How to Manage Stress and Maximize Life Without Sacrificing Relationships #520

Ever felt the overwhelming burden of stress from your professional life seeping into your personal relationships? Well, you're not alone! I've experienced the same struggles. I'll share how I've gone from being a workaholic to someone who has found a healthy balance between my ambitions and personal life. The best part? It takes only 10 minutes a day to start seeing changes. From creating excitement at home that's stronger than any stress to understanding the importance of not taking your relationships for granted, you'll gain insights and practical advice.

Moreover, we'll also explore the fine balance between rigid schedules and flexibility. There's no one-size-fits-all, but I promise, you'll find a golden middle that works for you. I'll share how discipline and scheduling time for crucial activities like maintaining relationships and caring for your health can lead to a more fulfilling life. If you're seeking a stress-free life, be ready to join me for the maximized life live online virtual program. You'll learn to manage stress, maximize life, and most importantly, achieve your financial ambitions without sacrificing your relationships. Tune into my show, let's together embark on this journey to a balanced life.

Chapters

• 0:00 Achieving Financial Ambitions Without Sacrificing Relationships
• 4:32 Balancing Work and Home Life
• 17:13 Managing Stress and Maximizing Life

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

that you can achieve all your financial ambitions without having to sacrifice your relationships and without having to grow a dad bot. It's possible. I'm living proof. I put this topic out on my Instagram last week. I gave you three choices, and the most requested choice was this how a stressed man can relax at home. That was what you guys wanted to hear about, and it's something that is very relevant in our academy and something that I'll be able to talk a lot about today, and something that I personally experienced and I still am challenged with on a day-to-day basis, because, obviously, when you work for yourself and when you're ambitious and even just dealing with pressure slash stress, it's hard to be able to switch off. So, what I want to cover and what I'm going to give you the tools to implement into your life over the next 15 minutes this is going to be short, so if you wait till the end, I promise you the last point will be the most game-changing, but everything else leads up to that point. So, point one we're going to cover how to build so much excitement at home that not even the most stressful day will come with you. The second point is you don't need to be a monk, right. Let me show you how to be present at home. Thirdly, why you only need 10 minutes a day to make this work.

Speaker 1: 1:44

So it's no secret and a lot of women reach out to me about this and a lot of men work with me because of this is that stress from their work life is impacting their home life. The challenge with that and I remember when this really raised its head for me is I want an aspire to create something for myself, not only because I want to be able to protect and provide for my family. I just want to prove to myself that my life is worth something, that I have purpose and I'm making the impact. And when I reach one milestone, rather than just settling, I appreciate that, I acknowledge that. But I'm then looking for the next thing because, once again, when you bust through what you thought was your, I guess, highest level, that then becomes the base right, and you want to continue building off that, and I know a lot of men experience that.

Speaker 1: 2:40

So what happens when we're playing the game of purpose and, I guess, climbing a ladder in our career environment? We have a lot of focus around that. We have support, we have focus, we have goals, we have problems to solve and it consumes a lot of our time. And because that's taking up so much of our time, the other areas that are equally as important we tend to forget about, and those areas, for me personally, have been my health okay, so my mental health, meaning how I feel about myself, my fulfillment, my happiness, and then my physical health, right, how I feel energy-wise, how I, you know, feel about my body, my strength, my aerobic capacity, and I'm not getting tired walking up the stairs, knowing that, if I needed to, I could protect myself, I could protect my family, all those that I care about. That gets neglected for a lot of people and there's no reason for it. And then, obviously, the relationships we've got your relationship with your partner.

Speaker 1: 3:40

I was guilty of it for such a long time where I would come home and bring my stress home and I would be an asshole to my wife, I would be blunt, I would snap it out and I would just expect her to get it right, to understand what I was experiencing. I was would expect her to support me because, hey, I'm out here trying to protect, I'm out here trying to provide, I'm out here trying to do something great, but I was justifying my poor behavior. Because of that and the same with my mates, I was like man, I can't make that tonight because I'm working on this. And what happened? When I kept saying I couldn't make certain events, I stopped getting invited. But I didn't belong to those circles anymore. People knew I was going to say no, so let's stop inviting me. I mean, why wouldn't you? And then I was scratching my head going why am I not getting invited anywhere anymore?

Speaker 1: 4:32

So how I then flip this around is why was work taking priority? And there's a number of reasons, and there will be so many for so many of you. Things like financial pressure is a big one. Purpose, community are all reasons why we want to invest in those things. So if we can understand we're doing that for our work life and that's giving us excitement or it's making us act out of fear or out of pressure, how can we create that same environment for our home life and for our health life? How do we create so much excitement that we want to go home? It's more exciting to want to go home than to stress about it and a mentor of mine, darren Bain, who has been on the podcast before, when I first started doing some work with him.

Speaker 1: 5:22

He said, mate, I don't care what's going on in your personal life, but you leave this shit at the door when you walk in. And that has stood with me since he told me that, ever since he mentioned that, I recognize that, no matter what crap has gone on in my personal life, as soon as I stepped into the gym to train or to work with clients, my problems had to stop. People were paying me to provide a service and to provide value. And although with relationships you're not being paid, there's still a value and an expectation right Meaning if you're building a relationship together, if you're building a life together, your wife doesn't want you coming home bringing shit all the time and I'm not saying this in the manner that don't talk about things. Of course you want to have your wife on the same page, so they understand, but you need to be working on it. How can I have those challenges and have those stresses but also continue investing in my relationship so that my wife still has the man she married?

Speaker 1: 6:24

That's an important thing to consider and, within the framework that we teach in our Academy and our Maximize Life program, it's like we help you understand that you've got goals and ambitions for career or for your wealth. You've got the same for your health and relationships and you've got the same right For your sorry said health and relationships. So sitting there going why am I forgetting something here? But I said them all because when you have a framework right, when you understand and what we teach our men and our members is that it's important to have goals and aspirations in all of these areas, because that's what completes you, right, and that's just a macro level. We break that down depending on the individual. But once you understand what it is that you want, you can understand how you need to shift between them and you can manage energy, you can manage expectations and you can hold standards Right.

Speaker 1: 7:17

A standard that I have is I never want to allow my work life to impact my home life or to impact my health. It's why this business exists, it's why I do this, that you can achieve all your financial ambitions without having to sacrifice your relationships and without having to grow a debt. It's just about understanding what you want from it and how we need to get there, and that's where that maximized life journey is so valuable to men. Now I just want to look at my notes to make sure that I'm not missing anything. The other main part with that how to build excitement at home is having that discipline equals freedom. So when you're understanding what you're going home to, why you're excited, it could be.

Speaker 1: 8:03

You know, I remember when I first started dating Amy, I was driving two hours a couple of times a week to go see her because we lived in different towns, but I was so excited. I didn't like the drive, but I was so excited to see Amy. And obviously, when you do anything enough or see anyone enough, you can lose that Because we start to take things for granted, it becomes habit. What we need to do is have intent behind those relationships. It's like every day is another day to win your wife over for the next day. That's the way that I look at it, and so I'm thinking about the actions. Or, if I come home stressed, how is this going to make? Will this make her want to be with me tomorrow? Probably not, but she will Obviously. That's a relationship and that's commitment, but I think like that.

Speaker 1: 8:46

So then, what could I do if there was one thing right now to snap my mindset? What's that? One thought? And I know this is possible for people, because I got a phone call two weeks ago. You know we had an event on and wasn't too excited to go, but I was going and then I had a maid call me and say hey, mate, I've got a corporate box to see Queen and all of a sudden, my enthusiasm, my energy shifted and just went through the roof. I was very excited to go, and so moments like that you know you might hear it with the water as well can shift your energy and can shift your perspective on how you want to view something, so we can start creating those events in our life.

Speaker 1: 9:27

And I encourage you one thing that I do every day and I've got my book here every day I'm writing in a book things that I appreciate about my wife, because I want to focus on those things, because that's what makes me not want to come home stressed. That's what makes me go. Okay, I'm stressing about this, however, because I've managed my time well and I've got it mapped out for the week. Once again, one thing we teach in our academy program it's how to manage your time so that you can get the things that are important to you done is because I know that it's like, okay, I'm not going to be mad at it. I know it's urgent, but for now I'm going to my family time. I need to be present there. I'll come back and deal with this problem tomorrow. That's what a lot of men struggle with. So when you can build so much excitement to go home and have the plan in place and the time management in place, you're not going to take it with you, I promise, I promise, I promise. Now point two you don't need to be a monk. Let me show you how you can be present home.

Speaker 1: 10:22

The biggest challenge I faced once again was managing my emotions. I thought you either had to be a hippie or a yogi, or pretty much one of the same thing is how I used to view that in order to be able to really regulate and understand your emotions. Stress is a feeling much like anxiousness or anxiety, based off unsolved feedback loops. So how I break it down is I make a plan on why am I? Or start with this.

Speaker 1: 10:51

What am I experiencing stress about right now? Is it financial stress? Is it because I'm worried about a bill that I need to pay on Friday? Okay, that's what I'm worried about. That's what's causing me stress right now. Okay, am I going to be able to pay that bill, yes or no? If yes, don't stress because now or maybe that's not the real reason. Maybe you're just worried. You have a bad relationship with money and you know scarce mindset, where it's not coming in as quickly as it's going out. If it's a no, where's the proof in that? Ask yourself, where's the proof in that? Because most people don't track their finances. They don't know how much they've got coming in every week from their income and their expenses. So if it was a no, I'd go. Okay, what are my outcoins this week and what's my income? Where can I save some money to be able to afford this bill?

Speaker 1: 11:41

People, when they experience fear towards things, generally avoid it. It's like that, you know, an ostrich or an emu puts its head in the sand. It doesn't want to see what's coming. As a man and as a leader, you need to step up and you need to face your responsibilities. It's not always comfortable. You don't need to be a monk to do this, but when you understand why you're stressed right, you're creating a level of awareness. And when you're aware of things and you understand what the triggers are, you can then put things in place to manage it as soon as you have management strategies.

Speaker 1: 12:15

I'm not saying you will never experience stress, because you will. It's part of life, it's part of growth, but you will be able to manage it better and, depending on the individual, depending on how your response to stress is how much you can tolerate. But you will never understand how much you can tolerate if you don't first build the awareness, understand what triggers or what's causing you to feel that stress, and then learn how to manage it. Because, once again, there's so many ways to manage strength strength, that too but stress and you know meditation things, journaling, building plans, allocating time, talking there's so many things that we've got a lot of tools for once again, and I teach all of this in the Maximize Life program on how you can do that and shift your perspective. And one thing I was going to talk about I'm just looking at these notes again is work is stressful, and I use a whoop at the moment and I got a lot of my clients wearing whoops as well, so I can track how they're sleeping, what their stress levels are throughout the day.

Speaker 1: 13:17

Because work is stressful, home life can be stressful, exercise is stressful and you can only tolerate too much stress before your body just goes and you feel burnt out. So you got to manage stress one by having those management tools a few which I gave you before but also understanding what are the things that are really causing you stress and how is your body responding to that. Because the Yin and Yang philosophy is a beautiful one and once again, the whoop is great at showing you that some days I wake up and I am ambitious. I have big career goals. I also have goals that I'm chasing. At the moment I want to do a sub 40 minute 10K race right, so I'm training hard for that. But there are some days where I didn't get a good sleep or I haven't eaten well and my body hasn't recovered to the level that it needs to in order for me to perform the way I want.

Speaker 1: 14:08

And many of you are like that as well. But because you aren't tracking it, you're holding yourself to a standard. That's not possible when you aren't recovering enough. It's why we talk about recovery being such an important thing. But you can be present at home, one by and I'll recap this becoming more aware around what the stresses are and the triggers are, and learning to manage that, but also making sure you're getting adequate recovery, and when you're feeling more fulfilled and happier, your ability to manage your stress is so much higher.

Speaker 1: 14:38

Number three and final we're nearly there, gentlemen is you only need 10 minutes of that to make this work. What you focus on grows. So if you understand what you want in those areas of your life, right. So obviously, every day, your focus is you get in the car, you go to work, you do what's been your KPIs are what you need to do on a day at work, and then we come home. That's the only time many people structure their day and because of that, you're giving yourself deadlines and there's people walking to your office. You're building stress. Where you can start becoming more efficient here is planning what's going to happen after that and how you need to feel and how you can manage your energy. So in order to do this every morning same thing I've got my book here where I'm writing. I also have a diary managing time, but I say I exercise because I want to increase my ability to have a great level of output through energy and through strength and endurance. Okay, so that's a non-negotiable. So I make sure that when I'm planning my day, I'm planning? Okay, am I giving back to my health area of life, my mental and physical? What that looks like for me is ingesting and consuming good content, stuff that I want to learn about and makes me feel like a better human, and also physically okay. So I make sure that's in the diary.

Speaker 1: 15:53

A second thing relationship. What are these small, intentional things that I can do to build my intimate relationship, to put a deposit there with my wife, okay, and also for my mates? I make my wife coffee every morning. I know that when I want to get home, I want at least one hour with Amy, at least one hour where I'm not stressed, I'm not watching Netflix, but I'm just hanging out because that's important to me and I know it's extremely important to her. So I schedule that in my diary because if I don't take it off, it ain't getting done. Same with mates.

Speaker 1: 16:23

And then we look at a really covered wealth and I haven't covered wealth from that perspective. But naturally there's things that I need to do to grow my business, to grow my finances, and they're important for me to get done as well, and it's always coming back to what's that one thing? And there's a great book called the One Thing, the One Thing that's going to improve your health today, the one thing that is going to move you closer to your financial goals today, the one thing that is going to improve your relationship today. What are those things? And get clear on them. If you just take 10 minutes to plan that, the rest of the day all you need to focus on is getting those things done. Focus delivers outcomes. That is how you're going to stop being stressed, because when you know you've allocated time for the things that are important, you're managing your stress. You're managing your expectations. It doesn't need to be more complicated than that.

Speaker 1: 17:13

Many people feel stress because they don't understand the time or what's going out financially and they just don't feel on top of things as a fear of being out of control. So if you can put more control in your life and Jocko willing says it best with discipline equals freedom. Something I was so terrified of was I can't Schedule my week in advance, because what if something comes up that I want to do? Help me back ages and I was not getting so many things done because I wasn't making time for it. So when I shifted the approach and started scheduling things no good to a point where I was a little bit too rigid and I said no to many things that maybe I did want to do. What I found? This happy meeting where I scheduled time for the things that were important to me in the health and relationship area Okay, and then I allowed for some flexibility, of other things popped up that I thought were more of a priority I actually wanted to do. But if those things didn't pop up which how often does something genuinely pop up that you really want to do? Not? That often will not for me anyway. So it just meant that I was getting the other things that are important for me rather than just living the same day, day in, day out.

Speaker 1: 18:20

Now that's wrapping up, but I just want to take a moment of your time. If you got value from that and if you want to understand the framework that we use in the maximized life A journey to help you get clear on what it is that you want from those areas and how you can schedule time to manage your stress, become healthier, wealthier and build better relationships, head over to the head of the link in my bio and click on the link to join our email list. So at the moment, we're just getting the dates for 2024, when we're running the maximized life Live online virtual program. So if you want to be in the loop that join my email list. You can add to the instagram bio or the link in whichever platform you're listening on and you will be notified when that's happening. But I hope you got value from it. My name is lachlan stewart and I'm tuning out, thank you.