“Is This As Good As It Gets?” Why Leaders Think Fulfillment Isn’t Possible

Blake (00:39)
Most leaders don’t talk about this out loud, but I hear it privately all the time. You’ve tried a lot to feel better. You’ve changed jobs maybe more than once, hoping the next company, the next promotion, the next boss would finally be it. You’ve chased the promotions and climbed the ladder, increased your responsibilities. You put your head down and pushed harder because you thought it would get easier.

You’ve taken vacation only to come back and feel overwhelmed and have that feeling come back again.

And you’ve probably tried to be more productive and organize your life better. You’ve read books, you’ve talked to mentors, maybe you’ve even gone to therapy, journaled, tried meditation or breath work.

You’ve tried to be more grateful. You’ve tried to relax and not think about work so much.

And here’s the thing, every single one of those choices was made from a good place. It was smart, logical, and proactive. So of course you tried them, I did too. And yet I kept finding myself back in the same cycles of burnout, lack of fulfillment, or feeling like I was compromising my life for my career. And here’s why this happens. When you don’t have a map for what’s actually going on,

You’ll keep trying and doing things so that you can finally feel that sense of peace.

There’s nothing wrong with that and there’s nothing wrong with you. The challenge is that you were searching for solution without being told what the real problem was or how to solve it.

I can’t tell you the number of people that have come to me saying, I’ve tried all of the things. I’ve gone to a career coach or therapy or, you know, meditation or tried all the productivity apps, et cetera. What most people don’t explain to you is that most of the solutions people are trying, they’re siloed. They treat a piece of the problem, but not the whole thing. So the relief is temporary.

The symptoms might shift for a bit, but that deeper pattern, it stays the same. Meditation is wonderful in the moment, but it doesn’t actually solve the root cause of what’s triggering you or what will trigger you tomorrow.

Breathwork can calm your system in the moment, but it can’t change the belief underneath.

That keeps activating that stress.

Paid time off will give you a break, but it doesn’t change the environment you return to or the misalignment that keeps showing up. Productivity hacks can help you organize the chaos, but if you don’t change the underlying belief systems and how you’re leading in living, they’re not sustainable.

In terms of really creating that change.

And they absolutely won’t change the part of you that feels unsafe slowing down, that struggles to sit in quiet and peace and not have the to-do list run through your head or to feel like you should be doing something more. Therapy is an excellent start. It can give you self-awareness and insight, but it often takes years, rarely integrates all the pieces necessary.

And sometimes actually further ingrains the belief systems and patterns that keep you stuck. A new job will give you a fresh start and some momentum, but if you don’t solve the root cause, that pattern will come back again and the experiences you’ve had in those past jobs will end up showing up and you’ll feel like you’re just repeating more of the same.

Leadership tactics, tools, scripts, they can help give you context in certain situations. But if you don’t address the root cause of why you second guess what’s causing your fear, stress, frustration, you’ll end up unable to deal with uncertainty.

And you won’t know how to respond authentically based on your values and your voice. And here’s a metaphor that I hope helps clarify why this doesn’t work. It’s like being in a boat with 20 holes, right? Each one of these things you’re trying is like putting a bandaid on each one of them, but the boat is still taking on water.

Not because those tools are wrong,

The real reason the boat is sinking. Cycles of burnout or lack of energy or going through cycles of being fulfilled and unfulfilled. They’re not caused by just one thing, so it can’t be solved by just one thing. And honestly, none of those approaches were designed to fix the root cause.

Whether it’s siloed or focusing more on symptoms, it’s really not a holistic approach.

And here’s the truth that most people never hear. Your reaction, your lack of energy, your overwhelm, they’re not about what’s happening today. They come from an operating system that was built decades ago.

Your nervous system, your belief system, and your identity learned really early on, I have to be responsible.

I have to keep it together. I don’t want to disappoint people. My value comes from what I accomplish. It’s safer and easier to do things by myself.

And honestly, that helped you succeed, achieve, and it helped you survive emotionally and physically and psychologically in the environment you grew up in. But at some point it stops working. And at some point it becomes the detriment to your health, your wellbeing, your growth, and your ability to really enjoy and thrive in your career and in your life. Because…

When your leadership and how you show up in the world is built on.

Giving so much effort, overachieving, people pleasing, taking on constant responsibility, fearing that if you stop doing that, that you’re gonna drop the ball and something would fall apart.

You aren’t gonna be able to fix that with a new job, more discipline, better organization, a mindset shift, therapy, meditation.

Because none of those things rewire the deeper system that’s running the show. You cannot outwork or outsmart an operating system that was never built for ease flow alignment or sustainable success.

The real reason the boat is sinking. Cycles of burnout or lack of energy or going through cycles of being fulfilled and unfulfilled. They’re not caused by just one thing, so it can’t be solved by just one thing. And honestly, none of those approaches were designed to fix the root cause.

Whether it’s siloed or focusing more on symptoms, it’s really not a holistic approach.

And here’s the truth that most people never hear. Your reaction, your lack of energy, your overwhelm, they’re not about what’s happening today. They come from an operating system that was built decades ago.

Your nervous system, your belief system, and your identity learned really early on, I have to be responsible.

I have to keep it together. I don’t want to disappoint people. My value comes from what I accomplish. It’s safer and easier to do things by myself.

And honestly, that helped you succeed, achieve, and it helped you survive emotionally and physically and psychologically in the environment you grew up in. But at some point it stops working. And at some point it becomes the detriment to your health, your wellbeing, your growth, and your ability to really enjoy and thrive in your career and in your life. Because…

When your leadership and how you show up in the world is built on.

Giving so much effort, overachieving, people pleasing, taking on constant responsibility, fearing that if you stop doing that, that you’re gonna drop the ball and something would fall apart.

You aren’t gonna be able to fix that with a new job, more discipline, better organization, a mindset shift, therapy, meditation.

Because none of those things rewire the deeper system that’s running the show. You cannot outwork or outsmart an operating system that was never built for ease flow alignment or sustainable success.

Now here’s the piece that almost nobody teaches, but it’s the heart of the work that we do here at Impact with Ease. Lasting transformation requires getting in alignment.

With how you are naturally wired to thrive.

Most leaders are operating in misalignment with how they’re naturally wired, forcing themselves to work in ways that are opposite of how their brain was built to take action. It’s really powerful and amazing what happens when you can come to understand how your brain is instinctually wired to take action, solve problems and operate under uncertainty.

The power of truly understanding that there is an operating system for you that’s different than other people that you’re surrounded by. And that when you are in alignment with that, you’re two to three times more productive, you experience less stress and more fulfillment in your work. It’s really all about how does my brain work to create results with the least resistance? And how do I continue to generate?

And continue to keep that energy and momentum going. Because when you’re not aligned with how you’re naturally wired, your MO, you’re gonna work two to three times harder than necessary and you’re gonna burn out twice as fast. And you might be able to do this for a few years, but you start tacking on the decades and it becomes harder and harder and harder to do the things that you used to be able to sustain.

On the flip side, when you are aligned, the work feels easy, energizing and natural.

The second element behind how you’re naturally wired to thrive is identifying your unique fingerprint for success. This is the natural pattern behind every breakthrough and success you’ve ever created.

That is truly unique, like a fingerprint to you. It’s what happens when you’re operating at your highest potential and your highest joy. Most people really have no idea what theirs is. You might understand certain elements, but you don’t see the entirety and you don’t see it at its highest level. And as a result, we end up overworking, getting caught in cycles of perfectionism.

Or focusing our time and energy on things that really aren’t our sweet spot.

We also struggle to communicate our highest value to other people, to connect those dots in terms of what it is that really makes us most passionate and offer the highest value. And if you’re in a circumstance, and I think to be honest, all of us ought to be thinking about this with how much is changing in the world of work with AI restructuring and the pace of change.

That we have to really be able to understand fundamentally how we create success without the labels of a particular industry, a particular role, a particular career path. Why does this matter? Because how you are identifying who you are in your career is so critical to the career path you create. And so often when I see people feel…

No longer passionate about the work that they’re doing or lacking clarity on what the right path is for them, is because they have too narrowly looked at who they are and their skill set and what they’re capable of doing. So once you unlock your unique fingerprint for success, it really expands your perspective and helps you see and understand how your unique fingerprint can be applied in so many different industries, roles, ways.

And that truly is career safety. It also is an ability to propel your career forward, doing the work that you’re most passionate about that adds the most value.

And that truly is career safety. It also is an ability to propel your career forward, doing the work that you’re most passionate about that adds the most value.

Know, inside organizations, we talk about career pathing. If you’re looking at, you know, career or leadership coaching, we talk about what’s your purpose and the path and the vision you want for your life. But ultimately, what I know to be true is when you don’t really understand how you’re naturally wired to thrive and that unique fingerprint for how you create success, you waste so much time and energy.

Overthinking, overworking, going in the wrong direction because you don’t really have the elements that you need to have that deep level of self-trust, conviction, and the ability to communicate that in a way that people rapidly and instantly understand the value you bring.

The clarity that it gives you.

Wipes away a lot of the noise and a lot of the things we spend time on that we shouldn’t.

The next element is really all about rewiring, limiting beliefs, conditioning, and experiences that you’ve been through that are the glass ceilings in your life causing you to continue to repeat the same patterns over and over again. This is not about just treating the symptoms. It’s not about just the surface level behaviors. It’s actually about addressing the root.

Which includes your nervous system, your belief systems, your identity, your emotional conditioning, the patterns and habits that you continue to go through, and ultimately being able to learn what are the lessons that life has been teaching you, and how can you

Unlock your own growth through being able to see those and start using those lessons to truly create the trajectory for the career and life that you want. This is incredibly powerful work.

It’s work that so many people misunderstand because most of the methodologies out there look like they need to be long, emotional, take years to do, or we have belief systems that it’s just not possible to create that kind of change. But I’m here to tell you that it is. And that there are so many things that we believe about life.

That when examined under a methodology and a proven process can help you begin to see the ways of which you’ve had limiting beliefs or assumptions that were standing in the way of better relationships, more momentum and trajectory towards the life you want, more space and time and presence to enjoy your life.

And more ease and flow in creating what you want.

And then the third element is really about understanding what you need and how you interact best from an environment standpoint.

It’s so easy to look externally and think, you know, it’s just this environment, this boss, this circumstance, this very busy timeframe,

This new group of leaders.

But the reality is, again, each one of us is wired to have certain things that we need in terms of our relationship, communication, environment, to operate at our best.

And if we don’t know what those are, we can’t ask for them. We also can’t identify whether the opportunities or people that are coming our way are right for us or not.

These are such critical skills to truly being able to spend your time and energy in the right environments with the right people doing the right projects and the right work that really light you up.

So often when you hear things about environment, what I see in the market is a lot of people telling you how to adapt to the environment. Know, Melody Wilding has a whole program on how to speak like a senior leader where she talks about scripts and how you can shift how you communicate. And while practical tools like that can absolutely be helpful, the reality is if you’re operating out of alignment with who you are and what you need,

Believing that solving those problems through using a script or a process is gonna help you have the peace of mind, momentum, and joy that you want for your life and career just honestly isn’t true.

I spent so many years in my career learning leadership skills, communication skills, how to be PC, and those absolutely are valuable. But when you aren’t in…

In full alignment with who you are what you value, you’re applying things in a way that is really honestly disingenuous to you. It’s like you’re having to put on a face and over time having to put on a face year after year after year, you just get to a place where you can’t do it anymore to be really frank and honest. And I think so many people believe that they just have to suck it up and put on the face and behave a certain way in order to be successful in their career.

And the reality is that’s honestly part of what’s really keeping them stuck. Here’s the truth. People can tell when you’re honest and vulnerable and you show up as your full self and people can tell when you are approaching things from a script or feeling like you have to show up in a certain way in order to be successful. It’s an interesting paradox. So many of us have been taught that in order to be successful, success has to look this one way.

And yet operating that way feels uncomfortable. It feels like force and stress. And over time, it creates burnout. And what I’ve actually really seen is leaders who show up with a sense of true self-awareness of who they are, their strengths and their opportunities that show up with humility and partnership.

That show up as their authentic selves and enable their teams to show up that way, those leaders are the ones that are seen as the people others want to work for. Those leaders are the ones that continue to propel in their career. Those leaders create environments and cultures where everyone thrives and where the team truly works together to create outsized results.

And so when I share this about environment, I just feel so passionately about this because I think so many people are feeling like they have to be put in this box to be successful. And while well-meaning and while absolutely learning diplomacy and communication skills is incredibly important as a leader.

The next level from that is really learning how to show up authentically as you and how to be able to lead from more flow and ease. And in a world that’s so rapidly changing, we need more leaders who can create a sense of safety, create a sense of vulnerability and authenticity inside these organizations. And the only way that you can do that for others is if you’ve done that for yourself.

So as we talk about these different elements, what I really see is most programs focus on one of them, or they often are addressing symptoms with tactics or strategies and not resolving the root. So if you’ve done these and you’ve wondered, like, feel like I’ve done everything and why isn’t it working for me? I hope you have a better understanding now of why. It’s why I am so passionately about the holistic approach to solve all of these issues.

Because holistic alignment creates whole life and career transformation. It’s the thing I kept seeking over and over and over again. With every book I read, leadership or productivity activity I did, the coaching that I went through, every single thing.

Was ultimately to try and figure out how I could truly have peace that I was exactly where I was meant to be in my career and life.

And I didn’t feel like I was having to sacrifice my life, my career, my health, my relationships, my kids for my career.

One thing I want to share that I think is incredibly important.

This process does not have to be long, hard, or complicated.

Holistic alignment.

Is about small changes on a daily and weekly basis that rapidly improve your energy, clarity, peace of mind, impact, your ability to be present in your life. You know, I spent almost 30 years of my life trying to figure this out, changing jobs, chasing success and climbing the ladder, doing therapy, reading books, working with so many coaches and consultants.

Trying everything to have the peace of mind that I was able to grow and feel passionate about my work without having to sacrifice my life.

And so the work that I share with my clients and ultimately with you guys on this podcast and honestly, pretty much anyone I come across is through nearly 30 years of in-depth learning, my own trial and error. It’s a proven map to help you finally unlock the peace, passion, purpose and progress you’ve wanted. And within a matter of just four to six.

Weeks, you can feel drastically more energy and presence and less stress, even in the exact same circumstances. Because when you’re in alignment, things rapidly improve. Things you thought weren’t possible become possible. Dreams that you had for the far-off future now become more tangible in the near term. Opportunities show up with more ease and flow. You begin to see how things could be a lot more simple.

And where your effort matters versus where it was creating a lot of friction, stress, or energy drain. You reclaim your spark and regain the confidence, tools, and a proven process to maintain that progress long-term.

Many of my clients have come to me believing maybe I’ll just never be satisfied or my expectations are too high. Maybe something’s wrong with me or maybe this is just quote unquote as good as it gets. Why can’t I just be grateful or relax?

Everyone else seems fine. Why am I not? And if any of those thoughts have run through your mind, I want you to hear this clearly. You are not broken and there isn’t anything wrong with you.

You have never been the problem. What you’re experiencing are signs and symptoms of misalignment in your life.

You’re not asking for too much or ungrateful.

You aren’t just stressed.

You aren’t failing.

The tools, processes, and systems you’ve used just have not been designed to solve the root cause of what you’ve been experiencing. And once you understand the lessons life has been teaching you and how to align with how you’re naturally wired to thrive, everything becomes possible.

You don’t have to keep trying things that don’t work or keep doing this alone. And you don’t have to spend another year feeling this way. There is a different way to lead and live and you deserve to experience it too.

Thank you so much for being here and for listening. And until next time, lead with intention and create your impact with ease.