When I was a child growing up in Brisbane, there was a saying that if you hadn’t started studying for your year-end exams by the time the Jacaranda trees were blooming, you had left it too late.
In my adult life, living in Melbourne, Spring Carnival race week evokes a similar sentiment. By November, many leaders describe to me the same pattern: shrinking attention, rising reactivity, and a sense that self-care was left at the starting line months ago. They look ahead and feel as if they blink, Christmas will be here, and yet, there is still so much to do.
It is precisely at this moment that a more deliberate relationship with how you feel (i.e., your emotions) becomes more important than ever.
Emotions are not instructions. They are information.
Handled well, they surface priorities, protect boundaries, and point to unmet needs.
Handled poorly, they lead to impulsive decisions, strained relationships, and a prolonged recovery in January.
From comfort to care
The concept of ‘self-care’ has become a catch-all term, often shorthand for scented candles, Netflix marathons, or a glass of wine at the end of the day.
But many modern rituals miss the point.
Genuine self-care is less about indulgence and more about restoration: practices that help the body and mind recover so we can meet tomorrow’s load with steadier resources.
This distinction matters because comfort and care may feel similar in the moment, yet they diverge in their effects.
Comfort often removes us from discomfort; care renews our ability to face it.
A perfect case in point…
Consider one of my clients, who leads operations in a busy health service. One Wednesday evening, they found themselves toggling between unanswered emails, a streaming queue of patients, and what felt like an endless to-do list.
They were tired, short-tempered, and tempted to rely on the crutches of sugar and caffeine to push through.
Instead, they paused and asked three questions:
What am I feeling?
What is it telling me?
What would restore capacity, not just comfort me?
That pivot from suppression or soothing to skilful use of emotional data changed their next step.
They noticed the difference immediately.
The easy option was an unhealthy snack; the better option was a 15-minute walk, including a few minutes of deep breathing.
None of those steps was heroic, yet they were restorative.
Why restoration works
If care is restoration, what exactly are we restoring?
The answer is physiological and psychological.
Under chronic load, the body’s stress systems remain ‘on’, degrading attention, memory, and decision-making quality – a phenomenon known as allostatic load1.
Purposeful recovery interrupts that slide, and involves activating your parasympathetic nervous system. So, your autonomic nervous system2 has two pathways: sympathetic and parasympathetic. Your sympathetic pathway is activated during stress, and the parasympathetic during rest.
Slow breathing3, exercise, time in nature, and safe social connection stimulate your parasympathetic pathway, reducing arousal and supporting flexible response and recovery.
On the psychological side, simple skills like labelling the emotion you are feeling and cognitive reappraisal reduce the intensity of negative emotions and help return control to your brain’s prefrontal cortex.
There are simple things you can do.
For example, before presenting at a key meeting or conference, rather than powering through, allocate time for rest. It might be two short reset blocks before the presentation, such as five minutes of slow breathing and a brief walk without your phone.
The restoration test
Because busy weeks blur good intentions, use a simple test before defaulting to a habit. Ask yourself: Does this action restore me, or does it merely remove me from what is uncomfortable?
Restoration is active. It replenishes energy, focus, and health.
In contrast, distraction is passive. It avoids, numbs, or delays.
The goal is not to banish comfort. We all need a do-nothing day and the occasional time to binge-watch your favourite TV show.
The aim is to pair comfort with at least one restorative micro-dose. Over time, your capacity for recovery improves, rather than just feeling short-term relief.
Practical steps for your end-of-year sprint
The reasons and logic are clear; what is helpful is a step-by-step method.
That way, you can translate the research on recovery and regulation into four practical steps you can cycle through this week. No heroics, just deliberate habits that compound.
Step One: Notice so you move from autopilot to awareness
Create three daily checkpoints. It could be morning, midday, late afternoon and ask:
What am I feeling?
Where do I feel it?
What is it signalling about my needs or risks?
This is especially important if your leadership is on auto-pilot.
Use precise language.
Swap ‘stressed’ for ‘overloaded and uncertain’ or ‘irritated and time-pressured’.
Being precise enables you to identify and create more accurate options.
Once you can identify the signal, you can decide what to do with it.
Step Two: Name it, by putting your feelings into words
Use a two-word label and a one-sentence cause.
For example: ‘I feel anxious and underprepared because the client brief is still vague’, or ‘I feel tired and foggy because I got up too early and slept badly last night’.
This small step measurably reduces amygdala activation and helps the prefrontal cortex steer.
With intensity lowered, you can choose recovery over relief.
Step Three: Choose recovery rather than simple relief
The next step is to consciously select an action that aids your recovery.
Using the model4 developed by Psychologist Professor Sabine Sonnentag and Associate Professor Charlotte Fritz, you can map your next action to one of four recovery experiences:
- Detachment, where you are not engaged in work. It might be ten minutes without work cues, stepping away from the phone or going for a walk around the block.
- Relaxation involves deliberately selecting an activity that reduces stress stimuli and increases positive emotions. It might be five minutes of slow breathing or gentle stretching.
- Mastery experiences where you engage in activities that are not related to your work but offer challenge and learning. It could be a non-work challenge that absorbs attention, like learning a new piece to play on the piano or testing a new recipe.
- Control relates to the degree to which you can determine which activity to pursue, in what way, and for how long. It might be proactively scheduling one 90-minute focus block and one meaningful connection for a relationship.
In the context of the earlier examples, your recovery might look like this:
- ‘I feel anxious and underprepared because the client brief is still vague, so I will step away from my desk and go for a walk. I will then email to confirm decision criteria and block 45 minutes for a first draft.’
- ‘I feel tired and foggy because I slept badly, so I will do a 10-minute meditation and push complex work to tomorrow morning when my brain is at its peak.’
Remember, recovery builds the base and then, regulation keeps you steady when the stakes are high.
Step Four: Regulate in the moment
Regulation is how you steer when the road suddenly bends. We all have days when it feels like the wheels are coming off.
In those moments, the action is not about suppressing emotion. It is about noticing the spike, buying a few seconds of space, and choosing the response that serves the outcome you want.
Begin by creating that space. Take six slow breaths with a longer exhale, place both feet flat on the floor, and if you’re speaking, lower your speaking pace. This simple grounding interrupts the surge, quiets the body, and gives the prefrontal cortex a chance to take the lead.
Name what actually matters in this moment. Say to yourself, for example, ‘The goal here is clarity on scope before noon’, or ‘The priority is keeping the team focused on the top three risks’.
A crisp intention narrows attention and reduces the pull of irritation, anxiety, or the urge to prove a point.
Reframe what you are facing. It can help to consider what else might be true or how this could look in a few months. Those questions can help you reframe the consequence and issue at hand. Reappraisal changes both the meaning you give the event and the action you take next.
Next, use tiny pre-commitments to keep you on track. If you notice a conversation escalating, you can, in advance, commit to pausing, taking a deep breath, and asking one clarifying question. If you notice a conversation going off track, you can commit to summarising, clarifying understanding and proposing a next step.
These if–then scripts reduce the cognitive load of deciding under pressure.
Then, protect the basics in real time by setting boundaries. For example, time-box the discussion, ask for a short break if thinking has stalled, or set a follow-up for issues that do not need to be solved in the room. Boundaries are not avoidance; they are a way to preserve quality when energy is scarce.
Lastly, do not regulate alone if you don’t have to.
You can borrow calm from a colleague with a quick, “Can I think out loud for sixty seconds?” or signal an ally to summarise the thread. Safe social connection is a direct route to a steadier physiology and clearer thinking.
Wrapping your week
Before you close your laptop this week, run a one-minute audit. What do you currently label as self-care, and which of those habits genuinely restore you rather than distract you? Choose one restorative micro-habit to prioritise over the next seven days.
Decide where you will use reappraisal instead of rumination, and nominate a co-regulation partner for your next tough meeting or milestone.
The end of the year will still be a busy time. The difference lies in whether you cross the line depleted or deliberate. When you treat emotions as data, schedule recovery like work, you will finish with more clarity and less cost, one small choice at a time.
Getting you ready for tomorrow, today®
Award-winning author and global workplace expert, Dr Michelle Gibbings, helps leaders, teams and organisations unlock strategic influence to accelerate progress.
References
- McEwen, B. S. (1998). Protective and damaging effects of stress mediators. The New England Journal of Medicine, 338(3), 171–179. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJM199801153380307
- Porges, S. W. (2007). The polyvagal perspective. Biological Psychology, 74(2), 116–143. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2006.06.009
- Zaccaro, A., Piarulli, A., Laurino, M., Garbella, E., Menicucci, D., Neri, B., & Gemignani, A. (2018). How breath-control can change your life: A systematic review on psychophysiological correlates of slow breathing. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 12, 353. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00353
- Sonnentag, S., & Fritz, C. (2007). The Recovery Experience Questionnaire: Development and validation of a measure for assessing recuperation and unwinding from work. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 12(3), 204–221. https://doi.org/10.1037/1076-8998.12.3.204