EP 116 | Are You Depleted or Just Tired? (And How to Tell the Difference in Your Business)

Doing Business Gently podcast, Episode 116: Are You Depleted or Just Tired? (And How to Tell the Difference in Your Business)

[00:00:00] Welcome to Doing Business Gently. If you’re a woman over 50 who has built a business alongside personal health challenges, caregiving, and the ever-changing world of entrepreneurship, you are in the right place.

[00:00:13] Marta Goertzen: I’m your host, Marta Goertzen, and on this show, we talk about building a simple and sustainable business that fits your current season of life and doing that gently from a place of rest.

[00:00:25] If you listened to the last episode, we kicked off a new series, and this was about are you burned out in your business? Maybe, maybe not. Because a lot of times what we call burnout is often misalignment, and that misalignment shows up as depletion or disconnection or even the good stuff of growth.

[00:00:47] Now, in the next few episodes, we’re gonna dig into these three areas a little bit deeper, and in this episode, we’re looking at depletion. And if you look at the definition for depletion, it is the [00:01:00] consumption of a resource before it can be replenished. So, does that feel familiar? Do you ever feel like you are completely drained emotionally, spiritually, physically, mentally?

[00:01:13] And when we are knowledge-based workers using our brain power and over-leveraging our brains and creative output without proper rest and rejuvenation, or spending long hours at your desk until you drag yourself away only to collapse somewhere else, or any time you push yourself to get something done without taking a break or pacing yourself so that you’re not depleting your energy and constantly running on empty.

[00:01:45] Now, I share all of these because these all have been me at one time or another, and I’m getting better at it, but still, these show up in my life and I get to the point where I’m depleted, and I have to ask myself why [00:02:00] am I depleted? And a lot of times there’s a misalignment of priorities. There’s a misalignment with what I’m trying to accomplish or what I’m trying to control. We’ll be talking about that more.

[00:02:11] And that really isn’t burnout. That is misalignment between what I say are my priorities and goals and what I’m actually doing. When we’re looking at depletion, it’s important that we take a look at what’s the difference between just being tired and what depletion actually is.

[00:02:30] A lot of times I think we’re just saying, “I’m tired,” because we haven’t taken the time to really look at it. It’s a default answer.

[00:02:37] When you’re tired, your body feels it, and your brain can feel like it hurts because you’ve been using it so much, it feels like mush. And you’re kind of ready to numb out and go have a Netflix binge and not make decisions for a while. That is s- a sense of feeling tired. On the other hand, however, if we look at depletion, this is also [00:03:00] mental, emotional, decision fatigue at an extra high level, and often even discouragement.

[00:03:06] And a lot of times you can’t even pinpoint why. It’s there, but no amount of sleep or resting or napping You know it’s not gonna help you, because you’ve been doing that and you’re still feeling, “Ugh, I’m just… I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what’s going on.”

[00:03:24] If you are tired, getting a good night’s rest or taking time to relax often makes a difference right away. You can wake up the next morning and feel, “Oh, okay, things are better.” Or you don’t, you know you’ve been pushing hard for a while, so you need to slow down for a little bit, and so you relax, and after that you’re feeling better. That’s a sign that you are just tired and you’ve been pushing a little too hard, and that’s what you need.

[00:03:49] Depletion, on the other hand, needs a different strategy. We all have hard days, weeks, or seasons. Those are unavoidable, but when it [00:04:00] becomes normal and you constantly feel yourself sighing or numbing out or disconnecting or looking at your computer screen and, not being able to focus, or you constantly go over to social media or for me, it’s YouTube or Pinterest, and just start scrolling. That, for me, is numbing out and disconnecting, and that’s the pattern that I need to start paying attention to.

[00:04:23] Because we are women who want to get things done. We know we can get things done. We’re the nurturer, we’re the caregivers, and so we find it hard to slow down and pay attention, and this is where we can easily default to that umbrella expression, “Oh, I’m just so tired. I just need to go rest,” or, “I need to get to bed early tonight.” But really, that is a surface generalization, and it keeps us from exploring what’s really going on, and it keeps us from asking this, “Am I just tired, or have I been burning the candle at both ends and now I’m starting to pay the price for it?”

[00:04:59] Now, there’s a [00:05:00] few places that depletion tends to come from, and we’ve talked about it, caregiving or chronic health seasons.

[00:05:07] That’s when depletion is coming outside of your business and not necessarily from how you’re running it. And this is a hard one. Again, we are nurturers, we’re the caregivers, and we want to feel capable, and we want people to realize that we can do this, that people can come to us and ask for help.

[00:05:27] We’re used to being the ones to get it done, and we get frustrated when we can’t it’s really hard for us to admit, “You know what? I need to slow down.

[00:05:36] I need to ask for help, and I need to take time to get my energy back.” And that’s when we just go, “I’m just tired, and so I, I can do this.” Or if somebody asks you what’s wrong, and you can’t answer it, and you go, “Oh, I’m fine. Don’t worry about it.” That describes the chronically capable woman entrepreneur over 50 because we’re so used to being able to get it done.

[00:05:58] And when we can’t, and we’re [00:06:00] actually in the stage of depletion and not just being tired, it’s hard to admit, and it’s hard to take the time to step back and address it.

[00:06:09] If you’re going through a season, a difficult season, there are some questions that you can ask yourself. One, are you getting enough sleep? Because that can make a difference all the way around.

[00:06:18] Will it solve everything? Depends where you’re at. How restorative has that sleep been? When you wake up, how are you feeling?

[00:06:27] The quote that we often hear is you can’t serve from an empty cup.

[00:06:30] Well, we do, and we do it repeatedly, but eventually that cup is gonna be completely empty, and either we’re gonna have to take the time to refill that cup, or we are going to f- hear that cup, in this case our body, to complete that analogy, our body’s gonna say, “No, you’re done. You can’t do this anymore, and I am telling you I am spent, and I can’t go any further.”

[00:06:57] So we need to pay attention to that, and so we [00:07:00] need to look at what are some of the ways that you can feel not just rested but restored? And for each of us, that is gonna look completely different. With the women that I work with, we all talk about what are ways that we’re going to rest and put res- restoration and rejuvenation into our schedule, and each of us have a different answer.

[00:07:21] For me, it’s often going outside and taking a walk. My daily walk is one of the things that I need to do to reduce my stress, to manage my stress, to disconnect from technology, and go out and explore with my dog, Mochi. It often can be also just taking a couple times throughout the days to take M- Mochi out for a walk around the house.

[00:07:42] In the summertime, go look at my garden, and just get away from my desk, away from my to-do list, and just breathe, and even just stand there for a few minutes. And what am I actually hearing? Am I hearing the wind, the birds? Th- there’s traffic out in the distance. Am I hearing the wind [00:08:00] rustle through the trees?

[00:08:02] Is it maybe that I need to sit down and journal and get all the thoughts out of my head so that I’m not feeling like I’m trying to keep everything and remember everything? Maybe it’s brewing a cup of tea and just sitting there and enjoying the taste, and the heat, and the steam.

[00:08:18] Maybe you need to have a good meal or have a cup of coffee with a family member or a friend. Maybe you need to call a friend. Maybe you just need to go sit on the front porch and just enjoy a few minutes of sunshine. Now, none of these are going to magically fix everything in that moment, but when you do these on a regular basis because you know that you are beyond just tired, you’re feeling depleted, it’s important that you find ways to rejuvenate and refill your resources.

[00:08:49] And this might take time, because we can get so busy doing business, serving our clients, doing our marketing, whatever it is, the [00:09:00] accounting. We wear so many different hats, and when you do that along with having other things going on in your life- It can be hard to sit back and remember, “What do I like to do?

[00:09:12] Have I worked on my hobby in a while? Have I just sat down and enjoyed time with a friend? Do I need to sit down and just watch a movie? Do I need to get more rest? Am I eating properly?” So, taking the time to understand what actually rejuvenates you can start very, very small by keeping a journal next to you or a piece of paper and just start writing down things that you know you enjoy.

[00:09:37] And they don’t have to be long, and a lot of times they can’t be long because either we are busy or it doesn’t feel safe for us to slow down. So, start with a few things that you could do in five minutes. Do you need to sit in quiet? Do you need to meditate? Do you need to take a few deep breaths? Do you need to go pour yourself a really yummy cup of coffee or a tea or just have that [00:10:00] ice cold water?

[00:10:01] What do you need right now? And needing is not a bad thing, and a lot of times we feel like we’re needy or we’re overreacting. We’re not. When you have been pushed past tired and you are in depletion, a need is not a luxury. It is something that we absolutely need to refill our resources and get back to having some energy.

[00:10:28] And if we don’t practice that on a long-term basis or if we don’t make time for that throughout our day, pretty soon your body’s gonna make the decision for you, and you’re not able to do what you need to do and want to do in your business and in your life.

[00:10:44] Another way depletion shows up is toxic hustle, and you might call this self-generated depletion because when hustle becomes the norm instead of the exception, toxic hustle, that busyness, is [00:11:00] what we are doing to ourselves.

[00:11:03] Because if we’re just busy for a season and we know it’s s- for a specific season and reason, that we can often deal with. But when that season or that reason ends but we’re still constantly feel- feeling busy and feeling like we need to be productive, that’s when we’re entering into toxic hustle, and that’s something we do to ourselves, and it does take time to recognize that.

[00:11:25] And this is one lesson that I learned when I was diagnosed with anxiety about 15 years ago. I had no idea I was anxious at that time. I had gone to the doctor repeatedly, and after, like, the third or fourth visit, Before I came into the office, she had me take a bunch of quizzes and tests before I walked, walked into her office.

[00:11:44] And when she came in with her clipboard reviewing those tests, she said, “You scored really high on the anxiety charts.” And when she said that, I realized that anxiety had entered slowly into my [00:12:00] world, and it stuck around until it became that constant hum in the background. It was always there, and I hadn’t realized it because it entered slowly, and it just slowly increased, increased, increased until it became normal.

[00:12:17] That’s what toxic hustle does. It comes in, and it looks like being productive. It looks like being able to provide value. It looks like showing up for people who need us. So, you might need to ask yourself, are you busy to be productive, and does it make you feel like you’re doing something, anything, to help move your business forward, to help take care of yourself, to help take care of the family?

[00:12:43] Or is life just busy right now and you’re in a specific season? Busyness tells us everything is urgent.

[00:12:51] And so if we are not intentional in examining why we are busy and identifying is this for a specific reason or season, that’s [00:13:00] where toxic hustle creeps in and makes itself at home and starts running in the background and you will get depleted, where rest and just more sleep isn’t gonna fix that.

[00:13:10] The third way depletion shows up is striving in our own strength, and this is doing it all under your own power instead of resting in God’s provision. And this is a lesson we all need to learn. And often we need to learn it and relearn it. You know, we get so busy and get so distracted, and we have to ask ourselves, am I praying intentionally and regularly about my business, about what my next step is, about a decision before we move forward with it?

[00:13:45] Or, am I praying, uh, and asking for blessing about a decision that I’ve already made? And if you’re like me, that question and the answer I give it, I often have to cringe. And when I am [00:14:00] asking God to bless a decision I’ve already made, that tells me that I am striving and trying to do business on my own instead of seeking Him first and asking for Him to direct my steps.

[00:14:13] So that one, if you cringed on that question and the answer that immediately popped in your mind, and I know it did- that’s a sign that you’ve been striving and trying to do that in your own strength. And there is nothing that’s gonna deplete you faster than trying to do business in your own strength and striving to make sure that the business is moving forward and with all the weight of all those decisions and the business itself on your shoulders.

[00:14:39] So what does depletion actually mean? And again, we, as I mentioned earlier, refilling your reserves and taking the time to notice and be intentional, that is not a luxury. It’s not indulgent. It’s how you change and how you change your habits and refill your reserves. And this really came home to me when my [00:15:00] counselor looked at me and said, “Time and space is your medicine.”

[00:15:04] During a tough season in my life where it was a season of caregiving, and it was exacerbating my own health issues, and I felt like I was getting nothing done. Nothing was working. And she helped me reframe this very gently. And she asked me, “Okay, let’s take a look at what has worked.”

[00:15:20] Where had I found success, even in the small areas? And as we went through my list, we examined why I was successful in those areas, and it was time and space. I made the time to do something instead of rushing through it, and I created space to do it. Which means that I gave myself room for margin. I built margin in, and I went at a pace that didn’t deplete me, and it worked.

[00:15:51] This was about getting things done without completely depleting myself, and so that was not indulgent. That was not a luxury. It [00:16:00] allowed me to finish something and feel successful in it. Now, seasonal depletion versus that, the depletion that becomes a norm, that is a different story, and we cannot identify until we take a few minutes, and we take the time and make the space to ask the question.

[00:16:20] Am I doing what I’m doing because I am tired, or am I depleted? Am I busy right now because this is just a season of busyness in my business or in my life? Or am I to the point where toxic hustle has creeped in, and I am now depleted? And one of the biggest signs, signals I can think of in, in my life and also the women that I coach, a lot of times the knee-jerk reaction is, “I need to redefine my business.

[00:16:49] I need to find a new tagline, or I need to go work on my website.”

[00:16:53] So if you find yourself all of a sudden needing to redefine your business or redefine your purpose or go redo [00:17:00] your homepage, that’s a sign you need to step back and say, “Why?” And if this is about control, and a lot of times it is, control means that you can take a project start to finish, or everything in your business feels crazy, but you can control what you, what you say your mission and your vision is.

[00:17:18] You can control that headline on your homepage. You can control what you call yourself and redefine what you call yourself. If you’re doing that because it’s you’ve grown and it’s time to do that, that’s one thing. However, if it feels like everything else is out of control and you are just beyond exhausted, but you’re still doing that work, this is a sign that I have started to recognize is a knee-jerk reaction to feeling out of control and often depleted.

[00:17:46] But it’s something that we can accomplish, and so we navigate into that area of our business. So, one thing I’d encourage you to do this week is to take a few minutes and … each day and just [00:18:00] track how you’ve used your time during the day. And do this for at least a week, because it’s gonna give you a, a bigger picture.

[00:18:07] If you can do it for two weeks, three weeks, you’re gonna get an even better picture. But if you take the time to look at how much time you’re spending on your business, how much time you’re thinking about your business, how much time you are spending outside of your business, you are gonna get some ahas.

[00:18:24] You’re gonna see, am I creating margin? Am I taking time? Am I making space? Am I finding ways to do work at my pace without depleting myself, is every moment booked, or am I trying to fill those blank spaces in order to get things done?

[00:18:42] Taking this simple step is a great first look at your schedule and how you’re using your time, and not just physically in the seat in doing business or in doing life, but how are you thinking about your business? How are you thinking about your life? Where is your mental energy going?

[00:18:57] Where’s your physical energy going? [00:19:00] So, this is a great first step that I recommend to start analyzing and asking some intentional questions. How am I doing in my business??

[00:19:09] Before we wrap up, I wanna just share with you a few questions here and a, a few thoughts in reply that you actually may wanna spend time this week journaling. One is, how do I know, what are the signs that I need to pay attention to if I am just having a hard week, or am I really depleted?

[00:19:27] And again, taking that time tracker and looking at how you’re spending your time, how much time you’re thinking about and doing business, looking at how you slept, how you felt when you woke up, you’re gonna start seeing signs, is this tiredness or is this depletion?

[00:19:44] And this is an interesting one too. Can I be depleted even if I’m not technically overworking? And yes, just because you’re not at your desk doesn’t mean you’re not thinking about your business, you’re not planning about your business, you’re not having to fit [00:20:00] in caregiving or health issues. A lot of times depletion is mental and emotional, not just physical.

[00:20:08] I call it over-leveraging my thinker. When I am overthinking and I’ve used my brain to the point where it is no longer working, that is a sign of depletion. And are you giving yourself the mental breaks, the emotional support that you need so that you’re not depleting yourself?

[00:20:28] And the last question is, how long does it usually take to recover from depletion? This is gonna differ from everybody, and it depends how long you’ve allowed yourself to, to be depleted before recognizing it and taking the steps to address it.

[00:20:42] It could take a, a few days. It could take a couple weeks. It could take a month or longer if you’ve been in a season of intense depletion, and you are going to need to refill those reserves. If you’re finding that just getting more sleep isn’t helping you and you’re not feeling better [00:21:00] in the morning, again, that’s a sign of depletion, and it’s gonna require more than sleep, and it’s gonna require being more intentional and making sure that you are making the time, making space, and you’re finding your pace.

[00:21:15] And that pace is probably gonna be different than it was a month ago, a year ago, five years ago. But we’re still pushing ourselves at the capacity that we had back then. You can refill those reserves, and you can find ways to increase your capacity by taking the time to make sure that you are not depleting yourself, and when you are depleted, taking the gentle steps to do business and do life gently.

[00:21:47] Join us in the next episode, and we’ll be looking at the next area of where misalignment can show up, and that’s disconnection.

[00:21:56] And if you would like to know where you are in your business, what [00:22:00] areas of your business are aligned, which are out of alignment, and helping you identify is this misalignment or is this burnout,

[00:22:08] I would invite you to take my business alignment audit, and that is at https://SelahStudios.co/alignmentaudit. The link will be in the show notes. But I would encourage you to take that, and that’s gonna be another thing that you can do just quickly in a few minutes that’s gonna give you a good snapshot of where you are aligned in your business.

[00:22:26] So I hope you’ll join me in the next episode as we look at disconnection.