5 Gears: How to Be Present and Productive When There Is Never Enough Time

81st Gear—Learning to Recharge

How well do you rest? Do you take the time necessary to fully recharge?

Do you have an intentional recharge zone or a routine you have disciplined yourself to follow that helps you downshift to rest, refuel, and renew your energy?

When you are not recharged or fully rested, it is almost impossible to be present with someone else, let alone add value to his or her life. When you are charged up and rested well, then you have the ability to impact those around you, which will simultaneously impact your influence.

People in general do not know how to rest or recharge. Therefore they are less effective than they could be. The majority of people I know fall into this category of not knowing how to recharge. They might read an article on rest and say, “I need to do more of that.” They believe they need to recharge and often talk about how worn out they are from all their hard work. And yet, when I ask them what they do to get recharged they say, “I'm just working through it. I will be okay, I'm just tired right now.” Translated, this means, “I don't really know how to recharge and I want you to know that I am a hard worker, and feel bad for me and maybe encourage me a bit.”

I can spot this behavior because I have lived it myself. In fact, 1st gear is not a gear I'm naturally wired to do well. But what I have discovered from my own failures is that if you fix your charging issues, if you figure out what 1st gear feels like for you and discipline yourself ...