Are You Consuming Too Much Ultra-Processed Time?
Are You Consuming Too Much Ultra-Processed Time?
PLUS: Save Your Brain: A Digital Survival Guide
June 28, 2026
“You are what you eat.”
\- Anthelme Brillat-Savarin
I use metaphors and analogies a lot in my work, as they help turn theory into something you can sense and feel.
So when I was reading an article by Dr John La Puma this week and he spoke about his concept of ultra-processed time, I felt compelled to share and expand on it.
You already know what ultra-processed food does to you. It fills you up without feeding you. Any short-term feelings of satisfaction are an illusion, masking the fact that you’ve eaten something of no real nutritional value. And of course if you consume too much of it, it starts to damage you.
La Puma applies the same logic to how we choose to spend our time and it provided the perfect lens for me to address one of the main challenges leaders stuck in a tired-but-wired state face.
This isn’t about burnout, it’s something more subtle. It’s the hidden creep of the ‘simmering six’, that kill zone of performance where hours disappear into things that feel like work, but don’t end up being productive. It’s about hours that disappear into things that feel like rest, but end up draining you even further.
So here’s a lean diet of brain food, in the hope it helps you choose things that nourish you and avoid the lure of the empty calories.
THE SCIENCE
Rachel and Stephen Kaplan are environmental psychologists who developed Attention Restoration Theory (ART). This is one of the most cited frameworks in cognitive science and is built on a finding that the focused, effortful thinking we rely on to lead and perform at our best depletes with use. They call it directed attention.
It’s why you’ll find it harder to think with clarity towards the end of a long working day. It’s why you’ll talk about not being able to think straight when you’ve already had to make a number of big calls that day.
Just like a pro athlete, you need to be aware of these limitations and how you can recover as quickly as possible.
The Kaplans identified a specific quality of experience they call soft fascination - think of this as the type of low-demand, effortless engagement that nourishes the brain. This can be as simple as a walk, or a purely social conversation. Time in nature is another proven way to recharge cognitively.
The problem is that many of us opt for what the Kaplans call hard fascination. These are activities that fully occupy your attention without actually restoring it. Doomscrolling, getting locked into the news cycle, a post-work conversation that descends into a litany of everything that’s wrong - they create the illusion of switching off to recharge, but they’re all empty calories.
That's ultra-processed time.
THE PROOF
Elite sport has developed a clear understanding of something that business culture still largely ignores. Rest and recovery are not the opposite of performance. They are enablers of it.
Roger Federer is one of the best examples I know of what this looks like in practice. He won 20 Grand Slams across a career spanning more than two decades, and he did it while investing in a full life outside tennis. Travel, culture, family, friendships. These weren't compromises on his performance. They were part of how he sustained it.
The cognitive dimension of that is just as important as the physical one.
He was intentional about what he put into his time. Not obsessive, not monastic. Intentional. He didn’t lose hours of his life to Instagram. None of his time was ultra-processed.
In his 2024 commencement address at Dartmouth, Federer spoke about this directly. Tennis could take him around the world, he said, but it could never be his whole world. Even at the top of the game, a rewarding life mattered to him.
It was a brilliant series of insights into how to perform at the top level across a long career. Invest 25 minutes in watching it here, as it’s the best kind of brain food.
THE APPLICATION
I want you to think of yourself as a cognitive athlete. You need to be aware of your capacity and how quickly you can recover. That starts with knowing what you're actually spending your time and energy on.
Most of us think we know. We don't. We tell ourselves stories about how we spend our time, and those stories are almost always more flattering than the reality.
So let's take a data-driven approach:
- Document your time honestly. Every day for the next week.
- Split it into two columns. The first is where you are making investments in your time and energy. The second is where you are consuming ultra-processed time.
Use the Kaplans' framework as your guide:
Soft fascination (restores your cognitive stores):
- Exercise
- Time in nature
- Meditation or breathwork
- Reading a physical book
- A genuinely social conversation
Hard fascination (depletes cognitive stores while feeling like rest):
- Doomscrolling
- Getting locked into the news cycle
- Energy-draining conversations
- Passive TV consumption
- Excessive email checking outside work hours
Once you can see your ultra-processed time, you can start cutting it out of your diet.
Go well.
J.
🔥 LIVE BETTER, LEAD BETTER
The best content I researched this week:
1. There’s no better time to share this Save Your Brain: A Digital Survival Guide from author and performance coach Steve Magness.
2. This simple chart from Dr Ryan Cedermark on the difference between positive neuroplasticity and negative neuroplasticity is a great guide to how you can shape your brain.
3. Of course making these alterations in your cognitive diet isn’t easy, which is why as your final action this week, you should watch Rich Roll explain the only way to change in 53 seconds.
Share this with a fellow leader - we’re stronger together.
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