You can perform. You can achieve. You can keep pushing… and still feel exhausted, disconnected, and empty. Because performance without alignment comes at a cost.
This breaks down what’s really happening underneath burnout… when your system is producing results but not in harmony with who you are.
This is where the shift happens… from force to flow, from pressure to alignment.
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Watch the episode here
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Performance Without Alignment Is Burnout In Disguise
Being Present: Past, Future, And Now
I am so excited to be here. This is a beautiful day, so I hope all of you are enjoying it. I did. I had a beautiful morning. I went to the beach. I got baptized. I feel so renewed. It feels like a rebirth. That was my day. I'm excited because it is a very special day. I hope you're all enjoying this special day in your own special way.
Before we get started, we know what we need to do. We need to bring ourselves here and now. A lot of times, during holidays, we tend to go to the past. Sometimes, there are things happening in our lives where the past comes into now. It keeps you stuck, and it keeps you thinking about it. Maybe you're having a family dinner. Maybe people are coming to your house. Maybe you don't want to host a dinner. Maybe you're pulled into doing something, and you're like, “Here it goes again. I'm doing it again.” This is when the past starts playing very heavily, and it keeps you occupied.
As I always say, you can’t be now and here if you're spending so much time in the past. It's not possible. What can I do with the past? This is for me as well. I do this all the time myself. I go to the past. I tell myself, “Why are you here? What are we going to do about it?” I take the lessons. I’m like, “What should I learn from this?” I bring it to the now and here because that past lesson could become something that I can build from. It's a foundation. Every lesson is a foundation for now and here. We can't ignore the lessons. We need to bring them now and here.
I'm here, but sometimes, and I don't know about you, I also get pulled to the future. Future thinking is beautiful. I want to think about my future. You might say, “Why can't I think about my future?” You should think about your future. The future is so beautiful. We have to, but that's not how our brain allows us to think about the future. Also, we can't do that for too many hours of our day. If I keep dreaming about the future, I'm not going to do anything about it either.
We can dream and set an intention. I don't set goals. You can set intentions, and then you can bless them and release them, but you cannot stay in the future because nothing happens. We cannot create the future by being here and now because our body is here and now. You didn't transport your body to the future. You're right here. Your mind is going. Our mind is sometimes our biggest ally, but it's also our biggest enemy because it tries to hijack us to the future.
The future is good, but unfortunately, I can guarantee you and bet you that you usually think about the future, like many of us, through the lens of the past. You’re like, “This happened to me. If that happened to me in the past, it's going to happen to me again. The last time I did this, I never got to do this. This time when I do it, it's going to be exactly the same way. I had a relationship. It was like this. I'm going to have a new relationship. It's going to be like this, too.”
The future is good. But most of us see it through the lens of the past. We think, “If it happened before, it’ll happen again.” That mindset keeps the future trapped in old experiences.
What is the point of that future intention-setting or thinking? It makes it so miserable, doesn't it? The past was miserable, that's one thing, but then to make the future miserable, too, is not cool. We have to stop our brains from doing that. I don't know why it does it, but it does it. If you haven't noticed it, start noticing it. The first thing in any change is awareness.
Start noticing how much your brain takes you to the future and how much it takes you to the past. When you become aware of it, you can understand why you procrastinate, why you feel like you're not consistent, and why you're not doing what you say you will do. All of those things become so evident because we're not here. The only place I can create is right here. If my body is here and my mind is somewhere else in the past and future like this, they're pulling me in opposite directions. How can I create anything in this moment? You can't. I can't. Nobody can. Do you see how important it is to keep talking to our brain about not going to the past or the future, but being here?
When we are here, this is the place we can learn. I know some of you are adults. You're like, “I'm not learning.” Every single day, you are learning. I am learning. There is not a day that we're going to stop learning until we're not breathing. That's the only day we're going to stop learning. We're learning something every single day. I learned so many new things. You're going to learn so many new things, too.
This is where you can live as well. If you're living a life where you feel like you're not present, where you feel like your body is here, but it's not connecting with anyone, or you feel uprooted, and you feel like you’re floating around, or you don't have a grip in life, that's because you're living in the past or future. You're not here living now. When we come to the here and now living, it feels very grounded. It feels aligned. It feels like, “I can do this.”
Living also happens in the present, right here and now. It’s the same thing with leading. When I say leading, many people say, “I'm not a leader. I'm not leading the country.” You might, but you're not. You are leading yourself. We are all leading ourselves. If I'm not leading myself, who else is going to do that for me? You are leading your life. I am leading my life. We are also leading the people we love and serve. Therefore, we are leaders. The only place you can lead from is also now and here. You can't do it from the past or the future.
Our brain is the biggest enemy. At the same time, it's the ally. We need to take control of it. If I don't take control of it, guess what happens? It takes control of me. I need to stay in full-time awareness to bring myself here and now. I've made this hand. This is an anchor. If you're ever tossing between the past and the future, tell your brain, “Stop it. I want to be here because I have lots of things to do, and I want to accomplish them. This is the place I can learn, live, and lead. Stop taking me to those places.” When I bring my hands together, there's a magnetic pull here. It's going to come together. This anchor is you.
Deep Breathing To Release Stored Stress
You can always have this posture to anchor yourself, so that you can come to the present. Another way to anchor that, even to take it another step further, is to use your breathing. I know many of you are going to say, “I do breathe.” You are breathing because otherwise, you won't be reading. We're all breathing, but we're in the busyness of life. We breathe from the surface. When I say breathe, it is taking deep breaths and slowing things down. It is slowing enough to notice where the air is even going in my body.
Can you imagine? It is slowing enough to notice where my body is storing things that I don't want it to store. That's slowing. You feel, “This is hurting. I must be putting some stress on it. Why am I putting stress here? Why is my neck hurting? Why is my lower back hurting? Why is my ankle hurting?” All over our bodies, we like to stuff our pain, pressure, anxiety, stress, and fear. They all get stored in those. That's not what our body is for. Our body is a beautiful place. We don't need to store them. If we learn to slow down, breathe deeply, and remove everything with the longer breath and intention, guess what? You're going to feel lighter. You're going to feel inflow.
That is going to ground you in this moment to come here and now. That's another way to come here and now. Let's take a deep breath. Inhale for four. Lots of air. Take it in. You're going to hold it for four, and then you're going to release it for eight. This time, you're letting go of everything. I need you to let go of all the pain in your shoulder, hands, arm, and neck. It doesn't matter where it is. Find it and let it leave your body. Let's do inhale for 4, hold for 4, and then exhale for 8. Letting go of everything you stored. Let go of anything and everything. Don't keep it. Your body is not for that. Let it go. Can you feel it?
When I'm holding up here, you can do two things. One is that you can send that air you took to every part where you forgot to send air before. Feel it. Think about it. I'm sending it to my heart, lungs, tummy, and lower back. Think about all the parts you can send it to. Why? I'm talking to my body. We don't pay attention to our bodies. We think it's gifted to us. It's such an amazing system that we take for granted. What about slowing it down to send air to different parts where we are talking to it as well? All the organs, all the parts, and all the tissues.
One way is to send the air. Another way that one of our coaches said was to go and pick up things from different parts. The next step is to release for eight. She said, “Why don't we go and pick up all the things we stored that don't belong there, so then we can exhale it?” It's up to you. I used to say, “Let's send the air everywhere.” That's how I felt, but after listening to her, it made sense. I could also take out stuff and then exhale in my next part of the breathing exercise.
Let's do that again. This time, I want you to go and pick up everything that's stored that you know is not supposed to be there. You have it because you learned it. It's conditioned to pack it all in. We're going to pick it up, bring it out, and release it forever. Let's inhale for four. Let's take lots of air. There's an abundance of air here. Hold, and then go around and collect in your heart. Do you have anything you stored? Grab it.
Is there anything in your tummy that you don't need? You feel like you've stored so much, and you feel sick storing it. Take it out on your shoulders. Are you keeping your shoulders up to your ears? Why? What is in there? What's the worry? What's the stress? What's the fear? Let's take them all. Can you gather them all? We're going to exhale all of that toxic stuff. We don't need it. How do you feel? I feel great.
This is something you can do anytime, anywhere, whenever you want. Guess what? It's a gift from God. It's a gift we all have. Why not use it? Try it and tell me. Breathing is so simple. People say, “It's so simple. I don't want to do it.” A lot of the things I talk about might sound like, “Here we go again.” These are scientifically proven, scientifically-based, neuroscience-based, and psychology-based. We are a living system. Even if you're in survival mode, this system needs what it requires. I could be in survival mode, but I still need to take care of it.
I know it's different. In social media and everywhere, everybody wants you to do what's quick. We all fall for this. We’re like, “I need the quickest thing to get to feel better.” Those are all surface. If we don't take care of this body the way it is designed, and if we don't pay attention to this body, it's going to show us in different ways. I have educators who are going to the hospital with stress after ignoring themselves. That's why we need to shift our mind from thinking, “I need something fast,” to, “I need something deeper so that I can holistically look at this.”
On social media and everywhere else, everybody wants you to do what’s quick.
I know a lot of us are in survival mode. The world is in chaos, and a lot is going on. We have lots of stuff, and we're so busy. That's why you have to lean into things where your brain says, “Don't do it. That seems like a lot of work. That sounds like woo-woo. It won't work. Don’t do it.” When your brain does that, you need to challenge it and think in the opposite direction. Why is it denying it? Breathing is our birthright. Why would our brain deny that that sounds stupid? It’s like, “Don't do it.” It doesn't make sense. It wants to keep you in survival. That's why it's lying.
You need to challenge it and say, “Stop it. It's my birthright. I'm going to take the time to breathe. Don't tell me that it's such a simple thing and that it's not going to work.” Since it's in survival, it wants you to do something fast. That's going to keep you in survival. We don't want to do that. We want to get out of survival. We need to do things that are going to go deeper into our system and holistically bring our bodies, souls, and minds all together as one thing.
A lot of the time, I tell people in my coaching that we listen to our mind or head a lot. Instead, I always say to listen to your heart. There are three speaks that I talk about. One is the brain speak. One is the heart speak. One is the body speak. When the brain takes over in survival mode, the heart shuts down. The body is also speaking, but we know it's from pain. We can feel the pain, but usually, we don't listen to any of those.
We listen to our head because our head is so noisy. It has overpowered every part of it. When your head is talking too much, it's time for you to ask, “What's my heart saying? What is my heart speaking?” The heart doesn't lie. When the heart speaks, it speaks the truth. Your body, with the head, speaks against you sometimes. This is why talking to your brain is a powerful exercise. Try it.
Performance Without Alignment Is Burnout In Disguise
In this episode, I want to talk about how performance without alignment is burnout in disguise. Let's talk about alignment. I talk about alignment a lot. Somebody messaged me, “You're saying our systems need to be in alignment and activation. What do you mean by alignment? What is alignment?” Our ReadinessOS™ is all about looking at it through the systems perspective.
Alignment: When your head is talking too much, it’s time to ask, “What is my heart saying?”
We are living human beings. We're not just functioning because we show up. We have other things behind the scenes that are all working together for me to show up like this and for you to live and show up in your life as you do. If something is off and we're not performing, or we're not getting good grades, or we're not being good parents, or I can't perform at work, it is because our program is universal. It's a human development program. It doesn't matter whether you're working as a parent, a nurse, a coach, a CEO, a child in school, or a child at home.
If this system is not in alignment, and if the systems are not in activation, forget it. Nothing is going to come out. It's going to come out as the labels, the behaviors, and the pattern that repeats. We stay in a loop as adults. We call ourselves lazy. We call ourselves, “I’m a procrastinator. This is why I don't get things done. I can't stay consistent. I don't have discipline. I don't have motivation.” We say a lot of things, but we haven't looked at this as a system from a system perspective.
In this episode, I want to talk about how performance without alignment is burnout in disguise. Would you ever drive a car with misaligned wheels? For those of you who are driving, if I give you a car with all misaligned wheels, will you drive it? No. No matter how hard you press the gas, the car is going to start pulling in different directions. It'll shake, and it's going to wear it down eventually. You can push all you want. You might go a certain distance. The car is going to wear itself out and maybe break down.
That's exactly how most people are living, if you think about it. We don't have alignment. We want to try moving forward from a system that's out of alignment. If you think of this as a car, if this system is misaligned, why would I want to keep pushing it to perform? I can't perform. I might be eating. I might be breathing. I look like I had the fuel to go, but the system is misaligned. Like the car, it's going to pull, hake, and go in different directions. Eventually, it's going to feel burned out or worn down.
No wonder you feel stuck or tired. It could be your child, your student, or any adult at this stage who is feeling stuck, tired, and inconsistent. It’s not because you're not capable. It's because something deeper is off. That's why. When this happens, what are we going to do? We push harder. We're going to try more discipline. We're going to put more effort. We're going to put more pressure. We're going to find the best strategy out there with the influencer or someone who's going to tell you the fastest way to do it. They’re like, “This is the only way to do it. Try this. This works.” We're looking for something to be magical that's going to come and fix this problem.
When we're doing all of this, it's like pressing the gas pedal harder while the wheels are still misaligned. The car doesn't fix itself. It burns out faster. That's exactly how your system is, too. It doesn't fix it by itself. When it's misaligned, your systems are misaligned. Internally, when you're misaligned, it's not going to fix itself. When you're pressing gas, it's like you're pushing harder and putting more pressure, more techniques, and more strategies. The world's best strategies won't work.
When we keep pushing like this, it’s like pressing the gas harder while the wheels are still misaligned. The car doesn’t fix itself—it wears down faster. That’s how your system works, too. It won’t correct itself when it’s out of alignment—it just burns out.
The misunderstanding that you think is a performance problem. It’s not just you, but everybody on this earth thinks at this point that this is a performance problem. It's not. It's an alignment problem. No one ever taught us to check the system. Have you ever even had any lessons in education or from your parents when you were a child? Anywhere along the journey, has anyone told you that this is a biological system, and this system needs to be in alignment and activation to accelerate and achieve?
Before alignment and activation, awareness comes first. I need to be aware of what's happening. I then can align, as I can with the car. I can activate the car, activate all my systems, and then enter acceleration. If I keep the acceleration, I will achieve whatever I want. Like in the car, I can get to my destination. That's the achievement. This 5A journey is all about understanding what it is and then going on a journey to get into acceleration the proper way. This isn't a performance problem. That's what everybody thinks. It's an alignment problem.
The 5A Journey For Acceleration And Achievement
Nobody has taught us to check this as a system. We ignore the whole body. We want this person to perform at the highest level and say, “We want to reach our full potential.” With full potential, if you look at it, I've said it before, too. Potential energy is not movement. It's kinetic energy that's movement. If I'm stuck, there is no potential that's going to come out of me. I'm stuck. That's why people feel stuck, because there is no momentum in that. We can get to our full potential.
Before expecting the system to perform, we need to check. That's the awareness part. I need to check it, like, “What's happening in here?” When I shift my lens through the ReadinessOS™, I stop asking, “Why aren't they doing the work?” I stopped asking that long time ago, and I started asking, “What in their system is out of alignment?”
My background is working in education with children and adults. Instead of asking why they aren't doing the work, I started asking what in their system is out of alignment. Is it the nervous system? Is it their energy? Are they protecting? I looked across twelve systems to map it out. When one part of it was off, guess what? The whole system compensates. Other systems will compensate. That's the problem. That's why we need full alignment before we can perform.
I don't push performance with anybody I work with. We have a system that can work across any age and any stage. It doesn't matter what label. It doesn't matter if you're 70 years old. Our coaching program can get you whatever you're struggling with. If you're struggling with a relationship, if you're struggling with performance, if you can't get good performance at work because you're stuck, if you're addicted, if you're anxious, or if you're full of fear. Anything, we can solve it. Why? It’s because we realigned the system. We slow everything down.
I was saying earlier how looking for the quick fix is hurting all of us. I don't look for a quick fix. I spend the time to align myself so that I can live a peaceful life, not looking for the next best thing that's going to work. It might work for somebody. Why? They were in acceleration. Everything works when you're in acceleration. What if you're not? What if you're blocked and stuck, and you don't even know that? You apply the world's best strategy out there and feel like a failure because it didn't work for you. They said it will work for everybody.
Another part of our system that I am trying to change is the assumption that we should be ready. That is one of them. The second one is that if I have something, it's going to work for you. That's the most annoying part about how people give advice. It being general and working for you doesn't mean it's going to work for me. You don't know it's going to work. Why not say the truth, like, “The truth is that this worked for me. You can try it. I don't know if it will work for you.”
It's not customized. We're not all the same being. We're different. We're unique. How can something that works for somebody work for everybody? We build the education system with standardization and generalization, and we forget how individual we are. We never looked at it from that lens. Guess what's happening? Since more and more kids can fit into it, what are we giving them? Labels. That's another topic. I'll talk about that. When we realign the system, we slow down. Everything is in the slowing down. I know the world is speeding. It doesn't matter because this system wasn't built that way.
Slowing Down And Regulation For Flow
This system was built on a different level where you need to slow down to notice. Slow down to feel your breath. Experience your breath then we regulate. I know a lot of people think regulation is overused. I don't know how other people teach it, but it is regulation through inside out. That's something that regulates you and something that's personalized to you, not somebody else's regulation. What regulates you? That's different then we clear what's in the way. If we want flow and alignment, we have to clear what's in the way.
We bring the system back into rhythm. Aligned systems don't need force. They move. That's why we call it blocks to flow. When blocks are removed, it flows. It doesn't need any force. When the alignment happens, what happens is focus comes back online. Energy is going to stabilize. You're to have energy stabilizing. You're not going to feel depleted. You're going to have energy re-stabilized. What's going to happen is that follow-through becomes a natural byproduct. It's not forced.
You're going to be able to follow through on things, like driving a car that's finally aligned, smooth, steady, and has effortless movement forward. The car will have smooth, steady, and effortless movement forward the same way you're going to flow forward. That's how you get into momentum. That's how you turn the full potential that is waiting to come out of you into movement, so that you can get results. The results are the performance.
Do you see the cycle and how it all works? It's all tied together. It doesn't matter what example I bring, whether it be a car or other machines. Anything we create as human beings is the same thing. If they're not in alignment, we're not going to have smooth, steady, effortless movement forward. If we don't have smooth, steady, effortless movement forward, you won't do anything. We will get stuck because our brain is going to say, “That's too hard. That doesn't feel safe. That feels like so much work. Stop.”
Anything we create as human beings is the same: if it’s not in alignment, it won’t move forward in a smooth, steady, or effortless way.
Stopping The Chase For Quick Fixes And External Solutions
No wonder we procrastinate. No wonder we start and stop, because our systems are not in alignment. We never look inward. We're looking for external things to help us. There's a whole industry that's going to keep you trapped in that because they don't want to tell you that it's in here. They're going to tell you it's their product. I'm going to tell you it's in here. That's the ultimate truth. It's all in here. “Is this body aligned? Are the systems aligned?” Ask yourself those very powerful questions.
Don't look for the next fastest thing. I know you're in survival. I know it feels like the best thing ever, but that's like looking for the magic pill. There isn't any magic pill. I used to tutor, and people came to me for that magic pill. I didn't have any pills to give them. What I did was start reading what was misaligned. When I read that, and I was able to align them, guess what? It felt like magic. They got results like magic, but it didn't happen by magic pills. It happened through the internal work that was needed for everybody to succeed.
My question is so powerful. I'm going to ask you this. Can you slow down? Can you stop chasing the next fastest thing to help you in life? Can we stop that? I know that in survival mode, we need that and want that. Our brain feels like that, but that's not going to help us. It's going to keep us stuck. We can do this with our children, too. We look for the next best thing and ask on social media or in groups. I see hundreds of mothers and dads asking, “This is what's happening to my daughter or son. Give me an answer,” and then they have 300-plus responses from random people.
All that random advice, what does that do for you? Does it make you calmer? Does it make you feel like you understood your son or daughter, or does it make you confused and feel more stuck? Which advice are you going to take? The one that says, “Be strict? Don't do anything? If it were my child, I would kick them out? I would do whatever they want and let them do whatever?” Which one will you take?
It's so much noise. I don't know how you're going to sort through 300 messages or more to figure out the answer that's going to land for you. Maybe by saying it out loud, you release the pain. That's possible, but reading all of that, I don't think you're going to get the right thing for your child. People are putting out stuff. They're not customizing for your child or your situation. This is one part of it. It’s the same thing with others who ask online. That's why I never answer those. I don't even know your situation.
Inward Investigation Through Compassion And Curiosity
I know a little glimpse of what you told me, and I'm going to give you some advice to solve it. The holistic way does not accept that. It doesn't work that way. I don't want to give you more pain. When you're already in survival, I'm not going to give you more pain. I'm going to watch for you to go inward and ask yourself, “Why is this happening in my family? Why did it come to this situation? What happened here? What am I not doing as a parent? What is happening to my child to behave like this? Where are they blocked?” Be compassionate. That's compassion.
Then, curiosity. It’s like, “What's going on?” If I get curious about what's happening to me and my family, that is observing. You start observation. That's becoming like a scientist. I know in survival mode, all of this is hard, but that is the only way to the result. That is the only way to fix it. When you become aware of those patterns, loops, and what's happening, you're going to have a quiet moment to recognize those. From there, you can start moving forward into alignment and activation. That, as a byproduct, brings the acceleration. That is the forward, effortless movement. That's how you achieve as a byproduct.
Achievement is always a byproduct of awareness, alignment, activation, and acceleration. Achievement is always a byproduct. It's not where we start. It's the end result. If you've been feeling stuck, off, or exhausted, I want you to take a deep breath and let it out. Let all of that out. It may not be you. You may not be broken, lazy, or whatever label you have given yourself. You may just be out of alignment. No amount of pressure will fix a system that needs realignment.
Going back to the car, if I push the gas without my wheels being in alignment, am I going to go where I need to go? Is it going to perform? No. Why do we do it to this body? Why do we not love this body enough not to do that? Before you push harder, ask yourself, “Do I need more effort, or do I need more alignment?” No one wins the race driving a misaligned car. If you're a racecar driver, try it. Can you drive a car that's misaligned and win the race? No, it's not possible. I feel sad for humans.
We've been so conditioned to believe to push harder, do more, do the next best thing, or supply whatever somebody tells you, and you should be working fine. It doesn't work that way. This body needs you to become aware and in tune with it so that you can feel what's going on. It’s the same for your children, the same for your students, and the same if you're a CEO. I know I've been talking so much about your body, but that's where it all begins. Unfortunately, I can't say anything different.
We’ve been conditioned to believe that if we just push harder, do more, or follow what others tell us, we’ll be fine. But it doesn’t work that way. This body needs awareness and attunement so you can actually feel what’s going on.
I'm not going to tell you something fast and quick like the rest of the world will tell you. I'm going to tell you the truth. The ultimate truth is that this body needs awareness of you. That means you have to slow down. That means you need to stop looking outward for quick fixes. That means you need to take deeper breaths. You need to sit by yourself. You need to start becoming like a scientist or an investigator. Investigate what's going on with lots of curiosity.
The final word for this episode on this beautiful day is that performance without alignment is burnout in disguise. No matter how hard you try, if you don't have alignment, you're going to burn out, whether that be in life, at work, or in helping others. You will burn out, and from burnout, there's nothing more left. Think about that. Think about everything I said. Take this day to reflect. Go inward. Become more aware so that you can start the process of alignment. Awareness is first. That's the first step. Thank you so much. I'll see you in the next episode.