Rest is Your Leadership Superpower

When did you last rest?

Sure, you slept last night for at least a few hours.

But when did you rest?

Rest is more than a reward for exceptional performance. It is more than the prize you collect after grinding through the quarter. It is more than the thing you schedule after every item on your list is done, because that day never comes.

Dr. Erin Wilson learned the hard way that rest has yet to be earned.

Co-founder of the Strategic Rest Summit and co-author of Strategic Rest in Leadership, Erin spent her early career fully committed to hustle culture. First in, last out, always say yes, never slow down. She hustled herself into a stress-induced seizure.

She told me on her Work Positive Podcast episode, "I had to stop and think. Am I still valuable when I'm not showing up as this version of me that always has it together?"

The answer she discovered, and now teaches to leaders around the world, is “Yes!”

The T.H.R.I.V.E. framework coaches you as a people leader to offer rest “just because.”

The R in T.H.R.I.V.E. is for Rest: Your Leadership Superpower.

The NAP Framework

Rest and sleep are different. Sleep is one form of rest, albeit an essential one. As sleep becomes the only form you count, you miss the deeper point.

Dr. Wilson's NAP Framework names three principles people leaders use to access renewal across every dimension of life.

N is for Nurture. Nurture recognizes every way you restore yourself beyond sleep: communities around you, people who value you as a whole human rather than just a producer, learning and development. Erin showed up to a DJ class exhausted on a Friday afternoon and left completely invigorated. Learning something new is one of the most potent forms of rest the brain knows.

A is for Assess. Seven types of rest exist, and most people are depleted in at least three of them. Assess your current rhythm. Name the type you need most right now.

P is for Prioritize. Then prioritize rest in your schedule. For me, rest is trail-riding on horseback across several hundred acres of Virginia farmland with my wife or fishing in a pond with my granddaughter. For you it may be cooking, music, reading, or gardening. The point is not matching someone else's definition of rest. The point is prioritizing your own.

Small Hinges Swing Big Doors

Dr. Wilson told me about a coaching client serious about making strategic rest part of his leadership identity. His intervention was small. He changed the default length of his meetings from sixty minutes to fifty.

Ten minutes.

Within days he sensed a shift. He arrived at meetings prepared rather than frantic. He processed the previous conversation before jumping into the next. He was present. He was better.

He did not announce the incremental shift. He modeled it. Within weeks, others on his team noticed his better mood, greater engagement, and more genuine presence. They made similar adjustments on their own.

Leadership Exhaustion Collapses Culture

Erin named the most honest challenge in transforming culture to make work more mentally healthy: "Leaders want improvement, but they really don't want disruption."

You want a more engaged team without disrupting the constantly-meeting culture that exhausts your people. You want lower turnover without disrupting the expectation that people are always on. You want creativity and innovation without disrupting the torrid pace that prevents both.

A Work Positive Culture fails to grow from leadership exhaustion. The cards collapse. The example you set is the most powerful permission structure in your organization.

Your Rest Do One Thing (DOT) Challenge

• Protect ten minutes today that belong only to you.

• Shorten your next recurring meeting by ten minutes without explanation.

• Watch your energy and the energy of your team rise over the next two weeks.

Work Positive Bottom Line

Rest is your Leadership Superpower. Do One Thing to rest today.

This post is from Dr. Joey Faucette's newest book, T.H.R.I.V.E. @ Work: Mental Health, Culture, and the People You Lead.

Keywords: strategic rest, leadership, burnout prevention, work culture, mental health, THRIVE framework, leadership energy, executive rest

#WorkPositive #CultureEatsStrategyForBreakfast #THRIVEatWork #StrategicRest #LeadershipWellness