You're at the Coaching Inn, 3D Coaching's virtual pub where we enjoy conversations with people who engage in the world of coaching. Welcome to this week's edition of The Coaching In. I'm your host, Claire Pedrick. And today I'm in conversation with Michael Levitt about his journey around burnout to the work he now does with the Breakfast Leadership Network. Michael, welcome. Great to be with you today.
Tell us a bit about your journey to this point and then we'll find out all about the work you do now. Yeah. My journey, the work that I do now, helping people with burnout was birthed out of my own personal journey with that wonderful thing that we call burnout. Back in 2007, I was hired as a healthcare executive for a startup healthcare organization. And I had never worked in healthcare before. I'd had a lot of startup experience, but never in healthcare.
So, What I had was a very, very steep learning curve to learn about an industry that I had only been a part -time user of, if that, and was familiar with certain things of it, but not everything. So here I am charged with recruiting physicians, hiring medical staff, securing medical equipment, coordinating a last minute clinic relocation. to navigating funding, navigating all of these things.
So it was definitely welcome to the team, threw you into the fire and let you, you know, firefight your way out. And while there was other people involved, it was definitely a, definitely felt like I was carrying a lot of the luggage through the airport per se. And that continued long after. running, you know, starting the clinic was running it and building it up and all of that. It just felt like I was just taking all of it. I wasn't really good at delegation.
And even though I could have delegated to either the board of directors or the staff, I just took it upon myself. And you know, for a couple of years, I was pretty much working from 6am to 11pm, seven days a week, right, did that for two years. And it all came to a crashing halt in May of 2009, where over a period of 369 days, so from May 2009 to May 2010, the following happened to me. I had a heart attack that should have killed me. I was 40. I was 40 years old at the time.
Then 17 weeks later, after recovering from that pretty significant cardiac event, I went back to the job and they decided they wanted to go in different directions. So they let me go. Now the location of this clinic was across, it was in Canada, across the border from Detroit, Michigan. And at that time that was the great recession in North America. And of course, when you're in an area that's in a recession or I would even argue in certain parts of that area, it was more of like a depression.
There wasn't a lot of jobs to be found. So it took me several months to find new work and ended up relocating to Toronto, which is a city that I really didn't want to go to. I've worked in big cities before and didn't really have an appetite to do it again, but had to out of necessity. And then after finding a job and was commuting back to where we were living on the weekends to see my family, I was doing that for a few weeks until we could find a place to rent in Toronto.
I was in my new job and I got a phone call from my oldest daughter who at the time was 10 years old and she was crying. I couldn't understand what was going on. I figured, you know, one of her siblings did something or broke a toy or something like that. It was like, no, the bank had come and repossessed our family vehicle.
Because when you're unemployed for as long as I was and on heart medication that costs over a thousand dollars a month, and you didn't have the insurance coverage, you have to make choices. Do I eat to feed the family and buy these medications to heal me and get me back to health? Or do I continue making the car payment and the house payment? Well, we chose what we had to do and nothing against our creditors.
We worked with them, but remember, this was a time of great recession for a lot of people. So there were a lot of people in that similar situation. They weren't able to make the car payments or their house payments or things like that. So. the banks had to do what they had to do in order to survive themselves. So they repossessed the vehicle. And then 17, or not 17 weeks later, but a few weeks later, we finally found a place to rent in Toronto. So we moved, got everything moved up.
And then we realized that we had forgotten the bunk bed ladder for a couple of our daughter's beds. So I was going back to the area that we were leaving the following weekend. to visit some friends and close up some accounts and whatnot before we did the official full transition to Toronto. So I went back, did the business thing that I needed to do, and then went over to the house to grab the ladder or anything else that we had forgotten.
And we were getting ready to put the house on the market to sell. And then when I went to the front door, I saw the largest padlock I've ever seen in my life and a small sticker on the door that said foreclosure. So in a year, heart attack that should have killed me, job loss, car repossession, home foreclosure. And all those things happened to me because I was burned out. My burnout led to making bad decisions around my health, work, you name it. I wasn't taking care of myself.
I was working way too many hours as I shared earlier and it all came to a crashing halt. And... When the cardiologist, Dr. Morse, was about to put the stents in my left interior descending artery, which has a nickname, by the way, for those that are familiar with cardiology, that particular artery is called the widow maker. Wow. usually, if you have blockages in that heart or in that particular artery and you have a heart attack, you're usually viewed, not seen. And I was very fortunate.
be alive. And even the cardiologist when he came in, he said, you know, you should be dead. And I looked at him and I said, I see you skipped bedside manner class in medical school. And he laughed and I laughed. My mom and my first wife were bawling at that point, because that's pretty significant thing. You know, you should be dead. You know, I thought it was funny. So did he. They didn't. But I found it kind of funny. Like, yeah, well, not, you know, so go and do the procedure. So he did.
And But at end of the day, I had a choice to make. At that point, I'm like, OK. Especially after the house and all that kind of stuff, I realized, all right, I've been through and lost just about everything you could lose at this point. I have a choice to make. One, I can say, wow, I'm like Superman. I'm resilient. I can withstand anything. Look at me. I'm still standing after all of this, which is true. But I realized that I didn't want to put myself in that situation again.
So what did I need to do to adjust however I was living in order to make sure that never happened again? So I went through that exercise and the only regret that I have about that time period. So that would have been, you know, mid 2010 until I'd say 2013 is when I did a lot of the work that I did to improve my life and all that. is I wish I would have worked with a therapist back then because I think it would have helped me streamline some things a bit. And I always I recommend to everybody.
Everyone needs a therapist. Yeah, everyone. Because there's something good. It's so interesting, isn't it? Because everybody paid the price. But that heavy load that you carried for a company. You know, you said I worked. really early to really late and you paid the price, your body paid the price, your family paid the price, your house and and I know that people listening will be, might be working with people or actually listeners, this might be you.
Will you go, well, I just need to do this today. You know, if I just do extra or if I just do extra hours this week, or if I just do extra hours this month, then something will change. And the thing that changed was your body. Yep, it is. And. There's busy seasons for a lot of industries, you know, if you're an accountant, you know, there's tax filing season and you work longer hours, I get it.
Depending on the type of work you do, you know, educator, you know, in schools, okay, you know, the school year is what it is. So, you know, there's going to be busier periods and all of that. But what we're finding is every period is busy for people right now. There's just a lot of people that are working a lot longer. They're working because they can work anywhere. You know, the whole pandemic situation, working remotely and being able to work from anywhere, great option for some people.
Some of it makes sense for them to work remotely all the time. But the problem is with the technology, whether they're our smartphones or laptops or tablets, they allow us to work anywhere at any time. And the problem is we... Do that. We work anywhere and we work all the time. We don't shut down. We don't stop. There's no, okay, yes, you can put do not disturb on Slack or other messaging, things like that, but the apps there, you're still gonna take a peek.
You're gonna check email for a minute and all that. And you're like, just before you go out to dinner and you see an email and you misinterpret it, or maybe it's a rude customer, maybe your boss is being terse with you via email on something. puts you in a mad situation. You're upset, you're grumpy, whatever, you're hurt. And then you get to go out to dinner with loved ones or friends or something like that. And what are you thinking about? You're thinking about that email. You're not present.
You're dwelling on that and you're writing Monday and here it is Friday at 7 p We get Saturday and Sunday to stew too. Well, I tell people don't check your email after hours or on weekends unless... That's when you are working. If they're requiring you to do that, then they should be paying you for that. And salary doesn't count. It's like, no, that's above and beyond. It's like negotiate with your employer. When am I available? When I'm not.
If they say you're available all the time, might want to update that CV. And because there's organizations that aren't doing that. I know some people say, no, there isn't. Well, there they are. I talked to a lot of companies that You know, are that way. It's like, no, they tell people quit checking your messages after hours, quit sending emails after hours, and you'll get in trouble for sent doing work after hours.
And I think that needs to be the norm instead of the exception, but it's employers have taken advantage of it and employees have not stood the ground saying, no, I'm not working on a Saturday night at 11 o 'clock because you're not going to get the best of me anyway. And the body keeps the score as Vessel van der Kolk says, yeah. Yeah, it certainly does. And every little input does something. Your brain recognizes, what do I need to do with this?
If it's a stressful thought or belief or you're anticipating something, it takes you away from recovering and resting, which is what we're supposed to do. And we don't. And... We sacrifice our sleep, which unfortunately has such a huge impact on every other aspect of our life, from digestive system to cognitive abilities to relationships, you name it. If you're not getting good sleep, that's going to be a problem for you throughout every aspect of your life.
So when you're working too many hours and not getting good restful sleep, you're not making good food choices because you don't have time quote unquote to. eat something proper, you're just inhaling something from the vending machine or from a quick restaurant down the street and eating quote unquote food. You're not giving yourself the right fuel. So your body's fighting to break down whatever you just ate. And it's just it's a vicious cycle, quite frankly.
So Michael, you recognize that therapy earlier would have been useful. What would somebody need to have said to you for you to have heard them? You know, it's funny, my brother and I have had this conversation on a couple occasions where everybody on the planet knew that I was burning out, except me. And I asked him, well, why didn't you say anything? And he said, we tried. He wouldn't hear me. He wouldn't hear us.
And that's when you are so overwhelmed with... your thoughts and fears and I'm just going to work extra this week, it'll be better next week, that mindset, it's going to be better. And it doesn't get better. You know, the workload wasn't going to change unless I, you know, made a change. And after I left that organization, I know they went through a few people after me, and not talking with people, but just knowing dynamics of work and culture and the players involved.
My hunch is, you know, they were continuing on the work behaviors and workloads that I was under and expecting that person to do that. And that person went, screw you, I'm not going to do this. And they left or they didn't, they didn't meet the expectations. Don't know. Never will. Cause I won't ask. And I quite frankly don't care.
it doesn't matter to me now, but I anticipate that there was a lot of, of that, that, you know, just w you know, we're going to, we did this person will just do this one, not understanding, you know, their skin in the game. I'm not blaming anybody. I blame me for allowing it to happen. I don't blame the banks for taking my equipment, my car, my house, or the organization for letting me go or the restaurants that gave me the food that I ate. I'm not blaming any of those. I ordered them.
I made those choices. It's all about being accountable to yourself. Because in that way, you can easily go on the victim card and blame everybody. And it reminds me of the late Jim Rohn and his mentor. When he was younger, he was complaining about where he was in life. And like, I don't have this, I don't have that. And he's like, well, whose fault is it? Well, there's a lot of people to blame.
So the mentor asked Jim to come up with a list of all the people and things that he was blaming on where he was in life. So he did. So he gave the list out and the mentor said, this is a great list, but there's one problem. You're not on it. And that was an eye -awakening moment for Jim. Say, I'm the one in control of your life. And a lot of people don't think that they are, but they are. It's like, well, I can't leave this job. Why? Because I need the money. For what?
For the house payment that I have to live in this house in this neighborhood with. the white picket fence and all these other things that I quote unquote have to have. okay. Well, yeah, I guess you do need to have money in order to do that. But did the bank say here you have to buy this house or here you have to have this car that costs $1 ,000 a month on a car payment or you have to have these things. I don't think these banks are busting down doors going you have to buy this house.
It's you made those choices. It's your signature out there. So your choices have consequences. So choose wisely. And as you're speaking, the thing that's coming to my mind, Michael, is, is that there was a tipping point after which you were not able to listen. Yeah. Yeah. The body was trying to tell me too. And I wasn't listening to my body either until, until the heart said, okay, well, let's see if this gets his attention. And it did. And we're seeing it now.
We're seeing, especially in talking with my cardiologist, which I still have. I go for exams every year or two just to make sure everything's functioning the way it should be. So far, so good. Because it's been, what, 15 years this year since that. So time flies. But. Yeah, I still go and you know, and he told me says, you know, you don't have to come every, you know, we could spread it out if you want. I said, you know what, I'm a big fan of prevention.
I'd much rather catch something in year two than wait till year five and go, wow, we've been dealing this for, you know, this and what kind of damage do we cause? So I'd much rather go and waste some of his time and make sure that the heart is still behaving.
But, but in conversation with him, there's, A lot of people that are having cardiac events that are younger than 40 now, and that's concerned because of stress and financial overload and all the other things that a lot of us get signed up in. And I know things cost a lot. I know in certain parts of the world, it's very expensive to rent a loft or an apartment or a condo or home, whatever. I get it. I know I can see it. I see what the numbers are.
It's not the first time in history this has happened Sometimes you got to be creative. Sometimes you got to live with people. There's you know, everybody that loved the TV show friends They were all living together.
They were Because they were in New York and an apartment in Manhattan is not cheap so they couldn't do it on their own so they grew up together and that's and they you know in a fiction based thing, you know had you know a lot of fun with each other and People do that all the time So it's this, I have to, or I should, or all those things that people limit themselves to instead of, okay, what's the reality? What are the numbers? Take the emotions out of it for a moment. What are the numbers?
And the numbers say this, okay, well, what can you do with that? That means you have to do this or this, or yes, you can rent an apartment on your own in... the middle of whatever area. It's as far away from the things you like. Yeah, you can afford that, but you're like, but then I don't have access to the things that I love and enjoy. You have to figure it out for yourself and what that means and the cost and all that other stuff. But unfortunately, a lot of people aren't doing that.
And they just say, I have to this, I should have this, my parents had this at this. So I should have this. And they're just causing more and more stress on themselves. And we're starting to see.
you know, people in their mid to late 30s having heart attacks, they're surviving, thankfully, but my concern is unless they do the work and take much better care of themselves, both from physical standpoint, but a mental standpoint as well, they're going to continue to stress that organ out and next to the brain, the heart and the brain, you know, the rest of it is kind of bonus. But if you don't take care of that, then.
You're 37 all of a sudden you're looking at three four five decades on heart medication Hmm, that could have some long time, you know long -term effects So Michael your body spoke to you and the bank spoke to you You spoke to yourself What's your dream now for the impact that you will have on the world For me is that the Burnout is a choice and sometimes I get people looking at me going I didn't choose to burn out But I want people to recognize that your choices your beliefs your habits
your thoughts Society can drive you to make choices that aren't in your best interest short term or long term So you have to choose wisely what's best for you? understanding it yes may not be the ideal situation right now, but I get to the point where you can adjust and live with what you have and live within your means.
And if you can live below your means, which is not easy, but doable if you're really, really, really good and make wise decisions on how you spend your money, where you live, all that kind of good stuff. Be creative on that. There's ways to do it. There's a billion TikTok videos on how to do it. And it just, for me, my dream is, I don't want people to burn out. I saw what it did to me. I just don't want to do it. I don't want organizations to burn their people out.
I'm not trying to point the finger at companies saying you're the reason because I go into organizations and there could be somebody that's completely burned out and they have a colleague that does the same exact job, same salary, same demographics, same everything. I mean, basically the positions are clones of each other.
two different people, one's struggling, burning out, having a horrible time, the other one's thriving, they're well harmonized in life and work and enjoying themselves really productive. You're like, okay, what's going on here? What's the differences? Where is it? A lot of it is mindset, a lot of it's external factors, a lot of it is how people deal with adversity and stress.
And when you can get people that... be a little bit more self -aware of what they're doing and make better choices, then they can navigate stressful situations easier and that stress doesn't become prolonged. That's what burnout is, is prolonged stress. So if you can keep stress managed, because you're not going to eliminate stress, sorry, we're trying to figure that out. We can't really do it. It's actually stress is good for our bodies because it's... It's pressure testing.
That's how muscles grow. That's how your mind grows. That's how you grow. That's how you challenge. But that's how you learn how to navigate difficult situations. If you have stressful situations, you figure out ways to do it. But when it's just constantly coming at you, you're numb. You're basically just taking the hits and you can't do anything about it. So I want burnout to go away. Am I going to see it in my lifetime? I hope so. My hope is that people will. do better things for themselves.
Organizations will continue to improve communication and figure out ways to help their employees the best that they can. But it's on the employee to take action too. Quit using your employer's wellness program as a band -aid and not doing anything yourself. You have to do it. I worked in primary care for over a decade, ironically.
and What I saw time and time again with people is they come to the doctor Using a monopoly phrase they come in with their get out of jail free card in wanting the doctor to do some magic spell to make them feel better After they haven't been taking care of themselves. They haven't been exercising eating well doing anything and then their bodies are a complete mess and they go fix me doc I was like you broke yourself. Why is it? You're the doc's job to fix you.
Yeah, we can prescribe a bunch of medications and hope that that can get you back normal, but everybody wants this get rich quick or get a free card or feel healthy without any effort. It's not how the body works. You got to put effort into it and take care of yourself. If you do that, you reduce the strain on the healthcare system. You feel better. You're more productive. You enjoy life. You're less stressed. And you're that's a win -win, but unfortunately we don't.
It's so interesting what you're saying, because it reminds me of a podcast I did recently with Kevin Hunt, who's a physiotherapist. And he was talking about people burning out through over committing to their leisure as much as they are over committing to their work. So, so he was talking about people under 40 who have a high. responsibility role and have also decided to run 10 marathons in a year. And so in their in their leisure time, they are they are saying, well, I'm relaxing by running.
But actually, what they're doing is they're just stressing out in a different space. Yeah, I see it a lot. And one of the things that I talked to people about this a lot is I think people have forgotten the fine art of being bored. Staring at a wall. Not doing in school. Yeah, not doing anything. Well, you know, organization I'm helping out, you know, it's a STEM organization.
And I listen to the parents coming in and they're like, OK, we need to reschedule John's Wednesday night class because they've got a fencing competition. OK, how about Thursday? No, they're doing piano. We can do a Friday at five. No. They're taking their tutors in doing this and then Saturday and Sunday, we've got them in ski practice. they're trying out for the hockey and the football team. So they've got their kid doing something about 10 days a week.
Spoiler alert, the Beatles totalist, there's eight. They're just they're overwhelming their kids and not letting their kids just be and not even letting their kids Think or dream they just have them doing and doing and doing because they're trying to prove something either to themselves or their neighbors. Well, my son goes to this or my daughter. I don't give a rats what your kid does. And neither does anybody else. I hate to be blunt here. We don't quit trying to use your child.
Sorry for the soap box here. What trying to use your child as this podium thing. Yes, you want the best for your kid. but give them some air to breathe to figure out what's best for them. Because otherwise you're overwhelming these kids and then you're like, well they didn't do well in that. Well it's because they were falling asleep before the bell went off to start the competition because you've got them doing these 10 ,000 things. And a lot of that, what that is, is being a CBT therapist.
It's the parents trying to overcompensate something in their own personal lives. And by keeping their kid busy, it's helping them ignore and not address the things that are going on in their life. And that's a Pandora's box of fun. But it's like, my kids gotta do this. Why? Pick two or three, let them be home two or three nights a week so they can have time to do their homework or play. Michael shows through so clearly.
So if you were to give people three tips to really address avoiding burnout, what would they be? Tip number one, make sure you get the best amount of sleep that you possibly can. And that means instead of, I know in the US, Super Bowl is coming up in a couple of weeks at the time of this recording. and that's usually when people go out and they buy these brand new monolith size televisions for their Super Bowl parties.
Instead of dropping all that money on a big TV to replace your already big TV that you have, go buy the best, most comfortable mattress that you can afford that's comfortable for you. Pillows, bedding sheets, all that. When we go stay at a really nice hotel or go travel or something like that and we stay at a resort, We lay down in the bed like, this feels amazing. Did you know you could have that same type of material at home? You can, and you should.
But people will spend thousands of dollars on a television, but get upset if they're spending more than $20 on a pillow. Invest more in the bedding, you'll sleep better. I love that. Why that's so important is because if we get good deep restful sleep then our body allows us to repair the damage we do to ourselves with all the stress we throw at ourselves. So that's tip number one, invest in the best bedding you can afford. Number two, be careful what you eat.
And I'm not going to tell you to quit eating fast food or all that kind of stuff. But this is a suggestion, not a recommendation. I'm not a clinician. But. I got a food intolerance test done a few years ago to see what type of foods that I have intolerance to or outright allergy to. And they tested me on over 250 types of foods. So I got this beautiful report color coded and showed me these are the foods that are really good for me. My body naturally digest without any issues.
There's some foods that were iffy, you know, you gotta watch it. And then there was a page of red, which says, don't eat this stuff because you either have a pretty significant intolerance to it or you're downright allergic to it. And there were foods that were on that red sheet that I had no idea that I had an intolerance to. So I started eliminating those things from my diet. So my digestive system started working better.
I wasn't having acid reflux issues or heartburn issues anywhere near like I used to like, huh. So eat well. Eat well. Eat the foods that are right for you. So get a food intolerance test done so you know what foods are on that quote unquote green page. You know, have more of those in your body because that's fuel for your body. You're going to feel better because your body doesn't have to think what is this food?
Because basically if you eat something you have an intolerance to your your brain and your body is going, what is this toxin? Because it's really what it is and it has to. work use a lot of extra energy to flush it through and if it's something your body naturally digests it's just gonna flow naturally.
So that's tip number two and tip number three you know really establish boundaries around when you work and really don't and and really have a hard cut off on that if that means putting your smartphone in a different room when you're watching television or if you're reading a book you know put the phone away you know don't keep it in your bedroom. Limit your screen time and figure out what those times are for you. Because I can say don't check your phone after seven o 'clock.
Well, you may have discovered during the pandemic that your optimum working hours where you're most productive is 7 a to 10 or 7 p to 10 p And if your employer allows you to work those hours and that's when you're most productive and you crank in it and you're in a flow in a state, then by all means work that time. But figure out when your best optimum self is to do work and productive and when you want some leisure, but don't sign up for 10 marathons, okay?
Maybe one quarter marathon or a half marathon. Now, if you run marathons, then okay, do a couple, that's fine. But when you're doing all those things, you're saying yes to that, but what are you saying no to? In many cases, you're saying no to yourself. And that can come back and haunt you. And there's also something, isn't there, about having a truth teller who you commit to listen to? Well, Michael Levitt, what a delight to have you at the coaching in today.
How do people get in touch with you? The best way to find me is go to breakfastleadership .com and at the top there's links to all kinds of resources, my blog, my podcast, links to my books and all that kind of stuff. And for your audience, if they want a free PDF copy of my Burnout Proof book, just go
to breakfastleadership .com slash burnout book, all one word for that second part, burnout book, and just enter in your name and email, and we'll send you a copy of the book as long with some of the resources that are referenced in the book that can kind of help you redesign things that you need to redesign in order to prevent burnout in your life. Thank you. And I'll put all that in the show notes. So thank you, Michael Levitt for coming to the coaching in what a pleasure.
Thank you. I'm Claire Pedrick and I've been talking to Michael Levitt. Bye bye. If you've enjoyed what you've heard today, we'd love you to share the podcast with a friend or leave a comment on social media. And if you'd like to become a regular at The Coaching In, you can subscribe on Podbean and all major podcast channels. We look forward to welcoming you next time. You've been listening to The Coaching In, 3D Coaching's virtual pub. For more information, check out 3dcoaching .com.