If I say this with a straight face, and I open my eyes very wide, people believe me... or, at least, they don’t ask any more questions.
The truth is much more mundane. I get my energy from doing lots of things. I pack my day with activity – even if I have to rise at 4am to get to a TV studio, I make time for a brief work-out in my gym, and I grab all the morning newspapers to read in the car (it’s OK, I don’t do the driving).
I learned long ago that the most exhausting thing is to do nothing, when there are things to be done. It’s much harder to avoid a task than to simply plunge in and get it done. A job that’s hanging over you is leaching your energy every second of the day.
Even something as dull as washing the dishes is a drain on your resources if you put it off. The actual business of filling a bowl with hot, soapy water, dunking the crockery and applying the dishcloth is child’s play – what wears us out, when we try to be lazy, is the weight of a job that’s waiting for us.
A pile of dirty plates is like a constant nagging refrain in the sub-conscious mind: ‘You haven’t done me yet,’ it whispers. ‘You’re going to have to face me sometime. I’m still here. You can’t ignore me forever.’
Do a job and it’s over. It’s in the past. But put a job off and it lasts forever. If you want your energy levels to soar, I have one simple piece of advice: find a job that needs doing, and Do It Now!