CHAPTER 6 BREAKOUT

YOUR WORK

It kinda screws things up when you overwork something.

– JEFF BRIDGES

Time to drill deeper. Recall that breakout creates Ahas when we identify energy-draining thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. With a series of Ahas comes the goal: Breakthrough! Breakthrough is the Ahhhh that aligns our energy so we can focus on what really matters most at this specific stage of our life.

Remember: Just as there are cycles of the tides and periods of the moon, so too are there periods of our life. What is this period of your life? If it’s a period, then no truer words were ever spoken than “this too shall pass.”

STOP first. LOOK next. LISTEN deeply.

EXPLORE THE BIG PICTURE FIRST

Just write down briefly the first thoughts that come into your head. Perhaps you’re thirty-five, starting a second job, trying to learn the demands of the new job, plus you’re in the throes of early parenthood. Perhaps you’re forty-eight, recently divorced, a solopreneur, trying to decide whether to grow the business or sell it, and dealing with aging parents. You get the idea.

Remember, you write to get it right.

LET’S LOOK AT YOUR WORK

We all work—whether for fee or for free. You might spend time as a community volunteer. You might be going back to school. You might be taking a certification exam. You get the picture. Consider the questions listed. Please write your answers and, as you do, note if there is something that provokes a thought of dismay. You are on to a potential breakout, an Aha. Also, note if there is something that brings a smile to your face. That is also a potential breakout.

Meet Phil Gerbyshak, now the Vice President of Sales Training at Vector Solutions. His burnout came when he was a vice president in IT, back in the days of “command and control.”

“I had big-time burnout. The leaders then were almost bending people to their will as opposed to partnering with them. And that was very hard. I was married to my Blackberry at the time and I actually got divorced because of it. She called my Blackberry ‘my mistress.’ It was very hard.”

The divorce struck Phil between the eyes, and his final day on the job affirmed his decision to leave. “My last day was June 10, 2010, when one of my nieces got baptized. Very important to me. But after the baptism, I spent six hours on the phone troubleshooting a problem that went nowhere and my Blackberry went completely dead. I called my boss, the CIO, and asked ‘What are we going to do? How are we going to be different?’ He said, ‘I don’t know. That’s your problem.’ I replied that my last day was Friday and I had just wasted six hours of my life with him.”

That experience confirmed Phil’s decision. But he lost a wife as a result of not stopping, listening, and looking at what was happening.

Any Ahas? Notice in all these case studies, each person did not stop, critically take a deep breath, look at what the results of a continued course of action were, and critically listen to the wisdom of their body and their partners.