Episode 109

Sleep Debt Is a Payday Loan. Here's the Interest You're Paying. 

Transitions - Part 4

There's a piece of productivity advice I hear a lot, and I have to admit that I don't agree with it: Always finish your top priority tasks before you go to bed.

In a normal, steady stretch of life, maybe that works for some people. But when you're in the middle of a major transition—a busy season at work, a child leaving home, an unexpected crisis, or simply a period when life is asking more from you than usual—I think that advice can actually work against you.

The problem is that your top priority task doesn't always have a predictable size. We aren't particularly good at estimating how long something will take, how much concentration it will require, or how much energy we'll have left by the end of the day. During a transition, you're trying to make those estimates when your usual routines and demands may already be changing.

So what happens? You decide you're going to finish the task before bed. Ten o'clock becomes eleven. Eleven becomes midnight. Or maybe you go to bed at your normal time but set the alarm an hour earlier so you can squeeze more into tomorrow.

You're borrowing time from sleep to make the rest of your life fit.

And that's where sleep debt starts to look a lot like a payday loan. You're borrowing energy you don't currently have, and the loan comes with interest.

What Is Sleep Debt?

Sleep debt is generally used to describe the accumulated difference between the amount of sleep your body needs and the amount you're actually getting. One short night may not seem like a big deal, but repeatedly getting less sleep than you need can create a deficit that builds over time.

For busy, high-achieving adults, this can be particularly tempting during periods of change. The calendar suddenly demands more from you, but the number of hours in the day hasn't changed. Something has to give, and sleep can start to look like the easiest place to find extra time.

After all, nobody is waiting for you at 11:30 p.m. You aren't disappointing a colleague by going to bed later. There isn't an appointment you have to cancel. You don't have to tell anyone no.

You simply borrow an hour.

The problem is that tomorrow still arrives, and now you're expected to meet tomorrow's demands with less energy than you had today.

That's the interest.

Why Sleep Debt Can Become a Negative Spiral

The cost of staying up late isn't limited to feeling tired the next morning.

Think about what happens when you finally stop working after you've pushed yourself beyond your normal bedtime. You're exhausted, so you skip the little things you would usually do to make tomorrow easier.

Maybe you don't pack your bag, look at your calendar, set out what you need, clean up the kitchen, or make sure everyone is ready for the morning. You tell yourself you'll deal with it tomorrow because you need to get into bed.

Then tomorrow arrives, and now the morning is more chaotic.

You're searching for something you need. You forgot about an appointment. Breakfast is improvised. You feel scattered instead of pulled together, and everything seems to require a little more effort.

Now you've taken out a second payday loan on top of the first.

That can create a negative spiral. Reduced energy can make tasks feel harder or take longer. You may have more trouble concentrating or find yourself making mistakes you then have to correct. You fall further behind, which makes staying up late again feel even more necessary.

The solution to yesterday's sleep debt becomes another night of sleep debt.

That's the trap.

Why Busy Seasons Make Borrowing Sleep So Tempting

I learned this lesson myself years ago when I was in graduate school.

I was finishing some fairly heavy academic responsibilities while also planning my wedding from about 3,000 miles away because my fiancé and I were living in different places. I looked at those two significant demands and cheerfully decided I had enough energy for both.

I was organized. I could handle it.

So I didn't adjust anything.

Instead, I stacked wedding planning directly on top of an already full plate and gave myself a daily pep talk about how I could make it all work. And for a while, I did.

That's part of what makes this pattern so deceptive. It doesn't necessarily feel like a mistake while you're making it. You may actually feel motivated and optimistic. You might be proud of how much you're accomplishing and tell yourself that this is simply what a busy season requires.

Until it doesn't work anymore.

Eventually, I was completely drained. Even basic things started to feel mentally cluttered and difficult, and I was more exhausted than I had ever been.

I finally had to acknowledge something I had been trying very hard to ignore: I'm not a machine.

The answer wasn't another pep talk. I didn't need to become more disciplined, squeeze another hour out of the day, or find a more efficient planning system.

I needed to take things off my plate.

Your Calendar Isn't Lying to You

There is only so much space in a day.

Think about a dresser drawer. You can keep stuffing sweaters into it for a while, and you may even convince yourself you've found a clever way to make everything fit. Eventually, though, the drawer won't close—or something breaks.

Time works the same way.

When a transition adds something substantial to your life, the day doesn't expand to accommodate it. If you're suddenly dealing with additional work responsibilities, helping a child through a transition, caring for a family member, moving, planning a major event, or navigating a crisis, those responsibilities have to take up space somewhere.

If you don't deliberately decide where that space will come from, there's a good chance you'll quietly take it from sleep.

This is why I think some traditional productivity advice can be particularly unhelpful during transitions. It assumes that the solution to unfinished work is finding enough discipline to finish it.

Sometimes the problem isn't discipline.

Sometimes the drawer is full.

Ask Yourself: Am I Willing to Take Out This Loan?

If you catch yourself pushing bedtime later because you need to finish one more thing, try asking yourself a very direct question:

Am I willing to take out this payday loan, and what will it actually cost me tomorrow?

Don't ask it rhetorically. Really consider the answer.

There may be nights when you decide that you are willing to make the trade. Life isn't perfectly predictable, and occasionally something genuinely does need to be finished.

The point isn't to create another rigid rule that says you must never stay up late.

The point is to make the trade consciously.

If you stay up for another hour, what is the likely cost tomorrow? Will getting less sleep make an already difficult morning harder? Will you need to be patient with your kids? Do you have an important meeting? Are you already several nights behind on sleep?

Once you look at the full cost instead of only the immediate benefit of finishing the task, the decision may look different.

Try This Bedtime Practice Instead of Pushing Through

Sometimes we keep working because our brain doesn't want to let go of an unfinished task.

You're halfway through something, you know exactly what you want to do next, and stopping feels risky. What if you forget where you were? What if it takes forever to get started again tomorrow? Wouldn't it be easier to just finish?

When that happens, don't rely on your brain to hold your place overnight. Write it down.

Take a minute or two to record where you stopped, what you were thinking, and exactly what the next step needs to be. You might write, "I finished sections one and two. Tomorrow, start by checking the numbers in section three and then draft the conclusion."

Now your brain doesn't have to keep rehearsing the unfinished task so you won't forget it.

You're creating a clear reentry point for tomorrow.

This is a tiny practice, and it's not going to solve an overloaded schedule. But it can make it easier to stop working when the thing keeping you awake is the fear that you'll lose your place.

The Real Solution to Sleep Debt Happens Before Bedtime

Making a note at bedtime can help, but it isn't the real fix.

If your schedule consistently requires you to sacrifice sleep in order to make everything fit, the problem isn't your bedtime routine. There is too much on your plate.

That means something has to change during the day, and this is the part many people avoid because it usually requires a conversation with another human being.

You may need to tell someone, "I have a lot going on right now, and I need to put this on hold."

You may need to say, "I can't do that this week. Can I take a rain check?"

Or maybe it's, "This is going to take me longer than I originally expected."

These conversations can feel uncomfortable, particularly if you're used to being the person who handles things. It may seem easier to absorb the additional responsibility yourself rather than disappoint someone, change a deadline, or admit that your capacity is temporarily different.

But if you don't have the conversation, the demand doesn't disappear.

You simply pay for it somewhere else.

Very often, that payment comes out of your sleep.

Stop Silently Absorbing the Extra Load

I see this pattern frequently in high-achieving people. Something changes, and instead of adjusting their commitments, they absorb the new demand.

A family situation requires more time? They'll fit it in.

Work gets busier? They'll make it work.

The kids' schedules change? They'll reorganize everything.

Something unexpected happens? They'll push through.

There may be no conscious decision to sacrifice sleep. Instead, bedtime gradually moves later because it's the only part of the schedule nobody else appears to own.

The cost is real even when the decision is invisible.

This is why protecting sleep during a transition often requires more than personal discipline. It requires communication and boundaries. Someone else may need to know that your capacity has changed so that their expectations can change, too.

What Should You Take Off Your Plate During a Busy Season?

Start with the assumption that the transition is temporary.

Most transitions have some kind of endpoint, even if you can't see the exact date yet. A move gets completed. A major project ends. The school year settles into a routine. Wedding planning eventually becomes a wedding. A particularly intense family situation may enter a different phase.

That means you aren't necessarily deciding what you will stop doing forever. You're asking what can be reduced, delayed, delegated, simplified, or removed for now.

Look at the things you're currently trying to maintain and ask which ones genuinely need to happen at their usual level during this season.

Maybe the volunteer commitment can pause for a month. Maybe dinner needs to get much simpler. Maybe a project deadline needs to move. Maybe the social event needs a rain check. Maybe someone else in the household needs to take over something you normally manage.

And if the transition lasts longer than expected, that's information.

It means it's time for another conversation about what your life can realistically hold now.

How Do You Protect Your Sleep When Everything Feels Urgent?

Start by distinguishing between something that feels urgent and something that actually has a deadline.

Then look at the trade you're considering. If finishing the task requires staying up an extra two hours, don't evaluate only what you'll accomplish tonight. Consider what those two hours may cost tomorrow.

If you decide the cost isn't worth it, leave yourself a clear note about where you stopped and what you need to do next. Then go to bed.

The next day, look beyond that single task. If you're repeatedly reaching bedtime with more work than you can finish, ask what needs to change in the schedule itself.

A bedtime problem that happens every night may actually be a capacity problem happening all day.

Can You Catch Up on Sleep Debt?

One of the reasons the "I'll catch up later" approach is so appealing is that it makes borrowing sleep feel temporary. You tell yourself you'll sleep more this weekend, after the deadline, when the kids settle into school, after the move, or when this difficult stretch finally ends.

But that thinking can make it easier to ignore what your current schedule is telling you.

Even if you eventually have opportunities for additional rest, regularly cutting sleep to create more working hours can still affect how you function during the very period when life is demanding more from you.

Instead of relying on some future stretch of perfect rest to erase the problem, pay attention to the pattern you're creating now. If you continually need to borrow from sleep to keep up with your commitments, treat that as useful information about your current capacity.

Your body isn't failing to keep up with your calendar.

Your calendar may be asking for more than your body can sustainably provide.

Is "Finish Your Top Priority Before Bed" Good Productivity Advice?

Sometimes. But like most productivity advice, context matters.

If you're in a relatively stable season, have plenty of energy, and know the task will take 20 minutes, finishing it before bed may make perfect sense.

If you're in the middle of a major transition and you're already depleted, the same rule can become a setup for exhaustion.

Good productivity isn't about obeying a rule regardless of your circumstances. It's about using your time and energy in ways that support what matters most.

Sometimes the most productive thing you can do for tomorrow is stop working tonight.

Sleep Is Part of How You Navigate a Transition

Over the past few weeks, I've talked about several kinds of transitions: the seasonal shift from summer to fall, family changes when a child enters a new school stage or leaves home, and unexpected crises that force your priorities to change without warning.

These transitions look very different, but they have something in common. They all create new demands on your time, attention, and energy.

If your response is simply to add those demands to an already full life, something eventually has to absorb the difference. Too often, that something is sleep.

The next time you're moving through a transition, try to recognize what's happening before the sleep debt starts piling up. Your capacity may be different right now, and that means your commitments may need to be different, too.

Give yourself permission to make those adjustments instead of treating powering through as the only respectable option.

Your calendar has limits. Your energy has limits. Acknowledging those limits doesn't make you less capable. It helps you make more intentional decisions about where the energy you actually have should go.

And tonight, if you find yourself staring at an unfinished task when you should be getting ready for bed, ask yourself the question:

Am I willing to take out this loan, and what will it cost me tomorrow?

If the answer is no, write down where you stopped and what comes next.

Then close the drawer.

When everything feels important, decide what actually deserves your energy

This episode also closes out the four-part Transitions series. If you're navigating change right now, you can go back through the previous episodes on easing from summer into fall, family transitions around school and leaving home, and redefining priorities when an unexpected crisis changes the plan.

And if you do only one thing tonight, make it simple: when you reach the point where you're considering borrowing from sleep, stop and calculate the interest before you take out the loan.

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The information contained and documents referenced in the podcast “Your Priority Centered Life” are for entertainment, educational and informational purposes only, and are not intended as, and shall not be understood or construed as, professional medical or health treatment, diagnosis, or advice. We strongly encourage listeners to consult with medical providers or qualified mental health providers with issues and questions regarding any physical and/or mental health symptoms or concerns that they may have. Furthermore, the opinions and views expressed by podcast guests, partners and/or affiliates are not necessarily those of the podcast host. Dr. Alise Murray’s opinions and views are expressed in her individual capacity and are not to be construed as those of any of her podcast guests, partners and/or affiliates.