Peak Performance: Elevate Your Game, Avoid Burnout, and Thrive with the New Science of Success

by Brad Stulberg

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •When you are working on a strenuous mental task and hit an impasse, stop working. •Step away from whatever it is you are doing for at least 5 minutes. •The more stressful the task, the longer your break should be. •For really draining tasks, consider stepping away until the next morning. •During your breaks, if you aren’t sleeping (more on this soon), perform activities that demand little to no effortful thinking. Though we’ll explore in great detail how to fill your breaks in Chapter 5, some examples include: Listening to music Going on a short walk Sitting in nature

Taking a shower Doing the dishes •You may have an “aha” moment of insight during your break. If you do, great. Even if you don’t have an “aha” moment during your break, your subconscious mind is still at work. When you return to whatever it is you were doing, you’ll be more likely to make progress.

Perhaps you’re thinking: “Okay, but accessing a secluded park in the middle of the day isn’t so easy.” Worry not—simply looking at pictures of nature can help. In a second experiment, Berman had students go through the same process just described, only this time, rather than go outside, they were instructed to view pictures (for just 6 minutes) of either natural or urban areas. The result was the same: The students who viewed pictures of nature significantly outperformed their urban-viewing counterparts.

try browsing a National Geographic or Outside magazine story with pictures of nature rather than your Facebook or Twitter feed.

Exposure to nature not only helps with creativity, but it may also lower levels of Interleukin-6 (IL-6), a molecule associated with inflammation in the body. Lower levels of IL-6 can prevent the harmful, chronic type of inflammation that often sidelines serious athletes. According to a study published in the journal Emotion, more than any other positive feeling, awe, an emotion commonly brought about by nature, is linked to lower levels of IL-6.

Whether you are tense because you are cranking out a memo on a tight deadline or because you are cranking out heavy sets in the weight room, mindfulness meditation can help improve your performance. The feeling of being wound up is the physiological manifestation of the mind bracing for a threat, and it enters into stress mode. If you remain stressed after taking a break (by stepping away from the keyboard or the barbell), you will lose much of the break’s effectiveness. It’s not hard to tell if your break is being hijacked by lingering stress. You generally feel it in your shoulders (are they raised?), forearms (are they flexed?), and jaw (is it clenched?). If you experience these sensations, you might want to consider a short bout of mindfulness meditation. Sit down in a comfortable position, close your eyes, and take 10 deep breaths, in and out through your nose. Focus on only the sensation of your breath. Physical pain, tightness, and negative thoughts may arise. If they do, do not ignore them. Rather, acknowledge them non-judgmentally, let them go, and then return to focusing on your breath.

After you’ve taken 10 breaths, you could continue focusing exclusively on your breath for the duration of your break. Or, you could consider transitioning to a technique called “open-monitoring” meditation, sometimes referred to as a “body scan.” In open-monitoring meditation, though you continue to breathe rhythmically, you shift your focus from your breath to various parts of your body. Start at your feet and work your way up. Focus on the feeling of your toes in your shoes, your skin against a chair (or your clothes), your muscles loosening, and your heart beating. Studies show that just 7 to 10 minutes of open-monitoring meditation aids in both physiological recovery and creativity.1

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Have the courage to take breaks throughout the day, especially when you are stuck or feeling unbearable stress; the more intense the work, the more frequent the breaks. •Take a walk lasting at least 6 minutes to increase creativity and decrease the ill effects of sitting. If you can, walk outdoors, but even taking a few laps around the office provides big benefits. •Put yourself in the way of beauty. Being in nature, or even just looking at pictures of nature, helps with the transition from stress to rest and promotes creative thinking. •Meditate. Begin with a few mindful breaths, focusing only on the breath. Then, consider shifting to open-monitoring meditation, scanning your body and shifting your awareness to all of its sensations. •Hang out with friends! At the end of hard work—be it with your body or your mind—surrounding yourself with friends in a laid-back environment fundamentally alters your biology from stress to rest.

We think we are missing out on a lot by sleeping, but in fact we are missing out on far more by not sleeping. Sleep is one of the most productive things we can do. We don’t grow when we’re in the gym or when we’re immersed in our work: We grow in our sleep.

Sleep and Our Growing Mind We can put in all the work in the world while we’re awake, but if we don’t sleep, much of its value is lost. Literally. That’s because one of sleep’s foremost benefits is the role it plays in how we consolidate and store—that is, how we remember—new information. Sleep’s critical role in learning is a rather new discovery.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Sleep is productive. •Aim for at least 7 to 9 hours of sleep per night. For those doing intense physical activity, 10 hours is not too much. •The best way to figure out the right amount of sleep for you is to spend 10 to 14 days going to sleep when you are tired and waking up without an alarm clock. Take the average sleep time. That’s what you need.

For a better night’s sleep, follow these tips, consolidated from the world’s leading researchers: Ensure you expose yourself to natural (i.e., non-electric) light throughout the day. This will help you maintain a healthy circadian rhythm. Exercise. Vigorous physical activity makes us tired. When we are tired, we sleep. But don’t exercise too close to bedtime. Limit caffeine intake, and phase it out completely 5 to 6 hours prior to your bedtime. Only use your bed for sleep and sex. Not for eating, watching television, working on your laptop, or anything else. The one exception is reading a paper book prior to bed. Don’t drink alcohol close to bedtime. Although alcohol can hasten the onset of sleep, it often disrupts the later and more important stages. Limit blue light exposure in the evening. Don’t start working on hard, stressful activities—be them mental or physical—after dinner. If you struggle with a racing mind, try inserting a brief mindfulness meditation session prior to bed. When you feel yourself getting drowsy, don’t fight it. Whatever you are doing can wait until the morning. Keep your room as dark as possible. If feasible, consider black-out blinds. Keep your smartphone OUT of the bedroom entirely. Not on silent. Out. •Try taking a nap of 10 to 30 minutes to help restore energy and focus if you hit a mid-afternoon lull.

need to rest in order to work your best. Nothing makes us more upset than illogical organizations that demand too much and as a result never get enough.

Nothing makes us more upset than illogical organizations that demand too much and as a result never get enough.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Regardless of the work you do, take at least 1 off-day every week. •Time your off-days strategically to follow periods of accumulated stress. •The more stress, the more rest that is needed. •To the extent that you can, time your vacations strategically to follow longer periods of stress. •On both single off-days and extended vacations, truly disconnect from work. Unplug both physically and mentally and engage in activities that you find relaxing and restorative.

Ten minutes until showtime. Anticipation is growing. His body may be ready, but his mind is still racing. Billingslea shifts his focus to getting into the right headspace. He’s taking deep breaths and visualizing his each and every move, how he’ll control his body when it’s moving at what feels like 100 miles per hour. He is trying to cultivate a specific psychological state, something he calls “the zone.” For Billingslea, the zone represents a mindset in which he doesn’t dwell on mistakes or get distracted by the crowd. Ideally, he told us, he stops thinking altogether and his performance becomes automatic:

Billingslea knows this sweet spot well. He’s been in it many times before, and the fluency of his performance tonight and every other night depends upon him accessing it. All of which brings us back to his warmup routine and its sole function: “It gives me the best shot of entering the zone, and of getting there consistently,” he explains. In addition to preparing his mind and body, this routine—the same one he’s executed for years—helps create a sense of normalcy and predictability, a kind of comfort in a situation that most anyone would find uncomfortable.

Before becoming the backbone for one of the most popular acts on the planet, Billingslea spent years perfecting his craft. He put in countless hours of deep-focus practice, stressing his mind and body before taking breaks to recover and grow.

Whether it’s a writer preparing to draft a story, an athlete prepping for competition, or a businessperson heading into a high-stakes presentation, great performers never just hope they’ll be on top of their game. Rather, they actively create the specific conditions that will elicit their personal best, priming themselves for performance.

right before a show isn’t going to add much. If anything, it will only detract by making him think more when his goal is to think less. The time during warmup is much better spent ushering in the physical and psychological zone he hopes to enter.

He doesn’t wait for the zone to come to him. He creates it. During the climax of a show, when everything is clicking, Billingslea is dripping with sweat as he physically pushes his limits. His mind, by contrast, is in a meditative-like trance.

cooperative mood. It turns out that a positive mood is also beneficial for problem solving and creativity.

It’s also important to remember effect of mood on performance when evaluating yourself and your teammates or colleagues. The latest science suggests it’s extremely hard to perform well at work if other elements of your life are not in harmony. Be kind to yourself and others who are going through challenging times, and recognize that disconnecting “work” from “life” is an illusion.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Reflect upon the activities in your life

that are most important to you. •Determine what state of mind and/or body they demand. •Prime yourself for performance by readying your mind and/or body prior to key activities. •Test and refine various priming techniques, eventually developing customized routines. •Be consistent: Use the same routine each and every time you engage in the activity to which it is linked (more on the importance of consistency in a bit). •Remember the impact of mood on performance; positivity goes a long way.

Ecological psychology suggests that the objects that surround us are not static; rather, they influence and invite specific behaviors.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Create “a place of your own” in which you do your most important work. •Surround yourself with objects that

invite your desired behaviors. •Consistently work in that same place, using the same materials. •Over time, your environment will enhance your productivity on a deep neurological level.

King doesn’t believe in happenstance or that inspiration mysteriously strikes. “Don’t wait for the muse,” King writes in his memoir. “Your job is to make sure the muse knows where you are going to be every day from nine ’til noon or seven ’till three. If he knows,”

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Link key behaviors to specific cues and/or routines. •Be consistent and frequent; execute the same cue/routine every time prior to the behavior to which it is paired. •If possible, link key activities to the same context (e.g., time of day, physical environment, etc.). •If your pursuit requires variable settings, develop portable cues/routines that can be executed anywhere (e.g., a deep-breathing routine, self-talk, etc.). •Consistency is king. The best routine means nothing if you don’t regularly practice it.

Without fail, he told us, testosterone levels were highest when his athletes felt good. So, he said, “When it came to performance on game day, everything we did was to make each and every individual athlete feel confident that her mind and body were ready when the whistle blew.”

Earlier in this chapter, we learned that routines are so effective because they prompt specific behaviors and physical and psychological states. What Hamilton’s story adds is that an individualized routine goes beyond just priming us to work. It also alters our biology, changing our hormonal profile in a manner that increases strength, energy, confidence, creativity, attention,

Joyner doesn’t have a special genetic mutation that gives him endless energy, nor does he work 12-hour days. He does, however, minimize distractions and eliminate activities that are extraneous to his work.

He doesn’t expend time or energy on anything that is not critical to his mission. “In order to be a maximalist,” he says, “you have to be a minimalist.”

The key to being a minimalist is making a routine out of just about everything that is not core to your mission. When decisions are automatic, you skip the conscious deliberation and associated brain activity.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Become a minimalist to be a maximalist. •Reflect on all the decisions that you make throughout a day. •Identify ones that are unimportant, that don’t really matter to you. •Automate as many of the decisions that don’t really matter as you can. Common examples include decisions about: Clothing What to eat at meals When to complete daily activities (e.g., always exercise at the same time of the day so you literally don’t need to think about it) Whether to attend social gatherings (It’s not always a good idea, but during important periods of work, many great performers adopt a strict policy of saying no to social events.) •In addition to eliminating as many decisions as possible, don’t devote brainpower to gossip, politics, or worrying about what others think of you.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Recognize the enormous power of the people with whom you surround yourself. •Positive energy, motivation, and drive are all contagious. Do what you can to cultivate your own village of support, to surround yourself with a culture of performance. •Remember that by being positive and showing motivation, you are not only helping yourself, but you are also helping everyone else in your life. •Unfortunately, negativity and pessimism are also contagious. Don’t put up with too much of either. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.

Perhaps the real secret of world-class performers is not the daily routines that they develop, but that they stick to them. That they show up, even when they don’t feel like it. Call it drive, call it passion, or call it grit; whatever you call it, it must come from deep within.

One of the best ways to “restore” willpower is to take a break from the demanding task. This explains why we generally wake up with a full tank of willpower in the morning—for most of us, sleep is our longest break.

Strecher discovered that throughout history, when people focus on a self-transcending purpose, or a purpose greater than themselves, they become capable of more than they ever thought was possible. Strecher believes this is because when we concentrate deeply on something beyond ourselves, our ego is minimized.

In situations that feel scary or overwhelming, our brain—our central governor, our ego, our “self”—automatically tries to protect us from failure. It shuts us down and tells us to turn in the other direction. Even if failure doesn’t mean physical injury, our ego doesn’t like emotional injury, either—it doesn’t want to risk getting embarrassed, so it ushers us down the safe route. It’s only when we transcend our “self” that we can break through our self-imposed limits. In a paradoxical twist, the less we think about ourselves, the better we become.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Our “ego” or “self” or “central governor” serves as a protective mechanism that holds us back from reaching our true limits.

When faced with great challenges, our ego is biologically programmed to shut us down, telling us to turn in the other direction. •By focusing on a self-transcending purpose, or a reason for doing something beyond our “self,” we can override our ego and break through our self-imposed limits. •To the extent you can, link your activities to a greater purpose (more on how to do this in Chapter 9). This way, when you are faced with formidable challenges and your mind is telling you to quit, you can ask yourself why you are undertaking them. If the answer is “for someone or something greater than myself,” you’ll be more likely to push

Thinking less about your “self” is one of the best ways to improve yourself.

PURPOSE AND MOTIVATION A self-transcending purpose not only allows us to overcome our greatest fears and break through our limits, it also improves our performance in less heroic, everyday activities.

When it comes to increasing motivation, a wide body of research suggests doing something for others is far more effective than traditional incentives like money or reputation.

Purpose fosters motivation; motivation lets us endure a greater perception of effort; and enduring a greater perception of effort often results in better performance.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •We are constantly balancing perception of effort, or how hard something feels, with motivation. •If we want to endure more effort, which often leads to better performance, we may need to increase our motivation. •The best way to increase motivation is to link our work to a greater purpose or cause. •Not only will focusing on activities that help others make the world a better place, it will also make you a better performer. •Especially when we are feeling tired or worn out, we should think about why we are doing what we are doing.

PERFORMANCE PRACTICES •Find opportunities to give back in the context of your work; these can be more intensive, such as coaching and mentoring, or less intensive, such as posting sincere advice in online forums. •The only criteria is that your “giving” is closely linked to your work and that you give without the expectation of getting anything back. •While “giving” is especially powerful for preventing and reversing burnout, you should still aim to avoid burnout by supporting stress with appropriate rest.

By declaring that man is responsible and must actualize the potential meaning of his life, I wish to stress that the true meaning of life is to be discovered in the world rather than within man or his own psyche, as though it were a closed system. I have termed this constitutive characteristic “the self-transcendence of human existence.” It denotes the fact that being human always points, and is directed, to something or someone, other than oneself—be it a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter. The more one forgets himself—by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love—the more human he is and the more he actualizes himself. What is called self-actualization is not an attainable aim at all, for the simple reason that the more one would strive for it, the more he would miss it. In other words, self-actualization is possible only as a side-effect of self-transcendence.