Latest / Business for Humans / Making Hard Decisions: Why It’s Okay to Walk Away

Transcript

Making Hard Decisions: Why It’s Okay to Walk Away · Business for Humans

• 0:00
  I'm Jamie Gennaro, business coach and consultant, and founder of Practica Consulting.
• 0:06
  In this episode of Business for Humans, I talk about the importance of embracing
• 0:10
  imperfection and knowing when it's time to let go of the things that no longer
• 0:14
  serve us, whether it's a job, a relationship, or a personal project.
• 0:19
  I dive into the habit of pushing through challenges just to prove something
• 0:23
  to ourselves or others, and I encourage you to take a step back and reflect
• 0:27
  on why you're staying in situations that feel so difficult.
• 0:30
  It's all about giving yourself grace, making mindful choices,
• 0:34
  and being present in the moment instead of always chasing future success. Enjoy.
• 0:39
  Music.
• 0:45
  So I woke up this morning to an amazing New Yorker article, the title, Should You Give Up?
• 0:55
  This article talks a lot about this idea that we grind ourselves to a pulp,
• 1:03
  trying to be heroes and heroines and trying to make sure we don't quit because quitting is bad.
• 1:10
  We're punishing ourselves when we do that.
• 1:13
  And can we just give ourselves the grace to say, that thing wasn't the right
• 1:18
  fit. It's time to close the door on that.
• 1:21
  It's time to turn the page. Because a lot of that grind and push comes from perfectionism.
• 1:27
  Or this idea that we're not good enough. So we need to prove something by grinding
• 1:33
  and pushing and forcing ourselves to make something work that maybe is not working.
• 1:39
  And it just resonated so much with me because I've been doing so much reflection
• 1:44
  on this idea of emotions at work and what we pull in to our work and what we
• 1:50
  bring with us there and where we might want to leave that at the door before we go into work.
• 1:57
  And as I've been reflecting on my career and all these environments that I've
• 2:01
  found myself in and all these emotional challenges that I've had to work through in my career,
• 2:07
  I realized that there were a lot of times that I probably should have walked
• 2:12
  away sooner, but I really took it on myself to say, okay, what's mine?
• 2:19
  What do I need to learn here? What do I need to work through?
• 2:22
  Which is great. And I think I've said this in recent articles.
• 2:27
  This is my approach with my clients also. When my clients want to quit a job,
• 2:31
  I'm always like, listen, let's leave clean.
• 2:35
  Leave because there's a bad pattern that we're just going to continue in the next job.
• 2:39
  Or there's baggage here that we need to work through before we just jump into
• 2:43
  a job that's going to require so much more energy.
• 2:46
  Let's just work through this stuff first before we escape, before we're escaping
• 2:51
  something that might be something that we actually need to work on. Still my philosophy.
• 2:56
  However, I think it's really important to look at the reasons why you're staying,
• 3:01
  the reasons why you feel like you need to work through the thing.
• 3:05
  And this applies across the board to everything.
• 3:09
  It applies to where you live, what types of relationships you're surrounded
• 3:14
  by, and your work environment, in any other environments you find yourself in,
• 3:19
  where you're taking on the responsibility of,
• 3:22
  okay, there's a lot going on here. There's a lot of emotion.
• 3:25
  There are things to work through. I want to be responsible for what's mine.
• 3:30
  I want to work through it.
• 3:31
  Totally commendable. And that's my recommendation.
• 3:34
  But there's also this moment that's important to look at, why am I staying?
• 3:38
  What am I trying to prove?
• 3:40
  Do I feel like a failure if I leave right now? Will I feel like a failure?
• 3:47
  And is that a reason to stay?
• 3:49
  And what have I really failed at? Have I done my best? Have I stepped into my integrity?
• 3:56
  Have I stood in my values? Have I tried to show up clean?
• 4:00
  Did I do all the work? And then is it time to just let this thing go?
• 4:05
  And again, it can be a relationship. It can be a job.
• 4:08
  It can be where you live. It can also be a project.
• 4:11
  Sometimes we just dump our heart and soul into different types of projects,
• 4:16
  especially creative projects where we're like, oh, we just put our soul on a
• 4:21
  platter and how can we just walk away from it?
• 4:23
  But rather than beating yourself up over the fact that you haven't taken this
• 4:27
  thing across the finish line,
• 4:29
  what about giving yourself some grace and leaning into imperfection and leaning
• 4:36
  into all those spaces to say, you know what?
• 4:39
  My life is not about getting over this hurdle so that there's something better
• 4:45
  on the other side and then enjoying my life when I get on the other side.
• 4:49
  It's like all that shit in between is your life.
• 4:52
  I totally believe in personal growth and I totally believe there are hurdles
• 4:56
  that we get over and I totally believe that it feels good on the other side of those hurdles.
• 4:59
  But I also know that if we spend our lives waiting for what's on the other side of that hurdle,
• 5:07
  waiting until it gets better, wait until this thing ends or that thing happens
• 5:11
  or I get to the finish line over here and then I'll be allowed to feel good,
• 5:14
  you're going to be waiting a real long time because it's never going to come.
• 5:18
  Where you are in this moment. It's happening for a reason.
• 5:23
  And this is your life. The moment you're in is the life.
• 5:27
  So if you're putting your head down and you're putting blinders on and you're
• 5:31
  like, I just got to put my head down a couple more weeks, get out of this situation.
• 5:38
  Remember that every moment that's being spent with your head down is kind of a moment wasted.
• 5:44
  So rather than measuring everything that you do in your life as a reflection on your worth.
• 5:52
  Oh my God, am I a failure because I didn't do that?
• 5:55
  Am I a piece of shit because I did that over there or because I did that?
• 5:59
  Rather than looking at these events, these siloed events as a reflection of,
• 6:04
  am I accomplished? Am I successful?
• 6:07
  Look more at what do you need right now? What is the world asking of you in this moment?
• 6:15
  What are your kids asking of you in this moment rather than,
• 6:19
  oh my God, when I get to this place of success, I'll be able to provide for
• 6:23
  my kids in a different way and I'll be able to give them this thing. Okay, great.
• 6:27
  Perfect. But what about what they need right now? And
• 6:30
  I think parenting is one of these real interesting places
• 6:33
  to get truthful and honest about where we are because I think what happens when
• 6:39
  our kids leave the house is we then reflect on all that time when we were on
• 6:44
  a work call and we ignored them or they needed our help with their homework, but we were too busy.
• 6:51
  This is what I want you to take away from these reflections today is what's
• 6:57
  happening in the moment, what's happening in your life right now,
• 7:01
  there's something being asked of you in this moment.
• 7:05
  And when you're always living in the future or you're always beating yourself
• 7:09
  up about how you've failed yourself or how you've failed this project or how you failed at work.
• 7:16
  If you're always in the mode of beating yourself up, you will never look at
• 7:20
  what is great about the moment.
• 7:23
  What is amazing about how you landed here?
• 7:26
  What is something that you can be proud of that you worked through to get yourself to this moment?
• 7:32
  You're beyond many hurdles right now. Doesn't matter how old you are or what
• 7:37
  you've done in your life.
• 7:38
  Every human has to overcome challenges. And you're in this moment having overcome many challenges.
• 7:46
  So you're in that future that you dreamed up before.
• 7:50
  You're in that, what's it going to feel like when I get past this hurdle?
• 7:54
  You're there because you have overcome and surpassed hurdles already.
• 7:59
  So now what is this moment asking of you?
• 8:02
  Not what do you need to be doing in a year, but what about right now?
• 8:06
  In this second? What have you been ignoring? What have you been pushing down?
• 8:11
  What have you been doing and grinding and pushing on because you feel like you
• 8:17
  need to prove something to yourself?
• 8:19
  Now, listen, let me divide goals and ambitions from what I'm saying here.
• 8:26
  There are some things that we grind ourselves to a pulp trying to fix.
• 8:31
  And a lot of times it's happening in our jobs where we're like,
• 8:35
  okay, I'm in a toxic work environment.
• 8:37
  I want to be able to make an impact. I want to be able to fix a part of it.
• 8:42
  I want to be able to reflect on what I bring to this environment and how I might be able to change.
• 8:47
  Commendable. This is what we should do when we're in these environments.
• 8:50
  And if you feel yourself changing, if you feel yourself going into bad behavior
• 8:58
  because of the environment, or you're starting to realize the impact it's making on you.
• 9:03
  The impact on you is outweighing the impact you're having.
• 9:06
  It's sitting on you too heavily for you to really get out from under that and
• 9:11
  make the kind of impact you want to make.
• 9:13
  So when you're in these moments where you feel the weight of the place where
• 9:19
  you are and you're working through it and you're grinding yourself through it
• 9:23
  and you're pushing energy,
• 9:24
  I'm like forcing myself into a space or into a fix or into a solution for this.
• 9:31
  I'm pushing, pushing, pushing myself.
• 9:34
  I just want you to take a second and take a breath to allow yourself the grace
• 9:39
  to say, okay, maybe I didn't fix it.
• 9:42
  But maybe it's also time to leave. Maybe it's time to get out from under the
• 9:46
  weight of all of this and realize that maybe I can't make the level of impact
• 9:51
  I'd like to make. And maybe that's okay.
• 9:54
  Maybe I did put my heart and soul into this project and maybe it's not going to go to the finish line.
• 10:00
  And you know what? That's okay. Because in this moment, what I need is to be
• 10:05
  able to give more time and emotional support to my kids.
• 10:09
  And that's the moment I'm going to be in. And that's the choice I'm going to make right now.
• 10:14
  Because if I make the choice to push harder in the workspace or push harder
• 10:20
  on this project, I'm going to ignore the things that life is asking of me right now.
• 10:26
  What is really required of me right now?
• 10:28
  And why am I doing this other thing? There are good reasons.
• 10:32
  I hate the word good, but there are viable reasons for staying in something that's hard, right?
• 10:39
  I don't want to just say jump ship immediately when things get hard.
• 10:43
  I believe in doing the work. I believe in facing things that are difficult and
• 10:48
  understanding why they feel difficult before jumping ship 100%.
• 10:52
  But sometimes we just beat ourselves up over and over thinking it's us.
• 10:58
  It's not always us. Okay.
• 10:59
  I am a firm believer, if you've worked with me, know what's yours.
• 11:03
  And also know what's not yours.
• 11:07
  If you're in an environment that is not feeling healthy, take responsibility
• 11:11
  for what's yours, but also recognize that it's likely not healthy,
• 11:16
  not because of anything you've done.
• 11:20
  Very possible that that environment was in a bad place before you even entered it.
• 11:26
  So just be honest about what you can change and what you can't change and be
• 11:32
  okay with imperfection.
• 11:34
  Be okay with maybe you couldn't solve that problem.
• 11:38
  Give yourself grace and strip away this identification of all of these milestones
• 11:46
  and all of these solves and all of this impact I've made is the definition of who I am.
• 11:54
  Yes, it's part of your character. It's part of what makes you you.
• 11:58
  It's part of your special, magical fairy dust.
• 12:02
  That's part of who you are. And also, if you're using it as a weapon against
• 12:08
  yourself, look at how I'm failing. Look at how I've failed.
• 12:12
  Look at how I'm not able to do this. I should be able to do this.
• 12:14
  How come I'm not able to do this? It's all my fault.
• 12:17
  I'm terrible. Look at how bad I am. That's a time to go, wait,
• 12:22
  is that true? Is that true?
• 12:24
  Am I really so awful or is it just time?
• 12:27
  Is it just time for me to say, you know what? This is not what life is asking of me right now.
• 12:32
  Beating myself up over this, pushing, pushing, pushing is not serving me right
• 12:38
  now. It's not serving what I need anymore.
• 12:41
  Or what the people around me need in this moment.
• 12:45
  And I'm okay with that. It's a journey. Getting to that place where you're okay
• 12:49
  with it is a journey. All I'm hoping to do is bring awareness.
• 12:53
  Be honest with yourself. Are you using it against yourself, this push,
• 12:58
  this proving, I need to prove something to myself that I can do this?
• 13:02
  Why? What are you trying to prove? How is that going to benefit your life as a whole?
• 13:07
  I am in a business that has hurdles, I'm an entrepreneur. I'm running a business. There are hurdles.
• 13:13
  And I am committed to getting over these hurdles.
• 13:17
  Because to me, when I look at that and I look at the reasons why I want to get
• 13:21
  over these hurdles, it feels right.
• 13:23
  It feels aligned. It feels like this is the kind of work I want to be doing,
• 13:28
  not just the work itself, but the personal work.
• 13:31
  This is the growth trajectory I want to be on.
• 13:34
  These are the things I want to work through. These are the hurdles that I feel
• 13:38
  like are really going to help me in many places in my life.
• 13:43
  If it gets to, I don't want to use the word hard,
• 13:46
  but if it gets to the point where it feels like I'm just forcing and it doesn't
• 13:51
  feel aligned anymore and it feels like I'm just trying to prove something to
• 13:56
  myself and it's really clearly not going well,
• 13:59
  I need to be honest with myself and go,
• 14:01
  all right, am I in it because I'm trying to prove something to myself or am
• 14:05
  I in it because it feels like the right challenge for me?
• 14:08
  What are the signs telling you? Don't ignore them.
• 14:11
  Follow your instincts. Your instincts know. Your instincts are like,
• 14:15
  this is a shit show. I got to get out.
• 14:17
  Follow your instinct. They're going to tell you the truth.
• 14:21
  It's when we try to push that stuff down and ignore it, ignore how we're feeling
• 14:25
  and how our body is reacting to something.
• 14:28
  When we put our blinders on and we just put our heads down, we're like,
• 14:31
  this is just what we need to do. We just need to stay here.
• 14:33
  We just need to like work through it, work through it.
• 14:36
  Really? Why? What are the things that are coming up? What are the fears and
• 14:40
  insecurities that are coming up that are keeping you somewhere?
• 14:45
  Or keeping you in a situation that is not benefiting you?
• 14:49
  Is it time for me to let go of this pressure I put on myself of doing everything at the highest level?
• 14:58
  Whose standards are we trying to meet?
• 15:01
  And how are those standards helping us along the journey that we're on in our
• 15:07
  lives, getting to that finish line in our lives, which is basically like laying on our deathbeds going?
• 15:14
  Did I live the life that I wanted to live?
• 15:18
  And if you're always in this proving I need to be perfect energy,
• 15:22
  you're going to miss a lot of life going on around you because you're trying
• 15:27
  to get something so perfectly dialed in and right. Life is messy.
• 15:32
  Life changes constantly.
• 15:34
  Life is the shit in between the good and the good, right?
• 15:39
  Like that is where life happens. It's how we manage that stuff.
• 15:43
  It's how we move through it.
• 15:45
  It's how we process it and grow from it. That's life.
• 15:49
  Life is all that messiness. Be messy.
• 15:52
  Life is not perfect. Life never goes as planned. We can put our life plan together
• 15:57
  and it's just not going to happen according to what the spreadsheet says is going to happen.
• 16:03
  It's just never going to be that way. Work isn't going to happen that way.
• 16:06
  Relationships aren't going to happen that way. Rather than forcing and trying
• 16:10
  to control the perfectionism of everything and making it dominate your life,
• 16:17
  just ask yourself in this moment, what is life asking of me?
• 16:22
  What is my life asking of me right now? How is it asking me to show up?
• 16:27
  Who are the people that really need my focus and attention right now?
• 16:32
  And am I giving that focus and attention to those people or am I being distracted?
• 16:38
  Where's that peace going to come from? So just look at the decisions you're
• 16:42
  making, the places where you're staying, the places that you're not leaving,
• 16:46
  and just make sure you like your reasons.
• 16:50
  All your decisions are correct. There's no right or wrong. Every decision will
• 16:54
  lead you to the place you are meant to go to.
• 16:57
  But if you took the pressure off yourself, if you stopped beating yourself up,
• 17:03
  if you allowed yourself the grace to make mistakes or to make choices that maybe,
• 17:08
  maybe are not right, like maybe they're going to be messy and hard.
• 17:12
  But if you allowed yourself to look at where you are and what you're doing and
• 17:16
  the relationships you're in and the work environments you're in,
• 17:19
  if you looked at that really honestly and said, this is one of those hurdles I want to work through,
• 17:25
  this feels right, feels aligned with the work I want to be doing here. Great.
• 17:31
  Stay in it. 100%. Love that.
• 17:35
  If you're like, this hurdle feels like just me trying to prove something to
• 17:40
  myself or people please or do what other people expect of me.
• 17:44
  And it's really hurting me. It's really hurting my heart.
• 17:47
  It's hurting my physical well-being.
• 17:50
  I feel bad. A lot of people get sick at work.
• 17:53
  They get sick over and over. I
• 17:55
  was in a job where I just kept getting bronchitis over and over and over.
• 18:00
  And number one, I wasn't stopping work. I wasn't taking care of myself.
• 18:03
  And everybody was like, can you stop bringing bronchitis to the office?
• 18:08
  Like, just stay home, bro.
• 18:11
  And I was just like, I just got to do it. I got to do it. I got to climb up
• 18:16
  this hill with my bronchitis.
• 18:18
  And like, surprise, surprise, I have asthma now. Like, duh.
• 18:21
  I mean, these things creep up on us. And when we push it down and we ignore
• 18:25
  it, it comes back with a vengeance. It comes back with a vengeance.
• 18:29
  So many soapbox episodes this month.
• 18:33
  So much about emotion, but I really hope you take something from this.
• 18:38
  I feel like the fall is a transitional time in general, but I do feel like there's
• 18:43
  a lot of people coming to me recently who are like, I need to make a change.
• 18:47
  And it's hard to make change.
• 18:49
  And so I hope you just reflect on this and make those decisions from a place
• 18:53
  of being really honest with yourself and allowing yourself to lean into what
• 18:58
  might be good about this change,
• 19:01
  what could be serving you about making this change,
• 19:04
  rather than thinking about all the things that you're going to be missing out
• 19:07
  on or all of the hard parts.
• 19:09
  Just lean into like, what could
• 19:11
  be really good for me here? And I'm going to leave it at that, folks.
• 19:15
  And as always, if you have comments or questions or things you want to work
• 19:20
  through. I'm here. You can leave a comment.
• 19:23
  You can write me an email, set up a call. I'm rooting for you.
• 19:28
  Music.