EntreLeadership - Here is What Makes a Business Successful! with Christy Wright

Episode Date: January 18, 2021

If you’re a go-getter, there’s a good chance you like to be busy. If you get to the bottom of your to-do list, you’re eager to fill it back up. But be careful, you can be so productive that you miss your whole life. Christy Wright, author and Certified Business Coach, challenges leaders to get a life outside of their business (right now, not once things slow down). Listen as she breaks down work-life balance and why it’s so important to invest in the things you can’t measure in dollars and cents.   entreleadership.com/podcast Christy Wright's website 2021 Goal Planner by Christy Wright Living True: 40 Days to Get Back to You by Christy Wright Choosing to Cheat by Andy Stanley The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry by John Mark Comer The Christy Wright Show podcast The Christy Wright Show 25 Ways to Protect Your Time Schedule a call with Tim, the Producer   Want expert help with your business question? Call 844-944-1070 and leave a message or send an email to [e-mail]. You could be featured on a future podcast episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You know, it can be so easy to get caught up in your business, especially when you love it so much. But you've got to take time to reflect on the question. Am I on track for my vision of a successful life? Your answer might be yes, I hope it is. But what do you do if you don't like what you see? What does it even look like to have a successful life? From the Ramsey Network, this is the Entree Leadership podcast, where we help business leaders grow themselves, their teams, and their profits. I'm your host, Daniel Tarty, and my guest today is Christy Wright.

Christy's a number one bestselling author, speaker, and one of our Ramsey personalities, and she's a longtime great friend of mine personally. She's one of our speakers at the Entree Leadership Summit and Master Series event, and the topic of her master series talk in 2020 is one that I wanted to have a conversation with her about as we're here starting 2021. It was all about the idea of not losing yourself in the business that you love. And guys, look, if you don't define what a successful life means to you, you're never going to have one. And this whole thing starts with a clear focus on the only thing that you can control.

We're the only thing we can really control. So I really can't control that other person. I can't even control situations, but I can't control me. So if I go, okay, what did I do to contribute to this? Did I handle this situation wrong? Did I send an email that was too blunt or direct or aggressive? how could I change something in me that would have led to a different result or how can I now? And so there's also something very practical about it that that is truly the only thing we can control.

And we know that intellectually, but man, when we're in conflict, we just want to get mad and change people and people to fix themselves. It's hard to remember. But if you can remember that, then you might lead to a lot better outcomes. Because you really, that is really the only thing you can truly control. I noticed she said asking different questions. I understand that, and you and I've talked about, this, you know, you do something and then you pause and reflect in hindsight and you're asking questions. I don't know that everybody does that. Okay. I mean, there's a thing about actually

asking questions. Yeah. Versus just kind of plowing through life. Yeah. Let me give you an example from marriage. This is not a business example, but it's something that's actually really helped my marriage. So I'm in Enigram 8 for anybody that's familiar with Enigrams. And I tend to be direct, quick thinker, aggressive, you know, blunt and so on. And my husband is more quiet and steady. He's an Enneagram 5. He's very kind. He's very nicer than me. I learn a lot from him. But I've started asking myself a question in marriage that has helped reduce conflict. And it's a really simple question. When I get mad at him about whatever, because in marriage, you just get mad at each other for whatever. Small things, dumb things, big things, whatever. I ask myself a question when I find myself getting mad. I ask myself, have I ever done that? And the answer is always yes, tardy. The answer is always yes. Whatever the thing is he forgot to get something from the grocery. Have I ever done that? Yeah. You know, he forgot to whatever, take out the trash. Have I ever done that? Yeah. And so what's so cool about this question, that's a really simple one, but that works relationally in business in any relationship, is it gives you empathy and grace for the other person where you approach the conflict so differently

versus pointing a finger. Why did you do that? It's like, hey, I've done this before too, or, hey, can you help me do this? You just, you have a different tone, a different posture, which leads to better conversations. It reduces the conflict, diffuses the situation. So that's one example. Another example we referenced earlier, what maybe have I done to contribute to this, whatever the thing is? You know, what could I have done differently? And so when you start to ask questions, like you said, focused on yourself, not from egotistical standpoint, but from a purely practical, this is what I can control, this is going to lead to better outcomes perspective. I think it really helps you grow as a person. And as a result, your relationships are so much better, any relationship.

Yeah. It's tough to ask those questions because oftentimes, you know, we want the problem to be outside of us because it's more convenient that way. But when we're really confronting ourselves, you know, we have to change. There's a great leadership coach. His name is Jerry Colonna. And he asked this question that every time I hear it, I just feel so convicted. And that is, how am I being complicit in the situation that I say that I don't want? And it's back to what you're saying. It's like, how am I contributing to this? Because when we look at that, we go, I'm going to be uncomfortable when I ask that question because then I have to go change something versus just complaining about it. Right, right. Well, I'll tell you, this is like a faith side of things, but I can tell you, every time I go to God in prayer mad at someone, he turns the mirror to me. Every time I'm like, have you seen so-and-so? Did you know that she did da-da-da-da? Or he did it. And every time the Lord will bring to mine something I have done. And I'm like, oh, dang it. And so you really are confronted with yourself. You know, one of the things that I say, it's similar to that quote, but I remind people, you can't complain about that which you permit. There's so many things going on in our life that we are allowing. We're complaining about our calendars. We're complaining about how busy we are.

It's like anything on your calendar is something you put there, by the way, or you allowed to be there. And so it again brings the responsibility back to us and say, what can we do differently? Who can we be differently? How can we grow to contribute? And really what's interesting when we look at this relationally, when we start to ask some of these questions. of how could I have handled it this differently. Me, as an egregate, someone that can be kind of hot-headed, aggressive, you know, whatever, it changes my entire posture and tone and language when I approach that person,

which I think is really important for people wired like me, because when you look at it from the other person's shoes, you give them the benefit of the doubt, you think, have I ever done that, then you might approach the conflict completely different and say, hey, you know, I didn't really like how this meeting went, and I'm sure you were just, just thinking, oh, we've got to get to the point, or you probably were just, you didn't mean anything by it. I know you didn't.

But it came across like this. As we're next time, can we just do it differently? That's a totally different language than you were out of line. You did something wrong. You embarrassed yourself. You know. And so it's amazing how those questions lead to better conversations and better results and just better relationships overall because that person that you then coached or corrected feels

seeing, heard, appreciated even in the midst of course. conflict versus feeling embarrassed, shamed, called out. I think if leaders will just pause and give people benefit of the doubt and assume they don't have the whole story, because we're so quick to label. Like we have an experience like that. And we're so quick to size it up, label it, and decide, well, they're just being a jerk. Right. But what you're talking about is slowing down enough to have compassion and go, maybe there's

more here that I don't understand. And you're giving them the dignity and some space to say, hey, educate me. I experienced it this way. but I know that you're a good person. I know you've got a lot going on. And all of a sudden you find out the backstory, and they've got a terrible day, and they didn't need to come off that way. And then you go, and then back to what you said before, have I ever done that too? Right.

Absolutely. Right. Right. Yeah. You know, leaders oftentimes, we just get going so fast. There's so much going on. Right. And we're high performance people.

And kind of like what you've said, it's our fault because we've created all the noise. Right, right. We are addicted to it. performance and the chaos. Sometimes it's like we complain about the chaos, but we also deep down inside, like, this is what I'm here for, you know? It's like the firefighter who's also an arsonist. And, you know, we can lose ourselves in the business. We can lose our identity with just the go, go, go. And you've talked about this a lot recently. In fact, on the stage at Entree Leadership Master's series, one of the best lessons, the top feedback that we got from the entire event was about this conversation. And I think it just really hit a nerve. Yeah. The business owner's going, I lose myself all the time in this thing that's my baby. Yeah.

And they can't separate who they are and what they do. And that's a scary place to live a long time. It is. And I would say that even as we start talking about unpacking this idea and digging into the problem, I think that it's really, really common. I think it's really, I don't want to say normal, like, oh, it's okay, healthy normal. But I think it's just common. I think it's a very tempting place to get to. we don't get their own purpose. I don't think anyone would say, I don't want to have a life.

My business is everything. This is all I want to be known for my whole life. Very few people would say that outright. But by our behavior, our choices, our actions, our calendar, we get to that place where we have a business and we don't have a life. You know, the title of the talk at Entry Leadership Summit and Master Series was get a life. Don't lose yourself in the business you love. And I think that when we have this moment of reset, of reflection on, okay, what is my life look like? What is more than just the business side of things? Then it gives us an opportunity to stop in the middle of the craziness and zoom out and go, what do I want to be known for? What type of man or woman do I want to be as a dad, as a person in my community?

You know, what do I want my legacy to be? What do I want to be remembered for? and it's probably a whole lot of things that are not just business, but because the business is so busy, because it's so addictive, because we do love it. And a whole long list of other reasons, we, one decision at a time, one day at a time, one year at a time, pour ourselves into it so much that every other area of our life kind of fades into the background. And we say, well, you know, when things slow down, I'll go on a date. When things slow down, I'll take care of my health. When things slow down, when things slow down, when things slow down, we'll go on a vacation vacation.

And things never slowed down. We know that. We know that. And so, you know, if things do slow down, we go create more, right? Because we're so, we love the busy. We love the chaos. We love the success and the productivity of all of it. But I think there's some other things going on that get us off track. And again, I would say that I don't think we get off track on purpose. I really don't. I think all of us have a desire to have other things in our life that we love. But one decision at a time we get there. So, for example, one of the things that I think is so addictive about the nature of business and work in general, is that you have very tangible results, right? Like, if you go make a sale today, you have numbers to show for that sale. Your effort led to these numbers that led to this top line revenue. It's a very concrete feedback loop. Very concrete, very measurable. And so you're able to point to that thing and say, I did this and it led to this.

Well, that, I mean, even if you look at human psychology, nothing is more motivating than progress. When you see progress, like, wow, I made 10 calls today that led to this many sales, that led to this paycheck, this top line revenue, this personal income for me, that motivates you to make more progress, make more calls, make more sales. That's not a bad thing. But let's look at that in contrast to your home life. Okay? Your kids, your cleaning, your hobbies, I'm in a season with little kids, I'm changing diapers. That's not real measurable. It's also not real gratifying.

You know, it doesn't matter what impressive thing I do at work. I could be on the Today Show, Daniel Tarty, and I go home, and my son's like, where's my milk? I need a snack. I mean, they will bring you right back down to reality. And so I think that you've got this contrast in these two worlds between your business life that is so measurable, tangible results. You can see your progress. And then your home life that is not as measurable, not as tangible results. And let's be honest, in a sense, you can control the business a lot more than you can control things at home.

I mean, I can control my work a lot more than I can control my kids. You know, I can try. But I think that these factors lead us to pour ourselves into this world, this business world, where we have tangible results. We can see our progress. The world rewards it. We are in control. We feel more powerful.

And we have this banner of, I'm providing income from my family. I'm doing it for the family. I'm doing it for us. And so all this combination leads to us pouring ourselves into it so much at the expense of every other area of our life. And I think it's a shame because we're going to look up and look back and think, I wish I would have invested in these other things I love to. My family, my relationships, hobby, time alone, personal growth, these things that do also matter. Maybe I just forgot about it. I was talking to a friend about this. And he said the things that really fuel

our ego short term are kind of like hunting. But the things that we value long term are more like farming. That's good. And in farming, you have to put seeds in the ground. Then you have to water it. And there's no fruit. You have to wait. And then you have to pull the weeds.

And you have to wait. And it's like months and months and months before you have the harvest on those things. We're hunting. You go out that day. You kill something. And you drive home that day. And there's a rush in the hunting. Right.

There's an adrenaline thing that I think especially as entrepreneurs, as leaders, you said it before, we're kind of wired for that. Right. How has people that are wired that way? Do we start to value some of, or at least borrow from the better part of that farmer mindset. Yeah. So I think that one of the things, there's a couple things that I think have helped me, and I don't have a perfect formula, but a couple of things that have helped me. One is being present. And so like really being present in the moment that I'm in, focusing on my

child's smile, the joke my son's telling, my daughter walking for the first time. Like allowing my mind to be there, it makes it easier to appreciate those things. But if I'm, if my body's there, but I'm thinking about work or thinking about I should be chasing this goal or I should be clean in the house, then I don't appreciate that. It's just happening around me. My body might be there, but I'm not actually present. And so just this simple practice of being where my feet are has led to more gratitude for those things as well. And so I think a lot of it is, you know, we understand training for a marathon. You know, I know I'm going to have to put in the miles. But I think you have to train yourself in terms of habits, train yourself in terms of discipline,

train yourself to be present. So often when my mind wanders, like so many entrepreneurs, Our mind is going 100 miles an hour. We got a million business ideas a day. We have to literally train our brain to come back to what's in front of us. So we go back to asking questions. Here's another great question. I ask myself this all the time. When my mind is wondering, I ask myself, what is in front of me?

And whatever's in front of me is more important, Hardy, every time, every single time. Whether it's my daughter or it's an email I'm writing or it's the thing I'm working on, whatever's in front of me is most important. And that's what I want to focus on. And so I think that there's an element of training, training new habits, training your mind to be present, training to appreciate, you know, those things. It's funny because with my kids, I've got a five-year-old, four-year-old, and one-year-old. And there's so many elements of my work that are so gratifying, like we said, it's measurable. I can see if I do this, this happens.

And at home, it just feels like chaos, and I'm cleaning up Cheerios every five minutes. And it feels like I do a lot of. work that does not pay off because the Cheerios are right back five minutes later. And so I think part of it has, there's an element we've talked about seasons before, but reminding myself that this season will not last forever. And so if I'm not careful, I will wish my whole life away. You know, when I was single, I wished I was married. When I was married, I wish I had kids. When I had babies, I wish they were older and it was not so hard. And I see how my mother-in-law looks at my kids and how my mom and my dad look at my kids and go, I'd give anything. I'd give anything to have those finger smudges on the window.

I'd give anything to feel that little baby's arms from my neck again. Because to them, 35 years is the blink of an eye. When I'm in it, the days are long, but the years are short. And so I think that there's an element of just choosing to train yourself to be present and appreciate right where you are, even if it's imperfect and less than ideal, and even if it's a hard season. I think you will miss your whole life if you're always wishing for the next season. And then you never got to experience any of it. And so for me, this whole idea of be where your feet are, wherever you are, be there, has led to so much more fulfillment, even if where I am is hard.

I allow myself to be there. And I think some of those things can help us reduce the distraction and the addictive nature of I've always got to go, go, go, go, do more because I'm going to be right here in this season because this season will not last forever. You know that Trace Atkins song? Yes. Yes. There's so much truth in that.

I was actually earlier this week, I was in Texas working on some stuff to help my mom with the family business. And I went to the cross-country course that I ran on in high school. And Christy, I had probably 20 years since I've been there. And I'm jogging the course, much slower than the last time I'm running. But I'm out there reminiscing about it. And I thought, the last time I was here, my dad was here with me. And I was just thinking about, you know, I lost my dad earlier this year. And that song came in my mind of like, you're going to miss these moments.

You better slow down. You better fight for with your kids with the ones that you love because you just don't know how fast it's going to go. Yeah. And there's always another email. Yeah. And there's always another meeting. And there's always another flight to get on. And I think you said earlier, we believe this myth that one day we'll get caught up on that stuff and then we'll be able to invest deeply in these things.

But by that point, the truth is the window's gone. Right. Right. Well, and it's interesting, too, because I think that one of the things that I do, let's use an example that's not just season or calendar related just for some variety here, a to-do list. I love a to-do list. It's a great tool for productivity, yada, yada, yada. Here's what I do with my to-do list. I put a million things on it.

And then I beat myself up when I don't get to all of them because the list that I created was so unrealistic. It's ridiculous. If I ever do accomplish my list, I don't sit with a blank. list. I think of things to put on it. And so let's apply this idea because we're so addicted to productivity. I mean, this is, you can even look at the psychology of this of when you check something off your to-do list, it releases dopamine in your brain. It is this reward-seeking loop in your brain that says, do that again. So I'm going to put something on my list so that I can check it off. And then I'm going to go back and put things on my list that I've already did that are done and put

them on just so I can check them off. And so we become addicted to productivity. Well, if you apply this to your life in terms of seasons, business, schedules, calendars, you're going to create where there is nothing, and then you're just continually seeking, oh, when things slow down, but you're creating a situation where things will actually never slow down. And so what's interesting, and I think this is really hard for entrepreneurs, it is very hard to turn it off when there's things still yet to be done, to stop, rest, play, go on a date, go on a vacation, play with your kids, have time alone, work out, whatever the thing is, to have a life. when there's so much still be done, you keep thinking, well, when things slow down?

You know, I did research. This was last year leading up to the rebrand of the Christy Wright Show and everything that we were doing. And I got on the phone and interviewed, I probably spent 30 minutes with each caller, probably interviewed 20 or 30 people and just asked them a series of questions of pain points, things they struggled with. And here's what's interesting. Every single person I talked to, male or female, whether they worked inside the home or outside the home, whether they had kids or didn't.

The age of their kids did not matter. every single one of them said those same words you just said, but when things slow down. So a 20-year-old and a 60-year-old said that. A man and a woman said that, someone with kids, someone without kids. But when things slow down, I'm going to fill in the blank. And we live our whole lives with this myth of when things slow down, I'm going to actually enjoy my life. And things never slow down. They never enjoy their life.

And they completely miss it. And so I think that as we talk about this conversation of having a life and even time management, One of the important pieces of it, in addition with managing your calendar and those type of things, like the tactical side, it's also being present for the moment that you're in, the season that you're in. Because you can create the most perfect schedule in the world, but if you're not present for it, you miss it. If every time I'm at work, I'm thinking about my kids, I'm not here with you. I'm not experiencing this moment. And then every time I'm home with my kids, I'm thinking about work and emails and looking at my phone, everywhere I am, I'm missing it. And so you live your whole life and you miss your whole life.

And so I think there's such a key, there's the tactical side of actually having time on your calendar, creating time on your calendar to have a life outside of work. But then when you have it, actually being present for it, actually experiencing the moment you're in, which in our culture of distraction and phones and technologies are harder than ever before. I want you to say more about the schedule thing. Emily and I used to have this kind of self-sabotaging bad habit. Okay. The way that we would use the calendar is if there's space on the calendar to get it in,

That was our filter for what we have time. Right. But we forget that just having time doesn't necessarily mean we're going to have the energy or the emotional capacity. Right. You know, that's the piece. Again, it's not as concrete. Right. It's not as easy to measure.

And I think we kill ourselves by just shoehorning in all these things into the calendar, 15 minutes between that meeting and that meeting. Okay, slam a phone call in there. And then on the way home, I'm going to be on the phone. And then I come in the door and I'm still on my phone. And you just, yeah, technically you have the time. But without the headspace and without your heart being able to show up, I love what you said, be wherever your feet are. You know, you get so distracted when you're just go, go, go, go, and the calendar's full of all this stuff. You talked about creating space in your calendar.

Do you use your calendar to actually block off things that, you know, to not do things so that you have that margin? Yeah, it's interesting. So I just, we were talking about this even before we started recording, but I just turned in my manuscript for my next book on Life Balance. And one of the things that I walk through in the calendar section of this book, the very tactical aspect, is I give the reader several questions to consider before they say yes or no to something. Because exactly like you said, how I used to make decision was, do they need me and can I do it? Like, is there physically time on the calendar? Well, yes, they need you. They're asking.

The needs are unending in this world. And if you have the sliver of time where you can cram or crowbar or multitask something in, then every single minute is accounted for. you're living your whole life according to reacting to what other people are asking of you. We never ask ourselves other questions, other more important, better questions. So the premise of the book, and I would say the premise of what I teach on life balance in general, is life balance is not doing everything for an equal amount of time. It's about doing the right things at the right time. When you do the right things at the right time, meaning the season you're in, what is most important right now,

then you can feel that sense of balance, but you're not doing everything. doing the right thing. So let's go back to the calendar example with you and Emily and I have done the same things and still can fall into this temptation. We fill our calendars full and we fill our to-do list full and we never ask ourselves if any of those things are worth doing. Is this worth doing? Is this a priority to me? Do I want to do it? Is this the best use of my time? How will this affect my family? What can I not do if I do this? And what's so interesting and, you know, I struggle with so many of these things, but one of the things that I struggle with, and I think a lot of entrepreneurs do, we love to be the hero, right? Like, we have this hero complex. We love to save the day. We love

to fill the gap. And so I'll give you an example. A couple years ago, I was pregnant with my third child, Mary Grace, and my son Carter was playing soccer, and we get an email from the soccer team, the YMCA organization. We want to have a coach for your son's team. So we're trying to figure out what to do. We really need a parent to step up. So I think, yes, I will do it. Six months pregnant me. I am the girl for the job. Not to mention, I was batching on my work to be out for a maternity leave. I was six months pregnant. I had a crazy schedule. This was a terrible idea. I just reacted to the need and I paid for it, tardy, every single Saturday when I'm having to make a rain call in 42-degree rain for four-year-olds, five-year-olds, every single Tuesday, organizing who's bringing

the oranges and the gatorade. I paid for it. Now, you would think I learned my lesson. I'm never going to struggle with that again. Next time I'm asked, it's a definite no. Well, fast forward to literally, just a few months ago, I, Carter has, by the way, Carter didn't even like soccer. So it's like, we're there every Saturday. He's like, Mommy, can we go home? I was like, I wish. You know, it's all for nothing. So Carter is just like all about you. This isn't even about Carter. This is about you. I'm like playing. I didn't know he hated it at first. At first, I thought he loved it. And then it turns out he hated and I had to still show up every way. So you think the lesson was learned. Carter has convinced me he, in fact, love soccer and definitely wants to play again. So after I

hear about this forever. I'm like, okay, we'll try again. I get totally different organization. A year and a half later, get the same email. Apparently, organizations are struggling for coaches, everyone in case you want to step up. I get this email and you would think it would be an automatic, no, and I still had the mental struggle. No, it was like this internal battle. No, you're not doing this. You're sitting on the sidelines with all the parents in lawn chairs. You're not doing this in the other part, but they need you. No, we don't remember the last time didn't go well, but who's going to do it if you don't do it? Remember, we made the, it was this back and forth, back and forth. And I think that we all still struggle with this. That's why I think it's really

good to have better questions that you ask yourself. So I'll just give you a few. Here's some, questions, and I threw out some a minute ago, but these are just examples that you can use to decide if I say yes or no to something. It's not like a formula. You have to ask yourself every single one. It'd be very hard to make decisions at that point. So ask yourself if you want to do it. This is assuming you have the time. Do you want to do it? That's a really important question we never ask. And even take that a step further. Will I want to do it? then. I want to do it right now, don't you? I want to do everything right now. Will I want to do it then on a cold Saturday morning in February? Will I want to do it then when I have to

leave my family on a Sunday night? Well, you know, so ask yourself if you want to do it. Well, you want to do it then. Ask yourself if it's a priority. I know y'all talk about this on Entree leadership all the time, but if everything's important, nothing's important. When you decide in advance what is important to you, it will help you see what is not important. So as an example, I had a friend recently have a baby, and I signed up for the meal train to bring her meal. Everything in me wanted to cook a home-cooked meal with seven courses and be really impressive. And when it came down to it, I was stressed, didn't have time for groceries, didn't have time to cook. And I thought, what is important to me?

Is it important to impress her with my cooking skills of the pioneer woman 45 recipe, 45-step ingredients? Or is it important to be a friend and show up and spend time with her? And I thought, I want to be a friend. That's what's important to me. I'm a friend, not a cook. And so I picked up takeout and went to her house and spent time with her. And when you know what's important, whatever that thing is, that it helps you see what's not important and make better decisions. You can ask yourself another couple of questions, which will I regret?

Will I regret doing that thing or not doing it? Another great question I ask myself this a lot. Which decision gives me relief? Saying yes to coaching soccer? Oh, that makes me feel stressed and tense and things. Saying no, makes me feel relief. Usually relief is a good indicator that I've made the right decision. So you can just start to ask your spouse, how will this affect them?

That's a really important decision, really important conversation as a family, because it's not just your time. Your time is shared with your family, your team, if you're making decisions for your company. And so I think when you ask yourself better questions, you come up with better answers. And here's what's cool, Tarty. You don't just come up with better answers. You're more confident in those answers. So when you say no, you stand behind it. You're not like weak and wobbly and going, I don't really know why I said no.

You know why you said no because you thought it through and you put a lot of intentionality into that no. And so it helps you stand firm, even when someone's like, oh, but come on, please, we really need you. You're like, no, this is not the season for me. You know, it gave me a lot of freedom and exactly what you're talking about. I used to struggle with this a lot. I still do, but I struggled with it so much more before I understood this notion that Andy Stanley talks about in his book, choosing to cheat. And his premise is, you're going to cheat somebody. You're either going to cheat work, or you're going to cheat your family, or you're going to cheat yourself, or you're going to cheat your friends.

you have to decide who you're going to cheat. And it's a different take on priorities. Right. You know, when we throw priorities around. Who are you going to let down? But we throw priorities in there. You almost, at least I do,

you go, okay, if I just prioritize everything right, I can still get all of it done at the max. And we're limited. Yeah. And once we realize we're limited, and there's only so much I can give to work, and there's only so much I can give to family. And so therefore, all of the demands are not going to get met.

Right. You know, and that's kind of like, blew my mind. Like, I can't meet all the demands? Right. No, I'm human. Right. And there's something, there's something kind of, you feel a little shame and lack in that, but you also feel this freedom. Yes.

Of like, okay, I don't have to do it all. Well, I think you, to your point, when you have an expectation of yourself that you can, if you could just be the most efficient, if you could just be the most productive and have the best time management app, you could fit it all in. And then when you don't, because you won't, because we can't, you feel like a failure. and you feel like a victim in your life. Like somehow I'm just, I'm failing as a mom. I'm failing as a leader. I'm failing as a business person. I'm failing as a friend, failing myself.

And you have this narrative that you're failing, which is not true. It's the wrong narrative. So let me give you, this is a silly example. This is a house example, but it's so visual, which is why I like it. So here's what I realized, Tarty. With three kids under six and a really busy job and all the things that I have going on that I love, I cannot, or I choose not to, have my whole house clean at the same time. Okay. If I was going to do that, I would literally clean nonstop and maybe have a fairy that cleans in the night also in addition.

Because it's like my kids mess up so quick. So instead of... If you could invent the ferry in the night cleaning business, I mean, we would all be multimillion. I would be a game changer. First customer. But here's what I do. So it used to be because I had this desire and expectation to have my whole house, because I do value a clean house. I do value that. I would go into the bonus room or go into a room and it would be messy and be like, oh, I need to clean this up. I see that visual mess, and that visual mess is a representation that I'm a failure. Okay? I change the narrative.

Think of this in terms of priorities. What is most important to me in my house? Most important to me, kitchen, living room, bedroom. That's where I spend the most of my time. Okay? The bonus room, the boys' room, and the deck are not most important. Toys are going to get pulled out every five seconds. I don't see those rooms.

I don't spend time in those rooms, and I'm fine if they stay a mess. Now, that seems like a really simple concept, but here's why this has been transformative. I choose what I fight for. I choose to fight to keep the kitchen, bedroom, and living room clean. those are places that give me a sense of peace, I go there. Then when I walk up in the boys' room or walk up in the bonus room and say, hey, guys, it's time for dinner. And I see that it's a disaster. I don't feel like a failure anymore.

You know what I see? I see that I chose that mess. I chose that no. I chose that mess to me is a representation of time better spent where in the evenings I'm going to play with my kids instead of picking up every toy. And so I think you can do this with your calendar. Instead of feeling like a victim and a failure, I didn't go to that party and I didn't volunteer there.

And I also didn't go to that meeting. I delegated to someone else. Instead, you say, no, I chose that, no, so that I could say yes over here. And we talk about that a lot with boundaries. It's not about saying, no, it's about saying yes to what's most important. We often focus on the no, the negative, we feel guilty, we feel like failure. Focus on the yes. Hey, because I said no to that, I got to have a night at home. Because I said no to that, I got to sleep in. Because I said no to that, I took my wife on a date. And you focus on what that allowed you to do, and you feel empowered and confident and proud of your decisions instead of guilty. And I'm really big on helping people shake the guilt in their life,

tardy, because I think so many of us walk around with all this guilt. And it's not only unnecessary, it's just untrue. You are making the choices that are right for you in any season, whether that's with your calendar or your house, pick what's most important, pick what you're going to fight for in this season, and pick what you're going to let go. And it helps you feel that sense of confidence and shake the guilt when you see those things. Well, and what you're hitting on, and especially for leaders. One thing that many leaders, or at least founders, never get to that they absolutely have to in order to scale their business, is the creative time to work on the vision. Planning, yes.

To think, to sit and plan and develop business models and crunch the numbers. You're the only one that can do that at the top-down way that's going to cause a business to thrive. And so to keep our to-do list and our calendars full with all these activities, really our egos are addicted to that, but it's a really immature way of leading. Yeah. Because it means that you don't understand the value of stopping and slowing down enough to think and plan and develop to, again, work on the, it's a cliche at this point, but work on the business, not in the business. And you can be really busy and your ego can be really pumped up working in the business 24-7 for the rest of your life. Yeah. But you're never going to build a peak performing business. Yeah.

But it feels a little squishy to go, I'm going to take three hours and I'm going to do strategic thought. Right. Because it's not as practical. It's not as concrete, right? But it's the thing that causes businesses to win. You've seen this. Well, and it's interesting because it's like we talked about when we started this conversation, because it doesn't have that really tangible immediate result, like making a sale, we often push that to the back burner because we can't see it, feel it, touch it, measure the result immediately. But it's such a good point. And I think it's interesting, too, because one of the themes we've kind of talked about, out here is asking better questions. And one of the questions you can ask yourself to help

with that is, do I have to do this? Whatever this is, it could be in your life or your business. Do I have to do this thing, me specifically? And we tell ourselves all day, every day, that we have to do things that we don't have to do. We just don't. We use that word. And that is a lie. It is a lie that we're believing and living within. And it's holding us back and keeping us from doing things we actually do have to do, like plan and create and cast a vision that no one else can do for us. And so all these tiny things that could be delegated or could just be eliminated. I can't tell you how many things I have on my calendar to-do list that I could just eliminate. I don't even have to delegate them.

They could just disappear. I just tell myself, I have to do it. And I will, quick sidebar here, I don't know if anybody listening relates to this, but one of the things that I struggle with as a creative person, as a visionary person, a person that has a lot of ideas like a lot of entrepreneurs are, I will have an idea pop in my head. And this is how the idea starts. You know what I could do? Tarty, I could start a whole new podcast and it could help specifically

people that are dealing with a beekeeping business and it could, it could like help them and like their specific niche, like their dream and like I know some people would be, like it's an idea. It starts with I could, right? I could. I could write a book on this topic. I could spin up a whole new business unit. I could hire 10 new people. I could. It starts as an idea. I could. But after it sits in my mind a while, it somehow, without me knowing, turns into, I have to. I have to start this podcast. But I have, I'm sorry, I'm busy, I'm going to start this podcast, I'm going to write this book, and I've got to hire these, I have to. I have to hire these 10 new people. If you would just question your thoughts, if you would just not believe everything you think, if you would just stop and pause and go, do I have to do that?

Or is that just an idea that I thought of one day that I then am now holding myself to? because this creative process where ideas pop in our head and we're inspired. And every idea we think is a good idea is not a good idea. But our coulds turned into shoulds and they turn into these things that hold us back that we use as an excuse of why we can't do the things, these other things like planning because, oh, we have to do all these things. Look at your calendar. I'd be willing to bet there's at least 30% of your calendar.

You don't have to do, you personally. Well, and it's the whole, it's the Predo's principle of 80% of the value comes from 20% of the work. And I've struggled with this a lot. I mean, you're reading my mail on things that I'm just like, oh, I've totally done this. First of all, one way I've figured out to challenge this is to tell myself, okay, I'm going to not go to that meeting. But next week, if it just is miserable and everything fails, like, I can go back. Dave Ramsey talks about, okay, you can get out of debt. And if you hate it and you're miserable, you can go get back in.

Sure. You know, so it doesn't have to be permanent. Like I've done before, I've gone on social media fast. I'm like, okay, just this week. I'm going to take the app off my phone. And invariably, that week leads to several weeks, and I love it. But that initial, like, can I really give this up forever? Like, don't punish yourself with making it a forever thing.

Like, try it. Like, see if you can get away with not doing that thing once or twice. And what you're probably going to find is I don't have to ever do it again. Right. But you can always go back if you feel like it really is mission critical. Right. And I think that's, again, back to this theme of seasons, I think when you realize that you are allowed to figure out what's in,

important in a season and say no to things that are not important in the season. When you remember it's a season, you're not saying no to those things forever. Yeah. So, for example, a lot of retail businesses just went through the Christmas season. Most likely, most retail businesses, their fourth quarter is their busiest time. So during that season, they're not probably cast in a vision. They are boots on the ground, get extra help in, temporary help, seasonal help someone to just get the orders shipped. But that's not how they operate all year long. They just know in this season we're going to operate this way. And then let's say, um, some businesses, a lot of times summer is a down season for a lot of businesses. That's a great

planning time. Summer months, we're going to say, what are we going to plan for the fourth quarter, third and fourth quarter? What are we going to plan for the next year? Maybe start working on some marketing campaigns, social media strategies. They start to work on things that are thinking further ahead, big picture, not as urgent, but still important. They just schedule those important things in a time that's conducive to their business trends and business flow. And so I think that to your point, when we remember that different seasons have different needs, it allows us, again, to be present and focused on what's the most important in that season, knowing it's not forever. We're not going to neglect these things forever. We're just neglecting them right now because we're focusing

on something more important right now. Totally. Well, and life is too fluid, and especially business. I mean, business is way too seasonal and fluid to just have this stock, like, okay, every week is going to look exactly like this. It's not realistic. For my family, for my business, for my health. And at the same time, there's a double-edged sword here. I want you to talk about this. I have used the season idea as a total cop-out for completely letting myself go, for example, with my health. So if I go, okay, I don't have time in this season to train for a marathon, then I'm going to drink sodas and eat Oreos every day and go all the way to the other end of the spectrum. Like, there's still things you can do to be intentional even if you're not all the way volume 10 on that thing in the season that you're in. So how do you kind of keep the balance across the areas without going full tilt just because it's a seasonal.

kind of aspect. Yeah, I love talking about some of the tendencies we have as entrepreneurs and business leaders, but I think one of the traits of like an entrepreneur DNA is we love to be impressive and we swing to these extremes. And so we're either all or nothing in or out, on or off, we're working out every day or we're eating Oreos by the sleeve. There's no just like, hey, we went for a three-mile walk a couple times this week. That's not even our part of our regular life. It just sounds so lame, right? It's so boring. We don't like moderation. We want big, impressive, showy, big splash. And And I think to your point, what's dangerous about this habit is that when we're on, we're so on, it's not sustainable. And when we're off, we're not doing anything because this moderation is not impressive to us.

And what's interesting is habits are created in the middle. Habits are created in moderation. Habits are created in the day-to-day disciplines that create a better life and help you be the person you want to be and get the results that you want to have in your life. And so to your point, you use the season example of a season where you're not doing anything. I don't think there's ever a season where you're doing things that are bad for yourself, right? Like even if you think in terms of personality, like, there's never a season to be a jerk. Sorry, I'm in a season of just being a jerk. Sorry.

It's like, no, there's never a good season for that. Okay, there's never a good season to, you know, not do the basics to take care of yourself. But it is this less versus more. It's an ebb and flow. And there's the focus might shift to one thing over another. And I think because we are so extreme, it's kind of like that the way we have that mindset of like, well, if we had pizza for lunch, might as well have wings for dinner because we've already screwed up our day, as if we can only have a perfect day. And so I think that when we start to give ourselves permission, and even it is a discipline to it of saying, I'm going to make smaller choices. And those smaller choices still have results over time.

So I'm going to choose water over Coke. Or I'm going to go for a four-mile walk. Because here's the reality. A four-mile walk that you do is better. than a seven-mile run that you don't do. And you're doing something. And I would say, let's take this to the whole family life side of this for a second. It's a similar mindset where we think, well, if I can't take my kids on a Disney vacation, I don't even need to worry about putting them to bed tonight type of thing. Because if I can't do big and awesome, then what's the point? It's like, if we could focus on

quantity over quality, it would give us so much more gratitude, so much more pride. And the things that we are doing. So I don't know, but you, but I would rather have two hours with my family on a Saturday where we're engaged in playing and hanging out with each other than eight hours where we're all staring at a screen and looking at our phones and we're not together. So when you focus on quality time, that's what your kids, that's what your family's going to remember. That's what you'll remember. Just go take two hours and go do a half a round of golf. You know, go take, go do a four-mile walk. Go do something that fills you back up, that enhances your life, and it doesn't have to be this big, impressive, huge commitment, lots of money.

It's just small things that – that's a Craig Groschelle quote that I love, and this is true in business disciplines, but also life disciplines. He says, it's the small things behind the scenes that no one sees that leads to the big things that everyone wants. A great marriage? Yeah, it's not because he took her on one fancy vacation to Europe once a year. It's because they were connected and communicated in the evenings because they had a date night, you know, a couple times a month, because they were intentional and connecting on quality, not just quantity, not just the big and impressive. So I think this applies to business and life, and it's something we have to a little bit go against our nature as entrepreneurs because we do

love the big and impressive. But if we can, again, train ourselves to appreciate the small things we actually do, will do more of them, which will lead to the big things over time. It's also about consistency. I had to develop a mantra because I was so bad at this. Exactly. I mean, again, you're describing young, immature, to talk about. But this mantra that I developed is consistency trumps epic. Oh, that's good. You know, because epic, the Disney World Trip, was it was almost like, okay, if I do that, then I can be a jerk of a dad the rest of the year.

I mean, I didn't really think that. Right. You know, it's almost like we get addicted and we over sensationalize these big epic experiences or these all-out kind of performances when the truth is, when I was in Texas and I took five minutes to facetime my daughter, you know, she's connecting going, hey, dad's showing up again. That's right. Dad's showing up. That's right.

And just because I'm traveling doesn't mean that I can't put some intentionality in there and be consistent. No, it's not the same as tucking her in bed at night or we'll still do the Disney World thing or whatever the equivalent is for that. But I think consistency and habits, you've said habits before on this podcast, it's developing those habits to be intentional over time and to be consistent. Yeah. And that's really what leads to that momentum that for relationships,

especially make those relationships feel like they're epic. Right. Well, and I think it's interesting. You make a good point, too, because I would say, I would argue that the Disney trip, taking your family on a Disney trip once a year is a whole lot easier than showing up every day. It's a whole lot easier than the emotional energy of showing up when your daughter just wants to talk about a breakup and it seems so insignificant to you at the end of the day, and she just wants her dad to hear her. Or when your son wants to tell you about a new project or, you know, I heard a,

a sermon at church recently, and he was talking about service, and he was talking about what true service looks like, how it's not the big impressive, it's the showing up. And he used the example of Jesus washing the feet before he goes to the cross. But I think it's interesting because he said a great line. He said, everyone wants to change the world. No one wants to change diapers. And I thought, isn't that the truth? And it, you know, as a, as a, I still consider myself kind of a new mom, because my oldest is six. If I've learned anything over the last six years, it's, you know, that work is easier than home. Work is, and it's, and my children are wonderful,

my marriage is wonderful, but it's like, it's hard work to show up for little kids. It's physical, it's exhausting, it's tantrums. I come to the office, I get to be impressive and in meetings and casting, using my gifts, and it's easier. It's awesome. It can be a place to hide from your family. Totally. Totally.

And so I think to your point, the consistency of showing up, even when it might not be as rewarding, even when it's maybe a difficult season, in these other areas of your life, your relationships or whatever those things are, that is what that consistency in showing up is what leads to the results over time that you want. The Disney trip does not lead to the relationship you want. It's the consistency that does. It's the quality that does. It's the showing up for, even if it's small, maybe you're in a season of craziness at work,

and you've only got a little bit of time to give. Make that little bit awesome and be there versus using that as an excuse. Well, since we can't do something big, we're not going to do anything at all. The whole, I've already eaten pizza, so let's go ahead. and have wings throw the baby out with the bathwater mentality. If we could appreciate the consistency, I guarantee you it would not only lead to different results, but you would notice how much our kids and our family and other people notice it. They appreciate those things.

One thing you and I have talked about before that has to be true in order to show up. And this is a little bit about the idea you were talking about training your brain to be present. We have to create space to ask the questions that you're saying we should ask. You know, we have to turn off a lot of the inputs. It is such a noisy world. Yeah. There are so many things coming through our devices. If we're not intentional to have guardrails there, to say, I'm going to turn off the noise, I'm going to create the space so that I'm training my brain, my habits, I'm doing that reflection, and I'm actually able to show up emotionally and be present. How do you do that when there's so much going on?

Okay, so this is interesting. I think one of the things that has helped me, and this is pretty recent in the last couple years, I think information about what's going on in your brain and your habits can help you fight against it. So, for example, have you seen Social Dilemma? Oh, yeah. Have you all talked about it in the show? No, but Emily and I've talked about it. It's scary. Highly, highly recommend this documentary about the addictive nature of social media and technology.

But the reason that I bring that up is social media and technology, and I don't mean just social media, even text emails, just the way that we interact with our phone. And I don't hate phones, but the way that we interact with. is training our brain. It is. And there's incredible research and it's fascinating and very terrifying to watch and understand. But when you understand it, it makes you more on guard against it. If I didn't understand it, I would be that much more susceptible to it. So as an example, one of the ways that technology is training us is, we are not okay with silence. We are not okay with stillness. We are not okay with our brain not running hard. So you go in an elevator, you take out your phone and you look at it. it because you don't want to sit there in silence and I don't either. We want to look at something.

We need to always be seeking information, seeking some type of input, our brain being, seeking this reward-seeking loop of whether it's notifications or emails or even just seeing what other people are doing. We can't be still and stare at the elevator doors until we get to the next floor and how many seconds is that, you know? One of the interesting stats in that's, it's not cited in the documentary, the social dilemma, but it's cited by the same people in the ruthless elimination of hurry by John Mark Homer, which I love this book. He says in that book that since the digital revolution, the human brain, the human attention span has dropped from 12 seconds to eight seconds. So it already wasn't very impressive, by the way. And to give you context,

a goldfish has an attention span of nine seconds. So we are losing to goldfish. Oh my gosh. Because of how we're interacting with technology. Now, again, I don't hate technology. I don't. It's an incredible tool. But when we have the information of how it's training our brain, we can guard against it and retrain our brain. So one of the things that I have tried to do for this is a simple thing.

We talked about boundaries. I have a box and it's just a small little mailbox on my kitchen counter. When I come home from work, I take my phone and I put it in that box. And I don't look at that phone from the entire time from I get home until my kids go to bed about 7.30 at night. And so it allows me to be present for them and not have the, you know, temptation to pick it up. Is it hard to do that? Yeah, but here's what I've noticed, and this is again a psychology thing. If I see it, I touch it. If I see it, I want to pick it up and check it. If I don't see it, I don't. If it's not around me, I don't feel this like, this, this

unconscious movement to pick up my phone, which is what we all do. And research shows this. We pick it up over 2,000 times a day. We touch it. And so when I take it out of sight, it literally is out of sight, out of mind. I might think of it, and then I'm like, oh, it's over there, and that reminds me, oh, it's because I'm with my kids. So it's this visual. space that it goes to, again, it's a discipline to train yourself because if you said, Christy, is the most important thing in your whole life, your phone? I would say, of course not. It's my children. But how do I manage my time? What am I doing between five and seven? Am I with my kids or am I looking at my phone? So I'm curious, because I imagine initially that was difficult.

Yes. Over time and doing that, what did you notice? Well, over time, my kids notice, for sure, but I noticed that it became a habit. I walk in and put it in the box. The first couple times I had to remember to put in the box because it's a new behavior. But after time of putting it in the box, I don't have to think now. Now it's a habit that I put it in the box. It becomes very easy. The other thing that's interesting is it's given my brain space to not be checking, keeping updated, scrolling, refreshing, seeing what's going, you know, and it's, and I am someone that teaches this and knows it, Tarty, and it's still hard for me. Yeah, we're all susceptible. And so I think that that's the reason I want to help people understand

information that can help to say, okay, if technology is training me to always be addicted to information, check my phone, constantly be keeping updated, then I'm going to have to not only guard against it with simple things like a box for my phone, leave it in the car, figure it out what it is for you. Just come up with some kind of guardrail to help you focus on what you actually want to focus on. But the other thing is it helps you train your brain to silence, to space, to margin, to dream, to create, to say, okay, I'm going to do this vision casting for my mind. business, I'm going to close my computer, I'm going to close my phone, and put every

piece of technology out of the room, and all I'm going to have are markers and a whiteboard. And I'm going to allow my brain to think differently versus check, check, check. If you're constantly checking something, it's a different gear and you're not going to be able to fully dream and create like you want to. So I think for me, the habit and boundary and the discipline of training my brain to go against what technology is training me to do has been difficult, but it's working. It's some effort is making a whole lot more difference than no effort. I guarantee you that. I love your passion for all of this. And I love how much you care about people not getting lost in their work, in the business and ultimately sacrificing the things that they value and care about the most.

And you're pushing back on the tide of the noise out there and giving people permission to say, hey, take care of you so that you can pour out into those that you care for. As we wrap up, as we put a bow on this, you know, it's the first part of 2021. Yeah. A lot of business owners, a lot of people like us. We've got these big goals for the year, but most of the time those goals are about, you know, performance metrics in the business. How would you encourage everybody right now to slow down and just say, hey, look at your whole life. Yeah. Yeah.

So we understand this language in business of casting a vision and defining success and setting goals. I would say take those skills that you have in your business. and apply them to your life. Because if you don't define what a successful life looks like to you, you'll never have one. If you don't define what a successful year looks like to you, you'll never have it. If you don't define what a successful marriage or relationships look like to you, you won't have them. So I would just say take these skills that you already have in business of casting a vision, defining success, setting goals, and apply them to your life because goals that don't create the life you want are the wrong goals. And so instead of just coming up with ideas and setting goals around

I'm going after him so hard, ask yourself the type of life you want to have, the type of person you want to be, and then set goals that drive to that thing. And I think what's interesting is it might be a very different answer that you would get than you would get if you just looked at what's the next best thing that you're supposed to chase, figure out what a successful life means to you so you can actually have one. I love that. It's an honor to have you on the Entry Leadership podcast. Thanks for having me back. I love hanging out with you. It's also a privilege to call you a friend, and we've had a lot of fun together through the years. You've got a lot of cool stuff going on right now. People that want to know more about what you're doing, how can they find out more

information? Yeah, so they can listen to the Chrissy Wright Show on podcast or YouTube, and then I have a free resource at chrisdyright.com in the resource section, and we've been talking a lot about boundaries, so I thought this might be helpful. It's called 25 ways to protect your time, and this is literally a script of 25 ways to say no, and the bonus part is without ever saying the word. So you can be really nice about it. It's not like, here's 25 ways to be a jerk. It's 25 ways to say no without whatever you're saying the word so that you can protect your time this year and actually spend it on what's most important and they can get that at christy right.com all right guys check that out christie right ramsie personality always great to have you back thanks for being here hey thanks for having me it's

awesome i hope that as you've heard this conversation you're sitting here at the beginning of the year thinking okay i can't just think about my business goals i got to think about my whole life look you're a whole person your business your relationships your family your social life your fitness. It's all connected, guys. Now, your business is important. And I want to remind you that the better you are as a person, the better you'll be as a leader. The better you are as a leader, the better your team will be. The better your team is, the better your businesses, the better your customers are. It's all connected. So what a great conversation to remind us that we can't just have a plan for our business. We have to have a plan for life.

And like Christy said in our conversation, a lot of this comes down to when you have that plan, prioritizing things and having boundaries. We have to learn to say no. It's so hard to say. But you can do it because you've got a life that matters. You know where you're going. You've got something to make happen and to contribute at a higher level than all the busyness and the noise that's pulling for your time all the time.

And to make that a little bit easier, Christy mentioned. She's got a really cool resource for you guys, 25 ways to protect. your time. You can get this resource by going to christyright.com slash resources or just click on the link in the show notes. Absolutely free, 25 ways to protect your time to help you as you're sitting here thinking about your life and thinking about what success looks like to have boundaries and balance in 2021. So be sure to check that out. Well, I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Entree Leadership podcast. Hey, do you know somebody that would also enjoy this conversation? We'd love it if you would share this episode, send them a link. Thank you for helping us get the word out. We really

appreciate it. Also, you can now watch interviews and highlights from the Entree Leadership podcast on YouTube. Just go on YouTube and search Entree Leadership, and you'll find all the good stuff right there. Hey, this is fun. If you're a small business owner between two and 200 team members, we'd love to have a conversation with you and get feedback on the show and ask you a few questions. Our production team is always trying to make this better, and we'd love to have a live call with you, the listener to get your feedback. So to do that, just click on the link in the show notes to fill out a brief survey and schedule a call with our producer, Tim. You can follow us on social media at Entree Leadership. You can also follow me on Instagram at Daniel Tarty. This episode was produced by

Tim Hull. It was edited and mixed by Will Rutter. I'm your host, Daniel Tarty, and on behalf of the entire Entree Leadership team, thank you for listening. Until next time, keep learning and keep leading. If you enjoy this podcast, you should check out other great podcasts from the Ramsey Network, like the Christy Wright Show. Hey, y'all, I'm Christy Wright. You know, it's so easy to feel stuck. You live life, just going through the motions, doing dishes, doing laundry, carpool lines, and a whole list of commitments that bring you no joy. We say yes to what everyone expects of us, and we have no energy or time for what we want. And let's be honest, most of the time, we don't even know what we want. Why do we live like that?

God certainly never called us to. You know, I believe that the life God has for us is bigger and more amazing than any of us realize. That's why I want you to check out the Christy Wright Show. Every week, we will fire you up to break through what's holding you back and inspire you to create a life you love and are proud of. Each episode will help you build confidence in yourself and the God that created you. To hear full episodes, just search Christy Wright, wherever you listen to podcasts or go to ramsysolutions.com slash shows.