I had a really busy fall: meetings scheduled back-to-back, an abundance of presentations and materials to prep, late nights on my computer finalizing details and even turning down new work and interesting opportunities. It happens. But, you know you’re overbooked when someone asks for 30 minutes of your time and you literally can’t find it that week during normal work hours.

Then mid-December vacation rolled around, and suddenly, I’m not busy. I’m slow, which was fine with me — a relief, even — but I realized my mind was still working overtime.

If you’re old enough, you might remember records. The larger records spun at 33 1/3 RPM and the smaller single records were 45 RPM.

I realized that moving from my busy fall to the slow New Year’s period felt like my RPM were off. With a packed schedule, I moved fast, pivoting and changing projects on a dime, I was the smaller record spun many more times each minute.

As my schedule shifted, I noticed I was stuck in that faster RPM mode. I hadn’t found a way to slow down my brain or feelings of urgency — as if I only had a limited amount of time to get everything done.

The more I spoke to my clients about this phenomenon, the more I saw how universal it is. Many of us find ourselves working hard day-in and day-out as the norm. And then there’s the true sprint: the time when my clients might long for 50-hour weeks because they’re regularly working 60-plus hours, including nights and weekends. Nothing is off-limits for finding more time.

“It’s a phase,” you tell yourself. “I’m just trying to get through the next product launch, data migration or round of clinical trials. After that, I’ll have more time for my emails/direct reports/kids/(fill in the blank).”