059: The Energy Equation: Why Working Harder Is Draining You & How to Build Energy That Lasts

0:08 Welcome to the Warriors Haven Podcast, the place where discipline meets purpose and everyday people become unstoppable. I'm your host, Jaisha Sutherland, a retired Army drill sergeant, single mom, and the founder of the Warriors Haven. Around here, we talk fitness, mindset, and the mission of building a stronger you, mentally, physically, and financially. Because this isn't just about the gym. It's about life, leadership, and living on your terms. So gear up, lock in, and let's step into the haven where warriors are made.

1:02 So let me start off by saying you're not lazy. You may be overloaded. And I want to start here because this matters. When your energy drops, your first thought may be, I need to get more disciplined. But sometimes discipline is not the answer. Sometimes your body is asking for recovery. Think about your phone. If your phone is at 3% battery, you can keep opening apps. You can turn the screen brighter. You can make the phone work harder, but eventually the phone shuts down. Your body works in a similar way.

1:47 The difference is that your body does not always give you a simple battery percentage. Instead, it gives you signals. You become irritable, you cannot focus, you wake up tired, you crave quick food, you stop wanting to exercise, you feel mentally foggy, you start procrastinating, you become less patient. Small problems feel huge. And then you say, What's wrong with me? Maybe nothing is wrong with you. Maybe your system is overloaded. Stress is not something that happens in your head. It affects the body.

2:34 The American Psychological Association explains that stress can affect many systems, including your cardiovascular system, muscles, digestive system, immune system, hormones, and nervous system. Your body is designed to handle stress. That is actually a good thing. Imagine you are walking across the street and a car suddenly comes toward you. Your body does not stop and ask, would you like to schedule a stress response? No. Your body reacts, your heart beats faster, your muscles prepare to move.

3:15 Stress hormones give you the energy. That is survival. The problem happens when the alarm never gets turned off. Work, bills, children, business, relationships, notifications, deadlines, news, financial pressure, health problems, social pressure, and then you add another layer. I have to be productive. So now you are stressed about being stressed. That is where the problem gets bigger. Chronic stress can create a wear and tear on the body over time. This is sometimes discussed using the term allostatic load.

4:04 In simple language, it means the cost your body pays when it keeps adapting to stress over and over again. Your body can handle a sprint, it's just not designed to sprint all day. So let's clear up some misunderstanding. Burnout does not simply mean I'm tired. You can be tired after a hard workout. You can be tired after a long workday. You can be tired because you stayed up too late. That does not automatically mean burnout. The World Health Organization describes burnout as an occupational phenomenon because your chronic workplace stresses that has not been successfully managed.

4:55 And it includes three major parts: exhaustion, mental distance towards the job, and feeling less effective at work. Notice something important. Burnout is not simply a motivation problem. It is not just get tougher. It is not stop complaining. It is not wake up at 4 a.m. And this is where I want to challenge the traditional warrior mindset because I know what it means to push. I was trained to push. There were moments when quitting was not an option. But there is a difference between resilience and self-destruction.

5:44 Resilience says I can handle hard things. Self-destruction says I must always be suffering to prove that I am strong. Those are not the same thing. Real strength includes knowing when to push and then knowing when to recover.

6:08 Your brain is constantly making decisions. What should I do? Who should I call? What should I eat? Should I work out? Should I answer this email? Should I respond to this person? What should I post? What should I buy? What does this message mean? What happens next? Now imagine doing that all day. Your brain is working constantly. And when you are stressed or sleep deprived, things can become harder. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute explains that people who are sleep deficient can be less productive, take longer to finish tasks, have slower reaction times, and make more mistakes.

6:58 That means sleep is not simply about resting. Sleep helps you function. And here's a statistic I want you to remember. The CDC reports that in 2022, about 37% of US adults reported getting less than seven hours of sleep. That means a huge number of adults are trying to perform every day without giving their bodies enough sleep. And then we wonder why people are exhausted. The CDC recommends adults get at least seven hours of sleep each day. So if your strategy is I will sleep less so I can get more done, you might actually be trading tomorrow's performance for today's productivity.

7:49 You are borrowing energy from tomorrow, and eventually the bill comes due.

7:59 Let's make this extremely simple. If you want predictable energy, protect your sleep. Not perfectly, consistently. You do not need a perfect bedroom. You do not need a$4,000 mattress. You do not need a complicated sleep stack. Start with the basics. Create a fairly consistent sleep schedule. Give yourself enough time in bed. Create a window period. Reduce things that keep your brain highly alert right before bed. And pay attention to what your body is telling you. Because sleep is not wasted time.

8:40 Sleep is maintenance. Think about your car. You would not drive your car for a hundred thousand miles and say, I don't believe in oil changes because oil changes are unproductive. You would destroy the engine. But we do that to ourselves. We say, I don't have time to sleep. And then we wonder why our engine is struggling. Now, here is where this gets interesting. When people are exhausted, they often think, I need to stop moving. Sometimes you absolutely need rest, but physical activity can also help your physical and mental health.

9:25 The CDC's current adult guidelines recommend at least 150 minutes of moderate physical activity each week, plus muscle strengthening activity at least two days. I know that sounds like a lot, but break it down. 30 minutes, five days. That's it. And you do not have to do it all at once. You can walk, lift weights, ride a bike, dance, do yard work, play with the kids, move your body. The goal is not punishment, the goal is capacity. I want you to stop thinking. Exercise is something I do because I hate my body.

10:14 Start thinking. Movement is something I do because I want my body to carry me through my life. That is a completely different mindset. You are not exercising to punish yourself, you are training your system to handle life.

10:34 Now we get to the part I really want you to hear. Your discipline strategy might actually be draining you. How? Because you may be treating every day like a maximum effort day, maximum workout, maximum productivity, maximum business, maximum parenting, maximum social media, maximum hustle, maximum expectations. And then you wonder why your energy keeps dropping. Let me give you a military example. You would not send a unit into battle every single day without resupply. You would not expect soldiers to operate forever without food, without water, without sleep, without maintenance, without recovery.

11:27 So why do we expect ourselves to operate that way? You need a cycle. Stress, work, recover, adapt, then do it again. That is how you build capacity.

11:46 Recovery does not mean doing nothing. Recovery means giving your body and brain what they need to return to a better state. That could be sleep. Walking, quiet, breathing, time outside, a meal, talking with someone you trust, stretching, reading, prayer, meditation, a hobby, a real day off. Even short breaks can matter. A systematic review and meta-analysis looking at 22 study samples and more than 2,300 participants found that short breaks had small but meaningful benefits for reducing fatigue and increasing vigor.

12:36 The evidence for improving overall performance was a little less clear. That part matters. A break does not magically make you more productive, but it can help reduce fatigue. So stop feeling guilty about taking a break. The break is part of the work. Think about lifting weights. You do not grow while you're lifting. The workout creates the challenge. Recovery gives your body the chance to adapt. Life works in a similar way. Challenge without recovery eventually becomes exhaustion. Challenge plus recovery creates adaptation.

13:27 Now let's make the nervous system simple. Your body has symptoms and systems that help you respond to danger, and systems that help you calm down. When you are under stress, your body can move into a fight or flight state. Heart rate increases, muscles tighten, stress hormones increase, your attention becomes focused on the threat. That is useful when you actually need to respond. But you cannot live there all day. Your body also needs opportunities to shift toward rest and recovery. This is why simple practices like slow breathing, mindfulness, quiet time, and relaxation can be useful.

14:16 Research on mindfulness is not magic. It does not mean sit down for five minutes and all your problems disappear. But evidence does suggest mindfulness-based programs can help reduce burnout and emotional exhaustion in some groups. In 2024, Systematic Review examined 49 randomized control trials and found that some, about two-thirds of them, reported significant benefits on at least some burnout measures, with emotional exhaustion showing the strongest effect. So here's the warrior vision. You don't have to meditate for an hour.

14:59 Start with two minutes.

15:05 Take slow breaths, relax your shoulders, notice what you are thinking, and remind yourself, I am safe in this moment. You are teaching your body that it does not have to stay on high alert. Now let's move and talk about food. Your body needs energy to function, your brain needs energy, your muscles need energy. So if you are constantly undereating, skipping meals, living on caffeine, or using highly restricted diets, your energy can become harder to manage. This does not mean every meal needs to be perfect.

15:50 It means your goals should be consistency. Build meals around foods that help you stay full and support your body's needs. Think protein, fruits, vegetables, whole grains or other carbohydrate sources, healthy fats, and enough fluids, hydration matters too. But I want to be careful here because the science is more complicated than social media makes it sound. You will see people claim if you are tired, you're definitely dehydrated. That is too simple. Hydration and the research on it and cognition has mixed results.

16:40 Some studies show dehydration can hurt attention and certain types of mental performance, while other research has found less consistent effects. What we do know is that hydration is important for normal body function, and dehydration can hurt physical performance, especially during longer activity and heat exposure. A systematic review of 64 trials involving 643 participants found that restoring fluids after dehydration improved continuous exercise performance with stronger effects in heat and longer duration exercise.

17:21 So don't make dehydration complicated. Drink regularly. Pay attention to thirst. Increase fluids when you are sweating heavily or exercising. And don't wait until you feel completely depleted.

17:40 Now this one is gonna step on some toes. Some people have become addicted to feeling busy. They think if I'm stressed, I must be doing something important. No, stress is not proof of productivity. Being exhausted is not proof that you worked hard. And being busy is not proof that you are winning. Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is stop. Look at your calendar. Look at your commitments. Look at your workload. Ask, what actually matters? Because if everything is important, nothing is important.

18:26 You need priorities. One of the biggest energy drains is constantly switching between tasks: email, text, Instagram, business, kids, work, back to Instagram, back to email, back to work. Your brain keeps changing directions, and that creates mental friction. So try this. Choose one important task, give it your attention, finish it, or reach a stopping point. Then move. You don't need to do everything, you need to do what matters. And here's another mindset shift. You do not need to have the same energy all day, and you should not expect yourself to.

19:17 Some people are sharper in the morning, some are sharper later. Your job is to learn your pattern. You are most alert when? When are you most creative? When do you become tired? When do you naturally want to move? When do you struggle to focus? Track it. For one week, write down three things: your energy, your focus, your stress. Rate each one from one to ten. You might discover something. Maybe your best thinking happens at 10 a.m. Maybe your energy crashes at 2 p.m. Maybe your stress is highest after certain meetings.

20:03 Maybe you sleep seven hours, but your sleep schedule is inconsistent. Maybe you're trying to do creative work when your brain is already exhausted. Information creates power. You cannot manage what you never measure. Now, let's bring everything together. Here is the equation I want you to remember. Energy equals capacity minus demand plus recovery.

20:38 Your capacity is what your body and brain can handle. Your demand is what life is asking from you. Recovery is what helps you restore that capacity. If demand stays high and recovery stays low, eventually your energy drops. Simple. You can think of it like a bank account. Every stressful event can make a withdrawal. Every hard workout can make a withdrawal. Every long day can make a withdrawal. Every night of poor sleep can make a withdrawal. Every emotional conflict can make a withdrawal. But sleep makes a deposit.

21:27 Food makes a deposit. Movement can make a deposit. Rest makes a deposit. Connection makes a deposit. Quiet makes a deposit. Recovery makes a deposit. If you keep making withdrawals without deposits, eventually the account goes negative. And when your account goes negative, your body starts sending you signals. Irritability, brain fog, poor focus, low motivation, poor performance. The answer is not always try harder. Sometimes the answer is restore the account. Now let me give you something practical.

22:20 I call this the warrior energy reset. Five steps. The first one, protect your sleep. Aim for at least seven hours as the baseline recommended for adults. If you are constantly sleeping less, do not brag about it. Fix it. Your sleep is part of your performance system. Step two, move your body every day in some way. Walk, lift, play, train, stretch. And work toward the CDC guideline of 150 minutes of moderate activity each week plus strength training at least twice a week. The third, take short breaks.

23:08 Not because you're weak, because your brain and body need recovery. Even short breaks have been shown to reduce fatigue and increase feelings of vigor. The fourth, eat consistently, drink fluids, stop treating food like something you have to earn. Your body needs fuel to perform. Step five, give your nervous system time to calm down. Slow breathing, quiet, prayer, meditation, walking, time outside, connection, whatever helps you shift from constant alertness towards recovery.

23:54 You cannot solve every energy problem with an individual routine. Sometimes the problem is the environment. Sometimes you have too much work, too little control, too little support, too many responsibilities, an unhealthy workplace, unrealistic expectations, or a schedule that does not allow recovery. The WHO specifically points to excessive workloads, low job control, long hours, lack of support, and other workplace conditions as risks for mental health and burnout. That means sometimes your solution is not how can I meditate better?

24:40 Sometimes your solution is how can I change the situation? Maybe you need to have a conversation with your boss. Maybe you need boundaries. Maybe you need to delegate. Maybe you need to stop saying yes to everything. Maybe you need help. Maybe you need professional support. Maybe you need to leave an unhealthy environment. Recovery is just not something you do inside your body. Sometimes you have to change what's hurting the body.

25:31 There has to be a time when the weapon is put down. There has to be a time when the body rests. There has to be a time when the mind gets quiet. There has to be a time when you eat.

25:54 Because the goal is not to become someone who can survive everything. The goal is to become someone who can build a life they can do constantly and not feel the need to have to survive in it.

26:14 Let me say that again. The goal is to become someone who can build a life that they do not constantly need to survive. You don't need to become better at surviving burnout. You need to become better at preventing it. That is the difference. So here's your assignment. For the next seven days, don't try to become more productive. Try to become more aware. Every day, write down how much did I sleep? How much energy did I have? How stressed did I feel? Did I move? Did I take breaks? Did I eat enough?

26:57 Did I give myself time to recover? Then look for the pattern. Because your body is always communicating with you. The question is, are you listening? And if you are constantly exhausted, struggling to function, experiencing major changes in your sleep, mood, or health, or feeling like you cannot cope, do not assume you simply need more discipline. Talk with a qualified health professional. Persistent fatigue can have some causes. And burnout should not be used as a catch-all explanation. But if you know you have simply just been grinding without recovery, today is your wake-up call.

27:44 You don't need more pressure, you need a better system. You don't need to work harder. You need to manage the energy that makes the work possible. Because sustainable performance is not about how hard you can push, it is about how well you can push, recover, adapt, and come back stronger. That is the warrior way. I'm your favorite drill sergeant Jay. This is the Warriors Haven podcast. And remember, discipline is not destroying yourself to get the mission done. Discipline is building yourself so you can keep showing up for the mission.

28:27 Friends, like I always end, stay strong, stay focused, stay ready. I'll catch you on the next episode.