Latest / Business for Humans / Recognition and Burnout

Transcript

Recognition and Burnout · Business for Humans

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  I'm Jaime Gennaro, business coach, consultant, and founder of Practica Consulting.
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  In today's episode, I explore the concept of hypervigilance and its impact on high achievers.
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  I discuss the importance of
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  self-awareness, relaxation, and reframing productivity to prevent burnout.
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  I share insights and practical tips on how to recognize tension,
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  practice self-compassion, and shift mindset patterns for healthier work and life balance. Enjoy.
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  Well, hi guys. What I want to talk about today is, and I'm kind of a little
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  raspy, sorry about that, but I want to talk about the idea of hypervigilance.
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  It sounds so big and so serious.
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  But I first heard this term in my yoga teacher training, and they were saying
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  that it's important to look for students who are hypervigilant.
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  And it's not necessarily a positive. And this kind of shook me up because I
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  am the student who wants to do it right and wants to get a pat on the back and
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  wants to get the teacher's attention because I'm doing all the things to be a good student.
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  But in the yoga world, if you're being hypervigilant, it means that you're probably tensing your muscles.
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  You're thinking too much about what you're doing. you're
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  being performative you're existing outside
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  of your body instead of being in a flow
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  being in a relaxed state focusing inward
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  and not caring what
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  people think about outside of you
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  and this kind of blew my mind because
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  I've always been an athlete a
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  student a people pleaser trying to
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  do it right trying to get that pat on the back and
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  I was you know now learning about it
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  from the other standpoint of like look for those students because
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  they need support and
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  not support and pats on the back like look how great
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  you're doing you're doing it well but more like how can
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  you release more how can you let
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  out of the position more how can you use props how can you make it easier on
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  yourself and then I was like ding ding ding that is the nugget of all the work
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  that I do and that word just made me realize like.
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  It's all tied up in not just people pleasing, because that makes it sound like
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  if you're a high performer or high achiever or hard worker,
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  it sort of minimizes the work that you do and how amazing you are and what a badass you are.
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  But there is this level of with
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  the people that I work with and also reflecting on
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  my own journey and my career and and my
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  journey with yoga too and basically all the
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  other sports that I've ever done is like I want to do it well I want to perform
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  I want to look like I'm doing it well not from like an ego standpoint but just
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  because I want to do like I'm competitive like I want to do things at the highest
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  level I can possibly do them.
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  But there's this need for recognition or this need for getting a pat on the back.
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  And it's not bad. I'm not saying you shouldn't be looking for that.
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  But what drives people like us into burnout is that if we don't get that pat
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  on the back and we don't get the validation, we keep trying to prove and we
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  keep trying to prove and we keep trying to get that pat on the back.
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  And it might be from a manager who's not great.
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  It may be from a coworker who's just not paying attention.
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  It may be in an environment that just doesn't give pats on the back.
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  And then we're like proving, proving, trying harder, trying harder.
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  How do I get the pat on the back?
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  And what I want to help you understand is that hypervigilance and competing
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  and proving your worth and showing up at that high achieving level all the time
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  is not getting you the rewards that you're hoping for.
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  And I know this to be true. And I know you're shaking your head like,
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  dang, I've been putting so much into this and I haven't been getting the same thing out of it.
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  So how do we make that shift? When we use yoga as a metaphor,
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  so much of that practice is about who you are in the moment.
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  You might show up for a practice and you might be energetic and ready to go
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  and doing all the hardest poses and doing headstands and handstands and wheels
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  and all the things, right?
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  And you might be ready to do that one day and the very next day you might have no energy.
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  And so much of that practice is just showing up anyway and having your own back
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  and not pushing yourself when there's no need to push.
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  So like I had a little minor shoulder injury in my old days. I would have shown up.
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  I would have done all the hardest things anyway. And I would have pushed through
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  the pain and I would have iced it afterwards.
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  And like, I don't want to appear weak.
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  And now that I'm older, I even have more of that because I'm like,
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  I don't want to be the one in the class that can't do the stuff.
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  Like, I want to show up and I want to do it all.
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  And in my old days, I would have just pushed through the pain,
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  pushed through the pain, pushed through the pain, prove yourself,
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  prove yourself, prove yourself. And now I'm like, for what?
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  Nobody's paying attention. Nobody is looking at me in that class. Nobody cares.
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  And they shouldn't. Because if they're looking at me, they're not thinking about,
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  or hopefully not thinking, and just turning inward and having their own practice
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  and their own experience.
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  Now, at work, it's harder to apply these principles.
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  It's not. But your brain is going to try to convince you it doesn't work like that.
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  Because you need to prove yourself. You need to be competitive. You need to perform.
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  You need to show up in all those ways. Yes and,
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  There is a way to show up in your best form, some good days, some bad days,
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  having your own back, but turning inward and knowing that you are good at your
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  job, whether you're doing a handstand or not,
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  you always create value because your value is inherent in who you are and how you show up.
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  And I know this because if you're listening to this or you've worked with me,
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  you are a hardworking, high-achieving, ambitious, most likely woman.
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  Maybe not. That's great. I'm so glad you're here because we need more men in
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  this world, in this space of paying attention, being self-aware. so stay.
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  But there's a way to do all that without pushing yourself into pain.
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  And how do we do it? Well, breathing.
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  So, and this might seem really like a weird thing to say, but we hold our breath
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  and we hold tension in our body and we carry that around.
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  And then we get home and we're like, oh why can't
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  i relax why can't i relax well your muscles
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  have been tensing all day long that
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  tension is like in your fascia which is
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  you know all of the the material that connects your muscles to your bones it
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  just is in there holding on and this is why we have weird posture the swear
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  necks hurt this is why we have low back pain because we hold all this tension and we can't let go of it.
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  I just want to bring awareness to this tension, to this pushing,
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  to this working through the pain.
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  What if you pulled back a bit? It's kind of like at the heart of all the work that I do.
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  What if you were in a yoga class and you didn't do the full-on push-up every time with your knees up?
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  What does it mean about you?
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  This is the conversation we have
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  with ourselves. Well, if I do it with my knees up, I'm weak. I'm lazy.
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  I'm not good enough. I'm not capable.
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  Nobody's going to think I'm strong. Nobody's going to think I have power.
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  Nobody's going to think I'm good enough. Well, let's just translate that into
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  you are thinking all those things about yourself.
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  You are thinking that if you put your knees down for a push-up,
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  that somehow you're weak, lazy, not good enough.
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  So how do we reframe that how do we put ourselves in a position where it's like
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  even if i put my knees down i'm still strong i'm still capable i'm still powerful
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  some days i'm gonna do it with my knees up i'm not always gonna take the easy way out i mostly never do.
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  So I'm going to take the easy way, the easier way, because I never do. And I want to try it.
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  I want to try it on. I want to see how it feels. I don't have to commit to it.
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  But I'd like to know if I could do a whole class with my knees down and how
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  I would feel afterwards. I did this yesterday.
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  I, you know, I'm nursing the shoulder thing. I decided I'm going to keep my
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  knees down the whole class for the push-up portion. If you know yoga,
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  you know what I'm talking about. If you don't know yoga, just imagine.
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  You do a bunch of push-ups, and you can do push-ups with your knees up.
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  You can do push-ups with your knees down.
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  Men and women have both options, right? But we try to take the harder option.
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  And I just decided at the beginning of class, I'm just going to put my knees down.
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  I'm going to go easy because if I start with my knees up, I'm going to push
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  myself too hard, and I'm probably going to walk away with an injury.
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  And I don't want an injury. It took weeks for my shoulder to heal.
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  I don't want to go back there, okay? And this is how I feel about work.
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  I don't want people to go back to that habitual pattern of pushing themselves into pain.
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  I want you to know how it feels to take it easier because it will start to create
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  relief and space, and it's going to release tension in your body.
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  This is what happens. And it starts in
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  your brain it starts with understanding where in
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  the day are you holding your breath where in the day are you holding tension
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  in your body there is no judgment there's no shame these are deeply ingrained
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  patterns it's all kept you alive it's put you in the place where you are in
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  your career in your family life all the things it's it's served you.
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  But now that pain is catching up with you.
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  It's making you tired. It's making you unable to do some of the other things.
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  You've pushed through pain for too long.
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  Start to notice the patterns. Start to notice the breathing,
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  holding of breath, the muscle tension.
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  Start to notice where you're like, I need to push harder.
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  Because that's not always the answer. Even business owners are like,
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  just push harder, push harder. Well, you might be pushing on the wrong things
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  and that's why you're not having the results that you want.
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  You have value. I want you to, besides the awareness, I want you to write down
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  all the ways that you create value at work.
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  Don't hold back. Brag. Nobody's going to see this piece of paper.
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  You might want to show it to somebody because you're like, see,
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  give me a pat on the back. Look at all the things I'm doing.
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  I want you to start giving yourself pats on the back.
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  I do firmly believe that managers should recognize the talent of their people.
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  That is a critical component of retaining talent.
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  So I'm not saying we need to dismiss them, but right now you're working on building
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  your own funnel of recognition, pats on the back,
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  confidence, really believing in yourself and standing up for yourself.
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  So just Where are all the places where you could make things easier? Put your knees down.
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  Decide when you show up at work tomorrow.
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  That the whole my calendar is full thing is a farce because you can move things around.
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  And I know you're like, no, I can't. Yes, you can. Because if you were sick,
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  you would move those things around.
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  So move things around on a day where you're like, today's my knees down day.
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  Today is a day where I'm going to take it easy. And you don't have to only do
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  that when you're feeling sick or you're feeling off or it's not your best day.
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  Do a knees down day when you have tons of energy when you feel really good where
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  you feel like you could take on the world because what you're gonna do is you're
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  gonna train yourself into.
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  Managing your energy just because you have tons of energy that you could expend
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  at work and trying to prove and getting recognition and all of that you might
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  use all of that great energy and then get home and be completely tanked when
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  the people who love you and also deserve the best part of your energy,
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  you're going to have used it all.
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  So take a knees down day, start to notice where you're holding your breath,
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  where you're holding tension in your body.
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  Just bring awareness to these things. This is always the first place that we go.
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  And even if you've worked with me before, if you've worked with a coach or you're
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  doing mindfulness training, we still forget.
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  It's, you know, it's a lifelong process, these things.
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  So you can always go back to the foundation, which is, am I holding my breath?
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  Do I need to breathe more?
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  These are things you can do at work and nobody is going to know.
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  You can breathe. Like, everybody breathes. It's not like you have to do an ohm.
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  Just notice, am I breathing? Like, okay, I'm going to breathe a little deeper.
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  I'm going to breathe into my belly.
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  I'm going to let the breath fill me up. Like, you can take a 30-second breath break.
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  Just remind yourself, like, yeah, I'm holding all my breath or I'm breathing,
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  like, really shallow. Okay.
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  Is my posture weird? Do I need to get up and take a break? Do I need to take a walk?
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  I need to do that right now. I was like, grind, grind, grind.
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  I have all these things I need to finish.
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  Mandatory walk. I already did my workout, but I need to just get up and move my body.
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  I need to get some circulation going. I need to take a walk.
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  So I'm going to cut myself off after this. I'm not going to do all the millions
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  of other tasks that I could just sit down and finish.
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  Finish i'm gonna go take a walk these are the priorities
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  right these are the ways that we start to change patterns when we want to do
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  the thing we do the thing you want to take a walk go take a walk don't make
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  excuses for why it's not allowed oh it's going to slow down my productivity
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  all these things right you know that those things are not true and you've just been using them,
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  as an excuse for a while so if you're listening to
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  this maybe you're already on a walk good for you maybe you are I don't know
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  getting ready for work put it in your calendar now get online drop a little
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  you know an hour-long walk in your calendar no excuses you don't have to,
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  tell people why you're taking a knees down day but you need to train your mind
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  that it doesn't mean you're lazy that it doesn't mean you have less value that
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  it doesn't mean that somehow you're not capable or good enough.
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  We're retraining all those things. Why are we doing that?
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  You're going to laugh. But like, this is how we
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  break down the ways of working that have been established for as long as we
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  can remember by a certain class of people who are trying to oppress their workers
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  so that they can stay at the top.
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  Like, this is an old paradigm, right? We don't shift the
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  paradigm if we stay in the
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  role of the subservient right if
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  we stay in that role we're going to perpetuate this
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  cycle forever i'm not saying you have to like go and have you know anarchy and
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  chaos in the in the workplace what i'm saying is start to detach yourself from
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  this being something personal you know something about your self-worth your
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  self-confidence like start to detach those two things.
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  Your full identity does not have to be tied to this job. I'm not saying leave your job.
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  I'm just saying like start to understand that the way you show up at work could
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  be indicative of some old personal patterns or some paradigm patterns.
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  And why would you want to give the best
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  part of yourself to something that is not giving the best part of itself to
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  you if you're not a partner in the business if you're not getting like incredibly
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  abundant salaries at the level
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  where it makes sense that you have to like grind right i'm talking like,
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  i don't even know what that salary would be for some people there's not enough
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  money for them to grind themselves to a pulp or get sick right there's just
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  not a number that pays for that.
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  But maybe there is for you. If you're making that number and you have a reason,
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  okay, then you can work harder.
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  I'm not saying you don't work hard. I'm just, I hope you understand the gist
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  of what I'm trying to get to you here.
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  Some people, there's a number. I'll work hard for that number.
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  I'll work, I'll grind myself to a pulp for that number.
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  If you're not making that number, pull back.
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  Notice where you're giving too much, where you're being performative,
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  where you're being hypervigilant.
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  For the wrong reasons be hyper vigilant
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  with your family and pull back a little bit at
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  the job it doesn't mean you're incapable it doesn't mean
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  you're lazy it doesn't mean that you're not valuable you're all
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  those things this is a little bit of a mindset shift of getting out of that
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  high achieving energy and into the if i put my knees down i still have as much
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  value and i shouldn't have to work more or get paid less if I'm taking a knees down day.
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  Doesn't mean anything. Try it out. See what it means for you,
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  like what a knees down day is, like
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  how that, how you show up at work differently if it's a knees down day.
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  Notice. Don't judge. Just
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  take note of all the things I talked about today let me
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  know let me know if it's working okay quick
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  one i hope it's i hope
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  it settles i hope it marinates i hope
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  it makes an impression over the rest of this week into
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  next week and i will talk to you then hey guys so my spring reset is still open
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  for 500 euros you get three one-on-one sessions with me that you can use until
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  june 21st i'm only holding three spots open, so make sure to book today.
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  The link is in the show notes.