Do You GIVE Too Much?

Do you give too much? Do you give too much of yourself? You have a hard time saying no. You offer more than maybe people expect. And then you show up and you deliver and you give and you give and you give and you give. And then bad stuff happens. Inside. You feel burnt out, you feel exhausted, you feel resentful. But then the idea of not giving, of saying no, of withholding in some way makes you feel anxious, like people are going to be upset, you're going to let people down. You feel guilty, like you're hurting other people, or you're bad, or you're selfish. If you know this crazy loop, then I feel for you. I lived it for so many years. And let's talk about the way out. So if you were too much of a giver, watch this episode. It's going to help you be way more free in your life. Welcome to another episode of the Art of Extraordinary Confidence. I'm your host, Dr. Z's. This is the show for you if you want to 10x your confidence by giving less. Actually, good news, you don't have to give less. Now if you're looking for some inspiration to give less and you're like, wait a minute, I thought he was going to tell me to stop giving so much. Dang it. Well, hear me out, because at the end of the day, it's gonna serve the same benefit, but it's just a different way to hit this. Now let's look at how you can shift this in your life. We talked about the problem in the beginning of the episode. Giving so much you're spent, right? But then the idea of stopping causes too much anxiety and guilt. So what do you do? Well, here's the thing. Being a giver in life is good. We know this on some level. There's givers and there's takers. And if you try to take too much from other people, you burn out relationships. You get short term gains at the long term and expense of the long term. So being a giver, being someone who adds value in relationships at work in situations is beneficial and it brings more things to you. So the problem is not being a giver. Here is the problem. It is an imbalance in who and what you're giving. The problem is not giving. The problem is the imbalance of who, how much you're giving to who and how much. Let's talk about each of those. So first, the problem is you might be giving too much to other people. Too much. The issue is not giving, it's giving too much. So for example, Someone needs help with something. You want to take a step back and assess. Okay, I want to give to them. I want to help them. How can I do that? So maybe you have 30 minutes in your day, and you're gonna give them your all. You're gonna give them your focus, your attention. You're gonna get on the phone with them, you guys are gonna meet for a coffee, and you're gonna give them your full support for those 30 minutes. You're gonna give your all that is powerful. That's being a giver, that's helping someone in their life. And it's gonna help you feel better about yourself. But also, you know, reciprocity. People will want to give back to you and you'll receive in your life. Now, that is contrasted with they need help. They need something. Okay, clear my calendar. They probably need five hours of my time. However much I think they need. I don't know, it doesn't matter. I'll just give it. I'll just give it. I'll just give it. So instead of giving your all, you're giving it all. I love that distinction. I learned it from Rich Litvin. Instead of giving your all, you give it all. You give it all. And if you do that too much too often, then there's nothing left. So you can give. Just start with, what do I have to give? What can I give reasonably. And how do you know? Right? Because we got. We're so alienated from ourselves. If you've been living nice person programming for a long time, then you've got to check out this book. This will help you stop over giving. We go in depth into guilt to the fear and anxiety that comes from saying no. There's a whole chapter on saying no. There's a whole chapter on guilt. But you can get on Amazon. And audible, by the way, not nice, fantastic book. But we have this conditioning that says, like it's selfish or bad if I say no. If I don't just give everything to everyone all the time, bad things are going to happen and we've lost touch with ourselves. We're alienated from ourselves. And so the way that you find how much do I have to give in this situation is you got to slow down, you got to feel. You got to tune in to not what your mind is saying, but what your body is saying. Because what you do is you'll be in a scenario. Friend needs some help, someone needs something at work, you'll say, okay. Impulses to give. Great. I'm a giver. That's awesome. That's a fine identity. But then you want to slow down and say, okay, I got to calibrate how much, you know. Know how much I'm going to give is the first thing you want to adjust. So you tune in and you run some scenarios through your head. Do I want to give them 30 minutes over the phone? Do I want to go visit them? Do I want to see them tomorrow? Do I want to tell them I'll talk to him over the weekend? Run some scenarios through and see what feels the best to you? One will stand out. It will feel better. You'll be like, oh, man, drive out there. Oh, no, that's gonna mess up my workout time. And I don't want to do that. But I can talk to him on the phone right now. Great. And maybe even that you want to refine further. Talk to him on the phone. Great. I don't know, man. I don't want to take forever. Okay, hold on a second. What do I want? Oh, okay. I'd love to talk for 20 minutes. That feels really good for me. But beyond that, I don't want to do that. So following through on that and taking care of yourself involves saying, you know, texting, like, hey, you know, I'm sorry you're having a hard time. Let's talk. I want to see if I can support you. I got 20 minutes. Right now, you're free to chat. So you set the frame. Or they, you know, you call on the phone and say, hey, listen, I want to talk with you. I want to see what's going on. I have 20 minutes right now, and then I got to go. But let's, you know, tell me what's going on. So you set that ahead of time, and then it's your job, not their job. It's your job to follow through, to have boundaries and take care of yourself. There's a whole chapter in that book on boundaries, too. And say, oh, look at the time. Listen, I would love to go further. I gotta go. And if you're worried about. Yeah, but I'd still feel guilty. I feel like I should spend five hours on the phone with them until they feel great. That's over responsibility. There's a whole other section in the book about that. That is something you have to address or your life's gonna basically suck. Mine did for many years. You're taking too much responsibility for everyone else, so got to get that handled. Here's the other thing, though. So now you've calibrated how much to give. The other situation is who to Give to and people who are over giving. If you're over giving, the issue is that you're not, you're typically not giving to one person, you're giving to everyone else. But who? That's right, you, you're not giving to yourself. And so that's why we get spent. So you can be a giver and you can give a ton. You just also have to give to yourself. So what does that look like for you? What can you give yourself consistently daily? What's something you need? And it's different for everyone. For me personally, I need to give myself a big chunk of alone time every day. For me to feel optimal. For me to feel joyous and alive and energized and passionate and ready to talk to people and be an amazing dad and husband and you know, teacher, coach, is writer, is to, is to have that chunk of time just for me. And I found that over time I've found ways to hack, you know, diet and sleep and schedule and all these things to harness like the maximum amount of time. So now on an average day I will have up to six hours to myself outside of everything, outside of a family, commitments, work, everything. Six hours. It's awesome. Like life is so good with that. That's what you know. So I didn't, I don't need all that to feel good. I mean I could probably feel great with an hour or two but you know, the more the better. So what do I do during that time? Well, I have an hour and a half of self care practices, cold shower, breathing techniques, some yoga and stretches, meditation, some journaling in there as well. Then I have time to do things that I'm passionate about. So I have deep work blocks of time, really focus in on writing and projects and just like things that are creative that I really enjoy. Studying French, something that I've always wanted to do in my life and now I'm like, well if you don't do it now then it's never going to happen. So carve out the time, make it so. And I have a fun goal of getting fluent within a 10 month period to be able to go to probably not to France, my kids are too young right now, but making a quick jaunt up to somewhere in Canada, a lot of Frenchies and just communicate. It's a fun little mini mission, mini goal. So that's giving to myself though, before giving to my kids, before giving to my wife, before giving to clients, before giving to anyone, friends, family, parents, it's me. So what can you give to yourself and Look, I've been working at this a long time. So you think six hours, Like, Jesus Christ, what is this guy talking about? It didn't start that way. It started with literally 30 minutes. I remember after my first son was born, like our life was in just total chaos. I had nothing. No routines, nothing. I don't know what was going on. It's like, oh my God, there's a human and we're responsible for him. This is terrible. Candace, sell all your bitcoins. Oh, God. They were only $100 a piece back then. We sold so many of them to pay for a hospital bill. I don't know, who knows what they'll be, you know, by the time you watch this video, but certainly more than a hundred dollars. Yeah, I was. I was overwhelmed and I didn't have any routines and I was like, okay, after about three months of that, it was just like, I need something. So I was like, I need 30 minutes in the morning. And I started to figure out how to take it, claim it, and make it happen, and give myself 30 minutes in the morning. I would just do some meditation, a little bit of journaling, and then I started to build on it. So what is that thing for you? Maybe it's some alone time. Maybe it's something else. Maybe it's cooking for yourself. Maybe it's time to go for a run or go to the gym. Maybe it's some other form of physical self care. Maybe it's doing something you enjoy. Like for me, it's that learning that language. Maybe it's, you know, I don't know, hiking for you, painting for you. Maybe it's. Maybe you're more extroverted. So maybe it's time with a friend, really carving out time with the people that you love most, the relationships you want to nurture the most. What is it for you? You know, by the way, you probably have a list of stuff that's popping in your head right now. So the key is not to just figure it out. That's the first step. The key is to set up. I'm going to give this to myself. I deserve this, and I'm going to give this to myself. And it's important for me to give something to myself every day. And if you're giving a lot out there, then you have to give more to yourself. And when you give more to yourself, just by the limited nature of time, you will start to give a little less to others, probably bring things into a more healthy balance. Because if this is how much you're giving to yourself. And this is how much you're giving to others. This right here. None for yourself, Ton. For others. That's not healthy. You're not. Maybe you think you're, I don't know, a martyr or a saint or something like that, but the truth is, and I talk about this in the book, not nice. This is a recipe for the resentment formula. You will feel, you will harbor resentment if you're giving more than you can and you feel like you have to out of guilt and fear and anxiety, you will build resentment. And either it will be conscious and you'll feel it like, ugh, I just. That person asks so much of me. They're so needy. Or you just feel like resistance to hanging out with them, like that kind of resentment or. Or full on anger, outbursts, explosions or unconscious resentment. And that's going to manifest as more anxiety in your life, ruminating on things, excessive obsessive thinking, physical problems. Talk about that in the book too, man. I had my fair share. Stomach problems, back problems, neck problems, knee problems, foot problems, jaw problems, eyeball problems, man, lots of problems when that resentment is being stuffed down. So let's shift all this. So remember to recap, the issue is not being a giver. You don't have to stop being that and just start being like, taker, taker, taker, Give, give freely, give openly, give with an open heart. But the subtle tweaks are with the person or the situation. How much and in what form do I want to give here? Give it a little thought, give it a little choice, like you're choosing. Don't just let them choose or assume that they need X. So I'm going to give all of that what works for me. How much can I give right now? And honestly, sometimes the answer is none. In this moment, I can't give anything. I'm overwhelmed in my own life. Maybe next week, maybe never to that person. That's where boundaries come in. But you can still give a lot of the time in the ways that feel good to you. That's the thing. The ways that feel good to you in your body. Remember not what your mind says you should do, but in your body. Then the other thing is fix the imbalance. Instead of giving to everyone, not yourself, start to give more and more to yourself. Find out those ways. You know what they are. Just start doing them. You'll get back into balance. You combine those two things and you'll feel so much better in your life, so much less tension, overwhelm, guilt, fear. And what you'll start to realize on the other side of all this not nice stuff. You know, when you take the risk, your relationships don't fall apart, you don't get fired, everyone doesn't hate you. There might be a little friction at first, but you get to the other side of it and you feel way more relaxed, way more powerful, way more free in your life. And you look back and you say, man, that was worth it. And then your future is open and bright and just filled with more joy. That's what I want for you. So share in the comments below. What are you learning? How are you going to apply this in your life? You know, have you gotten the book again? This is. I can only cover so much in these videos. That is like I sat down for more than a year and wrote down every little nuance of what I know helps in this area. And you'll hear about my journey in the book too. So I know I've been plugging it a lot in this episode and that's because I believe in it and I know that that it will help you shift this stuff and raising your awareness and having practical tools is the solution, assuming you apply what you learn in the book. So share what you're learning from this video from the book, how we can make these shifts in our lives. And as always, subscribe if you're enjoying these, you want to see more and click the like button and I will see you inside of the next episode until we speak again. May have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. I'll talk to you soon. Sam.