Ginger and Chocolate

The Ginger and Chocolate Pod is just two regular people talking about their experiences with mental health challenges, physical health and wellness, and endurance sports training. Co-hosts Lindsay and Mike interview athletes and subject matter experts.

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Ginger and Chocolate

Burnout

December 10, 2024 • Lindsay Hiken and Mike Ergo • Episode 158

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Summary

Here is the GoFundMe Link for Rick: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-rick-recover-from-thanksgiving-fire

In this episode of the Ginger and Chocolate podcast, hosts Lindsay and Mike discuss the pervasive issue of burnout, drawing from their personal experiences in both work and training. They explore the challenges of managing burnout, especially in the context of remote work, and share strategies for coping, including rituals for leaving work behind and the importance of finding balance in life. The conversation also touches on the impact of the pandemic on mental health and the significance of transitioning to new environments to alleviate stress. In this conversation, Lindsay Hiken and Mike discuss the complexities of burnout, particularly in the context of work and endurance sports. They explore the symptoms of burnout, the importance of motivation, and how finding a personal 'why' can help individuals overcome challenges. The discussion also emphasizes the significance of community and support in fitness, as well as practical strategies for managing burnout and maintaining well-being.

Takeaways

Burnout can stem from various sources, including work and training.
Taking breaks is essential for recovery from burnout.
Creating rituals can help separate work from personal life.
The pandemic has significantly impacted mental health and burnout rates.
Transitioning to a new job can provide relief from burnout.
It's important to recognize when burnout is affecting other areas of life.
Finding balance is crucial for mental well-being.
Remote work can blur the lines between work and personal time.
Awareness of burnout is the first step to addressing it.
Engaging in enjoyable activities can help mitigate feelings of burnout. Burnout can manifest as emotional exhaustion and feeling undervalued.
Recognizing burnout is often difficult, and others may see it before you do.
Motivation can wane over time, especially in repetitive activities like training.
Finding a personal 'why' can reignite passion and commitment.
Pro-social motivations can enhance personal goals by positively impacting others.
Community support in fitness can significantly boost motivation and enjoyment.
Varying workouts can help prevent burnout and keep training fresh.
It's important to leave work at work to manage stress effectively.
Engaging in activities with family can provide additional motivation.
Choosing the right environment for fitness is crucial for success.

Titles

Navigating Burnout: Personal Stories and Strategies
The Impact of Remote Work on Mental Health
Finding Balance: Coping with Burnout in Life
Rituals for Leaving Work Behind

Sound Bites

"Losing everything would be rough."
"Burnout from training or just life."
"I can turn anything into a problem."
"Working out with your kid is fun."
"I did not pick a good gym for myself."
"I need to be around other people."
"Varying your workouts is a good thing."
"Letting go of work

Thanks for listening to the Ginger and Chocolate Podcast. Check out our website at gingerandchocolate.com to get in touch with us. Follow us on YouTube, Facebook and Instagram @ginger_and_chocolate_podcast; and please subscribe to the show and select automatic downloads on your podcast app.

Lindsay Hiken (00:01.678)
Welcome to the Ginger and Chocolate podcast. am Lindsay and along with my co-host Mike. Hey, how's it going today?

Mike (00:09.69)
Hey.

good today is good I am awake alert clean yeah I'm feeling good

Lindsay Hiken (00:21.698)
All right. Clean even.

Mike (00:23.844)
Yeah, I took a... you know, this is... I took a pre-show shower. So now I'm feeling it. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (00:31.182)
That's nice. That's nice. I did not take a pre-show shower. I usually do, but to be honest, I have a new laptop and I needed to make sure I could get set up for the show. So that's what I did instead of cleaning myself today. Well, normally I would ask you kind of one thing about about yourself, but

Mike (00:49.658)
Nice.

Lindsay Hiken (01:00.364)
I think instead, let's take this time to talk about a listener need that we have.

Mike (01:06.67)
Yeah, so we have one of our listeners, Samantha and her husband Reese. So Samantha's father unfortunately lost his house on Thanksgiving, burned to the ground. Well, just within a matter of minutes. And I just noticed through socials that, you know, she had set up a GoFundMe for her dad. And I mean, the guy lost everything except his dog. Thankfully him, his dog got out safely.

But we're talking about, you know, all this pictures, personal effects, everything card gone. And, you know, I just reached out and said, you know, is there a way we can help on the show? Maybe we can ask our listeners who are able to and feel like they would want to donate to a GoFundMe to help this man, Rick.

in his time of need that we could use our reach for good to do something like that. And so I want, I would like everybody who feels inclined, who's able to take a look at the show notes. We've put a link for Rick's go fund me and there that Samantha's leading and just take a look. And if you're able to and feel inspired to donate to help

You know, this, would go a long way, so.

Lindsay Hiken (02:36.686)
Yeah, no pressure guys, but if you have it and you can do it, this is a good cause. Losing everything would be rough. Not just, you know, financially, but all of your memories and all of those things going. I can't even really imagine that. And we can't really do anything to bring those things back, but we can ease some of the, you know, pressure financially that you have when you lose all of your stuff.

Mike (03:06.33)
Yeah. Yeah. So I appreciate everyone who's willing to take a look and help out. So, you know, we'll probably put, you know, relay some of the stuff on socials and we'll be in our show notes and yeah, take a look. Thanks everybody.

Lindsay Hiken (03:24.888)
Thanks guys. Okay, on with the show. So today we're going to discuss a topic near and dear to my heart because I experienced it and I've been experiencing it recently, which is burnout. And this could be for you, might be experiencing work burnout like I like I have been or burnout from training.

Mike (03:35.597)
Yeah.

Mike (03:48.101)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (03:51.542)
triathlon training burnout or some other kind of training burnout or just the general burnout from doing way too much in your life. Mike, do you experience burnout and what types?

Mike (03:52.623)
Yeah.

Mike (04:06.978)
I do. experienced, well I experienced burnout with training for full ironmans. That, that, I think the perfect storm hit me after 2020, of putting on self sustained half ironmans, 70.3 distance. Now all the races and stuff were canceled. And I think just so much of it, the pressure of

what was going on with the pandemic and then the need to train. It just, it got to me. Got to me and then the sport was not fun anymore.

Lindsay Hiken (04:47.758)
And what have you done to address that burnout so far?

Mike (04:58.052)
Well, I...

took a break, which is not something we can always do with work when we burn out of work. So, but what I, what I did is, I, it was a difficult thing because a lot of time when you're burnt out with something, it's something you're heavily invested in. It's something that you might create your identity around, which for me was, was iron man and long distance triathlon.

Lindsay Hiken (05:08.258)
Right.

Mike (05:32.728)
And so it was a matter of just trying to figure out who I was and who I am. And while a big part of that was wrapped up around triathlon and carrying the flag for Gold Star families, I needed to see, can I still affect positive change in the world?

while taking a break or maybe even stepping away permanently from sport. I don't know yet. So I think the big thing for me was, finding another creative outlet, something I could invest my energy into. and I've experienced burnout at work too. You know, so yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (06:19.086)
I would imagine so. Do you you feel like with your work burnout, is it because you're you the nature of your work is so personal and you have to kind of put so much of yourself into it? Or is it more of like the volume of work that you have to do or what or is it a combination of all of that?

Mike (06:39.876)
I think it's a combination of it. Yeah, it can be a high stress job and, you know, working with people and helping them with their mental health and listening to some very difficult stories. Yeah, it can lead to burnout for me. it has in the past. Now I'm able to kind of, protect my own energy while, while holding space and compassion for people as they speak.

and as I shared time with them. But what the burnout for me was more, I see more recently, like the last probably a year ago, I was feeling it was more around the nature of my job shifting from, to include a lot more administrative tasks and a lot more things that I'd previously not done before. So the job changed from underneath me and all of sudden I'm spending a lot more time.

Filment reports and less time with people.

Lindsay Hiken (07:41.624)
Sounds like a manager type situation.

Mike (07:44.024)
Yeah, exactly. And so it's just trying to

trying to just keep up with that and the frustrations of trying to work with new policy that hadn't been totally tested out. that was tough. And what did do for that? just found networks of people that I worked with, colleagues, and either kind of had gallows humor about it or just

focused more my energy. like, okay, I can I can do this work and then I can focus on leaving it at the office and coming home. So I have some rituals where I leave my work at the office and then I yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (08:34.552)
Do you mind sharing what some of those are? Because that's definitely something that I need to do is to leave work when I'm done with work for the day.

Mike (08:38.384)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (08:42.512)
Yeah. a couple of things I do when I'm leaving the work, there, they're mostly mental exercises, but the, they have a physical component. So one of them is actually was inspired kind of by watching, football. And a lot of times you see college football when they're, they, they come out of the tunnel, they all touch the top of the tunnel.

Lindsay Hiken (09:09.708)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (09:09.868)
as kind of like a ritual of like, here we go. This is our this is our space here. We're coming into it. And for me, it when I do that, I touch the doorframe, you know, the threshold as I walk out, kind of like, okay, I'm tapping this, I'm leaving this right here. And I'll come back to it.

Lindsay Hiken (09:28.11)
That's actually, that's really cool. I mean, I'm gonna try that, because it's very simple, but just that act of like, okay, I'm letting go right now with this touch. That's a really very neat idea. I'm gonna try that today.

Mike (09:30.117)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Mike (09:44.056)
It's a good one. It's nice and simple. the nice part about it is there's a physical component. So the more senses you involve, the easier it is to remember your intention, I think.

Lindsay Hiken (09:55.854)
Okay, So tapping on the threshold is a really good one. Do you do anything else like making a list of what you're going to do the next day or anything like that?

Mike (10:10.368)
No. well, not a physical list. Maybe as I'm sitting there as about to close out, but all right, I'll take care of this stuff tomorrow morning. So that's, that's another intention I'm setting. That's a less formal practice I have though. It's just, it's pretty informal. the, the other one I do is I'm sending the alarm for the building a lot of times. And so I'm like, all right, well just, it's another chance to like, all right, I'm just leaving this here.

Lindsay Hiken (10:31.708)
Lindsay Hiken (10:38.446)
Okay. Hmm. I don't think I'm last out right now. I'm like, Can I do that? Don't think so. But I so I do do. I kind of go through my list of never ending tasks and

Mike (10:45.515)
Heh. Yeah.

Mike (11:00.386)
Yep.

Lindsay Hiken (11:02.21)
kind of say, okay, this is, I've done this to this point today, and then this is the chunk I'll do tomorrow. The reason I try to do that is because otherwise my, my brain wants to, especially in the middle of the night, think of the list of things we're going to do the next day. And that's not helpful to me. And so if I actually for me making a physical list, I have like, and I'll

Mike (11:07.247)
Yeah.

Mike (11:22.126)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (11:31.31)
It's like an electronic tablet. It's called remarkable. So you can handwrite. Handwriting things helps me. So I just kind of write down like, OK, these are the things and then I don't have to worry about it. I don't have to think about it in the middle of the night. Sometimes I do anyway, because my brain can be such a piece of shit sometimes. Such a little asshole. But.

Mike (11:50.64)
Problem solved in the middle of the night.

Lindsay Hiken (11:58.018)
that does help a little bit, at least for that moment, like, okay, I have my list, I don't need to think about it. But I wonder about ways to let it go when you're working from home. That seems to be a big thing for me is just leaving, making that separation.

Mike (12:24.709)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (12:25.526)
Yeah, you don't work from home. mean, you generally work in the office, right? Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm switching to a three day in the office work week because I have my new job I started and I'm super actually I'm actually excited about that. And and so far, I've been in the office the two days that I've worked. And it is nice because just the act of switching locations helps me let go of work for the day.

Mike (12:28.098)
Not, not generally, no.

Mike (12:35.824)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (12:53.626)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, home is a little tougher. When I do, I usually have to go outside and just, you know, breathe some fresh air in and do some things that change it. If I stay in the same room, I'm still there.

Lindsay Hiken (13:10.026)
Mm hmm. I feel very fortunate because I have a home office and I know that some people are still working from home when they're working like in their bedroom. And. I could I mean. If I had my set up in my bedroom, I would probably never. Be not working, you know what I mean? Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

Mike (13:20.324)
Yeah, yeah.

Mike (13:33.028)
Yeah, I know it's because the visual reminder is right there like well I could finish that thing.

Lindsay Hiken (13:39.694)
So I burned out at my job and I switched jobs. That was part of, I I should say, not because I felt burned out. The causes of my burnout were not gonna go away and I was not gonna, they were external to myself and my ability to control them. I had not really been able to kind of work through it. And so switching jobs,

Mike (13:58.8)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (14:10.138)
has worked thus far because I'm in a new job. We'll see. But some of the things that were present at my old job are not present at this job. So that's really going to be helpful to me. And I'm going to be working in the office more, which I really think is helpful. But when I was burning out, I kind of looked up burnout a little bit like I think I might be burning out of my burning out. And I can I asked AI to so we can look through that a little bit. But

One of the things that came up was that something like, and I don't remember the exact number, but it was more than 50. I think it was something like 60 % of people working from home. Pretty much since the pandemic have reported burnout from just because of working from home. And the article was saying a lot of people, are plenty of people that really thrive in that environment.

Mike (14:57.989)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (15:08.664)
but a lot of people is very isolating and they find it almost impossible to turn work off completely. And that's who I'm one of those people. I can't really turn it off. And I was working in an environment where you were encouraged not to ever turn it off. So.

Mike (15:15.192)
Yeah, I could see that.

Mike (15:27.894)
Yeah, it's tough.

Lindsay Hiken (15:31.596)
So I'm gonna do a little experiment and see what it's like to go in. And if I need to, I'll just go in five days a week, or four days a week. Because it's about trying, this whole change for me is about trying to get some of my mental health back that the burnout has taken away.

Mike (15:36.528)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (15:50.192)
Yeah, yeah, the one of the other big things that really helped me was supervisor had years ago told me that one of the keys to the longevity and the job was to introduce variance as much as you can.

Whether that's in routine, in the way you drive, in the order you do tasks, something to create it so you're not doing the same exact thing every single day.

Lindsay Hiken (16:19.822)
Okay, I get that. Yes, that I could. I could see needing to do that. Because I do get bored easily. My ADHD brain. And then if I'm bored, I don't want to do it. Just period. And then it's a struggle. And yeah, that makes sense.

Mike (16:31.364)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (16:44.204)
My job that I've been having has been in public accounting. It's typically a burnout job for several reasons. Like you do do the same thing over and over, slightly different ways. So there is variance, but there's always this pressure to do it in the same amount of time or faster, even though it might be something new, a different client, different way of doing things. You're supposed to kind of repeat it in a way.

Mike (17:07.351)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (17:08.725)
And so there's all this pressure, finish it this time, even though now you're doing something different or new, they still expect you to finish it in the same amount of time. You finish the thing you just did 5,000 times in a row, which sort of unreasonable. You need to learn something new. It's going to take a minute longer than if you don't know. So I can't say I was bored in that job, but I definitely was burned out.

Mike (17:19.311)
Yeah.

Mike (17:26.576)
Curve there, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (17:36.942)
I don't know you found that burnout in one area has bled over into other areas of your life if you aren't.

Mike (17:44.708)
Yeah, I think so. I think we all can find people who are unsatisfied with one area of their life and it just kind of spills out into the other parts of their personality. And it's usually you see that with people who, you know, feel depressed because the things that they don't see a way out of or a way to change what's going on.

Mike (18:16.782)
Yeah, it's a really important skill to be able to separate work and everything else. if that's the source of burnout, it's not easy. It takes a lot of intention to do it. Because if you don't know that it's it's spilling out to other parts of your life, there's no way you can address it. So awareness is first step and then finding simple rituals to maybe keep work at work is another way.

Lindsay Hiken (18:45.582)
Yeah, I think I'm in that that situation, you know, I burned out from work, but I also burned out a little bit on triathlon. But I don't think I actually burned out on triathlon. I. Started getting burnt out at work and not being able to leave it where it is. Feeling guilt all the time when I was working out. Like I should be working.

Mike (19:09.742)
Hmm. Yeah.

Mike (19:13.735)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (19:14.19)
Which is, when you say it out loud, it's like, geez, Louise, I mean, that's nuts. But, you know, when I was working out, I would feel like pressure about work when I was working. I would feel pressure about not training, you know, and at some point I was like, this training is supposed to be a source of joy for me. And a release from stress in it.

Mike (19:32.622)
Yeah. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (19:44.278)
It's a, you know, became a source of stress, which is. Well, you know, my neurosis makes it so that one of my special skills is that can turn anything into a problem, you know. Just give me something great. can figure out a way to turn it into something that's problematic.

Mike (19:47.898)
Yeah, I can relate to that part. Yeah.

Mike (20:09.582)
out the source of woe, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (20:12.632)
whether I'm, you know, addictively abusing it or feeling guilty about it, whatever. So I'm hoping and I shouldn't say hoping I'm going to be doing some things differently in my life now so that I can get back to who I am, like you said, and. You know, spend time with my team and training and with my friends. In a way that's pleasurable for me.

Mike (20:42.159)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (20:42.222)
without guilt and going into the office is one of these things changing my role and a new job is another one. So I have a different role to on top of a different company, which I think will is better suited for me actually. So I think that that's going to be helpful just in finding something that was more suited towards my personality and what I'm good at and has

Mike (21:09.072)
That's good.

Lindsay Hiken (21:11.22)
It's not to say it's not gonna be a stressful job it is but it's just gonna be stressful in a different way. Stressful in me thinking of how to do things in a different way, problem solving, which is good, that's good stress. Just like working out problems is something I like to do. Not, did you bill 15 hours to your client today? That kind of thing. So I'm excited about that.

Mike (21:24.485)
Mmm, yeah. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (21:37.728)
And I'm excited to find out if the burnout I feel around training and triathlon is truly burnout for that, or if it's just kind of bled over, because I suspect it's bled over into my triathlon. And I think it started with a pandemic. I really was in a state of denial about the pandemic when we were in the pandemic.

Mike (21:49.136)
Probably. That's what it sounds like to me.

Mike (21:56.89)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (22:06.274)
I was like, it's great. You know, I just get to work from home and this is awesome. And I feel amazing. And I get to do all these things with my friends kind of outside far apart from each other. But I get to like, because I'm not commuting, I can go ride my bike outside. And it wasn't until like maybe.

Mike (22:08.421)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (22:30.146)
I think, we stopped doing the show at some point because I think we were both feeling a little burned out. And again, I don't think that was from the show necessarily. I think I was just generally feeling burned out, but I didn't realize it.

Mike (22:42.352)
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the novelty of it, there are some great parts about it for a lot of people. once the novelty wears off and there's, it, you feel like the sustained pressure to, to do things, then that's when it sets in. I mean, a lot of, a lot of parallels to, to, you know, to, racing, you know, I think of like,

Lindsay Hiken (22:47.726)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (23:12.56)
Like, you know, especially like you think of Iron Man, Rosa, when you come back into the crowd and everyone's cheering you, it's like, all right, I can do this. And then you get back on the lonely trail and you're like, kind of tired. I'm ready to be done.

Lindsay Hiken (23:22.606)
Yeah. Exactly. Yeah, I mean, Santa Rosa in 2019 was the last big race I did. And I did a couple of shorter races after that. But and I enjoyed them for sure. But then I just think I was in a little bit of denial about how the effect of the.

the pandemic and being isolated at home, first going to work and just all of the things had an effect on me. was like, Josh and I made it through this so easily. We got along great, which we did. But around twenty twenty three or end of twenty two, I started feeling really bad and I was like, huh? And I was expressing things that people who were expressing them like early on.

Mike (24:18.244)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (24:18.336)
in the I think it just took my brain two years to catch up consciously to what was what I was going through.

Mike (24:23.536)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (24:27.502)
So, know, it is what it is. And I'm glad that I finally kind of realized that I'm susceptible just like everybody else. Yeah, I don't know why sometimes I forget that I'm just a regular person. And I think that I deserve to, this is a completely different topic, but it's that idea of like,

Mike (24:35.984)
Yes, you're mortal.

Lindsay Hiken (24:49.646)
I think we touched on it too, but when we were talking about Veterans Day, but the idea that like whatever I'm going through is not that important. It doesn't need to be addressed, you know, it's just a minimizing. Okay, well, I did ask AI just what is burnout and it says understanding and prevention. This is what it's saying here. So this is a of emotional, physical and mental exhaustion, which we know caused by prolonged or excessive stress.

Mike (24:59.045)
yeah, minimizing it. Yeah, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (25:19.73)
it often results in feeling from feeling overwhelmed, undervalued and unable to cope with demands. And that's, that's exactly what my job, that's exactly what happened at my job. so symptoms, because to me, and I'm sure to a lot of people, and I don't know about, you can tell me if this is you too. I burned out for a while before I realized I was burned out.

Mike (25:32.227)
Yeah.

Mike (25:47.162)
Yes. And probably other people could see it before you did.

Lindsay Hiken (25:51.758)
Mm hmm. Yeah. Josh was definitely like. Are you OK? You know, seemed a little so symptoms that says emotional exhaustion, OK, drain fatigue and lacking energy. Check increased mental distance from one's job, feeling cynical, detached or negative about work. And I think you could apply this to training as well, right?

Mike (25:59.844)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (26:22.254)
Just that increased mental distance where you're just kind of like, okay, I'll go do the motions of whatever's in my training peaks right now, but I'm not enjoying it. I don't feel pleasure from it, that kind of thing. This is, think AI pulled a lot of about job specifically, although I didn't ask it for that, but reduced professional efficacy.

which that's an interesting one. It says feeling incompetent, ineffective or a failure at work. I definitely express that, but that's interesting to me that it just provides a feeling of incompetence, not necessarily that you are being incompetent. I genuinely was thinking,

Mike (27:11.322)
Right, just feeling less effective.

Lindsay Hiken (27:16.888)
that I was actually less effective because of burnout, not just feeling less effective. It would explain, why I felt ineffective and got a strong rating on my eval, Yeah, they're like, you're doing a good job. I'm like, OK.

Mike (27:19.748)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (27:23.908)
Yeah, both could be true.

Mike (27:32.24)
Yeah, you're right, right? Two different things going on.

Lindsay Hiken (27:42.766)
So we kind of know the common cause of burnout, excessive workload, lack of control, insufficient reward or recognition. In terms of working out training for triathlon, you think it's the...

the insufficient, like I think at one point for me, the idea of crossing the finish line was very motivating to me. And it became less so at some point, and I'm not really sure why. What about for you?

Mike (28:12.56)
Yeah

Mike (28:21.648)
Yeah, that's true. mean, the special feeling of crossing the full Ironman finish line for the first time is outstanding. And it's so cool. And I think it's like, I don't know, like a lot of things you can do to excess or just over and over again, it loses.

the uniqueness once you do it more often.

Mike (28:55.098)
So.

Lindsay Hiken (28:56.526)
Yeah, idea of crossing the finish line, although it is, it did feel amazing. Is not enough to sustain me at this moment. And I'm not somebody who

Mike (29:08.1)
Yeah, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (29:12.556)
has ever really been interested in what my time is so that I could then focus on being a PR, doing a PR. I have teammates who know like exactly down to the second what they did on each thing and what their splits are. And so then they use that, I think, to motivate themselves because they're like, I'm going to, you know, do a negative split here. That's my goal. I'm going to do, you know, whatever in this workout, this ride.

Mike (29:17.645)
in here.

Lindsay Hiken (29:35.84)
I'm like, I don't even know how long that took me. Does anyone know how long were we? Let's see what Strava says later.

Mike (29:42.916)
Yeah, it's so funny though, as an aside, like when you talk to people who are type A who are really into the times, they lose their mind when you say something like that. Like what? You don't know your exact time? Like, I don't know. I don't know. Okay.

Lindsay Hiken (29:52.302)
I know.

Lindsay Hiken (29:57.102)
I can't remember even how long it took me to do Iron Man Santa Rosa. I just know that was really freaking long and pretty much all of my teammates were done with the time I crossed. Those are the two things that I know about that. And I've, I don't know, did you ever try to like get into some type A stuff with your workout? Like make an effort to try to do that?

Mike (30:06.073)
Yeah

Mike (30:19.951)
Yeah.

Mike (30:25.764)
Yeah, and it felt like I was pretending because I was.

Lindsay Hiken (30:28.814)
I made typical to people with ADHD made a giant ass plan. A very type A giant plan based on stuff I learned from my other you know from my teammates who are type A and then I did like precisely five minutes of it you know just not me it's just not me it's okay but I don't have that

Mike (30:37.198)
Yeah.

Mike (30:49.583)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (30:55.406)
I don't have that data that I can use as a motivating factor.

Mike (31:00.384)
What I what I really am impressed by and respect are the people who can do things like Iron Man or just say triathlon You know dozens even hundreds of times and and still have that love for it You know because there's a lot of repetition in it I mean the what's the variance is the course if you're doing different courses, right? but

Lindsay Hiken (31:16.366)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (31:24.188)
Mm Yeah.

Mike (31:26.842)
for triathlon and swimming and cycling and then running. You know, very, very, very much the same thing. So.

Lindsay Hiken (31:31.321)
That's true.

Lindsay Hiken (31:38.252)
Yeah, over and over and over again, really.

You know, I think one of the things I like about the team I'm on, I'm still on the team, even though at this point I'm just paying to have friends, you know, because I'm not doing the workouts. Is that Tim Schiepper has been very good at varying the workouts like a lot, and it's not non-traditional triathlon training. So.

Mike (31:53.038)
Hehehe

Mike (32:01.187)
huh. That's cool.

Lindsay Hiken (32:07.17)
He doesn't just have everybody on their tri-bikes zipping back and forth on a course that mimics sort of the race. He does a lot of things like everyone get on their road bikes and we're going to go do like 78 miles with a ton of climbing, like 8,000 feet of climbing or something. that seems to, it changes it up quite a bit, but still makes you strong.

Mike (32:22.062)
Mm-hmm. Wow.

Mike (32:29.988)
Yeah, yeah. One thing that I don't know if he got into is with burnout. That I think is a really good way to feel where you are is is going back to your why. And finding out why you're doing something. And for me, I'm fortunate in that my job is something I'm very passionate about and.

I have a big why to do it. And I know that's not always the case. Not always the case. Sometimes we just have a profession that we're good at and we go out and we do it because we need to pay the bills. Yeah, but still having a why can help us put up with the monotony of the job or whatever area of our life isn't exciting.

Lindsay Hiken (33:12.268)
Yeah, that's that's what I do.

Lindsay Hiken (33:24.352)
Yeah, yeah, I think.

Lindsay Hiken (33:31.276)
I think when I just read that little thing about feeling undervalued and that kind of thing, if you don't have an external why like you do for your job, then it's the only thing you have really is kind of feeling like you are bringing some value to the workplace.

Mike (33:35.93)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (33:54.82)
Yeah, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (33:55.55)
And so when you are not being acknowledged in that way, it does feel really bad because there's no other why to get you over that hump, really.

Mike (34:06.67)
That's true, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (34:12.108)
So I think it's important for me to try to find and for anybody in this situation I'm in which.

Lindsay Hiken (34:24.755)
external wife and maybe it's just something related to supporting my family you know that kind of thing so I got to think about that a little bit

Mike (34:26.064)
Looks like you might have frozen up on us, Lindsey.

Mike (34:34.383)
Yeah.

Mike (34:40.048)
There's it's what's really interesting is I read a Can't remember the exact title of the book, but it talks about the three kinds of motivators there's You know external There's internal and then there's pro-social. So let's take working out for example And those are in the order of how much they can affect

and be lasting. So an external motivator for working out, let's say, would be to, I want, you know, I want my wife to be impressed with how good I look. You know, I want my partner to look, be impressed with how good I look, or my friends. And then an internal one would be, you know, I really want to get in shape for the health benefits and feel good in my own body. And then a pro social one would be

Well, if I'm in shape, then I know that it's going to motivate other people to do that within my sphere of influence. And I'm going to be a good example for my kids or a good example for other people I work with. And that's going to help the quality of their life increase. And so usually the pro-social one, when we know we're doing something that's going to affect positive change in other people's lives, is the biggest motivator. And

We can always find those in what we're doing. It just takes a little creativity sometimes to write it down and figure out what it is.

So.

Lindsay Hiken (36:14.424)
That makes sense. Pro social. That's something I didn't know about, but it absolutely, it makes sense. I know when I was training for the Santa Rosa, sorry, everybody, I have a little bit of a cold, so I keep hacking and coughing, apologize. I did want to show my kids that you could set a big lofty goal and go after it. And that helped, I think.

Mike (36:42.306)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

You're good. Yeah, no, it definitely does help. I think the, the one thing that is helping me to get back into fitness right now and working out is actually my son, he's, he's really on this kick of working out. have an eight year old son who is lifting weights and doing laps around the neighborhood. He's like, dad, I need to get a six pack. I'm like, okay.

Lindsay Hiken (37:08.065)
that's so cool.

Did they have those for eight year olds?

Mike (37:14.832)
I don't know what the end goal is, but he's like, and now he's telling me, like, dad, I want to join the Marine so I can be stronger than you. I'm like, OK. But yeah, he really wants to work out. so knowing that there's something I can do to positively affect changing his life is a big motivator for me,

Lindsay Hiken (37:24.914)
Aw, that's cool though.

Lindsay Hiken (37:38.254)
That's awesome. That's really cool. Working out with your kid is fun. I did it with my daughter. I think we even talked about on the show like a long time ago when it happened, but did the rock and roll half marathon with her. my God, it was so cool to see, to do something like that with her. mean, you know, just crossing the finish line together was such an amazing feeling and it was something that.

Mike (37:40.122)
Yeah.

Mike (37:48.421)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (37:52.27)
Yeah, uh-huh.

Lindsay Hiken (38:07.744)
You know, I'd share a long time ago on the show just about the troubles that my drinking shard had, you know, caused my family and. Sort of this moment of, know.

I don't know. I want to say just it shows kind of the change in me and my child and our relationship. That moment was really, really cool. And so I said to her not that long ago, hey, do you want to do this? Do you want to do something again like that? Like we could train for something. And she was like, no, no, no. I did that to be with you and I'm done.

Mike (38:33.742)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (38:51.044)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (38:55.53)
OK, well, let's go to brunch then instead. She's like that I can do. Did I talk really quickly in terms of the training and trying to, you know, get myself motivated? Did I talk about my little CrossFit experience on here? I know I shared it with you and Peggy personally. Well, I will just share with the listeners. I did not pick a good gym for myself.

Mike (39:14.348)
I don't think so. I don't think he did.

Lindsay Hiken (39:23.654)
to try and I did I did try CrossFit I don't even know if I should call it trying CrossFit I went to a CrossFit gym and

Mike (39:31.844)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (39:35.47)
It was hella ghetto. I don't know how else to describe it. It was really like, so it was my first time there and the coaches were working on doing like a handstand push up with these people, which is not a new person.

Mike (39:50.263)
huh.

Mike (39:54.224)
Yeah, it's kind of an advanced move.

Lindsay Hiken (39:56.354)
you think doing a handstand and then pushing doing a push up isn't, you know, they, they basically just did like a warm up, which was okay, I could do but the coaches didn't have any way of addressing somebody in the who was new and who didn't know what they were doing. They just only knew how to teach the thing they were teaching, I guess. And so at one point, they had me like trying to balance on my head. And I'm like,

Mike (40:00.282)
You

Mike (40:15.663)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (40:24.812)
My neck hurts. And the guy was like, well, just kick up. Just kick up. And I'm like, but my neck hurts. And he was like, OK, well, maybe this maybe maybe you shouldn't kick up then. I'm like, yeah, I think maybe I shouldn't. And then he just was like, OK, cool. And he walked off and I was like, huh? At some point, I just got my stuff and I kind of exited. And I don't think I don't I'm pretty sure they don't even know that I left. It was so weird.

Mike (40:39.77)
here.

Lindsay Hiken (40:54.474)
And it was just a very, I was like, this, is this CrossFit? Because I'm not down.

Mike (41:02.128)
Yeah. The better, the better gyms at least that I've seen have like what they call it, like an on-ramp kind of program for people to, you know, learn what the hell is going on and how to do it and not get thrown into the fire or into the deep end really. Cause I mean, if your first class is doing handstand pushups or like muscle ups or things that, you know,

Lindsay Hiken (41:10.734)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (41:28.846)
Yeah.

Mike (41:30.746)
Thought the average person can't do then it's like, what am I doing here? I'm not a gymnast.

Lindsay Hiken (41:35.566)
Right. I'm most definitely not a gymnast. And I was kind of like, I would need to work on my upper body strength, which I have, which I have none. If I'm going to hold my entire body weight, you know, with my arms and then try to go down and back up again, I would definitely.

Mike (41:49.775)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (41:55.03)
You do so. I'm going to have to gather my motivation again to try CrossFit and do a little more research and to find a gym because I do think it'd be cool to, like you said, do variations, know, try to change my routine a little bit and get back into it.

Mike (42:08.186)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (42:13.72)
my goal for this week I'm gonna do my my gyms version of I don't know what they call it but it's their version of CrossFit just varied workouts and circuit training and calisthenics and weights so yeah with people with people

Lindsay Hiken (42:28.694)
cool. Yeah. OK, with others. So there's a designated time and you're going to go to that time.

Mike (42:35.792)
Yeah, so what I I learned about myself is the the I can do the solo workouts if it's run bike swim But Like a circuit training or hit training I Need to be around other people that's just how it is and I know that now

Lindsay Hiken (42:46.818)
Mm-hmm.

Lindsay Hiken (42:59.286)
Yeah. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Good. That's a good thing to know about yourself. I have the same thing. Not going to do any strength training on my own. Just. The first set up, I'm like. Let me go for a run. Hey, hey. Well, I think.

Mike (43:09.742)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (43:29.154)
I think that we did talk a little bit about burnout, which is what we intended to do. We talked about some, you know, some ways to address burnout. I don't recommend everyone leave their job, but maybe finding ways to let go of work and leave work at work. And varying your tasks at work is a good thing. Varying your workouts. Try being around people.

Mike (43:47.311)
Yeah.

Lindsay Hiken (43:57.016)
but in a way that's not work related. I think those are all good tips.

Mike (43:57.466)
Mm-hmm.

Mike (44:07.088)
Yeah, feels, yeah, and if there's other tips or there's other things that experiences you've had, go ahead and reach out to us. Email us and let us know so we can share that with the listeners too.

Lindsay Hiken (44:18.062)
you

Lindsay Hiken (44:23.916)
Yeah, that would be amazing. We'd like to hear from you guys when we do and you know, you can also feel free to let us know topics that you are interested in or people that you would like us to interview. You know, if you have a referral for that, we're happy to talk to them as well. I think that's it for today, though. All right, everybody, we'll see you next week. Bye.

Mike (44:42.714)
Sounds good to me.

Mike (44:47.086)
Bye.