In this episode, we sit down with Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith, a board-certified internal medicine physician and renowned expert on the seven types of rest. Dr. Dalton-Smith shares invaluable insights on how companies can support their employees through effective work-life integration and burnout prevention strategies. As the real estate industry continues to evolve, we knew Dr. Dalton-Smith would be the perfect guest to speak to our Hustle Humbly listeners.

She offers practical tips on prioritizing the right kind of rest, particularly mental, emotional, and creative rest, which are essential for entrepreneurs. Tune in to discover how to apply these strategies and set yourself up for restful success as you navigate the changes in our industry. We’re confident that after listening to this episode, you’ll be inspired to implement her advice and embrace a more balanced approach to your work and life.

Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith is a Board-Certified internal medicine physician, speaker, and award-winning author. She is an international well-being thought-leader featured in numerous media outlets including Prevention, MSNBC, Women’s Day, FOX, Fast Company, Psychology Today, INC, CNN Health, and TED.com. She is the author of numerous books including her bestseller Sacred Rest: Recover Your Life, Renew Your Energy, Restore Your Sanity, including insight on the seven types of rest needed to optimize your productivity, increase your overall happiness, overcome burnout, and live your best life. Over 250,000 people have discovered their personal rest deficits using her free assessment at RestQuiz.com. Learn more about Dr. Saundra at DrDaltonSmith.com.

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Speaker 1 0:01
The change is not good or bad, it just is. Is how I oftentimes look at it. Basically, how do you rest in the middle of your busy day? Nobody really has time to just block out, you know, a sabbatical in the middle of their life.

Alissa 0:16
I wonder if I could sleep more efficiently. I could be a five hour sleeper.

Katy 0:20
No, I don’t think you can, but you can’t make yourself be that, right? We all need a boundaries reset. Every once in a while,

Alissa 0:29
it’s like you just start giving a little bit, and then next thing you know, the boundaries are out the window. Hi y’all welcome to hustle. Humbly, it’s Alyssa and Katie and we are two top producing realtors in the Baton Rouge market. We

Katy 0:42
work for two different companies where we should be competitors, but we have chosen community over competition. The

Alissa 0:47
goal of our podcast is to encourage you to find your own way in business, so stop

Katy 0:51
comparing yourself and start embracing your strengths. Hi, Alyssa, Hey, Katie. Hi. Dr Sandra, hello. We’re so excited to have a guest today. We did a little intro before. I didn’t make Dr Sandra listen to her bio, but I do want her to quickly share with us where you are and what you do.

Speaker 1 1:10
Yes, I am near Birmingham, Alabama, and I’m an internal medicine physician who now runs a workplace, well being, consulting agency that’s

Alissa 1:20
amazing a workplace. Well, well, being consultant, very

Katy 1:24
important. Okay, so I don’t know how much you know about what’s going on in the real estate industry, but as we record this, there are major shifts in in the industry and what we’re allowed to do, and it’s a lot, a lot of change. Okay, so I really want to hear your thoughts on dealing with a major change, I don’t know, like, in any, like, entrepreneurial sense, and how can we handle that change? Like, what are your tips for handling this big change we’re dealing with? Yes,

Speaker 1 1:56
I think that is really what stress is. Stress is change. And so I think just recognizing that, that you know when something changes in our lives automatically, we oftentimes, we try to act as if it’s not affecting us. It’s going to affect you. That’s what stress is. That’s why I say stress management actually does not work, and we should stop talking about it, because you can’t manage change. Change happens. What you can do is you can manage how you recover from change. So accept the fact that change is coming, and then accept the fact that you’re going to have some some growing pains along the way with it, because that’s part of the process, but that really the resilience. What we’re wanting to come out of the change is only comes when we allow ourselves to rest and recover from the change. So look at how the change is affecting you, mentally, emotionally, socially, your relationships, how your body feels, all of those areas. And then look at what are the things you can do to restore those places.

Katy 2:55
That’s fascinating, right? To think about it more of like, how is it affecting all these different parts of your life, and not just your work life,

Alissa 3:01
yeah, and some of these changes have sort of been in the headlines for over a year now. And so I feel like I’ve told Katie before. I feel like I have gone through the different stages of grief, like I’m angry about it, and then I’m upset about it, and then I’m like, this isn’t really gonna happen, and now it’s happening. And so, and I’m, I’ve gone through the cycle a few times, and it’s, it’s just been recently that I’ve sort of moved more into the acceptance stage at the time of this recording. It has not been, it becomes official in our market to at the end of this week, at the end of this week. So, but even now, like, thankfully, after going through the motions, I’m getting to a place where I’m even kind of excited about it, which I would have never thought I would get to that place. But yeah, it is interesting to think of how you have to really analyze all the different areas of life to to figure out how you feel about it. Okay?

Katy 4:04
And I know that you talk about all the different types of rest, can you? Can you give us the seven types of rest now that we’re picturing it as not just the one thing? Like, what are the seven types of rest?

Speaker 1 4:16
Yeah, so Well, the seven types of rest include physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, social, sensory and creative. And I love what you you actually stated right before we went over to this question regarding kind of switching over from a kind of like, oh, this change is coming to okay, this change is coming now what? I think that’s a big part of it too. You know, I never try to make pessimists optimist, because it’s just, you know, just how you are, you know, everybody’s different, but how they approach those kind of things. But I think it’s good when you can make a transition into a growth mindset with change and that, you know, it doesn’t have to be negative. It’s like, what is the positives that could come out of this? And kind of put your attention more on those. Yeah.

Katy 4:59
I mean, I’m positive as as a person, so that makes sense. Yeah,

Alissa 5:03
Katie’s a very positive person. I’m not a negative person. I’m just very like I’m a logistical thinker, so I’m always trying to think like ahead, which sometimes can get me in the weeds of trying to prepare for something too soon, or stressing about something that’s not even here yet, but usually by the time it gets here, I’m okay. I just have to torture myself before the lead up. Yeah, on the lead up of it, of the change coming. So yeah, Katie’s usually my, my sounding board.

Katy 5:40
Okay, do you have any tips, though, on dealing with that, change management and resilience? I know, like, are there, like, some kind of easy ways for us to deal with that?

Speaker 1 5:51
Yeah, I think for myself, because there’s life is always changing, whether it’s professional or personal. I just literally yesterday, dropped my youngest son off for college, and we’re like, okay, now there’s, like, us in the dog, you know,

Alissa 6:05
you go away like, Well, both of

Speaker 1 6:08
my sons are, they’re only, like, a couple of hours away, so they’re away, but they’re not far away. So I can get down if I chose to. But, you know, it’s one of those situations where there’s good change. Change is not good or bad. It just is, is how I oftentimes look at it. Because if we go about it like I said, whether whatever your normal personality is, whether it’s optimistic or pessimistic, if we just address change as it just is, now what it gives you a kind of this clean slate to see, okay, let me look at the pros. Let me look at the cons. Let me see how these things kind of can mesh together. What can I draw? I always look at it as, what can I draw out of this, the pros and the con, what can I draw out of this that serves me to get me where I want to go? So sometimes even the cons can be things that serve you. If you approach them as, how do I use this to move me in the direction I want to go if, for example, if your situation is such that everybody in your industry is like in an uproar, the con may that could be a con, right? A pro for someone who’s in podcasting, could be our ratings could go through the roof if we really narrow down on this topic and really hit that hit at home and give them some true tips. You know, everything has a pro and con to it. We just have to kind of keep ourselves in a position of being creative in how we move with the changes.

Alissa 7:30
And you make a really great point too, because the other day, so the whole I started real estate in 2011 and the number one complaint is, you know, there’s too many agents. It’s so easy to get your license. The market is oversaturated. You know, there’s so many part timers trying to do it that can sometimes make the full time professionals lose their professional reputation. So one of the big complaints is always that Realtors wish there was a higher barrier to entry and so that it would just make it a little bit harder to do what we do. But if you really think about it, with all the changes going on within the industry right now, it’s giving us what we’ve always asked for, just on the back end. So now it’s like all these licensees, you know, the 1 million licensees in America as these, if you don’t implement these changes and new laws in a professional manner, you’re not going to be here in a year. It’s just not going to it’s not going to be worth your time and your money to do it unless you’re doing it correctly. So while it’s not what we’re getting what we asked for, I think it’s really going to clean out the industry, the professional and the strong will stay and though other because I’ll tell you, if I was doing this for fun or part time, I wouldn’t anymore, right? So it’s like that is one of the things that has made me excited about this change, is that I think it’s going to clean up our industry. It’s going to bring back professionalism even more and just sort of we it is a weed out process, while maybe not on the front end, definitely on the back end.

Katy 9:23
Okay. Dr, Sandra, I want to You said something in an interview of yours I listened to that was, what kind of tired are you? We talk about boundaries and self care a lot on the show. You know, the show is for realtors, who are entrepreneurs, and we have other entrepreneurs that listen, but talk to me a little bit about what kind of tired are you, and what you mean when you say that, yeah,

Speaker 1 9:45
I think too often people, we ask people all the time, how are you doing? And they say, Oh, I’m so exhausted. I’m so tired. And I feel like that question is just pointless. You know, the way I look at it is, as a physician, if somebody comes into the emergency. Room, and I say, you know, how are you feeling? And they say, I hurt. I’m like, and okay, it’s like, what am I supposed to do with that? And and saying I’m so tired is the same thing. It actually doesn’t give enough specificity for anyone to help you, and definitely not enough for you to help yourself. You don’t know where to begin. And I feel like, because we have kind of gotten accustomed to just saying I’m tired or I’m exhausted. That that’s why we feel like there’s a one word answer to a one word solution, and so many people have decided that solution is sleep. I just need to go to sleep. But how many times have any of us gone to bed and slept 678, hours and woke up still exhausted, sleep doesn’t resolve all tired. And so I feel like that’s why we have to really get very intentional. And there’s seven types of rest or restorative practices that I mentioned a moment ago. That’s what I prefer, that people do when they when some when they are thinking, I’m so tired. Narrow it down, which of those seven areas has the deficit? Where is the place you need to pour back into? Because the more self aware you can be and identify where you’re fatigue, the better chance you have then at picking a restorative practice that can pour back into that specific area.

Katy 11:17
Okay, so how do we do that? Logistically speaking, we look at the seven, the seven different types of, you know, tired and rest. How do we decide which one we are?

Alissa 11:27
And do you see that, you know, you work with people in workplaces, specifically which, I think is amazing for those that are maybe suffering because of career related stress. Is there one of what? A few of the seven types that come up more often? Yeah. So

Speaker 1 11:49
as far as how to to identify which type of which of the types of rest you’re probably most efficient in, I always say just you can do it one or two ways. The simplified way is, because we get this question a lot. We actually developed a quiz at rest quiz com for people to be able to automate it, go in and do it. However, that wasn’t available when I first started this process. I had to do it kind of a more grassroot way. And the way that I started the process was looking at my day. So if we’re taking someone who’s an agent and you know, what’s their day look like? Okay, they’re they might be at their home office, certain parts of the day dealing with dealing with financing people, or dealing with lawyers or banks or whatever it is that they have to do. And so part of it’s sitting at a computer. So they’re using mental energy, they’re using sensory energy, and that they’re dealing with their devices. Another part of the day they may be in a home that they are prepping for an open house or something. So they’re up and down and up and down and up and down the stairs, you know, to get everything together. So physically that day, their body might be being used more, carrying, moving furniture, whatever, to get the house prepped. So, you know, that day there was more physical another day they may be showing the house to people, and so there’s a whole lot of social energy that they’re expending because they’re having to, you know, go through the process of engaging with people, and not all people are nice. And so, you know, if they happen to come up against a jerk who’s like and in the process being professional, having to keep a smile on their face while dealing with the jerk, you’re using emotional energy, because you’re actually carrying some professional emotional labor, because you can’t really say, stop being a jerk to the person, because you’re trying to sell them a house. So you’re holding your emotions back, and then that’s an extra drain on your energy. So there’s lots of times when you’re using energy, you know, throughout those days, and then. So when you’re thinking about what kind of tired Am I, take a look at what kind of energy did I use that day. You know, I’m prepping the house. I had to be creative. I had to use my physical body. I had to whatever. Then that’s probably what’s making you drain that day if you didn’t do something to pour back into that bucket. And so that’s kind of how we approach it when we dive into it with someone, just because it’s going to change every unless your job is very regimented. And, you know, I every job has some level of routine and rhetoric that’s kind of the same old, same old. But also, what most jobs have every day has fluctuations, like you don’t know what’s going to happen when you walk in that house with a new couple looking at it right, no idea what’s going to happen. So I mean that it could, it could start off being, oh, this is a routine showing, and next thing you know, they catch a glimpse of something that breaks open an emotional well, and now they’re telling you about their child that got killed in a car accident, and now it’s an emotional day.

Katy 14:44
That’s literally what had happened. Dr Sandra, all the time, all the time, yes,

Speaker 1 14:49
and so, and that’s the thing. You didn’t come into that scenario emotionally equipped for the onslaught of emotions you probably attacked with at that moment. And so now, when you go home, and you get home, if you don’t process that, you’re like, Why do I feel so exhausted? Because you drained what little bit of emotion, emotional energy you had because you didn’t actually go into that situation, like, ready for it, you know, you that well wasn’t filled up because you didn’t even anticipate it was going to be

Katy 15:21
used. Okay? Now, how do we, since we’re on that example, how? How do you emotionally rest? What is? What is the way to do that? Yeah,

Speaker 1 15:30
so, emotional rest is when you what you experience, when you allow yourself to be able to express and to feel and to process your emotions in a way that that you don’t feel like you have to restrain yourself. And so that can be for some people, they like to do it with other people. So if you have a significant other, a spouse, a coach, a counselor, a therapist, someone who you feel the liberty of being able to say how you really feel without any type of covering it up or trying to make it sound better. For someone, you’re just going to say it as it is. That’s a form of emotional rest. For some people, they like to do this in a journal. And so they don’t have a person they want to say it to, but they can write out their true feelings and process it on the paper. That’s another way of getting emotional rest. For some people, they actually like to do it through a creative outlet. And so, you know, every country music song basically isn’t an emotional rest experience for that person, because they can write out their achy, Breaky Heart, you know, just on the lyrics, and they can release it authentically. That way. Some other people do that with the you hear people saying they go to like, art classes or pottery classes. And oftentimes that process of creating the art can be an emotional release, because you’re creating the artwork for no one else’s appreciation but yourself. When you’re able to release and you’re not you’re not caring how anybody else perceives it, you’re just being authentic who you are. That’s an emotional rest release

Katy 17:00
that is so fascinating and

Alissa 17:02
it’s so simple, I just never quite thought about that, right? I’m definitely a journaler. When I am just at my peak, I don’t really want to talk to anybody about it, and I haven’t ever really found talking helped a ton. But when I can journal, by the time I shut that book, I’m like, Oh my gosh, I feel so much better. I feel like Katie’s the creative Okay, every time I come to her house, she has a different flower arrangement on her Island or different plants in her bathroom with new towels like and she doesn’t do that for anybody except herself, right? That’s true. Like, that’s how you have emotional rest, maybe, like you’re piddling, but, but it does bring me to an interesting question, because of all the seven types

Katy 17:54
creative was the one I was most curious about, because I feel like as even eight entrepreneurs at this point with how much you’re on social media and how that’s a facet of your business, you’re sort of thrust into this creative world where you’re having to come up with content and post and like, but when you feel tired, which I’m sure a lot of entrepreneurs feel tired of that, how Do you creatively rest but still get your job done.

Speaker 1 18:22
Yeah, I love that, because what I just described with emotional rest, that creative aspect of it is, actually is not creative rest. That’s still creative work because you’re great, you’re working creative rest is when you actually appreciate what’s already been created. And so it’s things like looking at flowers. So flowers could be how you creatively rest, because the flowers are already created and you’re appreciating beauty. So I always say creative rest is the appreciation of beauty and art, and can be music, it can be nature, but you’re creating what’s already been created and allowing it to create something inside of you. So you allow that beauty to unlock something inside of your own creativity, inspiration, motivation, whatever it is needs to be unlocked, but you allow it to unlock you to then have a release of further creativity. And so, you know, for some people, it can be listening to music, and so they listen to music and they get sparked up and they get excited and motivated. Other people, it could be locations like some for some when they’re out doing, like their morning jog and just being out in nature, something about that is, you’ve heard people say, I go outside, it’s like, all of a sudden, I can think again. Well, you got inspired again. Thinking creatively is just inspiration. You got inspired again by whatever you saw, and it unlocked whatever was inside of you to then further create. Wow, that

Katy 19:48
makes perfect sense. Never would I have thought of that

Unknown Speaker 19:52
but, but it’s like, wow, yeah, just

Katy 19:55
wow. Appreciate

Alissa 19:56
it.

Katy 19:57
Wow, wow, wow. Okay, let’s go into. How do you rest when you’re an entrepreneur and maybe you’re not a nine to five employee, like we are. Maybe we’ve got to work after five, maybe we have to work on the weekend. Like, how do we how do we work rest into our work life?

Speaker 1 20:12
Yeah, that’s that’s actually what we spend all of our time working with people on is basically, how do you rest in the middle of your busy day? Because nobody really has time to just block out, you know, a sabbatical in the middle of their life. All of us need restorative practices built into our routines. And so it’s looking at your routines and then looking at, where do i Where are places where I can either habit stack and put some restorative practice on habits I already do, or I need to create a block of place, a space rather, to be able to do something that I know would actually help improve me, either personally, professionally or in some way. And so for myself, I like to do a lot of habit stacking, because it’s a lot easier to integrate things when you apply them to things that you’re already doing. So for example, I have a lot of zoom meetings that we do with people. All of the trainings and things that we do are based through zoom or through some type of platform like that. And so when that happens, when I have a break in between them, I do sensory rest deprivation exercises. So I know that being on Zoom and being on mics and all these things over and over again, kind of will cause me to become sensory overwhelmed. So I will pull out my noise cancelation earphones, I’ll close my eyes, I’ll dim all the lights. Everything’s on a switch, so I’ll dim all the lights, and I’ll sit in as much darkness and silence as I can for five minutes in between the next meeting, just to let my senses reset so that the next meeting, I can come in ready to go and not feeling like, Oh, my body’s so tired. I’m cognitively aware of kind of my posture and kind of how I engage with my workstation. And so whenever I feel like my neck or my shoulders start getting tense, I don’t try to work through it. I don’t try to push through it. I will, in the middle of the meeting, kind of do some next roles or things. If I’m training somebody in the moment, I’ll say, Hey guys, let’s take a two minute self care break for our spine, and I’ll walk them through the same process. And so, you know, that might not be what we’re talking about, but I’m like, if I’m stiff, you’re probably stiff too. So let me bring you in on the journey. And so it’s just a matter of kind of looking at and for myself as someone who wants to to emulate what it means to be a leader in areas that you feel are important to people that you practice it even when it’s not planned. You stay in the moment with whatever, whatever it is that you’re engaged with, and that you’re practicing it on a regular basis. And so for entrepreneurs, just look at for yourself. What are some habits you’re already doing where to be easy to bring in, like creative rest, change the lock screens on your computer and your phone to things that inspire you, paint a nautical wall. You know, one of the studies show that a lot of people water and being at the beach inspires them. Well, we can’t all live at the beach, and nobody has time to take a vacation every week. Put a nautical wall in your in your house, you know, just have an accent wall that reminds you of the thing that brings you inspiration. Put a picture of the ocean your favorite spot, so that when your screen goes blank and you turn it back on, you are immediately kind of confronted with something that inspires you. You can have noise cancelation earphones that you just keep at your desk at all times. You can for mental rest. You can have a like a journal or post it notes at your bedside, so that when you lay down to go to sleep and your brain won’t shut up because you’re thinking all your best thoughts in the middle of the night, you can jot them down real quick so that your brain can release it. You can go to sleep if you find that you have a hard time actually staying focused and concentrating. You can practice a combination of a high intensity physical activity that’s repetitive, like jogging or like the treadmill or something like that, that actually get this robotic in nature, can actually help you be more mindful and practice mindfulness tactics to kind of focus your thinking. So if you feel like you’re too scattered, because I find with a lot of entrepreneurs, they’ll say things like, I got so many thoughts and I can’t get them organized. Sometimes your physical body has to, like, be overwhelmed for your mind to like clear out. And so having a high intensity activity that you do that’s robotic, like jogging or some a rowing or something like that, can actually get your mind to actually line up into a more kind of cognitive place. And so just practicing some different things and see what works for you?

Alissa 24:41
Mm, hmm, and all these things are so simple, yeah, but I can see where changing your lock screen, yeah, that’s genius. Yeah, so easy well, and it’s like those. That’s something I’ve done before, but I never thought of it as like, like. I knew it gave me benefit. That’s why I did it, but to realize too, that it’s actually right helping, and not just in my mind, like it’s it’s a real thing. It really is making a difference. And I think too, as agents, when we have five minutes when we are sitting in the car waiting for the client to get there, we’re a few minutes early, or we’re sitting at the open house when no one’s there. Instinct for anybody, not just agents, is to pick up your phone and scroll just, you know, the mindless scrolling. And I think sometimes that’s mistaken for rest, but you do talk a lot about sensory rest and how just scrolling is not rest per se. You know, it may be mindless to an extent, but it’s it’s still using your your sensory energy to do that. What

Katy 25:52
type of rest is scrolling? Surely, it does fit the bill of some of the rest, but it’s probably hurting you in other areas.

Speaker 1 26:01
I find scroll, if you’re talking about like social media scrolling, I find scrolling tending to be more escapism than it is rest, same with netflixing. If that’s working, you know this, sitting on the sofa watching like episode after episode, it’s more of an escape because it’s it’s a moment to not have to think about the things you can think about everything else, but I find that it’s less rest, because it tends to not be very intentional about restoration. Now, you know you mentioned, like, if you’re sitting, you’re sitting in the car waiting to take a family in, or something I love to do, like when you have those like, small moments of time, so to speak, in the middle of the day, and you have a moment, and you’re, you have your phone, and you’re, for whatever reason, feel like you have to have your phone in that moment. Determine what type of rest I can get in that moment from that phone, if you have to have the phone. So is there a certain, maybe person on Instagram who always puts that or Facebook or whatever thing you’re trying to scroll is there a certain person that tends to put inspirational stuff or stuff that, like, makes you smile or funny or, you know, whatever? So I bind that there’s like, occasionally as someone will have like a, I can’t think of any of the names of the Instagram people, but they’ll have like, a channel that’s their dog. It’s like, not a person. It’s like, yeah, the it’s like, the Instagram account is like a dog or something, and it has, like, funny videos or all this different stuff. And so if you have something like that, and it’s really intentional, it’s like, I’m not going here just to scroll and see all the things I’m going here, because this actually brings a smile to my face. It makes me laugh, you know? It brightens my mood. It gets me in a certain mindset. I find those can be very effective scrolls, because they’re intentional. That

Alissa 27:52
makes sense, that

Katy 27:54
makes look and I follow a lot of those dog accounts. Dr, Sandra, I’m all for it. Okay, can we go back to sleep and physical rest for a minute? What? So if you’re physically tired, where does sleep play into this? And what are your tips or recommendations for sleep? Because I noticed where it said a lot of people struggle with insomnia and fatigue who maybe aren’t necessary, like they they’re struggling with that part of the rest.

Speaker 1 28:25
Yeah, so sleep is huge. Sleep is still mandatory. You know, it’s something that everybody needs and needs to have healthy and good sleep hygiene for. I’m finding that a lot of people don’t understand the relationship between sleep and rest. Rest is kind of the bridge that takes us over into deeper, high quality sleep. All sleep is not created equal. If you have like, and a lot of people do these garments and Apple watches and Fitbits and all these things, Aura rings and all the things you know that tell us kind of what our sleep quality is. And you’re noticing that it gives you like this horrible score. Your sleep quality was 70 today, and you’re trying to figure out, why are these scores so low? That’s kind of how rest helps, because just having your eyes closed for seven, eight hours, if you’re not getting appropriate amount of deep, restorative sleep, you’re going to wake up still feeling tired. And oftentimes we can’t get into those deeper, restorative depths of sleep because our mind is overly active, our body’s uncomfortable. You know, there’s other things going on that are keeping us from getting high quality sleep. So I feel like, for a lot of people, you know, you want to evaluate the quality of your sleep as well. Do you wake up feeling as if your sleep was beneficial, like, like it was at some level of restoration to it.

Katy 29:45
Yeah, that’s good. I am not a morning person, Doctor Sandra. I don’t I don’t really want to wake up in the morning. I’d like to sleep late as much as I could, but I have children, so I have to get them up and send them to school, and then I have to. Work The Miracle Morning people throw me off a little bit when they’re like, get up at five. Will you tell me your thoughts on for someone who’s not a morning person? What do I need to do? Can I just skip the morning?

Speaker 1 30:16
I won’t be doing miracle mornings either. So yeah, I don’t believe everybody has, like, a set time that they should wake up, I think is very individualized. Nor I believe everybody needs 678, hours of sleep. I know some people who who get extremely high, highly effective sleep on just five hours. And so I feel like it’s very individualized, I think, for each person and and it takes a bit of discipline, because I but I feel like for each person, we have to determine what is the optimal time for me to go to bed and what is the optimal time for me to wake up. Some people actually need nine to 10 hours of sleep because of whatever reason. That’s how their body’s Hotwired. It requires more sleep, and others don’t. But I feel like too often, we get in some some routines, I guess that. Oh, I go to bed at 11, and it’s like but should you you know they that may be what you’ve been doing for the past 50 years. But should you do you start noticing signs of your body naturally winding down at 830 if you do, then you might want to start going to bed at nine, because if your body’s natural circadian rhythm starts winding down at a different time. And yes, I understand you have kids that are up. You gotta do what you gotta do, but trying to kind of determine and even help them recognize when is your When do they need to go to bed? When do they start yawning and getting filling their body wind down and start filling their eyes, start droop, and you start noticing some of these signs that your body wants to go to sleep. The thing is, we can push our body way beyond what it actually is already telling us it wants to do. It’s the reason people can run a marathon or 100 miler. The body was does what you tell it to do. Doesn’t mean it’s happy about it. It will do it. It’s just trained to do it. And so some of our bodies have been trained to, well, we go to bed at 11 and we wake up at eight because that’s what she tells us to do. But that’s not what it’s trying to do. That’s not really how it’s optimized.

Katy 32:11
Yeah, that makes sense. And both of my kids are totally opposite. One wants to go to bed early, the older one wants to go to bed early, and we’ll get up early and like, exercise in the morning or get all of her stuff ready, and the other one, you have to physically wake up. And he doesn’t want to go to sleep at night, but he wants to sleep in I’m like, it’s that’s been most fascinating to me to watch, like, just kind of natural tendencies. Everyone does sleep differently. I

Alissa 32:36
feel like, yeah, and I think I I require a lot of sleep, but I’m also a very efficient person. So my daughter even asked me one time, like, if you could have a superpower, what would it be? And it’s like, I would only have to sleep for pleasure. Like, I don’t have to sleep. I could just stay awake and be one of these people that just, like, think about the things you could do. Yeah, I could do so much, but at the same time, I do require my husband like jokes with me, because even when we were dating in college, he’s like, I remember, you were always sleeping because I was, I’m a big Napper. Well, I was, you know, before kids and stuff, but I just require a lot of sleep. And then I wasn’t really a morning person either. But I do think, you know, I have a three year old that is not the best sleeper in the world. My daughter sleeps great, but he they, it’s like I had to accommodate them. And I have become a morning person, and I enjoy it even, which is strange, but I do go to bed very early, like by 830 I am just struggling to stay awake, and I just go to bed. Hmm, I wonder if I could sleep more efficiently. I could be a five hour sleeper. No, I

Katy 33:54
don’t think you can, but you can’t make yourself be that, right?

Speaker 1 33:57
You really can’t. You know your body needs what the body needs. You know, it’s kind of like the heart wants what the heart wants what the heart wants. It’s like you, you really can’t make it logical, um, why one person? Just like you’re seeing with your kids, why one person? Why one child can, like, get five, six hours, and they’re great, and the other one is like, they need 20 hours, like they need all of this leaving. You’re like, what is going on? We’re we’re individuals, and really just what our bodies need are different, and I think a big part of it is and it sounds like you’re doing this with your children, just helping them to be self aware and taking the shame off the fact that, yeah, okay, you need more sleep. It’s not a bad thing. It’s how your body’s hot wired, and you will be a more efficient, more fulfilled, more satisfied, more effective person, if you function with how your body functions, rather than trying to make it fit into the bubble of what somebody else says is the normal I

Katy 34:48
can’t wait for my husband to listen to this. Why? Because he doesn’t need as much sleep as I do, and I think that, you know, he’d be like, What are you doing in bed? Still? Like, I’m tired. Like, if, no, if they’re if alarm doesn’t go off. I might sleep until nine or 10, like, it could happen. But he’s like, right up with the sun. Yeah, I

Alissa 35:07
don’t shave my sleeper. But, like, even this morning, I was like, Why are you awake so early? It is not time yet. He’s like, but I see the sun. I’m like, it doesn’t matter. It’s too

Katy 35:20
hard. So funny,

Alissa 35:22
yeah, but I do think that in our industry, we got some tired people, yeah,

Katy 35:30
which of the seven tireds Do we think they might be? I feel like I’m expending a lot of mental energy all day long, like trying to solve problems. What are the, what are the good ways to mentally rest?

Speaker 1 35:45
Yeah, I would probably say we’ve done quite a bit of work with with real estate agencies, and so I would probably say, looking at, just thinking back through some of them with their rest quiz scores, I would, I would probably say the number one we’re seeing does have a have a tendency to be somewhere between mental and emotional, which is a bit shocking, to be honest with you. I I had, I was thinking mental and creative, but that’s not what the data showed. So with mental rest, one of the things is making sure that you are giving your brain time to to have some down time. And I find that because there’s so many pieces to the the process, from, you know, the seller to the owner, to the paperwork, to all the different things in between, there’s so many different pieces that there’s so much processing that’s always going on, and so much forward thought about the next process, oftentimes before it ever even got there. And so you’re always kind of thinking ahead to what the problems can be so to kind of counteract them, that it leads itself to this bit of what we tend to call kind of affectionately monkey brain syndrome, whereas, like your thoughts are swinging all the time. It’s like you’re one thing after the other after the other. And it makes it very difficult to, well, I should put it this way. It has a tendency to lead to certain mental rest deficits that that can be disturbing, like feelings of forgetfulness, like, like difficulty concentrating, having a hard time recalling it at times. And so sometimes people will say things like, you know, I feel like I’m getting early dementia, like all of a sudden, because I can’t seem to keep thoughts up, there’s and it’s not that really that thing’s wrong with the brain. It’s just the brain is over full, is not able to compartmentalize things and be as effective and focused as it would like to be. And so some of the things that would help with that are things that actually help you to focus better. And so mindfulness type activities, that’s where those kind of things come into play. Meditation sometimes helps with that. You know, we talked about brain dumping, decreasing multitasking, which I know can be hard when your job is like built around, there’s 15 things that has to happen for this house to sell. But when I say decreasing multitasking, it’s it’s Think about it this way, yes, emails are coming in all the time. You want to stay on top of them to some degree. But if you’re entire if you’re sitting down to do a contract, or whatever the paperwork is for a house, and in the middle of that, you you and a ping comes up that you have an email, and you go over into that email, you’re you’re twice as likely to have a mistake in what you were just doing in that document, because you left it and went to something else, you scattered your attention, which is going to make it harder to focus again, and increase the likelihood of mistakes. Whereas if you did time blocking, where maybe every other hour you checked emails and every other hour you did paperwork or whatever you know, you would actually be able to use your brain energy much more efficiently, and you’d still be on top of everything with less mistakes. So I think we just have to be aware of how we exhaust our brain. And multitasking is one of the ways, and we

Alissa 38:58
talk about that a lot on the show in real estate. Everybody treats it. Treats anything that comes in as extremely urgent. Nothing can wait. We cannot respond in an hour. We must respond now. We can’t say Sure. I’ll get this to you first thing tomorrow morning. And we always try to remind agents like we are not emergency room doctors if we don’t respond immediately, nobody dies in our industry. You know, it’s just a matter of communicating, letting them know. And I feel like this summer, I got so good at this, because I was actually physically and mentally unable to respond as quickly as I would like to, and being able to check my email way less often because I know I can’t open my computer if my kids are right there like it’s just not going to be productive, and it’s only going to frustrate me. So being able to say, I’ll get this to you tomorrow, or I’ll have. This to you right after lunch. You know, helped so much, but I it’s funny coming out of summer, because it was sort of a transition. This was my first summer, by the way, with kids, with kids home, and they’re at that age where she didn’t have daycare all summer, so it was my first summer to sort of juggle that. And in the beginning, it’s like I was resisting it. I was still trying to operate the way that I always operate in my business. I quickly realized this isn’t going to work. People are just going to have to be patient. I’m going to have to be patient. I’m going to have to just fix this, you know. And so, and then it got to where I was almost too comfortable delaying. Like I was, like, I can wait. I’m not gonna check my email at all today. But I mean, again, like nothing bad happened. And I always, you know, it worked out just fine. But it did take some forced implementation for me to realize that, but it was very freeing for sure.

Speaker 1 41:05
Yeah, I think you know, for the and that’s why I say every other hour, because, like I said, I’ve worked with agents before. I’ve I’ve heard it all, and so that with that time frame, because, because, with every other industry, just about I recommend three time blocks for emails, one in the morning, handle as much as you need to in the morning, shorter one around midday, and then a very tiny block, like 30 minutes no more in the evening, to tie up any loose ends. And then that keeps it under a flow so that you’re always answering emails, you know, within a timely manner, without having to be in your inbox all the time. But like I said, I realized that, you know, there’s this urgency kind of built. They

Katy 41:47
don’t they don’t listen, they don’t listen to her tip, yeah.

Speaker 1 41:51
So, yeah. So I have to adjust it a little bit, so every other hour is about the range that I’m seeing, that people are willing to do, because within an hour. I mean, if somebody should have to wait an hour, I mean, that’s just not logical, right? Yeah, and so that’s the that’s the number that we’ve been able to agree on with most of the agencies we work with. Because the reality is, unless you develop some type of restorative strategy for your professional and personal life, you’re not going to be able to sustain your lifestyle for much, for very long. Why do people become entrepreneurs? Why do people go into real estate? Why do they do jobs that give them freedom? Because they want freedom. Are you living a free life if you’re tied to your device, that is not what you signed up for. So stop lying to yourself and saying that that’s what’s that’s making you happy, because it’s not because over a period of time, you’re going to really become unhappy, and you’re just going to cut strings with it and go into something else, and without learning the strategies that next thing’s not going to make you happy either, because you’re going to fall back into old patterns. So that’s why I say change is not a bad thing. Everything. Change is always there. We don’t manage to change. We manage the recovery. So we have to just get into an understanding of life is always flexing. There’s always change. Let me find some strategies for the recovery. So no matter what life throws, I have these tools in my toolkit.

Alissa 43:15
And I think that’s such a good point too. Is we think, Well, you just do it. You just stop responding immediately. You just but you do actually have to unlearn the behavior that got you to that point. And it is like breaking a bad habit, you know it that’s change in itself, and so it feels wrong. It feels unnatural to let your phone sit over here for two hours. And we’re big fans of atomic habits, and you mentioned habit stacking, and he talks about that a lot, but it’s like, if you can put your phone away for 30 minutes or 10 minutes, you know, if you have are that attached to it, until that becomes easy, and then move to an hour, and then move to you really, And that’s what I had to do this summer. I had to retrain my brain to compartmentalize a little better so that I didn’t have to be on on call 24/7 while I’m, you know, with my kids and trying to figure out summer. But it took a few weeks to get there, but now that I’m there, it’s time to go back to school, and I’m hoping I can keep it going. That’s my goal. Is to keep it going. It was a good boundaries reset.

Katy 44:33
Yeah, we all need a boundaries reset. Every once in a while, it’s like,

Alissa 44:37
you just start giving a little bit, and then next thing you know, the boundaries are out the window. Yeah, it’s true. Yeah.

Katy 44:49
I think this has been wonderful. I took so many notes. We took so many notes. Dr Saunder, do you have any parting words for the real estate community? While we’re in transition, while we’re sometimes burning ourselves out, while we are working some people 24/7 What are your final thoughts?

Speaker 1 45:10
Yeah, I would probably say this. You know, in my book sacred rest, the very first part of the book talks about the seven types of rest. The second part of the book actually talks about the gifts of rest. And I think that that’s something we don’t recognize, is that in the process of doing these restorative practices, there are things that occur naturally, and I call them gifts, because it’s not something you have to do a lot of extra work for. They as you’re implementing the rest, you get these other things in the mix. And a couple of them, you actually just mentioned. One of them is the gift of boundaries. When you start doing some of these things, you naturally begin to create some boundaries around your life. And the another one, there’s 12, I won’t go through them all, but another one is the gift of reflection, because you start reflecting upon what’s working and what’s not working. And the final gift I’ll mention is that gift of freedom, because I feel like that is really what it looks like to have a life that is satisfying when you feel like you have the freedom to be able to not be on your phone 24/7, or the freedom to be able to have a conversation with someone without worrying about if the phone is going off or if someone needs you in that moment where you can be fully present with your Kids or your spouse or, you know, when you’re at the gym or whatever it is, and not feel guilty because you’re not attached to other things that you can appreciate life in the moment, for the moment without thinking about the moments before, the moments afterwards.

Katy 46:36
I love that that was perfect. So perfect. Tell everyone where they can find you, if they want to learn more from you and just engage where can they find you?

Speaker 1 46:45
Yes, all of the information is available at Dr daltonsmith.com it’s just Dr and my last name, daltonsmith.com

Alissa 46:53
perfect hosting. Are we toasting? Oh, doctor, Sandra,

Katy 46:56
did you bring us a toast today? Do you want to give her the we end each episode

Alissa 47:00
with a toast. Usually our listeners write in to toast a mentor or friend or someone. But when we have a interview, we like to ask them if they have someone they would like to give a toast or shout out to.

Speaker 1 47:16
Wow, I let’s see that I trying to think of something off the top of my head, but honestly, I would probably just give a toast to all the people who have emailed me recently, over the past couple of years, from resquiz.com about their experience with the seven types of rest. It has been my pleasure just to hear how you’re engaging with the concepts and the information and how you’re implementing it in your own life. So cheers to you for for taking care of yourself and putting yourself in a place for wellness. Yeah,

Alissa 47:43
I love that perfect, perfect.

Katy 47:46
Thank you so much. Yeah, thank you for being here. We appreciate it so much.

Unknown Speaker 47:50
Thank you. Okay,

Katy 47:52
awesome. This

Alissa 47:53
was wonderful, yeah, thank

Katy 47:54
you so much.

Unknown Speaker 47:55
Thanks very much. So much for having me on

Katy 47:57
Yeah, we loved it. It’s gonna be so helpful.

Unknown Speaker 48:00
Thank

Katy 48:01
you. Take care. Awesome. Bye.

Alissa 48:02
Thank you so much for tuning in to the hustle humbly podcast. If

Katy 48:06
you enjoyed this episode, please go to rate this podcast.com/hustle humbly, and leave us a review or drop a comment if you’re listening on Spotify,

Alissa 48:14
if you have an episode topic or someone you’d like to toast on the show, please email us at team at hustle humbly podcast.com, find

Katy 48:21
us on social media at hustle humbly podcast, don’t forget to find all of the free resources at hustle humbly podcast.com/resources,

Alissa 48:30
see you next week. This is the good life you.

The following is a rough transcript provided by Otter.ai.