How to Move from Striving to Thriving

Season 2, Episode 15

Summary:

“It felt like my whole life changed once I made the necessary shifts to get in thrive mode.” 

Have you ever felt like you’re working hard but you’re not sure where it’s getting you?

Do you wonder what you’re working towards? 

I used to be the same way. I was striving and achieving, it’s just it was coming at a high cost to me and the people around me. 

It took a lot of unwinding of old beliefs - like I had to work hard to get ahead – and really identifying what work and activities mattered…and which ones didn’t. 

I’m not going to lie. I didn’t make it easy on myself. I took the long route, but now that I’m on the other side, I want to share ways you can move from striving to thriving at a much faster pace than I did. 

Psst…it’s easier than I thought it would be.

If you pride yourself on being a hard worker, but you’d like more ease in your life. If you want to feel more energized in your day instead of exhausted. Or, if you want or need a vision to work toward, then you’re going to love today’s podcast

Links:

Masterclass: Secrets of the World's Most Successful People

Transcript:

Michael Kithcart: 0:00

Hello, I'm Michael Kithcart. I'm a high performance business coach and entrepreneur who helps worn out achievers become thriving powerhouses.

Welcome to the Champions of RISK Podcast, where we examine the many aspects of risk. So we can all face uncertainty with more strength, courage, and teamwork together.

Are you thriving in all aspects of your life right now? I mean, really just like feeling like you're prosperous and successful, full of energy and vitality.

Are you feeling fulfilled and in charge of your life? Or would you say that you're striving, you're working hard, you're making a heck of a lot of effort, and even maybe being persistent, but you're getting kind of frustrated, because you're not quite seeing the results of your hard work yet.

Which one sounds more like you, if you said, striving I, I get it. Because I was much more of a striver than a thriver. Much of my life, really, like, I think I even have a badge for striving, because I thought that's what I should be doing.

And then I found another way. And I have to say that my life is so much better and more enjoyable as a result of this. And so that's why I want to talk to you today about the difference between striving and thriving. And maybe before today's episode, you had never really even put those two words together, they kind of sound alike.

But, you know, do the litmus test here. Because striving by definition is to try and achieve a result to make a strenuous effort. I mean, right there in the definition, doesn't that sound hard? It's like to try earnestly and persistently. But all of that definition, when I look at it, it's all about trying to do something in the, in the spirit of exuding a whole lot of energy. And there's no guarantee right? The whole thing, I'm just reading you a definition here, it's not my definition, it's in the dictionary.

And the word try, isn't it like two or three times?

As opposed to thrive? Which is to grow vigorously, or luxuriantly, to flourish? Now, that sounds absolute to me, doesn't it? Like when you hear that there's no try and thrive? It's, it's just to become that to grow vigorously. I mean, it sounds like what many of us want to be doing in life? Maybe even, we imagine that our best life has that in it.

But where are you right now, today? And where would you rather be? I'm telling you, I was striving and achieving for so much of my career. And it was coming at a high cost, not only to me, but the people around me. I'm talking about my personal life, the teams I was leading. I mean, I was just leaking out frustration when I was in my high tilt, strive mode.

And I think you can relate, right? I mean, this is a podcast for high performers. And so does that sound like you at any moment in time. And I'm not saying that it was every single day, right. But there would be moments periods of time, where I was just in this different gear. And it was taking everything out of me. And other things that were important went to the wayside. And I I'm not proud of this, I'm just sharing it in case you actually are in striving mode.

Right now.

Like I said, it took me a long time to figure it out. And where it really started to shift for me is when I started analyzing and unwinding old beliefs and by old beliefs, I'm talking about things that if I was really being honest, I believed to be true for a lot of my life.

Maybe I'd even heard it from like my dad, my grandpa, you know, people around me people that I was trying to emulate early in my career.

And I just want to share some of these with you because I started jotting them down. And I'm wondering if maybe some of these are floating around in your head right now.

Things like you have to work hard. To get ahead, what I do is who I am. Now, that can sound a lot of different ways. But really, when I boil it down, there's a big part of my life or what I did represented who I was, I was addicted, to the hustle. I mean, nobody loves to hustle more than me. And I have to fight that sometimes, because I still got a lot of hustle in me. But here's the thing, everything was a struggle. It was complicated, I mean, things more complicated than they needed to be. And it it required a lot of effort for me to get the goals and the things that I wanted.

And I was always about I don't have time. I don't have time. I don't have enough time. I can't do that. I already have this. I was overbooked. Ha, anybody have three meetings on their calendar? all at the same time? I know you've had that before. I know. I'm not the only one. But my God, what does that do to your psyche? It's just like, so deflating to see that on a calendar.

So no matter what it was, like, I was overbooked.

I was overworked.

I was over this, I was over my tips, right.

And one of the big things, and I did let go of this a while back, I still had plenty of a track record, where I had a period of time where I kept thinking I needed to have it all figured out. Can Can you relate that at all? I mean, I know. I know,

I'm not alone, because I work with a lot of clients on this.

And that that piece of like figuring out like, I should know what I want out of life. I know, I should know how to put the brakes on and to relax and enjoy life. I should I should I should I should I should. And also that pressure inside of thinking like, Okay, I have this much experience, or I'm in this leadership role, I should, I should know what's going on, I should have this all figured out. And guess what, it was so darn freeing.

When I finally let that go. I have to say, if you are identifying with any of this, if you see yourself as more of a striver than a thriver, I am here to tell you today that there is another way to go through life. There really is. And so when I was thinking about this, because if it if we're in strive mode, we are, we are already in full tilt. And to think there's, I mean, like there's overwhelm all around, right?

And to think like, Oh, great, now I've got to figure out how to become a thriver instead of a striver. That starts to feel complicated, right? So I'm going to make it super, super simple.

And so in that effort not to overwhelm you. And just to get you started moving over into the thriver lane, I'm going to give you three things that really when I look back made a big difference. I know it can make a big difference for you.

And I'm not saying you have to do all three of them, hear me on this, okay? See if maybe one of these three things that I share with you sounds like something that you would be willing to do and take a look at and try and see how it makes a shift for you.

That's all I'm asking.

But here are three things that work. Evaluate what matters. That's the first one. What really matters in your life? And how much time are those things that matter to you actually getting right now, I need you to do this without judgment.

This is data collection, just check it out and see and then identify what is stuff that doesn't really matter to you.

But you know what, it's taken up a whole lot of your time, big chunks of your time. And just notice that. Now, this might feel hard to sum. But the next thing I'm going to ask you to do as you are evaluating what matters is to stop doing most things for a while just a little bit, drop out, drop out.

If you're leading 37 things, if you are on you know, every organizational board or subcommittee or stop, stop it. If you're volunteering for things at work, if you are, you know, have just meeting meeting, meeting, meeting, meeting all day long, stop doing some things and just evaluate and then what start letting the things that matter most you get a little bit more of your time.

And by stopping some things, you might realize that there are pieces that just never have to get added back. And here's what I want to say about evaluating is that it changes over time. So what matters to you today might be different, even three months down the road, like there are some times where we would just like need to have little surges, right.

And the priority needs to be in a particular direction. And but that doesn't have to happen forever. So I just, like give some grace here, the whole thing is about grace. But I think when we are in strive mode, in fact, I know when we are in strive mode, that we're not even really fully present in knowing what we're giving our energy to what we're spending our time on. So the first step is to evaluate what matters.

The second thing to get more into the thriver lane is to get quiet. Silence holds the answers.

Okay, you may be saying, there's not any silence in my life. And I can understand that I really, really can't find a way to get quiet, I don't care if it's five minutes, or five hours, get silent, and just see what emerges. quiet the mind, I'm not talking about meditating, I'm not talking about doing a mantra, or walking, or driving in silence, I'm talking about just sitting your butt in the place, be still and be quiet.

And see what happens.

The longer you can do it, the more amazing it can be. I did it for four hours, you think that's insane. Nobody can do that. Nobody can take the time. I got up at 2:30 in the morning, and I did it. If it's important to you, you will do it. And I'm telling you, it was one of the more calming things that I have done in the last year.

Really.

Okay, the third thing that I would recommend that I do recommend for the getting closer into the thriver lane is to stop the worry.

I'm gonna give you a little numbers rundown here, stop the worry, because the likelihood that it's not going to happen is great. Stop the worry, because that's future focused, get yourself present, we have 60,000 thoughts a day 60,000.

And guess what 85% of those are negative and 95% of that 85% are repetitive. So just think about this, we spend the majority of our day having repetitive negative thoughts, what the heck, the good news is, is that we can control our thoughts.

So I'm asking you to replace your negative thinking with positive thinking, interrupt the crazy. And here's how you do that. You just noticed when you're having a negative thought, just start noticing. And when you notice it, don't judge it, don't analyze it, just stop and replace it with a positive thought.

Something along the lines of everything always has been is now and will always be fine. say that out loud three times and tell me you don't start calming the fuck down.

I'm serious about this.

And guess what the likelihood that what you have been worrying about or have a negative thought about, it actually isn't going to happen probably like 97% of the time.

That's a huge likelihood that what you are wasting your time and your energy and your thinking on is never going to come into fruition.

So stop the crazy when you notice it, change it and go into a different direction and just replaced with a different thought like, I got this 100% possible 100% of the time. Everything always has been is now and will always be fine.

So that's it.

Those are the three tips that I'm going to give you today.

Try it.

What's the worst thing that could possibly happen out of this? And on the flip side? What good could come out of it? Just try one. Let me know what changes you notice. I want to hear from you. Leave me a message in the comment section. Email me drop me a message in any of the socials. I want to hear. I want to hear about how you're getting yourself into the thriver Lane.

Thank you.

Thank you for listening and I just want to just drop in as I'm wrapping up here. If you like this episode, or any of the episodes you may have listened to lately on the Champions of RISK podcast, please, please, please, I'd really appreciate it if you'd make sure that you're subscribed and also rate the podcast please. It helps a lot.

Okay, thank you very much catch you next time.

Imagine what could happen if you committed to excellence? What would change in your life? How much better could life be if you're operating from focusing?

And I want that for you. And that's why I created my free masterclass Secrets of the World's Most Successful People. Discover what the top 5% of successful people do differently, that make them thrive consistently.

That's right, I said thrive.

And here's the thing.

They are all areas. I'm even going to give you a tip. It's six things, it's six pillars, but this is what the world's most successful people look at on a consistent basis and it makes a huge difference. And guess what, you can do it too. That's why I'm going to share with you what the six pillars are what gets the world's most successful people in thrive mode and out of striving. You're gonna want to check this masterclass out because you know what, after the month of April, I'm, I'm retiring it until the fall. I'm done. I'm done.

So you have two more times in the month of April to be able to check out this free master class. So if you pride yourself on being a hard worker plus, a little more ease and want to feel more energized in your day instead of, I don't know, like, exhausted.

If you want or need a vision to work toward, then get yourself registered for this free masterclass. It's on April 22 or April 28, and you can get yourself registered by clicking on the link in the show notes or visiting www.michaelwkithcart.com. It's your last chance to get your hands on this material until the fall. So get yourself registered today.