Pace Yourself and Your Schedule To Recover Faster From Social Hangovers
Flexible pacing helps you meet more of your goals without zombie-ing out
This has been a mega social week for me compared to normal standards. It’s been great but exhausting.
I had meet ups with strangers, day job networking events, and attended a talk about curiosity and how to harness it better (by the wonderful Anne-Laure Le Cunff, creator of Ness Labs).
I’m naturally introverted but incredibly curious about myself, others and the world.
It’s why I called my coaching business Open Introvert - these seemingly contradictory aspects commonly co-exist in the world, but can be tricky to balance.
Since getting chronic illnesses and pain in my ‘20s though, I’m mindful about how and where I put my focus and energy.
It’s easy for me to get enthusiastic about people or new topics, become obsessed and go down rabbit holes for hours.
My boundaries and self-care go out the window and I wear myself out.
Nice one, Sabs!
It’s a hard balance to strike as curiosity is rewarding and uses the same reward pathways in the brain as our basic needs motivators, such as hunger and thirst.
This makes sense, as the more willing we are to explore the world around us, the more opportunities we have to find and benefit from i.e., unknown resources, such as food, people, shelter, water etc.
As with most things that need effort though, there is a cost.
I feel the cost of socialising and overstimulation acutely if I don’t factor in enough rest and recovery time. My social battery is drained.
Most introverts will understand this if they’ve pushed themselves too much in a short space of time. But it happens to extroverts too once they’ve drained their social batteries, although it may take longer.
The result is a ‘social hangover’ as it is known - feeling exhausted, mentally and physically tired, and needing time to myself to recover and recharge my social battery.
Over the years, one of the best approaches I’ve found to managing a large workload, socialising, and my curiosity drive is pacing.
It’s a technique I learned during my chronic pain treatment, and although I don’t always get it right, it’s effective.
Work Out What Drains and Recharges Your Social Battery
Introverts and extroverts are at opposite ends of a spectrum of being more or less socially oriented and motivated.
There are differences in the brain in sensory processing, with introverts more sensitive to social and environmental stimulation, leaving them easily overstimulated.
The dopamine and endocannabinoid reward system, associated with reward and pleasure, also operates differently in introverts.
Introverts may have a less active dopamine reward system, making them less likely to seek out external rewards and stimulation.
Since social interactions are richly rewarded in humans, us introverts need to put in more effort to get the same rewards and benefits as our extroverted pals.
So, it’s not that we don’t like socialising at all. We just don’t need it as much and are fine in our own company. Or we need minimal or less stimulating types to get the same hit.
Lots of socialising takes effort to manage, and becomes exhausting for everyone over time.
Once I understood this about myself, I realised why I acted and felt the way I did about in-person office or social interactions, or back-to-back catch ups.
It helped me ditch the guilt I had about preferring my own company or needing less social input than others, at times.
I also got better at checking my social battery. When it feels flat, I have specific people I reach out to for a boost, or I kick in certain restorative solo activities.
Conversely, I know that certain social interactions and situations will be more draining and effortful than normal.
Coming back to my socially busy week, these meetings with strangers satisfied my curiosity drive but drained my daily social battery so I had to rebalance my energy levels quickly to keep going.
Much of this is about boundary management too, and understanding my social tolerance levels and what oversteps the mark.
This means choosing when we do certain things - having a difficult conversation, carving out focused time, or basic life admin etc - we need to consider the mental and physical effort and impact involved.
Even if it’s in your mental list, work out your social battery drains and radiators - what saps your life force versus what recharges it.
Knowing what sits in each bucket helps you build a strategy that boosts your recovery more efficiently.
Pace Yourself In a Flexible Way
I’ll admit that I struggle with pacing as much as I should , but it’s vital I keep working on it.
It’s used more and more as a therapeutic technique but can be applied to everyday situations in non-pain management situations.
Pacing involves cutting up activity into manageable chunks and switching between physical, mental, social and emotional activities throughout the day.
And all these activities should have periods of rest planned around them to keep your energy levels as high as possible, and make sure you don’t become over‐tired.
This means taking notice of what your own particular ‘warning signs’ are, and stopping your activity before you reach exhaustion point.
Cambridgeshire Community Services NHS Trust
This is about enhancing your self-awareness skills and boosting your time management and productivity overall.
Understand what working at 80% of your capacity looks like versus 110%, so you can catch yourself earlier and adjust.
In this age of productivity gurus and hustle culture, we’ve got oodles of tips and tricks to be our most effective selves.
And yet many of us feel more rubbish than ever.
What these often lack is an understanding of our personal context, biology and natural baseline.
Sure, I can use tips that are based on research, but I still have my own body that has experienced its own journey.
We need to blend the best practice out there with our minds and bodies. This means being honest with who we are, the resources we have, and the unique challenges we face.
Since getting a chronic pain condition, I feel the impact of ignoring my mind and body, and that it’s often trying to tell me something needs to change if I listen to it.
I’d love to be a super fit triathlete or be able to do HIIT training more often than I do. But I know if I overexert myself physically, I get a pain flare up or injury that lasts a few days.
My productivity tanks and I end up in a cycle of self-criticism and guilt. The same is true for emotionally or mentally draining tasks.
Pacing myself is often the best way I get to do as much of what I want to whilst minimising negative impacts.
I still need to get better at recognising my 80% but it’s a mental concept I’m training myself to improve.
You know what pacing looks like for you.
What those manageable rest tasks are - whether it’s passive rest like slumping on the sofa, or active rest like going for a hike, creative hobbies or squats at your desk.
Create a list of passive and active rest activities that work for you and build a routine that rebalances your schedule and energy levels - like a takeaway menu you pick from each day.
It’s as much about having agency over your time and energy, as well as benefiting from the rest activity itself.
Build Up Your Activity Tolerance Levels
One blocker I often see for resisting rest or recovery tasks or pacing is the sense that the baseline level is the only one you’ll stay at.
‘I can’t possibly get all the things I need done if I’m having to slow down or pace myself’ you might say.
The irony is that taking this approach means you’re more likely to burnout and have less energy to get things done.
Having certain routines and rituals that anchor our mood and day are great for our minds and bodies. Start with these and build flexibly around them.
Once you’ve found the rest and recovery activities that work for you, flex up and down to meet your goals or obligations at a higher tolerance level.
That’s what I had to do this week. I knew there was going to be a bigger drain on my social battery, so needed to factor in more rest activities to keep going.
This included going to bed earlier, being mindful about my diet, and limiting conflict or tricky discussions in my relationships.
I still had a social hangover this weekend, but I’d baked in time for that too - minimising obligations on Saturday and giving myself permission to mooch about and have cat naps with the cats.
Your routine might be different, but look at each day and week and plug in paced rest activities strategically as if you’ve got a limited fuel source you need to manage and maintain.
This is really what is happening.
It’s just not a spare gas flask for a camping stove but your mental and physical energy you’re managing instead.
We all have time and energy available to reclaim if we think creatively. If we believe we don’t, that’s an area to explore further.
Why can’t you change something or your perspective on it?
Are you restricted by limiting beliefs, or are you worried about the outcomes that might be hard to accept?
It can be useful to talk to a trusted friend for a fresh viewpoint - I love getting an external opinion to help me challenge my assumptions and blind spots.
Key Takeaways
Connecting with others and social interactions are key to the human experience - it’s how we learn about ourselves, others and the world around us.
We get the most joy and pain from other people so we need to manage our routines and energy effectively so we don’t crash.
To get more done without being a zombie, recognise your personal context and baseline energy levels first.
What are your non-negotiables that form part of your standard routine? Start with those first and then work out how to pace your rest activities with tasks so you don’t burnout or overexert yourself.
This will help reduce stress or at least help you manage it better if you’re maxed out.
Finally, find meaningful ways to rest and recover and carve out your own version or menu for this.
Whether it’s passive cat naps or active hikes, don’t limit yourself.
If you take a flexible and balanced approach, you’ll recover from your social hangovers quicker and get more done in the long run.🚀
How do you rest and recover from your social hangovers?