Hijacked by Busy: Overbooked and Underconnected with Zach Manntai
Partner with work of CareImpact and Journey With Care!
Description
The Cost of Indifference Series: Episode 1
Have we allowed busyness to overshadow what truly matters in our lives?
Journey With Care explores this pressing question with guest Zach Manntai, who delves into the addictive nature of modern busyness fueled by constant technological distractions.
Hosts Wendi Park and Johan Heinrichs engage with Zach in a conversation about decision paralysis, the undervalued principle of saying 'no,' and the profound impact of purposeful, intentional relationships.
Amid discussions of mental burnout, capacity, and the critical importance of Sabbath and reflection, they provide a roadmap for reclaiming focus and compassion in everyday life.
This is a challenge slow down and intentionally invest time in our immediate surroundings, encouraging moments of pause and genuine connection.
Time Stamps
[04:49] Grounding Through Connection and Presence
[08:37] Intentional Community Building
[12:27] "Sociological Limits on Relationships"
[15:27] Scaling Ideas and Self-Acceptance
[17:15] Discovering Authentic Self Through Belovedness
[23:11] "Learning to Say No"
[24:16] "Sabbath: Embracing Rest for Renewal"
[29:47] Responding to Community Needs Interruptions
[31:17] Assessing Capacity for Commitments
[36:57] Walking with God for Peace
[38:52] "Sabbath and Restful Living"
[42:15] Technological Overload Hinders Human Connection
[48:29] Segment: Care Lingo: Compassion Fatigue
Guest Links
For the City (Calgary): https://cschurch.ca/centre-for-the-city
Other Links
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Reach out to us! https://careimpact.ca/podcast
Email: podcast@careimpact.ca
About the CarePortal: careimpact.ca/careportal
DONATE! Help connect and equip more churches across Canada to effectively journey well in community with the most vulnerable: careimpact.ca/donate
Transcript
Dopamine hits from from technology beeps and
Speaker:notifications and doom scrolling and this constant feed of
Speaker:information have created
Speaker:a brokenness in us where we don't actually know how to slow down and
Speaker:how to be bored, how to connect with people right in front of
Speaker:us. Because these amazing technological
Speaker:marvels and this massive amount of humans all around us
Speaker:content creating all the time, they're a facsimile for
Speaker:connection. Do you feel stretched too thin to
Speaker:truly care? It's something that many of us wrestle with more often than Wendi like
Speaker:to admit. Between endless to do list, daily demands, and
Speaker:good intentions, it's easy to miss out on what matters most. But here's
Speaker:the truth. The antidote to being hijacked by busy isn't doing
Speaker:less, it's focusing on what matters most.
Speaker:This is Journey with Care, a podcast by CareImpact where curious
Speaker:Canadians find inspiration to love others well through real life
Speaker:stories and honest conversations.
Speaker:Hey, Johan here. Today, we're diving into a topic that feels all too familiar,
Speaker:being hijacked by busy. How does busyness and decision
Speaker:paralysis prevent us from showing up with compassion? And how can we
Speaker:reclaim our focus and make room for the people that matter the most?
Speaker:Here's a personal scenario, one that's played out in my life more times than I'd
Speaker:like to admit. You see, I'm a list guy. There's nothing more
Speaker:satisfying than starting my day with a plan. Tasks written in my dollar
Speaker:store notebook, ready to be checked off. And if I don't make my list the
Speaker:night before, I often can't sleep. My brain just keeps going and
Speaker:going. Don't forget that email. Remember to clean the inbox. Oh,
Speaker:and make sure you message this person, and don't leave your guitar out. It's way
Speaker:too dry, and it might Zach. And that's actually happened
Speaker:before. So it's kind of a recurring nightmare that I have, but
Speaker:you get the idea. When I'm in the zone moving through my list, I feel
Speaker:productive. I feel like I'm doing something that matters. But
Speaker:occasionally, more often than I'd like to admit, my laser focus
Speaker:comes at a cost. There are times when my wife would try to talk to
Speaker:me, just, you know, connect after a long day working at a school. She might
Speaker:have something weighing on her heart or she just wants to share about her day.
Speaker:Just connect. But instead of leaning in, instead
Speaker:of asking how she's doing, I get stuck in my own
Speaker:head. I'll just sometimes nod and say, uh-huh. But I'm really just
Speaker:thinking about my next task. The next thing I can check off my
Speaker:list. Or worse, I'll be snappy at her because her timing just doesn't fit
Speaker:into my perfectly planned out day. But here's the thing. It's
Speaker:not because I don't wanna be there for her. It's because I've allowed
Speaker:my focus to be hijacked by busyness. Moments like
Speaker:these remind me just how easy it is to let the urgent overshadow the
Speaker:important. And that's exactly what we're getting into today. How does
Speaker:busyness and decision paralysis block us from showing up with compassion?
Speaker:And more importantly, how can we reclaim our focus to make room for
Speaker:the people and moments that truly matter? Joining us is Zach
Speaker:Manntai, a returning guest who has a lot to bring to this conversation.
Speaker:But before I get into it, we just wanna thank you for following along and
Speaker:sharing these conversations. The best way we can grow this podcast is through
Speaker:word-of-mouth. And, hey, if you like to support the podcast or if you
Speaker:wanna sponsor an episode, head over to CareImpact.ca/podcast.
Speaker:And I also wanna invite you to join our Facebook group. It's called the
Speaker:CareImpact Podcast Group. It's a place to continue this
Speaker:conversation beyond the podcast. Like minded people, we're having polls,
Speaker:discussions around topics, announcements about upcoming meetups and
Speaker:events, and even opportunities for you to get involved in future episodes.
Speaker:So find it on Karen Zach Facebook page or use the direct link
Speaker:in the show notes. Alright. Our guest is Zach
Speaker:Manntai. Zach is the leader of For the City based in Calgary,
Speaker:an organization that drives community transformation through bold ideas
Speaker:and meaningful connections. He has a unique ability to cut through the
Speaker:noise and focus on what truly matters. Zach is here to help us
Speaker:explore how we can reclaim focus and overcome decision
Speaker:paralysis to show up with compassion. And with Zach joining
Speaker:me is my cohost, Wendi. Wendi, you wanna start our conversation off
Speaker:here? Zach, I'm so excited to have this conversation with you
Speaker:and Johan, and we're gonna be talking about busyness. And
Speaker:that's something that's near and dear. Like, we've all had scheduling issues, and,
Speaker:we have full lives. So so this is a a a conversation we
Speaker:can all take to heart. So we're just so glad that you're in the
Speaker:real. This is a conversation we can all relate to. I'm just curious
Speaker:to start us off. What is some habit or
Speaker:mindset shift that helps you stay focused on what matters
Speaker:most in a season of busy? I think
Speaker:the honest truth is that this is as much aspirational
Speaker:as it is directional where it's like, I think I should be doing this. I
Speaker:want to be doing this as it is something that I actually do. A
Speaker:big part of what I think does ground me, though, is my connection to
Speaker:the people and and things in my direct vicinity, things that are going on in
Speaker:my neighborhood, things that are coming and going in my
Speaker:home, stuff that actually affects my family, and
Speaker:trying to think about how my actions and the time I
Speaker:spend in these things can be really
Speaker:impactful. One of the things that we can easily do in this world is just
Speaker:get overwhelmed with noise and all of this sense
Speaker:of not enough. And I think that if I sit back and I sit in
Speaker:a chair, I think I posted on the socials the other day,
Speaker:starting my morning with a cup of coffee and a book with my kids
Speaker:is a really grounding way. Now I acknowledge that that's a privileged
Speaker:ability to be able to do that. But just being able to turn off some
Speaker:of my devices and sit in a space and be with them,
Speaker:it's really helped me remember what matters most. I
Speaker:find there's there seems to be a culture of glorification of busyness
Speaker:almost, and it's often at a cost. I know even for myself, like Wendi I'm
Speaker:not feeling busy, I feel like I'm not doing anything of
Speaker:worth. And I know that's a me issue. I was just praying this
Speaker:morning with a group of people, and we were talking about be still and know
Speaker:that I am God. And I'm like, how do I be still? I don't know
Speaker:how to do that. Wendi, you probably have a few of the same problems. How
Speaker:do you how do you manage that? Well, I can so relate. And it's one
Speaker:thing people say, oh, you have to have balance in your schedule and have some
Speaker:some quiet time, and and you can't do everything
Speaker:cognitively. You know what? Amen, sister. Amen, brother. I hear
Speaker:you. You can't clutter. However,
Speaker:any moms out there, any people working full time and
Speaker:raising a family or and having other commitments, it's easier said
Speaker:than done. It's not even a mindset where you're just saying, hey.
Speaker:I'm just not gonna take it all on. Sometimes the world brings
Speaker:it on you, and you have to learn how to balance their
Speaker:seasons that are just full without you
Speaker:asking for it, at least for myself as a parent and
Speaker:leading an organization with a team and and things like that. So I
Speaker:think there there needs to be a bit of compassion, not to mention, I think
Speaker:different people have different tolerances of what busy should look
Speaker:like and what we can handle. But, back
Speaker:to you, Zach. I'm just curious. What are some things that you are
Speaker:doing to combat that? I know you have
Speaker:a full life as well. What do you do when you have so
Speaker:much thrown at you, and how do you
Speaker:sift through that all? I think the biggest thing that
Speaker:I again, as much aspirational as practical
Speaker:is I I would have to say no to things. And I think one of
Speaker:the things that I I learned a number of years ago
Speaker:was how many things I was saying yes to because I felt both
Speaker:personally that they mattered a lot. They were important. These were
Speaker:conversations or things that were going on in my community that
Speaker:truly were good things. But when I
Speaker:sat back and, for a number of
Speaker:personal reasons, almost had a full
Speaker:mental breakdown, it came down to the fact that I realized
Speaker:I had said yes to too many things that were
Speaker:good, and it was actively harming me. And so even that
Speaker:phrase that you used, Johan, like, busy is almost a badge of
Speaker:honor. It's like Wendi we sit back and think, oh, how are you doing today,
Speaker:Wendi? Oh, I'm busy. It's like, that's
Speaker:not a good thing. And so, again, a
Speaker:sense of privilege. I have really tried to find a
Speaker:balance between the good things in my life and the things that
Speaker:are necessities, things that are really going to
Speaker:create the changes in my family and in the world around me that I can
Speaker:actually touch and be a part of. And that means that sometimes when
Speaker:I'm thinking about all of my my schedules and my calendar,
Speaker:I'm putting things off for weeks or months that are capable of being
Speaker:done in that situation because urgency is often something that gets
Speaker:in the way of actually walking out the stuff that we're
Speaker:talking about. I was at a a gathering last night with a couple of other
Speaker:crazy Calgarians focusing on community building and and
Speaker:how relationships are important. And one of the things that came up repeatedly
Speaker:was how both systems like the way we build our neighborhoods
Speaker:and the way that we've built some of our our focus on a
Speaker:capitalistic pursuit of profits have actually harmed our ability to
Speaker:just get to know our neighbors and the people in our our natural communities,
Speaker:our villages. And one of the things that kept coming up was there was
Speaker:a a postal worker, and they were still in one of those
Speaker:regions where Canada Post does to the house mail.
Speaker:And when she stops and has a conversation with someone
Speaker:that she doesn't have an intimate relationship, but she has a familiar relationship
Speaker:with, it becomes an an impactful part of their life. And so
Speaker:that person is slowing down enough, and I use the phrase intentional collisions
Speaker:where it's like I'm intentionally creating spaces where I know I'm gonna
Speaker:bump into Wendi or I'm gonna bump into Johan because they matter to me and
Speaker:because those relationships matter to me, it forces me to
Speaker:slow down. It forces me to change my expectations
Speaker:of what success looks like because I could easily just turn it into
Speaker:busy. I'm running from one meeting to another, one Zoom to another, one thing
Speaker:to the next, and I don't have room to just slow
Speaker:down in my cul de sac, slow down on a walk with my dog, and
Speaker:have a conversation with someone else. And I find when I
Speaker:really look at the the flip side to this overwhelming dilemma
Speaker:that we're wrestling with is that by slowing down and intentionally
Speaker:crafting spaces where I know I'm going to spend time with my neighbors and the
Speaker:people that are directly around me, I find that I end up
Speaker:gaining health, and I'm I'm able to actually do some of the other
Speaker:important work that I work in better because I've been
Speaker:able to give myself a chance to breathe. That is so helpful
Speaker:because when we look at our day, we all have
Speaker:no matter where we come from, what personality types,
Speaker:what economic status we have, what city we're in, we all
Speaker:have twenty four hours. We all have seven days a week. We
Speaker:all have permission to take Sabbath. In fact, encouragement
Speaker:to receive the Sabbath from the Lord, whether that's on a a day
Speaker:or just incorporated. The Bible talks so much
Speaker:about rest and relationships. And so what you're
Speaker:talking about is so important. It's not just what we cram in as
Speaker:doing. It's what we're being in those spaces.
Speaker:And that needs to take precedence as well in a a culture
Speaker:that is very much capitalistic, moving up and succeeding
Speaker:and being more productive. Now you're talking to an
Speaker:Enneagram eight who loves productivity and efficiency,
Speaker:and yet relationships are so valuable. Can we
Speaker:have a meaningful, purposeful life
Speaker:while being in relationships? How have you played that out? Have you been
Speaker:on purpose in the relationships you invest in? Because I I also know,
Speaker:even Jesus knows, there were crowds looking after him. And there was
Speaker:times he got away and then times he had compassion, or he always had
Speaker:compassion, but times he stopped even in the busyness to have compassion.
Speaker:What's that look like for you in Calgary? Well, one of the
Speaker:things that it's it's a it's a bit of a sociological trope,
Speaker:but there's a a limit to the amount of active relationships
Speaker:we can have. Healthy levels of relationship where you
Speaker:have the the ones and twos. Usually, this is husband, wife, maybe
Speaker:family, your children. Then you've got a slightly larger troop that's
Speaker:like your slightly larger, maybe direct family, brothers and
Speaker:sisters, parents, that kind of thing. Then you've got an extended family of up to
Speaker:70 people. And then you've got this limit at around a
Speaker:40. And so if you think as a human
Speaker:being before 1900, the
Speaker:active relationships we would have would be in that 40
Speaker:person kind of thing. The comparison between
Speaker:then and now is such a a massive shift
Speaker:where when I think about my friends on Facebook or my
Speaker:connections on LinkedIn, the amount of people that live even just in my
Speaker:neighborhood that I drive past every day, Calgary is
Speaker:expected to hit 2,000,000 people within the next decade. How do
Speaker:I live in a city where I'm expected to both
Speaker:connect with, to have relationship with, to interact with
Speaker:that many people and still do it in a healthy way.
Speaker:For me, during COVID, one of the things that I
Speaker:think I actually found really healthy was that my slowdown, those
Speaker:intentional collisions, started creating little hubs of
Speaker:connection. For example, I I love coffee. And if you ever
Speaker:spend time with me here in Calgary, I'll I'll give you an experience of a
Speaker:lifetime around Wendi. For good coffee in Calgary. You you showed me some
Speaker:good places, and, you're talking to, some, coffee
Speaker:lovers here. Well, I try to share that love of
Speaker:coffee with others. And because in COVID, you couldn't do anything of gathering,
Speaker:you couldn't meet in buildings, I started running a cafe
Speaker:cul de sac. And so I live in this beautiful little cul de sac, and
Speaker:I'd bring my coffee machine out and get all my neighbors around. We'd
Speaker:have conversations and times of this, and it became a weekly
Speaker:rhythm of connecting. And it didn't matter if you were there every
Speaker:single time or if there was a time where you had to skip out.
Speaker:There was always a knowledge that you were gonna be able to come back and
Speaker:loop back in. And so by having these kind of rhythms
Speaker:created, there was a beauty in connecting with these people on the
Speaker:mundane, on the less beautiful, exciting parts of
Speaker:life, not the Instagram, not the TikTok
Speaker:reels. These are the kinds of things where it's like, hey. How was your day?
Speaker:It was boring. I did some paperwork. I cut the lawn.
Speaker:Well, that's awesome. Let's let's drink a coffee and spend time together.
Speaker:Those were some of the most beautiful times of just
Speaker:creating space and holding it for my community members that
Speaker:for me, I've tried really hard to keep that going. There's
Speaker:a phrase that Byung Chul Johan uses in a book called The
Speaker:Burnout Society. It's called self exploitation, where I
Speaker:do this to myself. I like take advantage of myself. I try and
Speaker:take these little crazy ideas, and I scale them. And sometimes
Speaker:the biggest problem is is that when I try and scale my little cul de
Speaker:sac cafe and start running a cafe for, like, 5,000 people,
Speaker:guess what? I can't do that. And so I have to
Speaker:remember that even when I do see something good
Speaker:by pouring fuel onto it, by trying to go to this extreme,
Speaker:I'm actually exploding myself and harming myself,
Speaker:leading to things like burnout and that pressure to achieve and a constant need for
Speaker:productivity are are symptoms of that sense
Speaker:of this isn't enough. But if I can say
Speaker:just sitting here with you, having a conversation with a Wendi,
Speaker:and having to accomplish nothing apart from
Speaker:relationship, going back to what you said, Johan, that sense of just
Speaker:being, this is truly an identity thing. And it's it's
Speaker:a sense of I am enough as I am. God created me
Speaker:as a beautiful, loved being. That's enough.
Speaker:I don't have to accomplish. There's a a beautiful language around, like,
Speaker:the Enneagram, and I'm an Enneagram too. And one of
Speaker:the things about the helper is that we often see our identity as only
Speaker:being good and useful when I serve someone
Speaker:else. When I empty myself out, only then do I actually have
Speaker:value. And one of the things that God has been trying to teach
Speaker:me over my entire life, and I'm still learning this,
Speaker:is that I can never earn their love more.
Speaker:I can never find more value in their eyes
Speaker:than I did when I was born, when I had nothing. And I could give
Speaker:nothing, and I needed everything. In that moment, I had all of the love
Speaker:of God that they would ever show to me in that moment.
Speaker:Yeah. I think that's really valuable out of a sense of being
Speaker:and tied with that, our belovedness of being
Speaker:enough because we are created in god's image, out of our
Speaker:belovedness, out of our being, getting curious of who
Speaker:I am, not in a self glorifying way, but
Speaker:being curious about how God created us. You you sharing
Speaker:about that your inner motivations on an enneagram or there's a variety
Speaker:of ways of finding out who we are, I think is a great starting point
Speaker:because out of that, we can see the shadow sides. We can see the
Speaker:the the ways that God has created us to be
Speaker:with others that you don't have to be a certain way and say,
Speaker:oh, we have to scale our schedules down like this because
Speaker:that's the glorified way. But out of you
Speaker:being, Zach, other people are getting the authentic you, and
Speaker:I love what you're saying. It's more about the quality
Speaker:and the intentionality of our connections than
Speaker:dropping all things and not doing the initiatives that you're
Speaker:doing. You're still doing things, but that's not necessarily
Speaker:your identity. It's coming out of who you
Speaker:are. And I think that's beautiful when we can
Speaker:actively still do stuff out of a a deep sense of
Speaker:who we are. Yeah. And and this is just me and
Speaker:my one person's perspective. The three of us are very different
Speaker:humans. And the strengths and the
Speaker:skill sets that we have, therefore, have a chance to be expressed
Speaker:in different ways. Me doing hyper local
Speaker:individual relationship stuff with my neighbors doesn't stop
Speaker:me from being involved in politics, involved in government's work,
Speaker:involved in systems change. It just means that when I
Speaker:do choose to go into those spaces, they
Speaker:have to still let me do the smaller things where I
Speaker:actually think, getting to know my kids and
Speaker:spending time with them is just as important
Speaker:as anything I might do that would touch all Albertans. And I think that
Speaker:that's a wrestling act that sometimes we have when we think about
Speaker:this think bigger, start local kind of thing. We have to hold them
Speaker:intention. Mhmm. I've worked in weird roles. If you ever look
Speaker:at my CV, you'll you'll chuckle because I I've done
Speaker:everything from work as a behavioral specialist in a psych hospital to
Speaker:being a paramedic firefighter to working in government relations and public
Speaker:policy. I have touched everything from
Speaker:someone has a car accident. I'm there with
Speaker:them in that one. And I've written policy that has
Speaker:affected all the four and a half million Albertans. And I
Speaker:have that weird thing where it's like, I where am I gonna put my
Speaker:time? Where am I gonna allow myself to be this? And it and it
Speaker:isn't an or thing. It can be and, But if we
Speaker:let the and become such a thing that we overwhelm ourselves
Speaker:because of that expectation of I have to be
Speaker:Zach or I have to be Wendi, it's harmful to us. So
Speaker:lean into your strengths. Lean into the things that you're good at. And I think
Speaker:that in that moment, figuring out what matters most both to you and to the
Speaker:people around you is an exploration. Yeah. And today, we're
Speaker:talking about being hijacked by busy. And
Speaker:the the detriment we're talking about to our relationships is that
Speaker:it can eat away. It can steal away our compassion,
Speaker:that relational compassion for the other, and
Speaker:even for ourselves, because we get on this,
Speaker:hamster wheel, and we just go, go, go. And before you know it, I don't
Speaker:think anybody chooses to go on a hamster wheel, but all of a sudden, it
Speaker:the the speed intensifies. And what I've
Speaker:noticed is that then relationships
Speaker:and those closest to me, they can suffer. I can
Speaker:suffer in self kindness. Can you tell me about what that
Speaker:looks like for you and how you've been how you've been
Speaker:able to maintain or pursue compassion for people
Speaker:while your proposals intensify, while your
Speaker:negotiations intensify, while your family life, just the the
Speaker:natural day to day things intensify. How have you
Speaker:gotten off that hamster wheel? Well, there's
Speaker:been the the worst side of things. A number of years ago,
Speaker:I had, some significant health concerns.
Speaker:I had, just welcomed our third child into the
Speaker:world. I was working a full time
Speaker:managerial role with a a provincial nonprofit. I
Speaker:was on the board of three nonprofits plus serving in our local
Speaker:church and then trying to
Speaker:help build into my community. And You're basically a subject
Speaker:expert on this episode. For crying out loud, honestly.
Speaker:And then we had a major family emergency that
Speaker:stopped my life. And
Speaker:this is where that mental break mixed with physical
Speaker:exhaustion, mixed with relational just
Speaker:shuttering happened. And in
Speaker:that moment, I had, for better or for worse,
Speaker:a decision I had to make. I had to decide, am
Speaker:I going to allow for me to breathe?
Speaker:Am I going to allow for my family
Speaker:to have me Zach, or am I going to keep
Speaker:pouring myself out into the world? And I
Speaker:had the physical limitations
Speaker:actually forced me to make that decision. And so
Speaker:I never would recommend burnout or a a
Speaker:complete mental physical fall apart, to anyone. But
Speaker:that was what happened to me once. Hence, from that,
Speaker:the the sense of I am going to make different
Speaker:decisions. I'm going to learn how to
Speaker:say no so that my family and those that
Speaker:are dearest to me do not
Speaker:lose me or suffer. My wife jokingly, but not jokingly,
Speaker:says, on my tombstone, it'll say something akin to, if not me,
Speaker:then whom? And there is a
Speaker:truth behind that that says Zach is known for being the
Speaker:one that you call upon and will always be there for you. I
Speaker:will pour out myself for you. And yet
Speaker:Wendi he's done that to a point of death, what good is
Speaker:he? And so if that's a shift that I have over
Speaker:the last number of years, the real answer is learning to say
Speaker:no. And to say busy is not healthy. Busy is not where I want to
Speaker:be. That self exploitation cannot
Speaker:continue. The phrase, don't forget to put the
Speaker:mask on you first, that they say in, on every
Speaker:airplane has to be the way that especially those of us that are in the
Speaker:helper kind of world have to remember.
Speaker:And so when we do that well, we can continue
Speaker:being a force for good, a a force for
Speaker:health and change in our nation Yeah. Because we've
Speaker:paused, because we've Sabbath. A friend of mine is working on her
Speaker:her doctoral dissertation all on Sabbath. And this beauty
Speaker:of sitting back and saying, this is core to
Speaker:who we are called to be. The the Genesis story
Speaker:starts with the creation of time and sacred
Speaker:rhythms, And one of those sacred rhythms is
Speaker:Sabbath. And so saying, no, I'm not going to do
Speaker:that good thing that I encourage you to continue chasing after. Good
Speaker:on you. But for me, I will not be able to
Speaker:participate because I need margin, I need space,
Speaker:allows you to handle the things. When when something significant
Speaker:happens, you don't boil over.
Speaker:We'll be right back with our conversation. Now back to the
Speaker:conversation. So have you determined what
Speaker:you say no to? Me being a list guy, I like my formulas.
Speaker:Kinda what's your process? What goes through your head where you find that
Speaker:balance between meaningful and busyness?
Speaker:So sometimes, it's literal
Speaker:I don't have room to my calendar. That is probably the first thing that
Speaker:that I'll say. It's like yesterday, like,
Speaker:literally right now, somebody invited me to an event
Speaker:that they felt that my voice and my lived experience and the things that I'm
Speaker:good at would bring value to this conversation.
Speaker:And they were like, hey, Zach, could you be here tomorrow? And
Speaker:do you know what my answer was? No. Thank
Speaker:you. I appreciate that. It sounds like a really
Speaker:good thing to be a part of, and I appreciate your invitation and
Speaker:thinking of me. I can't participate. I'm sorry. I don't have capacity right now.
Speaker:Now. Another thing is by actually putting in my calendar. A lot
Speaker:of new technologies are coming out that help trying to
Speaker:actually help us be more busy. I'm using them to help me be less
Speaker:busy. I'm I'm saying these are blocks in my calendar. If you wanna
Speaker:have a meeting with me, if you wanna set up a a consultation, if you
Speaker:want my expertise in a professional way,
Speaker:here's my availability. If that doesn't work for you, I'm sorry. I can't help
Speaker:you. And by doing that, again, there's a
Speaker:part of this that's privileged where it's like I'm not working a blue collar job.
Speaker:I'm not at a job nine to five, Monday to Friday, working
Speaker:my butt off, and then having to come home and take
Speaker:my kids to soccer or hockey and be involved with church
Speaker:and and and. I'm actually saying in
Speaker:practice, I have had the privilege of being
Speaker:able to say, no. I don't need you
Speaker:to show my identity as valued, and therefore, I
Speaker:can say no to you without having to feel like that. So that that's the
Speaker:first one. Like, literal time management. There's a a gentleman by
Speaker:the name of Sean Blanc. He's a he's a great guy. He's done a lot
Speaker:of work on focus. And one of the things that he
Speaker:really pushes for is deep work. In an
Speaker:economy where our skill sets sitting at a computer are just as
Speaker:valuable as the ones at the guy at the garage, We
Speaker:have a different requirement set upon us. And
Speaker:so, like, I have the ability to say, my emotional
Speaker:and mental energy ex exerted means I'm exhausted at the end of
Speaker:this piece, and I'm gonna take time. I'm gonna have Sabbath in my
Speaker:rhythm. I'm gonna do that. And so that's the first piece. The second one is
Speaker:is actually a lot more nebulous. So I'm sorry. There's no
Speaker:easy list answer. It's who are the people
Speaker:that I'm wanting to invest in most, and how does this affect
Speaker:them? So for me, in my neighborhood, we're working
Speaker:on a youth mental health and addictions project called Planet Youth. It's a
Speaker:collective action coming together, everybody putting their skill set
Speaker:into a project. And as a father of teenagers and as
Speaker:someone who thinks about these kinds of things as important, because it's
Speaker:directly connected to my children and their future and their livelihood and their friends
Speaker:in my, neighborhood, I'm involved in that. And so I'm helping lead this
Speaker:community action team. And so I've chosen to do that.
Speaker:But there's also food insecurity and new
Speaker:Canadians that are coming into our neighborhood. And Wendi and and and
Speaker:so I had to start saying no to things that were
Speaker:tangential to my family because my family
Speaker:was the beginnings of how I build community.
Speaker:So does it affect the people that matter most to me? And then if I
Speaker:have time, what else? Okay. So my neighborhood,
Speaker:my community association, those are things that in my personal life,
Speaker:I give time to. But I had to have capacity
Speaker:first, and then it had to factor into who does this touch most.
Speaker:Now for some people, that might be, a people group. Maybe it's
Speaker:not my immediate family that I'm thinking about. Maybe it's a faith
Speaker:community. Maybe it's a an cultural group or an ethnic group that
Speaker:is focusing all of my energies towards that kind of
Speaker:thing. You just have to decide that people group that
Speaker:matters most to you and where you're gonna put your time and energy, and then
Speaker:look for opportunities to be a blessing into those spaces. And so
Speaker:to me, those are the two questions. Do I have capacity? And then who am
Speaker:I wanting to best serve? Yeah. And to counter
Speaker:that, the the question that raises in my mind is
Speaker:that when there is a person
Speaker:at the street corner that is hungry, when there's a
Speaker:youth aging out, when there's a family in crisis that
Speaker:doesn't fit my schedule, when there's a a a young adult that
Speaker:needs a home, that doesn't fit my schedule, that interrupts
Speaker:what my rhythm and my priorities are, then
Speaker:what? Because one of the things that I I'm facing, and I hear what you're
Speaker:saying, and I I agree with that, but then there's also the other realities that
Speaker:we're seeing so many needs that we have the privilege to say no to that
Speaker:other people don't have the privilege of their circumstances. And so
Speaker:when does the circumstances in that
Speaker:community mindset rather than individual mindset,
Speaker:when does that break in and take precedence even when
Speaker:it interrupts our schedule, even when it interrupts what
Speaker:churches would say, oh, we have programs we don't have time for, and these
Speaker:things within our community. Not that they should churches should say yes
Speaker:to everything, but countless times, people say, that I that's
Speaker:really nice, but it's I just I I can't,
Speaker:because we have so many programs. Can we talk to that,
Speaker:that tension of those who have privilege, to say no
Speaker:to, myself included, to those interruptions,
Speaker:those invitations that are begging a
Speaker:response from somebody in crisis? I
Speaker:think the the question in some ways is
Speaker:really about that first one. Do I have capacity? And
Speaker:if the answer is no, why is that? What have I said yes
Speaker:to that might actually be harmful to my ability to
Speaker:do that? I try and both my business and my life hold about a
Speaker:20% buffer of time that can be used when an
Speaker:urgent thing happens that I need to participate in, whether that's
Speaker:a Wendi or a family going through crisis or a more systems
Speaker:level things where it's like, how am I helping thinking about food insecurity
Speaker:or people experiencing homelessness or or things like that where there is
Speaker:a a tangible need at a more
Speaker:macro level within my community that aren't necessarily directly connecting
Speaker:to me. One of the things that I find often there
Speaker:is that, to your point about church calendars and this the busyness
Speaker:of all of these programs is that they're not actually
Speaker:being a blessing in the way that we think they are. And so we need
Speaker:to be really thoughtful about what we have said yes to in the first
Speaker:place. And so by saying yes to all of these things doesn't mean
Speaker:that now my schedule is full and I don't have any capacity, therefore, I get
Speaker:to say no. And I think that you're right to challenge that because sometimes that's
Speaker:the easiest thing to do. If I have a full calendar,
Speaker:I don't have the capacity to say yes to the thing
Speaker:that's right in front of me. And then I can feel
Speaker:justified in saying, I'm overwhelmed.
Speaker:I have no more left to give. I'm going to walk
Speaker:past this man. And when I think about things like the Good
Speaker:Samaritan, the story is really interesting because the two
Speaker:who walked past him at the beginning have justified
Speaker:reasons for continuing to walk down their path, whether that's
Speaker:because they have somewhere to be, they have religious obligations
Speaker:that prevent them from becoming unclean. All of those things are
Speaker:justified responses to the tangible needs in front of us.
Speaker:But I think what Jesus does in that moment is he challenges the
Speaker:foundational expectations of what the group was doing because all of those things
Speaker:made sense to them. Of course, that person would just keep walking,
Speaker:except when he sends this Samaritan, this
Speaker:outsider, this person who they would have been angry at
Speaker:even just because of their existence is the one
Speaker:that seeks to be a blessing, who does take time
Speaker:out of their, perhaps, busy schedule to be a blessing in
Speaker:that moment, he takes this whole thing and turns it on its head.
Speaker:And so my question would be and I had to ask this question of myself.
Speaker:Why am I so busy? One of the things that I
Speaker:had to choose to say no to were some of those church programs.
Speaker:I was, and if you know me well enough,
Speaker:it fits, I was one of those super volunteers that was giving five to ten
Speaker:hours a week to our church as a lay leader.
Speaker:And there was never a place. I was raised in that culture,
Speaker:though. Whenever the lights were on and the doors were open, the Manntai
Speaker:were at church. And the thing that actually pushed me
Speaker:into the worldview that I have today was actually just that.
Speaker:If all I'm good for is building this
Speaker:church structure, building programming and preaching and
Speaker:worship and all of these other good things at the
Speaker:expense of loving my neighbor, at the expense of
Speaker:seeing the need around me and stopping and slowing down as I
Speaker:walk past it? How am I actually being
Speaker:an image bearer of God in in a good way? Am I doing it
Speaker:well? And I think that this is what's hard about this is
Speaker:that the simple answers to an overwhelming dilemma is to
Speaker:do less, give yourself capacity, start small, practice
Speaker:reflection, and then you're done. Except if going
Speaker:back to what you're kind of highlighting here, Wendi, I'm already
Speaker:overwhelmed and full. I can easily then not do the things that actually
Speaker:will create change and aren't actual blessings to the people around
Speaker:me. Yeah. And I think in the economy of God, when we
Speaker:do have that person laying on the side of the road, whatever that represents in
Speaker:our life that we say, hey. I see this, and it's been brought to our
Speaker:attention, whether it's for our invitation to to care
Speaker:for or not, but we're seeing that it may be an actual
Speaker:invitation to get off the hamster wheel. It may be
Speaker:that stick in the hamster wheel that screeches us to a halt. It
Speaker:might upset our day. It might upset our plans and our future
Speaker:in a good way, but I think that's where I'm thinking of Matthew
Speaker:11 where he says, come to me all who labor and are
Speaker:heavy laden. That's us walking down the road
Speaker:with a big agenda with our Google calendars booked up, and
Speaker:I will give you rest. So there's that balance I I love to hear.
Speaker:Take my yoke upon you. Is it that person on the side
Speaker:of the road or whatever that is representing? And learn from
Speaker:me. This is not a checklist. It's a leaning
Speaker:into God. God, what do you want me to do in this situation? It it's
Speaker:almost like God wants us to depend on him, oh, or
Speaker:depend on each other for that wisdom to learn from him in
Speaker:community. Yeah. For I am gentle and lowly in heart, and
Speaker:I will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and
Speaker:my burden is light. And I can testify that when
Speaker:God has put a spoke in my will and screeched me to a halt
Speaker:with things that I didn't have time for, that was exactly his
Speaker:mercy on me, and it's interrupted me. It's made me
Speaker:uncomfortable, but it's it's made me say no to the right things I thought were
Speaker:the right things. Yeah. Well and I think that when you sit in that
Speaker:moment, this might sound like a like a flip
Speaker:flop, but when God has Zach actively showing me where to
Speaker:put my time and I've been leaning into God's
Speaker:voice in a more tangible way, I don't feel overwhelmed
Speaker:and exhausted. I don't feel like I have nothing left to give. And so there
Speaker:is a piece to this where it's like Wendi I'm walking with holy spirit in
Speaker:a way that is truly aware of
Speaker:both the eyes of God on on the world and the places, there
Speaker:is an abundance in both those that come alongside me to
Speaker:to serve and to support, and I don't feel like I'm overwhelmed. I
Speaker:don't feel like I have nothing left to give. But the worst part
Speaker:is when I try and do things on my own, that's when I
Speaker:feel like I am forcing good at the
Speaker:expense of resting in him. And and that kind of language and that motif that
Speaker:that he talks about as the shepherd and and asking us to just come and
Speaker:sit with him, it's hard. Like, my mind goes straight to Mary
Speaker:and Martha. And it's like the it wasn't wrong that
Speaker:Martha was doing good work in the kitchen. It wasn't wrong that she
Speaker:was doing these things, but especially because of her
Speaker:heart towards Mary in that moment where Mary is just sitting at the feet of
Speaker:Jesus and just saying, I want to be close to you.
Speaker:Martha's response to that is the problem.
Speaker:It's the busy seeking of of validation through acts
Speaker:and all of these things that that actually Jesus is calling her out on.
Speaker:It's like, but why won't you just come and sit with me? Like, don't be
Speaker:mad at her. Don't don't judge her harshly for this. Know that
Speaker:she is seeking to be with me. And I
Speaker:think that when we do spend time
Speaker:pausing, sabbathing, like the throughout the
Speaker:Psalms, you see the word that is translated salah,
Speaker:pause. It's meant to be a part of the rhythms.
Speaker:Going back to Genesis, like, this is why the cyclical
Speaker:nature of of creation exists is to show us there is a
Speaker:time for this and a time for this and a time for this and a
Speaker:time for this. And pauses, Sabbath
Speaker:are key to making sure that there is a
Speaker:healthy way for us to say, I'm not
Speaker:overwhelmed and I'm not bad or wrong for just sitting
Speaker:here and soaking in his presence. And
Speaker:when I see the need to not put
Speaker:precedence on the tasks that I have on my to do list
Speaker:because being a blessing is
Speaker:the call on every single one of us. We are called to seek the
Speaker:restoration and reconciliation of all creation back to Christ. And if
Speaker:that's who we are called to be, then truly being a follower of
Speaker:Jesus means that in that moment, seeing the need and being
Speaker:able to take ourselves out of maybe our busy
Speaker:highway world and pausing and slowing down. And in
Speaker:doing that, needing to have had the capacity in the first place. Learning
Speaker:how to say no. Learning how to say, I'm not gonna just doomscroll
Speaker:and watch twenty four seven news and feel like I can't do it
Speaker:all. But sitting back, a good friend
Speaker:of mine and I, we're gluttons for punishment in this world.
Speaker:Again, I'm not speaking out of, a sense of
Speaker:arrivedness. I'm I'm reminded of Paul, like, it's not like I've figured this all
Speaker:out. I'm I'm still in this race with you. But that when I
Speaker:am healthy, you'll more likely see me reading fiction.
Speaker:Why is that? It's because I'm healthy enough to slow
Speaker:down and do something considered frivolous,
Speaker:enjoying a good book that isn't about business
Speaker:development or isn't about social change for justice.
Speaker:It's a fantasy book where I get to escape for a moment
Speaker:and just be present in a world that isn't
Speaker:chasing me or calling me to chase it. And being able
Speaker:to do that in a healthy way, that speaks to my health,
Speaker:and it speaks to my ability to say I can breathe better. I I'm
Speaker:more healthy now, and therefore, I can do these things.
Speaker:Yeah. I think you've answered one of the questions that I had in this conversation
Speaker:of, a practical step, and I think you've identified it so
Speaker:well, is that when we stop and when we Sabbath,
Speaker:that's when we can look at our dashboard, not coming out of
Speaker:formulaic, I'm gonna do this, this, and this, and almost make Sabbath part of our
Speaker:busy schedule. But out of a sense of rest, we start off
Speaker:our week in that or we start off our day in that that
Speaker:posture of Sabbath. We can actually pay attention to our
Speaker:dashboard. We can actually learn from him for his yoke is easy. We
Speaker:can actually lean in and say, okay, god. What is it? And so that when
Speaker:interruptions come our way, we're in a posture
Speaker:of receiving and learning. Do you think that
Speaker:busyness, the act of being so scheduled and full and
Speaker:glorified in in busyness, is really a drug of
Speaker:choice? And and that's not just for the
Speaker:world, but within the church. Busyness can be a drug of choice.
Speaker:And we almost needed Sabbath is kind of detoxing from that
Speaker:possibly. So for me, I think
Speaker:especially when I think about the population size of the Earth and I think
Speaker:about the increases in technology,
Speaker:what we have created is a
Speaker:like sociologists will talk about how dopamine hits from
Speaker:technology beeps and notifications and doom
Speaker:scrolling and this constant feed of information have
Speaker:created a, a brokenness in us where we don't
Speaker:actually know how to slow down and how to be bored, how to
Speaker:connect with people right in front of us. Because these
Speaker:amazing technological marvels and this massive amount of
Speaker:humans all around us content creating all the time, they're a
Speaker:facsimile for connection. And so busyness
Speaker:and this overabundance of twenty four
Speaker:hour news cycle and social media create a really easy
Speaker:out that actually harms our ability to to be
Speaker:present and pause. And it exacerbates the busyness
Speaker:expectation of everything Zach KPIs and measurement. Everything is measurement from an economics perspective.
Speaker:If you talk to a person working in a nonprofit, even though they perspective. If
Speaker:you talk to a person working in a nonprofit, even though they know that
Speaker:the social connection between humans is a difficult,
Speaker:almost intangible thing that you can't easily measure, you need to
Speaker:create a a measurable out of it so that you can go to your
Speaker:funders, you can go to these things. And so no matter what industry you're
Speaker:in, no matter what space you find yourself,
Speaker:the drive from an economic
Speaker:lens for more and faster and busier
Speaker:and bigger, they percolate into our
Speaker:relationships. And for me, I think that
Speaker:this is one of those cancers
Speaker:Zach, actually, it's funny. I never as we're talking this through,
Speaker:I'm like, that is what cancer is. It's when a cell doesn't
Speaker:know what its life cycle is. It doesn't know
Speaker:the the end. Go back to that rhythms kind of thing. A cycle
Speaker:is is meant to have a beginning and an Wendi. And,
Speaker:the busyness cycle of life is just this constant churn, this
Speaker:constant noise. And we don't actually have those pauses
Speaker:like Sabbath, like a moment of just sitting in the
Speaker:spaces that we have and saying, I have nothing to do
Speaker:right now, and that is okay. This is good. I don't
Speaker:feel the need to perform. And I think when
Speaker:we keep coming back to measuring
Speaker:ourselves at these not human scale
Speaker:things, it it continues to put pressure on us
Speaker:to to be happy, expected
Speaker:to say, yeah, Johan. I'm just busy right now. It's
Speaker:good. Rather Johan, it's busy right now. Something has
Speaker:to change. That's really good. I know there's a ton of things
Speaker:for me to chew on, and we can get into this a lot more. And
Speaker:we're actually gonna have you on again in this series a few more times.
Speaker:But we need to wrap it up here. Do you have one thing our
Speaker:listeners can walk away with today that they can implement into their
Speaker:week to be less busy? So the
Speaker:problem is giving them a task to make them less busy is kind of counterproductive.
Speaker:But but
Speaker:I would actually recommend something as simple as
Speaker:walking around your neighborhood, your village without your
Speaker:phone and doing it intentionally looking
Speaker:and listening. There's a practice in the urban development space called the
Speaker:Jane's Walk. And so one of the things that we
Speaker:did for the Our City Calgary conference last year in in my
Speaker:station was we went for effectively a
Speaker:Jane's Walk in my neighborhood, but through a more spiritual
Speaker:lens. You may be familiar with the practice of Lekta Divina. It's a
Speaker:sense of sitting and listening to a passage of scripture being read,
Speaker:and you listened for both what God is calling
Speaker:you to hear, what do you see, and what do you feel
Speaker:called to do out of it. And we were calling the people who were walking
Speaker:with me to do the same for the neighborhood that they were in. And so
Speaker:one of the things that I think grounds us is the people and
Speaker:place that we live in. And so whether that's your work,
Speaker:maybe that's where you feel called to, whether it's your neighborhood, your physical
Speaker:home, whether it's some other people group, I would say go for a walk
Speaker:there without distractions and just listen to the stories, listen to the
Speaker:words, listen to the sounds, and do it in a way that is
Speaker:a pause. It's a salah. It's a break in your morning, in your day,
Speaker:in your evening. Go for a walk without distractions and
Speaker:just listen. And I think that that's a good practice to
Speaker:have because that's when I started seeing and hearing things
Speaker:in my neighborhood that actually called my attention to maybe this is
Speaker:where I should be putting some more of my time, which meant that I had
Speaker:to take it away from somewhere else. That's great. And then and Wendi and
Speaker:I are actually gonna unpack a lot of what you said today. Next
Speaker:episode, we're we're doing every other episode. We're calling it second
Speaker:thoughts where we get to actually digest some of the stuff that we're hearing from
Speaker:our guests, rather than going on to the next guest. We really wanna
Speaker:put this stuff into practice. So I know, Wendi, you're going on a bit of
Speaker:a vacation, so you'll have time to practice. Homework here, guys. I I'm not
Speaker:the expert at not being busy, but I'm going on holidays to
Speaker:tomorrow, and I'm looking forward to our next episode. I'm gonna
Speaker:tell you what it means to pause, get off the the rat race,
Speaker:and and actually take in some of the stuff that we've been talking
Speaker:about doing it and looking forward to continuing this
Speaker:conversation in next Friday. So thank you so much
Speaker:for joining us, Sec. My pleasure, guys. And, I
Speaker:think this is important for all of us. Like you said, Wendi, we're
Speaker:we're all in this together. We each have our own cross to bear,
Speaker:so to speak, and we have to learn from each other about ways that we
Speaker:can step out of the busy and and try and hold
Speaker:space for where God is actually calling us to be and who we are.
Speaker:Appreciate you, bro. So this is the time in the show where we
Speaker:do our segment called Care
Speaker:lingo. Alright. The first of our Care lingo
Speaker:segment where we take the mystery out of some insider language you might
Speaker:hear, from us or other people in caring
Speaker:communities. And our phrase today is compassion
Speaker:fatigue. Now before we give the real definition,
Speaker:Johan, I'm just wondering if we could play some balderdash here a little. And if
Speaker:you were to hear, the word compassion fatigue for the first
Speaker:time, what might you think it means? I gotta think about
Speaker:that. And you mentioned balderdash. I just played with my youngest daughter this
Speaker:weekend, and she absolutely kicked my butt. So
Speaker:she might be the better person to have on to do this. I know the
Speaker:apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Oh, it might be fun to have more
Speaker:people on this segment anyway. You know, once we get some momentum going and
Speaker:and we get those words out there on the on the Facebook CareImpact
Speaker:podcast group. Yes. You know, so might other people getting
Speaker:involved. Maybe there's words they don't
Speaker:oodles of Christianese words. Oh my goodness. Do we have balderdash to
Speaker:play? My goodness. We start talking weird, don't we? And I'd like
Speaker:to hear what people's definitions are, what they think they might be.
Speaker:Anyway, compassion fatigue. We're getting back to the word. Right? Yes.
Speaker:I would say as someone hearing the term for the first time,
Speaker:it's it's what happens when you spent too much time in a room full
Speaker:of empathetic people who just won't stop talking about their
Speaker:feelings. Ew. You know, you start to feel
Speaker:drained. And every time someone says, how does that
Speaker:make you feel? You just want to crawl into a hole
Speaker:and die. It's the emotional equivalent to too much small talk at a
Speaker:dinner party where I just want to scream, I'm fine, but
Speaker:no one's listening. That may be what I'm thinking.
Speaker:Maybe that scenario may or may not be something that is a fingernail
Speaker:chalkboard moment for someone similar to me, not me, but someone similar to
Speaker:me. What would you say is the real definition without it?
Speaker:Your definition makes me fatigued already because I I'm
Speaker:with you. I'm like, oh, too much feelings. Let's get into action. I I
Speaker:do like feelings, but where are we going? But the actual definition of
Speaker:compassion fatigue happens when caring for others starts
Speaker:to feel emotionally draining, like, where we've been expending expending
Speaker:our energy and our our care and our compassion towards others,
Speaker:caring for very real and needed spaces. However,
Speaker:we're finite creatures. Right? And so it's like your heart
Speaker:gets tired from carrying the weight of other people's struggles. And without
Speaker:some good self care, soul care, and rejuvenation,
Speaker:we can easily get into a a case of burnout.
Speaker:So compassion fatigue, when not cared for, can
Speaker:lead to burnout. And you'll see that common, and this
Speaker:language is often talked about among caregivers, foster parents,
Speaker:adoptive parents, parents in general, and frontline
Speaker:workers, social workers, church ministry leaders who
Speaker:are giving a lot of their compassion towards others.
Speaker:Does that make sense? Yeah. And we talked about it a little bit with Zach,
Speaker:I think, too. So this gives it a little bit more context and a definition.
Speaker:So, again, listeners, I Manntai encourage you go to our CareImpact
Speaker:podcast group on Facebook at the on the CareImpact page, and you can
Speaker:suggest new terms or phrases or even definitions if we
Speaker:post them. So, yeah. First Care lingo segment.
Speaker:Thank you for joining us on Journey with Care. To get more information on
Speaker:weekly episodes, upcoming opportunities, or to connect with our
Speaker:community, visit journeywithcare.ca, or find CareImpact
Speaker:on just check the show notes for these
Speaker:links and all the links related to this episode. Share your thoughts,
Speaker:leave us a message, and be part of a network of individuals journeying in
Speaker:faith and purpose. Together, let's discover how we can make a
Speaker:meaningful
Speaker:impact.
