Did you take a lunch break today? If you are like too many writers, publishing folks and media professionals, you probably didn’t leave your desk.
Every Wednesday, Take Back Your Lunch participants step away for a real lunch hour, part of a movement founded by The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working author Tony Schwartz. Press play below to listen to an encore edition of the Morning Media Menu where Schwartz explained how American workers lose productivity when they skip lunch.
Here’s an excerpt from the interview: “The principles in The Way We Work Isn’t Working are even more important for people who feel they are under siege, who feel more pressure than ever, than they are for people who are a little more relaxed. The reason is that we’ve made a fundamental error. We think that the way to get things done is to work more hours, but actually it’s not about time–we’ve run out of time! The more hours you work, the less you get done in each additional hour.”
Schwartz continued: “It’s really about energy. It’s about consciously building more energy while you’re working. Part of that is recognizing is that resting and renewing throughout the day actually drives efficiency. Think about the Indy 500. The people who win are not just the fastest, but the people who make the most efficient pit stops.”
He offered some special advice for writers: “I spend a lot of my time writing. What I do in the middle of the day is take my run. For me, lunch hour is primarily built around a run and I have lunch at the end of the run. That’s enormously mentally and emotionally refreshing. The thing to do is figure out: ‘What thing actually makes me feel best when I do it when I’m not working?’ Renewal is really a function of how good you feel at the end of the renewing.”