0:02

Welcome to the Reload , where we help unconventional

0:04

leaders craft the life they truly want by questioning

0:06

the assumptions they have about how life works

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. My name is Sean and

0:10

I'll be your host on this journey . As

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a performance coach and special operations combat

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veteran , I help high performing executives

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kick ass in their careers while

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connecting with deeply powerful insights that

0:22

fuel their lives . Oh

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hey , there , see

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me new here of all places . Today

0:31

, I would thought we might talk about

0:33

something that seems to affect

0:35

a lot of my clients , and

0:39

that is this notion of caring

0:41

too much so

0:46

often , and like

0:49

so many of these episodes , this particular

0:51

episode is inspired by a conversation that

0:53

I had recently during a coaching call with one of the

0:55

executives that I'm coaching , and

0:59

she was talking about how she

1:03

puts so much pressure on

1:05

herself . Pressure

1:08

in all these different ways Pressure

1:11

to perform at work , pressure

1:14

to be the best partner

1:16

possible , pressure

1:20

in all these different

1:22

areas of her life . Even her recreational

1:25

pursuits are a source of pressure

1:27

. She can't enjoy

1:29

it just for the sake of enjoying something

1:31

. She has to be the best

1:33

. Now

1:36

, the tone that I'm taking here is

1:39

to try to inject a

1:41

little bit of lightness into

1:43

this conversation , because it already feels

1:45

pretty heavy and

1:48

if you are nodding your head with this notion

1:51

of the pressure that you put on yourself

1:53

because you care too much

1:55

, then you

1:57

might appreciate having a little

1:59

bit of lightness in the mix . Now

2:05

. It's no secret that the individuals

2:07

that I coach are highly successful and

2:12

they've risen to positions

2:14

of authority and power in

2:16

their organizations , whether that's government

2:18

, although I coach relatively

2:20

few of those . Predominantly I

2:23

coach people in corporate

2:25

organizations , but

2:27

occasionally I'll also get some nonprofit organizations

2:29

, some startups , and

2:33

in this domain of high

2:36

performance and high pressure , it

2:39

is , I think , self-evident

2:41

that we want to care

2:43

about what we're doing and

2:45

that it can be motivating and it

2:47

can be effective for us to care about getting

2:50

results . And

2:54

obviously , if you have been listening to this show for a while

2:56

, you know that I've talked across numerous episodes

2:59

over the last gosh

3:01

, what three years , now four years ? I

3:03

don't know something like that Around

3:06

this notion that when all we care

3:08

about are results , then

3:10

it starts to sour our experience and it

3:12

starts to become toxic . But

3:16

when we look at the pressure that we put on ourselves

3:19

because we care too much , we

3:22

often see that pressure is

3:25

typically directly

3:27

proportional to how much we

3:29

care about something . However

3:34

and this is the thing that I think

3:37

many people gloss

3:39

over why we

3:41

care about something really

3:43

matters and it really informs the

3:46

discussion that we're having . Do

3:50

we care about something because we value

3:52

the reward that

3:55

comes with the endeavor , whether

3:57

that's the end result or

4:00

whether that's the process , or

4:03

do

4:05

we care a great deal ? Do

4:07

we care too much because we fear

4:10

some sort of punishment or

4:12

cost if we fail

4:14

? Or

4:17

is it a blending ? And I would

4:19

say , most of the time in the work

4:21

that I do with people , they begin to

4:23

recognize and see that it is a blend

4:25

. It is a ratio

4:28

of valuing some

4:30

future reward or some future state

4:32

or just the process

4:34

, and

4:37

simultaneously fearing some sort

4:39

of punishment . Enough

4:43

, whatever

4:46

that means to you , whether it's not smart

4:48

enough , not successful enough , not strong enough

4:50

, not brave enough , not pretty enough

4:52

, etc . Etc

4:54

. And

4:57

if you want to dive a little bit deeper into exploring

5:00

virtue versus fear , you

5:03

can see episode 178 , which

5:05

, conveniently , is titled Exploring

5:08

Virtue versus Fear Deciphering

5:11

the motivations behind our actions

5:13

. But

5:16

where does that leave us here today If

5:21

you are the person who cares too much and

5:24

realizes that it is a painful position

5:26

to be in and that

5:28

it is also simultaneously affecting

5:31

your ability to be

5:33

effective , to

5:35

be productive , to get things done that

5:37

you want to get done , to be powerful

5:40

in your world , whatever that means for you

5:42

. Then

5:44

how do we deal with this ? How

5:47

do we improve our situation ? Well

5:52

, for starters , I

5:54

recommend that you bust out , yield

5:57

pen and paper or tablet

5:59

and smart

6:01

pencil or

6:05

stylus and

6:07

begin to write out . Don't type . Actually

6:10

make symbols with your hand . Whether

6:12

it's block lettering or cursive , it

6:15

doesn't really matter . But

6:18

to really connect with

6:21

writing out the idea with a physical

6:24

action , and not just

6:26

typing on keys that

6:28

all feel the same or , in

6:30

the case of a smart device , often just

6:33

a flat piece of glass . But

6:36

to actually , with your hand , make

6:39

the symbols makes

6:41

it a little real , more real . Real

6:44

, or I'm not really sure . We'll just

6:46

say more real for today , how about that

6:48

? And

6:52

tease out what

6:54

is causing you to care . So

6:57

let's just say that I don't know . Maybe

6:59

there's a project that's a really big project

7:01

at work . Even phrasing it that way , really

7:04

big project . What

7:06

makes it a really big project ? Does

7:10

big convey just the

7:12

scope of work ? Oftentimes

7:16

, when people tell me that they have a big project

7:18

at work , it's not just the scope of work , it's not just the complexity

7:20

of the work , but it's also

7:23

the perceived value

7:25

of the project itself To

7:27

their career progression , to

7:29

the organization , to

7:33

the people that report to them . Oftentimes

7:36

there are monetary bonuses connected

7:38

to the success of the project . So

7:43

, beginning to first write out what is causing

7:46

me to care about whatever

7:48

it is that I am hung up on , that

7:51

can be a project , that can be your role

7:54

in the organization , that

7:58

could be an identity to

8:00

which you subscribe . Like

8:03

parent , I

8:06

want to be a good parent . Why

8:09

do you care about that ? For

8:11

some people they've

8:13

had really terrible childhoods and

8:16

they don't ever want to visit

8:18

that or revisit that on someone

8:21

else their own child , obviously

8:23

. But

8:26

for other people they have different motivations . You

8:29

might think , oh well , come on , sean , that's like self-explanatory

8:33

that you want to be a good parent . I

8:37

can tell you for a fact that it

8:39

is not self-explanatory , that

8:42

I've had way too many clients

8:44

whose parents did terrible

8:46

things to them . Now

8:51

is it debatable whether that individual

8:53

wanted to be a good parent and just failed

8:56

miserably ? Yeah

8:59

, I guess somebody could make that argument , but

9:02

it's not a given that

9:04

every person who happens to create

9:06

a child wants to be a good

9:08

parent . Sometimes

9:11

there are actual cognitive

9:13

deficiencies , neurological

9:16

imbalances that

9:19

preclude that , or that at least

9:21

challenge it . I

9:24

want us to get away from this assumption

9:26

that every single parent out there wants

9:28

to be a good parent . For

9:31

other people they might be so wrapped up

9:33

in their addiction drug

9:36

addiction , alcohol addiction , whatever

9:38

kind of addiction that

9:40

being a good parent has fallen off

9:42

the radar Again

9:46

. Whatever it is that you find yourself

9:48

caring about , and if you

9:50

notice that

9:52

you are caring too

9:55

much and

9:57

I think I just mispronounced that word a little

9:59

bit , because what I was thinking in my head was

10:01

caring too much but then , immediately

10:04

after that was this notion that you're carrying

10:07

weight , you're

10:10

carrying a sense of heaviness

10:13

or duty , obligation

10:16

that's being thrust upon you with

10:18

this thing that you care about . That's

10:22

the thing that I'm talking about . If

10:24

you really care about something but it's exciting for

10:26

you and it feels uplifting and you

10:28

have just all the warm feels about

10:31

it , then great , great

10:34

, trucking with what you got . But

10:37

if you notice that

10:39

the care that you're connected

10:41

to feels heavy and maybe

10:43

it feels stagnant as well and it feels overwhelming

10:47

or overbearing , then

10:49

write out what it is

10:52

that is causing you to care , the

10:55

virtuous stuff and the

10:57

fear and scarcity based stuff

11:00

. Where

11:03

do the narratives of oh

11:06

if I don't care about this so

11:08

much , then I won't be enough

11:10

Start to creep in ? I'll

11:12

be a failure . And

11:17

once you've done that , you can

11:19

start to look at how you might mitigate

11:21

the freezing effect

11:24

of caring too much , because

11:27

quite frequently that's what

11:29

happens when people bring

11:31

this to my attention in sessions or when

11:33

it's during a discovery call or a debrief

11:36

of one of the assessments that I do for people . It's

11:39

in caring too much that

11:41

they psych themselves out . They

11:45

go from being somebody who is decisive

11:47

and prone to taking action and moving things

11:49

forward to being

11:51

paralyzed , not physically

11:54

, obviously , but just in their ability to move things

11:56

forward and take

11:58

action , to really

12:00

be a leader . A

12:03

big part of leadership is being willing

12:06

and able to make decisions Right

12:11

ones , wrong ones , bad ones , good

12:13

ones just making the decision and making sure that the

12:15

organization continues to move forward . Whether

12:19

the organization is a big company , whether it's a charity

12:21

, whether it's just a team , whether it's a family unit

12:24

, doesn't matter . You

12:28

can be a leader in all these different settings

12:30

, regardless of what your title is . So one element that has

12:32

people frozen in their caring too much is this notion

12:38

that they're going to fail . So

12:40

one element of getting yourself unstuck

12:42

is to really go through an

12:44

exercise of asking

12:47

yourself will

12:49

it be that bad ? And

12:51

if you want , you can search and I've mentioned

12:53

this in past episodes . You

13:01

can search for Tim Ferriss's

13:04

fear setting exercise

13:06

and that exercise is something that he has

13:09

communicated in a TED talk . It's

13:11

something that he's mentioned in books and

13:17

, in case you don't know who Tim Ferriss is , he

13:19

is a New York Times bestselling author and generally

13:21

a student of high performance and optimal performance , and

13:26

a lot of what he writes

13:28

is very much about how top

13:31

performers perform , how do they get

13:33

unstuck , how

13:35

do they move forward in the face of doubt

13:37

, in the face of fear , uncertainty

13:40

, etc . So

13:43

that fear setting exercise is quite

13:45

effective if you do it , which

13:49

I guess is part

13:51

of the process here . Another

13:55

element around caring too much , even

13:57

for the things that are virtuous , even

14:00

for the things that are exciting for us , is

14:02

it distracting so

14:05

sometimes like , imagine the first time you fell in love

14:07

and you were so

14:09

consumed by it and you wouldn't eat

14:11

and you wouldn't hang out with the friends that you normally

14:13

hung out with and all

14:16

you could think of was this other person that you were in love with . It's

14:19

so consuming , and

14:22

the rest of your life gets put on pause

14:24

because you care so much . Now

14:28

, that can be a wonderful feeling , and for anybody who

14:30

is in that feeling , ah , I

14:33

dig it . But

14:35

we also have to recognize where is it that we

14:37

are perhaps overindulging

14:40

in that , and

14:42

especially for my kind of client ? My

14:44

kind of client has a lot of responsibilities

14:47

in their life . Now , I would argue that many

14:49

of those responsibilities could be either delegated

14:51

or taken down

14:53

a couple notches at least

14:55

a couple notches , but

14:58

even so , they tend to be parents

15:00

, they tend to be people running companies , people

15:02

who are concerned about the well-being of their

15:05

employees , making

15:07

sure that they get paychecks , not least a witch

15:09

. So

15:12

they do have a lot of responsibility

15:14

and you know , oftentimes when we allow

15:16

ourselves to be so consumed by any one

15:19

thing , it takes our

15:21

eye off of everything else . Now

15:27

, if you notice that you're giving something disproportionate

15:30

bandwidth or disproportionate

15:32

attention , again

15:35

, you can ask yourself what is it about

15:37

this that is consuming so

15:39

much of my time , energy and attention

15:42

? Is there something

15:44

that is critically out of alignment or

15:46

misplaced . So , for

15:48

instance , one example that shows up quite

15:50

frequently in the realm in which

15:52

I coach is perhaps

15:55

there is a person , a

15:57

team member , who is in charge

16:00

of something , some sort of project or initiative

16:03

, but they don't have

16:05

the requisite skill

16:07

, expertise , experience

16:10

, whatever you wanna call it , or mixture

16:12

to capably

16:15

handle that project or

16:17

initiative . They're in over

16:19

their heads and

16:21

you , as the leader of that group

16:24

, might be spending

16:26

an inordinate amount of time sort of

16:28

ruminating on that , thinking about

16:30

it and worrying about it , instead

16:34

of identifying

16:36

where the gaps are and then working

16:38

to close them with the individual . So

16:41

I'm not suggesting that you

16:43

have to drop

16:47

something from your attention , but

16:49

what I am suggesting is that if you find yourself

16:51

ruminating on something and it's taking up a

16:53

lot of bandwidth because it is

16:55

something that you care deeply about , but then you can't

16:57

seem to figure out how to move forward , then

17:01

perhaps you need to write out those elements

17:03

that are keeping you stuck and then begin to tackle

17:05

them one by one . In

17:08

the instance that I just gave that example of

17:10

, perhaps you have a subordinate who

17:13

was in over their head . They can't really handle the level

17:15

of responsibility that you gave them , then

17:18

perhaps you need to step in and do some mentoring

17:21

. Or perhaps there's

17:23

some reallocating that has to happen in

17:25

their job description Maybe

17:28

there's , you know . You can parcel

17:30

out some of the responsibilities of that project

17:32

so that they're not so

17:35

in over their head and

17:38

, instead of just fretting about it at night , you

17:41

actually get involved , right

17:43

, and you not . You don't just take it over

17:45

, which is what so

17:47

many of my clients were prone to do . Oh

17:50

, you don't have it , they just swoop

17:52

in there and take it all back . No , no , no , no

17:54

, that's not what I'm saying . We still need to master

17:56

this idea of managing

17:59

our own over caring and

18:03

also our own over caring

18:06

other people's responsibilities

18:08

. But

18:11

you , as the person who has more

18:13

experience , might need to get in there and

18:15

offer some tutoring , some mentoring , some

18:18

training and

18:20

then again some management of workload

18:23

, potentially what

18:27

else ? If you recognize

18:29

that this caring

18:31

too much is perhaps a

18:34

byproduct of

18:37

the messaging that you perceive

18:40

from your group

18:42

, if

18:44

you notice that you're perhaps too

18:47

enthusiastic in

18:49

terms of your own natural predilection

18:51

on a certain subject , everyone

18:55

else in the company or everyone else in the

18:57

group perhaps it's a family right

18:59

Is super excited about

19:01

a certain topic and

19:05

you find yourself worrying about

19:08

not being accepted If

19:10

you don't likewise show

19:13

a similar degree

19:15

of fervor . How

19:18

can you ask yourself hmm , what's

19:21

the balance here ? I

19:23

really don't have the same sense of enthusiasm

19:25

about this topic that everybody else seems to

19:27

have . How is

19:30

it that I can be true to

19:32

myself ? I don't want to come off

19:34

us as like fake not

19:37

trying to be fake about how enthusiastic I

19:39

am about this subject , but

19:42

I also want to convey that I'm part of

19:45

the team or I'm part of the family . I'm

19:47

part of the group . Can

19:52

you recognize that you have a desire

19:54

to be with the group While simultaneously

19:56

acknowledging to them and to

19:58

yourself yeah , maybe I'm not

20:00

that into this thing that you guys all want

20:02

, but what I am

20:05

into is being

20:07

a team player or being part of the family and just being

20:10

part of that experience , because I

20:12

value the relationships . So

20:16

maybe I'm not quite so into this one thing that the rest of you

20:18

are into , but I'm

20:20

into you and therefore

20:22

I'm willing to go along with the thing , whatever

20:25

that happens to be , because

20:28

I value being with you and I

20:30

value the nature of the

20:32

relationship that we share , and

20:36

I think oftentimes clients create these dividing lines

20:38

that are not necessary and

20:42

they make their life a lot more painful as a result

20:44

. But in the end , I think , getting to

20:46

this place

20:48

where you really sketch out the areas

20:50

in which you're carrying and carrying too much

20:52

weight , you find yourself

21:00

either in paralysis or you

21:02

find yourself in some other kind of over indexed , imbalanced

21:05

state about a certain something

21:08

. Write all that stuff out and

21:10

then begin to ask yourself those piercing

21:12

questions why

21:14

am I so committed to this ? Why

21:17

am I so wedded to this ? Sometimes

21:26

our caring too much relates

21:29

to a certain perspective or a certain side of an argument , and this is

21:31

another thing that I think is

21:33

really important to me . And

21:37

this is another thing where a lot of my clients

21:39

end up really tripping themselves

21:41

up is that they are

21:44

too interested

21:46

, too vested or

21:49

too invested I guess I should say too

21:51

invested in being right

21:53

, and

21:57

that is probably an episode unto itself

21:59

. So I'm going to cut it

22:02

off here . If

22:04

you did enjoy this episode and

22:06

you found it useful , I would love it , absolutely

22:08

love it If you would subscribe

22:10

, share , thumbs up , like whatever

22:12

the thing is , and that , when

22:15

you share , share it with people

22:17

that matter to you , share it with

22:19

individuals that you think would benefit from having a conversation

22:21

around this topic , or

22:23

don't . It's totally

22:26

up to you . Until next time

22:28

, take care of each other .