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- #67 Prioritizing Mental Health & Paying the "Tired Tax"
Welcome back!
Happy Mental Health Awareness Month!
Though we spend a lot of time talking about hustling, making money, and boosting productivity, we understand that the most important thing is health and well-being.
What’s going on in your mind takes precedent over what’s going on in your wallet.
So, remember: a strong work ethic is great; your hustle is worthwhile; your job deserves your best effort, but you always deserve time for you. Take care of yourself and your loved ones, first and foremost.
🔥 Highlights This Week
Fattening The Wallet 💰️
Why You Shouldn’t Buy When You’re Tired
Boosting Your Productivity 📊
Hustle Hub: Low Stress, Proper Time Management, Elite Mindset
Taking Care of Yourself with May’s 2 DO
Elevating Your Brand 🤝
Don’t Lose Your Credibility with Unethical Persuasive Tactics!
Staying Informed with Major Moves
Making Cents 💰️
Making Cents shares (or reviews) financial concepts in a casual and accessible way to help you better manage money and build wealth.
Why You Shouldn’t Buy When You’re Tired
Short and Sweet: Buying when you’re tired is like grocery shopping on an empty stomach - you’ll regret half of what you purchase.
Why It Matters: Because when making financial decisions, you want to be in the right state of mind. When you’re exhausted after a long day (or week, or month), your decision-making suffers. When that exhaustion ends up costing you money, well, let’s call it the Tired Tax.
Get Specific: Why You Shouldn’t Buy When You’re Tired:
Quality vs. Quantity: Ever notice how tired shopping often leads to purchasing items you don't really need or truly value? Fatigue may skew your perception, making it difficult to differentiate between what's essential and what's just a fleeting desire.
Impulse Control: When you're tired, your brain's ability to resist temptation weakens. That bargain might seem like a steal in the moment, but it could lead to buyer's remorse later.
Regret and Returns: That late-night purchase might feel satisfying in the moment, but chances are, you'll wake up with a sense of regret. And let's not forget the hassle of returning items bought on impulse.
Take Action: One Thing You Can Do ASAP:
Sleep. On. It: Literally! If you feel the urge to splurge late at night, promise yourself to wait until morning. Set a reminder for the following morning and see if you still want to make the purchase. You'll be amazed at how different things look after a good night's sleep.
OTF EXAMPLE: The Social Media Rabbit Hole:
It's late; you're scrolling through social media; and you stumble upon ads for products you think you might need. Fatigue blurs the line between desire and necessity, and before you know it, you've clicked "Buy Now" on something you'll forget about by morning. If you sleep on it, you’ll undoubtedly make a better decision.
Hustle Hub 📈
Hustle Hub provides inspirational stories and valuable tips to help entrepreneurs, online creators, and side-hustlers along their journeys.
YOUR SUCCESS: Is your job stressing you out? Here’s how to “make your workday work for you.”
THEIR SUCCESS: Richard Branson shares the mindset that’s been most key to his success.
YOUR SUCCESS: The headline says it all: here’s “How to Protect Your Time (and Well-Being) as a Leader.”
Major Moves 🗞️
Major Moves helps you stay informed with positive stories about Fortune 500 companies and startups alike.
📈 S&P 500
Not a company, but more than worthy of headlining today’s Major Moves: “Stocks closed near session highs Monday, as the S&P 500 notched its best three-day run in a rip-roaring 2024.” Now’s a good time to check those investments and bask in the positivity.
👀 wayve
Tesla’s made waves (no pun intended) with their automated driving technology, but they’re not the only player in the game. In fact, there might be a lot more players in the not-so-distant future. “Wayve’s approach to autonomous driving is similar to Tesla’s, but Wayve plans to sell its model to a variety of auto OEMs.”
Translation: Wayve’s self-driving tech is like Tesla’s, and they’re gonna sell it to any car manufacturer that wants it.
🤝 LEGO
In honor of recently-passed Star Wars Day (“May the Fourth Be With You”):
25 years ago, Star Wars became the first franchise to strike a licensing deal with the world-renowned toy company. Now, the relationship is stronger than ever: “We’re celebrating 25 years of working together…[and] we expect to be here in another 25 years, celebrating the way we’ve evolved and made it relevant for the generations to come.”
Cool Communicator 😎
Cool Communicator aims to improve your communication skills - written and verbal, in-person and digital - so that you can be more effective and confident as a communicator and self-promoter (building your brand).
ELICITING EMOTIONAL RESPONSE, PART II: USE RESPONSIBLY!!
Last week, we talked about the basics of persuasion through emotional response; this week, we’re talking briefly about how to use your powers for good.
No Fear-Mongering - Fear is a powerful emotion that drives decision-making, but deliberately conjuring fear - especially when there’s nothing to be afraid of - simply to incite action is unethical.
No Gaslighting or Guilt-Tripping, Either - Same idea, different emotions. Making someone doubt themselves, or feel guilty, in order to take advantage of the poor decision-making that comes with those emotions is not right.
Avoid Logical Fallacies - while the word “logical” is right in the name, these are most often employed to spark an emotional response. Whether oversimplifying a complex issue, or purposely “confusing” correlation for causation, or anything in between, using any sort of misleading tactics simply to be more persuasive will bite you in the long run because, eventually, an audience will be smart enough to see through it. Basically don’t say anything a politician or snake-oil salesman would say, and you’ll be fine.
Credibility is crucial for being an effective persuasive communicator. Employing tactics like those listed above will cost you that credibility. In a world where everything lives forever on the internet, including tarnished reputations, why risk it?
O.T.F O.F.T = ONE FINAL THOUGHT
Language exists for people to get what they want from others. So depending on your perspective, you can argue all language is manipulative.
Everything listed above is clearly manipulative, because it’s not well-intentioned. If you are honest and strong enough in your morality, you have nothing to worry about from a communication standpoint.
2 DO This Month 💡
In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, here are two of the more underrated things you can do to strengthen your mental health:
1. Experiment with Mindfulness / Meditation
You don’t have to be a yogi or a monk to reap the benefits. Just set some time aside - you decide how much - to block out everything around you and just be. If you need help getting started, click here.
2. Limit Screen Time
This will always be a topic of conversation; after all, it’s hard to escape screens. We stare at a big one all day at work and are addicted to the small one we carry in our purses or pockets. But if you can commit to some measure of restraint - like we alluded to above, you set the timer for how long you wanna go screen-less - you will notice the benefits right away.
Before You Go
We hope you enjoyed this mental-health-focused edition of OTF!
Next week, we’ll be back with a focus on networking, a Search Bar that looks back at April, and a semi-deep-dive into why you should invest in real estate.
See you then!