THA S02 EP#35 - Sell With Soul: How Nervous System Regulation Builds Sustainable Revenue

Hustle culture has a way of convincing you that the answer is always more. More calls, more hours, more systems, more data. Michael Cupps sits down with Meg Misiak, a sales training expert who spent 12 years scaling teams at companies like HubSpot and Blend before burning out herself, to talk about what it actually looks like to stop doubling down on the wrong habits.

Meg's concept of Effortless Abundance is the idea that top performers are not working harder than everyone else. They're working with less waste, more strategy, and a clear understanding of why they're doing what they're doing. That clarity is the thing that makes habits stick.

The conversation gets honest about what burnout actually looks like from the inside, how performance can quietly become a value that slowly breaks you, and why subtracting the wrong things often has to come before adding any new habits at all. Michael shares his own story from a sales cruise he spent mentally checked out, distracted by a software deal, with his son nearby, and what a cancer diagnosis a few years later made him reckon with about the way he had been operating.

Meg also walks through her Sales Archetype Workshop, the Jungian framework she uses to help reps find the energetic identity that connects their habits to something they actually care about. And both she and Michael agree on something that tends to get buried in high-performance environments: values are not the words in your notebook. They are the choices you make every single day.

Connect with Meg Misiak: linkedin.com/in/megmisiak

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Transcript

Hello, and good morning. My name's Michael Cupps, the host of The Habit Architect. We're glad to have you here as usual. We... I'm excited about this guest today. We're gonna have a good conversation. Before we do, I just want you to remind you to go back and watch some of our previous episodes. CUPPS: Like them, follow them, subscribe on whatever podcast channel you get your information from, because that's really important to us as we continue to build this. And one of our guests, m- most recently Chantelle actually wrote a book that's very similar in vein to this. She called it The Success Lie. CUPPS: 0:35

Our guest today, Meg, is gonna, is, We're gonna have a great time, by the way, on this conversation, and I love this topic because what she talks about is the bad things about huls- hustle culture. And we've all been in that case where, our boss or we just think we have to work harder to get more, and we feel like no matter what it is, we just need to do more of the same thing. CUPPS: What if that same thing is the wrong habit and you're just pressing down and doing more, doubling down on the wrong thing? And I think a lot of people in business get to this point, particularly in sales and marketing, and that's

Meg's s- expertise, so we're gonna hear from that. She has got a concept that I love the name of it. CUPPS: It's called effor- Effortless Abundance because just think about those two words together makes us all very happy if you think about it. So I can't wait to ask her about that. So let's bring Meg on and get started with this episode. And while she's joining, a reminder, you can ask questions. If you're on LinkedIn, just type it into the video there, and as well as YouTube. CUPPS: 1:35

So those two are live. Send us all the questions. Meg said beforehand when we talked that she would answer them all, so send them in. Meg, great to see you. Hello. MEGAN: Hi. Good morning. So good to see you. CUPPS: Good morning. It's good to see you, too, from Mexico City as well. That's great to have a little international. CUPPS: We have Flora, our producer, in Argentina, you in Mexico City, and me in boring Dallas, MEGAN: yeah. She was talking about how humid it is there, and I'm like I would love a little humidity." We are in rainy season right now. A lot of people think Mexico is just hot and beautiful and sunny, and I'm like, "No, it's... MEGAN: Mexico City, we just have six months of rain every day," CUPPS: yeah. MEGAN: Yeah. Dealing with that. Yeah, well- But you might hear

the birds chirping. It's a good day. CUPPS: Yeah, it's a good day. G- glad to have you here. Why don't we start with an introduction. Be- give an introduction to yourself and what you do, and then we'll kinda dig into a lot of these topics. CUPPS: I'm fascinated by your practice here. MEGAN: 2:35

Yeah, and I really love the quick intro. So I, I'm Meg Michalak. I have spent 12 years s- basically building and scaling sales training programs. And- In that, I basically have worked with helping salespeople grow from very junior roles, like SDRs up to multimillion-dollar salespeople. MEGAN: I've worked with a ton of top performers, and most of my experience is in is in SaaS. This- Yeah ... this industry that is just super known and probably at this point infamous for being very burnout centric, hustle culture centric. Yeah. And I have always had a passion, even when I was in sales, for figuring out

different ways of doing things. MEGAN: At first it was like, how do I succeed as quickly as possible? And honestly, that led me to burning out myself. So I started my company a- almost six years ago, and I have been helping companies like HubSpot and Blend figure out the best way to, for their teams to sell. MEGAN: 3:35

But a year ago, I turned something that was a passion project for me, which was coaching individual sales reps on very similar- Oh ... journeys I had of going, hitting burnout, realizing wait, what am I doing? And then finding more sustainable ways to still be a top performer, but to also have more balance and to find this, what I love the mantra, effortless abundance. MEGAN: Like, how can we- Yes ... do the most success, the most living but with the least effort and especially the least waste. CUPPS: Yes, absolutely. That's exactly, and I wanna dig into that. I'm

excited about that. So my career started in sales 30 years ago, something like that. I don't wanna say out loud. CUPPS: Yeah. It's got my gray hair. The, and it was interesting because it was very much the more you do, the more you'll be successful. And it was interesting because the sales training then, a- and I never really liked it, it was more about how do you manipulate the conversation I think, as opposed to- Yeah CUPPS: 4:35

what are we doing to meet the customer in the middle and be more successful? Now, over time, it's changed and I've, I know there's better programs and stuff like that. But if you think with those two things, I can still hear people saying if you just make more phone calls," or, "If you do this you're gonna be successful." CUPPS: And I watched and managed a lot of salespeople that wasn't the, that wasn't the trigger that made them successful. It wasn't more that made them successful. It was how they did what they were focused on more successful. And so I'm looking forward to that. But let's talk about the burnout, 'cause I think that's a significant starting point for us because we may have people listening to this that are feeling that way or had felt that way. CUPPS: And tell us a little bit about that journey if you don't mind, because I think that's an important

aspect of it. MEGAN: Yeah. And before we dive into that, I actually just wanna highlight something you said that I resonate with so deeply. Even 30 years ago the cult of more in sales is so strong. 30 years ago, it might have been just more calls. MEGAN: 5:35

For me, when I started in sales, it was literally knocking on more doors. I was in, in the field. It was, like, more hours of NPR- Yeah ... 'cause I'm driving everywhere. And today that is, is so interesting because I think the cult of more has shifted. We pretend like we're so efficient and we are so productive, but now it's more systems. CUPPS: Yes. MEGAN: People are using it like it's more systems, more data, more personalization, more this, more that, and it's so shocking because most of the work that I do is just helping people figure out how to do less. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: And it's not more systems. It's not more data. Even more personalization, I'm like, everyone's using personalization. MEGAN: It's not even differentiated at

this point- Exactly. Yes ... and it's just bad. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: So I truly think the focus and the strategy is what I see. The irony is that what you said, like, when you look at the top performers, it is they're doing less, but they're doing it-- they're doing-- it, it's less waste and less action, but it's more strategy. CUPPS: Yes. Yeah. MEGAN: And I think that is truly the differentiator that I see. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: 6:35

And it relates to my own burnout story. And, to be fair, I think a lot of people when I reach out and I-- about burnout, they're like, "No, not me. Not burnout." Yeah. So but when I talk to people about hustle culture and about how they feel at work, that's when things start to shift. MEGAN: I think fewer people actually hit a point of burnout, and for me, what that looked like, I ha- I was just chasing the corporate ladder and I was climbing very

quickly. I literally just had this dream of, VP by 35 and not that really meant anything, it was just, the corporate- Yeah MEGAN: brainwashing. I need to be better. I need to be more. And it ended up, like right before COVID hit, I had... I literally was working multiple jobs because they're like, "Oh, we'll hire people under your team." MEGAN: 7:35

I was growing a team for the first time after being like a s- one, team of one for years. MEGAN: But I, at that point, was working 70 to 80 hours per week. I literally would be in the office until 1:00 AM. I was barely, I'd eat snacks in the office. I was back to back meetings all day long. And it felt exciting in that moment. I was like, "I'm building something. I'm doing something important." MEGAN: But I had been working so hard towards a certain goal, and when COVID hit they're like,

"We, we've done hiring freeze. We don't actually... We can't just, like-" Give you a promotion CUPPS: Right MEGAN: And I just had this point, A- and I also helped to double the sales goal. Literally f- I implemented framework. MEGAN: 8:35

The sales goal, best in case, doubled, and it was just all of this work and all of this very tangible. I was a top performer and I could prove it with numbers. And when I heard we ke- my boss also said something very rude to me. He's we don't just give away promotions." MEGAN: Something in me just cracked, and it was, I had been taught my entire life that you work hard and it pays off. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: And I think i- in that moment, just something, like that formula within me cracked, and it was just existentially heartbreaking. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: So I went home and I turned off the light, and I remember this so vividly. MEGAN: I went home and I the sun was still out, and I realized I hadn't seen the sun leaving work- Oh ... in

over two years, and I feel like something in me just shut off with that light bulb. I just went to sleep, and I, so I think I slept for tw- 16 hours or something crazy, and I just felt so numb. MEGAN: 9:35

But I ended up literally taking time off of work for burnout, and- Yeah ... they, I quit my job. Yeah. They ended up replacing me with five different people, and I have spent the entire time since then figuring out how to work differently. Yeah. And honestly realizing there's a lot of... It's not only the external, it was so internal for me. MEGAN: Yeah. And figuring out what points, what patterns, what, even childhood. How did my values lead me to that point, and how can I now work differently? Yeah. And it's been a lot of habit building, a lot of therapy, and a lot of honestly just struggling through it, learning, changing, and iterating. CUPPS: Yeah. It I'm sorry that happened to you and I w- wish I could say that's a u-

a very unusual story, but there's probably a lot of people that have, when you say those words, they felt the same way. And the thing about- ... the sun I think that's such a interesting statement because I was out walking this morning like I do every morning now, and- MEGAN: Yeah CUPPS: I was thinking that fresh air does a lot for people. Even i- if you can just go outside and get fresh air in the middle of a day, and people don't do it. They don't, because they go into the office and they think they're in that hustle culture and we gotta turn it out, work it out, have back-to-back meetings. CUPPS: 10:35

All that stuff, and it- it's, it just makes you less productive. It, it- if you just kinda get out and can take a deep breath of fresh air, your, and the sun, whatever it is, that alone is something that people should make sure that they build into their day. But the, but that's just a small piece of it, obviously. CUPPS: But I, it just hit me when you said, "I didn't see the sun," because I remember weeks like that where I didn't, and same thing. So le- let's talk about, you s- you hit on something there that I wanna dig into. I'm so sorry you went through that, but I also think I'm glad you pulled out of it like you did because now you're helping so many people. CUPPS: And I- you mentioned something about habits

and values, and I do that a lot. When I teach people about habits, if they're not tied to your values they're not gonna stick, right? They're not gonna last because it's not something that y- at your center you believe in. And so you talk about that a little bit so how do you put that into practice, and how do you tie the values to production, right? CUPPS: 11:35

Because you're still talking to salespeople, they're still, they're hired to sell whatever it is that they need to do. That's their role in the company. So how do you pull back that hustle culture and tie it to values? H- what's the mechanism there? MEGAN: Oof. Yeah. And it's funny because with habit building, I think the habits that I have done and the things that I told myself I should do- MEGAN: Never stuck. Yeah. And even yesterday I had a c- a coaching call with a client. She was like, "Meg, even from the habit..." I think habits like I have a lot of even habits around cr- creativity and things like that, like- CUPPS: Yeah ... MEGAN: all of my little bad art in my background. And she was like, "How do

you, how did you kinda build those into a muscle?" MEGAN: And, like, how did you build an identity? 'Cause also at some point our habits become our identity. CUPPS: Yes. MEGAN: 12:35

And I literally told her I, it started with values. Yeah ... and sometimes not the values that I already had, but values of almost aspirational values. One year I'm very big as well on year-long journeys and cycles of your life, and especially big themes and mantras. MEGAN: I pull a tarot card of the year every year. Even the devil was one, which goes into a lot of habits. But I do think that your values are so important to habit building- But the place where I meet a lot of reps are when performance is their core value. MEGAN: It is the thing in their life that they have prioritized so deeply, and it's almost slowly breaking them. MEGAN: And they don't, like- Yeah ... come to me and say this, but

there's a lot of symptoms of this- CUPPS: Yeah ... MEGAN: where they say things like, "I have been a top performer for so long." I've done it because I'm working, 12, 13-hour days CUPPS: Yeah MEGAN: And they've noticed that things in their life have slowly started to deteriorate CUPPS: Oh, yeah MEGAN: 13:35

Such as with this client, for example, she was saying that she used to be so passionate about, about craft nights Yeah ... and she used to be super passionate about cooking, and she's still very passionate about, going out with her friends and trying to paddle boarding and kayaking- all these things. But she was like, "I just don't feel... my life is so revolved around work and performance right now." CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: And I think a part of what I call effortless abundance is realizing almost that performance as a value is, will break you, and so it's almost figuring out

what values, how do you... MEGAN: Either it's reconnecting with things that used to be important to you, or it's also just realizing how putting a, taking a stand and being like, "Hey my values are misaligned, and I feel it." Yeah. Whether it's not having enough time with your family, or a lot of people tell me a lot of my clients are parents, and they're like, "I am e- when I'm with my family, I'm thinking about work, and that's not the parent I wanna be." MEGAN: 14:35

Yeah. Even if you don't have kids, like me, I'm, like, being more present with my partner. Yeah. And also just having time for life. CUPPS: Yes. MEGAN: And so I think yeah, I'm so curious about your perspective on this. But for me, it's interesting because I think you can start with your values or you can realize, you can use aspirational values, yeah. As I've realized that my habits are now misaligned, and a lot of the work that I do with people is realizing that, like, where, figuring out where performance-

Yep ... as a value comes from in their life. A little sales therapy. CUPPS: Yep. MEGAN: Because so many of us have taught, been taught what good balance looks like. MEGAN: Yeah. And honestly, a lot of it is not very good habits. Yeah. So even deconstructing- Yeah ... your perspectives and the habits that you learned. A lot of people are like, "Oh my, my parent just came home, super late every day." And I'm like, "Okay, cool. Do you want the life that, your parents..." MEGAN: 15:35

Even, we love- Yeah ... our parents, hopefully. But I think a lot of people wanna do things differently. Yeah. So it's also just realizing, like, where do your values come from, and are you happy with them? Do they need a little, reconstruction? And what, where you wanna lean into more with your values, because truly, like- how you live your life CUPPS: Yeah MEGAN: Like, how you spend every single day is truly who you are Yeah And a lot of people just have this moment of Wait, this is not- Yeah MEGAN: the

life that I wanna live. CUPPS: Exactly. MEGAN: Yeah, we- And that's where habits can come in. CUPPS: Yeah, I wanna dig into that a little bit. But I wanna- Yeah ... recognize there's a lot of people commenting. Julianne and Mary both love the tho- thought of the sun and nature, said that's so important when we were talking about that earlier. CUPPS: Yeah. So appreciate that. And then Paul says, "This is a perfect topic." So we're on topic, Meg. What... We're in the right spot here it sounds like to help people. So yeah, you, you- Yeah ... said a couple things there that I wanna mention. I go back. My son was... Gosh, I don't even know how old he was. CUPPS: 16:35

Probably he was somewhere between five and 10, and my mom and dad and the family, we wanted to do a cruise, or they wanted to do a cruise. It was the last thing I thought I wanted to do, and that was the wrong attitude. And I remember being on... 'cause we were trying to sell a software company, it wasn't quite ready, that had some holes in it, and you get on the cruise, and I was out of touch, and I s- I remember sitting on that boat thinking, "When are we gonna get to somewhere I can get on the phone or get connected?" And what a horrible thing. I think it was horrible for my family, but it's one of the biggest regrets of my life 'cause I had an opportunity to do anything I wanted with my son, and instead I was... CUPPS: I- in the back of my mind I was

thinking about, how are we gonna get... sell this company? And it's just one of those things that we do get wrapped up in and we don't realize the cause and effect. A few years later I was diagnosed with cancer, and may- I... Were those related? I don't know. CUPPS: 17:35

Maybe. But I feel like there was something that was affecting my body that was because of the thoughts I was putting into it or the thoughts that I focused on. And that's why I do, I agree with you. Values are wildly important, and when I ask somebody, when we start talking about their habits- or their, how they work and things like that, I say what are your values?" They always rattle them off really quickly. Family, work, wealth, family, wealth, health, whatever. And I'm like- ... "Okay, one-word values. So let's talk about that. What does family mean?" And they, when you start digging into it and you say... CUPPS: and they start saying it's I n- I ne- I need to stop going to happy hour with the buddies at work," and y- and I'm like, "Okay, so your value there is that you wanna be with your buddies at work instead of your family," right? Because if you really... if family's your number one value, you're getting home to your family, not go, stopping by the bar after you spent eight hours with these guys, right? CUPPS: And then, and so it's, it really, people really need to sit down and think about it.

And I think there's a great exercise that I learned at the hierarchy of values, is just start, just write them down and then be honest with yourself, and then ask, "What are you doing to live that value?" As opposed to just- Yes CUPPS: 18:35

listing your values, but what are the actions that I can take to actually support that value, right? And what's interesting about what you're doing is it's... I think it's fascinating that you're taking a performance culture in sales, and you're saying, "Okay, if you still stick to your values, you're actually gonna be, get abundance, and it's gonna be less difficult to get there," right? CUPPS: Is it- MEGAN: Yeah ... exactly that? And... No, absolutely. And one thing that just resonated so deeply with what you said as well is a lot of people can rattle off their values, but for me- Values are not just like the thing that you put on your- Yeah ... in your little notebook, but it's truly how you live, and it is habits. MEGAN: Yeah. Because... Oof, and it hits 'cause I think so many of us have had this experience of saying they value something But even for me, like my relationship and my relationships with my family and my friends and my partner are so important to me. And so even every morning, like making sure that I spend quality time with my partner before I come into my little office, yeah. And sometimes it's so small. But like these habits are things that really can transform your life. And so it's interesting 'cause when we talk about we talk about performance I have also been raised in an environment where I was like, "Okay, you work hard, and you just work harder than anyone else." MEGAN: Yeah. "And that is what will be, make you successful." CUPPS: Yep. MEGAN: But it sounds like you had a similar experience of honestly, when I looked into top performance- No. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: That, the people that are

working the hardest and just doing the same sh- it's like the definition of insanity, right? Exactly. Exactly. MEGAN: It's like doing the same thing over and over. Yeah. The people that I work with that are, like, the top performers, they're doing things differently. CUPPS: Yep. MEGAN: And one, one thing that is so cool 'cause the way that I work with people, one of the first exercises I do pretty consistently is what I call a sales archetype workshop. MEGAN: 20:35

Where instead of talking about- I like that ... how do, what do you wanna do? What habits do you wanna integrate? That's good. We actually start from a place of values. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: But I actually talk about, like, how I use Jungian archetype if you're familiar. But there, there are things like I have a magician tattoo of my archetype. MEGAN: But we talk about how do you wanna show up. CUPPS: Yep. MEGAN: And I don't mean like in... I don't mean just like what, it goes back to what we were talking about earlier it's hard to integrate a habit if you don't know the why behind it. Yeah. And so how I really integrate the why is by choosing

this archetype. MEGAN: And some people are the sage, where it's like- Yeah ... using wisdom and doing things from helping people see things differently based on your experience. Some people are the hero, and they're literally, like- Yeah ... one of my clients is the heart-centric hero, and it's very much at work as well as in his personal life. CUPPS: Nice. MEGAN: 21:35

He's "No matter how tired I am, I'm going to be the dad." He has several little girls running around, and he's "I'm always the dad who no matter how tired I am, no matter what's going on, I will show up." Yeah. "I will be at every game. I will be, like, I will be at every parent-teacher conference." MEGAN: And, sh- figuring out what this energetic archetype is for you can be really beautiful because it's not just "Okay, I wanna be, I wanna focus on my family." I think we can get lost in all of the different things. Yep. But if you choose an archetype that truly embodies all the different values in your life- CUPPS: Yeah MEGAN: it makes it easier. CUPPS: Yeah. And I li- I like that because I, having managed team,

te- sales teams as well, and there was always this kind of natural jealousy, I think is the right word for it. And they'd say that Meg is top performer. Oh, she got all the good accounts. I'm like that's not how it works," right? CUPPS: It's not that you were just given great accounts, you worked them in a way that made them great accounts, right? Yeah. And it's an interesting thing though, because we talked earlier about hustle culture, and then you talk about values. And I, it ma- it dawned on me that what hustle culture is about is changing your values, right? CUPPS: 22:35

It's telling you that the value you had about being dad or the, the heart- lead with heart that's not your value. Your value in hustle culture is do more, and do it repeatedly, and do it without a break and all that stuff. And so it's an interesting... I really like that connection that you just made f- for me, at least, about how- Yeah CUPPS: how it's actually separating, it's separating your values, which makes you half the person, I think, or whatever you want, whatever percentage- Yeah ... you wanna say. And so if you're half the person doing that job repetitively, you're not doing it as

best you can, right? It's just not the way it works. MEGAN: Yeah. MEGAN: And it is really hard because when we think about why, like, why is hustle culture a thing, and, like, why does... I call it the cult of more. Because it's pretty culty. And it is, there's just this almost the realm of hun- hungry ghosts in- Yeah ... in sales where it's just wanting all... MEGAN: 23:35

even when when I work with people, they're always looking, maybe sometimes at first they're like, "What is what's the newest and greatest thing? What's this and what's that?" And I'm like, it is not the magic bullet. There's no there's no quick and easy. A lot of it is just going back to the basics and also realizing that sales is literally just basic psychology and human connection. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: But I think the interesting thing about people in sales is it's such an, a beautiful opportunity for people who are so hungry for

success and- MEGAN: Validation- Yeah ... and are willing to work really hard to achieve it. And especially what I find is sometimes my clients open up to me the very first call. MEGAN: 24:35

Sometimes I've literally worked for clients who open up to me about some of the spiritual roots of why they are working so hard, like years later. Yeah. I literally have one of my clients who grew up in a cult-like religious environment. I have veterans. I have even people who they had a pretty good childhood but were seen as lesser than, yeah. The sibling that wasn't really as good in school or this or that. And not to, drama is all relative, but I find this, there is a trend. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: And maybe I'm just biased 'cause I work in sales and I see everyone in sales, and it's probably everyone, but I think that sales does attract a certain type of person who is hungry- CUPPS: Yeah MEGAN:

for that, A- and is willing to put so much work into it. And the issue is that the sales industry oh, it is a trauma bond with people f- like that, it's so easy to, to just break. CUPPS: Yep. MEGAN: But yeah, what I've found is that people who do end up having a ton of success there's two versions of that. MEGAN: 25:35

Yeah. There's the people who do turn into, like we've talked about, even those parents who literally just go to work all day, then have to go out for drinks with their coworkers because they have to they're so on and- Yeah ... dysregulated or "Oh, I need to..." MEGAN: It's okay, is it really actually about having, fun with your coworkers, or is it just 'cause you've then have so much coffee every single day that you're just like- Yeah. ... "I need to I need to numb from the stress," or, "I need to, like- yeah ... come down from all the caffeine." And so also just realizing that I think sales is a place where- More is, and like seeking more- Yeah MEGAN: is

so deep within our souls. And people are willing to really put in that work. But it's also interesting because for a, from a sales leadership environment, I don't know what you've seen, but what I've seen is that it's easier to have more as a strategy than have better as a strategy. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: Yeah. MEGAN: Yeah. Because then you have to actually admit that some things are broken. Yeah. Yep. You have to train people. And if we actually just say, "Hey, the people who actually succeed are the people who just work harder"- CUPPS: Yeah ... MEGAN: 26:35

that's a hell of a lot easier. And it actually that's not leadership. That's literally just, like- CUPPS: Yeah MEGAN: burning people out. CUPPS: Exactly. Do you see that? And I, yeah, I abs- 100% agree with you on that. So w- and I realize we're down at the half hour, which we try to go 30 to 45 minutes, and I could talk to you for hours. ... But let's talk a little bit about how you do it. So somebody calls you, an individual or a sales manager that has a team of five, 10, whatever. CUPPS: H- what's the process that you go through? And you mentioned the archetypes, so maybe that's where we've already talked a little bit about it. MEGAN: Yeah. Honestly I would

say a lot of times where I start is figuring out people's why, right? We ta- we actually, this has been such a common thread through this conversation, is the easier to build habits if you have a very clear why, or even, like, why not. MEGAN: 27:35

So when I first start working with people, we talk about their goals. And, even for example, some of my clients are looking to, build a personal brand because they want to do consulting after, and that's a very strong why, which is financial freedom and being able to live the way they want, to build a business so they can have more time with their family. MEGAN: They're not working for... So very strong why. CUPPS: And just a minute. Okay. There's so many people commenting. I just want you to know as you continue- Yeah. Oh, MEGAN: good. ... CUPPS: paul and Guy have talked about, burnout is real. Very good insights. Getting a lot out of this. I just want you to be encouraged because there's some good feedback. MEGAN: I think a lot of it these are the conversations we don't have that often because, there's also a lot of gaslighting where it's like if I don't succeed, it's just me as the issue. But I do think that, making this

shift can start with some small actions. But for me, you have to start with the why, so even I could just tell people like, "Hey, post every day." CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: But unless we connect it to that why it, a lot of times is very harder. It's a lot harder to just- Yeah ... actually do it. The other thing a lot of times I help with, like I do a lot of audits to figure out what is their why, but also the wh- when I say the why not. MEGAN: 28:35

... What I find with habit-building is sometimes people are literally so maxed out, it doesn't start with adding habits, but it starts with subtracting things that are not working. So for example, even if I'm like, "Hey, what are, what is one meeting you can take off of your calendar?" CUPPS: Exactly, MEGAN: yes. MEGAN: Because before you, like- CUPPS: Yes. MEGAN: Yeah. And I think, also when we study things like addiction, and I don't mean just alcoholism or, you know- Yeah ... using, but what I mean is even a lot of times our addiction can be to work- Yeah ... and to more, and to hustle. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: And when you treat it like an addiction,

when you study addiction, a lot of people think that they can just, like some people can just go cold turkey. MEGAN: But a lot of times what works most is replacing the addiction with something else. I read this amazing book and it said that the opposite of addiction is not sobriety, it is connection. CUPPS: Yep. MEGAN: Absolutely. And so I think yeah, when you think about these habits as something not that you can just put on. MEGAN: Yep. "Oh, I'm just gonna wake up earlier." Okay. Maybe you need to go to bed sooner as a first step. CUPPS: Exactly. MEGAN: 29:35

Exactly. What can you take out before you add in? And how can you have that really strong why behind you? Because if you don't, then you're never, it's never gonna stick. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: And I think there, one final thought on, on that is that a lot of my clients are such high performers that- There's just this very big trend I see where they want to literally completely change their lives in a CUPPS: week. Oh, wow. Yeah. MEGAN: And they're like... I don't know about you, but I see it with habit building as well, 'cause people are like- CUPPS: Oh, yeah MEGAN: "Okay, I wanna do this or do that," et cetera. And I think it's a very common and- Yeah ... part of my coaching is when they're like,

"I'm so sorry I didn't do everything that you asked. I didn't do the 500 things." Yeah. I'm like, "Okay." CUPPS: Cool. MEGAN: Now we can get to the real stuff. Yeah. Because for me when it comes to discipline is mostly, it actually is just if it's not working, we just need to go back and simplify a little bit. Yeah. Let's just start with one thing, and until we can do that consistently- CUPPS: Yeah ... MEGAN: we shouldn't add anything, or we actually might need to subtract. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: 30:35

So a lot of it- And- ... is just figuring out, yeah, figuring out what needs to be added, but also especially we talk about from, like, all the things you're doing, all... MEGAN: the cult of more. Yeah. Sometimes it's actually subtraction. CUPPS: Yeah. And I think that's very important, and I wanna spend a minute on that because that's... That is absolutely the biggest thing, is- ... I see it all the time. People say they wanna run a marathon, but they're trying to fit it into their same schedule. CUPPS: It's not possible. You just can't- No ... physics doesn't work that way, right? And so the, it... But the subtraction is a big thing because there are so many... when I started digging into it more, I started realizing the number of meetings on our

calendars that... And I hate that it became a meme, that, couldn't this have been an email that, that little saying, because it's- CUPPS: So true. It's so true. There's so many meetings we sit on that are an hour that could've been 45 minutes, or could've been 30 minutes, or could've been 15 minutes, or an email, it, the it just... we need to start thinking about this, but I think that hustle culture also has this thing that, how many meetings are you in? CUPPS: And it... even though you're not counting them, it... What's the biggest bravado thing to say? "Oh, I've been on back-to-back meetings all day." Well- MEGAN: 31:35

Yeah ... CUPPS: so you haven't been productive all day is what you're saying, it's, it really... I really resonate with what you just said there about take away something before you add something. CUPPS: Yeah. And when you add something, it hopefully is more valuable than what you take, taken away, right? And it's just gotta be that way. And I under- y- the connection piece is big. And I... it is to some degree, and I know this won't be a popular saying among hardcore salespeople, but it's putting humans back in, in the role, right? CUPPS: As opposed to kinda the robots. Yes- Yeah ... you can use the automations

to help you do more, but you gotta still be a human in the role, otherwise you're just, like you said, everybody looks the same, I think. MEGAN: Yeah, and I definitely see so much of like busy as a badge of honor. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: And it's interesting 'cause those are the people that when I meet with them, they feel the most unfulfilled. MEGAN: Yeah. Because the things that are filling their life are... it's almost like empty calories at work. CUPPS: Exactly. Yes. That's a great way- and- Yeah ... MEGAN: 32:35

yeah, and you- they're so busy, and then they get home, and they just like kinda crash. Yeah. Or they can't crash, they can't sleep 'cause they're so anxious, and they can't turn off. MEGAN: And when you think about living a better life and being more present, and truly living a w- a better life, I just mean what does that mean to you? Whether you want... A lotta times it's freedom, a lotta times it's family, a lotta times it's even like hobbies and interests and knowing yourself- Yeah MEGAN: And enjoying the time that you have outside of

work. It really does a lot of times start with reflecting on how you're spending your time currently- Yeah ... and realizing that you cannot keep doing that if you want to live differently. CUPPS: Yeah. MEGAN: Yeah. CUPPS: Yeah. By the way, we got some great comments. So good CUPPS: 33:35

Millie says, "Yes, Megan. Make space for the magic." Love the calling out the why not. Hugo "Very insightful. This is good about daily, small daily habits." And Guy, Atomic Habits, talks a little bit about this, so it's all good. Yeah, it's good. All good comments and people paying attention. The, these empty calories, I hadn't thought about that. CUPPS: I there's gotta be an equivalent word for the work that we do. And I was thinking maybe it's empty inputs. You're sitting in a meeting, and you're not getting value out of it, so there's no, it's not really helping you do your job better and stuff like that. But I love that. That, that analogy is real. MEGAN: Yeah ... CUPPS: if we talked a little bit about s- getting started. So somebody reaches out to you. Is it individuals and teams? Or I know you said you, you're helping individuals now, but are you still doing both? MEGAN: Yeah. I actually do work with teams as well. I actually

am an expert on deal qualification and the MEDDIC framework, and was like just, makes sense so the salespeople know it. MEGAN: But I still do train for teams. Even I'm currently doing planning a mid-year on site for a sales team where they want to figure out... they're- we're doing that archetype workshop of how do the salespeople wanna show up. Yeah. So I'm definitely rat- leading a little bit more, with a little bit more magic and a little bit more fulfillment based, which is amazing. MEGAN: 34:35

I'm like, we are, we live in a weird time where, you know, finding those sales teams that are interested in doing things differently. But the majority of work I do now I changed my business a year ago, and so I do work with one-on-one salespeople. And we work on yes, sales mastery so a lot of those tactics that can help you basically work smarter, not harder. MEGAN: I do work on the time management side of a lot of what we talked about today, habit building, et cetera. And then the third bucket I call, fulfillment, but I also call it sales therapy, of like- Yeah ... how can we

recognize the patterns and the mindsets that contribute to those other areas? MEGAN: Because it's so energetic, and a lot of times it starts, it's not just the external work, but it's the internal work as well. CUPPS: That's fantastic. And again- Yeah ... Guy, I wanted to mention, there's also another book out there called Time Bandit you can read that I wrote. And I love Atomic Habits. CUPPS: 35:35

It actually inspired me too. So what Guy said and, but what I kinda talk about- Yeah ... is pri- priority, values, priorities, and habits, the how they work together and stuff like that. So Guy, if you choose to do that, it did hit Amazon bestseller. So anyway, I wanted to n- acknowledge that. N- and that's fantastic. CUPPS: I love that you I don't wanna use the word pivot 'cause you didn't, but you added the element of individual one-on-one coaching. I think that's incredibly important for sales teams- Yeah ... for salespeople. Sales leaders should encourage their salespeople to get one-to-one mentoring because it will make them so much better. CUPPS: I always did that. I always encouraged the reps to find ways that they could make themselves better. Not just how to do more, but how to make themselves better at certain skills and, and- MEGAN: Yeah ... CUPPS:

life skills, all that stuff. I think that's very powerful. I'm glad you're doing that. How do people find you? CUPPS: That we've got a ticker going. LinkedIn- ... is probably the best way, but what's another way they can, what's the best way to reach out to you if they want to? MEGAN: Yeah, so I am obsessed with LinkedIn. I live on LinkedIn. I actually have a newsletter called Letters to My Burned Out Self, which is- Oh, CUPPS: nice. CUPPS: I love MEGAN: 36:35

it ... pour my heart into. Yeah, so we cover everything from authenticity to a lot of the stuff we've talked about today, like even like my burnout story. But that's honestly, if you're feeling any of this, I would highly encourage you to check that out. And if you are a salesperson that wants to explore a little bit more investment, in some of these things, 'cause what I find and, like, why I started working with individuals is I just, the individual work and the internal work is so important to me. MEGAN: Yeah. And a lot of times that's not what you're getting from your- Yeah ... the training that, like the product training, all of that. Yeah. So if you wanna check that out, I actually have a link on my website in my featured section to book a

consult with me. Good deal. It's never any pressure, but yeah, pure magic. CUPPS: That's awesome. That is so awesome. Meg, thank you so much for being here. I'd love to have you again and maybe we- Yeah. Sounds- I'd love to do some- like a live Q&A session. I think it would be a great thing and if we could get a group of salespeople that feel that burnout coming, it would be a wonderful thing for us to collaborate on. CUPPS: But I have so enjoyed this conversation. Thank you so much for joining us and- Yeah, and- Go ahead. MEGAN: 37:35

Oh my gosh, Cupps, like I'm so excited as well because I, I'm really excited to read your book before the next session we do because I feel like so often even like I love Atomic Habits, but I don't know about you I'm like raise your hand if you read Atomic Habits and still struggle, yes. And I think that what you're doing with incorporating values into it, oof. Yeah. I'm, like, so excited to read it and to dig in. CUPPS: Yeah, please do. It's a quick read, but it's a... Yeah, and I also just launched a priority matrix that that helps people too, MEGAN: oh, CUPPS: cool. Yeah. We'll make sure that's in the chat. CUPPS: But I think that people do get, do challenge with it 'cause we are