Entrepreneur touts intellectual exercise

Aaron Dirks, president of the Louisiana chapter of the international Entrepreneurs’ Organization, says he almost didn’t survive the recession. By 2010, he was in poor health, overweight, and only sleeping two or three hours a night—and all of his businesses were in trouble. Since he wasn’t sleeping anyway, he started exercising while listening to classic business books. After a while, he found that he and the people around him were becoming more productive. When he switched to exercise alone, the effect waned. Dirks now believes, after reviewing relevant research, that he was “fertilizing” his prefrontal cortex, giving himself the ability to reach a state similar to that of an elite athlete who is “in the zone.” Dirks recommends at least 45 minutes of cardio every morning, at 60% to 80% of your maximum heart rate, while listening to something intellectually stimulating and keeping something handy to make notes. “All [my] $100 million ideas came through this process,” he says. Dirks says he plans to further test his ideas by starting gyms where his employees would have free memberships, and where they might take an exercise class while listening to a lecture. “That’s going to be my experiment for the next five years,” says Dirks, who was the guest speaker today at an LSU Executive Education Breakfast to Business series event. —David Jacobs