Planning your time with the moon

Our series about how leaders can create a better employee experience is coming to an end.  I hope it has been useful to you.  I recognise that there are so many aspects that leaders need to pay attention to when it comes to your people.  But they are your greatest asset and you can’t do the work without them, so pay attention to their needs and desires and adapt your expectations to work with their strengths.

As a way of rounding this series out, I thought I might write about something a little more woo-woo!  It’s not so very woo-woo really – our ancestors would have worked according to the moon.

Some of you will know that I have been experimenting with planning my time with the moon.  You may think that is a bit flaky, but I notice that it makes a difference if I use the different kinds of energies that I have for different kinds of work, and that those energies shift according to the stage of the moon.

Here is what I have learned over the course of the last year or so, in case it is useful to you and your teams.

But first, let’s step back and look at all the other things we know about planning our time according to our energy.  Daniel Pink synthesised a ton of research into his book “When”, which is all about the perfect times to do things.  For example, we all go through a set emotional cycle each day, the morning peak, the afternoon trough and the evening rebound.  And there are three types of circadian rhythm: the night owl, the morning lark and the third bird (the standard, neither early nor late).  This suggests that we should do our most analytical, logic-based work in the mornings, when we’re most alert. The more creative tasks, where it’s helpful if the mind wanders and makes connections, are better attended to in the late afternoon – with larks starting this pattern earlier than the standard and owls starting later.  He also found that breaks and naps make us more productive, not less (as Cara also told us in a previous post).  Given that we know all of this about daily rhythms, doesn’t it also make sense that there would be monthly rhythms that we should pay attention to?

And yes, every woman knows about these monthly rhythms.  Women know that there are times in the month when they have higher energy and times when they are lower.  In fact, I was talking to a female climber this week who said that the community of female climbers discuss which times of the month to do strength training, when to do actual climbing, when to rest etc.  Female monthly cycles sometimes coincide with the moon, which can make the highs higher and the lows lower.  So it’s worth paying attention.  But not just as a woman….this has an impact on men too, you may just be less aware of it.

Moon cycles

Each month, we have a New Moon – or dark moon as there is no moon at all – and a Full Moon – the whole round sphere of a moon.  As we go from the New to the Full, the moon is said to be waxing, or getting gradually bigger.  Moving from Full to New, the moon is waning, or getting progressively smaller and more of a sliver.

The moon has an effect on tides, so if it has that much effect on the water on earth, it stands to reason that it would have an effect on all of our energy because our bodies are made of so much water.

My own experience

Writing from my own experience, my personal energy changes as follows:

• At the New Moon, I feel more of a need to rest and recharge.  My introverted nature comes out strong
• As the moon waxes, my energy builds and over the two weeks, I feel that I am in flow and getting more done with less effort
• At the Full Moon, I often feel quite antsy and fidgety
• As the moon wanes, I notice that things are not as in flow as my energy recedes again

So I have been trying to adjust my diary to match my energy:

• Over the New Moon, I try to block my diary out so that I don’t do too much as I know I don’t have the same energy levels.  I am not always successful at protecting this time, but when I do, I know it’s the right thing.  This is a time for ideating about the future, nurturing my creativity, setting intentions and goals
• As the moon waxes, I work on my most important stuff, the new projects that require me to think, write and act, making things happen. I can work and play hard when the moon is more than half-sized and growing towards and including the Full Moon
• As the moon wanes, I work on tying up loose ends, completing things, clearing things up, getting rid of clutter.  If I get this phase right, I can relax and rest at the New Moon.

I am not saying I have this down pat, as I am a doer and I am not good at resting!  But I like to try.   It has taken me about a year of noticing and experimenting though.  I needed to find out what my personal energy levels were at different times and what that would mean for me in my planning and doing schedule.  I used a Moon Journal to help me (I chose one by Mystic Tortoise from Amazon – don’t let the name put you off!!).  As a result of diarising my energy for about six months, I could then overlay that energy into my actual work rhythms.

If you were to take more notice of your energy levels during the day and during each month, how might you shift the way that you work?  What might you do when?  And how might you pay more attention to the rhythms and energy levels of the people you work with?

If you still think this is woo-woo, just ignore it.  But maybe, just maybe, there is a seed of an idea here that might support you and your people to optimise your energy in service of forward motion.