Working Towards Our Purpose

Welcome to episode 66 of Working towards our Purpose.

Thank you for being here. In today's episode, we're going to talk about

sustainability and burnout. But before we get into

that, going to do a little check in with ourselves. So take a

moment to check in with yourself, see how you're showing up today,

and I'm going to do the same.

Feeling pretty good today. Yeah, I

got some. Some insights last night,

my therapy session. That's kind of making me feel a little bit better.

Yeah, feeling. Feeling pretty. Pretty

good. Yeah.

Just. Just thinking about today's topic, burnout. And

yeah, hopefully you got a chance to check in with yourself there. I guess I'm

a little eager to get into the episode, but.

So, yeah, I've been kind of feeling low energy

and just kind of like something's a little bit off. Getting

a little tired and

I guess sort of frustrated with

maybe the pace at which I'm, like, doing things. And

I didn't really take a moment to, like, see what was going on. But I

had therapy last night and I sort of checked in with myself and realized

that, like, I think I'm starting to get burnt out.

So that was a nice feeling. And like, as soon as I said that

in therapy, I real, like, I felt this lifting from my chest

that I had, like, the tension in my chest sort of like,

got a little bit lighter. So that was kind of a signal to me

that, like, yeah, that. That is the thing that's going on. So,

yeah, just gave me the idea for this episode to talk about burnout and

how we sustain something. Because I think, like,

you think of burnout or I thought of burnout as like, something that you

did when you were doing something you didn't like.

But it's interesting for me now, like, I'm doing this podcast and I really want

to keep doing this podcast. And it's, you know, for the

first time, something that I see myself doing long term. And I'm

feeling sort of burned out. And I think I was resisting that. Cause I was

like, well, I can't be burnt out. I'm doing something that I enjoy.

But that doesn't mean you can't, you know, get burnt out from it. So

that's what we're gonna talk about today. And I think I want

to start the podcast with a sort of a

quote. It was a clip that I saw online the other day

of Nipsey Hussle, who is. Who was a

rapper and entrepreneur. And I just always liked talking to him

or. Sorry, I never talked to Him, I always like listening to him

because he always seemed

well spoken with his words, like, wise and, like, always

calm and, like, I don't know, when somebody speaks with, like, a sort of

calmness, I always, like, I always notice that. But anyways,

he was saying, I guess somebody must have asked him in an interview,

like, you know, what made you successful or something? What made you,

you know, almost a household name? And

he said that he, like,

didn't have anything special. Like, he. He didn't have it

figured out. He didn't sort of have anything better than

anybody else. The. The only thing, the only

distinguishing quality was that he didn't quit. And

that was pretty much it. Like, that was his advice, was that I'm. I

don't have anything. I'm not, like, gifted or whatever. I just didn't quit

what I was doing. And therefore, I.

Eventually, it led me to success because most people, especially

in, like, you know, the industry, that he was being a rapper, like, you

just. You give up, you know, And

I thought that that was kind of in line with the episode,

because burning out, and

the opposite of burning out is sustainability. So, like, if you're. If you're doing

something and you want to keep doing it and you want to be successful at

it, you have to keep doing it. So if you get burnt out and

that burnout leads you to giving up, then you'll never be sort of

successful. Whatever success means to you.

It doesn't necessarily mean, like, you know, be a famous rapper, but

to me, it means, like, to continue to do this podcast. And.

Yeah, and if I'm burnt out, I can't do that. So

I think when you're building something and when you're creating

something from scratch, it's going to be a lot of work. It's going to take

a lot of effort. Um, but

we have to find ways to keep it sustainable so that we can keep doing

it. And. And, yeah, that was just kind of the biggest thing for me was

realizing that, like, even if you're doing something that you do really

enjoy, you can still sort of get burnt out. And

how do you prevent that? So in

today's episode, I want to talk about, first off, how to

notice burnout and then how to prevent it. And

because I think for me, I didn't even really realize that I

was getting burnt out until I had, you know,

an hour therapy session where I'm, like, specifically talking about how I'm feeling and

stuff. So if I didn't have that therapy session, I might not have

realized that I need to do something about this

burnout feeling that I'm having. So

what is burnout look like

for me? I think it felt

sort of like I wasn't really enjoying the thing as much

as I used to. I always really like doing these

episodes and I was sort of noticing myself have a little bit of an annoyance

to it. Like, especially with the post production stuff being

like, I don't want to have to go all do this, you know,

making it into a blog article and putting out YouTube video, doing

all this back end stuff. And so I started noticing it like

not being as fun anymore. And

I also felt myself

just sort of like not having the

same amount of energy that I did before. So I think lower energy,

not feeling as excited about it. I also

noticed that when I was doing the work, I was much more

inefficient and basically taking

a longer amount of time to do the same work. And then it was

like work bleeding into the next day and then, you know, kind of just

this chain reaction effect of like not getting

things done in a timely manner or as quickly

as I, as I was before. So I think that that's like a really big

indication for me. Um, and

another thing I noticed was I was being more

self critical and more mean to myself in my head. Like,

you know, if I didn't finish the task in the day that I wanted to,

I started beating myself up again. And I know I've been working

on that and I've been trying to be more aware of that and to

try to not be mean to myself, but I noticed it was happening a

little bit more and more even though I was or I am trying

to actively not do that. So, so that's a

signal for me, I think, that I was being burnt out.

And, and then a big thing for me too was this is something that I

haven't really noticed before, but I had a lot of tension in my chest. Like

my chest felt really tight.

So much so that like it was hard to breathe sometimes and

I would take like a couple deep breaths and then like it would feel a

little bit better, but it was just this like lingering

thing in my chest, like just tightness. And

like I alluded to earlier, like when I acknowledge

that like I might be, you know, headed down the

burnout path, that tension kind of just like released from my chest and

I really haven't felt it since. And now I'm thinking of things

in terms of, okay, how, what can we do to

prevent this burnout? What can we do to make it A little bit

better. And I think that that's given me like confidence that

I'm going to take care of myself and therefore that tension kind of released.

Um, so. So yeah, I think, you know,

realizing that you are going down a burnout path, it's. It's

not really like a switch. It's not like you turn it on and you're burnt

out and you turn it off and you're not burnt out. It's more like a

gas meter, I guess. Um, so, you know,

I. I feel my gas meter go. Maybe I'm at like

quarter empty right now. And I. I'd like to be at

like 3/4 hole at least. Um, so I'm noticing it

getting like lower and lower and lower. And I think if I didn't stop

and realize that this was happening in maybe

another week or two, I might have just been like, okay, I

gotta stop. I can't do this anymore. I gotta take a week off. I gotta

do whatever. Um, so. So I don't want to get there.

Um, so I want to be able to now put some things

in place to help with that burnout. And

yeah, that kind of leads me to the next part of this episode

is like, well, what can we do to prevent burnout? And I think, you know,

once. Once you're already burnt out and you're at E, then

I think the only thing you can really do is like take time off or

to stop doing what you're doing. And I think that,

that, that reminds me of something that my

father told me one time. He. My father had a

bunch. I don't want to say a bunch, but he had more than one

business at one point in his life and he was doing a

lot, and his life

kind of made him stop. Do all the.

Stop doing all the things that he was doing. Um, he had

like a bunch of things happen to him in the same year and he ended

up giving up all of his businesses. And I remember

him telling me that, like there was.

I'll try to articulate this in the way that he did, but

I remember him saying like, he

never like took a break with the

businesses that he was doing. He never felt like it was enough.

Like, he just kept chasing the success.

And that was

like, kind of what led him to give everything up and to just put his

hands in the air and be like, you know what, I can't do this anymore.

And then to just give everything up completely. And I think that's

like an extreme version of burnout and not. Not

realizing that you're being burnt out not thinking

about the sustainability aspect of it. And I'm not saying this like,

you know, I don't want to make it seem like I

know better than he did, but I think what I'm trying to

just say is that, like, he sort of gave me this

insight to, like. Because when I first started my business, he told

me that story, and what I got from it was, okay, I have to be

careful about not just going

100%, 100% of the time. I have to be careful

that what I'm building is sustainable. And that that

word to me, always kind of stuck in my head from that conversation is,

I have to figure out the sustainability aspect of it. Because he was

really smart and figured out how to make businesses work and make money with them.

But he hit a point where he couldn't sustain it anymore,

and then it all went away, and he ended up going back to corporate, you

know, for his own choices. Not necessarily bad, but

for me, I looked at that as like, okay, I have to figure out the

sustainability aspect of it. So. So,

yeah, I. I definitely am always thinking about that. And

when I found

something that I want to keep doing long term, I'm thinking of it again

because, like, I'm noticing this burnout, and I'm like, okay, what can we do to

prevent this? What can we do to, like, actively manage this and

make sure that we don't get there? And so, yeah, so

preventing burnout. What can we do?

I do a pretty bad

job of celebrating my wins,

and I think that that's one thing you can really do, is

to celebrate your wins. And when you accomplish something, to take a moment and

realize that you've done that, that you've

accomplished a thing, and

it doesn't have to be like a big, grand celebration, but just like, some sort

of acknowledgment that, like, oh, I just got to

episode 66. That's great to think about

what you're doing. And last night, my

therapist was saying that a lot of times people that

have ADHD will have

this thing. And I'm paraphrasing her here, so, you

know, bear with me. But

she said that people that have ADHD have this thing where

they finish a task and then they automatically start thinking about

the next task, and they don't actually get the dopamine hit

from, like, accomplishing something that people that don't have ADHD

want get. So that made me think of my dad of, like,

you know, you. You get to this one thing, you hit this One marker of

success. And it's like, okay, what's the next thing? And you. You're already

onto the next thing before you finish the first thing. And

I. I do feel that I can be in that way sometimes too. So.

So maybe you feel like that if, you know, you're always

thinking about the next thing and, and not really taking a moment to

acknowledge, like, what you've done and. And to be proud of

yourself in that way, I think that can be really helpful.

To be able to keep things sustainable is to think

about how much you've accomplished thus

far. And it also gives you some incentive to keep going forward, too,

when you think about acknowledging

something good that has happened. And I guess as I'm

speaking, perhaps it invites a moment of me to do that

right now in real time. Yesterday

I got the most downloads I've ever had in one

day from this podcast. And likely

I think it was just somebody binging, like, almost every single episode. So if you're

listening to this episode, I appreciate you shout out to whoever you are,

but. But that's cool. Like, that, that's big for me. Like,

I never had that many downloads in one day.

And I think t taking a minute and being like, wow, that's pretty

cool. I've accumulated this

bank of episodes that allows for somebody to go and do that. And

that's based off of all the hard work that I put in to this podcast.

So I could take this moment and be like, yeah, I'm proud of myself for

that. And yeah, not that the

numbers are, like, the most important

thing, but. But that was kind of a cool thing. So

I'm acknowledging that right now. Um, and. And yeah, that brings me

to the next thing that you can do to prevent burnout

is taking time off regularly. I'm somebody who has a hard time

taking time off. I'm always, like, filling in my. My days and

nights and weekends with thinking about what I can get done.

And it's hard for me to take time off. So thinking

about how I can intentionally take. Because,

like, I don't know, I always think about, like, well, I'm only doing a little

bit of work here, and then I can enjoy the rest of my day, but

I rarely ever take, like, an entire day off and don't really focus on

work at all. Um, so

maybe I can do a little bit better at that about taking days off

and perhaps building them into my schedule, putting them in my

calendar, like, that would be a great thing. I can do

another thing that can really help with

burnout that's already helped me is meditating

regularly. And I know I always bring up meditation, but

I think when you're meditating and

you set time aside to just sit with yourself, you start to

notice the things that are bothering you. And I think that's where I noticed

the tension in my chest is during meditation. I'd be like, man, my chest feels

really heavy. Um, so, like, that's

a great time to also check in with your body and to see, like, where

you're holding tension. Cause I think that's another thing that you can do

is notice where, like, you're tense.

And if you are tense and if you're holding tension for extended periods of time,

then this is, like, a signal that your body's like, hey, something's a little

wrong here. You should pay attention to this. And. And when you're

meditating, you can do that. Um, and

I think that it can be really helpful to take some time

and to just like, sit with yourself and to see what you're feeling.

Um, to always notice your feelings is, you know, your feelings

are information. So. So using that information to be like, okay,

maybe I'm being frustrated with this. Maybe I'm

holding tension in my shoulders or my neck's been really stiff. What does that

mean? Maybe I can investigate that a little bit more. Um,

so. And then the last thing that I had here in my notes to

try to prevent meditation is to inject fun into.

Into the process. Inject some fun into your process of. Of whatever

it is that you're doing. And for me,

this morning, I. Since Nipsey was on my. My

brain, I. I wanted to listen to some of his music, But I normally,

like, don't do anything until after I'm done recording my podcast. But

I thought about this thing, and I was like, hmm, it'd be kind of cool

if I, like, listened to one song before recording to

kind of, like, you know, amp up my energy

a little bit and to do something a little bit fun to hear a good

song. So I just put one song on, and I listened to it, and I

was like, huh, that's kind of a cool part of my process. Like,

I'm taking my whole morning seriously, like, making all these notes and stuff. What

if I just listen to one good song before recording every time?

Like, that could be a little bit of fun that I could inject into the

process and to maybe, like, not take myself so seriously.

So I did that today, and it was kind of nice, so I might keep

doing that. But, yeah, to Think about, like, where you can inject a little bit

of fun, even if the thing that you're doing is enjoyable to

still intentionally, like, think about, well, how can I make it a little bit more

fun? Like, it's almost, almost a challenge. How can you make the

process of creating a little bit more fun? So.

So yeah, I think that this is an important topic and especially

when you're thinking about, like, you know, if I think

back to, like, when I was starting my side business and I was also working

my 9 to 5, you know,

burning out is like inevitable. Cause you're, you're literally always

working. And maybe if you're out there trying to create something or

be creative or start something creative, start a business or

whatever it is you want to create. To think

about, maybe just for a moment, like, how can we keep it sustainable?

Because it is important to be disciplined and to do

the work, but it's also more important, in my

opinion, to be able to keep that sustainable. So

how can you think about what you're doing in the

long term and feed it? Like, how do we put some

gas into the tank and get that meter up, up towards full instead of

down towards empty? And. And I think even that visualization really

helps maybe if it's a little bonus here to prevent meditation.

So think about that gas meter. Like, if you were to check in with yourself

right now, you know, with the burnout meter, are you more towards full

or are you more towards empty? And to think about,

to think about that and, and at the end

of the day, I think

one thing that I guess I'm. I

guess I'm thinking about my, My father a lot today, but one thing that he

always told me was work smarter, not harder. And that's what I

think burning out is, is when you're working

harder, not smarter. So,

so that kind of. That kind of came to mind at the end here. So

maybe I'll. Maybe I'll close the episode with that. Um,

and yeah, so. So thank you for listening. If you're watching on YouTube, leave a

comment and tell me. You know, leave, leave a comment to say what

you do to prevent burnout or, or something that you

do to, to notice that you are being burnt out. Um, so

you can, can follow me on YouTube, follow me on Instagram, working towards a

purpose. And thank you for listening as always.

And I will see you on another episode right real soon. Thank you.