The Leadership Lesson I Relearn Every Time I Get Too Busy

This morning, on the first day of work for 2026, I took myself for a run before starting the day. I updated my Strava post with the comment, “starting the work year prioritising me.”

Later, I received a text from a friend saying how proud they were that I was looking after myself instead of the company I work for. That wasn’t the intention of my post. It wasn’t an either/or statement. It was a standalone one: I am starting my work year by taking care of myself.

I fall into the same trap so many busy executives fall into. When I’m deeply work-busy, I stop prioritising my physical health, mental health, and even personal responsibilities. And it doesn’t matter how well I may be doing at work or how important that next meeting is —if I don’t take care of myself, there is an expiry date on the quality of what I deliver.

When I don’t take care of myself, I fail at taking care of my team, my customers, and my company. When I run or do a strength workout before work, I think more clearly. I’m less reactive. I’m kinder. I’m more productive. I’m a better human, a better leader, and a better employee. As psychiatrist John Ratey writes, exercise is one of the most powerful tools we have for regulating the brain.

Ironically, I teach this when delivering emotional intelligence training for leaders. There is substantial scientific evidence showing how exercise calms the brain and reduces reactivity. When I fill my bucket before work, I show up with more energy, more excitement, and a sharper mind.

So if I know this to be true, why do I fall into the same trap so many of us do—being so busy that we forget to take care of ourselves? Why has busyness become a badge of honour?

I will do my best as giving a simple, high-level answer here. There are both cultural and neuroscience-based answers. Culturally, we place value on how “needed” we are at work. There’s a real FOMO in many organisations—a fear of irrelevance if you’re not in the meeting. It explains the cast of thousands in meetings that could have been emails.

From a neuroscience perspective, our brains are wired to prioritise the immediate over the long term. And the immediate is usually urgent, but not important. Daniel Kahneman, a behavioural economist calls this present bias: our tendency to value short-term gratification over long-term benefit. In simple terms, if you want to prioritise your long-term health and happiness, it must be a conscious choice. Once the busyness of work and life takes hold, good intentions fall away and urgency wins.

As James Clear writes in Atomic Habits, “You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems.” At Amazon, we say good intentions don’t work—mechanisms do.

If you want to be your best at work, if you want to excel and increase your impact, stop glorifying busyness. Step away and design the systems that support future you. My Strava post this morning was a small reminder to myself that prioritising me is not selfish—it’s intentional.

I don’t know how to work without throwing myself fully into it. But I am relearning that throwing myself in fully includes taking care of myself, not just my task list.