“Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is relax.”

— Mark Black

It is all too easy to get lost in the hustle and bustle of our hyperconnected, overworked modern world. Who has the time to relax when there’s so much work to be done? Indeed, a strong work ethic is an important and laudable trait to have. But when a hard worker becomes a workaholic, it can do more harm than good. You sleep less, rely on bad habits to get through the day, and lose out on productivity. Worse, you run the risk of chronic health problems like heart disease and alcoholism down the road. The solution? Rest, relax, recharge. Your body—and your co-workers—will thank you.

Time to relax

• “If you have been craving some peace and quiet in your own life, you’ll find like-minded people on Escape to the Country to live vicariously through. Whether the episode focuses on a young family seeking a more pastoral and manageable upbringing for their children in Dorset, or retirees looking to start a bed-and-breakfast in Shropshire, the underlying reason each prospective buyer is on the show is the same: They desire a quieter life among nature.” – 6 Reasons to Watch Escape to the Country, TV’s Most Soothing House-Hunting Show
• “It’s an inspiration for me to see what everyone gets out of it and the creativity they didn’t think they had,” Rahe said. “It’s brought people to an environment where they don’t have to have talent to enjoy themselves. Coloring has given them an opportunity to be calm and take their minds off whatever is going on.” – Coloring club for adults encourages relaxation and artistry
• “In tough moments, we reach for premature conclusions rather than opening ourselves to more and better options. Faced with less familiar conditions for which our tried-and-true approaches won’t work, we reflexively counter our natural anxiety by narrowing and simplifying our options. Unfortunately, the attempt to impose certainty on the uncertain tends to oversimplify things to a black-and-white, all-or-nothing extreme.” – Stress Leads to Bad Decisions. Here’s How to Avoid Them
• “You have probably heard of the Fibonacci sequence, that list of numbers where the next digit is given by adding the previous two. It goes 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 and so on. But here’s something strange: work out the ratio of each number and its predecessor, and you start edging towards a specific number. Its first few digits are 1.618. This mysterious beast is the golden ratio, and it crops up a lot.” – Calming figures: The numbers that maintain harmony around us

Enjoy your weekend 🙂