In this solo podcast episode, the host introduces his 2026 "word of the year"—margin—crediting Sean Blanc for the definition. Margin is framed as the difference between one’s load (demands, expenses, emotional weight) and one’s limit (capacity to handle those demands). The host explains that a lack of margin manifests as stress, overwhelm, or financial tightness. He then outlines two complementary levers for increasing margin: (1) raising the limit through health‑related habits (sleep, nutrition, exercise), mental‑health practices (therapy, supportive relationships), and personal development; and (2) lowering the load by saying no, shortening or making meetings asynchronous, being selective with time commitments, and improving financials (raising income, cutting expenses). He shares a personal practice of a two‑week company shutdown for reflection on the year and the word of the year, and invites listeners to share their own word of the year on LinkedIn or in the YouTube comments, encouraging likes, subscriptions, and engagement. The episode closes with a motivational sign‑off encouraging listeners to lead well and pursue greater margin in their lives.
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Hey everyone, I started this idea of creating a word of the year, I don't know, 5 years ago, something like that. I think I picked it up, maybe I saw it online, John Gordon potentially. I think that's possibly where I got it from. And my word of the year this year is margin. And I want to give full credit to Sean Blanc. He's somebody that has become a personal friend to me, has become a mentor and one of my coaches. And so he defines margin as the difference between your load and your limit, the difference between your load and your limit. And so what happens and what personally has happened certainly to me is that whatever my limit is, my load is butting up right against that. And so when you hear or you say to friends, I'm stressed, I'm overwhelmed, I'm overworked, I'm tired, etc., those kind of things, typically it's whenever you are at a place to where you have no margin. Now this can become in— this could manifest itself financially, to where you don't have any margin in between what you're bringing in income-wise and what your expenses are, both personally and for the business. There's certainly margin there. But then also it could be time margin. You just don't have enough time in the day. It also could manifest itself to where it's just emotional margin. Whatever the genre may be, from your calendar and your time time to emotions to financials. I love that idea of margin is the difference between your load and your limit. And what that does is that it gives us two things. And I love it because it gave me a definition to it. But this second is it allows me to realize that there's not just one lever I can pull. Are there things specifically I can do? And then certainly in this podcast, in the context of being a business owner that can increase my limit. If my limit is whatever your limit is, which is, I guess it would be hard to kind of define what your limit is, but what you can actually do. Are there things that I can do to increase that? And listen, we all know the things that we can do from drinking more water, working out more regularly, getting more sleep, supplements, eating cleaner, working out, strength training, da da da da da, all those kind of things. But also, it also looks like therapy, having close friends, it, it, there's so many different things that it can go into. But what are the things specifically you can do in 2026 to increase your limit? Because if the load stays the same, but my ability to handle that load goes up— obviously, unless you're watching this on YouTube, you won't see my hands where I'm saying that, you know, my load is— my limit is one place, right? And the load is where I'm at already with my load is there, and there's only a small gap between the two. But if I go and I increase my limit and the load stayed the same, I have margin. Then the second thing I can do, and oftentimes in combination with increasing my limit, is, well, what can I do while I'm also increasing my limit? What can I do to decrease my load? And so if I can get both of those operating at the same time, I can start to say no to more things. I don't have to say yes to everything. I don't have to take that meeting. Instead, that meeting can be an hour. Can it be 30 minutes? Can we do things asynchronously? Can I say no to that, you know, hour and a half long coffee meeting that I would normally go to? Can I be more selective in who I give some of my time to? How much time I spend doing things that don't actually move the needle forward. So there's, there's There's so many different ways, but also in the financial way, like if we think about this just from, you know, numbers, you can say, all right, well, what can I do to increase my income? And what are the things I can do to cut my expenses? Well, those two things in and of itself increase your margin. And this is my word of the year. And I personally am gonna be doing, at the time of this recording, it's a beginning of, very beginning of December, and this is going to be my word of the year in 2026. By the time this episode's actually dropped, I will have done some reflecting. This is something I'm going to do in, uh, the 2 weeks shutdown that we have as a company that I want to be able to completely shut down, not do any work, not take any phone calls, and just be able to reflect on the year and reflect on this my word of the year. I'm really curious what your word of the year is. I'd love for you to connect with me on LinkedIn, or if you're watching this on YouTube, post a comment down below and let me know what your word of the year is. Have you had a word of the year specifically? What do you think about this idea of margin? Maybe it's not the word that you would choose for yourself, but I think as business owners, we all can use a little bit more margin And having this idea of load and limit gives me two things that I specifically can do. What are the things that I can do in 2026 to increase my limit? And what are the things I need to do specifically that I can lower my loads? Therefore, thereby, both increasing the margin, both for me emotionally, both in my calendar time, so I can give more of myself to the things I want. To be able to give to, to my family, to my friends. I hope that served you well. I would love to hear what your word of the year is for 2026. And I hope that this year is a year for more margin in your life in whatever way that that shows up. All right, everyone, till next time, lead well and go be great. And if you're listening to this and watching this on YouTube, uh, would mean a ton if you hit the like and subscribe button. Got some big things that were going to come later on in 2026. All right, everyone, thank you.
