In business, we often underestimate the impact that small things can make. This too often leads to missed opportunities and eventually to too many excuses for all the things you couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do. The fact is, in as little as 15 minutes you can achieve significant benefits to your energy, stamina, mental agility, and resilience. During a recent trip, while walking through Heathrow airport, Patti (our director of nutrition) and I saw a diving watch that had an illuminated 15 minute marker. Immediately we both were overcome with a huge “aha” moment that this could be a Tignum watch because there are so many powerful things that only need 15 minutes.

Some of our thoughts include:

_Reducing meetings to 45 minutes will create frequent 15 minute interludes where you can properly prepare for your next meeting and also recover from your previous meeting. This allows you to be in the proper emotional state and also be focused for the business at hand. Incidentally, our clients who have adopted this strategy report that their meetings are more focused, more productive, and more fun. They get more done in less time.

_15 minutes of Daily Prep movements in the morning can significantly improve your mobility, stability, and balance. This can reduce pain, improve efficiency, create more energy, and improve brain function.

_15 minutes spent preparing for your day (mental visualization) can make you more organized, more focused, more productive, more agile, and more efficient.

_A 15 minute walk will increase your lymph flow (immune function), deliver more oxygen to all of your vital organs (including your brain), improve your creativity, and reduce pain. All of these can lead to higher performance.

_By eating slowly, while in a relaxed state, you will provide your digestive tract with the 15 minutes it needs to release the digestive enzymes necessary to break down your food. Taking 15 minutes to prepare your own food can also accomplish this.

_A 15 minute power nap can increase your energy, resilience, and productivity (up to 35%). This beats an afternoon of feeling tired and lacking focus.

_A 15 minute resistance training circuit can increase your functional strength, rev up your metabolic engine, and increase the strength of your bones. Most important, it will increase your energy, improve your brain function, and help you sleep better. We call our circuit the no excuse workout and you don’t even need a gym or weights.

_A 15 minute mental preparation to go home from work can help you powerfully wrap up your work day and enter your home fully present for those you care about the most. This not only pays huge dividends at home, it also creates momentum to start your next day.

_A 15 minute oscillation break in the morning and afternoon to clear your head, do some breathing, and reset your autonomic nervous system will help you be more productive, alleviate the imbalance of stress hormones, improve your brain function (memory, mental agility, creativity, focus), and have more fun.

_Becoming aware of your 15 minute blood glucose alarm will help you prevent brain fog and the wave of stress hormones. Once you begin to feel hungry, you have 15 minutes to feed the brain. The more prepared you are, the better those meals and snacks will be.

_A 15 minute wind down at the end of the day to tell your brain and body that it’s time to shift into the quality sleep mode can help you improve your physical and psychological regeneration. This will not only improve your mood, your immune function, and your performance - it will probably change your life.

In today’s busy world it’s easy to miss the huge benefits that a strategic 15 minutes may have to offer. Think about the Formula One pit stop - in less than 10 seconds they can refuel the car, change the tires, rehydrate the driver, and create a short (but powerful) chance for the driver to recover. Swimming is about quality of time not quantity of time. Even more important, it’s about designing your life not leaving it to luck.

As always, we’d love to hear your thoughts.

Scott Peltin
Founder//Chief Performance Officer

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