People, Distractions & Boundaries | Bold Clarity

What if the relentless hustle to build your dream life is actually the very thing running you into the ground? 

In this eye-opening episode of Bold Clarity, we open up about a week of "pure insanity" that pushed me to total burnout, sharing critical reminders on why you must start managing your energy with the same intensity as your income.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Energy as Currency
• The Trap of the "Passive Yes"
• When the Body Forces a Pause
• Knowing vs. Doing
• Finding Your White Space

Connect with Bold Clarity: https://www.bold-clarity.com/ 

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#BoldClarity #SelfTrust #IntentionalLiving #MindsetShift #PersonalLeadership #BreakTheCycle #GrowthMindset #Season2 #Episode6

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

If you have ever, like me, looked at your calendar or your to-do list and thought to yourself, oh my gosh, how am I going to do all of this? This episode is for you. So today we are going to be talking through protecting your energy like it's your income. On the last episode, I had Shay join me, the owner of Galore Grazing in Dallas, and we had a fantastic conversation around what it looks like to build a life that you love. And we talked about some of the challenges that come with that. And um, you know, both of us as entrepreneurs talk through what that looks like. And when you are building your life and you're talking about aligning your actions, uh, you protecting your energy is one of the most important things for you to continue to do in order to really build the life that you want. And so I am excited to jump into this conversation today around some of the challenges that I personally dealt with when it comes to building your life. Um and also some of the strategies, right, that I've that I've adapted. So this is gonna be a really great conversation. So I like to think that I'm a pretty intentional person, right? And I've shared a little bit of you know, some of the strategies that I that I use and kind of some of the routines that I've implemented and things like that. And the truth of the matter is when you get to a point of having clarity around the type of life that you want for yourself, for your family, for your business, there is a level of excitement that comes with that. And and that excitement is really good, right? You you can visualize this life, and what happens is you start to see all of the things that go into you creating that life. And if you, you know, maybe struggle with being patient, um, then what can happen is that you have this excitement that can quickly turn to overwhelm and eventually lead to you being burned out, and you're kind of left on E and ultimately not able to put the energy that you need to into building this life. And so that's where protecting your your energy like it's your income comes in. And I want to frame the conversation with that comparison to your income because you know, we think about how hard we work for our money, um, we think about um the challenges that come when when money is low, the freedom that comes when money may be high. We think through, you know, the things that we want to spend our money on. And in a lot of ways, when you think about your energy, it really is a currency that is super important in your life, right? And the same level of intensity, the same level of intentionality that we have around planning our money, how we earn it, how we're gonna spend it, how we're going to invest it, those same principles ultimately apply to your energy, right? And so I hope that from this conversation that you can feel empowered to treat your energy like it is your income and protect it in the same way that you would your income. Um, and so that being said, I'm gonna talk about a time where, you know, maybe I didn't do the best job of doing that and then what that led to. And so again, just kind of circling back, right? Like I've been on this journey of self-growth and launching a business and just figuring out who I am and how I want to show up. And I've gotten really clear on what that looks like for me. I've been more bold than I've ever been in my life and going after that, and it's exciting. There's so many parts that go into building this life, right? And me being the planner that I am, I have all of these great plans that I really, really want to accomplish. And sometimes I put time limits that maybe are not realistic, right, on accomplishing these those goals. Um, I I feel too much urgency to go and chase after those things, and in those moments, I sometimes forget the importance of you resting, the importance of you being a good steward over your energy. And when you are not a good steward of your energy, right, and you get to this stage of burnout, it's really hard to recover. And so I'm gonna think back to this time where this was very true for me. So this was probably in February of this year, and that particular week where I was experiencing this, um, my daughter had a cheer clinic on a Saturday, a cheer competition on a Sunday. Um, her dad, my boyfriend, had been traveling for work that week, and so he was gone. I don't know, I think three days out of that that week. I'm still getting her to school. At this time, I was still in my team leader role, and so I'm trying to manage partnerships, manage people, coach people. Um, and I had just actually um launched the first episode of the podcast. So this is the first weekend in January, I believe, or excuse me, in February, and so I had all of these things going on, and at that point in time, I had two friends who I went to the gym with. We went to a really fun body pump class, and so we had our little group text, and we would, you know, say, all right, we're going to the gym today, whatever the case may be. So both of my friends that I go with are moms. One of them actually is someone who used to be on the team that I that I led, and um, our kids are close in age. Um, one of the moms, her her daughter actually was doing the cheer activities that my daughter was doing as well. Um, and then the other mom, her kids go to the same, or her one child goes to the same school as my daughter. And so these are people who are moms and they're busy and um, you know, have lots of things to do as well. And so nonetheless, um, I I made it through this hectic week of launching the the podcast of you know solo parenting for three or four days, getting through cheer clinic, getting through cheer competition, and on that Sunday I was anticipating going to the gym the next day because Mondays were one of the days that we would go, and I remember I sent them a text message on that Sunday evening. So we'd just gotten home from cheer, and I said, Hey, I don't think I'm gonna make it to the class tomorrow. In fact, I think I'm going to cancel my entire day because I think that all of the things I've been doing have finally caught up to me, and I am burnt out. And I sent that text message, and as I prepped for this episode, I went back and I read it, and then I went back and I looked at my calendar from that week, and it was pure insanity, and maybe I can throw a screenshot in. Um, I mean, overlapping appointments, um, no breaks between anything, you know, just like back-to-back stuff. And granted, all of the stuff I was doing was stuff that was important to me. It was stuff that I wanted to do, it was stuff that aligns very much so to who I want to be. And it was literally impossible for me to do all of the things that I'd, you know, planned to the level that I would want to do them for them to be impactful. And so I just remember in that moment when I sent that message feeling exhausted, feeling also a little bit embarrassed, um, because I'm like, here I am, this this person who is has you know asked for all of these things in life, and who's worked to get these things, and who's so grateful, and I'm I'm like tapped out, and you know, I'm also a leader. I've got people looking at me, and I'm coaching people on how to manage their time and how they should show up. And in the background, I have run myself to the ground, and it was a really hard moment, and I was really sad. And what ended up happening is I did indeed clear my schedule for that Monday, but that Monday wasn't enough, and I ended up actually, if I remember correctly, having to clear my calendar for at least four days, it might have been the the whole work week, um, because I was so exhausted and mentally spent I couldn't do anything. And what sucked is that because I had not planned rest into all that I had going on, right? And I hadn't planned to take a week off. Me taking that time also made me feel like I was getting further and further and further behind on all of these things that I was working on. And it was a really honestly looking back, it was a sad week. I needed rest, and it's so funny how my body made the choice that my mind wouldn't, which was girl, you need to go sit down somewhere because you cannot do it all. You cannot. And I'm gonna keep going, keep pushing. And my body was like, No, no, you you cannot. And I was 100% on empty, and recovering from that was was hard. It wasn't something that was just gonna take a day. And if you you think about you know money, right? And you think about when you have spent all of your money, right? And maybe you've even overdrawn, you're spending more money than what you have. What it takes to get back to, you know, a comfortable financial space, it's not usually something that's just okay, one day I'm gonna snap my fingers and okay, I I'm good because guess what? When you are at zero or when you're overdrawn, you still have obligations, right? You still have bills. And if it is not a planned part of your financial budget, right? Like, okay, yeah, I know that this week I might only be living off of $50, but like, cool, I got it, right? That's different than oh my gosh, I just looked up at my bank account and I have been spending, spending, spending, spending. And wow, I don't have money, and I still have things I need to pay, right? You're further getting yourself into this depleted state. The same thing is true with your energy, and it was just very difficult, and it it made me sad that I did not have the wisdom um to make a choice that I knew that I needed to make, which was like, hey, you need rest, you need to incorporate rest, right? Um, and so that brings me to uh my next point, which is we've talked so much about planning your day, right? And for me, it's my calendar. I live by my calendar. For you, maybe you have a to-do list, um, whatever, whatever, whatever it is that whatever tool you have that tells you or that you use to tell yourself, here are my priorities, here are my plans, here's how I'm gonna spend my energy. Whatever that may be, if you look at it and you see, oh, I have more things on here than I have energy for, then that should be your immediately immediate signal that something needs to be adjusted, right? Because if not, you end up going, going, going, going, and then you look up and you're done. You're exhausted. And so, like I said, looking at my calendar at that time, I saw no white space, right? Like there's literally no, no, no breathing room. I even saw overlapping things on my calendar, right? Like take my daughter to gymnastics and meet with my virtual assistant or um PTA meeting and I don't know, meeting with one of my agents. Whatever it may be. There was literally just overlapping, no one on this planet could look and do all those things on their own, like unless you've got a clone, okay? And so my calendar did not lie, like that's really what I'd decided to, how I decided to divvy up my energy, but it was not possible, right? It's like you make a budget and you you sit and you write down all your expenses, and then you look at how much money you have coming in, and you're like, oh well, I've got more of my money planned for spending than I do money that's coming in. There's a disconnect. So the wise thing would be make an adjustment, right? And yet, we all fall short sometimes, and that is what I did. So reflecting on this moment in time where I was just really struggling and so exhausted and burnt out and feeling behind and anxious and all of these things, um, there were a few takeaways that I had that I think are really important. The first one, not saying no to anything is still a choice. I'm gonna say that again. Not saying no to anything is still a choice. So somebody says, hey, I need you to do XYZ. If you don't say no, you're like, okay, right? Um somebody asks you and you say yes, right? It it could be either of those things. Maybe you're giving an explicit yes, or maybe you're just not saying no and you're just agreeing to whatever it is that you know people are putting in front of you or that you're putting in front of yourself. And that is a choice. That's the I think in the moment we think that okay, well, these are things that I have to do, right? Like I don't really have a choice. And I mean, they said they needed me to do this, or I told myself I needed to do this, and it is 100% a choice because you can say no. And you not saying no, you're you're committing energy that maybe you don't have, and so looking back, thinking about all the things that I had going on that week, right? Um, obligations as as team leader, like doing one-on-ones. Um, I remember specifically looking at my calendar and I had one-on-ones back to back. They're all virtual. I had them back to back, like four or five hours straight, just one after another, right? I didn't have to do that. I I definitely could have scheduled that differently. Um, I had, you know, cheer obligations for my daughter. Okay, cool. That's something that in that week, like I I owned because, you know, um my boyfriend was out of town. Podcast lunch launch. That's something I was excited about. And um, you know, something that I I owned. Could I have delegated some of that? Absolutely, but I did not. Um that week we had um some some gifts that needed to be delivered to the school for um some staff members for PTA that could have been delegated. Um I also had a chiropractor appointment scheduled on what it was one of the things that was overlapping, right? I could have pushed that back a week. Um I also was volunteering at my daughter's school, so I'm I intend to go up there like every week on Friday for a few hours and help out. And that was something that I had on my calendar and I still did, right? Looking back, it would have been okay if I skipped a week of volunteering. Um, it would have been okay if I went to the chiropractor one week later. It would have been okay if for this launch I planned ahead and delegated certain tasks to my virtual assistant. But I didn't do any of that, and like that's on me. Nobody else was gonna come and make those choices for me and say, all right, this person do this, this person do this, this person do this. Like, I'm the manager of my own life, you are the manager of your own life, and so it's on you to take inventory of what you have going on and what you have to give, and make sure that there is not a lack of balance in that. Nobody else is going to do it for you, right? People may try, they may say, Hey, I really think that you should take this off of your plate, but ultimately it's up to you. And so looking back, I realized I always had that choice. That was always an option. It was always an option to delegate, it wasn't always an option to skip a week of whatever. It was always an option to reschedule something. Those options were there. I convinced myself that they were not, and that I was obligated to do certain things, and the result was a burnout. I did it to myself. That's the crazy part. Like I literally did that to myself, and so it's interesting because one of the things that I think frustrates or frustrated me in that moment, right? Like when I got to like the Tuesday and Wednesday of that week where I'm literally exhausted, right? Um, after I was like, hey, I I can't do anything else. I was frustrated because I was like, Asia, you know better. Like, you know, you know that you're in charge of protecting your energy. You know how expensive your energy is. You know how intentional you need to be, you should be to protect your energy and you didn't do it. And you know, when you don't know better, it's like, all right, okay, cool, you didn't know. Now you know, but it's like I knew better, and so my other takeaway was like knowing is not the same as doing, so I can have knowledge of the best way to I don't know, bake a pie. However, when I go to bake a pie, I might do something totally different than what I know. That's a choice. So there's also this reconciliation between what you know and what you do, right? And people always say, when you know better, you do better, right? And so it was uh very eye-opening for me to think about the fact that I knew better and yet I chose not to do better, and I don't want to make I don't want to continue to make those types of mistakes, especially in a moment where the result is honestly so extensive. Which leads me to what was the real cost? What was the real cost of me not delegating, rescheduling, skipping, and putting myself into this position where what I think what I've told myself is required of me is more than what I actually have to give. And so the great thing about our bodies, right? Um my body made a choice that my mind wouldn't. My body said, girl, sit down. When my mind said, no, keep going, you can do it. Number two, um, I ended up making the choice to completely check out because that's what I had to do, versus you making the decision to check out because you're like, that's what I want to do, right? That was hard. Because the break that I took was unplanned. I also, just by the nature of it, got behind. Yes, people filled in and and supported, and yet there were plenty of things that only I could do, and I wasn't capable of doing them during that time, and so now I've also gotten myself behind and have all of this stuff that I'm thinking about getting done. I could have rearranged or rescheduled, delegated, skipped, and included rest and recovery in that, and I would have gotten the things done in the time that I needed to. I could have said, all right, I'm gonna put 20-minute buffers between every two one-on-ones. I'm going to shut it off at 3 p.m. two days this week so that I can relax and recharge. I could have done that. And then I would have been able to that would have been that would have been sustainable. I could have kept going. What happened instead is that I lost, I ultimately lost, I ended up losing more time than I would have had I used my knowledge to make a different choice about what I was doing and how I was using my time. If you're like me, and maybe you you are a high achiever, right? And it's really important for you to hit your goals and to be on the path. Um protecting your energy by you know saying no or skipping something or adding in a break can feel like it's slowing your slowing you down. In reality, though, protecting your energy is what allows you to be consistent, and we all know that when you're consistent, that's when you're able to have the biggest impact. So, reminders. Number one, your calendar or your to-do list, however, you whatever tool you use to plan does not lie. Okay, that is the source of truth for your yes. So if you go and look at your to-do list, if you go and look at your calendar and what you've planned that's going to uh use energy is more than what energy you have, adjust. Number two, not saying no to anything is still a choice. Number three, your body will always, always take the rest that your mind refuses to plan. Number four, knowing is not enough. You make the choice to actually do something differently. And lastly, protecting your energy is not selfish, it is how you keep moving and how you keep growing and how you build the life that you want to build. So I want you right now to pull up your calendar, pull up your to-do list, and check. Do you have any white space? Do you have any, do you have any blocks of time that are not accounted for? Okay. If so, awesome. Protect that time. Maybe even actually block it off and say rest, okay. Um, if you do not have any white space on your calendar, I want you to pick one thing that you can delegate, delegate, um, reschedule, or remove. Okay, just one thing to start. If you happen to be a real estate agent or entrepreneur, and you're like me and you know what you need to do, but you struggle with actually doing it sometimes and you need a little bit of extra push, book a clarity call with me so that we can talk about how I can support you in being able to protect your energy like it's your income. And if something in here resonated with you, share it with a friend. Make sure that you also follow, like, and subscribe. And as always, be honest, stay intentional, and choose bold clarity.