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On the WorkWell Podcast, Jen Fisher — Human Sustainability Leader at Deloitte and Editor-at-Large, Human Sustainability at Thrive Global — sits down with inspiring individuals for wide-ranging conversations about how we can develop a way of living and working built on human sustainability, starting with ourselves.
Jen Fisher:
I'm really excited to share that my TEDx talk, The Future of Work, is out. It combines my personal story with practical ways we can all come together to create a better world of work by focusing on human sustainability. Just search for Jen Fisher TEDx on your preferred search engine to watch my talk and please join me in the movement to make well being the future of work by sharing it with your networks. Thank you!
One of my favorite quotes is I am a human being not a human doing I'm not sure who said it but it definitely gets to the heart of the hustle culture that so many of us are experiencing in our day to day lives So how can we break free from all of the doing so we can spend more time being? Prioritizing rest is a great place to start.
This is the WorkWell podcast series by Deloitte. Hi, I'm Jen Fisher, and I'm so pleased to be here with you today to talk about all things purpose, well being, and human sustainability. I'm here with Ximena Vengochea. She's a user researcher, writer, and illustrator whose work on personal and professional development has been published in Inc., The Washington Post, Fast Company, Newsweek. Forbes and Huffington Post, among others. She's also the author of the books, Listen Like You Mean It, Reclaiming the Art of True Connection and her latest book, Rest Easy, Discover Calm and Abundance Through the Radical Power of Rest.
Ximena, welcome back to the show.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Thank you so much for having me.
Jen Fisher:
Absolutely. So it's been a little while since you've been on the Work Well Podcast. So can you refresh our listeners on who you are, your story, and what you're all about?
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yes. So I think the last time we chatted was around the time of the launch of my first book. Listen Like You Mean It, which is a book about listening and is directly tied to my career before focusing full-time on being an author, which is that I was a user researcher working at a couple tech companies and since then have kind of committed to writing and illustrating full time. And I think we'll talk a little bit more about that in terms of how it relates to my new book Rest Easy.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah, absolutely. And I'd love to actually kind of talk about that transition because your first book and the podcast that we recorded around that was so meaningful for me because it was around the skill of listening. So how did you go from listening to Rest?
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yes. Well, for me it's actually like a very direct path. Maybe from the outside it seems maybe random or not so connected. The connection for me is that, whenever I choose something that I'm going to write about, whether it's a book or a newsletter I'm always thinking about partly what's going on in my life. And also, you know, where am I learning something that could be useful to other people. So, listening really came out of my experience working as a user researcher since that's one of the core skills. And Rest Easy really came out of a need to rest. And the reason that I say those are connected is because I wrote my first book while I was working my nine to five while I was pregnant, and then on maternity leave while the pandemic was happening, a lot of things were going on at once. And, when you're in it, you don't really think much about it. You kind of can't afford to think much about it. It was very much just keep putting one foot in front of the other, only afterwards till you realize, wow, that was kind of a lot to be doing at one point, maybe others would've had that foresight. But I didn't, I was kind of like a kid in a candy shop of like, yeah, I'll do all the things. But I was pretty exhausted after that experience. And I don't think it's unusual in this culture, certainly for many of us to get to a point of burnout. Maybe, you know, your version of that isn't exactly the same set of ingredients as mine, but I think we're often familiar with that moment where you go, this is not working.
Ximena Vengoechea:
I am too tired. But I realized when I sort of reached that moment that I didn't really know what to do. I knew that what I was doing wasn't working, and my first sort of guess was to quit my nine to five, and I was in a position where I was able to do that. Which I know not everyone is, but I was lucky enough to do that. And I really thought that it would be temporary, in six weeks maybe I'd be back on the job market, that this was just a sort of temporary thing to kind of help me get my energy back. And it didn't work out that way. I pretty quickly realized that quitting your job does not actually mean that you are resting and recovering. And that it's a little more complicated than that.
Jen Fisher:
Say more about that. That's fascinating.
Ximena Vengoechea:
You know what? I think it's sort of the same idea behind, why do we look forward to vacation because we're not working, you know, as part of it.
Jen Fisher:
Then you come back from a vacation sometimes and you're exhausted.
Ximena Vengoechea:
You're exhausted. Or it even takes like several days for you to even get into the swing of being on vacation. Obviously if you don't have that nine to five, like suddenly you have more hours in the day. But I also had a young child who was not yet in school, the pandemic was happening. You know, there are plenty of other things that can fill your day with stress.
Jen Fisher:
And the world we're living in is just difficult to live in.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah. And so, I kind of realized, all right that was kind of my first personal rest experiment. And it wasn't enough. It was going to take more than that. And I sort of had a moment with myself where I thought, well, I don't really have any ideas about what else to do. You know, I was really banking on that one idea. And that really set off my personal journey and then also this book Rest Easy, which is the sort of culmination of this exploration of what is rest? I don't really remember, or I don't feel super confident in figuring out how to do this. Why don't I remember? This seems so basic and what does rest mean to me? Because it's not that there isn't advice out there, but it felt very vague, and it sort of felt like, yeah, everybody knows we're supposed to get eight hours of sleep. I've been working on eight hours of sleep my whole life, you know? Like, I'm still tired. So it really felt like something was missing. Rest Easy is the book that I wish I'd had when I got to that crossroads, to really get the rest I needed.
Jen Fisher:
I think that's such an important point, and I know you talk about that in the book. I've had so many conversations with people that they're like, I'm getting enough sleep at night, and I still feel exhausted. And so, I think that is such an important point because I know in my own experience too that I was like, wow, I feel like I'm doing everything that I've been told to do, or that I think I know when it comes to rest, which is to your point, primarily us thinking that getting enough sleep will fix it. And then when it doesn't, I know for myself, I personalized it. I must be doing it wrong, or there's something else wrong with me. I didn't actually understand that there's more to rest than just getting enough sleep, getting enough sleep, getting good quality, quality sleep is a very important part of that. But can you level set us on that? How do you define rest? What are the components and then what are the benefits of it?
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah. So, I think of rest as any activity, anything that is going to leave you either calm or energized relative to where you were before. It's either going to help you to calm down, slow down, feel that sense of inner quiet, inner peace, ease, or it's going to energize you. It's going to bring you up, it's going to boost you up, give you joy, and help you tackle whatever it is that you want to tackle. So, I think of it as kind of both sides of that coin, which already I think is a little bit different because it's easy for us to just focus on the first one. Rest is just, I need to sleep, I need to slow down. We can get a lot of energizing effects from rest as well.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Then the other thing that I would say is when I think about rest more tactically, I would say there are sort of three buckets that I'm really thinking about, and that's physical rest, mental rest, and spiritual rest. I think we tend to focus on physical rest. We tend to think about sleep. A lot of people kind of use those words interchangeably, sleep and rest. But there's also mental rest. If you've ever been on vacation and you've been kind of like laying down on a beach, beautiful scenery, and has your mind running a mile a minute, you know that it's not just about being in the right place or even lying down. There is something internal. There's something mental that has to happen for you to really relax as well.
Ximena Vengoechea:
So that I think is a really important category for us to think about. And then the third one, as I mentioned, is more spiritual rest, which I also feel is a little bit of a stepchild. It's like we don't really think about feeding, nourishing our spirit as a way to rest. But for me, if I go to a museum and I see a really moving piece of art, or if I go to a performance, a theater or dance, like those are really spiritually nourishing for me personally. And I do come out of those more relaxed. Now if the museum is super crowded and I have a long commute to get there, obviously that's going to detract for that. But there are these moments that we have that can be very restorative for our spirit, for our soul.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah. I think moments in nature, things that bring us awe can be very spiritually reinvigorating or refreshing. I want to kind of dig into some of the tactical things that we can do in each one of those areas. But before we do that, what are some of the things that people get wrong around rest? What are the myths? We live in this culture that in many ways tells us that rest is bad. That if you're not hustling, if you're not on, if you're not going and doing all the time then you must be lazy, and that rest isn't productive. And so, can we talk a little bit about that and kind of bust those myths and talk about why they're wrong?
Ximena Vengoechea:
Totally. Yeah. I think your kind of honing in on one of the big ones, which is this idea that your worth is tied to your output, that you as an individual, that your value is really in how productive you are. Now, that is true from a purely capitalistic perspective of if you are a worker, your boss, your manager of the company expects you to have some output. That’s true in very crude terms, but it's not true in terms of who you are and what you bring to the world and your experience of the world. And I think we can very easily confuse our value as a person with expectations from a work perspective. And that makes it hard to see that rest is not something that you have to earn.
Ximena Vengoechea:
I think for a lot of us that's probably the big myth. That I would say I see a lot is because we have this idea that we are our output, we do think that sitting still is bad. There's this thing called idleness aversion. It's like you can't sit still, you can't rest, you can't relax. Because it must mean that you are lazy or sort of morally less good than someone who works. And what that often leads to is sort of an unwillingness to rest just because our body needs it. Just because we want to, there's often an attachment between rest and deserving. So, I haven't done enough work to deserve that break. Or I can only take a vacation once I achieve a certain outcome. And that's a big one, because if you don't think that you deserve rest, then it's going to change your approach to it. If you think you have to earn rest, it's always going to be at the bottom of your list. Because there's always more things that you could do to prove. So, I think that can really get in the way of having a sort of more deeply rooted intuitive connection to rest.
Jen Fisher:
And, and it's so fascinating to me that the paradox in all of this, especially when it comes to work and work output, especially quality work output, that the more unrested you are the worse your output is. And so, there is a direct correlation, but somehow, we in our minds and in our culture and our behaviors have completely screwed up that correlation. And so, if you were exhausted and overwhelmed all of the time, your output in anything in your life that you're doing is going to be suboptimized because we do everything better when we're well rested. And that's just a fact.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Absolutely. And I think that's part of why rest is so crucial is, it is going to make you better at your job. It is going to help you be more creative. It's also going to help improve your relationships. The version of yourself that shows up to work or home or a social event exhausted is probably not that fun to talk to. Is probably not that generous in spirit, is not as sharp. I do think that's one of the big benefits, is that when we're rested, we're kind of closer to being our true selves, as opposed to this sort of hollowed out version of ourselves that, it's kind of like you're dragging your body around, but not fully there.
Jen Fisher:
So, I tell people that I absolutely agree with you. Rest, you don't have to earn your rest. We all deserve rest. But if you can't buy into that yet then think of rest as the ultimate performance enhancer. Because somebody with a really high-performance mindset, like rest is the ultimate performance enhancer. And so yes, we all deserve rest regardless. But if you can't buy into that, then just look at it as a performance enhancer. And people can gravitate towards that too.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Totally. And I think everybody’s at a different point in their rest journey. So if that's the message that resonates more, then I think that's great. I think for other people, let's say, who have more people pleasing tendency, the message that might resonate with them more is, this is going to be better for the people in my life. Maybe it's not for me, but it is for my community or my colleagues or my family. So, you know, I think part of finding the rest practices that work for you is also kind of finding the rest mindset that works for you and knowing your why, and that can be different for everyone.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah. And you talk about rest profiles and so maybe this is kind of a good segue into the rest profiles that you talk about in your book.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yes. So, there are five rest profiles, and these really help us understand our relationship to rest. And they have to do with our personalities and our upbringing, our identities too. I would say there's a mix of factors, but there's five that really come up the most. And the first is the intuitive rester. I think of this as the group that we maybe all aspire to be a part of, which is, these are the folks who have a really good sense of when they're tired when they need a break and what the best, most restorative set of activities is going to be for them. And they incorporate it in their routine. They are not waiting to burn out. They're really taking care on a day-to-day basis. May we all be intuitive resters at some point.
Ximena Vengoechea:
And then the second profile I want to mention are functional resters. So functional resters, similar to intuitive resters, they do have a pretty good sense of what's going to work for them. One of the big differences is that a functional rester can sometimes feel a little bit backed into a corner of, I have to rest because I will not function without rest. So, a good example would be people with chronic illness, people who maybe work overnight shifts and so have had to totally redesign their day to day to accommodate very real spells of fatigue or other challenges there. So, they have pretty good systems, but maybe less affection around it. Because they sort of feel forced into it. The third group are gold star resters. So gold star resters to me are maybe a little bit more connected to the conversation that we were having earlier because they are really looking at rest as something you achieve. It's sort of like you get a gold star, you get to rest, it's something that they will tackle at the end of their to-do list but not before because of that mindset of this is something I have to earn.
Ximena Vengoechea:
This is a reward versus a necessity. So, what's tricky for gold star resters is that, maybe they don't have the health issues that a functional rester might have. So they might not notice immediately that cutting corners on rest is affecting them. But they tend to be more prone to things like chronic stress that kind of creep in and are sort of always a low hum there until that moment of burnout reaches. So that's one of the tricky parts. And then there are anti resters. Anti resters I think are the group that is really actively not trying to rest, they're very much part of the rise and grind culture. They really see rest and other self-care practices as something to be ashamed of, something to not pursue. They take a lot of pride in powering through. It's part of their identity. So, they're not trying to rest.
Jen Fisher:
They are the I'll rest when I'm dead group.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah. And here's how few hours I can function on. And then the last group are deprived resters. So, a deprived rester might really want to rest, but they are at a moment in their lives where there are various circumstances that are out of their control that make it really difficult to rest. So that could be the parent of small children. Especially in those early years, you might really want to rest. You might know your favorite rest practices but it's just going to be extra hard during that phase of your life. Or maybe there's a bout of illness that is challenging, or caretaking for another loved one, or having a job that is just not flexible and requires more than you would like to be giving at that moment. So, I think we're all deprived resters at some point in our lives. We usually come out of that, it's usually not a permanent state, but I think we probably pass through it. And then the others, it sort of depends again on your circumstances and your personality and things like that.
Jen Fisher:
So, first of all, that's so helpful. And honestly, I see parts of myself in every single one of those profiles. And so, I'm trying to kind of figure out, there's a part of me that I think I'm still a gold star rester but wish that I wasn't. But anyway, we still live in this culture of busy and always doing. And so, in your research, in your writing, was there anything that surprised you about people's views around rest? And maybe more importantly, how do we change our views around rest and stop feeding this culture of busy?
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah, I would say the thing that surprised me was that in addition to our views around rest being influenced by our general culture and our approach to work and everything like that, it's also deeply influenced by our upbringing. So, the more I talked to people, the more that came up where someone would say, my mom used to always work on vacation and so do I. And they sort of like made that connection during the interview, or someone would say, my dad always let us sleep in on the weekends. And I always did that, and I didn't feel guilty about it until I started a job. And people kind of made me feel embarrassed about that, or I was being lazy. So just learning how deeply connected, understanding your role models. Maybe they were your parents, maybe there were other adults in your life, how quickly we pick up on those habits and approaches, and how deeply that affects our own relationship to rest, to me was surprising.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah, that's interesting. It makes sense when you say it out loud, but I'm not sure I would've thought of it going back that far. You know, in terms of our upbringing and how what our parents did, or other role models did. So, I guess, how do we stop feeding this culture of rest is bad, rest is lazy what, what do we do?
Jen Fisher:
Other than write books like you did.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah. I think it takes a few things and I think what I'll say is that there are things that we can do individually for ourselves. And then there's also going to be a set of things that we can do collectively. Because I do think of this as it's a challenge that is not solely up to you to solve. Meaning you can have all the rest practices in your life. You can do all the right things. And if you work somewhere that is a culture of butts in seats, for however many hours of the day, and no taking off early or no taking a sick day or if you're a shift worker. If you don't have certain benefits if you are a parent that doesn't have access to childcare, like there are bigger structural things that no matter how many candles you light are going to get in the way.
Ximena Vengoechea:
That being said, those bigger structural things are also things that take time, a lot of time to figure out. So, I would say, not burying your head totally in the sand and imagining that those don't exist, because when we do that, we tend to take the blame on ourselves. Why am I still so tired? It must be my fault, rather than these bigger forces. So, we think paying attention to those and doing what you can to get involved if you feel called to that cause, or to at least recognize that it's not your entire responsibility and therefore not your entire fault. So that's one piece. And then when it does come to working on that individualized piece of what do you need, absent those larger forces to get through your day, feeling rested, feeling energized, feeling calm. I think this is where it really can help to do a little bit of exploration. And the book has lots of techniques in each of those categories that we were talking about earlier of, physical, spiritual, and mental rest. So just starting with which part of those calls to you, I think, and going from there.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah. And one of the other things that you talk about in the book a lot, which I think is a great place to start for people are micro moments of rest. So can you tell us what those are? Might seem obvious, but explain that, but also give us a couple of examples of things that people can do during their workday or work night, whatever it might be, just to get those moments of rest and a little bit of recovery.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah. So micro moments of rest are really meant to be the sort of smallest moment of rest that you can squeeze into your day. So even those of us who are super busy, which I think we all feel that way, it's a way of creating a little bit of breathing space. And so, it can be anything from, let's say you are at the grocery store after a long day at work and you are waiting in line and there's people in front of you and it's crowded and it's stressful and you're answering work emails. What would happen if instead you just stopped to breathe? Just took that as a moment of okay maybe you didn't want to spend these extra five minutes waiting to pay for your groceries, but look, you have them now.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Can you reframe them? Can they be calming in some way? So looking for those little moments throughout your day. I think one other that I'll mention too is, a lot of us are attached to our devices. That's okay, we're all in the same boat. But looking for moments to disconnect and again, they don't have to be big. So, one of the things that I talk about is what I call transition time. So when you are, for example, sitting at your desk and then you go up to get a snack, a lot of us will take our phones with us even though there's not really any good reason for it, like a lot of us, were probably just on our phones anyway, especially working from home, it's simply moving from one room to another where we impulsively just grab that device. What if you left it on your desk? What if you just saw what that felt like? So, these are really small interventions that you can try and see. Really the goal is to create more space, more breathing room in your day. And then of course there are bigger things that you can do too.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah. Talk to us about some of those bigger things or I guess said differently. What can we do to make sure that we're making rest a regular habit? Micro moments are a good place to start if you don't have the habits already, but what's the bigger picture look like?
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah, I think the most important thing is really figuring out what actually feels restful to you. Because we were saying earlier, there're going to be things that you hear or common knowledge or you have been told and you just feel that is not cutting it. A good example for me in my case is, when I think of physical rest, I think of anything that I'm doing lying down. So, it could be sleep, but it could be reading a book. As long as it's fiction, and not reading nonfiction, because that's what I do for a living, it is not restful for me. Because I'm kind of thinking too much about how did the author do this. Oh, that's interesting that they told that story. But for somebody else, nonfiction could be really restful.
Ximena Vengoechea:
I think of, drawing, I find that very meditative, very relaxing, and not drawing with a specific outcome, even just doodling. For some people it's crossword puzzles or jigsaw puzzles. For some people it's physical activity that really gets your heart rate up. I mean, this kind of shocked me, but my husband, when I started talking to him about rest, he talked about mountain biking. And I thought, how is that possibly restful? That sounds so stressful and mentally, emotionally, and physically. But no, he really loves it and can get into a particular zone. And I think he is not that interested in massages, which I am interested in. So, there's all these different kinds of things that you can do to get the rest you need, but it's going to look pretty different for you than it will from other people.
Ximena Vengoechea:
And I think that's fine. And, if you can explore those things and think about what did I really like to do as a kid, for example. What's something that felt like play? And it doesn't mean that, let's say in my case I loved making movies and I grew up with three sisters, and so I could cast my sisters in the movies. We've got these funny sepia toned footage from you know, a mystery that I filmed one summer. I loved that and I felt like really relaxed in a way. I'm not signing up for a film class now. I'm not, trying to create movies on my phone or anything like that. My version of that today is I do allow myself to like watch a really good movie. I'm able to connect it in a different way or, take my son to the Museum of Moving Image in Queens, which is all about TV and film and those things. So, it doesn't have to look like the exact thing that you did as a child, but you want to kind of pull threads from it and see if there's something interesting for you there.
Jen Fisher:
I love that you brought up the mountain biking because I think that's such an important point for me. I go to the gym, and I feel like even though it's physical exertion and exhaustion, sometimes it is one of the only times during my day where I feel like I am disconnected from everything else that's going on. You know, I'm there, I'm present, I'm in the moment. And part of it's because you have to be, otherwise you'll get injured. And so maybe it's a forcing mechanism, but it is for me, I find that physical exertion of my body is one of my favorite ways to, and most impactful ways to rest. But I think oftentimes people don't think of that as rest. But it can be.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Totally. And, you know for anyone who's maybe less physically inclined, less athletic which I count myself in that group, any kind of movement is going to help.
Jen Fisher:
Going for a walk in nature.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Going for walk, tons of benefits there. You know, it was funny, my dog just got up to bark at a package being delivered. What dogs do is really interesting, which is after they have a stressful moment, which that was for him, they shake themselves off. So, they shake their whole body off the same way they would after getting wet or something like that. There is a reason they do it. It's a way to shake off their stress. And so, any kind of movement, even if it's just, dancing, maybe it's blasting a song and you know, dancing it out, or maybe it's just a full body shake. Just do as the dogs do and you're just shaking it out. All of those things can help.
Jen Fisher:
I think there's so much we can learn from dogs in our lives. Because after they shake it off, they then go to sleep. They go rest. I love that. And one thing that I also kind of wanted to loop back a little bit is, the workplace and strategies that we can use for ourselves to make sure that we're getting rest during our workday. But, as you were talking about kind of where some of our beliefs around rest have come from in our childhood, I do think we get a lot of those too, from the workplace and our adulthood. And those that we look up to as role models and how they show up or how we perceive their showing up when it comes to things like rest and recovery. So, I do think, and I'd love for you to talk about kind of as a leader, but even as a, a colleague, the importance of the level of somebody's comfort, being authentic and open and vulnerable about the rest that they need or the ways that they rest. Because I do think that that's a powerful way for all of us to feel like we can, and that we should be resting.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Definitely. And it's absolutely connected in terms of what's happening at a leadership level and also what's happening at an individual level. Those two things are connected whether we want them to be or not. We are taking cues, if you're an individual contributor, you are taking cues from your manager, implicit or explicit. And I think part of this is really about talking about it more, not treating ourselves as machines, as robots but being honest about, that was a really big project. I'm exhausted now. And being able to have that conversation and being able to think about, if you just hit a big project milestone, do you have to move on to the next thing right away? And there's always a next project right away.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Maybe if you work at a company that's flexible enough, you say, I'm going to take the day off. I did a good job. I'm going to take the day off. Maybe you don't work at a company that flexible. And your version of that is saying, I'm going to give myself a real proper lunch break today. You know, and I'm not going to sit in front of my computer, or I'm going to make sure that at least one of my one-on-ones is a walking one-on-one, so that at least I get some movement and that's going to be relaxing. So it's going to happen at different levels. I think part of it is talking about it, noticing it, and then experimenting and finding these ways that you can give yourself that pause because we often don't give ourselves that pause.
Ximena Vengoechea:
And then the other thing I would say is, this is sometimes easiest when you're first starting a job, but it can be done afterwards, even if you've been at a company for a while. But setting some boundaries, setting some limits, making it clear that you are going to leave at five on the dot every day, or that you're not going to take a 6:00 PM meeting on a Tuesday night. This is highly dependent on the work environment and how flexible it is, but I think at least establishing some of those things upfront can really help. Because when you're not clear about your boundaries in that regard, it's really easy to just have them slowly eroded. And then you don't realize oh, that's weird. I have a six o'clock meeting.
Ximena Vengoechea:
I guess I'm going because it would be weird to say I'm not going now. So, you know, it's not to say that you can't bring that up after you've started a job, you absolutely can. It just might be a little bit harder, but having those conversations and saying, I have to make a daycare pickup or I'm trying to foster better work-life boundaries or whatever your why is, if you feel comfortable sharing that can be useful too.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah. And I think that the good news is, is that these types of things are being talked about more and discussed more in the workplace. And people are trying, not always succeeding to hold and respect others boundaries. But you know, I also think that communicating those needs and when you were able to do things more often than not that one-off random 6:00 PM meeting on a Tuesday doesn't feel so awful. When every other Tuesday, you know that that boundary is held. And so, there's flexibility in all of those things. Because this is life, and nothing is perfect. But when it works more often than not, that's pretty good. That to me is pretty good. Especially in the world that we're living in. And you mentioned before briefly about kind of technology and, this notion that when we move from room to room in our own homes, we tend to grab our phone or maybe we're on our phone as we're walking from room to room. So talk to me about the role that technology plays in rest. I think we all know how it's a detriment, but in any way, is it a benefit or can it be a benefit?
Ximena Vengoechea:
This is a good question. Yeah, I mean, of course it's going to, I can think of multiple. It's for example, I just started doing Qigong for 10 minutes a day. That is very restful. And I watch a YouTube clip for it. You know, it's the same woman doing the same YouTube the same sequence of movements. And it's so easy for me to do that. And it's much easier for me to do these 10 minutes a day than it would be for me to go find a class or a center, interrupt the middle of my day. Take an hour to do that. So of course, there are going to be benefits. I think it's just about, what are you using technology for? Is it going to make things more restful or not?
Ximena Vengoechea:
And I think one of the things that we often get a little bit confused about is that we think that if we're really tired at the end of the day that we have like earned some chilling out time and we're too tired to do anything but watch tv, then stream something, that's not the same intention as what I was saying earlier, which is, I love film. So, I may watch a movie if I am at the end of the day, you on a weeknight and I can't think of anything else to do, but how I'm so tired and I'm just going to either, watch something on a streaming platform or browse social media or just kind of randomly clear my inbox. Like those are not restful activities. It can seem restful because we're on the couch, we're laying down, we are shutting down our brains.
Ximena Vengoechea:
We're choosing something really mindless. But usually if you are that tired that that feels like the only viable option, you should probably just go to sleep. Because all of that scrolling and streaming usually just cuts into our sleep. And of course there's blue light and that's not good for your sleep either. So, I think it's not so much that to rest you need to not use technology, but it is about being mindful and really being intentional and noticing okay, I have this impulse to carry my phone from room to room or to you know, watch the fourth episode of something in a row. Is that being intentional? No, that's more being reactive or impulsive. So, just being intentional about how we use technology, I think is the key.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah. I feel totally called out there, but that's okay.
Ximena Vengoechea:
We've all been there.
Jen Fisher:
So, one final question for you, Ximena, since going on this journey for yourself and especially writing an entire book about rest, what do you do differently in your own life now when it comes to rest? What are your go-to strategies? What have you changed most significantly since being on this journey for yourself?
Ximena Vengoechea:
Yeah, a few things. There is one around sleep, which is that I now have a bedtime routine and I try and keep a specific bedtime, a 30-minute window and stick to that because that helps you fall asleep faster. Your body is like, oh, it's 10:00 PM this is when she normally goes to sleep. We know what to do. So, it helps you fall asleep and feel more rested and just less anxious about sleep, which, if you've ever struggled with insomnia, is actually a pretty big deal. And then little things like, when I am walking my dog, I often listen to podcasts, but not always, that's again, being intentional about technology. It's like sometimes, especially because I work from home it's really nice to have a voice in my ear.
Ximena Vengoechea:
You know, I don't have colleagues anymore now that I'm a writer, so it's really lovely. But other times I realized actually this is the perfect time to just be present for a minute and just let my thoughts wander and do what they need to do and not crowd out those thoughts with a podcast, a chat show, anything like that. The other thing I like to do on those walks is now I pay attention more to fractal patterns, which are very calming visually. So, fractal patterns are when you look at a snowflake or broccoli, they're shapes that repeat themselves. So like a head of broccoli, when you break off a chunk, that small piece of broccoli, it's the same shape as that head of broccoli. Those are very easy to visually process.
Ximena Vengoechea:
And so, they can be calming to us. So, I'll look at the branches of a tree or at the patterns of leaves. And again, I'm just kind of giving myself something to do besides looking at my phone. And it's also restful. And then the last thing I would say that is super part of my rest routine now is I'm reading a ton of fiction. Which I love, love fiction. I was a literature major in college, and then once I started writing nonfiction, I really stopped reading fiction. But I've gotten back into that since working on this book and it's so restful. It just transports you to a different place. You don't have to worry about whatever your worries were, you are in a completely different world. And that's lovely.
Jen Fisher:
Yeah. I love that too. Well, Ximena this as I knew it would be, has been an incredible conversation. I learned a lot. I feel seen, I feel called out, I feel all the things that I should feel. So thank you. Thank you for that. And thank you for being back on the show.
Ximena Vengoechea:
Oh, thank you so much. This was such a great conversation.
Jen Fisher:
I am so grateful Ximena could be with us today to talk about rest. Thank you to our producers, Rivet360, and our listeners. You can find the WorkWell podcast series on Deloitte.com or you can visit various podcasters using the keyword WorkWell, all one work to hear more. And if you like the show, don’t forget to subscribe so you get all of our future episodes. If you have a topic you’d like to hear on the WorkWell podcast series, or maybe a story you would like to share, please reach out to me on LinkedIn. My profile is under the name Jen Fisher or on Twitter at jenfish23. We’re always open to your recommendations and feedback. And of course if you like what you hear, please share, post and like this podcast. Thank you and be well.
The information, opinions and recommendations expressed by guests on this Deloitte podcast series are for general information and should not be considered as specific advice or services.