When Passion Becomes the Problem with Dr. David Shar

[00:00:05] Welcome to The BOLT Podcast. I'm Todd Birch, entrepreneur, keynote speaker, and mental fitness coach. Whether you're a new listener or one of our loyal listeners, I'm glad you're here. See, I believe we're all a work in progress. No matter where you are in your journey, there's always another lesson, another challenge to overcome, and another opportunity to grow. And that's what this podcast is all about.

[00:00:31] With my guest, we'll have honest conversations about leadership and personal and professional growth. I'm excited for this next episode, so let's get to it. What happens when you fall out of love with something you once loved doing? We talk a lot about burnout, disengagement, and quiet quitting. But what happens to the people who started out passionate, motivated, and excited about their work?

[00:00:59] My guest today has dedicated his research to answering that question. Dr. David Shar is a behavioral scientist, work passion researcher, and lecturer at the University of Maryland. His original research explores why passionate people fall out of love with their work and what leaders can do about it.

[00:01:21] He's also the founder of Illuminate PMC and the creator of the Kinder Leader Framework, helping organizations build workplaces with both hearts and backbone. David, welcome to the Bolt Podcast, my friend. Thanks so much, Todd. It's so great to finally be doing this. Thanks for having me. Absolutely, man. So I got to set things up a little bit. How we met, this is usually how I start the conversation.

[00:01:50] And so David and I both had the opportunity to speak in a breakout session at the Kentucky SHRM in August. And I was very intentional, David, about whose sessions I sat in on as an attendee. And I saw yours. I believe it was called It's Not You, It's Me. Yeah. And I'm like, all right, this guy looks like a legitimate speaker.

[00:02:14] I'll, one, learn from him on the stage, but also I was very interested in the topic. And you didn't disappoint, man. I loved it. And when I was in that session, I'm taking notes and I had one note, get this guy on the Bolt Podcast. So that's why I connected with you and your daughter. You had your daughter there with you, which was really cool and special. And I love it, man. I love what you're doing.

[00:02:40] I love your energy and just your character. I could just tell that you're a good guy. And we connected afterwards. And here we are. So let's just, let's dig in and have a fun conversation, my friend. Wow. Well, living up to that intro and background, I think. Like, you're setting me up for failure here. But it was, it was so great seeing you at that, at that conference. And I was sorry that I missed your session.

[00:03:07] I think I just come in for like my one session and then had to, had to skip town. But when I saw you come up afterwards, because that talk specifically, almost every time I have somebody coming up to me where they are in tears and need to be consoled and coached through it, it's because it can be really powerful.

[00:03:30] Falling out of love with work is, I compare it to like a horrible divorce or an identity crisis even. Right. And so, so I'm consoling, I'm consoling this poor woman who, who this opened up a lot of things for her. And the cool thing about having my daughter, Rena, with me was that other people could, they didn't have to wait awkwardly to talk to me so they could go talk to Rena. And I looked over and I'm like, who's that young dude talking to my daughter?

[00:04:02] Because I mean, dude, I don't know where you're hiding the fountain of youth. But when I looked over, I thought you were 20 something max. And I'm like, he's chatting up my daughter over there. What is happening? And then afterwards she said, dad, that guy, you've got to follow up with him. He's so cool. He really wants to talk to you. And so that's where, that's where this happened. That's how it went down. Yeah, that's cool. That's really cool.

[00:04:28] Um, so we've got to start off with something that we've never started off with before on the show. Ice cream. Everybody loves ice cream. Even myself who is lactose intolerant. Hey man, there are some good soy ice creams out there. Let me tell you now, most places, most locations, you know, ice cream shops don't carry a soy version.

[00:04:54] So if you're listening, please consider the very small one percentage of us who go with their family to enjoy ice cream and can't. Um, I don't want a popsicle. I want some freaking ice cream. So anyhow, all right, let me get off my soapbox. This isn't about me. This is about you, David. So I want to start off with ice cream. Here you are owning this ice cream shop in Baltimore. And then you create something really special.

[00:05:24] And a lot happens because you don't wake up one day. Well, maybe there are some people that do say, hey, I want to be a PhD in behavioral science. Right. And I want to study, I want to devote my life to work passion and everything about that. So it started off with you entrepreneur owning this ice cream shop and some amazing stories evolved out of that that led you into what you're doing today.

[00:05:52] So take us, you know, in an abbreviated version of that experience. And I know you have, you shared one of your stories in the keynote, um, in Kentucky and, uh, that story got to me as well. So, yeah. So, right. There are people that wake up and say, I want to be a behavioral scientist. I don't really fit the mold of those people.

[00:06:15] Um, it did come from being a practitioner, being a small business owner, um, and falling into, um, these things and, and it building this curiosity within me. I got into ice cream because I love ice cream, you know, the soy ice cream. I don't know. I've got to, we've got to challenge you on that. Like a lactate pill and regular ice cream, maybe the better option. That doesn't work for you. It doesn't work brother. I've tried it. Yeah. All right. Well, you got to do what you got to do.

[00:06:44] I just got off a, a week long cruise where, you know, they've got the self-serve ice cream. And you'd think after being a, you know, a franchisee of an ice cream parlor for, uh, about a decade that I'd be all ice creamed out. But we had a rule in our family. Every time you pass that ice cream machine on the, on the cruise deck, you had to, you had to grab an ice cream way too much. Um, so I don't think I started off lactose intolerant, but I may be now from, from ODing all that stuff.

[00:07:12] Uh, but yeah, so I got into the ice cream business because I loved ice cream. It was also a cold stone creamer franchise where I love the awkward situations like dancing for tips and singing for tips and things like that. Um, and my shop was right down in Baltimore city. Um, and so, um, by virtue of its location, a lot of our crew members came from the inner city of Baltimore, which, um, meant that I had a lot of crew members that were coming from really tough,

[00:07:42] backgrounds. Um, they had family members, um, you know, in jail or killed at young ages, um, um, absent dad, sometimes absent moms and dads living with their, with their grandmother. Um, it was, it was really tough. And what I saw was that whatever I accidentally was creating at this ice cream parlor was bringing people back again and again, they would show up on their days off.

[00:08:10] And I didn't understand why, but I'm like, I'll, I'll take it. Like they'd sit in the back and even on their day off, I think we're past the statute of limitations. I won't have to pay them for that, for that work now, but even on their day off, there'd be a long line and they'd jump up and just start helping. And they're not even working that day. Um, they just wanted to be there as much as possible. And, and, um, you know, reverse engineering things.

[00:08:32] It seemed like I had accidentally co-created this place where they had this sense of belonging and voice and psychological safety and all those things that, that, um, we try to build into our businesses. But, uh, none of this really occurred to me until, um, the day when, uh, Simone's, uh, boyfriend got shot. This was the, this was what you were referring to earlier about what I had spoken about.

[00:08:56] Um, Simone was like this teenage, um, inner city girl and her boyfriend was in either the Bloods or the Crips. And one day, uh, she came into work looking really down and I said to her, hey, we used to have this rule. You're not allowed to come to work in a bad mood. You had to find a replacement. You had to call out. Um, but she was certainly not herself. So I called her in the back and asked what was going on.

[00:09:20] And that's when she explained to me that that morning she had gotten a phone call that her boyfriend was found, uh, shot multiple times and left her dead. Um, he was flown to shock trauma at Johns Hopkins hospital. So, you know, they, they know what they're doing there, but things still didn't look good. Um, and so I tried to push her out of the shop. I told her I would pay her for the shift. I would personally cover her shift. Just go.

[00:09:48] Like, I appreciated her dedication, but this is not the day to be at work. Um, and she insisted on being there. She said, I, I need to be here. I can only be here. This is my happy place. And that's where it all changed for me. That's where, you know, a lot of restless nights thinking about how did I accidentally stumble into this? And so much of it was that at the time it was a college dropout. Dropout. I was doing the opposite of what they were telling me to do in my business classes.

[00:10:16] And, and, uh, and so I, I had accidentally created this stuff. And, and so from that point on, I started reverse engineering and wanting to learn more and more and more. And that drove me back to school to finish my bachelor's to get my master's and then my doctorate degree as well. And specifically researching things about passion for work and why my ice cream scoopers were finding meaning in scooping ice cream.

[00:10:41] While all of my friends and family members with meaningful, objectively meaningful jobs like doctors, lawyers, teachers, um, dreaded going to work on Monday morning. I love it, man. I love it. Um, sense of belonging. We talk a lot on this show in particular this year about psychological safety. Let's be honest.

[00:11:03] I think that is, and as a entrepreneur business owner myself, that is the one thing that I've been able to do over 17 years that has allowed me to have really high retention rates. Because at the end of the day, people just really want to feel safe, right? Yeah. They want to feel, they want to feel safe. They want to be seen and heard, feel valued. Um, those aren't necessarily hard things.

[00:11:33] Uh, but a lot of people struggle with it, especially leaders in large organizations that I've seen. So if we can create that safe space, a space of belonging, then we build that bridge, that bridge of trust. That is, that's the gold. The people, then they'll do anything for you. Um, but it's amazing to me that they were coming there on their day off. That was, that was their space. That was their happy space, but their safe space. Yeah, certainly.

[00:12:02] I mean, they're, they're in the inner city. Uh, so many of them black youth from the inner city where, um, they go to school and there are guards, police officers walking down the halls. Um, they, on their way to school, uh, they have to pass the corner where people are selling drugs. Um, so I had one, I had one, um, uh, employee whose brother was, um, a gang member and drug dealer.

[00:12:28] Um, and he was violently killed in the line of duty, quote unquote. And so every day on his walk to our store, um, there was something else. And it was, he would pass these corners and they would pressure him to take over his brother's spot. Um, and yet he kept walking and came to work for me for minimum wage every day, scooping ice cream. Um, you know, and it wasn't just that.

[00:12:55] I remember the day when he was, uh, 20 minutes late, uh, for work and, um, and he shows up all frazzled and shows me a note. Um, that it was, uh, it was from the police that he was stopped for a citizen interview.

[00:13:11] Um, because while we were in Baltimore City, surrounded by what you think of Baltimore City, that inner city community, we were in this little bubble, which was primarily white, upper middle class. The, the, um, homes across from us were right on the water. You know, typically they were, um, uh, you know, uh, shoot, what was the, what was the, um, swimmer's name? The, the Olympian with the most medals. Oh, um. Yeah.

[00:13:42] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Michael Phelps. So Michael Phelps was a regular customers of ours. He lived right across the street from our store. So, um, this black teenager walking through that neighborhood was suspicious enough to be pulled over walking, um, for a citizen interview. Um, you know, where they, yeah, where they wanted to know what he's doing around here. Um, so these were the lives.

[00:14:07] And so at work, I didn't know that I wasn't supposed to give a 16 year old girl from the projects, the key to the restaurant and make her a shift lead on her 16th birthday. Um, but neither did she. Well, our, our, our, our collective naivete, you know, really worked in our favor. Um, they didn't know that work is supposed to be, it's supposed to suck. And it's supposed to be a place where there's no trust between people.

[00:14:35] They, because from so many of them, this was their first job. And so before they had been poisoned by all those work experiences that so many of us have had, they have this experience where this was the one place where they were empowered and trusted. One of the things that we used to do, um, we used to volunteer so much of our time and my employees had the choice to volunteer or work the store or not come in that day.

[00:15:00] And I remember one volunteer thing, we used to, um, go and have a dance party with the Arc Baltimore. So the Arc Baltimore would bring a DJ and about, uh, I think it was about a hundred individuals with developmental disabilities, um, their clients. And we would bring our crew and an ice cream bar. And we would have a dance party for like an hour and a half or two hours.

[00:15:26] And we used to do this every year and every year I had to pay somebody time and a half just to not work for free volunteer to come to volunteer with us. Um, I had to bribe somebody to stay back at the store, uh, because when you grow up in these areas where you're seen as the lowest rung of society to learn that you have something to contribute, that you can give, that you can do something for society.

[00:15:52] I think, um, it was incredibly impactful for them. And, and so for them personally, and I keep in touch with everybody or, or most of them now, um, we're now over 10 years out, I think, which is means I'm old. Um, but then, but then, um, also not, not just in their personal lives, but for the business, it was so valuable.

[00:16:13] But I think, um, business owners and, and managers and CEOs, they, they, as much as they don't love throwing money at problems, they're quicker to throw money at things than they are to throw time or that emotional bandwidth of throwing empathy at something. Uh, it's easier to just say, yeah, let's just implement this thing.

[00:16:36] And, and that doesn't answer these complex problems of how do you create trust and psychological safety and a sense of belonging. Those things take human, human devotion to the, to the cause. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. Um, we can't just add another perk. Um, sometimes we need to get vulnerable and put ourselves out there and have some real conversations. Yeah.

[00:17:04] There's, there's a lot of reward to doing that, to spending that time, but often times people don't for whatever reason. So, um, no, I love it, David. I love sharing those stories. You ever miss, you ever miss owning that ice cream shop? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:17:21] You know, when you look back on things, you miss all of the great times and you forget about the times, you know, there was, there was one night when I was trying to figure out how I was going to make payroll that week because Baltimore can get pretty cold in the winter and you don't sell a whole lot of ice cream when it's that cold. And I remember sitting at my desk at two o'clock in the morning, nobody else is in the entire complex. It's just me at my desk crying into my hands because of the weight of business ownership.

[00:17:51] And, and, um, you know, how am I going to not just feed my family? How am I going to feed their families? Right. And, and, um, and so there, there were definitely, I'd say with, with business ownership generally, it's, um, the highs are higher and the lows are lower. Um, so do I miss it? I, I completely miss it and, and really do think back so fondly about it. It was transformational for all of us involved.

[00:18:17] Um, and you know, what I, what I take that opportunity again at this age and stage of my life? No, thanks. But it was a great learning experience. Yeah, absolutely. And one that never, that you'll never forget and, and potentially change your trajectory. Yeah. Absolutely. That's awesome. Yeah. And I think we've all been there, man.

[00:18:40] Um, the, the late night spreadsheets, a million tabs of different scenarios in Excel crying. They can, what the hell am I going to do next? Yeah. You know, um, I've been there, especially during COVID that was very difficult time to be an entrepreneur, but, um, but we, we persevere my friends and, uh, we learn and, uh, we move on. So, hey, it's Todd again.

[00:19:04] Look, our leaders are facing incredible challenges right now with burnout, disengagement and stress among our teams. We see the data. We see the data.

[00:19:16] We see the data.

[00:19:43] And I'm going to be here. And, uh, we see the data. We see the data. We see the data, uh, we see the data, uh, we're doing the data on our own.

[00:20:10] program, I work with leaders and teams to help them reduce burnout, strengthen resilience, and create a culture where people feel supported, engaged, and capable of performing at their best, even under high pressure. It's a neuroscience-backed program. It's only eight weeks, and it works. So if you're interested in learning more about the program, visit my website, toddbirch.com. Let's set up a call, and I'll walk you through a quick demo.

[00:20:40] Now back to the show. So you're the passion guy. I'm the spark guy. I think we need to unpack this a little bit. It's not me versus you, spark versus passion, but let's kind of define these a little bits and how they work together or how they might be a little bit different. What do you think? Yeah, you go first. Tell us about spark. All right. So your spark, igniting your spark.

[00:21:10] It's that feeling, that feeling of being lit up, being full of life, full of energy, and really being the true absolute you. That's your spark. It's not what you do. It's that feeling of, you know, that thing you work on, that you lose track of time, that thing that gets you up in the morning.

[00:21:41] That's your spark. That's your spark. So I don't know how that differs from passion, because you could arguably say they're very similar. So how do you define passion? Yeah, I think in a lot of ways, we may just be using different terms for what we're describing. It's almost like on one level, you see it and you know it, right? I think that when we say passion,

[00:22:07] thoughts pop into people's heads and they recognize what they're passionate about and they know what that feels like and what it looks like. And then we create these constructs, these terms, these brands to kind of dig a little bit deeper. So for better or for worse, in academia, we really sort of dissect these things. And it's almost counterintuitive because passion is this feeling

[00:22:36] and it's this energy. And then you put it under the microscope and you start being scientific with it. And it takes a little bit away while giving it dimension at the same time. So one of the things you said really aligns perfectly with it. But the different elements of passion are, it's something that you find to be meaningful. It's something that you really like or love,

[00:23:05] like a strong liking or love for that thing. In this case, work, but it could be a sport. It could be anything. It's something that you devote a lot of time and energy into. It's something that motivates you and draws you toward it. And it's sort of the cycle that the passion creates more passion. But one of the elements that I think the one that really aligns with what you were talking

[00:23:33] about is that the object of the passion becomes ingrained in your identity. And that's why it's so powerful. And why so many of us, it's a very American thing to open a conversation by saying, what do you do? Because for many of us, we are passionate about our work and our work is who we

[00:23:55] are. And so when you meet a teacher, it's rare that that person might say, what do you do? I teach. It's much more likely they're going to say, I'm a teacher. That's making a statement about their identity. And so that's what passion is. It's this sense of identity, integration into your sense of

[00:24:19] self and your identity. The interesting thing about the research is that, you know, we've talked about passion, like in philosophy for millennia. We've talked about it as passion, as appetites, as all these things. And, and there's always been this debate as to whether passion was a good thing or a bad thing. And you think of sort of vices, and you could say, maybe we're passionate about alcohol or drugs

[00:24:49] or gambling, you know, and there, there would be small differences between those things, but certainly it's not always healthy to be passionate about something. And it turns out that the difference there between harmonious passion being, having this healthy passion where you can, it's that you can push pause on it, that at the end of the day, you can close your laptop and be good with picking it back up at nine o'clock the next morning versus obsessive passion. One of the early

[00:25:19] studies of, of passion as either harmonious or obsessive was, um, of, uh, cyclists, I believe in Canada, um, where it gets really cold and icy, um, in the winter, uh, they follow these cyclists and the, um, cyclists that were aligned with harmonious passion would take a break over the winter. Whereas the ones with obsessive passion would ride through the winters and injure themselves and ride through

[00:25:46] injury. Um, and, and, and that's the type where you would just run through a wall. So it's almost like one form of passion is a controlled passion. And the other one is when the passion controls you and those are going to have different outcomes. Um, it's not that obsessive passion is all unhealthy or maladaptive, but it's less healthy than harmonious passion. And in some cases it is unhealthy for people.

[00:26:15] Yeah, absolutely. And I'm glad, I'm glad you went there. Cause that was one of the slides that I took a picture of during your talk was harmonious versus obsessive. I found that to be really interesting and not, not any research that I had seen before. Um, and I think there, there definitely is that potential to take it to an extreme to where it becomes unhealthy, right? Something that is healthy that has

[00:26:42] propelled your career or got you to new heights or new opportunities. But I think it's, it's that difference between having those insights and being able to pause and reflect, right? So what is it about the person who is harmonious with passion? What, what are they doing differently? And my guess,

[00:27:07] based on my research and the research that I'm doing now on spark, very similar, and that it's an interruption and interruption, perhaps one that we choose, which would be some insight. Like you took the spark assessment just to take a snapshot, right? Take some self inventory to say, Hmm, it's cold out. I've been working my tail off. I love this, but maybe there are some other things that I can do

[00:27:31] to protect, you know, my instrument, which is my body, right? For this particular passion of cycling. Um, and that keeps them doing the thing right longer and perhaps even more successful. But if you don't have that interruption or creating the interruption yourself to pause and take some assessment, self inventory, then you just continue really to diminish, to be obsessive in your research.

[00:28:00] Yeah. Yeah. And, and one of the most interesting studies out there is where they found that people that have obsessive passion tend to work for their work, tend to work longer hours than people with harmonious passion and yet are no more productive. So you feel like you're constantly doing it and you're, you're take your work home. But at the end of the day, you're not even more productive.

[00:28:26] You're churning your wheels, but we can only produce so much. And, and sometimes it's the breaks that actually help us. I was just talking to, um, a, uh, a prospective student in, um, our IO psychology master's program at, at university of Maryland. And they were asking me about, you know, this 15 month sprint with this master's program. And I said, we go nonstop. We go through the summer, we go through the winter. But when I went through this program as a student many years ago, um,

[00:28:56] I put a vacation on my calendar. Every break, we would have a one, one to two week break in between terms and everyone I penciled in a vacation. And it's funny because all my kids were in school. My wife is a grade school teacher, so she's in school too. And it didn't matter. I put it on whenever my break ended up, I was just going somewhere. Right. We went on a cruise, went to Disney world. We went to the beach for, for a week. We, you know, did all of these different things.

[00:29:26] And, and my wife's like, we can't just leave school. I'm like, well, I want you there, but I'm going either way. And so I think all the kids like flung down to school that year because they were coming with me every, every time, like right in the middle of school. But, but, uh, those taking those breaks is so important. Being able to reflect is so important. But one of the interesting things is that there's

[00:29:48] a lot of evidence that the type of passion that you have is actually, um, influenced by where the passion came from to begin with. Um, and so, and you see this with, with athletes, um, when somebody takes out and you, you were an athlete, right? Like, uh, like, did you play in school and things like that? Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What did you play baseball, soccer, wrestling? I paid my whole life,

[00:30:15] not in college, but through high school. Yeah. So, so what happens a lot of times is somebody will, um, really get into like baseball and they'll be great at baseball and they love baseball and all they want to do is play baseball. And then, um, and then because they're so good and because, um, they're so passionate about it and putting in so much time and energy into it and it's part of their identity, they start getting scouted and people are like, Hey, you're pretty good at baseball.

[00:30:44] And so now you have these competitive coaches that are, that are like, you're on our team. And then, um, over time it becomes about, uh, this compulsion or being compelled toward baseball. At first it came from this, from this truly intrinsic passion where, or, or intrinsic motivation of like, uh, of loving baseball. But over time it morphs into having something to prove to yourself and to

[00:31:14] others. So it starts off healthy and then it becomes unhealthy. And I think that you could look at, uh, you know, young people, I've, I've got the privilege, you know, of teaching master's students. I see them go off into the world with these bright eyes, you know, and they're so passionate about the work that they get to do. And unfortunately for so many of us, somebody or a series of somebodies

[00:31:37] undoes that for us, the same people who are paying us, hiring us, paying us. And, and their job description is to, um, is to, um, motivate us to continue to perform. They actually do the opposite. They make it feel compulsive and they, and they make that harmonious piece into an obsessive piece. And that's where it gets really unhealthy that at the end of my talks, like I said,

[00:32:06] oftentimes I'll have at least one person that comes up and literally is bawling. And usually it's because we've unpacked something in that talk where they're hearing what we're talking about and they are seeing it within themselves. And usually they pour out this thing, this story about putting everything into their work and it not being recognized and people shutting them down and people, um, taking them for granted and people not recognizing their contributions.

[00:32:35] And the truth is that that person is much more too far on the obsessive passion side, most likely, because we shouldn't do it for the applause. We should do it for the impact. And that's easier said than done, especially when we get trained again and again and again, that here's the carrot, here's the stick. And when you introduce those things, those become the motivation, even if the mission and the growth

[00:33:02] and the community were the things that actually were motivating you to begin with. That changes over time because of the way that we're managed and quote unquote led. Yeah. Ooh, lots, lots to dive in there. Um, I think you're talking about a few different things. One, the box, right? The box that we get into, but especially those in creative fields. I'm a traditional graph designer, school BFA graph design, very creative, do whatever you want,

[00:33:32] work on projects that aren't necessarily practical in business. And then you get out and you start working for an agency or a marketing company or even corporates. And then you have those teachers, right? Or those mentors that potentially put you in a box where you're, you're not free to create like you were in high school. You don't have 200 hours to put into a project. You're actually being

[00:33:58] billed for the hours. So you have to stick to 20 or 30 hours, um, a little bit different. And then we, we start to lose, you know, some of that, what I would say the spark. And so I think this kind of leads back to, if you don't, if you don't mind, David talking about warning signs, because there's the thing about, I think a little different from igniting your spark and passion one. So with a spark,

[00:34:28] we can see, right, the different levels of a spark. And you took the spark assessment, you scored and the flame, which is, you know, mid to high, which is where we really want to be, right? You're, the flame's going, it's bright, you're curious, strong mindsets, you're taking action. But what happens over time, right? So we're passionate, let's take HR, because you and I speak to HR quite a bit. And there's quite a bit

[00:34:53] of, uh, listeners on the show that are in HR passionate about HR. I love people. I have that motivation, that intrinsic motivation or emotional attachment to helping people. I get into my job. It's great. First 90 days, maybe the first year. And I'm lit up if we talk about the spark factor. And then I don't get recognized, right? I'm, I hit the ceiling. I'm not at the table. I don't have a

[00:35:22] seat at the table. I don't know what is going on in, in the business decisions. So I'm not having the impact that I once had. So I'm losing potentially, I have the passion for HR, but my spark has started to dim, right? Um, and that's where I think the biggest opportunity is David. And we see this, we're not right. It's, it's there. Gallup, there are all, there are all types of polls and data out

[00:35:51] there that are telling us that 70, 80% of people are disengaged. Um, and then Gallup just released one a few weeks ago about just, uh, globally and Americans in general in life where they sit about 50% of us are just not happy. And our wellbeing is very low. Um, especially in young adults, which we can go there in a little bit, but I think it all comes down to just not having that insight.

[00:36:20] I think we're moving so quickly, right? Especially that obsession passion. You just don't slow down, right? I love that cycling metaphor. The runner just keeps going, going, going, going. And then at work, meeting, meeting, meeting, we get home and then we go to dance recital, ice cream, baseball, football, right? Gymnastics. And there's just no pause. So if we don't have a moment to pause and reset,

[00:36:45] to take that intentional vacation, like you did, David, then we just continue on that spark just slowly dims over time. And then we either get into the obsessive or we're just dimmed out and we just lose our spark. And that's what really propelled me into this because as an entrepreneur, I started to lose mine. I love my business. I love the people and COVID really opened my eyes. I come back from

[00:37:14] COVID. My people don't really come back to the office and I lose that connection to my people that I once had. And that's what lit me up. I still had a passion for it, but that's what lit me up. And that was no longer there, but I kept a journal. And so that was my interruption. That was my insight. I saw the pattern going back, you know, months. I'm like, I'm just, I'm not happy. So why, why would I continue to do this? I'm too damn old for this. Like I want to be,

[00:37:42] I deserve to be lit up by life and hopefully by my job, because let's be honest, we spend 90,000 hours plus in our lifetime working. Well, shit, let's be lit up by the work that we do, right? It doesn't need to be our identity for some it is for me, a lot of it is, and that's just goes back to

[00:38:06] childhood, right? And needing to be recognized. But still, I just, I think we all just need to be lit up by something, right? The reason why are you getting up in the morning and not just your kids? Yes, absolutely. Your kids, your family, your friends bring you immense joy, but we all need something personally that lights us up. So, sorry, man, I just wanted to. No, I love, I love that. And

[00:38:35] you don't want to put all your eggs in one basket. And so when you find that you're obsessing over this one thing, whether it's work or, or there's, you know, if everything in your life is, is around this one thing. Um, I mean, life is fickle and sometimes that thing goes away. I, I, um, had somebody who I

[00:38:59] did some work with who was a dancer and her entire identity was dancing until she was injured. And when she was injured, all of that went out the window and it wasn't just that she couldn't dance anymore. Uh, she didn't know who she was anymore and nothing compared to her identity as dancer. She felt like

[00:39:23] a fraud in every other area of her life. Um, and everything felt like settling. So before you get to that point, before the job changes, because the world is changing so rapidly. And so the job you fall in love with today may not be that other job. And so if there's harmony between all of these different aspects in your life, that when you are at work, you love your work and you're passionate about your

[00:39:50] work. Because for me, it's like, I get to have an impact on people and I get to help them live a better life and get better, get, get something better out of their life. Right. And so I do that through my speaking. I do that through my consulting. I do that through my teaching. I do that through my parenting. I do that through my marriage. I do that through my charitable work. I do that through

[00:40:18] all of these boards that I'm on, you know? And so I, I, everywhere I go, I'm the same person, right? A little off kilter, a little inappropriate, you know, like less professional, have fun with everything, passionate about everything. I bring the same energy, um, wherever I am. Um, the saddest thing is how many people, um, you know, when they show up to work, they clock into work and clock out of life, you know,

[00:40:46] and they're living for that weekend because they're not passionate about work. And what's the weekend? Well, you're so burned out from work so that the weekend just becomes, and every night after work just becomes you drugging yourself with your drug of choice, whether that's alcohol, too much food, um, uh, just, just sinking into your couch and doom scrolling or watching TV all night. Um, and so it's

[00:41:11] just this never ending cycle and it's absolutely horrible and nobody wins in that scenario. Not you, not your family, not your employer, nobody wins in that scenario. Uh, but on the other hand, if you're too passionate and obsessively passionate, you know, I, I, I talk about, um, I, I suggest that those who are burning too bright, eventually they're either going to burn out and, or the world around them is going

[00:41:38] to burn down. And so, so you don't, you want to, you want to keep everything balanced, um, because that's, that's what's healthy. Um, and so if you see that you're over, um, uh, you're, you're over involved or over identifying with one aspect of your life, you want to back up and, and look at your life in a more holistic way and, and ask where else am I maybe not contributing because I'm

[00:42:05] contributing so much here and only thinking about this here. Yeah, I agree. I like that. And I was, I wrote down Goldilocks. It's like finding right. The, the right porridge. It's not, I don't remember too mushy, too cold, too blazing hot, but right in the middle there, it's just right. Which is exactly by the way. Um, you know, there, there was, uh, um, the early research on passion

[00:42:33] said people are either obsessively passionate or harmoniously passionate. The original research on this, where they, where this, um, where this construct, um, and framework was developed in the psychological sciences. Um, the, the original researcher Valoran said, you can, they're not mutually exclusive. You can have a little bit of both, but every study after that, or nearly

[00:42:57] every study, like, um, would treat these things as if you are either obsessively passionate or harmoniously passionate. And one of the first studies that really dove into finding people that were at the intersection and had overlap or high obsessive, low harmonious or moderate harmonious and high obsess. Um, that was a study done, I believe in China and one, and the researchers

[00:43:25] pointed out, they argued that, um, that, that this type of research hadn't been done before because in the West where most, most of this research is done, we're not able to really balance two, two opposite faults in our head at one time. Everything is black or white. Everything is extreme. And what I found is that when you actually look at psychological science, so much of that stuff,

[00:43:49] the healthy spot is in the middle. I tell my kids about this socially, um, uh, politically, if you find yourself aligning with any extreme, you're probably going the wrong direction. Like find that middle nuanced space. Um, and so I think that that Goldilocks thing is absolutely correct. Yeah. So David, let's give, let's give the, the listeners some takeaways here. Um,

[00:44:18] what can they do? So one of the things that I talk about in my keynotes and my coaching with the, the spark framework and igniting your spark are the early warning signs, right? So again, being cognizant, being curious enough, being open to seeing the smoke and that it could, I'm sure stand with passion too, right? If you're, there are smoke signals before you get to that

[00:44:45] obsessive, right? What are those smoke signals? So for me in the spark framework, it's curiosity. The first thing, right? That curiosity starts to shut down. When you're extremely curious, you're passionate, you're growing, you're learning, right? You're, you're in it, you're lit up, but, and it's the first thing that could go very quickly too. And just like a muscle, you don't use it. It just goes, it goes away. You can get it back, but it's still, it's like a muscle curiosity.

[00:45:13] And then ownership. We, we start to take less ownership of projects or just whatever we're working on our connection. I know you talk a lot about the connection to whatever it is, people, work, mission starts to decline. And then we start getting protective instead of proactive. Those are kind of the early warning signs that I've seen in people in coaching. And I don't know

[00:45:38] if you have any warning signs that people can see if their passion for something is starting to go over that threshold of harmonious into obsessive or not. Yeah. Yeah. So guilt and shame are really good indicators. You got to stop and ask, why am I feeling this way? If you're leaning more toward obsessive passion over harmonious passion,

[00:46:03] a good litmus test is at the end of the day, when you have to close your laptop, are you able to, is there guilt and shame when I talk about my wife, even though grade school teacher does a lot of extra stuff for the school too. She runs their, their theater program and does a ton of stuff, but it's not like, like, um, uh, you know, brain, it's not, it's not open heart surgery, right? It's not life or death

[00:46:31] sort of stuff. Right. Um, I almost said not brain surgery. No, it's definitely brain surgery in terms of how important it is and, and, and all that, just in case she watches this, I want to make clear, it is essential work, but it's not life or death in the moment work. But, but even with her at night, she would be sitting on our kid's bed, um, rubbing his back. And as she was doing that, um, she would

[00:46:57] have one hand on his back and one hand on her cell phone responding to emails. And she felt this feeling of guilt and shame toward work that she wasn't fully present with the work and toward my son that she wasn't fully present with him at the same time. That's obsessive passion. Um, and, and she and I worked through it. She was my Guinea pig through all my research. We started noticing these trends and working through them and she's, she's great. She's, she's healed. Um, but, but then, um,

[00:47:27] you know, so that, that's definitely a warning sign. The other warning signs are just, uh, so guilt, shame, always question where those things are coming from. But the other thing is that when people start losing passion for work, uh, one of the things that a lot of my respondents notice was that a filter seemed to like drop away. Um, that before, when they were passionate, everything was about the mission. Everything was about the impact. Everything was about making a

[00:47:54] difference. Everything was about the client. Um, and then this filter starts falling away and then they start noticing bureaucracy, interpersonal conflict of poor leadership, all of the other things in the organization. And so that was, that was a hint to them that, that something isn't right. Um, and so that feeling and that feeling of like, who am I, those things are incredibly, um, those are,

[00:48:22] are serious smoke signals. And when you see them, um, talk to people because oftentimes these passionate people, one of my, one of my, uh, participants in my research said to me, David, I tried to quiet quit, but I didn't know how I was. I didn't have it in me to quiet quit. Your passionate people are your best people and they're high performers. So they may feel like, yeah, I didn't answer that email that

[00:48:48] night. Like they would say that to me, but nobody noticed because they're still doing 150% above what everybody else is doing. Um, so talk to people and be explicit about it and explain what's going on. Um, and, and from a leader perspective and an HR perspective, talk to your people, ask them what's going on, ask them what lights their fire, ask them where they feel their fire dims. What, what, what, you know, what's driving their passion and what's draining it right now. Um, and once those

[00:49:18] conversations start now, you're not on your own, you're not on that lonely Island and you can work together through your relationships, through your own, um, ability to, um, reconnect with the meaning and things and through the systemic pieces of work as well. Hmm. You stole my keynote line, David. What's that one? Uh, about, um, the path or, uh, the fire, what you just, yeah. Uh, so yeah,

[00:49:47] it's, it's interesting. People are complex human beings, but again, at the end of the day, it does come back to pretty simple practices. And I wrote something down here because you said before guilt and shame, it was stop, stop is pausing. It's an interruption. So really it's interesting as I, as I dig more into my research and writing my book, Ignite Your Spark, it does all kind of tie back to an interruption

[00:50:17] either that we choose or that is chosen for us. Unfortunately, you know, it could be a traumatic event in our life, but, uh, we need that interruption. And sometimes that interruption is just a pause, right. To, to really, again, to take, take notice of what's happening in our lives. Um, asking the

[00:50:37] question, am I lit up or am I feeling guilt or shame or as a leader interrupting rights and going to the employee and saying, Hey, I noticed some smoke signal. Something's off here, right? That's not different. You're not as curious. You're not speaking up as much. You're feeling a little guarded into survival mode. What can we do here? You're not lit up. And maybe there's an opportunity to give them a stretch assignment, throw them a bone or move them into a new role where they're,

[00:51:07] they're lit up again. But you're right. There is, and I've seen the research. There is that within that 70, 80% of people disengaged, there's that 50% mark that are your people. Like they're, they're passionate. There's just something that isn't lit up anymore. Right. And they're just going on autopilot groundhog day. And that's not good because eventually you just deteriorate. That spark

[00:51:33] just dims, dims, dims. And then when that puppy gets down to smolder, that's a problem, right? Absolutely. So, so really recognizing these smoke signals, knowing that there can be this really kind of obsessive piece of passion that's not healthy and taking a moment to pause, interrupting yourself or your colleague as a leader and just asking those questions and knowing your people is what you

[00:52:03] were saying. You know, knowing what lights them up and what that, that's, that was my keynote line. You know, knowing what lights your people up, what, what drains them? Because if you don't know when they're lit up, how will you know when they're not lit up? Right. But you got to take the time. This goes back to your original thought about time. A lot of it does come back to time and spending the time to know your people and, and what makes them tick and where they're at life. I mean, let's just be honest.

[00:52:32] We're not always going to be lit up on every single thing we do or passionate about everything that we're doing. It doesn't mean that we're still don't love our job, right? There's plenty of people who are so passionate about HR, but they're just not feeling it. Something is different right now. Yeah. And, and it's human and it's okay to be human and not feel guilty about it. Right. We call it, I just call it, this is a snapshot in time, but it's important to take those

[00:53:01] snapshots so that we know where we're at. Yeah. Yeah. I love your emphasis on taking time, assessing, looking inside. I think that that's absolutely essential and the disruption piece, because this stuff is just going to keep it's going to keep going in the wrong direction unless there's something that disrupts it. And by something, I, I mean, most of the time it's someone.

[00:53:27] Right. Absolutely. Now, David, I want to talk about the kinder framework a little bit. I know you have the sign behind you kinder and that that's your leader framework. And you talk a lot about heart and backbone. And I love that. So how do we, how do we use that? How does that, how can we leverage that to help us protect our people's passion?

[00:53:52] Yeah. So kinder is really important. Um, and, and specifically the part where it's not nicer it that, that you're looking for it's kinder some, you know, toxic managers, we all know about the asshole boss and that is toxic. Uh, but sometimes the boss that's too nice, uh, can be equally toxic. Um, interestingly in my own study on passion decline, um, almost exactly half of my participants

[00:54:18] talked about work overload too much. Everything was being piled on. They were volunteering for things that were being voluntold for things, uh, huge organizational change, you know? And so they, things started rolling out of control and there was just too much. And that I was expecting to see what I wasn't necessarily expecting to see was the other half of my, uh, participants talked about

[00:54:42] not enough, that they started to feel like they were stagnating, that they weren't growing, that they had stalled out, that they had learned everything that they could, that they weren't developing. Um, the thing about being kind, you know, I, I, I tell way too many people that my wife is not nice, but she is one of the kindest people I know. And what that means is that she is invested in you and she will tell you about yourself. She will, she will tell you what you need to hear,

[00:55:13] whether you know, you need to hear it or not, whether you want to hear it or not, she will tell you what you need to hear because she actually gives a damn. Um, too many times when we are nice, we don't give the feedback that our employees need. And it's not about our employee. We can trick ourselves into saying why upset them? Why shake things up? Why? Because that's how you

[00:55:35] help them develop. And that's your job and it's good for them. They need to develop. So being kind is when you really embrace that, where you actually are invested in your people and you give them the hard feedback and it comes from a place of caring and development. All of that is, is there. Um, and so that's really what kinder leadership is, is, is really about.

[00:56:02] Hmm. Oh, I absolutely love that. I can't wait to meet your wife sometime. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Sounds like my mom. Uh, she wears it on her sleeve and she's going to tell you how she feels, but at least, you know, where you stand, uh, and you're going to get direct feedback kind of goes back to positive toxicity, right? Um, kind of the same thing. We can be so positive

[00:56:27] to the point where it's not authentic anymore. And then when we are positive people like, well, I don't know. He's probably just telling me something just, you know, to push me away. Um, it doesn't have that, that meaning and gravitas that it once had when it was sporadic and truly authentic. For sure. And we do this and we, and we just talk about, Oh, you're great. Everything's

[00:56:51] great. And we don't, we don't get specific. So it's not actual specific feedback. And just like you will not gain any friends or any buy-in or trust. If everything that you say is negative or constructive, um, you've got to give people positive feedback. It's the, it works the other way too. If everything is positive, um, you know, you're not going to gain their trust either. Yeah. We, we call that, we call that a compliment sandwich, Dave.

[00:57:21] Right. Start with a positive, throw in some kind feedback and then end with a positive. Um, but, uh, you know, one thing I do want to emphasize that I, I don't know, I say this on almost every episode. So I guess it's pretty important, but it makes sense here. When you talk about feedback, we're not talking about year end performance review. That's too late. That's too

[00:57:46] late. Sticking to one-to-ones every single week, even if it's 15 minutes, that's when you really know your people. That's when you can give that iterative feedback that doesn't feel like this mound, right. Of overwhelming criticism. This is just an iterative. Hey man, great job. Compliment,

[00:58:10] positivity, authentic, and yes. And right. And, you know, on this one thing, you know, maybe you could approach us with a little more curiosity. That's all. And I think that would go a long way. Um, or I noticed, you know, that you're not feeling as passionate or lit up about this particular project. Why don't we kind of give you something to stretch on, um, give yourself an opportunity to grow a little bit. Uh, people, they want to grow. They really do as, as much as we don't

[00:58:38] like change, we're built to evolve, right. And, um, we want to grow. We really do. And that growth means being uncomfortable. It means feeling some discomfort, which we're not accustomed to, but we want it. We thrive on it. We really do. Yeah. And the status quo is, uh, the biggest myth there is. There's no such thing as the status quo. This world is moving all the time. So you don't

[00:59:08] get to fall back to the status quo. If, if the world is constantly moving and your organization is constantly moving and your competitors are constantly moving and your customers are constantly moving, then you not moving is the equivalent of you moving backwards. You're moving. Um, and so, uh, yeah, you need to bring people forward and, and performance management should be developmental. And if you are developing people, then it's not about a gotcha that six months ago, you did this. So

[00:59:38] you're not getting your bonus. Um, that doesn't help anybody that demotivates people. It doesn't drive them forward. Um, the, a, a living coaching relationship over time is exactly what's needed to actually develop your people. And it, and it's what they want. And by the way, we're not all great at taking feedback. Some of us absolutely suck at taking feedback. And by the way, that's also a trainable skill for taking feedback, right? Even with my grad students,

[01:00:08] when I teach a unit on, on feedback in our talent development course, I teach giving feedback and receiving feedback because it's such an important skill on how to receive feedback because it's not easy. Uh, but just because it's not easy does not mean that it's not critical. Exactly. And I, what I found is just the simple tactic of yes. And is a, is a great way that just doesn't spin it,

[01:00:35] but it's my wife always says, it's not what you say. It's how you say it. Um, and I've really taken that to heart, but, uh, yeah, status quo. That is not part of my language. I do not love that. Cause that takes me back to Carol Dweck's work that says you're in a fixed mindset. Yeah. You're in a comfort zone. You're complacent. And if you're not learning, you're not growing, you're not living, man, that, that is the bottom line. Um, and that, that takes action. And that that's the biggest piece,

[01:01:04] right. It's the, it's the pausing and then taking that intentional action. That's one thing to talk about it, but you got to do it. You got to do it. So man, this has been great, David. I love, love this conversation. I love what you're doing. I love your work and your research is so fascinating to me. Um, I know you and I are going to have more conversations down the road, but I want to be

[01:01:29] of your, your time. You got a lot going on. You got a big house over there with five, six kids. And then you have this human being of a dog, right? Yeah. My sister needs that last count. And then, and then the mastiff group. Oh my gosh. Those things are huge. Their heads are bigger than humans. Um, was it 250 pounds? Something I read right now. He's about two 25. Yeah. Jeez. Yeah. He's,

[01:01:55] he's a big dude. It takes two of us to walk him. Right. So you got, needless to say, you have a lot going on over there. Um, but, uh, sounds like a lot of fun over in the Shar household. Um, so coming to a close here, two questions, David, one, what is lighting you up right now? Um, so my, my mentor said to me when I, when I, uh, started conducting my research, she said,

[01:02:23] he said, the wizard chooses the, the wand chooses the wizard, right? That, that I, I study passion because it's inescapable for me. I'm passionate about everything that I do. Um, I find that I'm lucky enough, um, or super lucky to really enjoy everything that I do. I love my work. I love my family. I love, the adventure. Um, and, and I don't know that it's because I just happened to find the perfect job

[01:02:51] and build the perfect family. I think that, that it's, that it's maybe a mental disorder of mine. I just, I just love, I love it all. Um, but, um, something specific that's been lighting me up, which you sort of opened with was, um, that I started bringing my oldest daughter with me, um, you know, to all of my speaking engagements. And so, um, whereas normally I would hop on a,

[01:03:17] on an airplane, fly to some conference, you go to the hotel, to the conference, back to the airport, back home, and not even know where I was. Um, Rena, my daughter has been coming with me and, uh, she's been my speaker's aide. So she, she helps film and things like that. But, um, but we've been creating road trips and adventures out of it. We were, uh, very recently in, um, Tennessee down in Knoxville. We drove down to Gatlinburg while we were there and went for a hike and ran into three

[01:03:46] bears. So that was, that was so cool, you know? So like, um, just living life as an adventure every day is, is I think, um, you know, what, what lights me up. Hmm. I love it, man. I love it. Thank you for sharing that. So the last question, David, if you could leave our audience with one final thought message quotes, what would you say?

[01:04:13] Final thought, I would say, um, spend a little bit of time alone, just like you said, interrupt, take time and just ask yourself what's lighting you up right now. And what may, what types of activities are dimming your light? Um, why did you get into the work that you do right now? And what impact are you having? Um, asking yourself just these questions could start to

[01:04:41] realign yourself to bring yourself back to how you got here. And also maybe to alert you to the fact that, that, um, you should be making some changes perhaps that maybe you've outgrown it. And sometimes that's the answer. Sometimes is that, that you outgrew the organization, the job, even the career that you're in, and it's time for a change, but it all starts with reflection, uh, followed by some honest conversation. I love it. If it all fails,

[01:05:11] take a break and go get some freaking ice cream. Soy ice cream. Soy ice cream. All right, my friend, this has been, this has been great. Continue being passionate, lit up and kind, and, uh, we'll continue our, our conversation. Wow. Another great episode. Thanks for joining us on the Bolt Podcast. Look, if today's conversation

[01:05:36] sparks something for you, pass it along. Every share creates a ripple and that ripple has the power to change somebody's life. If you want more information, more conversations, show notes, resources, or free tools, check out my website, toddbirch.com. Look, leadership is pretty simple. It comes down to taking care of yourself and your people. Ignite that spark, protect that spark,

[01:06:05] and light the way for others. We'll see you next time, my friends.