How to Stop Feeling Anxious, Overwhelmed, and Burned Out

Work Stress

Jeremy: [00:00:00] How often do you get to the end of your workday or the end of some difficult task and realize, Oh my God, I don't think I've taken a deep breath in eight hours.

Zach: Well, for me, it's been a long, long time, but it used to happen a lot. So today we're actually going to talk about some of the tools and techniques that help us get through the day, taking those deep breaths that we so desperately need.

Jeremy: All right, Zach, I'm coming into this episode, relying on you and your coaching skills, because I know you've been, you've been in this corporate, you know, real job world for a long time. I'm new here and I'm, I'm running into an issue and I just keep seeing your dumb face on a rollercoaster cool as a cucumber and going.

[00:01:00] Not only how does he do that, but how does he do it at work? So let me just paint a picture for you. You know, I'm, I'm the new guy at this new job and, you know, I'm getting to that point where I'm confident and feeling somewhat competent in what I'm doing. And of course there's stuff I still have to learn and it's going to take a while, but I'm still at the point where clock in, clock out, you know, seven, eight hours later realize, I don't think I've taken a breath in like seven hours.

Just, just hammer through, respond to everything immediately. Every email, every Slack message is a four alarm fire that needs to be put out immediately. Even though I really know they're not, but that's the, the mode I'm still operating in. So I've been trying a few things, but I wanted to come to you because you've been doing this a long time.

You you're a, you're a big time muckety muck at your company. What do you recommend to, to the newbies that come in under you? What, what, what tools are you using to make sure that those, those, uh, you know, minor, uh, alerts. are not actually for alarm fires like my brain seems to think they are. [00:02:00]

Zach: Well, first I'm going to have to correct you.

You were absolutely right when you said muckety muck. Big time? I don't know about that.

Jeremy: I thought that's what it said on your business card. Sorry, I misread it.

Zach: Might be. I might change my title to that. Big time muckety muck. It's got a nice ring to it. So you haven't even like, you didn't even like prep me for this.

You just literally just dropped this on me and asking me to respond. So I've got, I've got like three or four things in my mind that I would want to talk about. Um, but I'll start with, you know, the one thing that it's, and it's so hard to learn because I remember when I started in my corporate career, it was just that it was, if I don't respond to this message, I'm going to get fired.

If I don't respond to that email, I'm going to get fired. Right. I would suspect you've got a boss that's understanding realizes that you're a human being and it takes time to get everything done and even if you do make a mistake like it's not the mistake that matters it's how you respond to the [00:03:00] mistake that matters right and don't make it again I would think that in your mind you make a big deal make a much bigger deal over things than say your boss would sure I know I always have And like, I feel like I'm going into a one on one with my boss and I'm about to get fired.

And he's like, man, shit happens. Right. Right. Meanwhile, like I was getting my resume together and like feeling like I needed to go. Yeah. Anyway. Right. If you've got a decent boss. And from what I've heard, it sounds like you do. Yeah. Right. He's not like that pressure's not there. That pressure is all on you.

You're the only one putting that pressure on you. Yes. Take it down a notch. And again, all this is your easier said than done the other thing that I tell myself all the time is All this work is gonna be here tomorrow Like unless you have like something that has a specific deadline of like this has to be done today None of it does right, right if you're in customer support you want to be responsive but not at the expense [00:04:00] of you know Like your family time or your own health and personal wellness remember whatever Level of emergency pants on fire that you've assigned to all of this stuff.

You assigned it. Oh yeah.

Jeremy: No one else did. Yeah. Every time, uh, an email comes in, it's basically a bear chasing me, right? Like I do whatever I can to get this bear to stop chasing me so that I can sit down and relax until of course the next bear shows up in my inbox

Zach: to, to help, to, uh, I'm at a, I'm at a mode now that if I get an email.

That thing ain't getting answered for at least a week. Wow. If I get, if I get a Slack message, I will respond same day. Yeah. Like I do, I do check my email and respond as quickly as I can. But most of my messages come in on Slack and, and that's the problem with like today's working environment. When I started a long, long time ago, we maybe had like, we barely even had like instant messenger.

We just had email and phone. Right. [00:05:00] You picked up the phone and you called if it was, if it, if it was an emergency and you sent an email if there was a little bit on it. And those are the only two ways you could get ahold of somebody. That was it. Yeah. Now it's like, well, I sent you an email and then you send a slack.

Did you see the email I sent you? And then you send them a text. Did you see the slack message about the email that I sent you? Right. And keeps going and going and going and going. There has been a couple of cases where I've gotten a text message from my boss going, did you see the message in that Slack channel?

Right? Those are the ones, yeah, you probably need to go respond to. Again, for me, like I respond to emails within a week. That's it. Like it, I usually respond quicker than that, but a week is the timeline that I try to respond to. Yeah. And the other thing I would recommend is if you're not like, if you, if you're just getting into this and you're.

All day long. You're not breathing. You've got the Apollo band. Yep. Don't you? I do. Why isn't that thing on [00:06:00] and running on com all day long?

Jeremy: Fair, fair point. Fair point. Got to go charge it up, get it back

Zach: on my wrist. That's that stimulates your nervous system to the same point of just breathing all day.

And like, I use that for presentations and things like that. But again, it's, you have to remember all of these things are, it's all in your head. Yeah. Like. And as a, as a coach, as a mental health advocate, hearing it's all in your head is not a good answer. But in this case, like that sense of urgency, that, that priority.

You are signing it yourself, so technically it is

Jeremy: in your head. And, and this, we are talking in this case specifically about, like, the office, right? But this is stuff that I think applies beyond that. So, so if you're listening to this thinking, Boy, Jeremy, sounds like you have a job. So, so do the rest of us.

That sucks. But these are things that I think I'm

Zach: glad you grew up finally, Jeremy. Right?

Jeremy: But these are things that I, I think, uh, will apply to your life when it's the kids that are, you know, overwhelming and demanding or Your responsibilities around the house, whatever the, so that's sort [00:07:00] of the point of this whole conversation is to apply some of these tools that Zach uses and that I in a better frame of mind also

Zach: use.

Well, so one of my favorite sayings is whenever I get an email or something that says, Hey, I need help right away or something like that. I always muttered to myself, a lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine. Right. That's usually what happens.

Jeremy: Right. In my case, what's happening is all of the people pleaser tendencies are being triggered by my insecurity and my lack of confidence that I haven't built.

If we're having this conversation in a year, we're not having this conversation in a year because I will have been doing this long enough, built all the habits, built all the pathways and know what I'm doing. It's just that, that people pleaser trigger of like, I want everyone to like me. I want to prove that I'm good at this.

I want to prove that this is something I

Zach: can handle. And that's fair. I mean, that's that. You should, you absolutely should, especially like in a career or, or something that's important to you. Right. At the same time, like you got to balance it. So [00:08:00] one of my favorite books on leadership is called the dichotomy of leadership.

Like there is a level of go getter you need to put into this, but at the same time, if you set the example for you, that this is how Jeremy operates and you respond within five minutes and you do this and do that. Yeah, when you're with your kids or when you're doing something else and you don't respond in five minutes, people are gonna be like, what the fuck?

Yep. Why isn't he responding? What's wrong? He's not performing to his usual level of activity and something must be wrong or like, you know, right.

Jeremy: It's just negative people that you interact with to respond in the way that you want them to respond to you. Otherwise they will just keep taking and taking and taking.

Well,

Zach: they'll keep taking it. But at the same time, like it could turn into a negative. View of you, right? Right. Whereas you've now brought yourself down to like, you know, still above average for the work that you do compared to everyone else. But compared to the Jeremy that answered in five minutes when I sent him that one [00:09:00] message, this is bullshit.

Right. So you got to, again, there's a dichotomy to all of this. You need to be a go getter, but you've got to be able to say no.

Jeremy: Yep. Absolutely. One of the tricks I have been using to try to get this under control. Is it's something we've talked about before, but just using the Pomodoro method, literally having a clock that runs for 25 or 30 minutes.

And at the end of it, it says, that's enough. Go take a break for five minutes and then come back. Having that built in, like literal alarm that says, that's enough. Make sure you're breathing has been super important to me in sort of in starting to manage this because otherwise. I do. I dive in and it's white knuckle and, and power through, get it all done as quickly as possible.

And part of it is I'm trying to get it all done so that I can breathe. But then I find myself having burned the entire day without getting that breath in. And so it's just, it's that discipline, right? It's the same thing. I applied everything else in my life is creating some discipline and some structure that says that's enough for them.

Now what about you? What are you

Zach: going to decide? So, uh, this is [00:10:00] going to sound horrible, but like the one positive thing about smoking cigarettes is that you go take a smoke break every hour, right? You take a break. I used to smoke, so I understand this and I get it, but But even if you don't smoke, like you need to build that habit to go take a smoke break, take a breath break, literally just stop what you're doing.

Get up, walk away. Every now and again, you need to have deep focus and sit there for four hours and white knuckle your way through it. But answering emails and slack messages, that's not it. That's not it.

Jeremy: Absolutely not. Uh, the other thing I've been doing is really just trying to focus on what is in my control, right?

Like what are the things that I actually have the power to change? Do I need to read all of the unread slack messages? No, that can wait, right? Do I need to respond to every HubSpot alert that I've gotten? No, I really don't. That can wait. There's nothing critical there that needs my attention right now.

So really just trying to focus on what's, what's the impact I can have, what's in my control and trying to put everything else on the back burner. Still not a [00:11:00] hundred percent there yet, but, but it is something that I'm, I'm being more intentional and aware of in my, in my day to day routine.

Zach: Well, I would, but we've talked about it a bunch.

The Eisenhower matrix is perfect for that kind of stuff, right? It is. Is it important and urgent to do? Well, white knuckle that and do it. If it's important, but it's not urgent, get it on your calendar, get time to work on it because it will eventually become urgent. If it's urgent and not important, that's something that you maybe want to delegate down to someone else who it would be important for.

And then if it's not important and not urgent Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do it. Or give it to somebody else who it is important for. Right? Like there are tasks that we like to hang on to. Um, both, I mean, even, I don't know, I'm having trouble with this at home. Like even now my daughter's within earshot of me, but I'm having her like do some chores and things like that.

And like, if she loads the dishwasher in a way that I wouldn't do it, I will reload the dishwasher. So [00:12:00] take a look at your tasks, take a look at the things that you do. Is there something. And That someone else can do, but that, I mean, that's literally it, man. Like you, it, if you go through it, you should be working on 90 percent of your time should be spent on important, non urgent things.

Yep. Absolutely. Emails, Slack messages. Those are important. Well, sometimes important, sometimes not important, but they're urgent. Don't let it happen like that. Make sure that they're important, not urgent.

Jeremy: Yeah. Uh, and finally, the thing that's worked for me, you know, in, in a past life, I was a morning gym guy and now I've been spending my, basically my lunch break.

I split my day in half in the middle part of my day. I'm either going to the gym or I'm going down to the lake to get into it because it's nice and cold having that, that physical. Removal from the computer, having that physical removal from the responsibilities, taking time just for me to make sure that I'm taking care of my body, taking care of my mind.

That has been essential because I can come out of [00:13:00] that. Basically, that's halftime, right? I get go give myself that pep talk, come out and come out and rock the second half. And that has been huge for me. I know. I know. Not everybody has that ability. Not everybody has a gym five minutes away or maybe downstairs in their building or whatever.

But if there's a way to work in. Some sort of movement, some sort of just physical break from the day, go for a walk, whatever it is. That's so, that's for me has been huge in managing the stress of this situation.

Zach: Yeah, absolutely. And that's, that is the key to my mental health. And I haven't been doing as much lately because I've been sick and like things have gotten in the way.

And I, so, you know, normally I'm a 430 wake up guy. I just can't do it on certain, on like three days out of the week now because I've got other things going on. So I've been going to the noon workout. There you go. But it's so different for me. Like, you know, and I'm getting, I'm getting used to it, but like I get done with the workout at the end of the day and like I'm extra tired in the afternoon instead of like my [00:14:00] normal tired.

So it's, I'm still easing into it, but yeah, absolutely. Like getting out and just walking away. Walk in, literally go put a load of laundry in full load of laundry. Like we work from home. A lot of us do anyway, like go just do that. Do a chore.

Jeremy: Yep. Just, just that actual break is a, is a big help. All right.

Well, that's enough therapy for one week, Zach. I appreciate you being there. It's always great to have you as a resource when I, when I'm having a hard time, I know that goes the other way sometimes for you. And so I'm grateful to you and I'm grateful for you, the listener listening to this. I hope this has been beneficial for you.

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Thanks for listening.

Zach: See everyone. [00:15:00]