How to ACTUALLY Avoid Burnout with Marie-Hélène Pelletier

You already know resilience matters. But what if everything you think about it is incomplete? In this episode, Kwame Christian sits down with Dr. Marie-Hélène Pelletier — psychologist, executive coach, and author of The Resilience Plan — to break down why resilience isn't just a trait you either have or don't, and it's not just a muscle you build through grit alone. It's a strategy. One you can actually sit down and plan. Marie-Hélène opens with a harrowing story from an 8-day mountain traverse in the Canadian Rockies — a river crossing gone wrong that nearly swept her away — and uses it to unpack a truth most high performers miss: we're great on "day one," when we're fresh and energized. The real risk shows up on "day eight," when we're depleted, still making decisions like we're at full strength. If you're someone chasing big goals and refusing to slow down, this episode will change how you think about what's sustainable — and give you a real framework to build on. Connect with Marie-Hélène theresilienceplan.com LinkedIn: Marie-Hélène Pelletier, PhD, MBA Connect with Kwame: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Request A Customized Workshop For Your Company⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Follow Kwame Christian on LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠negotiateanything.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Click here to buy your copy of Finding Confidence in Conflict: How to Negotiate Anything and Live Your Best Life!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @kwamenegotiates across all social platforms

• 0:00Speaker 00

  You don't know about resilience. If you're like me, you thought you did, but you don't know about resilience. Our guest today breaks this down in a way that you have never heard. And if you are somebody who wants to take big swings and do big things in your life, you won't be able to do it without understanding resilience in this way. We know resilience as a competency that you can grow and build. For sure it is, but there is also a strategy behind this. And this is the first time it's been released to the market. One thing that busy professionals are used to is strategic thinking and planning. And what I love about this is that we take this from a competency and turn it into a strategy.

• 0:41Speaker 00

  Now you can actually sit down, write out a plan to make yourself more resilient. Now, I hope you build your resiliency skill. I hope you flex that muscle, but let's hypothetically say you don't. You will be multiple times more resilient after listening to this episode because you'll know how to strategize around resilience. It's a concept I was not familiar with. And you'll see in this episode, it turned almost into a little coaching session where I was learning and taking notes for myself, saying, oh, we're changing the way that we do business because of this episode. Another thing that I love about this is we always think about resilience as something that is only within us. But she goes so much deeper beyond just the strategic element.

• 1:23Speaker 00

  She incorporates this as a core competency for your team, your organization, your family and your social circle. Because whatever it is that you're trying to do, you're not going to do it alone. You can't. So when you think about resilience, it has to involve the people around you. And that again, is something that is so novel in her approach. This is the story of Marie Elan Peltier and welcome to Big Swings Only.

• 1:52Speaker 00

  Today's episode is brought to you by Shopify, Granola AI, Quince and the Anxious Achiever Podcast. Stay present in your meetings. Get three months of granola free at granola.ai/kwami. For your gift list, shopquince.com for free shipping and 365 day returns. And make sure to tell them that Kwami with Big Swings Only sent you. Subscribe to the Anxious Achiever today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Do you have an idea that you want live for the holidays? Launch before Black Friday at Shopify.com/kwami.

• 2:26Speaker 01

  My husband and I do a fair bit of mountaineering, hiking and multi-day treks, that kind of thing. And we had decided that that year to go do this eight day traverse in the Canadian Rockies. So you go in somewhere, you know, walk eight days, get out somewhere else. And it was a very wild traverse, so no human-made structure on the traverse. So we got at the end of day one to this river. And it is not extremely wide, about 12 steps maybe, but there's no bridge. You have to walk in the river to cross it. And so we paused and you know, you were fresh, we're crisp. We're talking about the plans, plan A, plan B, what if this, what if that? Who's going first, second, we like the whole thing.

• 3:10Speaker 01

  And then Nick goes successfully crossed the river. And then that's my turn, same success. So we keep going, day two, day three, day four. By the end of day four, we're fairly high up in those mountains. And there is no river anymore. And there was snow initially because we were in a year, we were in the summer, but it was a year that had received a lot of snow. So we were still on snow, even though it was like June. But at some point, we're very high up and there's no, no anything anymore, which means we've got no water. So we get, I get severely dehydrated, basically. So we had to pause and decide, do we keep going and hope to find water?

• 3:54Speaker 01

  Or turn around, because we know for sure there is water if we go down, which is of course a very frustrating, unpleasant, but right decision. So we turned around. So day five, day six, day seven, you know, by day eight, we're like not, not walking together, not looking at each other, we're not talking to each other. We're like half dead, right? Very tired. We get to that same river and it crosses the river. And then we look at each other to talk. We actually cannot even hear each other. Because that same river is now much bigger because more snow has melted for eight days. Right now it's going to, and so, so Nick gestures, he's going to come back and get me.

• 4:37Speaker 01

  And I gesture back because I'm thinking one of us has crossed the thing, you know? Stay there, I will come to you, I'm gesturing. And, and then I go in the river. Wow. The moment I stepped into that river, felt the current very different from day one. Grabbed both of my legs, threw me off my feet with a force you could never beat. Now I'm going head first on my back in the river and like zero control. Doesn't matter how resilient I think I am. It's like, and then the next thing I feel is this force grabbing me by the backpack and, and throwing me on the second side of the river. And that was Nick, of course, who was able to get me.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  And so that is the river, the river story. I talk more about it in my book. But, but you know, moments like this in life for all of us, they, down the road a bit, not in the moment usually, but down the road can become a lesson. In my case, this actually served many lessons. But one of them connects with the importance of being strategic and planful about our resilience. Because in our professional life, say, you know, we're usually good when everything's fine. Like the equivalent of day one, when we've got energy, we're healthy, we slept well, you know? Things are normal, it's good.

• 6:02Speaker 01

  Where we're more at risk of whatever, like burning out, exhausting ourselves, is the equivalent of day eight, when, when we have many demands happening, we're already down in our levels of energy and health and resilience. And now we start not making such great decisions. And then that's when we're most at risk. And so the idea is that's what's at the core, at the heart of this issue, is the importance of thinking in advance, being strategic, planful, taking our context into account in a realistic way, including the changes that could happen in it,

• 6:44Speaker 01

  such that we can come even better prepared and stay even healthier and more resilient.

• 6:51Speaker 00

  Everybody, thank you for tuning into Big Swings Only. We cannot top that. End the episode.

• 6:59Speaker 00

  That was incredible. First of all, congratulations on marrying a legitimate superhero.

• 7:06Speaker 01

  Thanks, I'll share that with Nick.

• 7:08Speaker 00

  Yes, so there you had a great strategy there. But when I, when it comes to resilience, this has almost become a buzzword that has been utilized to the point of meaninglessness. And what you've done in a very short period of time is given us a brand new lens through which we can analyze this word. Because we think about resilience as, yes, sometimes we think about it as a trait. You either have it or you don't. Thankfully, societally, I believe we've graduated to recognize this is a muscle that we can grow. But you've added a layer of strategy to this that I don't think I've heard before, which is really, really fascinating.

• 7:49Speaker 00

  And this story exemplifies it perfectly because, and I, people, please online fact check me on this, but I'll give the general gist of this study. Because I remember there was a study where they were analyzing people's ability to project what they would do in the future. And when they put people in brain scans, when they would say, oh, in the future, I'm going to exercise or in the future, I'm going to eat better. The way that they thought about themselves in the future was the same way they would think about another different human being. And so it's not even me projected into the future. It's this hypothesized version of myself. And it seems like to a certain extent, that's what we do when it comes to resilience. They won, we say, yes, absolutely, I'll be able to do this and this and this and this. And we don't consider how circumstances might change.

• 8:32Speaker 00

  We might not even consider how our energy might wane over that time. And if we don't consider that in our resilience strategy, then we're almost doomed for failure, no matter how strong the muscle is.

• 8:44Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. And that's exactly that kind of thinking that also gets us in the state of, you know? Oh yeah, we know we should and want to say, exercise more, eat better, all these things. So we know all this. Do we implement them unless we have a strategic plan? We may not, right? So we have the information, but knowing versus doing is very different. And that's the same in business, right? We may know all the things, but if we don't have a good strategy, it's still not going to lead to more likely, higher likelihood of success. So that's, that's the, that's the piece. Like we could have all this wonderful knowledge from the psychology, psychology side.

• 9:26Speaker 01

  But if we don't turn this into a strategy, which is unique to each of us, and in a work context, that also would include actually the team we're in, the organization we're in, because work is a system.

• 9:39Speaker 01

  But yeah, being planful about it. And that does not require a five day full-time retreat.

• 9:47Speaker 01

  No, I, you could have, and we could have these worksheets in the show notes if, if we, if it's possible. But I have worksheets that come with my book. You can do them independently, whether you have the book or not. And they don't take a lot of time to work with to create the information you need for each of us, because it will be unique to each of us, to create our own strategic resilience plan. So, no, it doesn't take a lot of time, but it does require a bit of time.

• 10:15Speaker 00

  Yes. And so, listeners, definitely check out the details of the description of the podcast. We'll put that in there. And then I certainly will be doing this myself personally, because I know that as a public speaker, there are busy seasons, there are slow seasons. The summer is typically a slow season. We're going into the fall, which is going to be busier. And I remember last year, I was on the road 11 out of 13 weeks and three different countries. It was pretty heavy and I felt really burnt out. And it's tough to be onstage, bringing the energy when you're pouring out from an empty cup. And so, I never thought about resilience in this type of way. So, I'm definitely personally going to use this. So, thank you for that. And then I also want to speak to some of the high performers out here,

• 10:57Speaker 00

  because we can often be a little bit, we can overestimate our resilience in many cases. We can overestimate a lot of our competencies and capacities. And as a result, we kind of should on ourselves. Well, somebody at my level should be able to just power through this without it being an issue. And it's sounding like to me, an element of this, this new way of looking at resilience, where you're being more planful and being more strategic, it rests on a hidden assumption that there is a level of humility and self-awareness that the person can access in order to recognize that they do need to be more planful and strategic.

• 11:40Speaker 00

  So, how would you describe the nexus between humility and self-awareness and your perspective on resilience?

• 11:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it's, it's that, it really is, if you think about it, being just more realistic about the situation. And even if, let's say, we take a high performer, who partially thinks they are resilient inherently, of course, they can do this, or they should be able to do this, push through, that kind of thing. The reason why we get to think this way is not out of nowhere, some kind of weird, you know, delusional thought. It's because we actually have data previously in our lives, where we did get an incredible amount of things done.

• 12:30Speaker 01

  Like, we did. We pushed through. We were able to take things on. We did. And so, you get here and you look at this and you're like, yeah, look, I've done it before, I can do it again. But this, the circumstances, usually if we are now being even more realistic, so we're still acknowledging all of this, yes, check, that's true. All I'm doing is broadening the range of the reality and saying, and right now, we are 10 years later. So, the overall body-brain thing is already 10 years old. The machine is great, but the machine's older. Have you been maintaining the machine? Have you done all the things that would help that luxury car keep going so well, right?

• 13:14Speaker 01

  And you also are dealing with more, you, we, you know, that's the way life is, you know, we're dealing with more demands. You know, sometimes we think of human development in terms of child, adolescent, adult. Great. Wait a second. Within adult, we've got stages of development here too. And, you know, of course, it's not exact necessarily, but your twenties, your thirties, your forties, your fifties, and so on, and so on. They don't all look the same. Often, the demands will look different. They will increase. They'll get to a point where you're getting them from even a broader range of people in your life. And so, that, that also counts.

• 13:56Speaker 01

  So, all we're saying then, back to, I'm a high performer, I've got all these things to do, I've done this before. Why can't I push through? Of course, you can. You can for a period of time. You cannot for three months. But if you need to push through for a few days, yes. However, if this is a longer demand, like 13 cities in 11 weeks, or whatever the numbers were, then, yeah, let's be more planful. Let's ensure we're being realistic about the demands coming in and the sources of supply, and probably building, you know, the baseline even higher before this starts, maintaining it, what can we do to maintain it while this is going on?

• 14:38Speaker 01

  And then making sure we've got solid recovery after. So, it's been, again, just being strategic about it.

• 14:46Speaker 00

  This is, this is great. This feels like a personal therapy session for me. It's really amazing, because you are right. We're often, in many ways, a victim of our own success, because we can always look back in our history and say, but I've done this hard thing before, so I could do this again. And then we just keep on reaching back and getting all these old memories and doing it over and over and over again, completely depleting ourselves. I, I call it, in my mind, well, I'm going to stop calling it now, since I've talked to the expert. But in my mind, I call it law school mode, because I did a law degree, master of public policy, still finished in three years. And I said, well, let's do, just go into law school mode, man. You've done this before.

• 15:28Speaker 00

  This should be easy. Well, you didn't have two kids and like a company, and all of these, and all of these things that were pulling on you, you know? And really, what's interesting, and tell me if you've heard this with other high performers too, but for me, it is very, it's validating and encouraging that I can adopt these practices that lead to greater, not just wellness, but deeper resilience for higher performance later, and not feel like a loser, you know? Because that's the little voice in the back of your head, where it says, hey, listen, if you were truly a high performer, you would push through this. And then you see all of this, social media and people who are promoting the grind hustle culture all the time.

• 16:11Speaker 00

  And then you look at other people, it seems like they just keep on going. Am I weaker for not being able to? But you've really helped me to recognize how challenging, how maladaptive that way of thinking can be.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. No, that's, that's, that's so important. It's as if, you know, if you think of this, in each of our areas of expertise, you've mentioned your legal training. Anyone listening to us has had some kind of area where they know more about something. Now, we've all gone through this, where someone external to our area of expertise will assume that what we do has, you know, is fairly, you know, high-level, simple to some degree. Like, it has, you know, these are the things, or you're a lawyer, you, you know, figure out what the law is, apply the law, like, okay. Right? Okay, well, this is resilience. Okay, you do the things and then you'll be fine.

• 17:11Speaker 01

  Or you were just born this way and that's it, kind of thing. So, but it's as if we think of resilience as this even simpler concept. It's not. It has a lot of depth to it. That is, that has become the secret weapon of many of my executive coaching clients, to actually nail this thing and maintain it over time, such that as they are facing the incredibly exciting demands that they are facing. Most of the time, exciting, sometimes not so much, but you have to deal with them to get to the more exciting stuff. But, you know, whether it's your next CEO job, whether it's your next promotion, whether it's the next promotion you don't have right now, but you want to be absolutely prepared for it,

• 17:54Speaker 01

  that's where it goes. And so, absolutely, it has, it's completely changing the mindset, which sometimes we were either exposed to this in family life, or in, I mean, some, some industries, some professions will be a bit sending that message, right? That you need to get it right, and if you don't, you're a loser, you're incompetent, that kind of thing. And so, we're often, the reality, and especially as we have even more AI in our lives, where we need to, you know, learn by doing, test. And yes, at times, no, it's not going to work. And we need to manage the level of, you know, can we fail at this? Or is the, are the consequences of failing at this so high

• 18:37Speaker 01

  that we need to change that experiment to make it possible to learn from it without, you know, extremely negative consequences? So, so as, as you create this kind of plan, you can actually move forward with a better mindset, where you're managing these risks, you're knowing in advance that some things will not work, how it will likely feel, and no, it will not mean everything you are as a person is a failure. This one thing failed. Ha, very different. And what do we do with this? We can learn. That's the growth mindset part. Helpful. Moving on. And if it did lead to consequences, of course, we're going to deal with, yeah, the mistake or the failure,

• 19:21Speaker 01

  the consequences of the failure too, we do. And we will learn from it. Ha. Now, we're back to, we're building from this, we're in control, we're growing. And not just us, people around us. You mentioned kids earlier, yes. And team members, colleagues, co-founders, you know, we're all human. And there will be times when the brain's going to want to say, oh, look at you loser. And we're going to need to catch it and say, mm-mm, not my overall self here. This is a situation. Let's make sure we keep it where it is. Again, it's about being realistic. Just realistic, not even going for full on optimistic here. Because the brain sometimes just not gonna buy it, right?

• 20:05Speaker 01

  But if we go for someone who's naturally optimistic, of course, that works. But for people who are not naturally optimistic, if we try to push too much optimism, sure, they can say it, they're intelligent, you know, of course, they can say the thing, but it, the brain's totally not going to buy it. But if we go to realistic, you still see all the risks and all the things not working well. We keep it there, not erasing the thing. We're just making sure we see the full picture, which does include the learning, the situations where it worked, the situations where it will likely work again in the future.

• 20:40Speaker 00

  Yes. Oh, this is great. And, and that's one of the things I love about your work. It's so grounded in reality and it's so practical, too. Because sometimes it can come, the, the, the mental health and wellness community can come off as a little bit too, maybe almost Pollyannaish, even though well-meaning. But people can say this, that is not for me. But for you, you can, you approach it in a way where it, it demonstrates your core competence, not just in psychology, but also in business realities. You know, the people who are going to need this and what they will accept. And have the, having this realistic approach is something that helps them with that metacognitive internal negotiation that happens. Cause that voice is still going to be there. And I'm really glad that you said that, that voice is still going to be there.

• 21:25Speaker 00

  But now you have something that you can use to counter it, that your, your mind can actually respect and accept.

• 21:32Speaker 01

  Exactly. And, and you know, in, sometimes in some of my, my keynotes, I'll have a picture of, when I talk about this, of grizzly bears. A picture I took, not from the hiking trail. I happened to be in, you know, going up a mountain road and they crossed the road. So I saw them, I was able to take a quick picture. But what I, but I do encounter them sometimes in the trail and the grizzly bears are, they will win. You will not win. And so you cannot like, you have to manage the situation. But will you not go hiking because they exist and they are in the mountains? No, you will still go, but you manage the situation.

• 22:12Speaker 01

  And so you learn a lot about how they, they behave, you behave the way you need to. And, and it all works out. So it's the same idea with having some thoughts that are not helpful. We will have them at times, they will be there, just like the grizzly bear, they'll be there. Are we gonna not try things because it could not work or the brain could tell us, oh, you're a loser, you're failing? No, but we're gonna manage it. Say, mm-mm, normal, not helpful. And I like the, how you're weaving in the nego, the internal negotiation, because that's exactly what this is. Right? It's you responding and having a conversation with your own self-talk. I mean, that brings us almost to elements of cognitive behavior therapy, which initially was developed and, and has been researched for decades.

• 22:57Speaker 01

  It's extremely effective. And, and, but it was developed for individuals who were dealing with severe depression, anxiety and so many things. We don't need to be at that place of the continuum to benefit from this.

• 23:12Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 23:12Speaker 01

  We today have at times thinking patterns that are not helpful. And the sooner we learn to deal with them, the sooner we help kids deal with them. Like I remember, sorry, quick story, but my son, when he was five, we were skiing in the mountains and he was very young. So he was taking course, you know, a lesson, like a full day lesson and a couple of weeks in a row. And so the second week, we were dropping him off and, and he's like, this is the worst day of my life. And he is crying. And, and then I was like, oh, okay. Well, you remember last week, you came here? Yes. You remember how, when you came and saw us at the end of the day, what was on your face? Oh, I had monkeys on my cheeks.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  They had like draw, they were doing like painting on the face and he thought he had such a great day. Right? And, and I was like, do you remember how, was it fun or worst day of your life? Oh, no, that was fun. Okay. So is it possible that today might not be the worst day of your life yet? We don't know this yet. And in fact, based on last week, it possibly could be fun. So, oh, okay.

• 24:20Speaker 00

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• 25:05Speaker 00

  That's Shopify.com/Quami. Go to Shopify.com/Quami to hear your first.

• 25:13Speaker 00

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• 26:14Speaker 01

  See, that's the kind of thing we can do internally with our heads. We can help others around us, team members, colleagues, friends, but kids also, help just broaden the thinking.

• 26:25Speaker 00

  Brilliant. This is so good. I'm definitely using that because Dominic was saying the exact same thing. I said, you, you asked me to go for a bike ride here, we're here, man. So this is great because this is really, I always love to just take a quick detour to address this too. Because as parents, we have such an amazing ability to shape, literally shape, the minds of our children through the beauty of neuroplasticity. Their brains are very malleable here. And in many ways, our voices to them externally will become their internal voice as they get older. And so we can give them these opportunities to see the world in a different way. Not, again, not being super optimistic or tips on toxic positivity, saying, no, today is a great day. Just believe it.

• 27:09Speaker 00

  No, it's, hey, just maybe consider that there might be more to this day. Okay, I will be open to that. And that's it. That's brilliant. A-plus parenting.

• 27:18Speaker 01

  No, well, and I'm always like this, Quami? No, I'm kidding. No. This is one of those, like, there's a reason I tell you this story, like one of a few.

• 27:28Speaker 00

  Exactly. That's one thing I always said to myself, it's like, hey, listen, 80/20 rule. If you could be good enough 80% of the time, humanity will lead you to mess up 20%. But that's good enough ratio-wise, you know, when it comes to most things in life. And the one thing I really like about your work is that you broaden the perspective of what resilience is as it applies to not just yourself, but to those around you. Because a lot of times when we think about resilience, it's purely self-centered, to our own detriment. But you are intentional about talking about our teams. So for the people who have family, friends, their support circles, but also people who are on teams or leading teams, what do we need to know about resilience as it relates to the people around us?

• 28:13Speaker 01

  Yes. It's so, I'm so glad you're, you're bringing this part up as well. Because that, that's exactly it. It's, you know, resilience is very relational. It takes context into account, it takes our relationships into account. They are a big part of what contributes to everyone's resilience. So it is very important, very important. And you're right, it, it used to be that we were thinking about it in a very individualistic way. But that's also reflecting, it's not just like, oh, how, look at how wrong we've all been. It's in part because research was like this. And, you know, a lot of that conversation, certainly a lot of the conversations I make sure I, I bring to, to my work in general, is based on research.

• 28:56Speaker 01

  And research is this very alive conversation that happens through academic publications. Right? So for a fair bit of time earlier in our state of knowledge in this area, yes, you know, researchers were looking at the individual angle, which is an important one, still part of the overall system. And as things have continued to evolve and the, the research conversation continues and will continue, the angles of, the, the, the perspective of thinking of resilience in that systemic way has become even more clear and makes a lot of sense, really. And so what that means is, okay, well, let's say you are in, like you say, it could be in the work context.

• 29:40Speaker 01

  It could be in your book club. It could be, you know, any, any setup where there are people around you. Especially if we're going to, I'll go back to the work context for right now. If we're, we're here as a team and whether you're the leader or a member of the team, we're all influencing the team. But if you are a leader, you, that's part of your role to do that. So you definitely want to think about this, I would say. One of the ways to bring, or first, to think about resilience is resilience in a group is not going to be higher just because we've got like five people, all five of us who are just more resilient right now, that's a state and, you know, it could go up and down. And sure, it's gonna help, but it's not the only thing.

• 30:23Speaker 01

  We actually want to look at the resilience of the overall team. As a team, what's our ability to go through the next bigger demands and come out even stronger?

• 30:35Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 30:35Speaker 01

  So then, one of the ways to do this is in our, whatever, our regular team meetings, sure, we can check in on where is everyone at and, you know, have those conversations, yes. Could we also have on the agenda, our team resilience? And as a step one, you could just say this week, you know what? I've been thinking about this even more. I'm going to bring it back next time. I just wanted to share with you how I do think it's important that each of us individually builds our own resilience, maybe just say strategically, because I think that's even better. And, but also us as a team here. And then they're all like, oh, what do you mean? And you can say something like, well, yeah, we, in which ways can we build today?

• 31:20Speaker 01

  So that we're even more resilient as new next things happen. Okay. And then potentially at the next conversation, you could say, all right, let's think about in the next, whatever, next quarter, next year. When is the moment that we know will be even more demanding? The moment where, maybe it happens every year, maybe it's a large project that has a deadline. But the moment where the tendency will be, uh, let's all put our heads down and try to survive this. And that's it. Much like, again, you're, you know, thirteen trips in eleven weeks. I think I've now switched the numbers, but what, what is it, Kwame? How many trips in how many?

• 31:58Speaker 00

  It was forty-eight trips in twelve weeks, actually. Now, this is like a fish.

• 32:03Speaker 01

  Oh, my God.

• 32:03Speaker 00

  This is, this is a fish tail. It will get bigger and more hyperbolic every time we bring it up.

• 32:09Speaker 01

  I'm, I'm hearing this. Okay, I'll, I'll just stop asking now. But just a lot of travel in a short period of time, everyone, just because otherwise Kwame is just gonna go off the rails here. But, okay. Point is, right? Let's say, as you said, right, speakers, same for me, summer typically a bit more quiet, although surprising sometimes, but never as busy as a fall or spring. Uh, okay. So, but instead of just saying, ah, yes, it's coming, let's just deal with it. Maybe we could say, okay, what can we do before this happens to plan as a team now? Because now that this is an example of more individual, but let's say as a team, we know that

• 32:49Speaker 01

  there is this large project, deadline is November fifteenth, because it's ties, ties with the winter, the December holidays. So this is an extremely busy period of time. And usually what we do is we do all the normal things and things until things get extremely busy. And then we all like, try to survive this. And, and then go through the even more demanding month after that. And then crash in, you know, the holidays or that kind of thing.

• 33:18Speaker 00

  Right.

• 33:19Speaker 01

  Okay. Can we as a team think strategically about this? Is there a way, for example, that we could get to November fifteenth with even more energy?

• 33:31Speaker 01

  Could we look at what demands do we have between September first and November fifteenth? Is there anything here that we could actually push to the next year? Like, we don't have to do this right now. Are there things that, no, we cannot push it entirely, but we could do twenty percent of this? It just gets it started enough that we can pick it up back in January. But for right now, we're going to actually do a little less, if that's even possible, such that we get to November fifteenth with even more energy. And you see now, the entire, what's happening is we're being planful, yes. But now we're, we are thinking about this together as a team.

• 34:11Speaker 01

  This becomes a team goal, which means if, say, the three of us here are on that, on that team, we've talked about this, we've had great ideas, we've been more creative, all the things. But then, if I see that, I don't know, something happens in your personal life late September, and we're trying to preserve everyone, I'm good in that moment of time. I'm gonna offer you to do that meeting you were gonna do. And then you'll do the same for me mid-October. And now, as a team, huh? We are building that buffer, that, that resilience.

• 34:46Speaker 00

  Wow. This is, this is mind blowing. Now I know why they pay you the big bucks, because this is so good. I'm thinking about it even with, with us. Simone, do chime in right now. Think about this, within our, within our flow. Imagine if we were to do something like this. Now we can focus in the summer on batching as many podcast episodes as possible. And so we could do two every day, pretty manage, and make that pretty manageable, and just bank those for the fall season. And then also do with the, the, the, the majority of the course recording during the fall as well.

• 35:26Speaker 00

  And then we know that we don't have to be as responsible for creating new content during the fall, because we've already batched that during our slow seasons. This is, this is revolutionary. I'm, I'm blown away.

• 35:41Speaker 01

  Isn't it, right? And here's, right, but that's, and thank you, appreciate that. But what's amazing too, is it, it shows how, again, it did not take a lot of time.

• 35:51Speaker 00

  No.

• 35:52Speaker 01

  Right? So, because sometimes the people, people hear strategic, something, and now you think you need like five full days in a retreat somewhere, and it's complicated, and it's heavy, and it needs revisions, and it's like, oh, right? So we're not doing it. No, no, actually it doesn't. You think about the context, you look, it's like foresight, right? You think more i- in terms of what's going on. And that's the same concept. When, if we're reading about resilience in completely different areas, in engineering, in finance, in cybersecurity, all of these areas, when they are looking to create even more resilient systems. So I'm not on the psychological resilience, but they're on the ability of these systems to sustain blows, right? Or, or problems.

• 36:36Speaker 01

  A lot of it is the same approach. I didn't invent it, I'm just pairing it with what we know from psychology, such that it can be useful for us.

• 36:44Speaker 00

  Right. And, and also, and this gives us an, an opportunity to segue as well, because that's one of the keys to creativity. A lot of times, it's not necessarily creating something completely novel. It's bringing ideas that are time-tested from other industries, but would be brilliantly novel in this industry. And that's, that's what you've done here. And it's, and I, and for me, and maybe it's my business bias, I just feel like it's, when you add that lens, that word strategic before it, I get excited. I'm like, oh, we can plan for this, this is, I don't need to do too much, we just need to do the thing. And that, that makes it very doable, it feels more doable. And you mentioned creativity, though.

• 37:28Speaker 00

  This is, again, something that is not talked about a lot as it relates to resilience or the benefits of resilience. Can you talk about how creativity plays a role in all of this?

• 37:40Speaker 01

  It, it is about, well, so it plays in different ways. Um, so often, uh, when groups have come to me about this, it's, they know they need to be even more creative and innovative. And they're asking me to help, how do we get to even more of this? And a lot of the angles of getting to more of this individually, but also as a team, includes elements of being even more agile in our learning, right? Shifting the mindset, building more resilience, uh, is one of them. And working as teams. And so there are many of the building blocks of what I do that will lead to better creativity,

• 38:25Speaker 01

  better decision-making, better judgment, that kind of thing. So that's one way. Another way is that in order, if we go back to, say, the more strategic resilience angle, is we do need to do things differently. Keep doing the things that we've done them, nothing's gonna change. We need to change something. And, and again, in a very practical way. It's not just the, uh, having new possible ideas. It does need to translate on the personal resilient side into innovating with different ways. Right? So for you, even going back to the example you gave a moment ago, that realization that you've reached this stage, because there was probably a stage

• 39:09Speaker 01

  when you were doing podcasts and speaking and that kind of thing, where it was fine to do a podcast a week, whenever, wherever you would be, whatever travel happened that week, you could fit it in, it was fine. But now that we have sixty trips per week, see, I'm, I'm building.

• 39:25Speaker 00

  Yeah, I love that. We're growing.

• 39:28Speaker 01

  We're, we're like, wow, a moment away from a million. But the- As the, but things have changed. And so there was a moment where this schedule worked. And you've kept the schedule because it was working. And now other things are happening, but you kept the schedule because it's working. And at some point you're like, no, it's not. We could actually shift this. And that is this moment of stepping back with a bit of perspective. And frankly, possibly a bit more brain space. Cause we are recording this in a summer moment. So yeah, possibly if you and I had talked in the middle of November, by the time you're doing your like

• 40:08Speaker 01

  20,000th trip per week kind of thing, then you may not have said this. You may, you may have just said, okay, great idea. I may next question, right? Whereas now you're like, oh, wait. And why is that happening? That's in part because you've got brain space. You've taken a bit of time this summer, maybe. You're certainly not doing 20 trips a week right now.

• 40:29Speaker 00

  Right.

• 40:29Speaker 01

  And so you've got thi- this context where you can bring new ideas into a different context and see how you could apply them. So it goes both ways.

• 40:40Speaker 00

  Unbelievable. Yeah. So this is, it's almost like embracing the, the mindset of seasonality with resilience to a certain extent.

• 40:49Speaker 01

  You could.

• 40:49Speaker 00

  Yeah. Because I think about the athletes, for example, they have off seasons, on season. They were recognized sometimes I might need to skip a couple of games to make sure I'm available for the playoffs. Whatever it happens to be.

• 41:00Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 41:01Speaker 00

  And they, you know, we think athletes are tough. Okay. Well, we many a times when we think about white collar workers, information, like the people who are, who operate with their minds more so than anything else. We're not pushing ourselves physically necessarily at work, but we're pushing ourselves magnet, mentally. We're cognitive athletes to a certain extent. And so what, once we recognize that, then we say, okay, cool. Yeah. An off season isn't that bad. I can relax for a little bit and it actually will optimize performance.

• 41:33Speaker 01

  It will. And, and see, that's where the context, the, the concept of being strategic. In addition, I agree, it does sound good to many of my clients as well. But it sounds good in part because exactly what you said, it connects with something we know. In a business context, we know why we need to be strategic. Right?

• 41:53Speaker 00

  Right.

• 41:53Speaker 01

  We know that just having a great idea is not enough, that we need to look at the context, to do our SWOT analysis and to, you know, market analysis and who's going to buy this and all the things. So we need to do the same thing here, being, being strategic about it. And so, so that's what then makes us, let's say, if we stay with the, this analogy of cognitive athlete, physical athlete need recovery time, moments where we take it slower, that kind of thing. And then when I work with my executive coaching clients, there is no way that they will want to hear the word slow, slower, slowing down, slow, none of these

• 42:35Speaker 01

  that does not map to how they think about anything. It, I, I, in fact, I think they have like a negative, just physical reaction to it. But you know, what, what I think is important in much, and that's why, that's where.

• 42:52Speaker 00

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• 43:35Speaker 00

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• 44:51Speaker 01

  That, that strategic approach to it helps. When we're building a strategy at work and you know, as, as it relates, say to a new product or a new service, we're not just saying, well, we have an idea for a new service. Let's create a strategy. The strategy has a goal. There is an objective we're trying to achieve with that strategy. And then we build it to map to that goal.

• 45:17Speaker 01

  So same thing here. Let's say we are a cognitive athlete, so many demands we're facing and we cannot be all, all out, all the time. There needs to be moments of recovery. But then the, the description of what needs to happen for that recovery from that strategic planning of how much travel am I actually going to agree to? How many trips am I going to string instead of coming back home? How many coming back home will I make sure I do? Cause it works for me. All of these decisions lead to ensuring a better, a healthier

• 45:57Speaker 01

  attention to the demands I'm facing and the supply of energy I'm bringing to myself. All this for the goal of continuing to, whatever it is, deliver to my best. How maintain good judgment, maintain my, my, my sharp thinking. Maintain my ability to lead with creativity and innovation. So now the decisions to take a day off and not only tell your EA or tell your team that you're taking a day off, which is code for if an important meeting comes in, I will still ask you.

• 46:39Speaker 01

  The message instead becomes I'm taking a day off and I'm back to back with personal commitments. So, no, we can't fit a meeting and back to back with personal commitments. Now people imagine all kinds of things. Well, maybe Kwame needs to take his car to the garage and then he needs to go to this health appointment. The reality is Kwame's back to back is a long coffee, early morning, followed by playing with the kids, followed by sitting on the couch until your partner feels like coming and joining you to just have a chat and you're just listening. Like, yeah, personal commitment day. And that's for that objective.

• 47:22Speaker 01

  So there's no label of slowing down that does not connect. But you've strategically planned.

• 47:29Speaker 00

  You have just liberated tens of thousands of people who are going to listen to this episode. Oh my goodness. I don't know if you realize this, but you have a hidden superpower of making things sound really cool that people have a subconscious bias against. Right? Because when it comes to the idea of resilience, you have said, okay, strategic resilience. There's a plan behind it. Oh yeah. I like that. That's cool. Rest, you back to back personal commitments. Now it doesn't feel like I'm having a lazy day. Do you know how guilty I feel sometimes where I say, man, I am burnt out, but I don't want my team to think that I'm just like lazing around.

• 48:11Speaker 00

  I need to still show up. I can't just have a blank day. What message does that sound? But back to back with personal commitments and the personal commitment is a commitment to yourself to rest. Or maybe strategic rest in order to be able to reach peak performance later. And now you can give yourself license to do it. It's so interesting, the power of semantics as it relates to these really core fundamental human concepts.

• 48:40Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. No, the, the words, they, they are important. If we're saying, don't think of a red shirt, what just happened? Oh, we all did. It's true. So no, no, the brain listens to the words. Absolutely. And, and also just us, right? In, in the, if we take the self-talk perspective.

• 49:00Speaker 01

  The reality is that, you know, we're leading in so many other ways, but we need to also lead with going on in here. And is that helpful? And I need to take, yeah, strategic control of.

• 49:10Speaker 00

  Amazing. Oh, this is great. And Simone, before we go, let's get Simone in here. Simone, you've been waiting patiently, observing from your dark cave.

• 49:21Speaker 00

  So tell us what's on your mind.

• 49:25Speaker 02

  Is there any research between building a strong resilience plan and they improve of health? Because I know burnout, stress are very, are so related to like autoimmune disorders or any, any other disease. So if you build a good resilience plan, have you done any research or talk to any client that has improved the health or, or even the family energy? You know, when, when you are burned out, then it affects your family, it affects your health, it affects your whole world.

• 50:07Speaker 02

  So if you build a good resilience plan, does it change? Have, have you done any research on that?

• 50:12Speaker 01

  So it's a great question. And here's the thing with, with psychology, often the equation that you're looking at will have many variables in it. So your thinking is exactly in the right direction that, well, logically, if we were to improve our resilience, would this have a positive impact on our relationships, on our physical health, on our risk, autoimmune system functioning, these kinds of things? And so we don't have the answer to that high level question because that is such a multi-variable equation that it would be very hard for me to say, oh yeah, here is the research.

• 50:55Speaker 01

  In fact, how would one even do a research on this would be so hard, right? But what we do have are then more granular yes to your question, basically, that as we are building our resilience, a lot of my clients will have, say, three strategic pillars, some of which may be like have better boundaries or manage my time better, but many of them will have invest even more in my health or invest even more in my relationships, for example. And one of the things we do know is that as we're improving our physical health, we are improving our mental health, we are improving our overall physical health now, but also longer term.

• 51:37Speaker 01

  For example, we may see a bit, a piece of research and there has been exactly that and it's been repeated, that physical activity at midlife decreases our risk of dementia later in life by, I think the research was, I want to, I'm not going to say the exact number, but it was higher than 30%. I remember that. So, okay, right? So that, that has, that's a very granular bit of answer to your question. But all this to say that it is safe to say, based on an immense amount of different types of research that I bring together here to say this, that as we are stepping back, each

• 52:18Speaker 01

  of us, looking at, and I love in your question, how you're weaving in both the professional and the personal side, so important. So many times people tend to think, oh, my emotions at home or at work are in that lane. That's where it is. It's all in the same person. It's all in you, it's all in me. And so we need to think about, that's why those worksheets that I've created, they ask you about all of your values, what's important for you in all aspects of your life, professional and personal. And then that leads to looking also at your context and then creates pillars that will include whatever you choose to include there, which will have, yes, positive impacts on both physical and psychological health.

• 53:00Speaker 00

  So good.

• 53:02Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 53:03Speaker 00

  So good. MH, this has been an absolute masterclass. Thank you so much for coming on the show. And before you go, I want to give you one more opportunity to let listeners know about how they can reach out to you, work with you, and some of the other things you're, you're working on.

• 53:19Speaker 01

  Oh, thanks. It's been an amazing pleasure to, to speak with you and to be here with both of you. Okay. So theresilienceplan.com leads you to my book, my work, all of that. Connect with me on LinkedIn, MH Pelletier, easy to find, always happy to see what you're up to and, and then that way we can all contribute to that important conversation. And then the book is everywhere you buy your books. If you're more online, you can go to the places you usually go. If you are also able to go to a local bookstore, I would say go to your local bookstore. And if they don't have the book, get them to bring it because these bookstores, I mean,

• 54:02Speaker 01

  they are part of the community, they're part of where you bring your kids to help them learn to read and develop that interest. And they are a place where people connect with each other and we need to help them. So just a thought on the local.

• 54:16Speaker 00

  I love that. And I especially love the shout out to the local bookstore. So kudos. Thank you so, so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.