the Ultra Productive Accelerator, which is a five-week live coaching program with Erik Patejka, my co-author, and me, which will take place in January or in February.

And again, that’s also part of the pre-order bonus. So if you order the book, uh, it’s like thirty dollars, you will get these nine infographic one-pagers and a free seat in the, in the live coaching program with both of us. So yeah, that’s where people can go to if they wanna, like, learn more about focus, rest, and stress optimization and yeah, like get started on their path to sustainable peak productivity and performance.

Melody Wilding: Amazing. Thank you so, so much for being here

Dr. Christian Poensgen: Thanks, Melody. This was great.