As a serial entrepreneur, a mom, and the oldest daughter in an immigrant family, Georgie-Ann is a natural leader personally and professionally. But this life-long tendency is beginning to take a toll on her. Stevon offers strategies for relieving the pressure to be all things to all people.
Stevon Lewis is a licensed psychotherapist and coach. Learn more about his work here. If you loved this episode, be sure to listen to Still Needs Validation and When Self-Doubt Creeps Up.
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Stevon Lewis:
What's up everybody? Welcome to How to Talk to [High Achievers] about Anything. I'm Stevon Lewis, a licensed psychotherapist today. We welcome Georgie-Ann. Georgie-Ann has been an entrepreneur all her life. As a natural leader, an eager problem solver, she's always the first one to step up. But being the person to charge all the time is beginning to take a toll on her personally and impacting her professional growth. Let's get into it.
Georgie-Ann Getton:
My name is Georgie-Ann Getton and I am an entrepreneur, a mom, originally born and raised on the island of Jamaica, but I've spent the majority of my life here in the United States, specifically in New York. I am an average reader, learner, and lover of all things technology. I'm a part of a few different tech company boards, and I just really love to problem solve, run businesses, and just think of new ways to solve old problems. I started my first few businesses back in middle school, high school unofficial ones, but my official businesses I started in college and I have been an entrepreneur since. And so, where I'm at with this current phase is that one of my companies that I started, which is a business development company, it is in the scaling phase. So, we've passed a quarter million in revenue and that's kind of where the business is.
Georgie-Ann: And as for me personally, I'm in a rediscovery phase because I've been entrepreneurial for so long. I've been in this leadership role in various ways from school clubs to again, being a parent, to being an entrepreneur that I'm looking for more spaces where I don't have to take on such a heavy leadership role, where I'll be more of a learner, a student than just the person in charge. I have been in charge the majority of my life. I'm the oldest of about six siblings. My family immigrated from Jamaica to the United States when I was around seven years old, I kind of became the translator for my family. So, if the phone rang and it was somebody more business like, Hey, you come talk to the person or something technology based because I've always been passionate about technology, I would be the go-to.
Georgie-Ann: So, I would be like fixing stuff, leading conversations, planning things. So, that was like my role in the family, the classic oldest daughter syndrome being in charge, being the one that is looked to for direction. And then when I became a mom that just amplified even more. And even before that my friend groups, they will joke around like, oh, you're the mom of the group. It came with a lot of pride and joy to know that I could protect and help and support folks. But as I've gotten older, I've started to question who's there for me? If I don't want to be on a hundred today, will I be supported? Will I fall to the ground? Or are there people around me, things, resources around me that will hold me up in those moments? Between the ages of 23 to 25, I call it my little quarter life crisis.
Georgie-Ann: I had moved away from locally from my family. So, my nuclear family at that time because I had gotten married and I was living upstate New York and I was so far away from everyone. It was very emotionally draining. I had two small children. My ex-husband at the time, who was my husband at the time was always working. And I just felt like, okay, I know no one in this neighborhood, who do I even talk to? I started questioning what activities are just for me because I realized so many of my tasks day to day were for everyone else around me. I started to become resentful of that. I just needed a moment. I just needed a day. I just needed to get away for a second, celebrate, or have some fun. And I didn't even know what that could look like.
Georgie-Ann: So, this idea of working at another company or being a CEO at another company for maybe a year, maybe two years has been floating around in my head just to one, bring my expertise and my knowledge to that organization as well as to see what else is out there. I think what it would do to the other parts of my life is potentially give me back more time, feel less, how can I say it? Less pressured to keep my brain on because with my businesses, every single thing that I see and everything that I do is so wrapped up into the business. And I think where I would be working for somebody else, I'll be able to give myself more permission, potentially even build up a habit to separate a little bit, more not take work home so often, right? If somebody else is at the head of an organization, I think I'll get an opportunity to tap into that creative side a little bit more versus just the analytical side, which is what I use mostly in my businesses and bring those insights out for their organization.
Georgie-Ann: And then also think of ways to bring that back to my own. That's what I'm thinking. I may be completely wrong, but that's kind of how I have this like fairytaled out in my head. It has definitely been a challenge to balance being in charge slash wanting to be in charge and letting go of that power. My brain will be like, oh, I have the solution, like that's instantly. When I see something, I almost always have some type of idea, problem solve, and it has been really a task to tell myself, allow the person to if they're going to fail or if they're going to succeed, allow that person to try or allow that organization to try. If I jump in too soon or try to be controlling too much, I'm taking away that gift of learning. It has been a journey and a process finding that middle ground, but I'm learning and it makes it fun to test myself in this way.
Lewis: Georgie-Ann, thanks for sharing what you're going through. As I listened to Georgie-Ann, what stood out for me were a few things. First for her, she's had a lot of success early on in life. And so, in her life as an adult, that's the role she's assumed is I am the fixer. I am the problem solver. I am the person to get things done and that's led to her being successful. It's also very exhausting and she's tired. In my work with high achievers, this sort of experience is fairly common. And what you find is that in the success comes pressure. So, on the surface, what we see as someone who's doing really well in life. And so, they're relied upon a lot more. What we don't see underneath is this intense pressure to show up and be all things to all people. And I think that pressure is where Georgie-Ann is right now and why she's wanting a bit of reprieve or a respite.
She's wanting to take a break. She's like, let me just work for a company. Have a boss that I report into and I give them some ideas and they give me some ideas. And she's looking for a little bit of that mentorship because she's had to be that for everyone else and for herself. For someone that's in a position where they're frequently the go-to person in their circles, I give some advice that they probably don't want to hear. And it's this idea of accepting the fact that this is you. I don't know that Georgie-Ann's ever going to be in a position even if she worked for a company where she won't end up being out front. Her work ethic, her skillset, her abilities are always going to elevate her or put her at a place above or beyond maybe the rest of the people in her circle ecology.
And that she has to get to a place of where she's able to accept that's going to be her. Embrace it, own it. It is who you are. It's a gift you've been given, comes as a burden sometimes. And I know she spoke of looking for like a mentor and wanting to learn from others. And I'm wondering if she's thinking of that as a need, as opposed to a want. And I don't know that she needs that because she's been successful already. And so, that may be what she's looking for, she already has and the person she's looking for is herself. I'm big on language and people will often talk about, I need to have this or I need this. I'm really quick to challenge or interrupt that. For me, a need is something that has to be present for you to be able to survive, that without it you can't continue to thrive or do well in life.
Lewis: A want is something that would be beneficial that we desire, but isn't quite necessary. And so, she's looking for something she's never had. And I think she even cautioned against it in her language in saying, well in my fairy tale, I believe that this is what I need or what I want, realizing that maybe she gets it and it's not all it's cracked up to be. And so, I'm really clear about making people understand or be aware of the fact that what you tell yourself you need, you will become frustrated over if you don't have it. I don't want people to discredit their wants or feel as though their wants aren't valid or important. I also don't want you to get so tied to them and it's really important for you to again, to not feel that pressure or to not be disillusioned with where you are to accept the fact that if you're getting good results, what you tell yourself you need, may not be necessary.
And I think for Georgie-Ann, she wants some rest. She's looking for mentorship. She may be disappointed in the idea or the realization that the person she thought would be able to mentor her and she would be able to learn from and gain from isn't able to meet those expectations. What I've noticed with high achievers is this tendency to want to have others show up in their lives in the way that they've been able to show up in the lives of others. Because again, they operate at a very high level and because they do, and that's where they live, the belief is that other people can do the same and that's just not true at all. So, when I hear Georgie-Ann asking for or wanting or desiring for some support, she's looking for that support to come from other people. And that's why I don't think people will like the response is because I'm saying, well, it's up to you.
And that doesn't really sound compassionate or comforting. It's like, I'm exhausted, I want somebody else to show up. And I'm not saying you have to continue to do for others and do for yourself at the same time and that way. I'm saying that you know what you need and what's best for you. So, then it's important for you to create or set up moments or create boundaries for you to be able to give yourself what you need. If that means then that for you to do well in life, do all the things that you do, you need to be able to get eight hours of sleep. Then you need to make that a non-negotiable for you. You can't continue to try to show up for other people or attend to the request of others if you need that to be able to perform high at a high level. Because you do something well and then this happens often you get rewarded with more requests to do more things.
It's unfortunate, right? We would think that when we do something good, we would get rewarded with rest and support. That's not how it works. People are like, oh, this person does this thing really well. Let's give them more things to do, so that they get done really well. People are looking to get their needs met. If that's you in life, you're the person meeting other people's needs, it becomes your responsibility to meet your own needs. And that's not a selfish thing, you don't need to feel guilty about that. You've got to show up for you. One major takeaway from Georgie-Ann's experience being a high achiever and being successful, it comes out of cost. There's this dichotomy in her situation where she wants to relax and there's also this fear that other people will not fill the void if she does take a step back. And so, she stays stuck in the position she's in unhappily. I think it's really important for people to be aware that your role maybe is to not be savior.
Lewis: And when you're a high achiever, overachiever, letting something not be what you envision you could make, it is very hard to do. She spoke about this a little bit of trying to push herself to let things play out as they would and maybe it won't get to the 99% we know it can. And that's hard for her because she knows if she steps in, she can make it 99. And I'm saying you can get that level of success, the 99% at what cost to you? What are you sacrificing to do that? I want people to keep in mind that comes at price and who's paying for it? We get promotions. We are celebrated by others. We win awards. There's also the sacrifice you make in terms of your time to do other things, your neglect of yourself and your own needs. We'll get to a place of thinking about the next accomplishment and we will forget that part of that needs to be rest. And when we are resting, we feel like we aren't being productive or that we aren't doing something we should be doing.
And I think that people need to broaden their definition of success to include rest and to include attending to one's self, so that productivity is not only associated with doing things that doing nothing might be something that is really important for you in the moment.
And that's a wrap. Thank you so much for listening to How to Talk to [High Achievers] about Anything. We have really big plans for our show and we want you to be a part of it. We want to hear about your successes and challenges, your sacrifices, the ways you've celebrated, and what's ahead as you grow. Send our producer, Virginia an email and we'll get your story on the show. She's at virginia@lwcstudios.com. How to Talk to [High Achievers] about Anything is an original production of LWC Studios. Virginia Lora is the show's producer. Kojin Tashiro is our mixer. Juleyka Lantigua is a creator and executive producer. I'm Stevon Lewis on Twitter and Instagram, we're at talk to achievers. Bye everybody.
CITATION:
Lewis, Stevon, host. “Tired of Always Being in Charge”
How to Talk to [High Achievers] about Anything,
LWC Studios., May 16, 2022. Talktohighachievers.com