Sleep Your Way to the Top!

There they were, two of the most formidable women in America, sitting side by side on the stage of Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco: Arianna Huffington, president and editor-in-chief of the Huffington Post Media Group, and her friend Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook. The media mavens united for this much-anticipated Commonwealth Club INFORUM event March 27 to discuss Huffington’s new book, Thrive, a heartfelt, inspirational read that poses an important question: How can women redefine success, not only in order to lead healthier, more productive lives, but also to change the world for the better?

For Huffington, that topic literally hit her hard one day in 2007 when she collapsed in her office, struck her head on her desk and ended up with a slashed eye and broken cheekbone. She saw several doctors to find out why she had fainted, but none could find anything medically wrong. But the reality was, during the two years leading up to the incident she had been working 24/7 building her new business, the Huffington Post. Yes, she had achieved success as defined by the traditional measures—money and power—but there was something missing. “There was nothing wrong with me—just with the way I was living my life,” she said. “Believe me, if you are lying in a pool of blood in your office, you are not successful.”

After that wake-up call, Huffington embarked on a life-altering journey that included redefining her vision of success and striving to live the life she truly wanted—one of well-being, wisdom, wonder and giving. Those four pillars compose what she calls the Third Metric of success, beyond money and power. Here, a breakdown of these elements, as outlined in Huffington’s thoughtful and inspirational book.

Well-being. We are all too aware that the Western workplace culture is fraught with sleep deprivation, stress and burnout. More than 30 percent of people in the United States aren’t getting enough sleep, Huffington said, which is negatively affecting their decision making, self esteem, impulse control, and interpersonal relationships. So if women can do just one thing to improve their lives, it should be getting more shut-eye.

Sandberg, who admitted that she had been implementing some of the tips in Huffington’s book, said that most of the mothers she knows are hyper-aware that when their kids are tired they become moody. However, these same grownups often ignore what their own bodies are telling them. Repeating a piece of advice Huffington had recently given her, Sandberg said, “We take better care of our cell phones than ourselves…We would never let our phones go under 13 percent battery charge.” Huffington agreed, adding that “sleep is a wonder drug that helps you recharge and renew.” She encouraged women to get seven to eight hours a night  because “there’s practically no element of our lives that’s not improved by getting adequate sleep…You need to sleep your way to the top.”

Managing stress should also be a priority to women who want a better quality of life. Women in highly stressful jobs—particularly mothers—have a nearly 40 percent increased risk of heart disease and heart attacks and a 60 percent greater risk for type 2 diabetes. And aside from working long hours and dealing with job tension, we are contending with the modern challenge of disconnecting from digital technology.

Huffington recommended that we incorporate meditation into our daily lives in order to boost our cognitive functions, creativity and ability to stay present. Meditating for just five minutes a day, as Sandberg revealed she now does, keeps us focused and centered. Shutting off the devices and  immersing ourselves in nature, practicing yoga, caring for a pet, or socializing with loved ones are other ways to unplug, reconnect, and rekindle our sense of well-being.

“Believe me, if you are lying in a pool of blood in your office, you are not successful.” —Arianna Huffington

Wisdom: We all have an inner wisdom that deserves to be listened to, Huffington said. It’s often the voice that warns us against making a decision that doesn’t seem right or taking a chance on a new venture or relationship. But tapping into that intuition requires disconnecting from our devices and reconnecting with our inner harmony and strength. It means getting rest, eliminating bad habits, and decompressing through meditative deep breathing. “It’s from this sacred place that life is transformed from struggle to grace,” she writes in Thrive, “and we are suddenly filled with trust, whatever our obstacles, challenges or disappointments.”

Another powerful way to get in touch with your inner wisdom is to let go of the negative self talk, which Huffington refers to as “the obnoxious roommate in your head,” and to let go of goals that are draining your energy. When Sandberg asked how this can be done, Huffington explained that one of her biggest revelations was discovering that she could check off an item on her to-do list by simply dropping it. “That’s how I completed learning German and becoming a good skier and learning to cook and a host of other projects that now no longer have a claim on my attention.” 

One of the biggest lessons we can learn while going through life is that although we may not always have the power to choose what happens to us, how we respond to adversity can make a huge difference to our health and happiness. We have the inner tools to meet life’s challenges, Huffington said, whether they are middle-class struggles or life-and-death situations. With wisdom comes the age-old knowledge that the universe is bigger than us and our problems. “We are not on this earth to accumulate victories, or trophies, or experiences, or even to avoid failures, but to be whittled and sandpapered down until what’s left is who we truly are. This is the only way we can find purpose in pain and loss, and the only way to keep returning to gratitude and grace.”

“We are not on this earth to accumulate victories, or trophies, or experiences, or even to avoid failures, but to be whittled and sandpapered down until what’s left is who we truly are. This is the only way we can find purpose in pain and loss, and the only way to keep returning to gratitude and grace.”

Wonder: The third element to leading a more purposeful life is to rewaken the sense of wonder we knew as children. Every day we have the ability to soak up the beauty around us, but are we awake and present enough to experience it?

Pausing to feel that childlike sense of awe and curiosity “is part of the fun and intense mystery of being alive,” Huffington writes in the book, and can help us uncover the deeper truths of the world. But how do we get more wonder in our lives while we’re rushing around leading busy lives? For one thing, Huffington said, put down the smartphone and stop snapping pictures of things you should instead be experiencing. Go to a museum or listen to some beautiful music. Get out there in nature. And live each day with the full knowledge that yes, you will die one day. If you’re a mom, spend time together playing and enjoying the little moments. “It’s nice to leave your kids an inheritance, but you can also pass down the shared experience of a fully lived life.”

“When we are all mind, things can get rigid,” Huffington writes in Thrive. “When we are all heart, things can get chaotic. Both lead to stress. But when they work together, the heart leading through empathy, the mind guiding us with focus and attention, we become a harmonious human being.”

Giving: We live in a world where chasing success is literally killing us, said Huffington. Management books whose titles include phrases like  “Crush it!” and “Kill Your Competition!” emphasize the competitive and aggressive environment in which we live. But instead, said Huffington, “we should probably be giving CEOs books like The Giving Tree.”

If the first three elements of the Third Metric were personal wake-up calls, the fourth one is a wake-up call for humanity. With some 16 million kids in America are living in poverty, the world is not doing so well under the current definition of success. So here’s where Huffington offers women the ultimate challenge, something she calls the third women’s revolution: “We don’t just want to be on the top of the world. We want to change the world.”

How can we do this? By managing compassionately at work. By giving time and money to charities that mean something to us. By making small gestures of kindness to people we meet during the day, and by volunteering at our local nonprofits—even better if our children participate with us. Charitable acts like these set you on a path toward spiritual fulfillment and help you feel more alive and connected to others. And if that’s not enough incentive, studies have shown that people  who volunteer have lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol in their bodies, suffer less frequently from depression and may also live longer.

The ultimate take-home from Thrive? “If we worship money, we’ll never feel truly abundant. If we worship power, recognition and fame, we’ll never feel we have enough. And if we live our lives madly rushing around, trying to find and save time, we’ll always find ourselves living in a time famine, frazzled and stressed.” Wise words from a woman who’s achieved success as we all thought we knew it.