Hindsight is a useful tool. Examination of past events, particularly negative ones, provides insight on how to prepare for an unknown future. But too often, we get hung up on the specifics.
History is full of specific lessons that aren’t relevant to most people, and not fully applicable to future events because things rarely repeat exactly as they did in the past. An imperfect rule of thumb is that the more granular the lesson, the less useful it is to the future.
Focus instead on the broad trends; the things that apply to nearly everyone. This includes: how people respond to surprises, how they think about risk, what motivates them, etc.
History provides many of these broad lessons. One to keep in mind is this: The long run is usually pretty good and the short run is usually pretty bad.
Use this to inform your financial decisions. Understand that, while the long term trend will be up, there will be many setbacks along the way. The key is to survive these setbacks and stay in the game long enough to enjoy compound growth.
To put this lesson into action: save like a pessimist, invest like an optimist.
The Big Lessons From History | Collaborative Fund
Pod Give Me Strength
For shift workers, a comfortable place to sleep is a life saver (potentially a literal life saver). University Hospitals in Cleveland is providing that place with the installation of 3 HOHM sleeping pods at it’s main campus.
Hospital health care workers often nap before, after or between shifts, Strosaker said. HOHM sleeping pods — think freestanding boxes with beds — offer a comfortable, secure and private spot for resting at work.
Of course, you can expect resistance to such a concept. Adoption will be slow due to productivity fears, or worse, nothing more than perception. But this progressive thinking is sorely needed in the world of shift work. Remember: there was a time when automakers willfully neglected advances in auto safety, like roll bars and seat belts, to keep costs down.
See No Evil, Breathe No Evil
You’re probably aware that certain breathing techniques can help calm us down, reducing stress and anxiety. What you may not be aware of, is the role vision plays in our stress response. Through conscious control of your vision and breath, you can control your level of calmness.
When [you] look at a horizon or at a broad vista, you don’t look at one thing for very long. If you keep your head still, you can dilate your gaze so you can see far into the periphery—above, below and to the sides of you. That mode of vision releases a mechanism in the brain stem involved in vigilance and arousal.
One can actually turn off the stress response by changing the way that we are viewing our environment, regardless of what’s in that environment.
And as for breathing, it’s not just a slower rate that helps. It’s also the ratio of inhale to exhale.
So if you want to increase your heart rate, you inhale more than you exhale. The opposite is also true. Every time you exhale, you’re slowing down the heart rate.
Vision and Breathing May Be the Secrets to Surviving 2020 | Scientific American
Caffeination Hydration
There’s a long standing belief that coffee will dehydrate you. As we shift workers are often a little too reliant on our caffeine fix, this may be concerning.
While caffeine is both a natural diuretic and a bladder stimulant, the effects are mild and research shows that coffee and tea are not actually dehydrating when consumed in moderation. Feel free to count it toward your daily liquid intake as follows:
One cup of coffee would count as about half a glass of water.
One cup of tea would count as about three-fourths a cup of water.
Do Coffee & Tea Count As Water? MDs Spill The (Surprising) Answer | mindbodygreen
Can’t Sleep?
Maybe this pandemic, by way of added stress and a change to your routine, is the cause of your insomnia. Or maybe your shift work schedule has been causing sleepless nights (or days) for years. Either way, you’re not alone.
Whether you’re suddenly tossing and turning at bedtime or waking up in the middle of the night, the first step toward better sleep is to figure out what’s triggering your insomnia.
Break the Cycle of Insomnia | New York Times
Stay healthy-
Jason Glenn