by Tom Rath
Given that I had been battling cancer for a decade at the time, I used my knowledge and dedicated all my time to helping my grandfather extend his life as much as possible. Don and I assembled all the research we could find on the topic as we traveled to different medical centers for treatment. In the midst of this ordeal, I remembered that Don had once told me he thought it was crazy that people wait until someone is gone to say kind things in a eulogy.
So I stayed up late for several nights and wrote a very long and emotional letter to my grandfather, explaining how much he had influenced my life over the years. It was essentially a eulogy written to someone who was still alive. This letter told my personal story about battling cancer as a teenager and went into great depth about what a difference my grandfather’s ideas and approach to life made during this time. I explained how his love, caring, and thinking essentially built a reserve that helped me make it through all of my health challenges in relatively good shape.
Because I had almost no confidence in my ability to communicate effectively in writing, I was hesitant to even share this heartfelt letter with Don—but given the circumstances, I decided to give it to him. When he read it, he was deeply moved and grateful. That part did not surprise me, but a brief interaction we had a few days later caught me off guard.
Don told me that after reading the letter multiple times, he thought I had a real talent for bringing things to life with words. This was something no one had ever suggested, let alone stated explicitly. He asked if I would be willing to share my personal story from the letter in a book. As long as somebody else was doing the writing, I figured that would be okay.
Then Don asked me if I would help him write that book over the next two months. This was the only time he ever acknowledged the reality of his condition in our conversations. So I agreed to give it a shot and do my best, knowing that my grandfather had quite a bit of wisdom that could benefit other people. We worked tirelessly over the next couple of months and were able to finish our first draft of the book, How Full Is Your Bucket?, just before Don passed away. That book has since helped my grandfather’s work reach millions of people, and we even turned it into a children’s book that is now used in classrooms around the world.
Develop the Ultimate Strength
This personal experience showed me how a single interaction and observation can have a lifelong influence. After nearly three decades of exploring my own talent, having great people around me, and taking countless strengths assessments, writing was the last thing I ever planned to do. Then one person said he spotted a talent worthy of investment, and that insight continues to influence how I now spend my time every day. The more I reflect on this experience, the more I realize that the ultimate strength is finding and developing talent in others.
One of the best ways to help another person grow is through the right types of praise and recognition. Simply telling someone they did a “good job” on a project is nice but not very helpful, especially if your comments lack sincerity. In fact, insincere positive remarks could be even more toxic and detrimental than negative comments.
In addition to being sincere, words that give people a positive charge should be as specific as possible. A series of six experiments published in 2014 reveals why specificity is essential for motivating other people. Participants in one experiment were asked to “give those who need bone marrow transplants greater hope.” Phrasing the goal that way was less motivating compared with a request for participants to “give those who need bone marrow transplants a better chance of finding a donor.” It was also more effective when researchers asked participants to “increase recycling” rather than “save the environment.”
The more specific your language is during even brief interactions, the greater the influence. As you help other people see what they do best, you will help them build a cumulative advantage over time. You could also make a contribution to their future health and well-being that you may not be able to see in the moment.
Put Your Own Health First
Some of the most caring people also tend to be the least healthy. This is what I observed, time and time again, while spending the last few years focused on health and well-being. After writing the book Eat Move Sleep, which I will draw from throughout the next three chapters, I heard from thousands of people who were struggling with their personal health and a general lack of energy.
Surprisingly, workers in the professions I admire most, such as nursing, are often the least healthy. One study found that 55 percent of nurses are overweight or obese. If there is any group that needs to be healthier and set a good example, it is people working in healthcare. As I listened to the stories of workers across professions, from educators to business leaders, it was clear that some of the most mission-driven people have spent a lifetime putting everyone else’s needs before their own.
While this is admirable on many levels and consistent with the focus of this book, it is a costly mistake. Even if you are determined to be the least selfish person on the planet and do nothing but serve other people, you need the daily energy to do so effectively. When I spoke with hospice nurses who were always putting the needs of terminally ill patients and their families first, the last thing they were thinking about was their own health and energy. Yet when I asked them what it took to be their very best at helping people during this time of need, they acknowledged that they could be of far more service if they invested time in their own health and energy.
A study of more than 30,000 nurses across Europe found that those who work long shifts (more than 12 hours) are 32 percent more likely to rate the quality of care on their ward as poor, compared with nurses working eight-hour shifts. They were also 41 percent more likely to report failing or poor standards of safety on their ward. In many cases, working longer hours is a disservice to those you intend to serve.
I have seen this phenomenon in businesses all around the world. There is often an implicit pressure, for leaders in particular, to be the first ones in to the office, to work the longest days, and to claim they need very little sleep. Yet the last thing businesses need is star performers in the workplace burning out because they have a routine that is unsustainable. The research my team conducted on this topic found that people who have very high energy levels in a given day are more than three times as likely to be completely engaged in their work that same day.
If you want to make a difference — not just today, but for many years to come — you need to put your health and energy ahead of all else. If you are wiped out from working around the clock, subsisting on food from a vending machine, and not making time for daily exercise, then there is no way you’ll be effective at helping your friends, family, colleagues, patients, or customers. The good news is that making choices to improve your energy does not require a complex grand plan. It all starts with the next choice you make.
Use Short-Term Thinking for Better Health
As I mentioned at the beginning of the book, I have spent the last 20-plus years battling various cancers and trying to improve my odds of living longer. An important lesson from my own experience is that even a profound threat to one’s mortality is a poor motivator for making better decisions today. Knowing that it may help prevent cancer several years down the road does not motivate me to exercise on a daily basis. Most people don’t stop before eating a fast-food meal to contemplate how doing so regularly could increase their long-term risk of heart disease.
All of the knowledge about creating healthier lifestyles does very little good until it leads to a change in daily behavior. This is why I’ve spent a great deal of time over the last decade organizing the most practical ideas for better health and more energy. As I read through a wide range of research, I look for studies that connect better daily decisions with short-term wins and incentives. While I’m not a physician or an expert on these topics, I use my background as a patient and researcher to find the most pragmatic ideas for healthier choices.
Making the connection between bett
er decisions and my daily energy levels has done far more to change my behavior than all I have learned about longer term health consequences. When I have an important day ahead, I make sure to get some activity in the morning so I’m in a better mood and my thinking is sharper. I base my decisions about what to eat for lunch on whether the meal will help sustain my energy into the afternoon and evening. If I am active throughout the day and eat well, I know that I will then have a better night’s sleep, which will give me a head start on the next day.
It is remarkable how quickly these small choices accumulate, for better and for worse. A breakfast filled with sweet, baked, or fried foods makes it almost impossible to get back on track for the rest of the day. On days when I have to sit on an airplane or in a meeting for several hours, I am physically and mentally wiped out from inactivity. A single night of poor sleep usually makes me grumpy and impairs my ability to work effectively.
When things go wrong in any one of these three areas — eating, moving, or sleeping — it throws everything else off course. A poor night of sleep leads to skipping a workout, lousy food choices, and so on. The good news is, doing just one of these things well can lead to an upward spiral in the other two areas. Contrary to my original expectations, experimental research suggests that it is a good idea to tackle multiple elements of health at the same time.
Think about how your eating, moving, and sleeping influence each other every day. Doing all three well is the key to having more energy throughout the day. When you need to be your very best — for work, family, and friends — start by ensuring that you have adequate energy to be fully charged.
Eat Your Way to a Better Day
The foods you eat directly influence your energy levels throughout the day, yet it is often difficult to know what foods to eat and which ones to avoid. Many people, myself included, have gravitated toward blunt measures of overall consumption, like total calorie count. Unfortunately, calories are not a measure of food quality.
A landmark Harvard University study that tracked more than 100,000 people over two decades makes it clear that the quality of what you eat is more important than quantity alone. This study revealed that the types of food you consume influence your health more than your total caloric intake. Consuming 300 calories’ worth of spinach is not the same as eating a sugar cookie with 300 calories. Yet most people I speak with continue to believe the age-old myth of “everything in moderation.” As the study’s lead author Dariush Mozaffarian put it, the moderation myth is really “just an excuse to eat whatever we want.”
Eating well is much easier when you begin with the right foods. Instead of jumping from one fad diet to the next, you can build the core elements of eating healthy into something much more sustainable.
Start with the basics: Avoid fried foods. Eat fewer refined carbohydrates. Eliminate as much added sugar as possible. Build meals around vegetables. Substitute whole fruit for sweets. Drink more water, tea, and coffee instead of soda or other sweetened drinks.
There is a lot of conflicting advice today about what is good and what is bad in terms of diet. But no one is making the case that you should eat more donuts and fewer apples. Eating right does not need to be overly complicated.
Building your routine around the right foods is not only sustainable, it’s enjoyable. Start by eating more foods that are a good source of daily energy. This is a lot easier than jumping on the latest diet bandwagon or going to extremes.
It is important to note that consuming the right foods for your health and energy is very different from schemes to lose 10 pounds in 30 days. The human body takes quite a bit of time to react to dietary changes — in many cases, a year or more. Make better daily choices with the idea of boosting your energy so you do not grow impatient waiting for drastic physical changes, which typically take more time.
Make Every Bite Count
Every time you take a bite of food, you are making a small yet important choice. Each drink requires yet another small decision. When you make a choice that does more good than harm, such as opting for a salad over a burger, the resulting net gain gives your body a positive charge. Deciding to drink a sugary soda instead of water produces a net loss.
Most meals contain both good and bad ingredients, such as high nutrient content but an excess of sugar. You probably eat some foods that are less than ideal several times a day. But try to do some mental accounting. Based on all you know about the components of a certain item or meal, ask yourself if what you are about to eat is a net gain or loss. As you continue to ask this question, you should become better at making decisions in the moment.
Most people eat more refined (processed) carbohydrates than they need relative to the amount of protein they consume. Yet large-scale studies on this topic show that even modest increases in protein intake, when coupled with a reduction in carbohydrates, improve health. One way to dig beneath the headline of total calories on a menu or box is to look at the ratio of carbohydrates to proteins.
I started doing this a few years ago, and it is a good shortcut when scanning packaged items in a grocery store or basic nutritional information on a menu. The mixed nuts I carry with me in my bag as a standby snack or the palak paneer (an Indian dish of spinach and cheese) that I eat for lunch are nearly a one-to-one ratio of carbs to proteins. At a minimum, I try to avoid foods that have higher than a 5-to-1 carbs to proteins ratio. For reference, most snack chips or cereals have a 10-to-1 ratio.
A 2014 study from the University of Missouri found that consuming protein in the morning increases levels of dopamine, a brain chemical involved in moderating impulses, which reduces subsequent cravings for both sweet and savory foods. But if you skip breakfast, it causes your body to store additional fat and increases your waistline over time. To stay sharp and slim, it’s critical to eat the right foods early in the day.
Sugar-filled cereals and breakfast bars may give you a quick energy boost, but the effect will not last. In contrast, eating foods with a low glycemic index in the morning prevents spikes in blood sugar later in the day, which could make for better choices in the afternoon and evening. Instead of traditional cereals for breakfast, consider foods like egg whites, berries, lean meats, salmon, nuts, seeds, vegetable-based shakes, or other options that are not filled with added sugars.
Maintaining a better balance of carbohydrates to proteins throughout the day should boost your energy and improve your health over time. The other thing to look for — on any bag, box, or menu — is total grams of sugar. When it comes to this metric, the closer to zero, the better. There is absolutely no dietary need for any added sugar — a toxin that fuels diabetes, obesity, heart disease, and cancer. Sugar substitutes are not much better; they simply lead you to crave more sweet foods.
Set Better Defaults
Dietary habits usually follow the path of least resistance. While this tendency sounds like a flaw, it can also be advantageous. If you make a list of healthy foods before you go grocery shopping, you are less likely to stock up on impulse choices. And you’ve probably heard that it is better to shop for food when your stomach is full instead of when you are hungry.
When I visit my neighborhood grocery store, I spend the majority of my time in the fresh produce and seafood sections. I know that if I can avoid the middle aisles that are loaded with unhealthy and processed items, those things will not wind up in my cart. By now, I have learned that anything that goes in my cart makes it home, and whatever makes it home ends up in my stomach.
You are also far more likely to eat what you can see in plain view. Organize the foods in your kitchen and pantry so the best choices are most visible and easily accessible. It also helps to hide poor choices in inconvenient places. An even better idea is to clean out your pantry and cabinets and simply get rid of anything with low nutritional value that you may be tempted to eat.
Put fruits, vegetables, and other healthy options at eye level in your refrigerator, or leave them out on the counter or table. Even when you aren’t hungry
, simply seeing these items will plant a seed in your mind for your next snack. Also consider taking small bags of nuts, fruits, or vegetables with you when you are away from home. That way, you can satisfy a mid-afternoon craving even if no good options are available. The more you plan to make healthy choices in advance, the less willpower you will need to avoid tempting last-minute decisions.
Find Food That Charges Your Mood
Standing on the bathroom scale at age 38, Jeremy Wright was shocked by what he saw. The scale topped 225. So he went to see his physician and received even more sobering news: his fasting blood sugar was 134, putting him on the precipice of diabetes.
After stepping on his scale that day, Wright began making small changes to his lifestyle that have added up in the year since. Now, before making any decision, he asks himself if he’s helping or hurting his health. He goes to the gym five days a week, even if it means leaving work an hour earlier. When he works from home, he stands. He’s cut down on the carbs and sweets. When he snacks during the day, it’s on nuts and water.
Wright said he started feeling better almost immediately after making these changes. Today, his weight has dropped from over 225 to 190. His waist size has gone from 40 to 34. His shirts have gone from extra large to large. His blood sugar is normal. And most important, he has more energy. Even though he’s working fewer hours, he gets more done.
The food you eat every day not only influences your energy levels, it also clearly affects your mood. When researchers study the relationship between what people eat and mental health, it is clear that some foods give you a positive charge, while other foods have the opposite effect. Eating too much fatty food, for example, can make you lethargic and moody. A 2014 study suggests that highly processed foods with added sugar may also contribute to laziness.