📅⏱️ Ever notice how leaders try to “power through”… then wonder why their patience disappears by 3pm? ⏱️📅

Many high performers assume recovery has to be BIG to be worth it...a day off, a holiday, a full reset. But the reality (and the opportunity) is smaller…the leaders who sustain the longest don’t just work hard. They recover more often and in deliberate ways.

Here’s the reframe:

Recovery isn’t the absence of work. It’s the presence of tiny resource top-ups across the day… the kind that keep you human in the meeting that matters.

🧠 What the science suggests

Micro-breaks (think: seconds to a few minutes) can improve how we feel and can modestly support performance, largely by reducing fatigue and restoring mental resources (Albulescu et al., 2022). https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0272460

Studies also show that WHAT you do on the break matters. Small, intentional activities are associated with better day-to-day recovery from work demands (Kim et al., 2017). https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2017-00303-001

Even classic organisational research has linked break activities to better emotional experiences that feed back into performance (Trougakos et al., 2008). https://www.researchgate.net/publication/228079836_Making_the_Break_Count_An_Episodic_Examination_of_Recovery_Activities_Emotional_Experiences_and_Positive_Affective_Displays

🟢 Practical implication for real leaders

 Try this between meetings today (2 minutes total):

🚶‍♂️ 60 seconds of movement (stand, walk, stairs, outside if possible)

 💨 3 slow breaths (longer exhale than inhale)

 📌 One intention: “How do I want to show up in the next room?”

Your calendar will always be full, but your nervous system still needs a say… and small, consistent habits really do compound.