Mental Exhaustion, Perfectionism, and the Path to Recovery in Your Law Firm

Law Firm Growth Podcast Episode 63: Breaking the Burnout Cycle with Dr. Sharon Grossman

Narrator: [00:00:00] Welcome to The Law Firm Growth podcast, where we share the latest tips, tactics, and strategies for scaling your practice from the top experts in the world of growing law firms. Are you ready to take your practice to the next level? Let's get started.

Jan Roos: Hey everybody. Welcome back to The Law Firm Growth podcast. I'm your host as always, Jan Roos, and I am here today with a very timely guest in Dr. Sharon Grossman, who is an expert on burnout. So it's been certainly an interesting year to say the least, even if we're counting since the beginning of the new year and certainly the bigger picture of the 365 days leading up to this point have also been interesting.

Jan Roos: So we're really happy to have you on the show, Sharon. So I wanted to ask you first, just to start out, I saw an interesting stat earlier this morning. This is actually brought up to me by my partner, but basically. I've heard there's an increase of burnout that like, in terms of the searches that are happening on Google, like big time.

Jan Roos: So how's everything looking from [00:01:00] your perspective as far as the kind of demand that you've been getting the last little bit?

Sharon Grossman: For sure, we've seen a huge spike, not just in burnout, but also in anxiety. Especially since the beginning of COVID, when there was so much uncertainty about what's happening with this pandemic, how long it's going to last, what it's going to do to people's businesses.

Sharon Grossman: And we had the first surge and the second surge, and then we had elections. So there's just so much stuff happening in 2020 that is brought up. A lot of anxiety for people. And one of the things I like to share is that burnout is really about chronic stress that has accumulated over time.

Sharon Grossman: And so it makes sense that when we're super stressed out about all these things that are happening and if we're not managing ourselves that it's going to manifest as burnout.

Jan Roos: Yeah, so I can imagine that's something that's going to be happening to an attorney in the best of times, but it seems like things have been compounding in the last little bit.

Jan Roos: And yeah, just as far as building this up from the first [00:02:00] principles, I know like we've mentioned this term burnout, which I'm like aware of, but how do you determine when does stress become burnout? What's the definition and what are the other key terms to be aware of as we start this discussion?

Sharon Grossman: That's a really good question. Like we said, burnout is the accumulation of stress. Chronic stress over time, but the way that you know that you are not just regular stressed, if you will, but actually feeling burned out is that it starts to manifest and other symptoms. So the primary symptom is exhaustion.

Sharon Grossman: And when we say that it is more of a mental exhaustion than anything else. So if you feel like it's hard for you to focus, you are just having a hard time keeping it together. That could be. Like a mental exhaustion. We also see for some people that they become really cynical at their job They have this attitude that you know, oh forget it like it's never gonna work anyway Why even bother?

Sharon Grossman: And some of the same talk that we sometimes hear of people who are depressed so sometimes it gets [00:03:00] confused with depression for that reason And then we also see how it starts to affect people's Ability to get their work done. And part of the reason why is because we lose our belief in our ability. So our self efficacy, if you will, is being affected because our mindset is so negative at that point that we're not focusing as well, so we can't produce in the same way that we used to.

Sharon Grossman: And everything just becomes this like landslide. So those are the three main. Symptoms, I would say, but there's an actual progression and people have different models about the different stages and things. There's, you can definitely look that up and see how, manifests through these models, but I think it also is a little bit different for everybody.

Sharon Grossman: And I've even heard that it manifests sometimes differently for men and for women. So it's just interesting. And I think the most important thing to pay attention to is how you're feeling and what are some of the [00:04:00] symptoms that are happening and sometimes, we're very familiar with the experience of feeling stressed out, but we don't always know what to look out for.

Sharon Grossman: That helps us to determine that it's beyond just regular stress, that I'm actually going through this process of Burnout. And so it's important to educate yourself on that continuum

Jan Roos: in the vein of being able to see this in yourself. So everyone can tell whether they've had stress or not, like in your experience.

Jan Roos: Is burnout something that most people have gone through at one point in their lives, or is it something that's, it's rare in the population, before 2020, obviously,

Sharon Grossman: I would say it's probably somewhere in the middle where it's not everybody. And it's not something that's very rare, but it's some, it's probably about half of the population at any one point.

Sharon Grossman: Feels burned out. And this is pre COVID number. And I would say with a couple of caveats, one is in certain industries, you see it more so than others. So certainly with lawyers, we see high degrees of [00:05:00] burnout. And I also. Really believe that it has to do with the individual very much because so much of burnout is about your mindset and the way that you're thinking.

Sharon Grossman: If you think about what stress is about perception. So we often think, Oh, somebody is doing something that's stressing me out or my job is stressing me out or my boss is stressing me out. And these are all external factors and certainly. They can be perceived as stressful, and then we feel stressed out, but it's not the actual events around us that are causing us to feel the way that we do.

Sharon Grossman: And that's a really important distinction, whether it is true for stress or whether it's true for burnout, because oftentimes we say, Oh, I'm just burned out because of my job, and the truth is, how do you think about your job that is causing you. to burn out. And the clearer you get on that, the sooner you'll be able to actually intervene and to prevent that feeling within you.

Sharon Grossman: So it's important to [00:06:00] pay attention to that. And the reason I said personalities is because there are some people who are more negative in their mindset. Likely to burn out. There are people who engage with their work in a certain way that is more likely to create burnout. So we have people who are perfectionists who drive themselves really hard, who feel like they have something to prove.

Sharon Grossman: And so when you're super driven and you're putting everything into your work and it feels there's no balance in your life where you've lost your sense of purpose. There's different things that can come into the mix. And when that happens, that's like the perfect storm for burnout.

Jan Roos: So it's like almost like a, it's definitely a self reinforcing cycle.

Jan Roos: And I can definitely imagine, and that's the thing too. Like a lot of people go into law school because they were the kid who always got good grades and then they do well in law school. And then they pride themselves in being really doing good work at the first firm they work at. And then, especially if your sense of.

Jan Roos: Self worth is tied to your work product. [00:07:00] And all of a sudden your work product isn't necessarily at the best quality because you're burned out. Like I can absolutely see how that can just snowball and become like a really horrible outcome. So you mentioned perfectionism as one of these like root causes, but.

Jan Roos: That's actually really, this is actually a question I had written down for later in the podcast, but as far as the potential for people to be more or less susceptible to this, I was thinking of things from like a physical perspective there's those old stories that like Margaret Thatcher only needed to sleep four hours a night or something like that.

Jan Roos: But as far as the different potential, would you say it's more mindset than a physical capability for the most part?

Sharon Grossman: We have two things. We have our mindset, which when we are very negative, then it is going to affect everything right? And because there's that mind body connection, you're going to feel perhaps more physically exhausted when you're mentally exhausted and when you're thinking in a negative way.

Sharon Grossman: But the other piece to consider is the physiological, as you're referring to, which is your energy level. [00:08:00] So if you think about it, if you want to narrow it down, we're known as an energy game. And so how you manage your energy is going to be basically Something that's going to be able to determine how you feel the people who are so focused on work and aren't taking the time to eat well, to exercise, to get enough sleep.

Sharon Grossman: People are sacrificing their sleep and then get more work done. They're never disconnected from media. Like all of this stuff can have, can really wreak havoc, not just on your mind and, on your mental health, but. on your physical health. And so we know that when you aren't eating healthy foods, you're more likely to feel fatigued.

Sharon Grossman: And when your body's in that slump, you're less likely to want to go exercise because you haven't exercised and you're feeling crappy. Then You know, it's hard to, this quality of your sleep is affected, so everything affects everything. And so you can't really separate the two. I think you need to find that like happy place where [00:09:00] you're getting your work done and you feel inspired and you feel accomplished and you feel fulfilled by your work, but at the same time, spending some time on yourself on the things that are meaningful outside of work, whether it's on your health, whether it's on your relationships, anything that.

Sharon Grossman: Is going to complete the picture.

Jan Roos: Yeah. And I guess to your point, everything kind of being connected to, there is a mindset element to that. Cause you can think about the people who idolize people like Gary V and they're like, oh, wow, I love it. Putting a hundred hour weeks or like people who got their start in law at a litigation group where they were competing against this faceless other outwork them.

Jan Roos: It's if your mentality is the hardy work, the better you're going to get. You might be more likely to light, leave these things by the wayside. And that kind of seems like that actually leads me back into one of the things you mentioned earlier, which was like these stages of burnout.

Jan Roos: So if somebody feels like, and I know you mentioned there are a couple of models, but if you want to just pick one that you've been liking the most, but just as far as like somebody who might be [00:10:00] suspecting that they are on the path or in the grips of burnout, what are the major stages and how would somebody identify whether they're in one stage or another?

Sharon Grossman: It's an interesting question because there are, as I said, different models out there. And so it's really going to depend on which one, I don't know that they've been scientifically proven, but one that has is known is by Freudenberger North. And he talks about there's 12 parts to this cycle.

Sharon Grossman: So it starts out with the compulsion to prove yourself as we just talked about. Which leads you to stage two of working harder. Stage three is you start to neglect your own needs. And I think this is like where I dive in with people. It's what was happening? If you're feeling fried, if you're feeling depleted, you're There's probably some unmet needs and we need to get really clear about that.

Sharon Grossman: So this is where this is an invitation for people to increase their self awareness and get in touch with themselves. Stage four is when you neglect, [00:11:00] we said have a displacement of conflicts and needs, and then we go into revision of values. So what's so interesting is at first people are really driven.

Sharon Grossman: And they start to see that they get into this conflict between what I need and what the job needs of me or what other people need of me. And this is a psychological phenomenon where they start to change their story.

Jan Roos: Interesting.

Sharon Grossman: With it, their reality. They're like I really, I'm not sure that I actually value like time for myself.

Sharon Grossman: It's probably not as important because. Yeah. And then we go into stage six, which is denial of problems, noticing that, you're gaining weight. You've had a little too much to drink for the last month that you're isolated. You're not going out with your friends as much. That your sleep is negatively [00:12:00] affected, that your mood is down, whatever the case may be.

Sharon Grossman: And then you're like, Oh, it's probably nothing. You're not really paying attention to what's contributing to it. And you're not in that problem solving mode at this point. You're just That's probably nothing.

none: Yeah.

Sharon Grossman: And then we get into withdrawal, which is stage seven. And then we, from there we go to stage eight, which is obvious behavioral changes.

Sharon Grossman: So we actually start to see people turn their behaviors around and that could mean a whole number of different things, but it could be that. From the neglect point of view that you're just not doing the things that you if you're a runner and you ran all the time, now you're not running, but it can also be in your work.

Sharon Grossman: If you've always come into the office and chit chatted with all of your colleagues. Now, maybe you just go and sit in your desk and. Put your head down, it can really manifest differently. And from there we go into deep personalization, which is actually interesting [00:13:00] that he talks about this, because this is something that we talk about that happens when you're really out of your mind

none: when,

Sharon Grossman: You're feeling like, you're not really in your body, like things are happening, but you're just like dissociating a little bit.

Sharon Grossman: And then stage China's inner emptiness. So you're feeling like you've given your job your all, there's nothing left to give. There's just like this total, this hole within you, if you will. And then we get into depression. And then finally, what he calls the burnout syndrome. And so that's a 12 step process that is, is, shared in the literature.

Sharon Grossman: I don't know that everybody goes through all the stages. I don't know that it necessarily goes in that order. I would just say the simple kind of model to think about is. What's happening now for you that feels different from before. And you might associate it with some terms that you're already familiar with, like anxiety and depression, because you already know what that is, or stress and depression.

Sharon Grossman: We [00:14:00] all use that very colloquially, but there are some subtle differences. And so if you're paying attention. To that, it can help to inform you about what's actually happening.

Jan Roos: And as you went through that, I was like, starting to think around like step like three or four, I'm like, this is already not a path that I certainly would want to be on.

Jan Roos: I think most of the people trying to live happy lives want to be on either. But yeah, it's a lot of different signs. It's almost might be more of a. Spectrum, would you say? And if you're not, if you don't necessarily have to go through the slide, it's yeah, I'm thinking, actually, this is another thing that went into my head while you're going out of that is like the progression of Edward Norton's character and fight club where he shows up, he's smoking cigarettes at his desk and it doesn't necessarily have to be that literally extreme for people, but yeah, I think probably in retrospect, a lot of these things will make sense.

Jan Roos: But what I also find really interesting about that is the fact that people are changing their narrative. To justify what's happening. And just to take a step back for anyone who's listening, this is Dr. Sharon, you have a degree in psychology. So this isn't woo kind of stuff.

Jan Roos: Like we [00:15:00] were talking about real cycle psychology stuff, but basically like people can change the narrative. And at that point, it's tough because you don't even know that you're in it at that point.

Sharon Grossman: Yeah, it's actually an interesting thing that we do, and it's not just around burnout, but in general, and I think everybody can relate to this when it comes to their limiting beliefs or to self sabotage, right?

Sharon Grossman: We see this all the time. There's a phenomenon called cognitive dissonance, where if you believe something that is different from your external results in the world, then what You know, our brain is what am I supposed to believe? There's like this truth and this truth. There's this inner truth and this outer truth.

Sharon Grossman: And so what's interesting is that sometimes we will change our story to meet what's going on outside. And sometimes we sabotage the results outside to meet our inner truth, right? This is what we call self sabotage. So if just to give an example. I was talking to somebody about their relationship and they were talking about how they believe that men [00:16:00] are cheaters.

Sharon Grossman: And she couldn't be in a successful relationship as a result of that. And, it was interesting. It came back to the fact that her parents had gotten divorced. Her dad cheated on the mom. And, it was like. Tell me about your relationships and did your boyfriend cheat on you?

Sharon Grossman: And she's no, he was the exception. And I'm like look what you're doing there. So this is what our mind does is when we find evidence that is contrary to our belief, we start to say, Oh, that doesn't really count. That's the exception to the rule. We start making excuses for why it's not really relevant information.

Sharon Grossman: And then what she would do is she would cause. Some drama and the relationship so that it would end and then she could say, I can't do relationships or

Jan Roos: yeah, let's do them anyway.

Sharon Grossman: And that's sabotage, right? Because she didn't believe that it could work because all men are going to cheat on her.

Sharon Grossman: And and so this is what our brain does. It like creates these stories and then we either change our reality or [00:17:00] we change, ultimately what you want to do is think about what you want. And then. Have a belief that aligns with that. And it's important work to do to really remove those obstacles, those limiting beliefs so that you can be successful.

Jan Roos: Yeah. And that's actually, that's really interesting. And we actually had a recent podcast that we just recorded on. This is an old Thing. I think I heard this from this is an old NLP thing, but it was like, basically the prover proves what the thinker thinks. So you're going to figure out a way to figure it like, make whatever reality that you're insistent on finding is something you're going to find.

Jan Roos: But it's really refreshing to hear that from a trained psychologist, because, for anyone who's actually the topic of that podcast was, the bridge between psychology and what people consider more of this whatever law of abundance. I guess more air quotes, but there is a real psychological basis to a lot of these things that sometimes people will dismiss out of hand.

Jan Roos: But I also want to say if somebody knows that if they accept the fact that there's not, what they're looking at isn't necessarily an objective view of reality. And they are aware that they can be [00:18:00] changing the narrative for themselves. I guess it's almost like a vaccination against burnout because if they understand, Oh my God, is this something that I really believe?

Jan Roos: Or is this something that I've told myself to believe? And I know you mentioned perfectionism as being another thing that could lead to burnout, but what are, like the mindsets That you think are the best defense against being in a situation where you might be more primed to enter this stress and burnout kind of situation.

Sharon Grossman: I think regardless of what's happening on the outside, your job, if you want to prevent burnout, is to manage your thinking. And very few of us are actually very mindful beings. We're reactive. And so things happen and then we get stressed out or things happen and we get upset, we get frustrated, we get sad, like all these emotions happen.

Sharon Grossman: And then we say, Oh, it's because you said this thing or you did this thing or that happened, but really, if you do the work of going inside and figuring out. What actually was that [00:19:00] intermediary step, which is what did, what story did my brain just make up about this thing? Then you can understand why you feel the way that you do.

Sharon Grossman: So for example, if you're a lawyer and you're in your law firm and you're working 80 hour weeks, And you're feeling exhausted. It makes sense, right? But if it's, that you have this now cynical attitude about how, your clients are always going to be these like really

Jan Roos: difficult or

Sharon Grossman: just ungrateful.

Sharon Grossman: Yeah. Like the legal profession is always going to be X, and you've got some labels, some story around that sort of thinking is going to make you feel a negative. Way because you have that negative association. So you really want to ask yourself, what is it that I think about this situation that's happening?

Sharon Grossman: So we've got COVID now. And, at first people were all excited. I get to work from home and then [00:20:00] people are like, Oh, I have to work from home, and that's an example of, you've got a situation and. The way that you look at it is going to affect how you feel. And we, and the situation is the same, you have to work from home.

Sharon Grossman: So it's you can be excited about it or you can be frustrated and upset about it, it's all in how you think about it. So much of it is going to have to come down to managing your thinking, managing your brain in order to change your experience. And so I often tell people, if you don't have to quit your job and find something else, and you don't have to change your industry.

Sharon Grossman: You just have to change how you are within your job or within your industry. And I was taking the, two and a half years to write a book about all this stuff. And in that process, I went and I interviewed a number of lawyers and I found it actually fascinating, the differences that exist out there.

Sharon Grossman: So I started out by looking at lawyers that work in these very prestigious [00:21:00] firms. You better like global. They've got, gazillions of dollars coming in.

Jan Roos: Big law. Yeah. The white

Sharon Grossman: huge law, right? And who do they attract people who are super high achievers, people who basically are married to their job and there's nothing else.

Sharon Grossman: There's no room for anything else. And I have to say that it was. A little bit sad to see what's happening in these people's lives, because one guy in particular that stands out, I spoke to this guy was making in the millions every year, which you're like, wow, this guy's really successful and good for him.

Sharon Grossman: And that's great. But it came with such an enormous cost because he had no personal life. Like his wife was leaving him. And even when they were still married and he had, the family and they would go on vacations. He knew without, shadow of a doubt that some, at some point somewhere, someone was going [00:22:00] to call him back to work.

Sharon Grossman: And so he would compensate for that by bringing additional members. On the trip. So the kids can bring a friend and the wife can bring a cousin and everybody had a backup plan because then as soon as he would leave, they would all be okay. And that was his way of not like feeling guilty about having to leave.

Sharon Grossman: Like I said, it's such a cost and he was working nights and weekends and just like around the clock and he couldn't see it. He couldn't see that. His commitment to work and his kind of sacrifice of everything that exists in the world, like that all of his time, energy, all his resources are in this one basket was causing him grief because he was, he was depressed.

Sharon Grossman: He was obviously lonely because his wife was leaving him. And what do you do when that happens? You lean more into work. Yes.

Jan Roos: Yeah. It was all, he was all in on the work. And at this point going back to the model, he'd probably written himself a narrative for how that [00:23:00] was going to work out for him.

Jan Roos: And he was already ignoring all those things and that, that kind of stuff too.

Sharon Grossman: Yeah. And I asked him, do you think that your marriage would have been saved if you would have worked less. And he's no, I have nothing to do with it. So you could see that

none: this is a

Sharon Grossman: denial, where we think that we can continue to do things in the old way.

Sharon Grossman: And that it's not going to have any sort of effect on our lives. And then when things go bad, we're like, Oh, it wasn't because of that. That's just happened.

Jan Roos: Yeah.

Sharon Grossman: And then in contrast, I was just wanted to share that. Then I spoke to another lawyer who was making far less, but was. So happy because of the way that he structured his lifestyle.

Sharon Grossman: So he was happy to be in law, but not to be under the pressure constantly. And so he just chose his lifestyle to be very different. He was living out in Hawaii with his wife and. He bought second home on the beach and every weekend [00:24:00] him and his wife would go and hang out on the beach and their summer home.

Sharon Grossman: And, it was such a contrast in like how you live your life. And both of them are lawyers, but one is like making so much money and has nobody to spend it on. And the other guy is like. Making enough to thrive and is actually thriving. So I just thought that would be an interesting share.

Jan Roos: Yeah. And that's, and I definitely want to dig into that. And I want to go a little bit tactical before though. So basically I was thinking, so one of the things you mentioned was that a lot of the times when people end up wanting to go to a different industry, if we take the guy who was like, the guy who had the bad If he got married that day, And he went into, I don't know, insurance or something like that because he hadn't decided to look on that.

Jan Roos: He'd probably find himself in the exact same position in five or 10 years, wouldn't he? And that's the thing too. Like a lot of the times and what we found, and this isn't necessarily for burnout specifically, but when people end up writing these stories for themselves in relation to maybe a marketing program that we're helping them with, if they've made up their mind that it's not going to work out for [00:25:00] them.

Jan Roos: And then basically, you can either face this demon with what's in front of you right now, or you can. Tell yourself it's going to be different next time around and find it in six or 12 months from now. But as far as getting out of that and facing these things head on from like a, like tactical perspective, how do you encourage people to actively think about their thinking in that way?

Jan Roos: Do you recommend journaling or should people be in therapy? What, how does somebody consciously go after this and then work on themselves?

Sharon Grossman: I don't think that there is just one right way to do this. And I think really just also depends on. Your preferences, some of which have to do with your personality.

Sharon Grossman: So for example, if you're an extrovert, you're more likely to want to talk about it. And so it's something that you can do if you had a mentor, a coach, a therapist, a colleague, or somebody who is willing to listen. So having social support and expressing yourself outwardly is probably more of a match.

Sharon Grossman: If you're more of [00:26:00] an introvert, You're probably more likely to want to journal about it. You might do some meditation or maybe just talk to one friend, something like that. So I think it depends. One of the things that I tried to do when I created my book was to have it be like this. Resource that people can use as a way to coach themselves.

Sharon Grossman: I actually built in a workbook that people can go through each section, digest the information, answer some questions for themselves, and be able to see how the information that applies to their situation. So when you've got things like that, that allow you to reflect on what's happening and slow down the process and really.

Sharon Grossman: Think about it from a new angle, you start to have some insight, the more insight, the more self awareness you have, the more you can do things differently.

Jan Roos: And then to get like super nitty gritty on this is this something that people should be doing every day, every week, every year? What does this, I know there's no one right answer, [00:27:00] but what do you generally recommend for somebody who's coming to you in like the grips of a bad burnout situation?

Sharon Grossman: I would say there's two things. One is you've got to recover first and foremost. So it's If you had the flu. You would first want to recover from the flu. You want to build up, you want to like rest and do something to take care of your body, right? Maybe drink lots of fluids and take some medication or what have you.

Sharon Grossman: Once you get back to your baseline, then it's about. Building up your immune system. So you don't get sick again. So what do we do? We get the flu shot or we take vitamin C or we do things to prevent it from happening as much as possible. And it's not a guarantee, but you're in a better place than if you weren't doing those things.

Sharon Grossman: And I think the same applies to burnout. So the recommendation is that you have some way to get yourself out of the hole. You have to change. Mostly, I would say you would start with your mindset. You want to change the way that you think about things, which will change how you feel. And then you'll change how you [00:28:00] engage with your work, how you engage with your life.

Sharon Grossman: And then once you get back to baseline, then it's about creating some sort of routine that Hopes you stay in a good place. So that's where self care really comes in. And there's not like a total prescription for that, where you say Oh, you've got to do this every day. You've got to do this for X amount of time.

Sharon Grossman: I think the ideal is. That you do something on a regular basis, whatever that means for you. It could be every day, a little bit of something or every other day, but what you do is going to differ, right? So we know it's important for us to do like the basics, right? Eat healthy exercise, get enough sleep.

Sharon Grossman: Those are like basic things. And then beyond that, if you really want to. Build up burnout prevention, if you will or just in general, just like being a good place in your life, that's where a meditation practice can come in where what you're doing is you are rewiring your brain to be less [00:29:00] reactive.

Sharon Grossman: And so what happens is because, like I said in the beginning that we are very reactive people, right? It's just how we're born, right? We're not born with all this mindfulness. This is something that you have actually, it's a skill that you have to learn. You have to build over time through practice.

Sharon Grossman: And in that same way, Just to backtrack. So that's why we feel all these emotions. And that's why we do all these things to cover up all these uncomfortable feelings. Like we, we drink a lot or we do drugs or we're overeating or we're shopping or we're on Facebook all day long. Like we're doing everything we can not to feel all the discomfort that we feel.

Sharon Grossman: And what I would say is that while all of those emotions serve a purpose, Also, I think that if you took the time, and it doesn't have to be a lot of time, but it can be like 10 minutes a day to meditate. What you do in that process is you're actually changing your brain [00:30:00] so that when something happens, you just don't react as much.

Sharon Grossman: So you don't have to do all of this work to then get back to baseline. You don't have to work as hard to bring yourself back if you. You're just more to begin with. So I think that's really powerful. And I love sharing that message with people because it is not just about every time I'm burned out or stressed out, like, how do I get back to myself, but it's really about how can I empower myself even beyond that?

Sharon Grossman: How can I be stronger, more resilient so that when things happen. It's not that big a deal. I don't feel it as strongly.

Jan Roos: Yeah, it's interesting too. Like I'm thinking especially of these like super type A people. They might think that. Doing having a meditation practice or something like that would be a sign of weakness.

Jan Roos: But in the reality, what's weak is getting absolutely rocked emotionally by every bad thing that happens your way. And you got to think it, it's, it might be considered a little bit new agey, but like ultimately if this makes you more tough as a [00:31:00] person, that's, that's pretty bad ass people should lean into it a little bit more.

Jan Roos: Okay. I want to zoom out a little bit. To people who might be thinking about this from an organizational perspective. So if you have somebody that's maybe like, how can leaders drive to make a team where burnout or like expectations where burnout is less likely to show up for the people that they're working with?

Sharon Grossman: Yeah, that's a really good question. And I don't know that there's one right answer, but what I would say first and foremost is. You want to make sure that the culture is one that embraces the person and doesn't think of workers as a machine, right? Is how, if you are that like super type aid personality, You probably think of yourself as a machine, you treat yourself as such, where you just are constantly pushing, and sometimes we find ourselves when we're those like type a personalities in [00:32:00] industries and in.

Sharon Grossman: organizations where they expect the same. It's a match, right? I'm looking for people who are really going to work hard and they're like, I'm a hard worker. I'll be, I'll fit right in, and it does work to a point where you can like produce, but what we have to understand. Both on a personal level and on an organizational level is that when we take time out to take care of ourselves as human beings, we actually can reach more optimal performance.

Sharon Grossman: And so it's not just Oh, if I take time out to meditate or to exercise or to take some deep breaths, whatever the case may be, then that's time that I could be spending. Spending on work, right? That's how we often think about things. What we know is that when you don't take that time out, you're more likely to burn out.

Sharon Grossman: And that really forces you to slow down. Whereas if you have it built into your day and into your week, then it actually keeps you going. And. Be able, you're able to focus more. You're able [00:33:00] to get into that state of flow with your work and be more creative and all these things really contribute to the quality of your work.

Sharon Grossman: So it's not about being a perfectionist. It's about optimizing your conditions. Optimizing your mind so that you can have better performance.

Jan Roos: Yeah. And that actually brings us full circle to that, that Hawaii guy though. Cause it's at the end of the day, it's I think this whole mentality where if I could only get an extra hour and a half out of myself every day, it's that old phrase, like tripping over dollars to pick up pennies, because it's like, with that extra hour and a half of work, which probably isn't going to be good as the first hour and a half of work you put in the day.

Jan Roos: If you have that six days a week for years on end, then you probably As a leader, aren't getting to the point where you have that big idea that might actually create something that's a lot bigger than your individual contribution for that kind of time. But like to the kind of, and it's interesting too, and like a lot of people, like I listened to Tim Ferriss podcast, he has a lot of high performing people and like without fail, almost everyone has some sort of a meditation practice, the other thing too, I [00:34:00] always hear like Richard Branson always says this.

Jan Roos: It's like the hour, the day that he spends in the gym ends up getting him six hours of productivity, like the other thing too. So I think it's a really short sighted that people can't do that, but from like a cultural perspective, like making space for your employees and not just yourself too, is like probably going to make it less likely.

Jan Roos: And you're going to have the situation where. You got to rotate somebody off the team for two weeks at a time because, they're having panic attacks and aren't showing up to work because, there's been horrible things expected of them.

Sharon Grossman: Organizations have been incorporating more mindfulness practices and they're bringing in trainers and there are.

Sharon Grossman: There is a movement to start to implement this and to take away the stigma of it being something superfluous or something that's woo, because they're actually studying this and they're seeing with the data that this actually increases their bottom line that people are taking less sick days that people are in a better mental state that people are Just [00:35:00] more satisfied with their work.

Sharon Grossman: There's all these measures that you know, when you have data and you can't argue with it, then every organization is like it is saving us all this money and health care, costs, but they're not sick that they're not taking time off from work. All these things. Why wouldn't we bring in somebody to teach this?

Sharon Grossman: Why wouldn't we embrace this in our culture?

Jan Roos: Yeah. I love that too. That's the best thing ever. When you can feel good about doing something and make more money. It's a two for two. Okay. That's awesome Sharon. So I guess parting wisdom. So what's the best way for somebody to get in touch with to enter your world, if it's something that they've been, encountering themselves or it's in their organization, like what's the best place to get in touch with you.

Sharon Grossman: So the best place is to go to drsharongrossman. com on there. There is. A place where you can sign up if you want to have a breakthrough session with me There's also a link there to my book the 7e solution to burnout So if you want to grab a [00:36:00] copy, it's on amazon, but you can also link to it from my website It's all kind of everything's on my website.

Sharon Grossman: I'm also including on the website something that I just came up with recently, which is the burnout meter. So if anybody is curious where they are in that process of burning out, they can take this assessment and then get on the phone with me and I'll give you your score and tell you about what your next steps should look like.

Sharon Grossman: And then I'm also currently working on a webinar. So if you go over there, And it's not ready, then come back soon and check it out, but it will be a free webinar on my website that talks a lot about some of these mindsets that contribute to the problem and what you can do to help yourself get out.

Jan Roos: Okay, awesome.

Jan Roos: So super appreciate all that stuff. Sure. I know I'm probably going to be hopping on to grab the book after this, but I definitely encourage anyone who's in the same boat to to do the same. I think, this of all years, it's absolutely something to pay attention to and, obviously it sucks when you get in a situation where the, the wheels fall off.

Jan Roos: But, whenever people find themselves it's an opportunity [00:37:00] to do it right the next time. So thanks for taking the time, Sharon. And for the rest of you guys, I will see you next Tuesday, 8 AM Eastern on The Law Firm Growth podcast.

Narrator: Thank you for listening to The Law Firm Growth podcast for show notes, free resources, and more head on over to Casefuel.

Narrator: com slash podcast. Looking forward to catching up on the next episode.