Do Nothing with Celeste Headlee (Part 2)

We’re back again this week with journalist Celeste Headlee, whose conversation with Dr. Jack Muskat, Medcan’s clinical director of mental health, was so captivating we had to dedicate two episodes to it. In her book, Do Nothing: How to Break Away from Overworking, Overdoing, and Underliving, Headlee argues that our obsession with productivity is enabling burnout culture and harming our health. When we last left Headlee and Dr. Muskat, the duo explored the surprising historical evolution of work and how one restorative train trip forced Headlee to unplug and rethink her own relationship to her job. This week, they dive into the lifestyle changes we should all be making in order to break out of this vicious work cycle we’re trapped in and embrace leisure.

LINKS

• Celeste is quite active on Twitter and Instagram.
• Read more on Headlee and her work at her website, and check out her book Do Nothing.
• An interview Headlee did with NPR leading up to the book’s launch. 
• Here’s a WHO article categorizing burn-out as an “occupational phenomenon.”

INSIGHTS

• Data from the International Labour Organization and the WHO shows a concerning trend for those spending long hours at work. “We’re talking about the World Health Organization saying overwork can kill you,” says Headlee. The findings show an increased risk for premature death caused by heart disease and stroke for those who work more than 55 hours a week. But the real kicker? Headlee says research reveals that the net difference in pay for someone working 55 hours versus someone working 35 hours is only 6 percent. [04:20]
• So what can we be doing to more effectively combat burnout in the workplace? Headlee thinks one of the solutions is better management practices. One of the problems with remote working, she says, is that managers started instituting more intrusive policies because they didn’t trust their employees to be productive from home. It had the opposite effect—as a manager “your job is actually not to manage a team, it’s to coach them and give them the tools they need for success.” [05:58]
• But surely the cult of productivity is good for something—coming up with a vaccine in 11 months doesn’t happen without some serious work. However, Headlee notes that working to solve a crisis is different from a 50 hour work week. Throughout history, humans have always come together (and usually work prolonged hours) to solve a crisis. The main difference? Afterwards, “they were given a nice, long break.” That is “the rhythm of homosapiens,” Headlee says—and one we’d be better off sticking to. [09:42]
• And for the younger generation? Headlee notes that the host of work-related worries Gen-Z deals with is the upshot of a society that brainwashes its members into believing they’re only valuable if they’re working. In reality, “it is a delusion to think that if you keep pushing your brain, it helps you get more done”. Headlee notes that studies on productivity show that those who work 10-15 hours a week are generally the most productive. Humans are naturally equipped to work in teams, and yet most of what we’re taught growing up is about individual responsibility. Working in a group is a skill that has to be developed—training people to work by themselves won’t do them any good in the real world. [10:55]
• To the CEO or executive that says they have no time for hobbies: Headlee doesn’t believe you. “You have more time than  you think,” she says. You have to find where the “leak” is (i.e., are you scrolling Instagram in between emails?) and plug it with something that’s just for pleasure—something that doesn’t go on a CV, that won’t be beneficial for your career or even go on social media. That, she says, is the kind of leisure that we’re missing. [15:56]
• “Leisure should have nothing to do with work”. Imagine you have two modes—open and closed. When you’re ‘open’ says Headlee, it’s business as usual, you work, collaborate—complete your tasks. But after that’s all done, when you switch to ‘closed’, that means no more memos, Slack or emails. Headlee wants people to be bored again because “your brain hates it.” We’re so used to being caught up in whatever is going on in our lives that simply sitting and doing nothing feels like torture. But being bored is when your mind is most likely to let memories percolate, or make interesting connections—amazing things can happen when you give your mind the freedom to just wander. [18:38]
• “I want people to experience boredom again,” says Headlee. Why? Well, your brain hates the state of being bored, so it will start to wander. A wandering brain will start to make surprising connections, like remembering that you haven’t called your favourite aunt in a while. And the only way to accomplish this is by truly separating work from leisure and giving your mind the freedom to just wander. [19:51]