Shifting to a Sustainable Performance Strategy

SUMMARY

Do you find yourself exhausted all the time?

As much as you try, even if you get great sleep overnight, you wake up and you just do not have the energy that will sustain you for the day. I completely understand that, because it is an experience that I have been through many times.

So, as we shift gears this month, we move out of the personal leadership area and back into the professional leadership space, which is the area that is all about getting results from your own efforts.

I want to start by talking about the first shift, and it is an extremely important one: your performance. This is a shift from high performance alone, where you are just constantly going and going, working long hours without rest, believing that is the way to get ahead, that hard work is what gets it done, to a more sustainable model of performance, where you are not only able to get things done, but you are also able to keep doing them over the long haul.

The first thing you need to do is shift your mindset. Move away from thinking that high performers are the ones who always succeed.

In this shift, there are three key areas to explore:

First, your clarity, which is having a clear understanding of who you are, what you stand for, and what is important to you. That includes your priorities. We talked about this earlier when we explored values.

Second, your capacity, which is not endless. Just like your phone runs out of charge if it is not plugged in, so do you.

And third, your agility, which is the ability to shift and adapt in a fast-paced world, to stop and rest, and then move again without everything falling apart.

These three areas helped me shift my performance into a place that is far more sustainable, so I could do this for the long term.

Join the conversation as we move through this together. Let us help each other rise up and move forward in a more sustainable way.

This week, I am going to drop three short reels that will give you a little taste of each of those three areas: clarity, capacity, and agility.

Then, for the rest of the month, we will go through strategies and practical steps, not just theory. These are things I have done and helped others do. These are things that brought real results. They brought me back to where I am now and helped others enter a more sustainable performance zone.

Come with me on the journey. I look forward to being a part of this with you.

I will see you in our first of three videos later in the week.

TRANSCRIPT

Do you find yourself exhausted all the time?

As much as you try, even if you get great sleep overnight, you wake up and you just do not have the energy that will sustain you for the day. I completely understand that, because it is an experience that I have been through many times.

So, as we shift gears this month, we move out of the personal leadership area and back into the professional leadership space, which is the area that is all about getting results from your own efforts.

I want to start by talking about the first shift, and it is an extremely important one: your performance. This is a shift from high performance alone, where you are just constantly going and going, working long hours without rest, believing that is the way to get ahead, that hard work is what gets it done, to a more sustainable model of performance, where you are not only able to get things done, but you are also able to keep doing them over the long haul.

This is the area where I find myself doing most of my work as I partner with people all around the world, because burnout is so prevalent. Without having an understanding of why this is important, you will neglect it, just like most people do.

The first thing you need to do is shift your mindset.

Move away from thinking that high performers are the ones who always succeed. You are constantly being fed that narrative. It also plays into the identity work that we have done together. It feeds your approval addiction, that feeling of unworthiness, imposter syndrome, and all the other things we have talked about, the inability to set boundaries, and to say “yes” and “no” appropriately.

If you have not gone through any of that content I have put out there, go back and build that foundation first.

So, shift the mindset. That is step one.

You also need to understand that working in an unsustainable manner will not get you the results you want.

I know this firsthand. I have had four physical and two mental breakdowns in my forty-odd-year career. You might think that means you should not listen to someone like me; after all, how would I know what I am talking about if I have not worked it out myself?

In fact, the opposite is true. Through that journey, I learned so much, and I continue to learn more about what is truly important, so that I will be able to be around longer and spend time with my grandkids.

I remember it all came to a head a number of years ago. I was working in the city here in Sydney, up on the 27th floor of a building, in a law firm, which is something I often do. I was giving a presentation to a group of partners. I loved it because I love being able to empower people to rise above their current situation and get to where they want to go.

It was a beautiful sunny day outside, just like it is today. Everything felt great, until it did not.

All of a sudden, it was like a black cloud had fallen over me. I thought, “What is going on?” I did not feel well at all.

But because I was still working through those identity issues at the time, I kept going. I smiled a little harder, but it was a false smile. I was anxious and confused about what was happening, but I did not want them to know that.

Imagine stopping and saying, “I am not feeling well. I cannot go on.” What would they have thought about me?

That is where I was back then.

So, I kept going. I finished the presentation. Everyone loved it. We shook hands. I walked over to the elevator and got in.

As those elevator doors closed, with no one else in sight, I allowed myself to be vulnerable. I thought, “What is going on here? Why am I feeling this way? Am I having a heart attack? Am I having a stroke?”

I tried to get to my next appointment, but I was not really there.

Eventually, I said to the person, “I have to go.” I stood up and walked away. I went home, went to the doctor, and then spent the next six months trying to figure out what was not wrong with me, which was even more frustrating.

So, I went on a journey. I studied the neurobiology behind what was happening to me. I became a neuroscience nerd. Not the Dr Google kind, but studied from real professionals who knew what they were talking about.

Eventually, through a friend, I found someone who helped me understand that I had adrenal fatigue, a very serious stage of it. My adrenal glands were depleted of cortisol because I had been running on edge all the time.

If that sounds a little like your story, I hope I have your attention.

Because what I have now been able to do, not only for myself, but for others too, is to identify what is unsustainable in the way you operate.

You might think the things you do to get ahead and to please the people you want to please are helping you, but they are actually holding you back.

In this shift, there are three key areas to explore:

First, your clarity, which is having a clear understanding of who you are, what you stand for, and what is important to you. That includes your priorities. We talked about this earlier when we explored values.

Second, your capacity, which is not endless. Just like your phone runs out of charge if it is not plugged in, so do you.

And third, your agility, which is the ability to shift and adapt in a fast-paced world, to stop and rest, and then move again without everything falling apart.

These three areas helped me shift my performance into a place that is far more sustainable, so I could do this for the long term.

If you are exhausted…

If you feel like you are on the road to burnout…

If you have been through burnout and come out the other side…

Join the conversation as we move through this together. Let us help each other rise up and move forward in a more sustainable way.

This week, I am going to drop three short reels that will give you a little taste of each of those three areas: clarity, capacity, and agility.

Then, for the rest of the month, we will go through strategies and practical steps, not just theory. These are things I have done and helped others do. These are things that brought real results. They brought me back to where I am now and helped others enter a more sustainable performance zone.

Come with me on the journey. I look forward to being a part of this with you.

I will see you in our first of three videos later in the week.