Pod Insights Change Wired Overdrinking, overeating, overscrolling at night: a 5-minute fix every high performer needs. About this episode Your late-night wine, snack spiral, or doomscrolling streak might not be a “discipline problem” at all. I’m Angela Shurina, and I’m digging into the surprising reason so many of us repeat self-sabotaging habits even when we know they wreck our sleep quality, mood, and next-day productivity. We start with a real coaching moment a client sums up perfectly: after a crushing week, 4 glasses of wine felt earned. When we slow down and get curious, the story shifts from guilt to clarity. The behavi...
Transcript 0:09 Speaker 00 Hey guys and welcome back to another episode of Change Wired Podcast. My name is Angela Shurina, I'm your host, I'm your partner in change, personal and collective transformation, executive coach 360, master health, stress management, sleep, nutrition, fitness coach. Yes, I've done all of that guys and that is why I am in quite a unique position of helping you and helping myself to analyze, to discover, to think through different tools and strategies to discover, unlock, use more of our potential. So together
0:50 Speaker 00 we can create the most extraordinary lives and live the most extraordinary life experiences, creating more beautiful world all around us. Today guys, by the end of this podcast, you're gonna learn why so many of us develop this like self sabotaging behaviors, whether that's finishing your day with four glasses of wine too many, or scrolling till you can't control the scroll and it controls you, and then going to bed later, and then not sleeping that well and waking up not as fresh, feeling
1:30 Speaker 00 the potential from your next morning and from your next day, or maybe it's watching Netflix, or overeating on nuts, or chocolates, or whatever snacks you like and you tend to go to when you need to just unwind and relax. By the end of this podcast, you can understand why it happens for a lot of us and what can we do to stop doing the behaviors that we wish we didn't. And it's actually all quite simple, but first, let me share a story from my very recent client's conversation.
2:08 Speaker 00 Let me find the story on my blog that I write every day on your best coaching on Substack. So the conversation went something like this. Well, four glasses of wine too many this week. Full on week at work, my wife, my wife was away, I was holding down the kids, preparing the house for the move. Like all of it, four glasses of wine, I felt like I needed them, that I deserved that. A client mentioned in our recent session. And I followed, I followed, I followed it up with a question. What did you think you needed them, like those four glasses of wine?
2:50 Speaker 00 Not, and I asked this question, guys, not to judge, but to help the client reflect on, on the cause of this behavior. Like, why there was this need? What was happening? What was the feeling he was trying to achieve? What change of state you were after when you felt that you needed this wine that it gave to you? He thought about it for a moment and he said something that I'm personally quite familiar with. I just needed to wind down, like press stop button hard and fast. Get myself to chill and do nothing.
3:35 Speaker 00 My mind is always going in hundred different directions at the speed of light. Busy mind, I said, I'm quite familiar with the concept myself. Just your mind just goes, goes, goes and you wanna do, do, do. And then I asked, if you could just stop, truly allow yourself to like rest, do nothing, be unproductive. And just recharge. If you were to just allow yourself to lay on the couch staring at the ceiling or a seat in your comfortable, on your comfortable sofa.
4:15 Speaker 00 Do you think you'd still need that wine? The client thought for a moment and like, probably not. And also I know that my sleep is trash after and it doesn't help with my training recovery, with my fitness goals, with my weightless goals, and it kills my productivity the next morning. And everything feels a bit off, definitely not feeling my best after all this wine in me before sleep.
4:42 Speaker 00 And let you mind me of something, something that I used to do. I was never into wine. I had it like once in my life for many different reasons. It was never a thing, but every couple of weeks I'd stuff myself with nuts in the evening, like handfuls and then more handfuls, one kilogram of them, easy, like one kilogram of nuts. It's a lot of nuts, guys. I don't know if you tried eating that, but you're not gonna feel your best after all of this, you know, food in your stomach with hard to digest. Nuts are one of the like really heavy foods to digest.
5:26 Speaker 00 So my brain would get foggy and heavy and sleepy and I finally would be able to just like, you know, switch off and not do much, just rest, do nothing.
5:38 Speaker 00 And at some point I noticed this pattern that if I just spend that time, the same time I'd spent eating those nuts and it also took quite some time. If I just spend that time and the time that followed on intentional rest, lying on the couch with some jazz or long hot shower or staring at the wall, going around, not anything productive or learning, nothing at all.
6:09 Speaker 00 Just something that I could say was a waste of my time, you know? Then if I were to just allow myself to do that, I wouldn't actually need the nuts. And then I'd sleep better and I'd wake up fresh instead of sluggish with a stomach ache and low energy from a bad night. So you know what? I decided to give it a try. When the urge came, I'd push that stop button intentionally, instead of waiting for my body to force it, for my brain to force it. And guess what? I stopped overeating for good. When I learned to do nothing at all.
6:50 Speaker 00 Or sometimes when I needed to call a friend or my mom or go and see people. Social need is another need that I used to stuff myself with nuts over instead. Right? Or those uncomfortable feelings. Like, the reason actually might be different when you're trying to numb yourself, like with wine, nuts, or scrolling. The reason might be different, that emotional trigger. But the cause, sort of the response, the, is the same. It's that, you know, either to stop and wind down or to numb certain feeling. And after you do the behavior, it just changes your feeling. It changes your state.
7:35 Speaker 00 You never actually had the need for wine or the need for nuts or the need for scrolling. That was not your need and you probably by now already are aware of that. Sorry, by the way, guys, if you hear some noise for some reason outside of my window at 6:00 AM in the morning, there are bikes going back and forth. Go figure. Anyhow, so I stopped overeating for good when I learned to just do nothing. In high-performance circles, they teach us, I went through a high-performance coaching program. So they teach us to teach our clients to do, to practice wall staring, which is exactly what it sounds like.
8:19 Speaker 00 Intentionally staring at the wall, any wall, for some time.
8:26 Speaker 00 Like wasting your time, one might say. Why does this actually work? What's the reason? Your brain accumulates fatigue, just like your muscles do. It's the feature of your nervous system that can't be on in go mode all the time. Your nervous system needs breaks, just like your muscles. When, let's say, you do your bicycle curls, or when you do your squats, or when you do any weight training, or let's say sprinting or running. You can't be sprinting or running, or squatting, or pushing, or bicycle curling for forever. You need to stop.
9:08 Speaker 00 That's why in training, they introduce rest periods. And then after rest, when you recover, when your system recovers, you can go again. And with good, balanced, well-designed recovery periods, you can go even better. Your brain, your body, your nervous system, they adjust to the load. They adjust to the work. They learn, they accumulate. Like when it comes to, for example, learning or reading, you have time to connect the dots. And then after rest, you are more prepared, you are sort of warmed up, and you can go longer.
9:47 Speaker 00 And if you incorporate the needed amount of stop buttons, or intentionally incorporate rest and breaks, what neuroscientists and researchers and performance experts tell us, then you can prolong your performance for quite, quite some time. Again, there is a reason why sprinters don't just sprint for kilometers on end. It, a lot of it has to do with inability of your nervous system to be in that intense go mode. You need to break before you can go again.
10:28 Speaker 00 And that is what a lot of high performers, people who are wired to act, to eh track their time, to try to maximize value of almost like every second, like their whole life is on fire. That is a problem of a lot of high performers. We just don't stop. And especially if you naturally have this busy mind, I don't know, sometimes, you know, they say you have ADD, ADD, ADD. But sometimes it's just busy mind that just keeps coming up with ideas and your nervous system is more active than it is not. I don't know if you noticed it about yourself, but if your mind, if you are in the goal mode more than you're not,
11:10 Speaker 00 then that can be your problem, inability to stop yourself intentionally, to give your nervous system, your brain and the rest of your body to recover. So then you can actually sprint again, right? Your brain accumulates the again fatigue, just like your muscles do. Your nervous system can't be in goal mode for hours nonstop. And when it hits a threshold, it will find a way to make you stop. The question isn't if it's gonna happen. The question is how? Will your nervous system, will your brain find the behavior that gives you genuine rest?
11:51 Speaker 00 Or the one that steals from tomorrow and your other goals like fitness or weight loss? With my client, we built three experiments. Experiment number one, micro breaks, five minute on the timer midday. Objective, do nothing. Surprisingly, and it's not just the case for this client, I noticed it in myself as well. When I set the timer, I feel a lot more like secure. I trust the moment. I feel like, ah, it's not like it's gonna last forever. I set the timer for five minutes or 10 minutes or 15 minutes.
12:34 Speaker 00 And then after that is finished, you know, I have all of the other things that I got. I do and they're gonna be there and I'll be just fine. So the timer seemed to be the key. It works for most high performers who are afraid to like lose and waste time really, really well. Again, because it creates boundary around this rest. It's something it feels like it's gonna go on forever. And plus, you have something to do. Actually, nothing. So for five minutes, the item on your to-do list is nothing. And my clients with the, even with the goal mind, that doesn't seem to stop. Actually, for them, it works quite well and it worked for me quite well as well. So first habit, micro breaks.
13:19 Speaker 00 So set the timer for five minutes. What is recommended in high performance coaching? Actually, every ninety minutes or so, because your brain works in cycles, just like it sleeps in cycles of ninety minutes. At night, those are called sleep cycles. During the day, those are called ultradian cycles. So your brain works in those cycles of high activity and rest. And it seems to be somewhere around ninety minutes, even though, you know, our biology is not exactly precise clock. So every ninety minutes, I would suggest incorporating breaks, at least five minutes when you literally do nothing.
13:58 Speaker 00 And ideally do something like staring at the wall, allowing your brain to recover, just like that muscle of a sprinter. So then you can sprint again. You'd be surprised how much longer your no fatigue state will last and how much less urge to overeat or drink wine or scroll you will have. And not only that, in those five minutes, when it comes to mental performance and work, your brain does work and it connects the dots and it learns and it creates like new connections for new ideas and solutions. So it's actually not unproductive, but a very productive state. For athletes, they found if you, let's say, if you are learning any skill
14:43 Speaker 00 and you give yourself that rest when you just drop on the ground and for five minutes you lay there, your brain actually starts to replaying those physical skills and you learn them faster and you do them more efficiently. So it's like a win-win. It's not a waste. It's just the work that your brain does, you don't see it. So micro breaks. Trust me, every ninety minutes, five minutes or at least like midday, once a day, try it. The second one is smelling the roses. And that is what my client shared with me, this beautiful moment, which I can totally relate to. When he likes riding his bike outside.
15:22 Speaker 00 And he said, you know, there is another thing, like, I never stop to just enjoy the moment. Like, there is this bench on my right, and it has this beautiful view. And I always wanted to stop and just sit there for five minutes, and I never did. And I'm like, I can so recognize myself in that, that I would walk past this beautiful scenery. And it can be, you know, random day on random Tuesday afternoon. And the, I don't know, something would just catch my attention. I would think to myself, oh, that's beautiful. And I would want to stop and just observe it. And I wouldn't allow myself to do that because, guess what? I had things to do and I needed to rush somewhere.
16:08 Speaker 00 And it felt like my whole life was on fire. When in reality, like those five minutes, life delays you all the time, right? What if you delayed yourself on purpose and dedicated that to the moment of beauty, of awe, of mindfulness? Which they say quite amazing for your well being, your feeling of connectedness to everything. And yes, your recovery. So the practice was smelling the roses. Whenever you feel that urge to stop and smell those roses, do. What, because why not? Is your life truly on fire? And do you truly need every second of your day to be productive?
16:52 Speaker 00 And it's never the case anyhow. So you might just quote unquote waste or enjoy those five minutes on purpose. What's the worst that can happen? Maybe the wine habit fall, will fall off eventually. So that is practice number two, smelling the roses. And then the wine swap, practice number three. When you feel the urge for that behavior, whether that's scrolling a wine or stuffing yourself with nuts or whatever food you tend to go to.
17:27 Speaker 00 Take a long shower in the dark. Darkness comes down your nervous system versus taking a shower in this brightly bathroom, which is like a wake up call, which is not actually relaxing for your nervous system, right? So tone down the, dim the lights and take that long shower. Just, you know, usually water grabs your attention and your mind naturally stops and slows down. And then after that shower, allow yourself again that break for 10 minutes or 15 minutes, whatever the time is that you would spend anyhow drinking that wine. Allow yourself to just do nothing, lay on the couch, watch the ceiling, or if you can
18:12 Speaker 00 like watch the clouds outside, again smell those roses, listen to your favorite piece of music, like just spend the time that would take to scroll or drink wine or again whatever that habit is, eat your nuts, just spend that time and chill and do nothing and see what happens after.
18:39 Speaker 00 The main idea here is all of it comes back to one question and it's worth asking about any behavior you keep doing, but you wish you didn't. It like, what's the purpose of this behavior? What is it actually serve? What's the real need that I'm not satisfying? What's the feeling underneath the state change I need? And then what else could meet this need without the painful trade off of that behavior I wish I didn't do? And ask this question, like what is, what does this behavior actually serve? What need?
19:20 Speaker 00 And then what else could satisfy that need without the painful trade off? And ask this question without judgment, but from curiosity, like what is it exactly? Why am I doing this? Like, how, how is it helpful in my life? And it is helpful in some way. There is a change of state, there is a need that you satisfy with it. The behavior isn't, is never the problem. It always serves some problem, solves some problem or serves a purpose. The unmet need is the real issue. So what behavior in your life is quietly doing a job that something better could do instead?
20:02 Speaker 00 Something that serves your other goals, your other objectives, your well-being a lot better? So that is the question, right? Your homework for today is to look into that behavior that you wish you didn't do, like wine, like overeating, like overscrewing. Look into that behavior and ask yourself, when does it happen? Why does it happen? Without judgment and then saying things like, oh, I'm just not disciplined, right? Et cetera, I need to be, I don't know, more productive or something else. Like, ask yourself, what purpose does it serve? What need does it satisfy?
20:41 Speaker 00 And how can I meet this need without guilt, without some self-sabotage? How can I meet this need with loving kindness to myself, compassion, understanding, and true care for my well-being? Like, how can I serve this need? How can I satisfy this need without the painful trade-off? And when you ask this yourself with curiosity, without judgment, when you keep asking, the answer will come. And your experiments, the ones that you can try, the ones that will help you, will come up. And you can try these other practices that work for so many people, right?
21:24 Speaker 00 Micro breaks every ninety minutes, set the timer for five minutes and just chill, do nothing. And then smelling the roses when the moment comes, when you wanna stop and adore or experience something, which is be in awe in the moment, do that. Like, you have five minutes. And then the swap. A figure out what else can you do instead of that behavior that doesn't really serve your life and your long-term or even perhaps short-term objectives? So you do wake up fresh next morning and continue as your best self or as close to that as possible. Thank you guys for tuning in. Thank you for listening.
22:08 Speaker 00 If you like what you heard today, if you found it useful, if you know the person who is struggling with this behavior that they wish they didn't do, that they didn't indulge in, please share this podcast episode with that person, with that friend, with that family member, with that team member. Perhaps it will be helpful to them, just like it was to you. Thank you guys for listening. Thank you for tuning in. Till next time, please do explore that behavior that you wish you did less of. And till next time, keep growing.
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