It was surrounded by trees that I had the aha moment.

I’d been wrestling with this challenging problem all day.

But now, in my local park, I knew what I needed to do.

With an energized mind and spring in my step, I walked the 20 minutes back to my house.

Once inside, I messaged my colleagues about how we’d solve this problem.

This happens to me pretty much every day, thanks to my daily reset.

Let me back up. I work at Inflectiv, a HubSpot Solutions and RevOps Provider, that serves scaling companies across North America and Europe.

Our team of 3 full-timers and several part-timers is completely remote. I founded our company in 2020 at the height of the pandemic. Working remotely is our default setting.

In fact, assembling this team would not have been possible if we weren’t remote-first: 

Remote work is a huge advantage for us, but we found one drawback: our work is complex so we sometimes get stuck. When that happens, it’s difficult to find the spark and dive in with a fresh perspective.

I felt it myself. As an introvert, day after day of video calls sapped my energy. 

I also often found myself feeling overwhelmed and couldn’t think as clearly as I used to. We even started to act a bit cranky with one another.

Then one day, I said to myself: “$%#@ it, I need to get outside.”

I popped in my earbuds and walked out my front door. Eventually my feet led me to a wooded area of my local park. 

Over the course of 45 minutes, I become less antsy. My mind started to wander to other things.

I took in some breaths, looked into the distance, then up at the sky.

It felt wonderful. When I got back to my home office, it was like a whole new day.

From then on, not one workday goes by without a daily reset. 

Here’s the interesting part: each of us takes their daily reset differently.

One team member got a dog who requires regular walks. The dog is “the best thing that happened” to her, and I see how much better she feels and works after her daily pooch resets.

The other team member with a little one at home feels less stressed by getting multiple breaks to feed and play with her daughter.

Yes, taking time away from the 9-5 workday can be challenging for meetings. But I see a huge personal and productivity increase when our team works on their own schedule. The work quality is better too.

So when did it become necessary to build a daily reset into a remote worker’s daily routine?

When the daily commute disappeared.

Believe me, I’m not advocating we bring the daily commute back. I’m happy to save 1-3 hours a day not travelling to an office.

But what many people don’t realize is the secret benefits we get from the daily commute:

Our brains and bodies miss these things when we work remotely every day.

That’s why I recommend that anyone running or working in a remote workforce carve out time for a daily reset.

Each person is different. Some people fill their buckets up by connecting to nature. Others may do specific activities, spend more time with family, or require more social interactions.

Start by asking your team what a daily reset might look like for them. And then determine how you can build that into the way your team works.

There’s much more to say on this rich topic. But I must admit: I’ve hit a wall.

I’m off to reset by taking my daily nature walk. Talk later!