Something You Should Know - The Secret Story of Your Private Life & How to Make the Best Use of Your Time

Episode Date: August 7, 2025

UPGRADE TO SYSK PREMIUM! To unlock ad-free listening to over 1,000 episodes plus receive exclusive weekly bonus content, go to ⁠⁠ https://SYSKPremium.com⁠ People don’t drown the way you think they do. Someone could drown right in front of you, and you might not notice. It happens all the time. This episode begins by revealing what to look for to spot a drowning person. https://www.thehealthy.com/first-aid/silent-signs-of-drowning/#ixzz3dGUMjhU8 In the United States, we have an expectation of privacy. We are entitled to a private life. But it wasn’t always that way. The idea of privacy is a fairly recent innovation. For a long time, the feeling was you don’t need a private life – unless of course, you have something to hide. Are you entitled to a private life? Is your privacy being eroded by government and technology? Listen as I discuss the history of and future of personal privacy with Tiffany Jenkins. She is a cultural historian and author of the book Strangers and Intimates: The Rise and Fall of Private Life (https://amzn.to/4f2wxAs). Do you feel in control of your time? Do you get the things done that are important? Managing time is tricky and complicated. Things change, priorities get shuffled and there is always more to do. How do you get a handle on it all? Here with some great help is Risa Williams, a psychotherapist, speaker, and wellness coach who specializes in time management and goal setting. Risa is author of the book Get Stuff Done Without the Stress (https://amzn.to/4m5Iw2A) Do pick-up lines ever work on women? What’s the best thing to say if you meet someone you are interested in? What should you not say? As you might imagine, there is research on this which I share in this episode. https://www.businessinsider.com/9-facts-about-flirting-2015-6? PLEASE SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS!!! SHOPIFY: Shopify is the commerce platform for millions of businesses around the world! To start selling today, sign up for your $1 per month trial at⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://Shopify.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ INDEED: Get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Indeed.com/SOMETHING⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ right now! QUINCE: Keep it classic and cool with long lasting staples from Quince! Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://Quince.com/sysk⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns! HERS: Whether you want to lose weight, grow thicker, fuller hair, or find relief for anxiety, Hers has you covered. Visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://forhers.com/something⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to get a personalized, affordable plan that gets you! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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it's almost as if it's a threat. Preachers talk about only adult. and murderers need privacy, that you should do nothing in private, that you wouldn't do in public. Also, the best way to break the ice to start a romance, and simple strategies to control your time, something a lot of us struggle with. I think the main thing I'm hearing from people is that they're overwhelmed. They never feel done with their to-do list, and they just keep adding more things to their to-do list, so there's never this happy and done feeling. All this today on Something You Should Know

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You'll know just how healthy they are Visit specksavers.caver's.ca to book your next eye exam. Eye exams provided by independent optometrists. Something you should know. Fascinating intel. The world's top experts. And practical advice you can use in your life. Today, something you should know with Mike Carruthers.

I just think this is so important. And by my telling you this, it could actually save someone's life, which is why we're going to see. start with this. Hi and welcome to this episode of something you should know. So here's the question. If you saw someone drowning, would you know it? There's a really good chance you wouldn't. In the movies, you always see the drowning person flailing around and kicking and screaming, help, help, help. That's not how people drown. Drowning is typically done very quietly. People often don't even seem in distress

and they may even remain upright in the water. In a study of drowning cases, 90% of children who drowned did so under the care of a grown-up. Ask any ER nurse and they'll tell you that most kids who drown do so in a pool at a pool party. So during the summer stay alert for people who are in distress even though they may not look like it. Here are some of the subtle signs. Their eyes

are glassy and unable to focus or they're closed. Their face may be hard to see. Hair may cover their forehead or their eyes. Their head is low in the water with their mouth at water level. Head may be tilted back with their mouth open.

And they are quiet. Children playing in water make noise. When they get quiet that's when you need to get to them quickly and find out why. and that is something you should know. I want to take a moment to tell you about something very special. We have a new subscription offer for our listeners called S-Y-S-K-Premium.

You can access all the episodes ad-free, all the new episodes, all the back episodes, ad-free plus bonus content each week for only $3.99 a month, even less with an annual subscription. Go to sysk Premium.com to learn more and sign up now. There's a link to Sysk Premium in the show notes, and signing up couldn't be easier. That's Sysk Premium.com for 100% ad-free listening and exclusive episodes each week. It is a common belief that we have a right to privacy, that we are entitled to a private life. But then you hear people say things like, well, what are you afraid of? If you haven't

done anything wrong, you've got nothing to hide. You've got nothing to worry about. But is it really about right and wrong? Or are human beings allowed to do things and say things and think things in private that nobody else needs to know about? I'm sure you've done things in private that aren't necessarily wrong or immoral, maybe just silly. But if your friends found out, you you'd be horrified and embarrassed, which is why you strive to keep those things private. What's interesting is that historically, the whole idea of personal privacy

is a fairly recent invention, and it seems to be something we're still trying to figure out. That's according to my guest, Tiffany Jenkins. She's a cultural historian and author of the book, Strangers and Intimates, The Rise and Fall of Private Life. Hi, Tiffany. Welcome. Pleasure to be here, Mike.

So this idea of a private life, which I think a lot of people cling to and think, you know, that's a right of mine. I have the right to have a private life. Historically, how has that been viewed? Very differently. I mean, the first thing to say about a private life is that it's not a natural occurrence. It's not something that people naturally want. It's something they kind of almost stumble upon organically and accidentally. So if you look back at, say, the 17th century,

When people do start to talk about private life and privacy, it's almost as if it's a threat. It's almost as if it's a frightening condition. Preachers talk about only adulterers and murderers need privacy. And the idea was that you should do nothing in private that you wouldn't do in public. Do nothing privately you wouldn't do publicly. It's a very different to work to the way privacy then was seen in the 19th century, even now in the 21st. Well, you wonder if that may have been the way it was seen,

was it the way it was practiced? It's hard to imagine people. And adulterers and murderers want a private life. Well, that's more of a secret life than a private life. That's right. I mean, we never know quite what people get up to in private or, as you say, in secret, because they keep it hidden. But we do know that society's mandated, for example, spying through keyholes for the check

if people were fornicating, basically having intimate relations before marriage. We do know what people said to each other, which is don't go away in private in case the devil comes to you when you are on your own. So the way people talk about having a private life does change dramatically. But also there are obviously laws that come in, laws that come in really from the 17th and 18th century through really in the 19th century. And in the 19th century, there's a lot of privacy laws that come into play. But before that, before the 18th century and when there's now laws for protecting privacy, before that, when people had no expectation of privacy, did they behave better? or did they have their private life and hide it better?

I don't think they had a private life in the way that we would understand it. I think it's dramatically different. And it begins ever so slightly when people start talking about what they think about on their own and the division between what they are thinking and what they are saying. So some of the early battles around private life. And you can see this in the definition. of the private in kind of semantic discussions. Some of them begin in property.

So how do we keep people out? You know, up until like the 17th century in England, the king could come into your house and put his troops there. You had no kind of right of privacy against him. That begins to change then, both in terms of keeping people out, like the king, but it's contested. You know, you have to kind of fight for it. and a lot of people are against it.

They think the king should have that right and people should have a right to come into your home and sit on your furniture and cook in your kitchen. They also start talking about developing an inner life and private thoughts and how they're different to what you're allowed to say in public. And there are philosophers, you've probably heard of the philosopher Thomas Hobbes.

And he says, and this is a dramatic change, to earlier writings, he's writing in, say, the 17th century, he says thought is free. And this is a revolutionary idea. And the idea that he is saying is that you may have to say one thing in public because basically people had to follow a particular religion and a particular way and worship in a particular way. They had to sign up to all of that in public. But he argued you can think freely in private. In your head, you are free. And this, that was a revolutionary radical thing. He had to write that in France. It couldn't be published initially in England. Well, it makes you wonder, it makes me wonder, did people

buy into this in the sense that they really checked themselves, edited themselves, wouldn't dare think of something naughty for fear that that was evil, that you couldn't have those kind of private thoughts that did people really do it or did it that was just what people said they were doing? I think they really did it. If you read the diaries of early Puritans and these are diaries written for themselves. It's all about how they prayed in private but they were with their, they would be with their husband or they would be with their family. So the very idea of private is something that involves other people. And they're constantly admonishing themselves for having naughty, bad thoughts, but they write that all down. So I think

they have this kind of very, very almost self-policing way. And after all, they, you know, they believed in an all-seeing, never forgetting God. So in their minds, they're never alone. And so we now have, it seems if you ask people, that they believe they deserve a private life, that they have a private life to some degree, and that that is in, you know, in, you know, in, America, we have life, liberty, in the pursuit of happiness. We have the right against unreasonable seizures. We have some laws that protect us. And that seems to be just part of everyday understanding that we do have the right to privacy. It's probably been eroded slightly over the past 10 years, both in terms of government laws and surveillance,

but also in terms of the way we live our lives. I think people are much more, less suspicious, perhaps, of government intruding into our private lives, but also just as the way we behave, you know, there's a lot of intimacy in the public realm. And by that, I mean people talking about their emotions and their families. people proposing on screen, you know, at a ballgame rather than doing it in private. So I think things are actually changing.

So although we still talk about rights, in terms of the way we live, I think we're giving away some of our private life. But you say that a private life is essential. So what do you mean by that? I mean, a space where you are free to develop your inner life, to be off, to have a space where, you're not subject to the pressures of public performance, as well as freedom from intrusion from government or the corporate world. And so I'm as much interested in it in terms of the way we behave as the world. government tax but I'll give you an example perhaps of of how I think it's being encroached there's a there's a thing here where people talk about bringing your true

self to work and this is sort of sense that you've got this inner self that you should always always show everybody else and I think that's kind of I don't think we should always bring our true self to work I think that's for the kind of private realm And the workplace is somewhere where we are our professional selves. You know, we're slightly different. We might be better behaved, better dressed. Treat people in a less colloquial and informal way. Perhaps call each other sir sometimes or madam or mister or professor, depending on the vocation.

But I think that sort of has tended to be seen as phony or inauthentic or false. or hypocritical. So I'm talking about sort of a distinction between how we behave in private as opposed to how we behave in public. We're talking about privacy, your private life. And if you're entitled to one, my guest is Tiffany Jenkins,

author of the book Strangers and Intimates, The Rise and Fall of Private Life. Hey, it's Hilary Frank from the longest, shortest time. An award-winning podcast about parenthood and reproductive health. We talk about things like sex ed, birth control, pregnancy, bodily autonomy, and, of course, kids of all ages. But you don't have to be a parent to listen. If you like surprising, funny, poignant stories about human relationships and, you know, periods, the longest shortest time is for you.

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so you, your child, your family can choose the episode that's the right level of scary for you. Tune in to Grim, Grimmer, grimist, and our new season, available now. So, Tiffany, when people talk about their right to privacy and that their privacy is being invaded, they typically mean by technology that the government is watching or that social media companies are monitoring your behavior or your Alexa speaker is listening to what's going on in your house, that technology is eroding your private life. For a start, I think throughout history, there have been all sorts of panics around technology, which have turned out to be ill-founded. So in the 19th century, there were big anxieties about Kodakas, which were instantaneous and portable cameras. So up into that point, people had to go to a studio to have their photograph taken.

And when the portable camera was invented, people were very concerned that privacy was being invaded. Or in the 20th century, Lyndon Johnson, when president suggested a national database, which would compile data from like 20 databases. And this was a massive, massive privacy scare. And there were congressional committees set up to investigate it. And it never went ahead. But neither of those things really were privacy threats. And I think there's a parallel to today where there's a lot of concern about, technology as as taking away our privacy. But I don't think that is that I don't think that is

the main the main threat. I mean, one of the one of the big threats that I see is the way in which people expose each other's private conversations, either to make them look bad because we all say silly things in private or things that are pretty horrible. But whether it's, I don't know, the king of England, his son, Harry. He exposed the private conversations that he and his father had at his grandfather's funeral in his very, very successful autobiography spare. And it's become almost the kind of casual thing that we can do this. And I think that's a terrible invasion of privacy, a more one that sort of affects people on a day-to-day basis because their privacy isn't being respected and it means that we can't frankly say bad things in private when in a way we

should be able to but it seems like that's been going on forever that people share secrets and tell private things sometimes as a way to bond with people you know that i know something you don't know and i'm going to include you in the circle of trust here which brings people together i mean it seems kind of human nature people do but i think it's kind of of it's kind of become much more accepted. So in Britain, one of our old prime ministers, Boris Johnson, when he had a row with his partner, Carrie, and the neighbours recorded it and it was put on the front page of the newspaper. So that's not just kind of telling your friends something. You probably shouldn't, you probably shouldn't tell them about your own private life. It's sort of, it's become a lot

more acceptable. And that's another example would be the way in which public figures are discredited because of their private actions. So it's almost as if it's allowable to kind of pull somebody down because of what they've done in, in private. So in some cases, you might think that's, they're quite reasonable. They're a bad character. But I think that there's a kind of invasion of privacy going on that is actually unfortunate because it's essential to have that space behind closed doors to sound off or to be a bit, to behave in a slightly ill-advised way, to be a better person in public. And there's a sense that we always have to be on and perfect rather than having the sense that actually sometimes you just can be off and go away, let it all out and then come

back a better person. It seems like this problem sort of polices itself in one way. And that is when you reveal private things, when you tell people about other people's private conversations, as Harry did, you, the teller pay a price as he did. he's taken a real hit to his reputation because people don't respect that and so whenever you reveal private things to other people you run the risk of it blowing back on you

for being kind of a gossip I guess and so maybe you don't do that yes and so in a way it sort of it does make my point that I think it's probably a bad thing it's it's rebounded negatively on his him and that we should probably pay attention, really, and start thinking about this kind of this border that, you know, there's a border in all our lives between what is public and private.

But everyone's definition of public and private are not the same. I don't think there's a couple alive who hasn't been upset with their partner because their partner revealed something that they thought should have stayed private that the other partner revealed to someone else? Yes, it's a very grey area. And it changes. It changes across history and across society and in terms of social norms. And obviously individuals have to work it out between themselves. But I would like to see a conversation where we began to think positively about keeping certain material private and developing, if you like, our inner lives. And and our intimate relationships, because I think if you're in a relationship, you know,

there's a beginning, particularly at the beginning, where you're testing out whether you like each other. And at some point in that, you tell them something secret. You tell them something that makes you vulnerable. That is a display of trust and it's a bonding exercise. But if we're constantly kind of revealing everything, that will never happen. Intimacy definitely requires seclusion and privacy. There's often people will use that phrase, well, what do you have to hide? Like, that everything should be public

or more things should be public. And, you know, what are you hiding if you don't want people to know? What are you doing that we should know about that you shouldn't be up to? That's right. It's a very famous thing that thing Eric Schmidt said, who when he was head of Google, which is, what's your problem?

If you're not doing anything wrong, you've got nothing to hide. I think, well, I think we've all got something to hide. Not particularly terrible things, but just things that make us look, you know, not brilliant if everybody was to see. But we need that kind of, we need to be able to be slightly, you know, to say silly things, to rant and rave, to sit around in our pajamas with porridge on our face and not be our best selves. But I also think, as well as the fact that I think we all have something to hide and we wouldn't perhaps be very interesting if we didn't. But I also think some things just the nature changes when everybody can see them, when they're exposed to public view.

I think particularly they're kind of intimate parts of life. But if we're always thinking what would it look like to people we don't know, to strangers, if we're always thinking about how others see us, Perhaps we're not really living in our moment and enjoying the thing for itself. It's like we're just sort of dancing for an audience. But sometimes you just want to, you know, you just want to dance on your own and not worry about how people see your moves. Well, what you just said about Eric Schmidt saying, you know, what do you have to hide? Like if you're not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to worry about.

That's so, it's so misses the point because there are plenty of things. people do that are not wrong, but they're sure embarrassing if people knew about them. I mean, I don't know. Maybe you clean the house naked or, you know, you sing into your hairbrush when you get ready in the morning or, you know, things that are just private, that are you and it doesn't harm anybody else. And it's certainly not wrong, but it would be embarrassing if other people knew about it. There's a safety net, really. It is a sort of of, it's a space of freedom and it's also a space of safety. And if you don't have that, I think, I mean, if you're always being watched or you always think you're being watched,

you're never going to do anything new. You probably aren't going to, probably going to start almost lying to yourself because you just, you're worried all the time about how others see you. So what's the advice, if any, about all of this? For a start, history shows that, you know, privacy panics are overstated often. So we can relax a little bit about some of the technology. History also shows that, you know, privacy does come and go. So although it's not natural, we can feel good about the fact that actually you can claw it back. we can make it happen.

And I think we have to start by accepting that we're different, or we should be different in private than in public. You know, draw our own boundaries between how we behave behind closed doors with friends and intimates and how we behave at work. And know that it's actually, it makes us a better person in public and a better person in private. If we have these sort of two realms separated from each other, So it's just like if you, you know, it's the end of the week, you go home, you shut the door or you turn off your laptop and you just exhale, that's when you can be intimate and with your friends and your family.

And it makes you a better person when you go back in the office on Monday that you've had that kind of space. I think we have to make the case that don't tell everybody everything, respect people's privacy, draw your own boundaries. And let's see if we can't erect a more secure division between public and private. Well, I think it's something everybody thinks about and should think about, about the difference between your private self and your public self. And I like what you said about how, you know, having a private life makes you a better person. I've been talking with Tiffany Jenkins. She is a cultural historian and author of the book,

Strangers and Intimates, The Rise and Fall of Private Life. and there's a link to that book at Amazon and the show notes. Tiffany, thank you. Oh, Mike. Thanks very much. It's been a pleasure. Get to Toronto's main venues like Budweiser Stage and the new Roger Stadium with Go Transit. Thanks to Go Transit's special online e-ticket fairs, a $10 one-day weekend pass offers unlimited travel

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current events. Then tune in to see you next Tuesday for our listener poll results from But Am I Wrong. And finally, wrap up your week with Fisting Friday, where we catch up and talk all things pop culture. Listen to Don't Blame Me, But Am I Wrong on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast. New episodes every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. We all have our own ways of managing our time. Some of us do it pretty well. Others of us just wing it moment to moment, and the rest of us are somewhere in the middle. However you manage time, that's how you manage time, and changing it can be pretty tricky, which is why I don't have a lot of time management experts on here

with a lot of complicated processes to manage your time, because most people aren't going to follow it. But there are some strategies that can help you improve the way you handle your time so you feel like you're getting things done and enjoying time for yourself. And here to explain them is Risa Williams. She's a psychotherapist, writer, speaker, and wellness coach who specializes in time management and goal setting. And she's the author of a book called Get Stuff Done Without the Stress. Hi, Risa, welcome to something you should know.

Hi, I'm so happy to be here. Thanks so much for having me on. So people come to you because they're having trouble managing time. So what do they tell you? What's the big problem that you hear? I think the main thing I'm hearing from people across the board is that they're overwhelmed. They never feel done with their to-do list and they just keep adding more things to their to-do list. So there's never an emotional connection with anything they're doing. There's never this happy and done feeling.

One of my clients put it as they feel like they're on a hamster wheel of nonstop stress. And I think I'm seeing that in so many different ages for, people of so many different backgrounds and working in different occupations. So I think that's the main problem I'm seeing right now. People are really functioning at a high level of stress. They're having trouble organizing things they need to do and prioritizing what's important to them. And even just maintaining a sense of well-being and balance is hard for a lot of people these days. I've always subscribed to the philosophy that people do what's really important because you have to do what's really important. And if there are things left on your list that never seem to get done,

they kind of by definition can't be that important because you never find the time to do them because you're busy doing the important things. Right. But I think if we don't make consistent space and time or even really get really honest with ourselves about what is important to us, what gives us that sense of well-being and happiness, what are some things that are important for us to do from a quality of life point of view. If we don't make the space and time and get really honest and intentional with ourselves, it's really easy for our weeks to get away from ourselves. And we're sort of functioning on autopilot where we're just plugging stuff in. And that leads to that feeling I'm talking about at the end of the week where people just don't

feel like anything's done and they don't feel a sense of relief or accomplishment about any of the things that they've just finished. I remember reading just recently that more than half of all Americans, and it wasn't a lot more than half, but it was more than half, don't have some sort of to-do list or schedule for the day kind of thing, written down. Maybe in their head they do, but that more than half of people don't have a written plan for the day, which surprises me just because of my experience that when something's written down, there is a magic that it is more likely to happen than if it's just floating in your head. Yeah. I think it's true what you're saying. I think a lot of us try to wing it with time. And I tried to do that for many years. I was always

trying to wing it with my free time. I had this illusion that, you know, there was work, which is pretty much scheduled for a lot of us. Work is pretty, we have a routine. And usually those tasks are given to us and we know what we need to do. But then we have this slot of time called free time, which is sort of this amorphous blob in our heads that we try to pack so many things into. So when I talk about it in my book, I have two boxes. And I imagine there's a work box and there's a free time box if you picture an imaginary box. And we're trying to put so many things in our free time box. We're putting chores and family time and creative hobbies and projects. And what we're not really getting honest about most of the time is how much time do any of those

things take and how much energy and focus do I need for some of those things? And are some of those things leisure activities where I don't really need to plan it and are some of those things, things I need to make time to focus on to do? So as a writer for a long time, I was trying to wing it with time and just say, you know, sometime in my free time I'll write that book or maybe when I have a moment I'll get around to And what happened was I never ended up writing anything because I wasn't defining focus time. That's a little different than free time. So I think it's about getting really honest with how much time and energy is this going to take,

how much focus is this going to take? And do I need to map it out on paper? Would it be beneficial for me to see the little steps and how much time this is going to require for this particular project? And there may be things in your life where you need to do that with and get a little more honest with how much energy and time it's going to take. And there may be parts of your life where you don't want to do that, where it's perfectly healthy to not map out that time, you know? I know for me that, you know, one of the things, one of the revelations I remember

hearing so many years ago that it's always stuck with, well, I've, a couple of them. One is that nothing takes 10 minutes. And the other is that, you know, you have to plan your free time because otherwise it just drips away. If you don't plan it, nothing ever gets done. But as you were saying, we know that we schedule our work time, but if you don't plan your leisure time or your free time, not much happens. Yeah, it's really easy for the time to get away from us,

for us to get distracted. And again, it's about what do you want to put in the free time, right? So there are certain things like maybe you're on vacation, or you're hanging out with your friends or family, maybe you don't need to plan that as much. But if you are trying to move certain things ahead, like creative project or household projects or these kinds of things, they really will take up time, energy, and focus.

So we have to budget it accordingly and show up at a consistent time to do it, just like we do for our jobs. So I think the approach is you already do this for your job. You already show up at the same slot of time. and it's become a routine. And just because you're showing up at the same time for the same amount of hours, you're naturally progressing the things you need to do with work.

You know, they're naturally happening because you're showing up. We need to see other things in our lives that are important to us in the same light. We need to carve out space and time for them and consistently show up and tell our brain that it's important for us to do this thing. So an example I was saying was when I'm trying to write something, I have to slot that time in and treat it as important as my other jobs or else I can't make any progress on it. It would be really unrealistic for me to just expect my brain to turn on like a light switch anytime I have a break and just be able to type.

It takes me a long time to warm up that muscle to boot up the writing computer in my head to be able to write. So I think it's about adopting a kinder approach to yourself and understanding that your brain and body need to get aligned with what you're doing. And we can be a little more intentional about deciding what the next segment of time is for and what we're going to do with it. Explain what you mean by focus time. I think I know, but I want to hear you say it. So I think a lot of people really don't understand how their own focus work. And it's different for every person.

So some people, depending on what project you're working on, their focus might not just turn on because they're sitting there staring at a document thinking, oh, I need to do this thing now. So there's something called activation energy, which I talk about. And that's the idea that you have to ramp up the energy before you focus. It's almost like you have to get your brain in the mood to focus before it can focus. So again, this is like carving out space in your schedule so that you have enough time to ramp up your focus, but also getting in the mindset to focus before you do the thing you need to focus on. So there are all sorts of tricks you can use to make it like a game to turn your focus on.

It just depends on your own particular brain. It isn't like a one size fits all. So for example, you may find that movement works really well to turn on your focus. So you may want to go for a walk and think about the thing you have to. to do next while you're walking. Some people use task sprints. So like a timer, this is where the Pomodora method would come in for some people, where you give yourself a limit of time that you're going to focus on a task forward to turn your focus on to do it. Some people use music as a way to ramp up their energy. So for instance, when I sit down to write, I tend to play the same writing

playlist of music because I've trained my brain over the years that when I hear that music, it's time to write. I've created a behavioral association with the music. So I would encourage people listening to think about what gets your focus to turn on. You know, and how can you get yourself in the mood to focus before you tackle that task ahead of you? And what about time of day? I mean, there are some things that I do better in the morning and, well, there's mostly things I do. I most do anything better in the morning than I do at any other time of the day. You know, all of us have. different times a day when our energy is the best. And it's different for every person. Some people

I work with, they're great in the morning. Other people I work with, their energy is so clear after dinner and they're ready to go long into the night with working on projects. So I have a tool called the task intensity meter, which asks people to rate tasks by how stressful they are to them. So it would be low, middle, or high intensity. And when I say intensity, it just means how intense is it for you to do that task? So we can do it with anything like doing the laundry or finishing a work report. What level of intensity is that task for you? And then what I try to do is if that's a high intensity task for you, what is the best time a day for you to tackle that high intensity task? And often what I find is, I know this sounds obvious enough, but

people do the exact opposite of that. You know, they'll save the hardest task for last sometimes, and that's when their energy is the lowest to do it. So it's not a good pairing. Or they'll try to put too many high intensity tasks back to back without a break. And then by the end of it, they're so stressed out, they're struggling to even get through one step of the last task they have to do. So give me some advice for those times when I'm stuck.

on something. I mean, it happens to everyone where, I mean, some things you can manage and handle really easily, but then there are those certain things in your day that are, that are tough. You get stuck. You put it off. So what do you do then? So often when someone's feeling stuck on something, it isn't the whole thing that's making them feel stuck. It's a piece of the task they need to do. So we'd break it down into the steps you need to complete this task. And then we'd write you know, low, middle, or high next to each step, so L, M, or H. And we'd look at the pieces that are high intensity of that task for you to complete. And then we'd start to tackle some of the lower level ones first to ease you into it so that you could tackle the high intensity task. And if you

look at your whole day, if you're feeling overwhelmed a lot, just sitting there in the morning and writing out the things you need to do and then rating them as low, middle, high intensity, sometimes even doing that helps people see easier ways that they can start to rearrange the things they need to do so they're not overwhelming themselves with a lot of stressful things in a row. If it's like you can't rearrange it because it's work and you have a bunch of meetings that are pre-scheduled for you and they're all high intensity for you to do, then what I advise people to do is take time buffer breaks. Every time you have to do something that really stresses you out or raises it to a high level of intensity for you, you would take a time buffer break after, which is

a break where you deliberately bring your stress down afterwards and you're kind of intentionally planning it. So you're looking ahead at your schedule thinking, wow, that meeting's going to be usually I really stressed out during meetings. And this one I have to present at. So I'm going to be pretty high levels of stress. So I better take, you know, at least a 15 or 20 minute break afterwards to let the stress come down. And during those breaks, it's good to think about bringing the stress down and get really honest about what things bring my stress down. Because so often we're taking breaks, but our stress is staying at the same level throughout the break. So what we're really learning to do is regulate our own stress and learn to find ways

to calm ourselves down so that by the end of the day, we're not feeling burnt out and overwhelmed from everything we've done. And what are some things you would do during those breaks to bring the stress down? Things like breathing techniques, like doing box breathing, works really well for a lot of people in high stress jobs. This is where you take a deep breath in for four seconds, you hold it for four seconds, you exhale for four seconds, and then you hold it for four seconds. So you picture like your breath going around a box.

and it's easy to do and nobody knows you're doing it. So you can do it in the middle of a meeting or at your desk. They've done plenty of studies that even being in a green space like around trees and plants and nature for 15 minutes will drop people's cortisol levels by a lot. And the same is true of blue spaces if you can stare at water. If you have a view of any kind of water, river, pool, anything like that tends to bring people stress down. You have to learn to work with your own body and your own nervous system and try out some little things throughout the day and see if you can feel a little bit of relief.

Do you think most people have something that they say they want to do that they never seem to get to? I think a lot of us do. I think a lot of us have an unstated belief that we have more time than we think we do and we have endless amounts of energy and focus. And there is this kind of idea that, well, I'll get around to it someday or, you know, future me, I'll do it, or future meal start it, or I'll wait for motivation to kick in and then I'll do it. And to normalize that, I think we all do that to a certain degree. But if you really want to start moving forward on things and you really start getting honest with how long will this actually take to do? You know, how long will it take me to complete that project. What is the actual realistic time frame I have to do that in?

And then you start mapping it backwards from, okay, I want to finish this thing in a year. Well, what does that look like in six months? What does that look like in three months? And what does that look like now? I think it gives us that bigger perspective of the journey and all the steps and energy and focus it's going to take each week to get there where we can start. to evaluate, do I want to do this? Do I want to sign up for this? And if I do, I should probably start moving it forward a few little steps. It's getting that honesty with yourself about a realistic time frame. And when you actually want this thing to be finished by, that you're just imagining in your head, it's taking the intangible and making it more tangible when we

write stuff out on paper for ourselves. Yeah, because I wonder like when people say they want to write a novel. Do they really want to write a novel or do they want to talk about how one day they're going to write a novel? Well, some of that is true, right? I think sometimes we talk about things because it's a little less scary than actually doing it because maybe deep down inside, we know that if we were to map that out on paper, wow, that's a lot of pages and that's going to take a while and that might take a year. And sometimes what we're craving is the feeling of being done with it, the feeling of I want to feel proud of myself. I want to tell people about this. I want something to be excited about. So we have to imagine where we're going emotionally and why we want to

do it and get really clear about do I want to sign up for this. See, I've always thought that it, because I know people that I think say they have these big goals of, you know, some invention they're working on or some book they're going to write. And they never do it. And they never do it. And my sense is the reason they don't do it is they're afraid that they're going to get to the end and it's going to flop. And to leave it in that limbo of one day I will, I'm an inventor. I'm an author. But I never get judged because I never finish it.

Yeah. In a way, it's a way we protect ourselves. It's like self-protection because if I never start, I won't have to face the uncomfortable bits that come with learning something new or trying something new or putting myself out there. But what I'd like to encourage you to think about is sometimes being stuck feels more uncomfortable than moving forward and navigating that new terrain that is unfamiliar because when we move ourselves forward and try new things and grow in this way, our motivation and confidence starts to kick in the more we do it. So we get those rewards eventually a feeling.

that. Whereas when we're stuck and afraid to go forward because we're protecting ourselves, that is sometimes a worse feeling than moving forward and trying something new and being a beginner at it and learning it as you go. So I think it all goes back to us being a little kinder and gentler with ourselves, not expecting ourselves to be perfect or advanced at something we've never tried before and talking to ourselves as if we're our own friend. You know, often we talk to other people in this way when they start new things. We're very gentle and encouraging and kind to them. And the way we talk to ourselves is completely a different story.

It's very harsh. It's very full of unrealistic expectations that we don't have for other people. Yeah, well, I've always thought that, you know, nothing keeps you stuck like being stuck. That without that forward movement, it just, you just get. frozen. And then that makes you feel worse, which loses your motivation, which then makes you more stuck, which, and it's just, it's just, and just moving a little bit can reactivate that momentum. Yeah, I love, I love how you said that. I love what you're saying, because I really do believe that motivation tends to strike moving objects. And we have this, sometimes an unstated

belief that if I just sit around motivation and inspiration and clarity are all going to find me somehow and strike me like a lightning bolt and then I'll move. But I find it's the other way. It's that when you start moving a little bit, eventually momentum and motivation find you and then carry you forward through the harder stuff. But you do have to take those first easy, tiny little steps forward for any of that to happen. Well, you know, I imagine everybody suspects maybe they could handle their time a little better. And it's good to get some advice from somebody who knows about this stuff. I've been talking with Risa Williams.

She is a psychotherapist, writer, speaker, and author of the book, Get Stuff Done Without the Stress. And there's a link to that book at Amazon and the show notes. Risa, thank you so much for being here. Oh, thank you so much. It was wonderful talking to you.

If you want to meet somebody in hopes of maybe starting a romance, what's a good opening line? Well, for a study at the University of Alaska, researchers asked 600 respondents to rate the effectiveness of three varieties of opening lines in a flirtatious situation. First was the pickup line, like, you must be a librarian because I saw you checking me out. And then the open-ended innocuous question like, what do you think of this band, or what team are you rooting for? Or the

direct approach, like, hey, you're cute, can I buy you a drink? The responses were pretty evenly split along gender lines. While men in the study tended to prefer the more direct approach, women tended to prefer the open-ended innocuous, what do you think of this band, or what team are you rooting for approach as an opening line. And not surprisingly, very few people liked the pickup line. And that is something you should know. When you share the this podcast, it does wonderful things. It makes you look smart because you're sharing a podcast that your friends are going to like. And it helps us because it helps spread the word. It helps us get new listeners. It's just a good thing to do. So just hit that share button and send

this podcast to someone you know. I'm Mike Hurruthers. Thanks for listening today to something you should know. Hey, it's Hillary Frank from The Longest Shortest Time, an award-winning podcast about parenthood and reproductive health. There is so much going on right now in the world of reproductive health, and we're covering it all. Birth control, pregnancy, gender, bodily autonomy, menopause, consent, sperm, so many stories about sperm, and of course the joys and absurdities of raising kids of all ages. If you're new to the show, check out an episode called The Staircase. It's a personal story of mine about trying to get my kids school to teach sex ed. Spoiler, I don't.

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