Why Your Brain is Exhausted by 3pm - and How to Fix it
Exploring decision fatigue and what it does to your body.
Last month, I stared at my uncleared notifications for 30 minutes and try to clear them right after getting out of bed. After that, it was time to go to the bathroom and get my day started. I brought my phone in with me, sitting on the cubicle and ended up doom scrolling for another 45 minutes.
By this time, my butt is sore, my legs cramped up from sitting too long and had to forced myself to walk to the showerhead to then take a quick shower, because I lost track of time.
After that ordeal subsided, I was bombarded with the notifications needing my attention. Now I’m wondering whether I have time to do what I planned in my calendar with an empty stomach. Forget that.
I skipped breakfast, attended a meeting that required a lot more brainstorming and decisions, and we went back and forth with my colleague till 3pm fixing errors.
By the time I ended - I left out a huge sigh, and thought, “Finally, I can now work on other things. I stared at my to-do list, yawning away. 5 minutes into my next task, I just wanted to click “X” on the browser and lie down. I started to procrastinate if this was even worth doing today.
I ended up opening my Grabfood app to order some food, and now spending more time trying to decide on what to eat, and I just couldn’t.
I became a hungry, grumpy dude with lesser tolerance at 5pm. Food came at 6pm. It was dinner by that time. Time flew by and I was too stuffed to do any kind of work. I ended up binging Netflix.
Decision Fatigue happens when we run out of willpower, and this phenomenon suggests that self-control and willpower draws from a limited internal resource.
In a research written by Brandon Oto, he explores the concept of decision fatigue, its causes, characteristics, consequences, and practical implications particularly for Emergency Medical services personnel.
The characteristics of Decision Fatigue
Self-control gets used up: Every time you make a decision or force yourself to do something difficult, it uses up some of your mental energy or self-control.
The hardest part is committing: Thinking about options or analyzing a problem doesn’t tire you as much as actually deciding and committing to one choice.
Tendency to avoid decisions: When tired, people often procrastinate or avoid making decisions altogether to conserve energy. They delay commitments if they can.
While the research talks about the EMS personnel, the impact of decision fatigue applies everywhere.
Anybody needing to make simple day-to day life decisions can feel it too.
This can be deciding on simple things like, what to eat, when to go out, what to wear. It gets worse when your surroundings are amplified by so many options, e.g heading to a restaurant and having 100 type of food in their menu.
My poor choices and decisions right from the start of waking up to checking notifications and replying messages that unleased an alternate timeline.
Please learn from my mistake. Here’s a few actionable things that worked for me.
Automate my Mornings: Instead of waking up and immediately getting sucked into notifications and doom scrolling, I a set morning routine, with no phones.
Set on eating an easy to prep food: I started buying eggs and coffee. I make half-boiled eggs in the air fryer. 8-9 mins, on 100 degrees. Add some pepper and soy sauce. This became my usual routine go to food that I can set up easily.
See through yesterday’s plan: I set my priorities straight the day before so I spend less time deciding what to do the next morning. The moment, I wake up, I go to my to-do list, and execute. Any incoming urgent messages have it’s place later.
Keep a simple workflow: This is what I truly aim towards now. I reduce my work to only a few variables. I make my decisions straightforward by throwing out the possibility of providing more options because that will open up more holes.
Take action, if not delegate, else throw it: If it’s really that important, work on it. If it’s not important, delegate it to someone else. If not, it shouldn’t take up your mental space.
"The biggest productivity killer isn’t laziness - it’s decision overload."
Here’s more resources on decision fatigue.
Do You Suffer From Decision Fatigue? - New York Times
8 Signs of Decision Fatigue and How To Cope - Cleveland Clinic
Thank you for making it this far. I appreciate you, as always, share this if it’s meaningful.
Let’s Discuss:
What are some of your biggest challenges you face day to day? Share them in the comments below.