SHORTS | Energy and Motivation Maintenance with Kate Sikora

You're sending me a curveball right now. I can't believe you're doing this.

It's not a hard curveball. Like I was asked this the other day in a leadership program as well. Like how do you manage and sort of maintain your sort of energy and motivation?

Oh, this one again, I have the right balance right now, but it's. You have to be at the center. If you're not happy and healthy and doing well, everything else is not going to be happy and healthy and doing well. And it's something that you have to prioritize to be able to bring that energy to your everyday. I journal every day. I actually, I was in a mastermind group the other day and we were, I was joking about the fact that I literally have a journal for everything as well. Like I've got my business journal, I've got my life journal, I've got my five minute journal for I need to just be thinking in a positive mindset. But having that 10 minutes of reflection every day, whether you do it via meditating or journaling or just going in for a walk, that is crucial. And I couldn't bring everything else that I bring to the day without having that time for myself to do that. And then the other piece is just physical health. So I prioritize getting myself to yoga. I don't. Doesn't matter what it is that need that seems to be taking priority over that. There's nothing actually that does because that me being happy and healthy is what's going to have the ripple effect across the absolutely everything else that's going on. And good night sleeps. I also very much value that. But they would be the big ones, I would say.

And has that always been the case for you, especially around the health piece or was there a particular catalyst that was the sort of trigger point for you to make a change and really learn that actually if you are happy and healthy at the center, then everything else works. Was there like a tipping point for you?

I would say that I barreled through the earlier parts of my career and barrelled through the earlier parts of my time as an MD just doing as much as I could. Work, work, work, work, work, work, work, work. And you just, you just get to a point where you're just exhausted. There's no point. And I wouldn't say burnout per se, I never got myself to that point. But you just, you're not useful to anybody when you get, you do that. You're, you're not useful to yourself. You're not useful your Team, you're not useful for your family, your home. And I would say the tipping point probably was having my daughter and becoming a mother and that side of things and really having to get. Get into that mind, shift into that. That world at the end of every day and get down on the floor with her and play with her and chat with her about her day and. And be healthy for her. And that was probably the tipping point for. For me and my husband, I would say we both worked like maniacs before that, and now we've. We just see balance as being much more, much, much better. Don't get me wrong, there's still nights where you're up burning the midnight oil. And on Wednesday, I went to yoga, but then I came home and did two hours of work after yoga, which I, again, ideal world wouldn't have done, but I needed to get something finished, but I had prioritized yoga, so. But I'm just saying that because it's never as easy as that sounds. Right. Like, I may have gone and I did the class, but then I still came home and had to get something done.

Yeah, that's life, right? That's kind of what. That's life. That's what happens sometimes.

But I would say that, yeah, that would be the tipping point for me was that kind of establishing a home and a family in the life that needed me to be not only healthy for the. For my husband and the business, but also for her. And that just gave me a whole other piece of clarity, I suppose.

Yeah. And that's the biggest leadership job and test in the world, right? Being a. Being a parent.

Yeah.

Like, I see my daughter. My daughter's 12 now, and sometimes, like, I'll hear her. Her say something, go, oh, that's interesting. I'm not sure, kind of I like that or that tone. Then you go, oh, hang on. She's got that from me. Because they're always watching. Right. And it's not just what we say that they pay attention to. Like, it's a truism in parenting as well as leadership. Right. People pay more attention to what you do than what you say.

Absolutely, they do. Oh, I've got so many stories on that one, Ben. I could be here imitating us at the moment, but the moments I'm like, oh, yeah.

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