653 | Finding Balance: Leading Without Losing Yourself

Leadership without balance isn't sustainable. Today we're talking about how coaching helps leaders break unhealthy patterns, reclaim their lives, and lead with clarity at work and at home. That is coming up next.

Welcome to The Chris LoCurto Show, where we discuss leadership and life and discover that business is what you do, not who you are.

Welcome to the show, folks. I hope you're having a fabulous day wherever you are.

Today we are talking about how leadership isn't just about running teams or making decisions. It's about the life you're creating in the process.

And I think so many people never even spend time thinking about that, that this isn't just something you go and do. This is a massive part of. Of your life.

And for so many leaders I've coached, the reality is this, they're burned out, they're exhausted, they're running on empty, or they were.

But today I want to talk about how coaching helps restore balance. And I think that's one of the things that we have focused on heavily with so many of our clients is what is balance?

And adjusting out this concept that if you're not working 100 hours, you're not doing enough, you're not good enough, you're not worthy enough.

Listen, there is not a perfect balance, but there is a sustainable rhythm where you can be healthy, you can be effective, and you can be fully present with the people who matter most.

So we're going to walk through five key areas where coaching helps leaders break cycles, reclaim their energy, and start living differently.

1. Recognizing When You’re Out of Balance (00:01:48)

Now, the first key, the number one key, is awareness. You must recognize when you're out of balance. That is a must.

If you are not able to see that your life is out of balance, that, you know. And again, work life balance is not an equal thing.

It can't be, you know, there. There isn't. You don't have the ability to spend as much time at work as you need to and then have that same amount of hours in your personal life.

You could, you could make that happen. But somewhere in there, you've got to put in sleep, food, you know, some level of health, exercise, if possible, all these things, right? So there's no perfect balance.

We haven't found that you can get there, but there is balancing your work life, right? Your work and your life. And that's what we're trying to focus on.

But the first step is, if you're going to change anything, you have to start with being aware what needs to be changed, what needs to be focused on. So the first step to change is awareness.

And most leaders don't even realize just how unbalanced they've become until it's affecting their health, until it's affecting relationships, until it's affecting their joy.

And, and unfortunately, even at that point, many people don't tie it to the lack of balance in their life. I've worked with many clients that have, you know, worked 70 plus hours because, you know, the thought process is, well, that's just the cost of leadership, right?

You just have to continue to work those many hours. And they never realized how much that was bleeding into their family life.

And then after spending time coaching with them and walking them through this. So here's what you need to understand about quality coaching. When you find a quality coach, somebody who understands.

I'll give you an example. When I started racing formula cars years ago, I'm somebody who always gets coaching.

I'm somebody who's always looking to somebody who knows something about something I'm trying to accomplish and, and to get them to give me information, guide me, direct me, speak to me in a way that I understand it, coach me in a way that I understand it.

And when I started, I was getting these data coaches. You know, these are great people. They're coming with the team that I'm racing with and they understand data like crazy.

And I would go out there and I would run as hard as I could. I'd be racing around and, you know, we'd be doing practice laps or it would be in races and we'd come back and sit in and just really tear it apart and go through the data.

And I would hear these things like, well, you can do that faster. Well, you shouldn't have done this here, or you shouldn't do this over on this place. You need to change. And I would get all this information.

I go, well, but help me to understand why, because how can I do that piece faster? Well, you, you just can. Because other people do. Well, you just can. Didn't help me, right?

There were things. I remember one time, this crazy first turn at Road Atlanta where I just walked the car out to the edge, hit the grass, slid all the way to the wall. It's super, super fast, super fast turn, crazy fast.

And could not understand why that happened until I got a driver coach. Now, what is a driver coach? A driver coach is somebody who is an actual driver and they understand it's not just data.

They understand the data, but they understand the car, they understand the process. And it was so amazing that I sat down with this driver coach and I'm like, look at this situation. What did I do wrong? Help me to understand.

Because the concept of I can go faster when I just slid out, you know, went across the grass into the tires isn't resonating with me. And he looked over my day and he goes, oh, it's because you lifted.

And I was like, right, yeah, I was going in. It was very fast. He goes, yeah. In that turn, you have to power down.

Explain that to me. The more you put power to the, the tire, the outside tire, the more it's going to actually hold you through that turn. You have to trust that the power is going to hold you.

But the moment you start to lift a little bit, you're taking air off the car, which makes that back end wobbly.

And that's why you walked it all the way out to the grass. I immediately got out there, went out, ran around the truck, came into turn one, kept that power down like crazy and bam. What a massive difference. I held that turn.

I was able to increase my speed, I think by like 10 miles an hour. It was incredible, right?

It took me a couple of laps to get there, but once I could trust that that's what I was doing and needed to do, all of a sudden it increased my ability. What am I saying?

If you don't have the person who understands they're not the right coach.

If you don't have the person that can figure out and see why you're doing what you're doing and experiencing what you're experiencing and you know, understand why you're spending 70 plus hours and how it's affecting your business and your family and your personal life and your health, then that's not a coach that you want.

Don't have that person on your team.

Don't give that person your hard earned money. Find somebody who understands what it's like to be in the seat you're in. Find somebody who understands what it's like to run a business or many businesses.

Find people who get it because when you do, they also understand the other aspects of your life because they've been there and they've learned how to overcome or they've learned how to fix, or they've learned how to change or adjust or whatever.

You hear me all the time on this show talk about how important not losing your family is, how important remembering what your kids names are, that you're not spending so much time at work that you forget what it's like to hang out with your own kids. Right?

I get it. Because I've been doing it for 30 years. 30 plus years, actually. I get it. That's what you need in your life.

You need somebody who goes, here's how to make your business way more effective, way more efficient, way more whatever we're trying to accomplish without sacrificing your personal life.

But it all starts with one very important thing. Awareness. If you are not aware, then you can't fix it. You can't fix what you won't face. And coaching gives you clarity about what's really happening in your life.

2. Breaking the Pattern of Overwork (00:09:15)

Number two, breaking the pattern of overwork.

Many leaders are stuck in generational or cultural patterns of workaholism. They saw it modeled. It's what they understand. So they repeat it. Now you will never hear me say, don't go work your butt off.

I am a huge advocate of busting your butt. I just want you to do it correctly. I want you to do it efficiently. I don't want you to work 90 plus hours because you saw somebody else do it and you think it's the right thing to do.

I want you to work hard. I want you to be proud of yourself. I want you to know that you've done a great job and yet you still have plenty of time in your day for life, for your family, for rest.

These are all things that are necessary for you. But if you are stuck in the addiction of workaholism, which is, I have to be working 24 7, I've got to always be doing something, then guess what?

You are going to watch your life fall apart. It is not going to be what you want it to be.

You've probably, if I sat you down and I can't tell you how many folks in Next-Level Life that I have, I mean, tons of people that would talk about how, you know, they had a dad or a mom who was always working and always providing.

And when I asked the question, hey, what did you see about that?

Well, you know, that's the reason why we got to do a vacation or that's the reason why we got to have some toys or, you know, some stuff or whatever. Whatever. Or a bigger house or whatever.

Every single time, Every single time I've ever asked the question, let me ask you, would you rather have had all of that stuff that your parent working like that provided, or would you have rather had more time with that parent growing up?

Every single time. There has never been a time that somebody has said, oh, yeah, I'm glad they worked that hard. So we had stuff. Every single time.

Adult people have said, no, I wish I actually had more time with my dad or I wish I had more time with my mom. Every single time.

So if you have convinced yourself that working non stop because you watched parents do it is going to create some phenomenal expectation in your career, guess what?

It could. You might. But I can tell you what your kids are thinking. I'd rather you be home a little bit more. That's not saying be lazy and don't work hard. Do not confuse that. What I'm saying is the addiction of workaholism.

I must always be, I've got to work more, I've got to do more, I've got more, more, more, more, more work. Why? Well, because I have to provide.

What do you have to provide? People put a roof over the head, give them food, clothing, you know, provide the necessities. But at the end of the day, your kids want time with you, your spouse, hopefully your spouse wants time with you. Right?

When you have a good coach, they help you identify the destructive patterns and choose a healthier way to still accomplish your work goals, your business goals, without you messing up your personal life, without messing up relationships.

It's not difficult. You just have to know how to do this correctly. I run multiple businesses and I have a fantastic family and I love spending time with my family. And I'm somebody.

My family, we honor Sabbath, we honor rest because God tells us to. We're supposed to. And I will tell you, when we started doing that, massive change for us, we look forward to it every single week.

That rest is important. It's vital. So I will tell you, having somebody who actually understands what it's like to work your butt off, I've always been working my butt off. I just became really good at the efficiency piece.

What things should we be focusing on? What things should we be working hard on? Focus on those pieces.

Get somebody who can help you and coach you in that and you will be blown away by how it will change not only the growth of your business, but but the growth of your personal life as well.

3. Creating Space for What Matters Most (00:14:10)

Number three, creating space for what matters most.

Folks, balance isn't about equal time. It's about intentional time. Let me say that again. Work life balance isn't about equal time, it's about intentional time.

So when you do something like building an intentional habit of shutting work down at a specific time, for me that's a must. My work stops usually by 6pm at night.

Sometimes it's earlier, sometimes it's, I need it to be shut down by 5pm sometimes in the dead of the winter, I might try to get it even shut down, you know, specific days a little bit earlier if possible.

It just kind of depends when we're doing events and, you know, StratPlans and all this stuff and we're running and it, you know, it's exhausting.

Then I don't mind looking at a day and going, I need to rest a little bit more since I've been running so hard this week. Right, here's what you will find out when you make a habit of shutting down your work.

Let's say you shut down your work, nothing is done past 6pm you close out your day like we teach, you know, we teach people how to close out their day so their, their work doesn't stay with them all night long.

You're not constantly going back to your phone or having your send yourself emails.

You know, you set up something so first thing in the morning you know exactly what you're going to tackle and you're going to rock on with that. This is what we'd help people to do.

When you do this, you will find that within weeks your evenings are going to feel radically different. Now the first week it's probably going to feel awkward.

I feel like I have to do something, I have to do something. Because you've had this force of habit of having to email yourself or text yourself or whatever it is that you're doing or text team members.

But when you learn how to handle your day, how to schedule your day, how to mark your time for what you're working on and how to close out your day properly so you set the next day up, you will be amazed at how your evenings go.

You'll be amazed at how you're not going to bed. Listen, my head hits the pill-- my wife hates it because my head hits the pillow and I'm gone. I am out. And for her it usually takes her about five, 10 minutes or so before she can get some z's.

But how many people do I know that can lay in bed for 30, 45 minutes, an hour, processing. They'll wake up in the middle of the night, they're processing what they need to get done.

They forgot something, they have to go write something down. They get up in the morning, they're, you know, they have not had quality sleep and they're, you know, running and gunning in their mind already.

That's not my life, folks. That's not our team's life. That's not how we live. We close out our day properly, we know what to hit first thing in the morning we know what it looks like.

You know, my wife and I get up, we get to spend time together. In scripture, we get to spend time together focusing on our relationship. We get to spend time together with our youngest daughter.

These are things that are important when you have coaching. It creates accountability for living your priorities, not just talking about them. So stop talking about what's a priority and start living it.

4. Rebuilding Relationships Through Humility (00:17:35)

Number four, rebuilding relationships through humility.

Now, sometimes the hardest part of regaining balance is admitting where you've fallen short. Folks, listen, there is such freedom in taking responsibility.

There is such freedom in going, you know what? I have done this wrong. I have run too hard. I have made the wrong things greater priorities.

There is such freedom when you apologize to your spouse, to your kids for being absent, often for, you know, helping them to see that, you realize that it's had an impact.

When you do this, you're going to often discover that those moments of humility build way more respect and loyalty than years of overwork ever could possibly do. Right?

Your kids don't grow up and become adults sitting in our Next-Level Life chairs going, man, I really respect that. My parent worked way more than they spent time with us. We never got to see him, but again, we had a great car.

That's not it. You will find that you will build incredible bonds with your family when you bust your butt and then spend proper time with your family. You don't continue to.

You don't bring your cell phone to the dinner table. You're not texting at the dinner table. You're not texting while you're spending time with your-- your spouse. You're not texting while you're supposed to be having fun with your kids, those things aren't happening.

And if you go, you know, for those of you that are old enough to remember the, the old song Cat in the Cradle, what are you teaching your kids? You're teaching them that their greatest worth.

Listen to me on this, get this. You're teaching them that their greatest worth is how hard they work. And I promise you, it's not even remotely close.

Their greatest worth is what God says their greatest worth is, which is the opportunity to be his child, right?

His heir. That's the first place that we look for worth. Work doesn't show up for a little bit down the line, right?

So coaching helps leaders take that ownership, helps them to restore trust and, you know, loyalty and model what healthy leadership looks like.

So at home, your kids and your spouse get to see what it should be, not what worth being lost in work looks like. Instead they get to see, yeah, my parents work hard, they bust it.

But the greatest thing is the time that we get to spend with them.

5. Sustaining Balance Through Leadership Growth (00:20:34)

Number five, sustaining balance through leadership growth. Finding balance isn't a one time decision.

You are not going to do one event, one thing and then all of a sudden you've found balance and you know everything has changed. This is an ongoing process of growth. It is something you have to be committed to. It is something you have to be intentional about.

It is something you have to be proactive about. About leaders who continue in coaching learn to say no wisely. They learn to delegate more effectively.

They learn to build teams that thrive without constant micromanagement. I can tell you this, you, I just spent an entire week doing a StratPlan, not leading my business, not leading the leaders.

I have got leaders that are out speaking at massive companies worldwide.

Well known company that would, you know, we can't mention unfortunately. But one of my leaders is spending two weeks there, the other one is spending a week there teaching, training, growing. And yet they still lead people. Right?

I've got another leader who has gone to another company teaching, leading, guiding. I spent time doing this. And yet our company continues to grow. Our company continues to operate. No fires, no problems, no issues.

Great team members operating with excellence, efficiency, care, concern. They're doing a phenomenal job. This is because we don't have to constantly micromanage. We choose not to micromanage.

We choose to lead, to train, to guide, to, to direct. And because we do that, none of us leaders are having to spend incredible amounts of time getting caught up, if you will, because we have delegated properly, we have the right roles for us as leaders.

We have the time to do the very things that we're doing. So we get to come home to our families and rock on. You need that type of balance.

And a massive part of it is learning from somebody who can show you you where to say no. You've probably heard the old saying, every time you say yes, you're saying no to something else, right?

Well guess what? Many times you need to be saying no to a lot of things so you can say yes to the right stuff.

Balance grows as your leadership grows and coaching equips you with the tools to stay healthy and effective. Not just for today, but long term.

Next-Level Leadership LIVE Event 2026 (00:23:43)

Now I've seen it happen. Year after year, leaders show up overwhelmed, burnt out or stuck in old patterns.

I think about the leaders I've coached over the years who finally stepped out of the Leadership Crazy Cycle and almost every one of them has said, Chris, I wish I'd have done this sooner.

Because once they get their team aligned, everything changed. This is why. This is why we created the Next-Level Leadership LIVE Event. It's what it's all about.

In just three days, you'll gain clarity, you'll gain tools, you'll gain strategies to transform not only your business, but your relationships and your personal life as well. I'm telling you, we focus on it all because we want you to have that balance.

So if you know it's time for a reset, if you're ready to lead with balance, with confidence, and with direction, join us. Make the decision to join us at the Next-Level Leadership LIVE Event.

You can learn way more about this and you can register by going to chrislocurto.com/liveevent. One word. chrislocurto.com/liveevent.

Action Steps (00:25:03)

Now, in the meantime, here are some action steps you can apply right now.

First, identify one area of your life that feels out of balance. Pick one. Don't try and figure everything out. Don't try and solve 14 different problems that you have. Identify one area of your life that feels out of balance.

Ask yourself, what's one step I can take this week to start shifting that to getting it into balance? Consider the role of accountability.

You know, who's walking with you, who's guiding you, who's helping you to make sure that the change sticks, who's giving you wisdom from decades of experience on how to make the change stick.

Additional Resources (00:25:50)

Also, other resources, go to the podcast episode 622 | Boldness vs. Burnout: Reclaiming Your Energy to Lead with Confidence.

In this episode, we hit the topic head on because too many leaders are silently battling burnout, thinking it's just part of the job. Spoiler alert. It is not. It is not.

Also great blog post: From Burnout to Balance: How Leaders Can Manage Stress and Recharge.

Here we explore how to go from burnout to balance with intentional steps so you can manage stress, find balance and and recharge so you can lead your team effectively.

Guys, these resources are powerful for you. They will help you accomplish literally what we're talking about, right?

Conclusion (00:26:36)

That's why you're listening to the shows, because you know this content is. Is fabulous. It's helpful, right?

So life balance isn't about perfection. It's never going to be. It's about alignment. Coaching helps you see what really matters. It helps you break old patterns and step into a new way of living and leading.

So if you've been running on empty, remember this. You don't have to stay stuck in the Cycle. You can reset, you can restore, and you can start leading in a way that brings life to your work, to your family, and to yourself.

Well, folks, that is all the time that we have for today. I hope this has been crazy powerful for you.

I hope this helps you to make quality decisions, to own your life, to bust your butt, to be proud of yourself with what you do at work, but even to be more proud of how you live your home life, your family life.

So with all of this, as always, take this information. Change your leadership. Change your business. Business, Change your life. And join us on the next episode.