Memory loss due to brownouts interfere with job engagement, productivity and career success.
The owner of a small tech company said her team told her she has a memory problem because she doesn’t recall their conversations. “They’d be telling me about a concern, and I wouldn’t hear them,” Laura said. “Because something else usually steals my attention. I’m working out a problem in my head and tune out everything around me. Many times I’ll be driving somewhere else and end up at work. When my mind is on five million other things, I get in my car and go on autopilot without realizing it.”
Laura suffers from brownouts—the equivalent of alcoholic blackouts when the mind is overloaded and preoccupied with work. During a brownout, people tune out the here and now and forget previous conversations or meetings because their wandering mind is busy working. Driving while working (DWW) has caused people to zoom through stop signs, past destinations or end up someplace unfamiliar to them.
A professor at a major university said she frequently finds herself in the middle of downtown, forgetting her destination. She’s trying to figure out a solution to a problem at work or planning a special project. Once while driving, she had been mentally coordinating course assignments for the next three academic terms. To her dismay, she found herself pulling into the parking lot of a condominium where she had not lived for many years and had no memory of driving there.
A client told me, “My wife sometimes tells me she thinks I have Alzheimer’s, but she doesn’t have anything to worry about. It’s just that my mind is on my job and nothing else is important at that particular moment. I’ll ask her a question, and rather than wait for an answer, my thoughts jump to something else. When I ask again, she tells me I asked her the same question three times, and I don’t remember asking the question, much less hearing an answer.”
Scientific Research
Brownouts are byproducts of work overload and job stress, causing workers to be frustrated, inefficient, unproductive and mentally exhausted. Plus, brownouts break down clear communication among managers, co-workers and team members. Research shows that stronger memories help us make sense of future changes. But when previous memories are blunted by brownouts, it interferes with our ability to function optimally in our careers.
Recently, a study by scientists at Washington University in St. Louis showed that the stronger a memory is as it’s first encoded, the easier it is to note subsequent changes and integrate it to update your understanding. Our memory is based on features of past experiences to guide current behaviors. Whether experiencing something new or something we’ve experienced a hundred times, we use memories of the past to navigate subsequent encounters. “The bigger the discrepancy is between a previous memory and what happens the next time,” said a member of the research team, Professor Jeffrey Zacks, in a recent interview, “the stronger the signal is that you need to update your memory representation.”
According to Zacks, memory has a survival quality. "We have memory so we can recall—the last time I went to the watering hole, the sabre-tooth came from my left, so I'm going to look left this time,” he says. “But if this time it comes from my right, I'd better be able to update my representation. That is how you pass on your genes."
Decision Fatigue And Cognitive Health In The Workplace
After hours of brownouts, chances are the job decisions you make will be different from the ones you make after your brain has a rest period. Scientists have discovered a phenomenon known as decision fatigue—which is what happens when brownouts wear out your brain and deplete it of mental energy. The longer you’re on autopilot and the more choices you make in those extended hours, the more difficult it is for your strained mind to make decisions. It becomes hard to make even ordinary choices, such as what to wear, where to eat, how much to spend or how to prioritize work projects. Many workers start to take short cuts, compromising quality standards. And some have short fuses with co-workers and loved ones, eat junk food instead of healthy meals or ask someone else (sometimes unqualified sources) to make critical decisions for them.
The human mind wasn’t designed to be chained to the desk and overrun with flooding thoughts. It needs restorative rest just like your body does when you’re tired. Not unlike the human body, cognitive health requires present-moment rest and relaxation to prevent brownouts. A calm mind is just as essential to cognitive health as turning off your car engine to keep it from overheating. The resting state stimulates the rest-and-digest response and relieves brownouts.
It is essential to make a point to get out of your head occasionally and engage in certain activities such as brisk exercise, relaxing in nature, power napping, deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation, meditation, yoga and massage. These activities turn off your mind’s red alert and throw a calming switch that brings balance. Mindfulness—the peaceful observing what’s happening around you as it’s happening—is a healthy antidote to brownouts while you go about business as usual.
Open awareness can be any brief activity that makes you mindful of the present moment. Open awareness meditation for just 60 seconds helps you unwind, clear your head and raise your energy level. Focus on the different sounds around you, pay attention to flowers, trees or some aspect of nature. At your work station, notice the exact spot where the floor supports your feet or the back of your chair supports your back. When walking, zero in on the feeling of your feet inside your shoes and of the carpet underneath your feet. Take time to really taste your beverage of choice during the workday instead of chugging it as you ruminate over a work problem. After one minute of open awareness, bring your attention inside and notice if you’re not calmer and more clearheaded.
Reference
Comments from Dr. Zacks and portions of this post were adapted from Brandie Jefferson. Washington University in St. Louis. "Stronger memories can help us make sense of future changes: Brain imaging, behavioral data suggest basis for some age-related memory issues." ScienceDaily, 24 November 2020. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/11/201124134614.htm>.
