Why Most Evening Routines Don't Work for Event Professionals
- Jen Wead
- Aug 21
- 8 min read
Updated: Aug 23
You got through the event. You drove home, peeled off your shoes, and sat on the couch in the dark for a few minutes before you could move again. By the time you thought about "winding down," it was after midnight and your alarm was set for five.
There is a whole industry built around evening routines. Journaling at golden hour. A calming walk. A 10-step skincare ritual. Eight glasses of water and a chapter of a book.
If you are an event professional, you have probably rolled your eyes at all of it. If you were me, you would feel a constant sense of guilt, and dare I say shame, because everyone else seems to make it look so easy and I couldn’t even get my face washed at the end of the night.
That inability wasn't because I didn't want to doit "enough". It is because my evenings do not look the same. I have never worked an 8-hour day with a lunch hour and two 15-minute breaks. I have rarely been able to consistently cook a hot meal for myself and sit at a table to eat it. At least not during event season. After my 10-12 hours, I am unpacking gear in the dark, responding to a vendor text at 1 am, eating something standing over the sink before (conservatively) I collapse into bed and lay there thinking about all of the details I should have written down, all so I can do it again the next day. Thank goodness I finally realized that it wasn’t me. These Pinterest lifestyle routines were not designed for the event pro. Can I get an Amen?
They were built for someone who finishes work at 5pm and has two quiet hours before bed. That is not me and, if you are reading this, I am guessing not for you.
After way too many years putting myself at the bottom of the priority list, I have learned a few things, Event Pro Life Hacks, so to speak, and I am going to start by sharing this first foundational anchor.
The Problem with Traditional Evening Routines
Most evening routine advice starts from a false assumption: that your evenings are calm.
For people in this industry, they are not. You are often at an event, coming off an event, or mentally preparing for the next one. You are troubleshooting, following up, triple-checking details. Your body is running on adrenaline until it suddenly isn't, and then you crash hard. Your colleagues are also night owls finally getting to their emails and messages from their own spots in their beds. How many times have you had a quick text chat with a fellow vendor only to realize it was 2 am? 80% of event planners sleep poorly in the week leading up to an event, with 35% getting less than four hours of sleep before going on-site. Less than 4 hours!
Traditional routines are designed for predictable schedules. Set times, set rhythms, consistent environments. Event work is the opposite. Every week looks different. Every event cycle has its own arc of pressure and release. You cannot paste a generic wind-down planner onto that and expect it to hold.
And when it inevitably won’t it is easy to feel undisciplined, defeated and like you are failing something. “Maybe I just need to try harder, commit more, want it badly enough.”
That is not the problem, and neither are we!
The Truth: Event Days Start the Night Before
If you haven’t learned this on your own yet, I am going to share the most basic, yet effective tip. How you feel on event day is almost entirely determined by what you did the night before.
It isn’t quantified by what you ate that morning nor how long you meditated, although those actions are sustaining. Instead, it is all about how you prepped the night before, really that entire week when handling intricate or multiple consecutive events. Going forward, ask yourself: How do I set myself up for success the night before? You can do this exercise in past tense and examine your recent events and ask the same questions to decide where you need to strengthen your pre-event evening routine.
Specifically, did you prep your kit? Did you make a to-do list and get your documents printed? Did you give your nervous system even fifteen minutes to stop receiving input before you tried to sleep? Sleep is the foundation to your foundation. Read that again.
A study published by ClinkClink found that 86% of event managers report experiencing physical symptoms of stress, including chronic headaches and severe burnout.
Burnout in this industry is real, and it is relentless. But it is not usually caused by a single catastrophic event. It is caused by hundreds of small days where you gave everything and left nothing for yourself. Where you went to bed without closing the loop on the day and then woke up already behind.
Don’t beat yourself up. Forbes continues to rank Event Industry Professionals in the top 5 most stressful jobs year after year.
Most of us in this world work with a sense of urgency, that while great for the job, it actually signals to our bodies that we aren't safe. And we live like this for entire seasons. Living in a constant state of fight or flight dysregulates the nervous system and then everything our bodies have to accomplish is done under duress. When you have no structure going into a rest window, your brain does not actually rest. It stays alert. It keeps running the list. You sleep, technically, but you do not recover. And then you get up and do it again.
That cycle is what breaks people. I have seen it many times. I have lived it. In truth, it is my single largest challenge.
What I found, eventually, was that I did not need a longer more elaborate routine. I needed a consistent, frictionless one that effectively changes with my schedule.
The Solution: A 3-Phase Evening Routine for Event Professionals
This is not a wellness plan. I think of it as an evening ritual and rituals are sacred to me. The same way you prep your kit before an event, you prep yourself. I even set the mood for myself by lighting a candle and playing favorite music because I know myself and if I don’t lean into enjoying this ritual, it won’t stick. I know I am not alone in that most event professionals need a different evening routine.
Phase 1: Prep and Plan
Many people will skip the night before discipline and set an alarm for an earlier morning or worse, just wing it. But, before you try to rest, close the operational loop. Lay out your outfit. Pack your bag. Prep your food. Charge your devices. Do a quick brain dump so the running list leaves your head and goes somewhere it can wait. Be free with your brain dump. Unburden stress, jot ideas, script how you envision event day and put a little to do list right there and leave it in a place to execute the next day. This is you giving yourself the gift of clarity and the first step in regulating your nervous system. When tomorrow is handled, your brain stops working the problem at 2am.
Phase 2: Digital Sunset
I think of Phase 2 as the transition between concluding business and focusing on me. The event industry keeps you on call, but your body needs to know when the day is over. Put the phone on Do Not Disturb. Dim the lights and make sure none of your overhead bulbs are on unless they are red sleep light bulbs that block blue lights. Stop taking in new information. Music is fine. Scrolling is not. For me, it is the most challenging part of this. No one loves to geek out to learning more business or tech info on YouTube University than I do. If you really must have screen time, for instance if you read a kindle or you fall asleep to the tv, Blue Blocker glasses will help by allowing your body to naturally produce melatonin while reducing sleep latency. If you wear glasses like I do, I use these to ease my insomnia and honor my digital sunset.
This phase isn't about virtue it's about sending a clear signal to your nervous system: the day has concluded, and you are officially permitted to pause. Now, take that shower, stretch, or whatever makes you feel like it will take just a few minutes, but benefit you tomorrow. I like to shower here, make a cup of herbal tea and take my evening magnesium supplement.
Phase 3: Deep Rest
This phase is my favorite when I really lean into the ritual of it all. Choose 1-3 small acts that support fully coming back to yourself. Read. Stretch. Sit still for five minutes. Do some easy breath work (in four, hold four, exhale four, hold four) Visualize three things you are grateful for, even on a hard day, even if the three things are "the event is over," "I ate today," and "my feet are finally off the floor." I made myself a sleep playlist of yoga Nidra and mindset mantras on YouTube that I listen to and do skincare that I keep in my nightstand or use my smartwatch to do breathwork. I recommend doing Phase 3 from you bed or in your bedroom.
Set your intention for tomorrow, just in your mind or vocalized, and avoid another to-do list. One sentence. What kind of person do you want to show up as? That's enough.
I have run through these phases quickly, in 15-20 mins, sometimes doing alot of it from my bed, and I have spent real time and effort on the phases, taking 45-hr. Both activations were
highly supportive to my morning and especially to the execution of the event. I am a recovering workaholic who had very little personal time and would always do all of my packing and prep the morning of. I feel more centered and prepared now and rarely forget anything in my haste to get to the gig. Instituting this into my life has changed it for the better.
The Simplified Version: A Checklist You'll Actually Use
I am not going to tell you to do all of this perfectly every night. You will not. Neither do I.
But I do come back to the structure and that is what matters. That is consistency that will really pay off and when you start to notice it, you won't have to motivate yourself. The success will motivate you naturally. It is so helpful to have a list you can run through even when you are exhausted that takes 15-30 mins and still counts.
The checklist I use has four sections:
Prep for Tomorrow: Outfit, bags, food, devices, brain dump.
Close the Day: Work shut down, phone on Do Not Disturb, lights dimmed, no more input.
Reset Your Body: Stretch or shower, skincare, a few minutes to slow down.
Enter Rest: Something quiet, three things you're grateful for, one intention for tomorrow.
That's the whole thing. You don't have to hit every item every time. You just have to show up to the structure.
I turned this into a simple checklist you can actually use. This list is a google doc you can use over and over, with check boxes and direct task making links for your to-do list. Grab it below and please let me know if it helps you. Thank you and happy event life.
Please note the links are for products I have purchased and actually use. I do also get a small commission from them at no cost to you.
