It made sense once I understood the reasoning, but I would not have intuited this on my own. I’m clearly not alone, judging from the countless number of posts on various Bonsai forums from folks who are mystified as to why their trees, which they tended to lovingly indoors, end up dying. I’m sure some of this is because of general nature blindness, but I think another factor is society’s dysfunctional relationship to rest.

I was reminded of this when a friend was telling me about how the leaders at her work — a large tech company with thousands of employees — are constantly throwing around the word “velocity.” All of the internal messaging is about going faster, never easing up. Not surprisingly, there is a high-level of both burnout and apathy there. When urgency feels artificial, people tune it out.

I’ve seen similar cultures at countless nonprofits, but for different reasons. The stakes feel higher, because people’s lives often depend on the work. Resources tend to be scarce, but leaders look to do more with less rather than invest in greater capacity. The resulting burnout is predictable, and yet the cycle has proven difficult to break.

Most recently, I’ve been hearing about a new, but similarly pernicious pattern induced by artificial intelligence. Despite AI’s promise to do our hard work for us, people who are using it regularly often find themselves even more exhausted. My friend, Greg Gentschev, recently observed:

The funny thing about using AI for projects is that I feel decision fatigue. Everything gets done so fast that it’s hard to keep up. I think this is going to be a common complaint going forward.

Using AI can feel like managing a bunch of mostly competent, very fast interns who work nonstop, 24-hours each day. There are more to things to review, more things to respond to, more decisions to make, and no natural barriers (like your team needing to sleep) to stem the tide.

We’re like those poor Bonsai trees being kept awake by artificial light and heat. We, too, need to rest, or else we, too, will die. It’s crazy that anyone would feel compelled to explain this core human need, but the pace of de-humanization in our society is bringing new meaning to “velocity.”

So what can we do about this?

First and foremost, we can re-assess the stories we tell ourselves. As everyone who is actually a high-performer at their craft knows, sustainability and “velocity” are not at odds with each other. Ask any marathon runner. Rest and recovery, along with mental and emotional well-being, are critical for us to be at our best. Telling ourselves otherwise is not only counter-productive, it establishes the foundation of a toxic culture.

Second, we can name our intentions clearly. In my work with groups, I often see leaders confuse poor habits with lack of agency. We tend to replicate what we’ve experienced. If no one before us models a healthy, balanced culture, we’re unlikely to do otherwise, regardless of what we actually want. We assume that everything is the way they are, because that’s the only way they can be, when in reality, we tend to have more choices than we realize.

Which leads to the third and most important thing we can do: Establish new habits. My training, Power and Love for Managers, along with my work with dysfunctional teams, focuses on establishing Working Agreements and thinking through structures and processes that support them. If your intention is to create an environment that feels welcoming and supportive, then how you onboard new team members or how you run your meetings matter. Being super clear about roles and having clear cycles of stress and recovery will do way more for achieving human “velocity” than excessively preaching about it.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to go fast. Indeed, sometimes our work requires it. But “velocity” doesn’t require shedding our humanity. Leaning into what actual human beings need to go fast will do wonders for your group’s culture and results.