At Your Best

How to Get Time, Energy, and Priorities Working in Your Favor

By: Carey Nieuwhof

Narrated by: Carey Nieuwhof

Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins

Publisher's summary

“A perceptive and practical book about why our calendars so rarely reflect our priorities and what we can do to regain control.” (Adam Grant) 

“Carey’s book will help you reorganize your life. And then you can share a copy with someone you care about.” (Seth Godin)

You deserve to stop living at an unsustainable pace. An influential podcaster and thought leader shows you how.

Overwhelmed. Overcommitted. Overworked. That’s the false script an inordinate number of people adopt to be successful. Does this sound familiar: 

• Slammed is normal. 
• Distractions are everywhere.  
• Life gets reduced to going through the motions. 

Tired of living that way? At Your Best gives you the strategies you need to win at work and at home by living in a way today that will help you thrive tomorrow. 

Influential podcast host and thought leader Carey Nieuwhof understands the challenges of constant pressure. After a season of burnout almost took him out, he discovered how to get time, energy, and priorities working in his favor. This approach freed up more than one thousand productive hours a year for him and can do the same for you. 

At Your Best will help you:

• Replace chronic exhaustion with deep productivity 
• Break the pattern of overpromising and never accomplishing enough 
• Clarify what matters most by restructuring your day 
• Master the art of saying no, without losing friends or influence 
• Discover why vacations and sabbaticals don’t really solve your problems 
• Develop a personalized plan to recapture each day so you can break free from the trap of endless to-dos 

Start thriving at work and at home as you discover how to be at your best.

©2021 Carey Nieuwhof (P)2021 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“The results we get are largely determined by the systems in our lives. The wrong system makes results harder to get. The right system makes it easier, almost effortless, to achieve the right results. This is brilliantly illustrated in Carey Nieuwhof’s new book, At Your Best.” (Greg McKeown, New York Times best-selling author of Effortless and Essentialism and the host of the What’s Essential podcast)

“Carey Nieuwhof offers a powerful recipe for thriving: Do what you do best, at the times when you’re at your best, while making sure other people’s priorities don’t get in the way. An important guide for anyone feeling burned out by their ‘successful’ career.” (Cal Newport, New York Times best-selling author of A World Without Email and Deep Work)

“Clear, concise, and highly practical, the strategies Carey Nieuwhof outlines will help you accomplish far more in far less time at work and at home.” (Nir Eyal, best-selling author of Indistractable)

So helpful.

I started implementing this book before it was even over, and started seeing and feeling the benefits on day one. One of the most practical, actually helpful, leadership and productivity books I've ever read.

He's lived my life!

The story of burnout was my story. I wish I would have had this book years ago. If you are in your 20's or 30's, be sure to pay attention. The lifestyle you think you love can be your greatest enemy. Carey explains this perfectly and gives you the tools to change.

very helpful at 68

with this advice I can see my career extended because my energy can be focused. and refocused. thank you

Quality productivity tips

I really liked the content in this book for if nothing else it made you think about how you’re spending your time. I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking to optimize their time or learning time management. The tips are simple and diverse enough that you feel as though you’ve been given useful advice that you can use.

Solid book that has practical guidance

Came to the book because the author’s leadership podcast. It’s an easy listening book with hands on materials.

Transformative

This book is shaping how I schedule my day and this is transformative to my productivity and mental well-being. Such simple yet previously untapped (for me) ideas.

Great for leaders

Good points and strategies. I like how he left it up to the individual to find what works best for them but to give guidance to help find that.

For someone who works a 9-5 job maybe in a shop or where they don’t “lead” this book may seem like it’s not for them however you could look at it from a family/relationship role.

By far the best of its kind

This is the best business and personal life book you’ll ever read. Dare i say the only one of its kind that your library needs! Its that good! Rest assure I’m not being paid to say this I just honestly believe it.

Life changing book I've needed for decades

Hi! I'm a perfectionist and a completionist. After listening to this book I now know that I'm also obsessed with being productive. I've been trying to be more balanced for decades. I was a workaholic working 90 plus hours a week. Then I just couldn't keep doing it. My body started breaking, so I cut it back to 60 hours a week. Still bad. Still falling apart. Then I got therapy and really reset. Now I don't work weekends, and try to keep below 50 hours a week. Managing it from an hours standpoint alone has not worked. Those 50 hours are just as stress packed as the 90 hours used to be. I come out of work feeling terrible, unable to cook dinner, and spend the whole weekend trying to find some peace in my brain so I can do another terrible week again. I really needed this book, and every single message in this book. A lot of it also is perfect summary of what my therapist worked on with me too. I had to do a lot of boundary setting and this book has amazing descriptions of that. Although there wasn't new to me info in that section, listening to it helped me let go of a lot of guilt. Sometimes you set boundaries for years, and you have a friend that just keeps pushing them. You beg them to change a small thing, and they refuse to. Even something that you both know is a tiny thing that affects how comfortable you are to even hang out with them. I really needed to hear all the steps for boundary setting again, realize I had followed them all, and just let my guilt go. Yes, I did enough and then some. Listening to this book, I'm now embarrassed how long I let that unbalanced wreck of a friendship go on. The overall theme is so important and something that I need to set in my brain. I really do struggle to just be. And to love myself if I'm not being productive right at that moment. Until I embrace that laziness does not exist, I'm just always going to push myself too far. It's unhealthy. This is the intervention I've needed for decades. I do think I need a new framework in my brain, as I dismantle this productivity is everything framework. This book gave me a lot of ideas on how to build that. I love the homework of looking at my cute and super chill dog and holding that love of them for just being, as a standard to use with myself. I love my silly dog so much, so that is quite a powerful thought if I could feel that about myself. Thank you to the amazing author and the amazing reader. You are some of the best therapy I've had in years.

Worth your time…IF you apply the exercises

This book was presented by an author who told his story in an authentic and kind manner… So much so that I wish I knew him. He shared his insights along the way that led him to maximize his time and energy in order to make time for what was most important, to reduce stress & to meet his future goals.

The premise of the book is theoretically simple, and maybe even obvious, however, the implementation and application of the theory and plan that he shared really takes some thought and time to plan out for best results.

I downloaded the worksheets and completed them, however, I quickly recognized that there was a part that was missing. It asked me to categorize the tasks (work. Self-care, family time…all of it) that I am supposed to do as either requiring high, mid or low energy and/or priority. Here is where I found the conflict of time that I needed to resolve. For example, exercise and self-care is a high priority, especially since I was diagnosed with breast cancer, six months ago — thankfully I am presently without evidence of disease :-) I’m doing everything I can to prevent recurrence. And while exercise is a priority, which would put it in the green zone, I don’t need the mental energy to do it, and could do it in any of the zones. Since I run a bricks and mortar & online brain training learning center business (Brain Boost Academy), I have so many high priority things to do along with my own self care, but it’s difficult to fit everything into my day. This is why I got the book.

With the provided worksheets as a jumping off point, I created my own worksheet that included the self-care activities in my a.m. and p.m. routines - also categorized as low, mid or high priority. Another worksheet for my work activities with the same categorization. And another for my weekends and free time. I further labeled each am/pm task or activity as: sleep, exercise, connection, stress management, health/detox/nutrition/sunlight. Some activities ended up on both lists.

By creating additional lists, I was able to deduce down my tasks and activities in a functional way that I can apply to my every day life.

The concepts and examples shared by the author were very helpful! He helped me to realize that I was having one of my most important weekly meetings too late in the day. It was a high priority meeting that was being held in a low energy time of my day. I also realized that I was using some of my mornings to chop & cook veggies for my meals (another high priority in order to stay healthy), but this is easily something I could do in the evening, when I don’t need as much mental energy. And I feel more accomplished, because I am starting my work earlier and getting more done during my peak mental hours.

I’ve been gradually shaping how I am spending my time, and the tasks that I’ve chosen to take action on during my high, mid and low energy times of the day. I am feeling lighter, more organized, I’m getting more done, and I’m even a little bit happier. I’m definitely less anxious because I feel more in control and I am following the natural rhythms of my brain, body, and circadian rhythms of the day.

Thank you Carey Nieuwhof!

Great audiobook

Really enjoyed this. Connecting energy zones to schedule is very useful. Carey is helpful and supportive and I have read alot of personal development books and thought this was an excellent read.

Practical strategies for better leadership.

I have enjoyed listening to Carey's wisdom on how to get the best out of time. His approach is practical and his explanation is through without being overly long. Carey's openness and honesty about his personal walk and struggles is a breath of fresh air.

Powerful Stuff

I loved the essentials of how much is lost in ignoring the basics.
This is easy to read and understand
My only gripe ( if you can call it such)is that it's too short.