The Leadership Trap: Success at Work, Failure at Home

Name: The Leadership Trap: Success at Work, Failure at Home
Uploaded: 2026-10-06T18:09:59+00:00
Duration: 37 min 6 s
Channel: Workforce Alchemy

00:05Kevin Davis is a lifelong entrepreneur, the founder of Maxed Out Man, and the author of

00:13How I Lost My Left Nut and Other Life Lessons. After nearly losing his marriage, while chasing

00:20business success, Kevin rebuilt his priorities, just passed his 31st wedding anniversary,

00:27and has spent more than 25 years helping men and couples strengthen their lives, leadership,

00:34and relationships. Today, we are exploring how ambitious leaders can succeed without losing

00:40what matters most. Welcome to the show, Kevin. Yeah, I was so excited, Mason, to be here. I

00:45appreciate you having me on. And just when we got on earlier, I know it's just going to be a

00:49fun time.

00:50So thanks for having me. Looking forward to it. And I'm willing to bet those watching and listening,

00:55there's more than a few of them out there that are probably dealing with some of these issues.

01:01And hopefully you can provide some insights and some experience that can help them avoid

01:06tripping over the same rocks that many others have before. Right, right. Yeah, what I say is I would

01:11rather guys fall and like bruise themselves than break their face like that, which has been more

01:18my experience. So, you know, it's a lot easier if you just, if you just, you know, sort of fall,

01:23you know,

01:25early in your marriage, Michelle gave you an ultimatum that forced you to confront how your

01:31ambition was affecting your family. Take us into that moment and explain what you finally saw

01:37that you'd been missing. Yeah. So there's a whole chapter in the book about this, which,

01:42you know, the book is, is about stories, crazy stories and poignant stories and funny stories

01:47of my life. But this story in particular was one of those epiphany moments, a defining moment,

01:54as they say, that literally could have made a break made. It was a make or break moment for

02:00the rest of my life. We were early in our marriage, had a new baby, six months old.

02:04And at the time I was traveling a ton. And so literally like this was back in the yellow

02:10pages days. This is late nineties, but I would wake up in a, in a hotel room and be like,

02:15and I

02:15don't do drugs or drink or anything. So this is just pure craziness. But I would wake up and say,

02:20hey, let me grab this phone book and figure out what city I'm in. So I know I was a

02:24corporate

02:25trainer and, and did all sorts of things for during the.com days, but I was very good at my

02:30job.

02:30And I started with a.com company at startup at 18 and we grew it to over 250. So that

02:36kind of sets

02:36the stage for kind of how that looks and, and a bit of a workaholic at the time. And I

02:42had no real

02:43basis for understanding what it meant to be a dad. And so Tony Robbins talks about this thing where

02:49our whole ambition in life is to, is to avoid pain and seek pleasure. And so what I think men

02:55and women, both, but predominantly men, and cause I'm a dude in this case, I didn't know what to do

03:01with the new baby and how to be a dad and a husband in that case, but I was really

03:05good at my job. So

03:06you can assume you could see where this is going in terms of like, where do I put my energy?

03:12And it

03:12was really towards my career and business and helping grow the company and those kinds of things.

03:17So the fear and pain of being a bad dad versus the pleasure and, and, and happiness of being

03:25good at your job, avoid the pain, seek the pleasure, get it.

03:29Yeah. Accolades, money, success, growth, all of those things that when you look at this little

03:34two month old baby or four month old baby, you're like, I don't even know what to do with this

03:39thing.

03:39Right. And that's, you know, that's a total, and I'm not saying that this is like,

03:43that's a complete 100% failure on my part. And, you know, and, but, uh, Michelle gave me the

03:49ultimatum. She's like, Hey, I got my stuff packed with, you know, one day. And she's like, would you

03:53like to come home now and like be a dad and be my husband? Or should we just go? And

03:59dude, like,

04:00it was a crazy experience. Cause they talk a lot about these epiphanies and doing a one 80 and it

04:07was

04:08instantaneous. I was like, all right, like all of that flooded. I'm a Christian guy. And so like,

04:13there's a whole God component to this saying, saying, dude, what the hell are you doing?

04:18Like, I assumed God would talk to me that way, by the way. And I, and I was like, all

04:22right,

04:22well, this is like, I instantly, like, it's almost like someone just laid out on a, on a PowerPoint,

04:28like in instantaneously of all the stuff that I'd been doing and all the stuff that I should have been

04:33doing. And so I just made a one 80. We found a couple in our church that represented who I

04:39believe

04:40we represent now, but it's like, you knew these guys were in love. They've been married for 30 plus

04:45years at that point. And we wanted to be like them. So we sought them out and they kind of,

04:51you know,

04:51again, longer story, but they, they got us situated and, and mentored us and coached us and

04:56kind of helped us along the way. I'm 30 and it's been 28 years now since that happened. And dude,

05:03it literally gets better every day. It's, you know what, it's nice to hear those success stories

05:08because as a successful employee in a growing company, I'm sure that was still very, very

05:14difficult. I will say, based on personal experience that it is even harder when you're not just an

05:22employee at a successful, a successful employee, a successful company, but it is your company because

05:27your company is your baby. Yep. And that becomes even harder. And I'm sure there's people out there

05:35listening that know, that can feel what I'm saying. When it's like, this business is my baby. I can't let

05:42it die. I need to do whatever I can. And now you've got marriage and a real baby. That's, you're

05:48in a

05:49position where it's like, all my choices suck. This is all bad. I've got to pick the least bad

05:56choice because what am I going to let down? So I, I'm really anxious and excited to hear about your

06:04perspective and how you've helped others. So how do you know when dedication to the businesses

06:09perhaps cross that line into the neglect of the people who matter most?

06:13You know, I was talking to someone yesterday about this and there's an old saying, if you want to

06:18know, if you want to know where your, where your dedication is in your finances, you know, this is

06:23old school, right? You'd use your bank statement. You'd use your online account now, but check your,

06:27look at your checkbook. And so the same thing holds true when you look in your marriage and priorities

06:34and family and all those go look at your calendar. Like that's a sobering and very black and white way

06:41to show where your priorities are. And so for me, if I did that, I could see that, Oh, I'm

06:46only home

06:47one day a week. And during that week, I'm preparing for the next trip, you know, or during that day.

06:51And then I'm, I'm thinking about business and we kind of have our nightly phone calls when I'm on the

06:56road and blah, blah, blah. But you know, in that case, I think a lot of people are just not.

07:02So I have

07:03this theory that work-life balance is BS. I don't think there's anything. And again, unpopular opinion,

07:10but hear me out. I really feel like work-life balance is really just a shifting of priorities.

07:16It's kind of like they say multitasking is really just task switching. There's, there's actually no,

07:21most people can't multitask. I don't feel well. I have to focus on one thing and knock it out

07:27and give all my attention to that. I chew what's in my mouth before I take another bite.

07:31Right. Well, and I, I, my brain is a little bit like those 16 lane Chinese highways. So I,

07:37I got very, very good at my brain just works really well at task switching, but ultimately

07:43you're not multitasking. You're just better at task switching and priority works the same way.

07:48Work-life balance works the same way. It's just where you're prior, putting your priorities at

07:52that given that time. And what I think one of the biggest mistakes we make as entrepreneurs and

07:57business owners is that we have something that requires priority. Let's say it's a big project or

08:02client fire or whatever that looks like, right? Finances cash. And what we say is, Hey, we're

08:08going to put 110% effort into this, which means our family gets probably 10 or 0% effort. And

08:15we're

08:15going to just, we're going to go take care of this. And the problem is then there's another thing to

08:19take care of and another thing to take care of and another thing. And so you're completely out of

08:23balance from a priority standpoint. And you never go back. I, I describe it, you know,

08:29those old teeter totters, you know, and if you were great school, like I was, there was usually

08:34like a big kid, fat kid, you know, like skipped a grade or whatever. And he's the guy that's

08:40sitting. I, and I describe him like a gorilla, but like, he's the one that's sitting on his side

08:45of the priority while your legs are dangling on yours. And I feel like that that's what we do

08:51like this when we're up on the prior, that's where we're dedicating priority to a certain

08:55thing. Could be marriage. It could be family. It could be hobbies or could be business, which

08:59is typically the case. And so a lot of times what we need to do is we need to like

09:04throw

09:04that guy a banana or something and have him get off so that we can get off and rebalance

09:09our priorities. And I think that's one of the biggest challenges we have as entrepreneurs.

09:13I really like that we're talking about this stuff because like, and I liked the way our

09:17conversation started because there are people that are watching, listening right now. They're

09:22at that point where it's like, I can't let my business go. I can't let my career go. I

09:26can't let my family go. I can't let my kids go. And what we're talking about now is the

09:32warning signs that appear on the road to that place and what to look out for and how to handle

09:39those and how to, so you don't get to that place. And I love that the very first right out

09:44of the gate, you're like, look at your calendar. Like that's a warning sign. If it's not balanced

09:49and it's, it's not giving enough attention to each of the priorities in your life, I love

09:54that you shared that. What are the biggest mistakes that high performing leaders make

09:59when they try to solve marriage or family problems with the same mindset that they use

10:04to solve business problems in your opinion?

10:06I mean, I think really what's funny is that it's not necessarily using, it's, it's ignoring,

10:11it's not using the things that they use. So if they have a team member that has a problem

10:16and they're communicating, there's a problem. They probably listen to that team member

10:19and they figure out what the, what's going on. If they get a balance sheet, that's out

10:23of balance. So they know that there's something wrong. They go fix that thing. Well, what we

10:27tend to do when it comes to marriage and family and other areas of our life is we completely

10:33ignore it. Our wife has been, we've been silent at the dinner table for the last 18 months.

10:38Our daughter's begging us to go play, you know, dolls with her or whatever, like all of these

10:44things. And I think we tend to ignore those things more than we try to solve them with business

10:51practices. And I think that's, that's one of the biggest challenges. And I will say before,

10:54one of the things I wanted to point out is that one of the biggest challenges we have

10:59as entrepreneurs is we oftentimes trade our life to build the business instead of using the business

11:07to build the life that we want. Because at the, at the end of the day, that's what it's supposed

11:13to,

11:13like your life shouldn't be given up to build a business. The reason we build businesses and make

11:18money and all of those things build legacy is so that we have the life that we want, not the

11:23other

11:23way around. So many entrepreneurs say that they're working hard for their families while their families

11:29experience them as unavailable. How can a leader honestly determine which version is true?

11:36It just requires a good, hard look at themselves. And if you've ever said something that you and I

11:42talked about before we started recording, and I've used the same language, if we didn't have all this

11:47stuff, I wouldn't have to, or didn't have this lifestyle. I wouldn't have to work this hard.

11:55Right. Which is at the end of the day, it's nonsense, right? Like we've created a life that we can

12:00change at any moment. And for the most part, our mother, our, our wives, kids, community and friends,

12:06they don't even care about that stuff. Like they don't care if you're a six figure entrepreneur or

12:1110 figure entrepreneur, they need you. And I think that that's one of the biggest challenges that we

12:16have. You know what? I'm going to share a quick story because you just triggered a memory that

12:22it was 1997. And I'm sitting on Waikiki beach on a surfboard. And it was beautiful, sunshine,

12:31warm air, gentle breeze. And I wanted to learn to surf. And so I got one of those big long

12:37boards and

12:38you got the instructors and stuff there. And the waves are little baby waves and stuff. But you know,

12:42I grew up in Missouri. And there's this teenage kid sitting next to me and we're waiting for a wave.

12:51And I asked him, I said, so what do you do? He goes, oh, I live here, man. All I

12:55do is he goes,

12:56I park cars at night. I crashed with some of my buddies that all of us go in on a

13:01small place that

13:01we rent and we surf all the time. I said, dude, I wish I could do that. He's like, you

13:08can,

13:08all you got to do is move. And I heard this like, the simplicity of that comment. And I've never

13:16forgotten it. He was sitting to my left. He was like, you can, you can live here if you want.

13:20All you got to do is move. And I was just like, he's right. But you have all of these

13:26constraints

13:27about what you can and can't or should or shouldn't do. And no, I was not willing to give up

13:31all the

13:32other values of my life to go ride cars in Hawaii and go surfing, although it was cool. But the,

13:37but the point always stuck with me is I always have a choice. And we talked, you talked about

13:41Tony Robbins. He goes, he talks about decisions, decisions shaped your destiny. Like, what do you

13:48decide to do? What do you decide is pleasure? What do you decide is pain and how much of each

13:52guides your path? And, and that was a moment where it sounded cool, but it would have been more pain

13:59than the pleasure I would have gotten. So I stayed on the course, but I guess that's a long way

14:02of saying

14:04not to overcomplicate things. It's the, it can be a simple choice. Like I'm not going to do this

14:08anymore. I'm going to do that from now on. Like I get it. Well, and I use this phrase that

14:12people

14:13don't like most, everything that's going wrong in your life is probably your fault.

14:18But the good, now here's the good news. The good news is if it's your fault, you have the option,

14:23you have the ability to fix it because, because you were responsible in the first place. So now you can

14:28be responsible to fix it. If it, if it's not your fault, which is very rare that it's totally

14:34outside, then you can't fix it. So that's great. Like everything comes down to those choices.

14:39It's, and it's really interesting because there's a lot of people that work in places

14:43and they're super frustrated because they're given responsibility for solving problems, but

14:48they may not be given the authority that's commensurate with that responsibility and things

14:52continue to suffer. So that's a really terrible place to be when you're heavily accountable and

14:56held responsible for results, but you aren't given the freedom or latitude to do things the way,

15:00you know, they need to be done to get those results. So you become the scapegoat, terrible

15:04position to be in. I get it. When you're talking about your personal life, you have authority that

15:10is equivalent to your responsibility. If you don't like something, you can change it.

15:14Well, and in that case, you can just go get another job. I mean, like people are, people

15:19overcomplicate that decision. And I've proven so many times in my life that when I use fear to make

15:25decisions on keeping myself in a place where I shouldn't be. And then I get over that and I

15:30make the change, the opportunities that show up, you really, I can't even like this happened to me

15:36early, late 2025, early 2026. And like, I could not keep up with the new opportunities once I dumped

15:42the weight of the other. Sure. So let's get back to some of the early roadmaps that people can,

15:48might be able to use to see the tough spot coming before it occurs. What should a CEO or business

15:57leader do when they're physically at home, but their mind is still managing employees, customers,

16:03cashflow, and unfinished work? Because that's a tough one.

16:06Yeah, that's a really tough one. I have this, I have a technique that I'd like for you guys to

16:10try

16:10if you're listening to this and watching this, which is, I call it the threshold method.

16:13It's not overly complicated. So for most of us, we pull into the garage or we pull into the

16:19driveway or whatever. And we're, we've got to get out of our car and go through what in the

16:24construction world is just called a man door, like versus the garage door. So it's that door

16:29between the house and the garage, the door between the house and the outside. And I call it the threshold

16:35method because what I would like for you to practice, and you can do that this week, stop,

16:39whether it's 30 seconds, 60 seconds, 90 seconds, whatever it is. And, and literally,

16:45well, figuratively, figuratively change the hat that you're wearing. So if you imagine I've got my

16:51entrepreneur, CEO, employee hat on, I, I figuratively take that off and put a new hat on. And the new

16:56hat

16:56on is dad, husband, homeowner, all of those things. And, and it, it takes a little practice.

17:03It's a little bit meditative, meditative, but you literally change your mindset to like,

17:08all right, well, I'm leaving that crap on this side of the door. And I'm taking the, I'm embracing

17:15what my responsibilities are to be the husband, father, homeowner, friend, et cetera. That's on

17:20the other side of it. Perfect. So can you maybe tell us about a specific habit or operating principle

17:27that contributed to your business success, but created problems elsewhere in your life? And maybe

17:33what lesson did you take from that? Yeah, it's, it's poor focus really. Like it's, it's,

17:39it's, and priority, basically poor prioritization, which is I can, I, you know, I can put my head

17:46down and work 12, 14 hours a day. I did this in 2025. So I'm a, I'm a, sometimes I

17:51don't live what

17:51I preach, uh, which I think all of us, all of us have, have a challenge of doing, but that's

18:03a

18:03like, if I didn't have all this crap, I wouldn't have to do this, all that, all that stuff we

18:07already

18:07talked about. And so everything was out of balance. And so my wife came to me towards the end of

18:11the

18:11year in December, and she said, one of the worst phrases that you can hear, you're not being, she

18:16didn't say I wasn't the, but she said, you're not being the man that you need to be for me.

18:23And dude, like, I mean, that's a dagger, right?

18:27No wonder you've kept on with her for 31 years, right? But you know, we have that open and honest,

18:31honest relationship for her to be able to say that. And instantly it's another one 80, right?

18:35It's like, sometimes we just need to get the kick in the balls for lack of a better term,

18:40uh, or slap in the face and to be able to make that, make that choice to say, you know

18:44what?

18:44You're right. Like, and then, then the follow-up question in this is what I, I encourage major

18:49communication. No, don't leave anything unturned, just like you wouldn't at your business.

18:52I was like, well, how can I be better? Like, what things can I do right now?

18:56And so she gave me the list and it was time and it was different things that we could do.

19:00And so

19:00then I just did those. That's one of the things I think we screw up as entrepreneurs and business

19:05owners and CEOs and all that is like, we know what to do. And if it were in our business,

19:10we go do

19:11those things, but at home, we still know what to do. We just don't do it. So along those same

19:18lines,

19:19how do you approach deciding what must be, what must receive your attention now,

19:25rather than allowing maybe the loudest business problem to control your entire day?

19:31Well, I go back to what I said about building a life versus building a business. I have learned

19:35because I made this mistake early on and, and I really learned the lesson that I always default

19:42to my family and my, and my marriage, because that's the thing that's sustainable. Like, look,

19:48I can start, I've had 20 businesses so far. I could start another one, but can I really start

19:55a new family with a new wife? And you know, like you can do that, but it's a lot easier

19:59to just keep

19:59the one you have and make it really good. And I think that tends to be like, you just have

20:04to decide

20:06in my opinion, opinions vary, but you have to decide what you want to be the priority and then stick

20:13to

20:13that. And we do that in our business, right? Like we say, okay, well, this is, this is our goal

20:17for

20:17this year and everything we do and the decisions we make should be, we'll serve that goal. And if you

20:23do that with your family and your marriage, it'll be the same thing and your health. Like I'm a big

20:27health guy, like all of those things, you know, you have to, you stick to when, when the question

20:32comes up, it's not a hard answer because you've already defined what the answer is.

20:36So your book turns 17 difficult or unusual experiences into lessons and practical strategies.

20:44Can you maybe walk us through the process that you use to turn a painful experience into a

20:49principle that you can actually apply? Yeah. So I'm a really good problem solver. And I think

20:54most entrepreneurs and business owners and CEOs are, and so I use those problems. So

20:59you essentially need to evaluate what's happened. If it's a just, and again, we're talking to business

21:05owners. So if something happens, you do a debrief essentially, like in the military, they do a

21:10debrief on, you know, after action report. And so you look at the situation and you really get the

21:16takeaways from those things to say, okay, where did I screw up? Where did I go? You know, what things

21:21did I do right? What things did I do wrong? What things could I have done to, to affect the

21:25outcome

21:26either positive or negatively? And that becomes the lesson. And then, because that's the debrief,

21:31and then you use that lesson to say, okay, what, what things, what two or three things can I

21:36implement so that I have a strategy for moving forward? So if this situation presents itself in

21:42the future, I know how to handle it. So can you maybe tell us about a time when admitting that

21:48you were the problem changed the outcome and what made it possible for you to move from

21:53defensiveness to responsibility? Yeah. I mean, it's easy to go back to the marriage thing. Cause it's,

21:58it's kind of the, the number one for me is that I was a hundred percent in the wrong. My

22:01wife had no

22:03culpability in that. I made decisions that were counter to what I promised, what I, what I said

22:09at the altar that I was going to do. And so I just said, look, this is, I, this is

22:14me. And the good

22:15news is, like I said before, it was a hundred percent my fault, which means I was a hundred percent

22:19responsible for fixing. And so then I was able to take those lessons and say, look, you're working too.

22:25And you know, you can read the story in the book. It's a, it's a long story, but suffice it

22:29to say

22:30that by making that decision, I actually came out way ahead, even in my career, which then led to

22:37self-employment and entrepreneur journey. So those decisions can make a huge. So, you know what? I,

22:42I typically won't do this, but in you're willing to share your side of it. I, I was at that

22:49same

22:49point you were, but I wasn't an employee. It was a business that I built and I spent years and

22:56years

22:56and years and it was my baby. And our son was, I was married for 22 years and our son

23:01was an adult

23:02and it was, and, and Melissa and I have a great relationship to this day, which offline you and

23:09I talked about, and I'm going to share this in the hopes that others realize this is also possible.

23:14And she's an exceptional human being. Otherwise I wouldn't have married her in the first place.

23:18She continued is, was, and will always be very important to me. Wonderful mom. My kid hit the

23:22jackpot when it came to, to, to, to, you know, wonderful mom. And she was very supportive of

23:28the business. And at one point in time, when it came to the head, it was just like, I, I

23:33couldn't let

23:34the business go. I kept putting in those hours and those days and doing whatever it took, as long as

23:40it

23:40took, I refused to relent. I think I can do it all. And she suffered because of that and didn't

23:46feel

23:46like a priority. Justify me. So, and fortunately now, and she still works with me. Like we were,

23:52we're still that type, but both of us continue to operate in a world where our son, we look at

24:00him

24:00and say, Hey, I would never say or do anything to Melissa that my son wouldn't say dad handled that

24:07like a boss. He, he was kind, he was thoughtful. He did the right thing. And the reverse is also

24:13true so that it makes it very easy for us to continue working together because we have those

24:18filters and they're tied to our identity. But the, the, the thing that's the thing that I

24:24really wanted to share was some of the things that make that work. Oh, this is a credit to her

24:31because she owns a yoga studio. And when she became the entrepreneur that wasn't working for

24:37someone else, there were times where she would work seven days in a row and wouldn't know what

24:41day of the week it was or what month it was. And, and things just hit and happened. And because

24:48she is

24:48a world-class human being, she even came to me and she said, I'm sorry. I had no idea. Now

24:56I am

24:56walking in your shoes and I feel what I know on a smaller scale, what you felt earlier. Cause my

25:03son

25:03never went to daycare. She, you know, I worked in a way that we made enough that she was able

25:08to stay

25:08home. And I felt that, Hey, I'm doing my job. My, my son has a engaged mother who's paying attention

25:14and is always there. He's not in daycare being raised by someone else. And, you know, we're making

25:19enough money and stuff, but like, it was a constant push. Everything was great. But if, if I let go,

25:27it, it, that could all go away. The, the nature of my work requires continual effort, which I love

25:31doing. Don't get me wrong. But I thought that was a world-class human response for her to be able

25:37to

25:37say, Hey man, like, I am sorry. Now I know what you felt like. And I know that it's not

25:42that I wasn't

25:43a priority. It was that you were trying to do everything for all of us and you didn't want to

25:48fail in any of it.

25:49And you chose perseverance and paraphrasing a little bit, but like, I really appreciated that

25:56conversation. It just goes to me piling on about what a great human she is, but there's not a lot

26:03of people that would admit that, especially unnecessarily, but she did. And, and I of course

26:10was, I said, Hey, you know, Nope, I've been there. I understand. Keep pushing on. You can make it and

26:15you can do it. And she does have a very successful yoga, yoga instruction practice now, but, but like

26:21I just empathized and encouraged her to stick with it because that's what she's passionate about.

26:26But so it can be done, but that perseverance, let me ask you your opinion on this. So how do

26:32you know?

26:33Cause that's my lived experience. Your lived experience is very different. Now you're, you've

26:38been married for 31 years. I was married for 22 and I still got a great relationship with her.

26:42However, it's good, but she it's because she's a world-class world-class human being. So how do you

26:50know when perseverance is still the right response for lack of better word? And when continuing to

26:57push is actually making the situation worse. What's your insights on that? I think really,

27:02you brought it up, which is you're having this conversation post like post divorce, post all this,

27:08right. Which is, which is, and we talked about this offline, that your situation is extremely rare.

27:13Doesn't really happen very often at all to where the divorce goes through. You're still friends all,

27:19you know, you co-parent, but then you talk badly about each parent and all that crap.

27:23Yeah. That never happens ever. Yeah. But, but, and that's what I'm saying. Like,

27:27it's very rare that you would have that, but I think what it points to is that those conversations

27:32need to be had all along the way in an open and honest way so that then, you know, when

27:39to persevere

27:40and, and what to persevere on, because you can have the conversation say, you know, for me, it's like,

27:47Michelle, this is, you know, this is what we're facing. We're trying to build this in the next six

27:51months. And this is what it's going to look like, right? Like, this is what I think it should look

27:56like. And I will say, what do you think about that? How do you think that's going to impact you?

28:00How do you think that's going to impact our marriage? How do you think that's going to

28:03impact me as a, as a man? And to be able to have that conversation, because then she will say,

28:08look, I don't, you know, you can't go back to 14 hours a day. You get fatter, you're unhealthy.

28:14Our relationship suffers, all that is so we can talk through this. And, and my advice is always

28:20more communication than less communication and open, vulnerable, open, open, vulnerable,

28:26and honest conversation. That's a really good point. Cause I have the benefit of hindsight.

28:30And I'm willing to share this so that others can benefit from it. This is not fun for me to

28:35talk

28:35about, but, but I'm willing to do it. If it helps others, you can't unscramble eggs is what I,

28:41is what Dr. Chapman says. Yeah. So what you're saying there, like, cause I can remember times

28:47where I would be, it'd be late at night and I'm sitting at the laptop cause I have stuff that

28:52has

28:52deadlines and not has to get done period. I mean, it's, it's for me to be the responsible human being.

28:59I am. I'm good. It was necessary for me to get, I felt it was necessary for me to get

29:03those things accomplished, which meant I'm going to be working late. So she would come downstairs.

29:08I'm sitting on the laptop working on stuff and, and to her, you won't even close your laptop.

29:14I'm not a priority. You're not paying attention to me. And in my mind, I'm sitting there thinking

29:19like, I'm not in an office somewhere. I'm here in my, my presence is here and I'm making an effort

29:25to be around if they need me for something. And that was the next best thing. It's like,

29:32ultimately it would have been great. Put my laptop down. Hey, let's go do this. But that wasn't going

29:36to happen. I had two bad choices. One ignored my responsibility or the other ignored my responsibility.

29:42One was work and one was family. And I tried to blend the two together, but what you're saying

29:47would have been a better move. If I could look back to, Hey, look, this is what I'm going,

29:52this is what's on the line. This is when it's due. I could have not been here, but I chose

29:58to be here.

29:59So you're right. I'm, I didn't put the laptop down. I didn't stop. And I'm doing to go do whatever.

30:03This is why I'm not trying to make a habit of it, but I'd rather be here than not here.

30:09And,

30:09and the second that I'm done with it, that I can give you my full undivided attention and whatnot,

30:14but I didn't communicate that. I just like, I just got to get done with this. And as soon as

30:18I

30:18get done with it, then whatnot, what you're saying.

30:21Yeah. I mean, I, and I think there's something that we often owning it. That's me owning what you're

30:26saying. I love that. It's your fault. You can fix it, right? But here's, here's a great example.

30:31And I think that in that case, if we use that example, I add my own, the, we don't have

30:36to do

30:37huge things like close the laptop, go out for dinner, all of that stuff. Honestly, for most cases,

30:45it's literally closing the laptop and turning and being able to have the conversation with her at

30:51that time. I'll give you an example. Yeah, but here in, but it, it w it would require so much,

30:56so little effort and would require so little time, but it communicates so much.

31:00So we're in, I probably did the opposite without saying it. My body is probably like,

31:07can't you see? Yeah. Can't you see I'm busy? My body is like, I'd rather be doing something

31:14other than this right now, but it is necessary for me to do this. Like you're making it worse

31:19and it's going to take longer because you're distracting me from getting this done. And that

31:23would have been a disaster. So at least I had the sense to keep my mouth shut.

31:27Well, but we communicate that, right? I mean, it's so you're looking at, if you're on watching

31:32this on video, I'm, I'm in a section of my office, but my office and my chair is that way,

31:37which face the rear of my chair faces a door. So I'm turned away from the door. And so one

31:43of my bad

31:44habits was that when my wife would come in, she would sit, there's chairs behind me. She was sitting

31:49in the chair and I would not turn around to have these conversations. No. And, and, and she said,

31:55what, you know, all I need you to do is turn around. And so what I will do is I

31:59physically

31:59turn my chair. I engage with her 100% and we have a conversation. Now there are times when I'm

32:05like,

32:05dude, I'm right in the middle of a thought. Can I, can I come to the kitchen? Cause she stayed

32:09home,

32:10mom. She's been at home the whole time. I've been at, in my office at home the whole time,

32:14but that communicates volumes. Right. And so if you're listening to this, you don't have to plan

32:20a fricking two week vacation to a lot, communicate that your wife is important to you or your partner's

32:26important to you, whatever it is. You just have to do like the little things can make such a

32:32difference. So as technology makes leaders more reachable and businesses more demanding,

32:39what personal boundaries will become essential over the next few years, in your opinion?

32:43Do what I just did, which is I went up with 16 high level entrepreneurs up into the mountains

32:49of Montana and left my phone at base camp for six days. Okay. So no communication to the outside

32:56world for six days. And you lived. Oh, and the world didn't burn down. And my business, you know,

33:02the bank didn't foreclose on my house. It's all a miracle, right? Like, and what that showed me is I'm

33:06not as important. Like this stuff is really not as important as what I think it is. And it, it,

33:12it rarely is right. Like we're not carrying cancer. Most of us, we're not launching the

33:18space shuttle. We're not, you know, we don't have our hand on the button, you know, like

33:22there's no life and death for, for most of us. And so the encouragement would be like, do

33:28technology free Tuesdays and litter, and you could start small. You don't have to take the whole

33:34Tuesday, but maybe take the afternoon and say, look, I'm just going to put my phone in

33:38a box. They have lock boxes and turn off my, you know, better yet, go for a walk or go

33:44do

33:44something else. But I think realizing that, that technology and our access is actually hurting

33:51us and hurting our productivity, productivity. And dude, you can go on, ironically, chat, you

33:57beat your Claude and look up studies about this. It's a hundred percent proven that the more

34:01time we spend on devices, the least, the less productive we get.

34:05It's funny you say that because like, you're a little bit off topic, but not that much.

34:10It dry. It used to drive my friends and close family crazy because I have no notifications on

34:17my phone. If you send me a text, like I want to spend my time. If, if you and I

34:23are engaged

34:24in a business conversation or a personal conversation or a sporting event or whatever, I want to give

34:28that my undivided attention. And I refuse to, to have an electronic leash or a digital leash

34:35annoying me and distracting me all day long. So I have all my notifications turned off for

34:40my emails, for my texts, for my phone calls, nothing. When I have a moment in time, I, where

34:48I have a few minutes, then I will look at and see who texted me and what needs to be

34:51responded

34:52to. I will look at emails and batches and handle it. Or I will see who left, who called

34:58and left the voicemail. If I'm expecting an urgent call, then I will make my call available

35:03so I could hear it ring, but I usually have it on silent, but that's only if I'm expecting

35:06the call. Otherwise I give my undivided attention and I am so happy and so peaceful. People are

35:12like, well, what if it's an emergency? Well, then I've trained everyone around me to call

35:15someone else. It'll get handled and no one's ever died because they couldn't get ahold of

35:21me. Yeah. Emergency has a whole different meaning, but there, you know, if you've never

35:25done time blocking, which I don't know if you do time blocking, which is basically just

35:29dedicate points in your calendar that you, you know, like I only really check emails

35:34and texts first thing in the morning and then later in the afternoon, maybe two or three

35:38times a day, which helps a lot. And then my executive assistant, I love it because by the

35:42time I get up in the morning, she's already gone through and kicked out 98% of my email

35:46and only pens the ones that I actually need to look at. Huge, huge time saver, but time

35:51blocking works really well, but I love the notifications thing.

35:54So if you only had one piece of advice that you could give to people watching or listening,

35:59what would be the most important piece of advice you could offer and why?

36:04I kind of alluded to it earlier, but make the main thing, the main thing and realize that

36:09the main thing isn't actually your business and finances.

36:14Awesome. So if people want to know more about you, your book, I'm guessing speaking engagements,

36:19things like that, what are the best ways for them to learn more and interact and connect?

36:23Yeah, you can reach out to me at maxedoutman.com. You can email me at maxedoutkevin at gmail.

36:28That's an easy way to do it. I have a free gift called the Activated Marriage Toolkit,

36:32which gives you kind of some fun stuff, but date night ideas, conversation ideas, and some

36:37different things. And you can go to Toolkit, and you can put this in the show note, but go to

36:41toolkit.maxedoutman.com and you can find me there. And I'm on all the socials. There's some great

36:46content out there. Perfect. Thank you so much. I hope everyone else enjoyed our conversation as

36:51much as I did. And thank you. Thanks so much, Mason. Appreciate you.

The Leadership Trap: Success at Work, Failure at Home

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