Contractor Cuts
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Contractor Cuts
Beyond the Paycheck: Finding Fulfillment in a Demanding Industry
Burnout in construction happens when contractors get stuck at the safety needs level of Maslow's hierarchy, unable to access the relationships and accomplishments that provide true fulfillment.
• Maslow's hierarchy of needs begins with physiological needs (food, water, shelter) and safety needs (financial security)
• When contractors focus exclusively on safety needs, they neglect relationships and community
• Burnout occurs when you spend all your energy "fishing" without building systems to make fishing more efficient
• Working "on" your business (building processes) is as important as working "in" your business (daily operations)
• Many contractors blame clients for problems when they haven't developed proper processes to manage client relationships
• Taking inventory of what you truly need versus what society says you should want helps redefine success
• Sometimes burnout indicates you're in the wrong role or need to reassess your skills
• Building processes takes time but ultimately frees you from the daily grind
• Setting realistic goals with your family about what success looks like prevents chasing others' definitions
If you're experiencing burnout and want to talk, reach out to us at ProStruct360.com for a free 30-minute consultation. We've learned the hard way so you don't have to.
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Welcome to Contractor Cuts, where we cover the good, the bad and the ugly of growing a successful contracting company.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Contractor Cuts. My name is Clark Turner and I'm James McConnell. Thanks for joining us again this week. So this week we are throwing James a bone and talking about his favorite topic oh boy, maslow's hierarchy. So we're actually talking about burnout in construction today, and when James and I started talking about this topic and the subject and what should we talk about it kept coming back to Maslow's and how that affects us as humans and how it affects us as general contractors or whatever you're doing in your job. This is really good for any person working, owning their own company, running a business.
Speaker 2:So today we're going to talk about burnout and how it affects us and, kind of below the surface, where burnout comes from and what we can be doing today to start moving away from burnout. Because I think we've both experienced it and we've both been in that spot and scratched our heads and we're like man, I don't, I don't. You know, this isn't fun anymore, this isn't fun waking up, it isn't fun going to work, it isn't fun in life. And so how do we move beyond that and what are the steps we can take? When you're in it, it's hard to see the way out, and so hopefully this is a podcast that, if you are feeling that or headed that way or in the smack that middle of it, this is something that we hope can help kind of walk you show a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel. Why don't we start by you explaining to us what the heck Maslow's hierarchy is and why it pertains to what we're talking about today?
Speaker 1:So Maslow's hierarchy is a soft science. It's not like you'll have you. If you look up Maslow's hierarchy, you'll see it everywhere. But it is one of those soft sciences where it's not like no one's going to be able to prove this, but you'll intuitively know that it's accurate. Yeah, so it's a triangle and for those that are able to see it, it looks like this. The bottom of the triangle is physiological needs. So this is food, water, shelter the basics that you need to survive, to not die, to not die Of which, if you live in the United States, you're covered. Your physiological needs are covered.
Speaker 1:The next one is safety and security. You're really this focuses on like just the human element, not where we are in society as people. So safety and security looks different now than it did you know 500 years ago, however long ago. You want to go back now. It's like what is your 401k look like? Do you have a retirement plan? Do how are? Is your incoming money more than your outgoing money? Yeah, do you know when your next job is coming in? Yeah, all that type of stuff.
Speaker 2:Well, it's the basic needs beyond staying alive, right, staying alive.
Speaker 1:Can.
Speaker 2:I put my kids in braces right Stuff where it's like the basic needs. Can we send the kids to the doctor?
Speaker 1:Because I don't have any extra money right now. Like, are you sure they're that sick? Honestly, if you think, if you, the way you're talking about it now, it's kind of a light bulb for me, like safety needs, safety and security is kind of like the new baseline for everybody. Yeah, no for sure. And so if those things aren't met and in the whole structure of Maslow's hierarchy is, you won't move to the next phase until you are sufficient in the lower phase. Yes, so you're not going to start focusing on your safety needs until your physiological needs are met? It's not. I don't need to protect my camp, I need a camp.
Speaker 2:If I can't buy food, I'm not even thinking about the braces that my kids need, right.
Speaker 1:They don't need good teeth, they need to eat. Yes, the next level. So you've got physiological safety and both those are the basic needs, those are basic together. Yeah, the next one is belongingness and love. So relationships, friendships, romantic relationships, community in general. So you see, this, I think and again I'm just armchairing here I'm not a scientist, or even a soft scientist.
Speaker 2:I think you're pretty soft man. Appreciate it, bro.
Speaker 1:I think when you are struggling to have your safety needs met, you're not focusing on community, You're not focusing on your relationships. You experienced this in your home with your spouse. When things are hard, when there's stress, when you are struggling to see how the next couple months is going to actually lay out, I guarantee you your relationship with your partner is is not a hundred percent. You guys are struggling because you're not communicating.
Speaker 2:Your head down, You're trying to figure out how to make the number one reason for divorce is finances, and it's because there for you have different thresholds of safety, right, so, like you can't spend that, well, I need to spend that, I want that, we need to do that and and so, even there, even those type of needs and and not being lined up internally at home, yeah, is blocking you from from fulfilling the love, the love and the belonging. And, yeah, the next level, of need, um.
Speaker 1:The next one uh, beyond once, you have community and you have good relationships, and nothing's ever a hundred percent. You're vacillating between things, but you've got good relationships. The next thing you're looking for is esteem, the sense of accomplishment, so like getting your company from the 500,000 to the 1.25 million to the 1.5 million. That's esteem I'm going to. I've got these things covered. I have enough bandwidth, I have enough cognitive capacity to pursue these other things that are higher. And then the next one, above that is self-actualization, and a lot of people talk about this. One is like the giving back, where I have so much knowledge, I have so much space and all of my other needs are met. I've got good family, I've got good community, I've got enough to survive and things are coming in, things are good. I just want to do something philanthropic, I want to write that book, I want to start coaching people.
Speaker 1:Those things are self-actual actualization, where you're becoming your highest, best self, whatever, whatever that looks like, yeah, so again, all of these things you're you're typically vacillating between, uh, you know, self-actualization, esteem and belonging for most of your life, but the safety needs. This is burnout. This is the burnout cycle, when you don't feel like your safety needs are being met. That is where burnout comes in because you spend so much energy in that area. The relationships you live there, you live under that stress, yeah, and the relationships are what actually give back to you. We've all been in a scenario where you having a rough time, you hang out with your friends for an evening and it's like God, I needed some reality. Yeah, god, I needed that, my cup's full. I feel like I could climb a mountain and maybe the next day it brings you down a little bit, but it was enough, yeah.
Speaker 2:And it always is. Or you're struggling with the, with the finances and the safety needs, and your wife sits down and looks at you and like, hey, you're enough, you're doing great here. Like just those little things like that that are like, oh my gosh, that's it. Like I felt that need being filled that I didn't even know I needed from the relationship or from the steam and there's Pat, like all all you need to know to like make that connections like that.
Speaker 1:One time that happened for you, like that's it. That's the connection to make that this thing. Actually there's some meat to this bone. Yeah, it was always a dream of mine to try and connect this to what we do, cause I think it is really powerful, yeah, and so that's just kind of.
Speaker 2:I'd also say that if you're listening to this and you're like I don't have a lot of friends and I don't really need friends and I don't really need that, I don't know that this is kind of a self depth and understanding level of things to to realize that we need these as humans. And a lot of people are nurtured a different way. A lot of people are grow up with with your father that is in stuck in the basic needs and doesn't care about relationships and that's all you've seen your entire life and the best way he could love you is to say this is how life is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you're going to live in this world. Yeah, this is life. It kicks you in the teeth and you got to smile and keep going, yeah, and so that's, that's all you're out.
Speaker 2:And so a lot of people try and buy the rest of the stuff. But they get successful business and they try to buy the love, the esteem and the self-acquisition and you can't purchase that. It is experiencing and going through it and giving back, and I think a lot of people get stuck with like I was a terrible dad. My kids are grown now and that's just forever lost. I'm never going to have that feeling of accomplishment as a father. Fix it If your kids are still alive, you could still go back and work on this stuff. And so, even though this is real touchy-feely stuff for contracting but I think it's important because this is the basic needs of a human to grow and get depth in life is the important part, because it's like you can live collecting dollars, collecting money and living making sure your safety needs are felt, but going beyond. That is where real life, in my opinion, really is happening.
Speaker 1:Well, and when it all gets down to it, there's also the law of conservation of energy. Yeah, it's neither created nor destroyed, just exists. This is this is science, this is Einstein or nor destroyed, just exists. This is this is science, this is Einstein, or Newton, or whoever it is. We have energy stores and if you wake up in safety needs which when you're in burnout, that's all you're doing you wake up and it's like okay, time to go get that fish.
Speaker 1:That is cortisol and that's stress and that like amps up your burnout times 10 and that's why people stay in that spot. Yeah, because it's the. Uh, what's the? It's a vicious cycle. Like you have no space for relationship and relationship requires two people. Yeah, so if you don't, or desire or desire for for relationships, so if you're not, if you're not even opening yourself up to that next level because you're so stressed out, it won't be there for you because it requires you to engage with it.
Speaker 1:So with, without going too much more into Maslow's, that's, that's the hierarchy and that's kind of where I think burnout stalls people and it really there's not a. I don't think there's like an amount of work. You either have to get lucky and like, oh, we just landed this huge job that solves all the problems, or you need to recalibrate and take inventory of what's important. Am I actually in a bad spot? Yeah, because what probably is going on is we live in a really kind of tough society for this, because Instagram, you know, social media, facebook, whatever people are posting, it's hard to look and see people doing really well and if you're not where you think you should be, it's like that's first and then my relationships will follow. It's kind of a bad like open yourself up to the people around you so that they can help you get to the next level.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, and and in our society we the safety needs. The security and safety is quickly becoming the 10,000 square foot house.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's success. It's ridiculous.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and so I stay in that grind because that's all that is. The top of the pyramid for me is that dollars and having more and bigger houses and all that stuff, and so, getting to that spot, you're not satisfied, right there. That's why you have billionaires who commit suicide, because there is not a uh, that is not all of life, and that's how, that's what we pedestal uh here in america. So, that being said, I think you had a great example when, when you first explained this uh, when we're talking about it, talking about the three guys on an island. That helps if you, if you're trying to understand the maslow's hierarchy. This analogy, I think, helped me kind of connect the dots on it. So kind of explain that one, all right.
Speaker 1:So picture now. You just have to suspend reality a little bit for the sake of the analogy. Okay, so there's an Island and there's three people on the Island. There's no way off the Island or on the Island, they're just there, okay, and they're in different areas. They don't know each other exist yet.
Speaker 1:Uh, and so you're one of the people and the first thing that you need to do when you realize you're on the island is you need some shelter, you need some food, maybe a fire, um, and that's really what you need to to get set up and to be like okay, okay, I got my food, I found a coconut, I got a fire, I have a little hammock. Okay, let's reorient ourselves. What do we need to do next? Safety and security. Okay, so then you're this one guy. You build a little semicircle around your hut you don't know if there's wild animals out there or anything you need to protect from you store. You found the tree that you found the coconut from. You climbed up there. You got six coconuts. You pack those into your tent. Now you've got a little bit of security. Okay, what else? Like what's my next move?
Speaker 1:That's when you realize oh, you're exploring a little bit. You see a little smoke. You go over there. Oh, there's another person. This person is a little bit further down the road than you, but they've been focusing on, uh, building. That's what they've been spending their time doing. I just want to keep building things and building systems to make sure that I, uh, don't need to work so hard to get all this other stuff. So you match up with this person and you're like, oh, let's divvy up this work.
Speaker 1:And so now you're specializing in one thing, they're specializing in another, and now you don't just have a little campsite and a tent, you've got like a log cabin with a fire. It's keeping you guys warm. That's conserving energy. You have fish that are coming in pretty regularly. You still got the coconuts. Now you have a variety of nutritions happening.
Speaker 1:What else? Well, now we both go off and explore and we find somebody that's actually started their own garden, and so now we bring them into the fold and we support them so that they can garden really well and their food brings energy to us, so that he can focus on building. And then I'm going to focus on the thing that I really want to do is getting us off the island. So all of these different aspects are happening and because we're all starting to pool our resources together, we're able to then build a boat, get off the island, whatever, whatever the scenario is, but you're, you're doing belongingness in, uh, the community that you've built there. That's providing its own security in and of itself. Yeah, because you have the relationships that are honest to God. Those are going to fill you up, whereas the safety and the physiological needs, they don't fill your cup.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, and I think the connection to burnout for me in this story is and again, going back to the pro-structing coaching side of it, and again going back to the pro-structing coaching side, when guys come in burnt out into the coaching program, it's because they've been fishing and fishing, and fishing and they haven't had time to work on their house, they haven't had time to plant a garden, they've just been fishing, and today they caught nothing. And tomorrow they caught two fish and the next day they caught nothing. But I caught the fish and the fire went out and the fire went. And it's this but I caught the fish and the fire went out and the fire went. And it's this constant.
Speaker 2:I have been freaking fishing for 10 years and I can't do this anymore. Right, it's this, I'm at the end, I'm at the. I just I'd rather just die, right, like I'd rather not be, like I just gotta be done, like I don't know. There's no light at the end of this tunnel. There's only one way, one way off this island.
Speaker 2:In that way, yeah, and I think that's where contractors especially, but really any person gets stuck in the burnout of like I've done the same thing over and over and I'm getting almost worse results and I fire, but then the fish all went away and then I go in fishing and the fire went out and it's like, you know, three steps forward, five steps back, and it feels like I'm constantly doing that and I can't get out of even doing this basic stuff and got. I mean, we get stuck in it at any level, even if your safety needs are met, but you get stuck in it in terms of I just can't move up this pyramid, I can't move forward, I can't get any any sort of grip and and and growth or movement in my company or finances or you know all sorts of things, and that's that's where we're burning out at work. And so I think one of the big, the biggest things that I and that I love my self-actualization you mentioned earlier.
Speaker 2:It's a tough T. It is. It's a hard T All from coaching, because I get to see people move from this burnout stage or from this I can't grow stage to a spot where their marriage is better, their friendships are better, their life is better, because they've actually put some processes in place of, oh, let's build a fishing line that sits we kind of construct a fire every single time that we need one and let's, let's get some kindling put aside and let's do this, and let's have a process to every morning we get this much wood because we know we burn it and so putting and again, I'm not trying to push our processes around this big, big, important emotional thing- Well, you, the safety and physiological needs.
Speaker 1:You can build processes for those. You cannot build a process for relationships, because that's not how people work. Yeah, and the belongingness, esteem and self-actualization, those are the ones that like ward off burnout. Yeah, it's the opposite of burnout, because the effort that you put in it's given back to you, to the full, and that's like that sounds like woo, woo and like that's.
Speaker 1:you know, how can you even say that you've experienced it? I know every person has experienced this to some level, where it's like I have no energy. But then I'm engaging with somebody that's giving back to me, or I'm engaging with something that's giving back to me for some reason. It's like feeling really good, like that's it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like that's what you're looking for. My daughter asked me once uh, prove it, I'll call her, uh, she. But she asked me and said um, she's like, do you like work? Like, do you enjoy work? Like, cause it's I don't understand why you like. Do you like work, do you enjoy work? Because I don't understand why you. I understand we need money, but do you like it? And I said to her I was like everybody, no matter who you are, doesn't like a portion of their work.
Speaker 2:And a lot of people don't like 100% of what they do and they just show up and do it because they need the money, because they've got to make the money, and they find enjoyment elsewhere, outside of work. And a lot of people don't like 100% of what they do and they just show up and do it because they need the money, because they got to make the money, and they find enjoyment elsewhere, outside of work. I was like for me, I hate about 70% of what I got to do. I was like I hate 70%. I don't like getting in QuickBooks. I don't like being organized. I don't like meetings where I'm sitting there having to do whatever know, do do whatever. I don't most of the stuff I don't like but the 30% of my job and where and I kind of went into like the coaching side and like how I help people. And you know that that part that I feel like I've got creativity in it and I can actually go out and like grow something and help and do that, I was like that's fun. I was like and that's that's what you got to look for in work, how much fun you can have versus how much money you need. And how do we find that balance of both to where I'm making enough money to hit our safety needs. But then, after I've got that, can I enjoy my work also? And so I do enjoy work, like I enjoy 30% of what I do, and that for me is an accomplishment, because I used to enjoy zero percent of what I do. That's why I'm not a general contractor anymore. I burnt out there and I've stepped out of that company and went into this company and still am participating in those, because I enjoy the participation and the growth and that stuff. But been able to try and move into something that is more fulfilling in terms of the coaching side and the software and the development, like I love that stuff and it's kind of a creative outlet. But I think the part of where am I going to get enjoyment in life from is how we move up this.
Speaker 2:Even if you're enjoying your job or if you don't, you enjoy your family or you enjoy your hobbies. I love playing pickleball, I love doing whatever. It is Great. Let's lean into that and not get stuck on these basic needs, not get stuck down on security. And the problem is that's great, clark, that's great, I love that, but at the end of the day, no one's paying, no one's sending me a check Like I got it.
Speaker 2:I got to make the money and I think that's where the burnout happens, of no matter what level you're at, whether you're trying to make rent or trying to make a mortgage on that 10,000 square foot house, where is your happiness coming from and what are your basic? What are real basic needs for you and what can be cut out? And if I am hitting those basic needs and me and my wife are on the same page as to what basic needs are Beyond that, everything else is for fun, right? Everything else is for enjoyment and pleasure. If you're a Christian, it's for serving God. There's other things outside of hitting these basic needs in terms of food, water safety, that sort of thing.
Speaker 2:But how do we get beyond that and how do we grow? And it all starts if you're running your own company. It all starts with building processes around these basic needs within a company to where you can duplicate yourself and grow, to where this is working for you and you're not working for it, to where we're building something that, even if today you're still having to fish every single day, how do we get your fishing more efficient? How do we get your fire building more efficient? To where you're not doing the same stupid thing every single day, the same stupid way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Easy, Gill net trot line. I mean there's plenty of ways to build a system for fish.
Speaker 2:I mean there's plenty of ways to build a system for fish, exactly. I mean legit, like that's the truth. And so people say, hey, I'm going to work on my company, not in my company. But they don't. They answer emails more, they write more estimates, and that's not how you do it in construction.
Speaker 1:They skim through Facebook groups like, ooh, that's a job I could bid on. Hey, let me do this. That's fishing, that you're fishing. There's a hundred other people dropping comments and DMS and they're going to get the cheapest possible price.
Speaker 2:You're not getting it, yeah, and when you come into the coaching side, I I've mentioned this last podcast, I mentioned it all the time is you're going to be working two jobs. I need you to fish because you got to pay your bills. But then, on the side, how much of your time this week can we set aside to building the fishing system, building the fire system, writing out processes of how we collect wood every morning or how we do like? I want you to work two jobs and I want you to give 40 hours to fishing, because that's barely making the dollars that you need. And I need you to find five to 10 hours a week to work on the company and setting up these. And the more we do that, the less we have to spend time fishing. And so I get you got to fish, I get it. Keep fishing, you got to. We all have to. We all have to pay those bills. But how do we set aside that and then start working on the processes to build the company to where the fishing becomes 40 hours goes to 30 hours and I'm still catching as many fish. 30 hours goes to 20 hours and I'm still catching more fish than I was. And how do we start doing that and managing that side? And that's how we grow and build a company, right?
Speaker 2:That's why coaching is so important because, yeah, you can probably figure out how to build these processes over the next eight to 10 years on your own in the company. We've built the processes, we've done it. Let us help you do it. Like, let us implement those with you and help guide you to it, to where you're getting. You're expediting your time and for success from eight years down to 18 months, right, how do we expedite that? Don't learn the hard way. We've learned the hard way. We've made all of the bad decisions. Let us help you with that, right. That's where the coaching side is fun and enjoyable, because it's like, hey, listen, let me show you how this fish trap works. Let me show you how this works. Let me show you why we gotta build this. Before we build that, let's start eating the elephant, one bite at a time. Right, let's walk through the growth path checklist and say, listen, I don't need you to be working on how you're going to hire because you don't have any work to hire someone for. So let's start with that, right. And so let's build out the processes of what you need today and then start working on tomorrow's processes, and then start working on next year's processes and let's start building something to where, in five years from now, you're done fishing. You got three people out fishing for you and all you're doing is managing the company, enjoying what you're doing and and growing those processes even bigger to where you're building your boat to get off the Island Right, and so I think that's kind of the the the picture when we started talking about this that I kept thinking about. I was like this is where we help, this is what we do.
Speaker 2:But also visualize yourself if you're burning out, if you're tired of doing the same thing over and over. How do we move beyond this? How do we lean into the belonging, the love, the esteem, right, helping others, that sort of thing and start forcing yourself that direction? Call a buddy to go bowling, right. Call someone to go do something. Just fake it till you make it on some of that stuff to. If you feel that burnout, that's happening, yeah.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I think a couple of notes that we had on this too is a lot of times when you see, when I see contractors, you they're so angry, they're angry people Right, and they're angry at their customers, or they. I can think of one guy that came into coaching that he could point me to a customer that he liked Right. It was just everyone's the enemy. And you said something we were talking about this that that kind of stuck was when clients are blocking your basic needs, they become the enemy. And when we make them the problem that I'm not getting paid, of course you're going to hate them, right, of course that. So, first off, stop blaming others, stop pointing the fingers. If they're standing in the way, it means you didn't lay out the processes, you didn't lay out how things were going to happen and you didn't do your job well, and that's why customers are acting that way. Now there's worse customers and better customers well, and that's why customers are acting that way. Now there's worse customers and better customers, but even the worst customers we can handle within our processes. We weed them out, we walk them through it, we make agreements, we set the client engagement agreement together, and so we turn someone who would have been a terrible client into a manageable client, right, and so there's a lot of this that goes along with it, but I think that that was right on in terms of when you're angry at customers, it's because they're blocking your needs and so fix that, fix that part of it to where you're not losing on jobs, we're winning on every job, we're not allowing the customer to do certain things.
Speaker 2:And then also the scarcity versus abundance mindset I think we've talked about. But I think what are your basic needs like? Take a minute, take a weekend, what do you like? What are we accomplishing here? I met a guy, uh, two weeks ago that that was interested in coaching and he was like hey, I don't want to, I don't want to build something that big. Like when, like I know that you guys are in multi-state and doing this and that, like I don't want that and that, like I don't want that, I'm like great, awesome, I don't want that for you, like that's great, like what do you want? He was like I want to make about 80,000 a year and I just want to like be able to go on vacation, like have family and like that's amazing. Let's, let's set that up as to how we're going to get there, because there's still processes in place to get you to that spot and you don't need to be catching a thousand fish in a day. You want to catch 10 fish a day so you can feed your family and have a little leftover to trade, right? So let's build processes around that. So it's not a you got to be greedy and go after everything, or it's not a you're going to be small and nothing else.
Speaker 2:What size company and operation do you want? What's fun, what's manageable? What do you want and how do we grow in it? And let's build you in that direction, right? And let's be real on what we actually want. I think both of us in the past two, three, four years have changed our mentality on that. I think, in terms of what we want, I think families change that. I think having kids change that for both of us. But I think having those realistic conversations with your spouse, with yourself, of what do I want out of the next right. Maybe that's what they call a midlife crisis, but I think that's so important in doing this. As to understanding, I mean, on our retreat, the first thing we said is where do you want to be in five years? That's our North Star. Where are you going to go? Whether it's I want to be retired, I want to sell the company, I want to have multi-commercial and residential, and we're doing new construction and renovations.
Speaker 1:Great, let's set those goals and let's start building towards those. I think that, at the end of the day, it's like you might ask yourself these questions and get down to the base of it, and it's like I don't want to do this thing anymore. Yeah, and maybe that's maybe that time is up for you now, like this, this experiment is over and you're going to move on to the next thing. Yeah, at the, you only have so many years on the fricking planet. Yeah, like you gotta find a way to enjoy, enjoy it.
Speaker 1:And so if you can't, if this isn't working, it doesn't necessarily mean that there's not something else that'll work for you, that all of what you've done and built doesn't go away. It's all, uh, it's all, uh, it's all in your back pocket. It's all lessons that you've learned. But, uh, if you are not getting out of the safety needs, it doesn't matter, it it's so, it's so easy to stay there, especially just in the culture that we live in, because you're, you're, you're not hungry, you're not actually hungry, you're not starving, you're not going to die from it, you're going to kill yourself from stress, uh, but anyway, that's not helping.
Speaker 2:No, it is, and I think I think one thing that's that's honestly a question that I'd ask if you were burning out is are you bad at fishing? Are you just not skilled there? And is this what you should be doing? And I think the hard part is saying well, I'm catching enough fish to live, and that's what you're saying I'm catching enough fish to live, so I'm just going to keep fishing. And it's like maybe you're really good at gardening and you can do that and exchange it for 10 times the fish that you're doing. Like, let's, let's assess your skills Right?
Speaker 2:We talked about this last podcast about an employee that worked here. That wasn't a good project manager, he's just not skilled and he was working twice as hard as everybody else and coming up short still. And it's like let's, let's start there. And if you're if you're good at fishing, you just don't know how to put the processes together, let us help you. We got you, let's do that together. But I think it's assessing am I a bad fisherman or am I stuck in not being able to build the processes to duplicate what I'm doing Right? And if that's the case, let us help you. We're here for you. But I think assessing that and being real with yourself is how you get out of that burnout and and making the hard decisions to say we're not gonna fish for a couple days because we're gonna start a garden and I'm gonna step out in faith and do that right and and maybe that's what you need to do. So, anyways, that's all I got you. Anything else?
Speaker 1:no, I don't I had one more note, but I don't think we need to go into it. Yeah, I agree uh I?
Speaker 2:I think we're we. We talked about doing a deeper dive into maslow's uh hierarchy in a later podcast, but I think that's good. I think I think the goal for us is, if you're listening to this and you feel like you're in burnout or headed that way, let's take some steps to get you out of it, because it is eating the elephant one bite at a time. You're not getting out of it today, you're not getting out of it tomorrow, but can we build a path to get you to where? What do you need to start filling those needs and how do we get you pushed up the hierarchy?
Speaker 1:And sometimes that's all you need, like that day you're experiencing this burnout, this deep anxiety that things are not going right. Sometimes all you need is the 15 minutes step back and actually inventory. Yes, things are tight financially. Financially, I've got a roof over my head, my kids are eating, I'm eating, we have netflix, I have a vehicle that I'm gonna put gas in and not think about it like things are good. Yeah, things are actually good. They're not where I want them to be and I feel like I'm getting my ass kicked every day, but all things considered, it's actually pretty darn good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it just doesn't feel like that every day and we want to feel good, like we want to have that quick hit of like everything's great, everything's great. It doesn't always have to be that way. You don't have to live in that world, but you do need to be able to step back and have enough space to interact with relationships. Yeah, because if you don't, you will stay in burnout and you will push everybody away from you, because what people do when they're in burnout is they isolate. Yep, that's it, yeah that's right, all right.
Speaker 2:Well, thanks for listening to the heavy episode of burnout. Um, if you have any questions, want to reach out, want to talk to anybody, hit us up. Prostruck360.com. Contact us. I'd love to have a 30-minute phone call with you if you just need to pick someone's brain. I got one this afternoon that I'm just calling a guy who he messaged me and was like hey, listen, I'm thinking of filing bankruptcy and I don't know if I can keep doing this. Can we talk? I'm like, yeah, let's talk.
Speaker 1:So I'm talking.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I know, but but again, like that's, I love that. I love those conversations in terms of like I'll shoot you straight, uh, but at the same time, like I want, I want help. I want to help be helpful and and help other people grow to where they're trying to get some. All right, thanks for listening. We'll talk to you guys. Nice week, bye.
