Compound Emotion
Weekly essays on money, time, energy, and long-term thinking.
Last week, I wrote that “pay yourself first” isn’t just about money. We also invest our future through our time, attention, and energy. A few days later, I realized something: it’s difficult to invest your energy well if you never allow yourself to recover it.
One afternoon this week, I found myself rewriting the same paragraph for this newsletter over and over. Each version felt worse than the last. Instead of closing my laptop, I made a cup of tea and kept going. It didn’t help.
Later that evening, I came across a tweet Tim Ferriss shared. It quoted Anne Lamott:
“Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.”
The quote made me smile. Then it made me uncomfortable.
If my laptop slows down, I restart it. If my phone freezes, I reboot it. But when my mind slows down, my instinct is usually to work a little harder. Somewhere along the way, I started expecting more from myself than I expect from the machines I use every day.
Some of my best ideas haven’t appeared while staring at a screen. They’ve arrived while walking the dogs, taking a shower, or waking up after a good night’s sleep. I can think of many problems that felt impossible at night but surprisingly manageable the next morning.
Working in finance has taught me that decision quality matters more than decision speed. Most expensive mistakes don’t happen because people lack intelligence. They happen because they’re tired, distracted, rushed, or trying to solve today’s problems with yesterday’s energy.
I’ve noticed the same pattern outside of work. I’m more patient with my family after I’ve rested. I write more clearly when my mind has room to think. Even ordinary conversations seem to go better when I bring energy instead of exhaustion.
For years, I treated rest as something I earned after finishing my work. Today, I see it as part of the work itself. If energy is one of the most valuable investments we make, then recovery isn’t a luxury. It’s how we replenish the capital we’re investing.
Recovery doesn’t interrupt performance. It makes performance possible.
We often think productivity is about squeezing more into each day. Sometimes it’s about creating enough space to bring our best thinking to what already matters. Just as money compounds through consistent investing, better decisions often compound through consistent recovery.
The older I get, the more I think recovery is another form of long-term investing. We invest in our future with money, but we also invest through sleep, exercise, reflection, and the willingness to unplug before we’re forced to.
The goal isn’t to work until we break. It’s to recover before we do.
Lately, I’ve started wondering whether recovery deserves a place alongside money, time, and energy—not as time away from life, but as something that quietly improves how we live it. The next time I catch myself trying to push through exhaustion, I hope I’ll remember that sometimes the best way to move forward is to step away for a while.
If this essay brought someone to mind, I’d be grateful if you shared it with them. Some reminders seem to arrive at exactly the right time.
P.S. I’d love to know what helps you recharge. Just hit reply—some of my favorite conversations begin that way.
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See you next Tuesday.
Bill