Growth Instigators Hotline

#490 Gasoline: Important guage!

• Aaron Havens • Season 5 • Episode 490

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A near-empty tank can turn a great drive into a scramble for the next exit, and the same thing happens in our leadership when we run on fumes. Using gasoline as a clear, memorable metaphor, we explore how to track the energy that powers your decisions—emotional, physical, financial, and relational—so you can prevent burnout, protect momentum, and make better calls under pressure. Instead of waiting for results to slip, we show how a simple dashboard helps you spot dips early and refuel with small, timely actions.

I walk through the core elements of building a personal dashboard: choosing the few gauges that matter, scoring them honestly, and identifying one small move each week that lifts your score. We talk about why energy is a leading indicator, how micro-refuels like sleep anchors, movement snacks, budget check-ins, and candid one-on-ones keep your tank healthy, and what happens when you ignore the warning lights. You’ll hear stories and practical prompts that make the process easy to start and simple to sustain.

As a coach, I also share why a second set of eyes can accelerate growth, offering neutral feedback and focused questions that reveal blind spots and simplify next steps. If you’ve been pushing hard, coasting, or feeling that “almost empty” panic, this conversation gives you a framework to regain control and build margin with intention. Subscribe for more Growth Instigators Hotline messages, share this with someone who’s running low, and leave a quick review to tell us which gauge you’ll check first.

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SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to message 490 of the Growth Instigators Hotline, where we examine an everyday normal object and assign it a deeper meaning. I'm Aaron Havens, your host and growth coach. What can gasoline remind us of today? We all pay attention to the gasoline gauge, the fuel gauge in our cars. Wise leaders monitor energy levels, emotional, spiritual, relational, not just results. Ignore the dashboard is a costly mistake. Gasoline is taken for granted until it's running low. I think we've all been there on the perfect road trip, jamming our jams and commuting or whatever, and we look down with panic. Oh shoot, I'm almost out of gas. Then suddenly you'd pay twice the dollar amount just to have enough fuel to finish your trip. Uh raise your hand. I've ran out of gas twice in my life. How about you? It's an exhilarating feeling to say the least. So we know the importance of monitoring fuels in our vehicles. How about in our lives? Now I get the honor to coach some incredibly smart individuals and companies, and one of the most powerful tools I walk clients through is named, I've named it the dashboard. This is an Andy Stanley idea that I've morphed over the years. If you look at your life, what are the most important areas that you evaluate often? Emotional, physical, financial, relational. I'm not sure what they are in your life. I know what they are in mine. So as you take a leadership lesson from gasoline today, we monitor the gauge closely in our cars. What gauges do you monitor just as closely in your life? Is closely the right word there? I'm not sure. So, anyways, if you need help with your thinking in your life and leadership, I can help. Your life is too valuable to just be coasting along. Sometimes we just need another set of ears or eyes on something to help growth happen. Shoot me a text or send me an email at Aaron at Growth Instigators.com if that is you. And hey, you can listen to any of our past messages wherever you get your podcast. Join us next week as we examine leadership lessons from oh, this is gonna be a good one. From coffee. That's right. 491. The message will start, and we'll examine a leadership lesson from Coffee. If you have any thoughts you'd like to share, I'd love to hear them. Contact me at Growth Aaron at growth instigators.com or leave me a message after the beep. Here's two thinking better.