[00:00:38] Vesna: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Peak Revival Podcast. My name is Vesna. Today I'm gonna talk about. If you've ever been called a workaholic, and where does it come from and why does it matter for you in five years from today, have you ever thought to yourself, I. Am I a workaholic? I've had clients say to me, am I a workaholic? Is that what this is? Is that my problem? And maybe [00:01:00] someone said it to you in passing as a joke or not, but otherwise, that word's kind of been floating around in your mind or through conversation. Now, what does it mean and where does it come from?
So the dictionary definition of a workaholic is a person who compulsively works. Excessively hard and long hours. And when you look at the word compulsively, it's like this irresistible urge to work which sounds a bit funny when it comes to work, but there is an urge and something's pushing you to keep working extra long and hard hours.
Now that's. The dictionary definition and while that's great, it doesn't really mean much in practice. I want to ask you some questions and I'm gonna go through some questions really slowly and I really want you to ponder these questions and the first answer that comes up for you when I ask these questions, and this is gonna be really important.
Number one, if you were to take a full week away from your business and not check in at all on your emails, on your team, nothing, right? You are unreachable for one [00:02:00] week. Would you feel guilty? Would you feel bored? Would you even schedule something like that? Right? What comes up for you with that question?
Secondly, has anyone ever said to you, you always say you're gonna slow downand you never do.
Three. Does working harder make you feel more worthwhile? Right? Like you're a valuable part of the business or the family or the relationship? Is there an element of working at this that makes you feel valuable or worthwhile? If no one could see what you were doing, would you still do it?
If you loved your work, but you were never recognized for any achievements, would you still work as hard? And lastly, what happens when you slow down? Do you feel calm or do you feel restless, anxious, agitated, bored? So I hope that you pondered those questions. It, I think they're telling questions because they kind of go to the place of where [00:03:00] this behaviour is coming from and I really want that to trigger in you to find the answers.
Right? With workaholics, It's not just about doing the best work, like I talked about in a previous episode, about your drivers. So whether you're a visionary or you're driven for impact, et cetera, like we had drivers for high performing women, a hundred percent. But this is something a little bit different, okay?
This is when you end up sacrificing, like you're exhausted, you're burnt out, you are, on the floor crying. Can't deal with your day. Your relationships are no good, right? You're fighting, you're not close with your kids. Whatever it is, that is an unhealthy. State to be in. Okay. That is, you've gone too far.
So what is driving you to go too far? You may not be there, but you might be heading into that and thinking, actually, my relationships are affected, my health is affected. What is driving this With being a workaholic or working excessively hard, there is a driver to prove your worth through your achievements. Workaholics often try to prove themselves. And so [00:04:00] there's a sense of not feeling as valuable. And so the work is to provide the value, right? So whether it be a reflection of your income, your house, your car, the size of your business, your net worth, right? And traditionally, this was kind of, men fell into this category, but I see many women today, right?
And not just from a business and network and and income perspective, but your children, like your children a reflection of your worth, right? how hard you've worked. To get them where they should be. your looks, your weight, right? These are all ways that we try to prove our value or our worth to avoid rejection, to feel like we belong.
To feel secure. Now, when it comes to business, I know that working hard in business just looks like it makes total sense, right? You gotta work hard in business. 'cause business is a tough game, right? You gotta be on the go, you gotta be doing stuff. Busy, busy, busy, busy. But I don't. Really believe that that's how it works, right?
I used to like, I remember I've shared a story once before and I, and I do always share this story because it was such a big [00:05:00] moment for me. I remember once I asked my dad who'd been in business his whole life, and I said, you know, this was when I was struggling in, this business, in the online business.
In the beginning, I really had no idea what I was doing and I was putting all this money in and not getting money out. And I said to him, have you ever seen anyone work this hard? And not make money. And he said so many people. And I was like really blown away by the answer. And I was like, yeah, okay.
That's actually true. That's how people go bankrupt in business, right? They're still working very hard. So hard work is an element, yes, but it's not the one thing that's going to make you successful. Okay. And I think there is a belief that you can't achieve what you want without hard work. And I think there's a limit to what is hard work or working excessively hard, compulsively hard, that you are burning out and you're actually impacting your relationships, your mothering or your health.
So work hard can equal success except for when it doesn't. Okay? So it's not a surefire formula for you to be successful in all areas of your life. And I think that you know this, right? I think you've [00:06:00] probably worked hard as I have for different things in my life. I worked very, very hard at it and didn't get what I want.
And there are other things where. I didn't work that hard for it and I got it right? And so there's more things at play here. But what I really wanna point to is that taking some of that need to prove your worth off your shoulders through your work, okay? And so you can simply enjoy your work and have more freedom, have more ease, have more enjoyment, have more vitality, right? Have better relationships.
So, like I said, there is a core belief. There's an underlining story that defines work holism, and it's, if I work harder than everybody else, I'll prove that I matter. Okay? This is very unconscious. There is something about doing and working that equals values. Somehow that's been programmed into our mind.
And actually there was a psychologist who I'm gonna talk about, Alfred Alder. He said that This mindset really started in our school years, like in the traditional school system. Because we were graded, it become very [00:07:00] competitive. And so therefore we developed this belief that if we work harder, then we are more valuable, that we're more recognized, we get more achievements, right?
And so therefore we are more valuable in the world. I guess not even more valuable, but we belong, right? We feel part of the group. Okay, we feel accepted, we feel more secure. So that's really kind of this core belief, right? Working harder makes you feel some sense of security or some sense of belonging, particularly if you wanna get to a place that you wanna get to that.
feels like it's got that sense of security. So Alan Alder was a psychologist around the time of Freud and Jung, but he saw things very differently. He didn't see that. Our past, our childhood was the main reason why we are stuck in our life and, and continue the same patterns. Like he does recognize things from our childhood, but ultimately, he believed that these stories could be broken.
Right? Whereas Jung and Freud. Thought about going into your past more and more and more and more to try and, [00:08:00] um, dig more dirt up and try and overcome it. Alder didn't see that as a very successful formula, and he said there everybody can change regardless of their past. But he did say that for workaholics.
This is a. Working hard for a fictional final goal. what he called it, and he said, it's an unconscious belief that we hold that if we achieve something, whether it's recognition or success or status, that will finally feel secure, accepted, and whole. But it's fictional, right? You think about maybe where you are right now, okay?
Five years ago you would've been really happy to be where you are right now. Okay? Hopefully for many of you, sometimes things happen, but. All in all, maybe in your business or in your personal life, five years ago, you wanted to be in this place, right? That was a goal that was going to feel like you had made it.
You had achieved, you were whole, you were content, but you are in this place today and you don't feel those feelings, right? The goalpost has shifted and Right, and that's why he calls it the fictional final goal.
So for a workaholic, the fictional final goal [00:09:00] could be when my business runs perfectly and my team performs flawlessly, I'll finally relax. Once I hit 7, 8, 9 figures, I'll finally feel successful and secure. if I stop or lose everything I built. Okay. So these are some of the irrational goals that are formed in early life and that play out in our life because of feelings of inadequacy or fear of not belonging.
So that's from our childhood. But again, Alan Alder, and I think a lot of, psychology Today really focuses on that we can change these things, right? These are just stories that are unconscious that we've carried through from our childhood.
in Urian psychology, he called it. We build a private logic. We build a private little world that's logical to us, right through unconscious beliefs, and it ends up ruling our lives, right? So we constructed this story from childhood to make sense of the world, our place in it to gain significance, safety and belonging. And that becomes the lens through which we live and interpret [00:10:00] everything. So we live in a way of things that we want to avoid and that we want to strive for.
you know, some of those things that I've already mentioned are not thoughts that we say out loud, but they look like behaviors, like saying yes when we want to say no, overworking to compensate for feeling like an imposter, pushing past exhaustion because there's no other option, Or avoiding delegation because we don't trust anyone to do it right. I think those are really typical signs that I see for business owners that they are really stepping into that workaholic. They're really stepping in that if it's meant to be, it's up to me.
And there's really so much to prove there, right? There's only a reliance on yourself, but there's also this need to prove your value. Okay? And if we took you outta the equation and everything ran perfectly. What about you then? What's your role? What's your value that you bring? Okay? And this could be outside of business as well, in the family unit, in a relationship, right?
Have a look at how much there is, or could there be a story of trying to prove your worth [00:11:00] in your relationships. so one thing I would ask you to do is where you are today, project yourself 5 years ahead. Feeling the way that you feel today operating things, the way that you're operating today, 5 years ahead, How would you be? Would you be happy with continuing exactly like this for another 5 years? Would you feel like you would've gotten ahead in life or where you wanted to get to and push forward another 10 years? I really see yourself 10 years from today, and you're still exactly the same place in the, in terms of how much you work, how many hours you work, how stressed you feel, how overwhelmed, how anxious, how exhausted, how your relationships are, how much time you have with your kids in 10 years from now, what is gonna be the impact of that.
Do you wanna be in this place 10 years from now? Because I can tell you that, and I know this from personal experience, we wait for things to change. We wait for things to settle down, but it's, we need to change, okay? Things don't settle down without our participation, right? We need to organize things, but we need [00:12:00] to uncover these core beliefs that are driving us.
I've always said. I always say to my coaches, I always make everything harder than what it needs to be. I used to, I'm gonna say that I used to make everything harder than what it needs to be. There was an element of, I really did believe that if I worked hard, if there was hard work involved in the process, and this is not just in my business, but anything, it had to feel hard, then it was worth it.
Okay, then I'm worth it. Then I'll get the result. And I see women who, you know, whether they're on, a health journey. Or a weight loss journey or whatever it is, if it feels easy. Like sometimes I talk about things in my work and they're very simple things to do, and they work very, very well, but it seems too easy for them, right?
Because they have a belief that it has to be hard, really hard, or maybe a really restrictive diet in order for them to get the results that they want, right? And that's why our beliefs shape so much of what shows up in our life and the way that we feel.
So let's go into your kind of private logic story, this kind of [00:13:00] childhood belief that you've carried forward from a very young kid. So I want you to ask yourself these questions. And actually what I'm gonna do is below this, I'll put all the questions in A PDF so you can actually take the time to go through this.
'cause I think it's really important. If you're not happy where you are now, and if you project yourself 10 years forward and you're like, yikes, I do not wanna be there, then this is an important exercise. What are your core beliefs about work? What are your core beliefs about rest? How much rest is too much?
How much rest is lazy? Rest, right? You're lazy. Like really break it down. what is your core beliefs about worth? What makes you valuable? Is there anything you need to do to be valuable? How is value even assessed? Are you more valuable than me? Am I more valuable than you?
Like how do we know who's making this up? What would happen if you didn't work so hard? What would happen if you stepped back a little bit and didn't work so hard? What fear comes up for you with that question? And then you wanna understand the purpose behind it. So what is this [00:14:00] behavior trying to achieve? Where are you trying to get to? What are you, what's the end result here?
Is it security? Is it significance? And really look at what this behavior is trying to achieve.
then I would even explore for yourself what valuable looks like. Right? Can you be valuable even when you're resting? Can you be valuable without doing anything? Because if that's the sole driver for us trying to prove our place in the world, then we have to look at where. Value comes from
Your worth and my worth are never in question. We can never get that through our work. Okay? So that feeling of not being enough or trying to prove ourselves is a moment of disconnection from our innate wellbeing.
So when you get caught in insecure thinking, you're going to look outside, you're going to look for achievements to make you feel secure and valuable, but that is only a disconnect from your innate wellbeing from the truth. That's really the place to look at because at the end of the day, whatever you achieve, [00:15:00] you may or may not feel valuable, but there are periods of time when you feel more connected to yourself, there's less noise in your head, you've got more mental bandwidth, you kind of, you know, slow down and there's no question to prove your worth.
There's no question whether you are valuable. So I'd love for you to ponder those questions and those thoughts. And uh, if you can leave me a comment below.
