EP 091: Your Wealth or Your Health with James Cant

I hope you found a better way to deal with this than me.

When it comes to business…

One of the things I have struggled with is the pressure of getting client results.

The online ads game is challenging, to say the least.

In a nutshell, here is what makes it so hard.

Clients often need a consistent flow of leads into their business.

The platforms (FB, Google, YT) change whenever they feel like it.

You are in the middle.

What works one week might not work the next.

You can spend months developing a strategy only for it to become obsolete overnight.

You have no control over what the platforms like Google or Facebook do.

For example:

I had a plumber client who needed 10 calls a day to keep enough work coming in for his business.

If he got less than 10 calls, he would have staff sitting there doing nothing.

He would be burning money in wages.
(which got to him in a big way)

It was my job to make sure those calls kept coming in.

Whenever the leads didn’t come in, my phone would ring.

On a bad day, he would call me and say things like:

“What am I paying you for!”

“How am I supposed to make payroll if you can’t do your job!”

“You have one week to turn this around, or we will use someone else”

Clients would threaten to go elsewhere all the time.

Which caused me a lot of stress.

I hate to say it, but it got to a point in which I would dodge client calls.

Anyhow.

It bothered me when we couldn’t get client’s results.

Which often led to working more hours trying to improve results.

I would lie awake at night thinking about the clients.
Dreading when the phone would ring next.

At the end of the day, clients didn’t care how many hours I worked or if I was sleeping.

They cared about the result.

They had their own challenges in business to deal with.

They had trusted me to get them results, and at times we were failing them.

Often I would pass that pressure on to the team also.

Like it was their fault.
The truth was the team was doing fantastic.

The real problem was that I couldn’t handle the pressure from clients and was pushing it onto them.

Wonder why some of them resigned…

Anyhow, 

As the company grew, so did the pressure and stress of getting clients’ results.

Things were getting worse, and the signs of stress were showing on me.

I started to notice how quickly I was ageing.

In the space of a year, it looked like I had aged 5.

My hair started to fall out.

Eventually, the stress and pressure got too much.

You need to find a way to cope.

Many turn to food and alcohol.

For some, it’s video games.

For me, it was cycling.

It turns out exercise is a great way to deal with stress.

Finding cycling was the gift I needed.
Cycling was the thing that got me through the next year.

I was finally sleeping again!

Stress management was easy as it was all done on the bike!

But…

What started as going for a few rides a week to deal with stress turned into doing 300km+ every week.

Not because I wanted to.
Because I needed to.

It was the only way I could cope with the stress from the business I had built.

If I didn’t ride, I didn’t sleep.

Throw into the mix 5 cups of coffee per day.
+ a poor diet

Guess what happened next?

Complete and utter burnout 🔥
The complete destruction of my health.

You know it’s bad when you find yourself in a heart specialist’s office.

He wanted to put a pacemaker in to fix the damage done to my heart.

Imagine how you would feel when you are sitting across the table from a heart specialist as he says these words.

“You will be lucky to make it to 50 if you keep doing what you are doing.”

All the money you have been making means nothing at that moment.

You won’t be around to enjoy it.

If I had kept going the way I was, I would have never seen my kids grow up and would have left my partner alone.

It was the “wake-up” moment I needed.

Anyhow, pressing on.

This week’s podcast is an important one.

James Cant joins me from JCF coaching.

He has a special skill set when it comes to health and peak performance.

Most notably:

• He helps people get out of the type of burnout I got myself into
• He gives people the tools to avoid ever getting into that state

This podcast is what I wish someone would have sent me all those years ago.

DISCLAIMER:

All information we share is NOT financial or investment advice and is purely intended for entertainment and educational purposes only. Always seek professional advice before acting on any financial decision.