the anti-burnout plan for entrepreneur parents

Summary

no success in business compensates for failure at home. entrepreneurs hear “burnout” and picture the office. the real burnout, the one that costs you the most, is happening at the dinner table.

why entrepreneur-parents are at higher risk: we’re high agency, high standards, and we run the same intensity at home that we run in the company. that doesn’t work. parenting is not a sprint and your kids are not employees.

the three hidden patterns that quietly destroy home life:

1. compartmentalization. you tell yourself work and home are separate. they aren’t. the leak is constant.
2. performance parenting. you treat your kids like KPIs.
3. time without presence. you’re in the room, on your phone, and call it quality time.

the anti-burnout equation, built on self-determination theory:

• relatedness. do not parent in isolation. build the village. partner, co-parents, friends, family.
• autonomy. keep something that’s yours. the gym, the hobby, the quiet hour. you can’t pour from a dry cup.
• competence. reframe the bad moments. the meltdown isn’t proof you’re failing, it’s a rep at staying calm under fire.

the move I call need-crafting: stack your goals so what helps you also helps them. a Saturday workout with your kid is one rep at competence, autonomy, and relatedness all at once.

burnout isn’t a productivity problem. you can’t out-system it. try harder at home.

Transcript

no success compensates for failure at home

In 1924, J.E. McCullik published the book, Home, the Savior of Civilization, where he made the profound statement, “No other success can compensate for a failure at home.” If you’re anything like me, you will spend all of your time and energy making sure that your business does not burn to the ground. But what if you are more at risk at burning out at home? And specifically, I’m talking to the parents who are also entrepreneurs. I recently came across a study about parenting and parental burnout and it said that up to 9% of parents in western countries are experiencing parental burnout and it’s escalating quickly.

It comes with exhaustion so deep it leads to guilt, distance from their kids and sometimes even thoughts of escape. Now this is even worse for entrepreneurs. So, what I’m going to be going over today is I’m going to talk to you about how to protect your energy at home so you can show up better, not just as an entrepreneur, but more specifically and more importantly as a parent. So, big reason I’m doing this episode today specific for entrepreneurs who are also parents is because I feel like the risk for burnout on either end is much higher.

The biggest problem I’ve seen with entrepreneurship in my own personal experience is I’ve had the other job.

entrepreneur parent burnout is different

I’ve almost lived three lives, right? So, I was in the military. I also had a job post-military, like a full-time drive to work type job. And now I’ve been an entrepreneur for well over a decade just working for myself. A lot of that working from home. And what the biggest difference I saw in being a full-time I pay all the bills through my efforts of entrepreneurship is that I cannot compartmentalize or I struggled for a very long time to compartmentalize the different areas of my life.

Right? When I was at work in the military, I could leave my work at work. I could come home and be a parent. Now, the job was incredibly demanding. Sometimes the hours were really long. So, I’m not trying to say one is easier or harder. Don’t go down that road. What I’m saying is compartmentalization was easier in my mind. Same with the job. You know, I could focus on go to work, drive, do the job to the best of my ability, go home, don’t worry about it.

Just focus on being a parent. And then once I made that switch to full-time entrepreneur, I had two kids at the I have three now.

why compartmentalization breaks down

That’s where I realized the big shift. I was like, “Wow, this is a lot harder cuz there’s a lot of stress. You have to constantly be thinking about ideas.” Or maybe you don’t have to be, but you are. You’re always thinking about ideas, what’s next? You’re thinking about the business, how things could be better. And it’s very hard to shut that down. So, your mind is racing constantly. You’re trying to learn how to turn that off.

And then you’re also navigating the daily battle of parenting which can be an absolute gift but also an incredible challenge. You know, there’s just so much that can go wrong to and all these things can go towards burnout. And when I say things that could go wrong, I’m not talking about all these things in parenting can go wrong. It’s just we want our family life to be good. Uh but we do so at the expense of our own personal mental health.

And that’s the thing that can go wrong the most. And so if you want to burn out, like you want to be on a good path, here are the three steps to do that. One, if you treat your spouse like they’re your two room roommates just managing tasks, that’s the first thing that you can do. The second thing is don’t have anything you call your own. Business does not count. And the third thing is beat yourself up daily at how much you suck or how much you’re failing at whatever it is, whether it’s your fitness, your parenting, or even in the business yourself.

If you do those three things, so you are treating your spouse just like a roommate who’s doing things, you do some tasks, she does some tasks, you don’t have anything to call your own, no hobbies or whatever, and then you beat yourself up daily. You are doing all of the opposite things of what proven psychological uh, you know, methods specifically in the self-determination theory prove that you will end up on this path to burnout. So if you want to not do that, here are the four things that you need to focus on.

So this is the anti-burnout equation for entrepreneurs who are parents. So the first thing is relatedness. So do not parent in isolation. You need to put things on the calendar right now. So what I mean by this is have a weekly meeting with your spouse, your partner.

the 3 patterns that lead to burnout

And this is not just to again divvy up the task. This is more about what you’re actually, you know, interested in. What are your goals? What are your aspirations? You know, how can you catch up? How can you maintain that relationship? And then also get other people involved, right? Get other people involved. Like call in the grandparents, call in the aunts and uncles. Like do life with other people. Make sure you’re scheduling time with your friends.

You know, go play pickle ball. Go out to dinner and schedule those things. Just go ahead and put them on the calendar at the beginning of the month. Put all those things on the calendar. This is not something that I’m great at in all honesty. I have such a closed myopic view of business and fitness and parenting. It’s very hard for me to, you know, kind of break out of that and go to dinner with, uh, you know, friends or whatever.

It’s very hard, not only just time- wise, it’s it’s hard for me to think about things like that. But that’s the first thing that you need to do is make sure you’re not doing this alone.

the anti-burnout equation explained

Make sure that you actually feel like you have relationships out there. That’s the first thing that’s going to help prevent you from getting to burnout. Cuz I know when I spend time one-on-one with other people or a group of friends, it removes that like seriousness of entrepreneurship for me.

relatedness: do not parent in isolation

It removes that like, oh yeah, like that problem I’ve been just fixated on. Like it’s really not that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things. And then same with parenting. Like I get really worried or spun up or like super busy and stressed out and it’s like when you when you have that moment to pause, reflect, and take a step back, you’re like, you know what, things are going to be fine. Like it’s not that big of a deal.

So making sure getting other people involved is a big one. Um the second thing is autonomy. You need to keep something that is yours. So two things that I recommend. Um, the first is I actually had a conversation with an entrepreneur about this recently who transitioned from working in an office full-time to starting to work from home. And he was like, I have no time. Like there’s no buffer between being the entrepreneur to stepping out of my office and then being a dad.

And I’ve been in there that situation. And uh I actually had a recommendation for my wife years ago uh that I’ve that I’ve implemented, you know, periodically when I feel like it’s needed. If I had like a really crazy day at work and I just know like, okay, I got to step into the next phase, just have like some sort of 10-minute windown routine. Even if it’s just in your office, if you can walk, uh, before you like officially sign off for the day, whatever, listen to a podcast, meditate, breathe, whatever you have to do to set up set yourself up like, hey, work is getting shut down.

autonomy: keep something that’s yours

I’m now moving on to the next thing. That’s the first thing that you need to do because you’ve selected that, right? You’re not just being forced. I say forced to work, but like you’re working all day, right? you’re doing that for the family and then immediately go into parenting. Um that can be a challenge sometimes if you don’t at least create 10 minutes of space and you need to select it. It’s the autonomy of that selection that’s the biggest thing.

Now the other thing within autonomy is making sure that you have some sort of hobby that you are actively working on. Um for me I consider fitness my hobby.

competence: reframe the bad moments

Um but I wouldn’t recommend other people put it in the same boat because some people don’t actually enjoy fitness as much as I do. Like I’m always actually trying to improve something. Like it I’m trying to get better at fitness, not just fitter. It’s like, “Oh, well, let’s learn something about heart rate training. Let’s learn something new with kettle bells or barbells or whatever.” Like I just actually enjoy it as a hobby. For some people, you’re like, “I just do it cuz I told I have to and I know it makes me healthy.” So if I wouldn’t consider fitness being your thing unless it’s actually your thing.

Whether that’s uh you know shooting a bow or climbing trees or watching birds, whatever it is that you want to do, make sure that you have some sort of hobby and you make it your own and carve out that time for it uh whenever you can. Now the next thing is to have a reframe of when you’re not doing well. Okay? So, don’t get into this loop. If you are really busy, your head’s full, like you your kids are crazy, and you snap, you yell at your kids, or you just aren’t as present with your kids.

Maybe you’re on your phone, emails, doing all these other things, and you catch yourself in these moments. You’re like, “Man, I wish I didn’t yell, or I wish I was more present, or whatever.” Whatever the case is, you’re going to run across these moments. What you have to do is actively make a statement in your mind. Be like, “Okay, that was a miss. that was a failure. I’m not perfect, but I’m getting better. Okay, it’s how you reframe it because one option is just be like, I suck.

Like, I absolutely I suck at all this stuff. Like, I just I can’t handle it. Like, I’m not good at it. And then you will start to spiral. It won’t happen immediately. It’ll just be a little bit down, a little bit further down, a little bit further down, a little bit further down. So you need to make sure that you are reframing the conversations in your mind to be able to handle the negative selft talk that comes and be like hey I did just do the wrong thing but I’m actively trying to get better and I’m going to do something differently the next time.

Now the next thing is need crafting. So layer your needs into your daily life. So, one way to look at this um specifically if you have kids like I do who have practices all over the place, you know, all throughout the week is a lot of times you can get too focused as a parent focusing on the needs of your child. And while they have a lot of needs that need to be met, so do you.

So do you mentally, physically, spiritually, everything. And so you’re like, when am I going to do these things? I have found cuz my kids are sports at very young ages. the best time to do this stuff um will be at their practices if you’re not actively coaching. Now, sometimes I’ve been in the coaching situation where you can’t always do this, but it most parents are not coaching. So, if you’re one of those parents who are not coaching, use that time.

Like, don’t don’t rush home and try and cook dinner during the practice or whatever. Or don’t sit in your car while they’re doing soccer practice and scroll Tik Tok or Instagram on your phone. like those are those are the worst uses of your time when you might just need that time for yourself.

need crafting: where parenting and self care overlap

And so um what I’ve seen a lot of people do and what I’ve done over the years uh you know a lot of kids like uh football practices are typically at a track like there’s a there’s a field so I can walk or run or do lunges. I’ve seen a lot of parents you know doing walks more recently these and people didn’t used to do this stuff. utilize that time or if you need to go to your car, sit, breathe, meditate, whatever, just this overlapping of goals with your child’s needs is what you need to start fitting in.

And that’s where life gets a little tight, time gets a little tight, but these are the things that you need to be focused on for your mental health and to avoid that parental burnout. So, all of these things fit within the overarching self-determination theory, which I’ve just been going deep on lately. So, that’s relatedness is the first part of that. That’s don’t parent in isolation, right? That’s like making sure you’re connected with other people. That’s primary of primary importance.

The most important thing when it comes to avoiding burnout is making sure that you have a group of people that you are interacting with them. The second thing is autonomy. So that’s keeping something that’s yours. That’s the hobby. That’s the 10-minute selection. And a lot of autonomy is the fact that you selected it, right? It’s it’s the fact that you chose to do this and no one else did.

why burnout isn’t fixed with productivity

That’s that’s the main box you’re trying to check with autonomy. So it’s not just like go pick up a hobby that you hate.

final challenge: try harder at home

It’s like what do I want to do and actually go do that thing. The third thing is competence and that is reframing your mistakes as progress which I talked about. And the last one is need crafting. So that is where it’s it’s it’s almost like habit stacking, right? It’s like something else is going on and you’re doing something at the same time. So kids practice, you’re going on a walk. Kids practice, you’re going meditate. Kids doing nap time, you’re doing something else, right?

Like those are the things. But you need to layer in the self-care side of things and not just always being productive. Uh because if you are just always looking for productivity, you will eventually burn out. So if you can do those four things that you will be much further away from burning out. So you will start to give yourself a little space which will help you not burn out as an entrepreneur and not burn out as a parent.

And if you can achieve both of those things, I think you are living a life that you will enjoy and you will not be so stressed out all the damn time. But you’re going to have to try harder to get it done.