April 22, 2022 • 36 mins
The #1 life reinvention roadblock for many unfulfilled high performers is what Dan likes to call "the burden of the breadwinner." On one hand, you feel a duty to financially provide for and protect the people you love. On the other hand, your soul is crying out to be a whole human being. One with a healthy balance of purposeful work, authentic self expression and love and play. It's a tension of opposites. It can keep you paralyzed in a soul-sucking job, but also lead to burnout, anxiety, relationship tension and regret.
This week, Dan does a deep dive into the burden of the breadwinner and how it impacts high earning men and women in different ways. Plus, you'll get five tips to release yourself from the burden. So you can thrive in a life with less anxiety, more support and newfound fulfillment.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The number one life reinvention roadblock from many unfulfilled high
performers is what I'd like to call the burden of
the breadwinner. On one hand, you feel a duty to
financially provide for and protect the people you love. On
the other hand, your soul is crying out to be
a whole human being, one with a healthy balance of
(00:20):
purposeful work, authentic self expression, love and play. It's a
tension of opposites, and it can keep you paralyzed in
the soul sucking job, but also need to burn out anxiety,
relationship tension, and ultimately a life of regret and unfulfilled dreams.
This week, I'm Life Amplified. I'll take a deep dive
(00:41):
into the burden of the breadwinner and discuss how it
impacts hiring men and women in very different ways. Plus,
I'll give you five tips to release yourself from the
burden so you can thrive in the life with less anxiety,
more support, and newfound fulfillment. Welcome back. Why is an
amplified life. It's having amplified relationships with people who support
(01:05):
and encourage you to be your best. It's having amplified
energy to conquer the challenges of the day, and it's
having an amplified career, one that's meaningful to you, the world,
and your bank accounts. I'm Dan Mason, helping you discover
your calling and create an amplified life on your terms.
(01:26):
This is the Life Amplified Podcast. One of the questions
I ask on my coaching applications is what is the
biggest block keeping you from reaching your goals? And one
of the biggest answers that always comes back from new
clients who work with me is some variation of, hey,
I am the breadwinner. I can't put my family financially
(01:48):
at risk by following my dream. And it just sort
of reinforces the idea that so many of us lived
by this starving artist trope that to be creatively fulfilled
in our work means we're going to lose all of
our money. Therefore we're going to lose our family, are
the approval of our parents, and ultimately we're gonna die
broke and homeless behind a Walmart dumpster, which of course
(02:12):
is not the case. I'd like to think that my
life is a demonstration of that, and so many of
my clients I work with who successfully navigate their career
and life reinventions, but I deeply relate and empathize with
the fear that comes with that. I've told you the
story on the podcast many times. In I was the
(02:33):
sole breadwinner for a home that included my now ex
wife and her six year old daughter, and I took
tremendous pride and being able to provide for the family.
In fact, that is what my definition of masculinity and
manhood was. A lot of that was demonstrated in my home,
growing up with a father who climbed the ladder and
(02:55):
became CEO of a major corporation, and you know it,
was able to take the family on trips, he was
able to pay for my college, and therefore, in my mind,
that's what being a man in the world was, which
interestingly enough, came with a lot of other subconscious beliefs
that were demonstrated, and number one being that to be
(03:18):
loved is to be needed, right, which is not a
helpful energy for anybody. By the way, those are two
very different things. You can have people that need you
in your life, but they don't necessarily love you, which
also explains why my marriage didn't last very long. Back
in the day, that was before I started my own
(03:38):
personal growth journey. But if I believe that my value
is a man in the world was based on what
I could provide, that didn't leave a lot of room
for my purpose. And that's why it took me five
years until well after my divorce before I stepped away
from corporate and I launched my coaching practice. But that
(03:58):
was interesting also because I was in another relationship at
that point with with a woman who you know, she
was a great person, but when we met, I out
earned her three to one. I was definitely the breadwinner
in our relationship, and when I walked away to start
my business, she was out earning me by probably two
(04:19):
or three to one, which again brought up a lot
of uncomfortable stuff. We're gonna talk about how it was
having a female breadwinner in a family. Uh, really brings
up a lot of unspoken emotions. There's a lot of
research on this that I'm going to share with you.
But for me, I felt emasculated. I felt like I
was able to provide and do all those things, like
(04:42):
you know, when we first started our relationship, I was
able to, you know, pay for the brunt of the
vacation and take her away to nice resorts, and then
once I didn't necessarily have all that money liquid in
the bank, I became the Hey, can we just do
a stay cation guy, or maybe we can find a
bargain Airbnb. And that was really embarrassing for me. I
felt like I wasn't really showing up the way that
(05:05):
I wanted And because at that point in my ex
girlfriend and I didn't necessarily have the skills to talk
openly about these uncomfortable things, it was a big contributing
factor to the demise of that relationship. So I'm going
to dive into this today. We're gonna talk about this
burden of the bread winner. And I've done so much
(05:25):
research on the different ways that this affects both high
earning men and women. But we want to just lay
all of our cards on the table, talk about the
elephant in the room. Ultimately, with the intention that you
are able to pivot toward your dreams, that you're able
to value your purpose over simply earning a paycheck. But
(05:47):
you can do it in a way that reduces the
amount of anxiety and fear that comes up for you,
that's going to reduce relationship tension, that will help you
feel more supported and ultimately build a life where you're
successful and fulfilled. Right, that's what we're all going for.
So we're gonna talk about male and female bread winners,
(06:07):
but will start with the men today because the number
one theme that gets in the way for a lot
of men and their career and reinvention, and it certainly
was my story as I just shared, is that men
face a societal expectation to provide. Now, whether that's right
or wrong and whether we should be redefining gender roles
(06:30):
is probably a conversation for a different podcast, but seventy
of people in a recent survey said the ability to
support the family financially is considered very important to be
a good partner. And what was interesting is only thirty
two of people actually said that about women. And there's
another study out there that suggests that a man's earning
(06:52):
capacity is an important consideration in the dating world. So
the result that we end up here is this idea
that staying in the corporate rat race, even if you
hate the job, can be more of a game of
perception and self preservation for men than actualizing their purpose
(07:13):
and doing the things to build a legacy. And for
many male breadwinners, there's a silent struggle to keep everyone happy.
On one hand, you know, being successful and getting those
accolades and attention, you know, masculine energy. We like to compete,
we like to strive, So on one hand, we want
(07:34):
to please the corporate overlords. But there's also this always
be hustling culture of corporate America that in many instances
pulls men away from their families, which causes a lot
of underlying resentment from the people that they're providing for.
So a lot of men that I coach feel like
they're in a bit of a no win situation where
(07:56):
they're working too much in a job they don't even
love to provide for a family that they feel like
they can't please. You know, if they fall into workaholic tendencies,
or they're traveling too much, or they're not able to
show up and take on a certain amount of the
work at home or raise the kids, or participate in
the elder care. That will also cause a lot of tensions.
(08:19):
So one of the things that we want to look
at here, and I'm talking to the men, but this
is going to be an overall theme for both genders.
When you are a breadwinner is where did you learn
that sacrificing your own personal happiness for the greater good
was a noble idea? Because it certainly is. Sacrifice can
(08:40):
be a demonstration of love, and as we talked about
on the podcast, I did want to at the end
of nineteen with my friend Nick Tillia, who's a coach
and also a father, it's just not the most full
expression of love. Nick shared his story that at one
point when he was in his career pivot out of
teaching and the coaching he like they were struggling so
(09:02):
much financially, he would not eat dinner so that his
kids could eat. He wouldn't go to the gym because
he felt like he should be home with his kids
after school. But that idea of sacrifice was really keeping
him from stepping into his divine purpose, and on the
back end, he just wasn't showing up as the man
he wanted to be. So his idea now of demonstrating
(09:25):
love is to be fully in his purpose to earn
money doing what he loves, where he can provide awesome
experiences for his family. That he's able to take his
oldest daughter to Coachella on the weekend. And you know,
some of these special experiences. So you know how you
want to show love for your family. Start to consider
(09:46):
was it modeled for me growing up that I had
to sacrifice to love people, or that I can thrive
in my dreams and share that overflow of financial abundance
that comes with it with the people around me. But
here's the thing that happens for many men, and I
know that this was the case with me personally. When
(10:08):
a man is not fully living in his purpose, he
will begin to feel weakened because we know in a
very deep part of our soul that we are living
a lesser life than more capable of. And over time,
those prolonged patterns of settling people, pleasing, playing it's safe,
it diminishes our confidence and our self esteem. And there's
(10:30):
a great book by David Didak called The Way of
the Superior Man where he really digs into this concept
that when a man is not living in his purpose,
his family also senses that weakness. You know, a lot
of times the partner in the relationship ends up having
to take the lead and take charge at home more
than they like to because the man is so is
(10:54):
energy is all used up. He doesn't really have the presence,
the energy, the passion to make decisions away from the office,
and after all, somebody has to get shipped done, which
usually falls on the partner. So male breadwinners will come
to me and complain that their sex life has gone south,
(11:15):
that you know, there's no physical intimacy with their partner
because there's that lack of safety. You know that the
feminine energy doesn't fully trust him to provide an environment
of safety. She feels like a lot of the decision
making is falling on her. And it can even show
up in relationships with children. You know, a lot of
times male breadwinners will complain that their children are pushing
(11:39):
back against discipline because on some level, the kid can
sense their father's own lack of self discipline. So you know,
there's a lot going on here. But what it's all
going to lead to is a deep seated anger within men.
This is why men's mental health is such a topic
right now. When we see people falling apart art and
(12:00):
becoming mass shooters, notice that it's rarely women, right We've
got a lot of angry men who are not in
their purpose, don't feel like they can live in their purpose,
and a lot of times they feel like they have
to fulfill a role in the world that's expected of
them but not true to who they are. And when
you throw in any stories of being unappreciated for the effort, uh,
(12:25):
there's just this overall frustration that is always going to
boil to the surface. But if you are a male
breadwinner listening today, what I want you to understand is
if you're feeling disrespected by your female partner, if you're
feeling disrespected by your children or by your friends, A
lot of times that can be a projection. And this
(12:47):
is tough to say, but as somebody who has been there,
I gotta keep it real with you. It can be
a projection of the way you're disrespecting yourself, selling out
your soul for a cushy pay check in a four
oh one k, trading the need for authentic self expression
and freedom, just to get love and praise from bosses,
(13:10):
from parents, and from society on social media. You know,
we know that three peas of the masculine energy in
a relationship is to protect, provide, and procreate, But there's
two other peas, purpose and presence at home, and when
your career becomes a cop out for neglecting your purpose,
(13:33):
and it's an excuse to avoid being present with your
loved ones because your energy is all used up just
trying to push through in a job that you hate.
It's virtually impossible for a man to achieve a lasting
sense of freedom or fulfillment. Now, let's flip the script
and talk about the female bread winners, because ladies, y'all
are killing it. You know, according to PE research for
(13:56):
American households are led by a female headwinner, which is
the highest number in the history of tracking this data
and very important too that women are able to establish
that financial independence. We have a generation of women right now,
you know, especially when you think, you know, it's like
some of the outdated social expectations fifty sixty years ago
(14:19):
that our grandparents went through, where women don't have to
marry a man for financial security or have to marry
into the right family to be safe. You know, women
have the ability to do this on their own. And
you know, we've got more women crushing it in corporate
than ever. However, there are unique challenges for the female breadwinner,
(14:44):
mostly uh the fact that of female high income earners
are also taking the lead in childcare, cooking, housework in
elder care as opposed to four of male breadwinners who
do the same. So for a lot of the women
that I coach, and I want to be very careful here,
it's very easy for me, is like some white middle
(15:07):
aged dude to feel like I'm man explaining the challenges
of women. But I will say my coaching practice is
actually seventy high performing women. So I've heard about these
pain points very much on a very personal, firsthand basis,
and I'm just going to share with you what the
research says here. But the challenge for women is that
(15:29):
they have to keep the plate spinning right, and it
creates a second full time job at home on top
of an already demanding corporate career. And this is what
exponentially increased burnout rates and cause women to disproportionately lead
the workforce when the pandemic hit in one And particularly
if you are a high performing woman who's unfulfilled and
(15:52):
you want to go become a entrepreneur or you know,
go to work for yourself or maybe pivot into a
different career, the thought of that can be exhausting because
even if the female breadwinner has the financial means to
take a break and reassess their career. The exhaustion and
the burnout from leading at work and home leaves very
(16:12):
little energy for even the most basic self care, let
alone the amount of mental bandwidth that it takes to
build a meaningful second chapter. So let's dig into more
of what the data from Harvard Business Review says. That
is the fact that female breadwinners tend to be more
dissatisfied in their relationships. Women with higher status jobs than
(16:36):
their partner are sixtent less likely to be happy in
their marriage. They're actually more likely to be resentful or
embarrassed of their partner, and they're more likely to consider divorce,
especially if their partner has anything less than full time employment.
And you know, in my coaching practice, I've probably done
(16:58):
over ten thousand hours of coaching high achieving female clients
in and of themselves, and I've witnessed how all these
unspoken relationship resentments can be career reinvention roadblocks. Because Number one,
if the female breadwinner can't count on her partner to
show up and do the dishes, or bathe the kids,
(17:18):
or to tuck them into bed at night, she feels like, well,
how could I ever depend on him to pick up
the financial slack while I start a business, write a book,
go back to school, or pursue my lifelong dream. Another
interesting thing here that I want the female breadwinners to
consider is the trauma history that's associated with this, because
(17:40):
what I've noticed is when a female breadwinner has a
family history with an unreliable father who either was lazy,
didn't do a good job taking care of the family,
or maybe ran out on the family, that creates a
tremendous internal story about well, I can't depend and done
(18:00):
a man, and I've got to do all this myself.
You know. I remember coaching a woman who was, you know,
a vice president at her company, very high performing woman,
and she had this story her whole life that was
I have to be a better man than my father.
And how that was manifesting is having to get everything done,
work hard, put her kids through college, but also take
(18:22):
care of the house while she had a husband who
was very much an artist and a creative but wasn't
doing a good job of monetizing any of that. So
there was a lot of this underlying resentment, a little
bit of embarrassment over where her husband was. And it's
uh you know, that's a very tough way to be.
(18:43):
I mean, you talk about being on a fast track
for divorce one day, all these unspoken tensions are going
to get in the way there. And we just don't
really talk about this much, you know, But all the
research says that we need to relation ships and marriages
where the female is the breadwinner. We told you that
(19:03):
the woman is more likely to be unsatisfied, but if
the man feels emasculated and unable to step up, he
becomes more likely to use a rectile dysfunction medication, and
those men are actually more likely statistically to have an
extra marital affair. Now, we've discussed a lot of this
(19:23):
burden of the breadwinner in regards to marriages, but we
haven't really acknowledged the burden of the single breadwinner mother,
who actually makes up about one in five American families.
So for them, it's even an heightened sense of responsibility.
A lot of those people when they come to me
(19:45):
feel trapped. They feel like they have to continue to
push through uh and they just the idea of a
career reinvention seems out of reach for them. They feel
they can't switch companies because what if the new company
doesn't offer the same flexibility, and she can't take hair
of her kids. You know, the idea of taking a
new job for less money and more growth potential become
(20:05):
scary because if the new opportunities never materialized, she feels
as if she's jeopardizing her family's future. So a lot
of times, when we're talking about a single parent here,
that nervous system need to survive trumps the sole desire
to expand and become more, which just leads to more
in decision, in action, and stagnation. Coming up after the
(20:29):
break will tell you what to do with all this information.
Five tips to overcome the breadwinner burden and navigate your
life reinvention with less anxiety, more support, and better connection
to yourself, your purpose, and the people you love. All right,
so let's get into this the five tips to overcome
(20:49):
the breadwinner burden. Now, some of these are practical strategies,
some of them are just internal mindset shifts that you're
going to have to take on if you're going to
move forward. But we'll start with number one, which is
you cannot continue to use your family as an excuse
to play small. And I realized that we all have
responsibilities in life. We have to pay the bills, cover
(21:11):
the mortgage, take care of your loved ones. We all
need to be a productive member of society. But remembering
that your only true obligation in life is to discover
your purpose and bring it to life. And there's so
many talented, gifted people that could make a huge impact
in the world, and they stay in some soul crushing
(21:34):
shitty job by saying, oh, well, this allows me to
build a great life for my family. But and I'll
speak from myself back in the day when my idea
of masculinity and we'll get more into this in a second,
was about just the presence I could buy for people
with my money rather than the emotional presence that is
(21:54):
needed to sustain a relationship. Uh, I wasn't really showing
up and providing a great life for the people that
I wanted Anyway, I wasn't really being the emotionally attuned
partner that I wanted to be. So think about how
much better off your family would be if you came
home as the most invigorated, excited, lit up present version
(22:19):
of yourself. Financial abundance is great, but if you're emotionally
short changing yourself and the people that you love. In
the process, you run the risk of living your life
an emotional bankruptcy, which in many ways is the ultimate failure.
What good is it to have all this money in
the bank and to have a miserable, tense existence in
(22:39):
your life every day? So that is the tip number one,
And then I would really say one be in that
is remembering that this idea that you can't live your
purpose and support your family simply isn't true. If that
were the case, we would never hear stories about people
who pivoted it in the second chapter of their life
(23:02):
and build a business or started a speaking career or
wrote their screenplayer book. Uh, they would never have done that.
And you can go on Google. You can find all
the inspiring stories and you don't need me to sit
here and tell you about you know, Colonel Sanders or
Morgan Freeman or Julia Child, you know, like we've talked
about that on this podcast before. But if it were
(23:26):
true that you couldn't reinvent and state financially afloat, then
there would be no examples of people who have done it.
The challenges is that you don't think that it's true
for you so we're gonna get into the questions that
you should ask yourself to find out why that's true.
And that just really leads me into the second tip
(23:46):
to help you overcome the breadwinner burden, which is to
uncover your burden blind spots. You know, most of us
have these beliefs that revolve around sacrificing to take care
of others. We have beliefs round NonStop hustle and climbing
the ladder or having to do everything by ourselves. And
(24:07):
as is the case with all your beliefs, they're really
not yours. None of us were born with any beliefs.
We came out of the womb as blank slates. And
most of your beliefs are things that were indoctrinated into you.
You know, nobody is born Catholic, Presbyterian, or Muslim, right
(24:27):
those the beliefs that you have when it comes to
your spirituality or religion are things that were indoctrinated into you.
What you believe to be true about your career, about
what's possible for you are things that were simply demonstrated
to you their generational patterns. You know, air quote here
gifted to you, typically by people who didn't know better.
(24:50):
So before you can move beyond the breadwinn burden, you
have to understand the subconscious prejudices that are keeping you
stuck in old patterns. Start with these question what did
you see in your father's behavior as a child and
how did it influence what you believe about men or
being a man today? Number two, what did you see
(25:12):
in your mother's behavior as a child and how did
that influence what you believe about femininity and feminism as
an adult? Another question to look at was sacrifice demonstrated
to you by your family as a show of love?
And are you engaging with your family the same way today?
And is that sacrificing yourself and your goals? Is that
(25:35):
creating some underlying resentment for you, if so, towards who?
And is there a way that you could create a
fuller demonstration of love within your family today? I told
you about that interview that we did at the end
of ten with Nick Tilia, you know, who believed at
one point he was going to sacrifice by skipping dinners
so his family could eat. And now his fullest demonstration
(25:58):
of love is, you know, to take his kids on
nice trips and spend quality time bonding with them through
activities and things that they love. Very important question here
for you Number four. Did your parents get the things
they wanted professionally and personally? If so, what did they
have to do to get it? Do you hold the
same rules as your parents or have you swung the
(26:20):
pendulum in the opposite direction and do you hold opposite rules? Now,
these are just, you know, places to get you started,
and if it's sparking some aha moments, might be a
great time for you to reach out and talk about
one on one coaching so we can work through this
and help you move beyond it. But once you understand
your subconscious model of the world that is dictating your
(26:42):
beliefs your behaviors, you can better understand why you're feeling
stuck and you can better communicate your needs at work
and at home. Tip number three to move beyond the
breadwinner burden. This one's for the men. For the masculine
energy partner will say, uh, your power is not related
(27:03):
to money and status, and that flies in the face
of everything that we see culturally. You know, think about
all the TV shows that are popular. My god, I
just finished binge watching Succession. You want to talk about
toxic masculine energy of men who think that they're worth
in the world is based on how much power that
(27:24):
they have. Go give that show a binge watch. It's
an incredible TV show, by the way, But we've also
seen this archetype and things like Breaking Bad, Right, you
have these male characters that would literally rather be sociopaths
than mediocre breadwinners. And this is demonstrated for us in politics.
We all know about some well known politicians who we
(27:46):
see in the news who value their own power over
democracy itself, who value power over basic human decency. So
we've got to move beyond these outdated stereos hypes and
for men to find lasting fulfillment, male breadwinners have got
to understand that their power is actually in their connection
(28:08):
to their purpose without a higher calling. You know, we
as men, you're living in impotent existence, and that could
be in the boardroom but also in the bedroom. Right,
You're constantly reacting to life, but you're never going to
actually feel like you're in the driver's seat and you're
never gonna feel free. So when you know your purpose,
it allows you to live in your truth. There's so
(28:31):
much energy that comes from that and it spills over
to your family, You'll show up as the most present
and version and loving version of yourself. For my female
bread winners out there, it's really about learning to thrive
at work without resentment at home. We said earlier on
the podcast. At the forty pc of households led by
(28:52):
female breadwinners. According to Harvard research, both partners in that
relationship secretly struggle with operation eating outside traditional societal norms.
This was a fascinating bit of research that I came
up with. Couples with female breadwinners are six more likely
to under report the woman's income due to underlying feelings
(29:15):
of embarrassment and shame. And what's interesting here is it
doesn't matter who's doing the reporting. Women who are finding
the taxes will over report their partners income and keep
there's the same, while men will actually under report their whites'
earnings and increase. There's so you know, there's so much
(29:36):
unspoken stuff that's coming up here. But it's also in
realizing what is the path according to the people who
have studied this, to true marital harmony in a home
where there is a female breadwinner. While Harvard says a
high earning woman has to feel supported at home. That
(29:56):
will help the marriage flourish. But it's all about the
type of support that's crucial. This isn't necessarily just about
emotional support. The data shows when men pick up their
fair share of the housework, child and elder care duties,
female breadwinners, uh, those relationships work great. It gives the
(30:18):
breadwinner more mental bandwidth to focus on her career or
perhaps a reinvention if that's what she's planning. But it
also creates a tremendous feeling of respect. So, as is
the case in any relationship, communication and teamwork matter. And
this is remembering that no matter who is making the
brunt of the income for the family, it doesn't make
(30:41):
the person who is earning less less important, you know when,
especially when we're talking about stay at home parents, and
certainly there are a lot of stay at home dads
these days, but the work of a stay at home parent,
if it was outsourced, would cost well over a hundred
thousand dollars a year and expenses. So one of the
(31:04):
things that I see a lot of times with male
breadwinners when they come to me, they're like, well, I'm
the one who works, and they dismiss the fact that
being a caretaker and being a mom at home is
a full time job in and of itself, and if
the guy was paying for all that, it's gonna cost
him six figures in the external world. So that's not
(31:24):
an excuse an excuse to put yourself above your partner. Likewise,
with the female breadwinners, right, we want to be able
to respect your partner and what they're bringing to the table.
But this really requires an open dialogue. You've got to
create a safe space to share your feelings, your needs,
and your expectations and really negotiating the win win for both.
(31:48):
How do you want to divide up those chores at home?
What do you need? What do you need from your partner?
What do you need for yourself? Uh, there's no one
size fits all for that. It's going to be unique
to the couple. But you've got to be able to
have the conversation. And tip number five when we talk
about these five steps to help you reduce the breadwinner burden,
(32:10):
ultimately it's about allowing yourself to receive support because this
breadwinner pressure is very real, and it is emotionally charged,
and when it's left unaddressed, it's a major contributing factor
and anxiety, depression, burnout, and divorce rates in this country.
So you shouldn't just try to keep pushing through, pushing
(32:32):
your feelings down, or trying to process some of the
stress by yourself. You know, breadwinner should seek professional help.
You should find a coach who can help you address
that internal pressure to perform and the tendency to put
your needs last at a root cause level, because I
guarantee you there is some childhood programming subconsciously that is
(32:55):
driving that. And additionally, you've got to be able to
ask for and support at home. You have to be
able to speak up about what you need, whether it's
dividing up the home tasks, the child care duties, whether
you're going to make a decision together to hire some
outside support. And man, this is more true than ever
for single parent bread winners, you know, who feel like
(33:19):
they got to do it all. You've got to find
that support network, whether it be from extended family or
a lot of times it's just finding other parents in
the neighborhood who understand that pressure. Somebody who can, you know,
take your kids for a few hours while you take
that time for self care to get to the gym
or to get to a yoga class, whatever that looks
(33:39):
like for you. Community support, mentorship, all of those are
so important for you moving beyond the breadwinner burden. So
quick reframe on these five tips. Number one, you cannot
use your family as an excuse to play small. And remember,
if it were impossible for you to live your purpose
(34:01):
and financially provide, then it would be true that nobody
has ever done it. That's an old story, and you're
going to uncover where that comes from when you follow
tip two, which is uncover your burden blind spots. I
gave you four powerful questions here on the episode that
will help you start to investigate. What did you learn
(34:22):
about men and women and sacrificing and relationships growing up
as a child. Number three for men in the masculine energy,
partners and relationships. I want to be very clear here
by the way, I know that this episode can sound
really head a heater normative. You know it's coming from
(34:42):
a middle aged straight guy. But when we talk about
men and women, what we're really talking about is masculine
and feminine energy. And even in lgbt lgbt Q relationships,
you know, we know that those partners occupy different energies,
so you know, if it helps you, replace men with
masculine energy, replace feminine with feminine energy. But for the
(35:05):
masculine partner, we've got to unravel this myth that your
power is about your paycheck. Your power is actually your
ability to bring your purpose to life. Number four. For
the female feminine energy breadwinners, you have to be able
to thrive at work without resentment at home, which means
(35:26):
you need to have an honest conversation with your partner
about some of those underlying feelings that come up when
one partner is financially better off or doing better than
the other. And it's about really having a win win
conversation about dividing those chores at home because for any
feminine energy partner to be taking on a second full
(35:49):
time job doing the housework on top of a full
time career, that is not going to end well. And
tip number five, it's allowing yourself to ask for and
receive support. I hope this podcast was beneficial for you.
If it is, could you please share it with a friend,
screenshot it, upload it to your Instagram stories. Be sure
to tag me at c sc Dan Mason. Uh that
(36:12):
way I can send you some love. I would love
to thank you for listening, and also if you'd like
some extra one on one support to move through some
of these themes we discussed today. You can apply for
one on one coaching on my website. Creative Soul Coaching
dot net is where you can go. I love you
for listening. Thank you so much for being here, and
(36:34):
remember it's time to turn down the volume on your
negativity turned up the volume on your purpose so you
can live life amplified. I'll talk to you next week.
The number one life reinvention roadblock from many unfulfilled high
performers is what I'd like to call the burden of
the breadwinner. On one hand, you feel a duty to
financially provide for and protect the people you love. On
the other hand, your soul is crying out to be
a whole human being, one with a healthy balance of
(00:20):
purposeful work, authentic self expression, love and play. It's a
tension of opposites, and it can keep you paralyzed in
the soul sucking job, but also need to burn out anxiety,
relationship tension, and ultimately a life of regret and unfulfilled dreams.
This week, I'm Life Amplified. I'll take a deep dive
(00:41):
into the burden of the breadwinner and discuss how it
impacts hiring men and women in very different ways. Plus,
I'll give you five tips to release yourself from the
burden so you can thrive in the life with less anxiety,
more support, and newfound fulfillment. Welcome back. Why is an
amplified life. It's having amplified relationships with people who support
(01:05):
and encourage you to be your best. It's having amplified
energy to conquer the challenges of the day, and it's
having an amplified career, one that's meaningful to you, the world,
and your bank accounts. I'm Dan Mason, helping you discover
your calling and create an amplified life on your terms.
(01:26):
This is the Life Amplified Podcast. One of the questions
I ask on my coaching applications is what is the
biggest block keeping you from reaching your goals? And one
of the biggest answers that always comes back from new
clients who work with me is some variation of, hey,
I am the breadwinner. I can't put my family financially
(01:48):
at risk by following my dream. And it just sort
of reinforces the idea that so many of us lived
by this starving artist trope that to be creatively fulfilled
in our work means we're going to lose all of
our money. Therefore we're going to lose our family, are
the approval of our parents, and ultimately we're gonna die
broke and homeless behind a Walmart dumpster, which of course
(02:12):
is not the case. I'd like to think that my
life is a demonstration of that, and so many of
my clients I work with who successfully navigate their career
and life reinventions, but I deeply relate and empathize with
the fear that comes with that. I've told you the
story on the podcast many times. In I was the
(02:33):
sole breadwinner for a home that included my now ex
wife and her six year old daughter, and I took
tremendous pride and being able to provide for the family.
In fact, that is what my definition of masculinity and
manhood was. A lot of that was demonstrated in my home,
growing up with a father who climbed the ladder and
(02:55):
became CEO of a major corporation, and you know it,
was able to take the family on trips, he was
able to pay for my college, and therefore, in my mind,
that's what being a man in the world was, which
interestingly enough, came with a lot of other subconscious beliefs
that were demonstrated, and number one being that to be
(03:18):
loved is to be needed, right, which is not a
helpful energy for anybody. By the way, those are two
very different things. You can have people that need you
in your life, but they don't necessarily love you, which
also explains why my marriage didn't last very long. Back
in the day, that was before I started my own
(03:38):
personal growth journey. But if I believe that my value
is a man in the world was based on what
I could provide, that didn't leave a lot of room
for my purpose. And that's why it took me five
years until well after my divorce before I stepped away
from corporate and I launched my coaching practice. But that
(03:58):
was interesting also because I was in another relationship at
that point with with a woman who you know, she
was a great person, but when we met, I out
earned her three to one. I was definitely the breadwinner
in our relationship, and when I walked away to start
my business, she was out earning me by probably two
(04:19):
or three to one, which again brought up a lot
of uncomfortable stuff. We're gonna talk about how it was
having a female breadwinner in a family. Uh, really brings
up a lot of unspoken emotions. There's a lot of
research on this that I'm going to share with you.
But for me, I felt emasculated. I felt like I
was able to provide and do all those things, like
(04:42):
you know, when we first started our relationship, I was
able to, you know, pay for the brunt of the
vacation and take her away to nice resorts, and then
once I didn't necessarily have all that money liquid in
the bank, I became the Hey, can we just do
a stay cation guy, or maybe we can find a
bargain Airbnb. And that was really embarrassing for me. I
felt like I wasn't really showing up the way that
(05:05):
I wanted And because at that point in my ex
girlfriend and I didn't necessarily have the skills to talk
openly about these uncomfortable things, it was a big contributing
factor to the demise of that relationship. So I'm going
to dive into this today. We're gonna talk about this
burden of the bread winner. And I've done so much
(05:25):
research on the different ways that this affects both high
earning men and women. But we want to just lay
all of our cards on the table, talk about the
elephant in the room. Ultimately, with the intention that you
are able to pivot toward your dreams, that you're able
to value your purpose over simply earning a paycheck. But
(05:47):
you can do it in a way that reduces the
amount of anxiety and fear that comes up for you,
that's going to reduce relationship tension, that will help you
feel more supported and ultimately build a life where you're
successful and fulfilled. Right, that's what we're all going for.
So we're gonna talk about male and female bread winners,
(06:07):
but will start with the men today because the number
one theme that gets in the way for a lot
of men and their career and reinvention, and it certainly
was my story as I just shared, is that men
face a societal expectation to provide. Now, whether that's right
or wrong and whether we should be redefining gender roles
(06:30):
is probably a conversation for a different podcast, but seventy
of people in a recent survey said the ability to
support the family financially is considered very important to be
a good partner. And what was interesting is only thirty
two of people actually said that about women. And there's
another study out there that suggests that a man's earning
(06:52):
capacity is an important consideration in the dating world. So
the result that we end up here is this idea
that staying in the corporate rat race, even if you
hate the job, can be more of a game of
perception and self preservation for men than actualizing their purpose
(07:13):
and doing the things to build a legacy. And for
many male breadwinners, there's a silent struggle to keep everyone happy.
On one hand, you know, being successful and getting those
accolades and attention, you know, masculine energy. We like to compete,
we like to strive, So on one hand, we want
(07:34):
to please the corporate overlords. But there's also this always
be hustling culture of corporate America that in many instances
pulls men away from their families, which causes a lot
of underlying resentment from the people that they're providing for.
So a lot of men that I coach feel like
they're in a bit of a no win situation where
(07:56):
they're working too much in a job they don't even
love to provide for a family that they feel like
they can't please. You know, if they fall into workaholic tendencies,
or they're traveling too much, or they're not able to
show up and take on a certain amount of the
work at home or raise the kids, or participate in
the elder care. That will also cause a lot of tensions.
(08:19):
So one of the things that we want to look
at here, and I'm talking to the men, but this
is going to be an overall theme for both genders.
When you are a breadwinner is where did you learn
that sacrificing your own personal happiness for the greater good
was a noble idea? Because it certainly is. Sacrifice can
(08:40):
be a demonstration of love, and as we talked about
on the podcast, I did want to at the end
of nineteen with my friend Nick Tillia, who's a coach
and also a father, it's just not the most full
expression of love. Nick shared his story that at one
point when he was in his career pivot out of
teaching and the coaching he like they were struggling so
(09:02):
much financially, he would not eat dinner so that his
kids could eat. He wouldn't go to the gym because
he felt like he should be home with his kids
after school. But that idea of sacrifice was really keeping
him from stepping into his divine purpose, and on the
back end, he just wasn't showing up as the man
he wanted to be. So his idea now of demonstrating
(09:25):
love is to be fully in his purpose to earn
money doing what he loves, where he can provide awesome
experiences for his family. That he's able to take his
oldest daughter to Coachella on the weekend. And you know,
some of these special experiences. So you know how you
want to show love for your family. Start to consider
(09:46):
was it modeled for me growing up that I had
to sacrifice to love people, or that I can thrive
in my dreams and share that overflow of financial abundance
that comes with it with the people around me. But
here's the thing that happens for many men, and I
know that this was the case with me personally. When
(10:08):
a man is not fully living in his purpose, he
will begin to feel weakened because we know in a
very deep part of our soul that we are living
a lesser life than more capable of. And over time,
those prolonged patterns of settling people, pleasing, playing it's safe,
it diminishes our confidence and our self esteem. And there's
(10:30):
a great book by David Didak called The Way of
the Superior Man where he really digs into this concept
that when a man is not living in his purpose,
his family also senses that weakness. You know, a lot
of times the partner in the relationship ends up having
to take the lead and take charge at home more
than they like to because the man is so is
(10:54):
energy is all used up. He doesn't really have the presence,
the energy, the passion to make decisions away from the office,
and after all, somebody has to get shipped done, which
usually falls on the partner. So male breadwinners will come
to me and complain that their sex life has gone south,
(11:15):
that you know, there's no physical intimacy with their partner
because there's that lack of safety. You know that the
feminine energy doesn't fully trust him to provide an environment
of safety. She feels like a lot of the decision
making is falling on her. And it can even show
up in relationships with children. You know, a lot of
times male breadwinners will complain that their children are pushing
(11:39):
back against discipline because on some level, the kid can
sense their father's own lack of self discipline. So you know,
there's a lot going on here. But what it's all
going to lead to is a deep seated anger within men.
This is why men's mental health is such a topic
right now. When we see people falling apart art and
(12:00):
becoming mass shooters, notice that it's rarely women, right We've
got a lot of angry men who are not in
their purpose, don't feel like they can live in their purpose,
and a lot of times they feel like they have
to fulfill a role in the world that's expected of
them but not true to who they are. And when
you throw in any stories of being unappreciated for the effort, uh,
(12:25):
there's just this overall frustration that is always going to
boil to the surface. But if you are a male
breadwinner listening today, what I want you to understand is
if you're feeling disrespected by your female partner, if you're
feeling disrespected by your children or by your friends, A
lot of times that can be a projection. And this
(12:47):
is tough to say, but as somebody who has been there,
I gotta keep it real with you. It can be
a projection of the way you're disrespecting yourself, selling out
your soul for a cushy pay check in a four
oh one k, trading the need for authentic self expression
and freedom, just to get love and praise from bosses,
(13:10):
from parents, and from society on social media. You know,
we know that three peas of the masculine energy in
a relationship is to protect, provide, and procreate, But there's
two other peas, purpose and presence at home, and when
your career becomes a cop out for neglecting your purpose,
(13:33):
and it's an excuse to avoid being present with your
loved ones because your energy is all used up just
trying to push through in a job that you hate.
It's virtually impossible for a man to achieve a lasting
sense of freedom or fulfillment. Now, let's flip the script
and talk about the female bread winners, because ladies, y'all
are killing it. You know, according to PE research for
(13:56):
American households are led by a female headwinner, which is
the highest number in the history of tracking this data
and very important too that women are able to establish
that financial independence. We have a generation of women right now,
you know, especially when you think, you know, it's like
some of the outdated social expectations fifty sixty years ago
(14:19):
that our grandparents went through, where women don't have to
marry a man for financial security or have to marry
into the right family to be safe. You know, women
have the ability to do this on their own. And
you know, we've got more women crushing it in corporate
than ever. However, there are unique challenges for the female breadwinner,
(14:44):
mostly uh the fact that of female high income earners
are also taking the lead in childcare, cooking, housework in
elder care as opposed to four of male breadwinners who
do the same. So for a lot of the women
that I coach, and I want to be very careful here,
it's very easy for me, is like some white middle
(15:07):
aged dude to feel like I'm man explaining the challenges
of women. But I will say my coaching practice is
actually seventy high performing women. So I've heard about these
pain points very much on a very personal, firsthand basis,
and I'm just going to share with you what the
research says here. But the challenge for women is that
(15:29):
they have to keep the plate spinning right, and it
creates a second full time job at home on top
of an already demanding corporate career. And this is what
exponentially increased burnout rates and cause women to disproportionately lead
the workforce when the pandemic hit in one And particularly
if you are a high performing woman who's unfulfilled and
(15:52):
you want to go become a entrepreneur or you know,
go to work for yourself or maybe pivot into a
different career, the thought of that can be exhausting because
even if the female breadwinner has the financial means to
take a break and reassess their career. The exhaustion and
the burnout from leading at work and home leaves very
(16:12):
little energy for even the most basic self care, let
alone the amount of mental bandwidth that it takes to
build a meaningful second chapter. So let's dig into more
of what the data from Harvard Business Review says. That
is the fact that female breadwinners tend to be more
dissatisfied in their relationships. Women with higher status jobs than
(16:36):
their partner are sixtent less likely to be happy in
their marriage. They're actually more likely to be resentful or
embarrassed of their partner, and they're more likely to consider divorce,
especially if their partner has anything less than full time employment.
And you know, in my coaching practice, I've probably done
(16:58):
over ten thousand hours of coaching high achieving female clients
in and of themselves, and I've witnessed how all these
unspoken relationship resentments can be career reinvention roadblocks. Because Number one,
if the female breadwinner can't count on her partner to
show up and do the dishes, or bathe the kids,
(17:18):
or to tuck them into bed at night, she feels like, well,
how could I ever depend on him to pick up
the financial slack while I start a business, write a book,
go back to school, or pursue my lifelong dream. Another
interesting thing here that I want the female breadwinners to
consider is the trauma history that's associated with this, because
(17:40):
what I've noticed is when a female breadwinner has a
family history with an unreliable father who either was lazy,
didn't do a good job taking care of the family,
or maybe ran out on the family, that creates a
tremendous internal story about well, I can't depend and done
(18:00):
a man, and I've got to do all this myself.
You know. I remember coaching a woman who was, you know,
a vice president at her company, very high performing woman,
and she had this story her whole life that was
I have to be a better man than my father.
And how that was manifesting is having to get everything done,
work hard, put her kids through college, but also take
(18:22):
care of the house while she had a husband who
was very much an artist and a creative but wasn't
doing a good job of monetizing any of that. So
there was a lot of this underlying resentment, a little
bit of embarrassment over where her husband was. And it's
uh you know, that's a very tough way to be.
(18:43):
I mean, you talk about being on a fast track
for divorce one day, all these unspoken tensions are going
to get in the way there. And we just don't
really talk about this much, you know, But all the
research says that we need to relation ships and marriages
where the female is the breadwinner. We told you that
(19:03):
the woman is more likely to be unsatisfied, but if
the man feels emasculated and unable to step up, he
becomes more likely to use a rectile dysfunction medication, and
those men are actually more likely statistically to have an
extra marital affair. Now, we've discussed a lot of this
(19:23):
burden of the breadwinner in regards to marriages, but we
haven't really acknowledged the burden of the single breadwinner mother,
who actually makes up about one in five American families.
So for them, it's even an heightened sense of responsibility.
A lot of those people when they come to me
(19:45):
feel trapped. They feel like they have to continue to
push through uh and they just the idea of a
career reinvention seems out of reach for them. They feel
they can't switch companies because what if the new company
doesn't offer the same flexibility, and she can't take hair
of her kids. You know, the idea of taking a
new job for less money and more growth potential become
(20:05):
scary because if the new opportunities never materialized, she feels
as if she's jeopardizing her family's future. So a lot
of times, when we're talking about a single parent here,
that nervous system need to survive trumps the sole desire
to expand and become more, which just leads to more
in decision, in action, and stagnation. Coming up after the
(20:29):
break will tell you what to do with all this information.
Five tips to overcome the breadwinner burden and navigate your
life reinvention with less anxiety, more support, and better connection
to yourself, your purpose, and the people you love. All right,
so let's get into this the five tips to overcome
(20:49):
the breadwinner burden. Now, some of these are practical strategies,
some of them are just internal mindset shifts that you're
going to have to take on if you're going to
move forward. But we'll start with number one, which is
you cannot continue to use your family as an excuse
to play small. And I realized that we all have
responsibilities in life. We have to pay the bills, cover
(21:11):
the mortgage, take care of your loved ones. We all
need to be a productive member of society. But remembering
that your only true obligation in life is to discover
your purpose and bring it to life. And there's so
many talented, gifted people that could make a huge impact
in the world, and they stay in some soul crushing
(21:34):
shitty job by saying, oh, well, this allows me to
build a great life for my family. But and I'll
speak from myself back in the day when my idea
of masculinity and we'll get more into this in a second,
was about just the presence I could buy for people
with my money rather than the emotional presence that is
(21:54):
needed to sustain a relationship. Uh, I wasn't really showing
up and providing a great life for the people that
I wanted Anyway, I wasn't really being the emotionally attuned
partner that I wanted to be. So think about how
much better off your family would be if you came
home as the most invigorated, excited, lit up present version
(22:19):
of yourself. Financial abundance is great, but if you're emotionally
short changing yourself and the people that you love. In
the process, you run the risk of living your life
an emotional bankruptcy, which in many ways is the ultimate failure.
What good is it to have all this money in
the bank and to have a miserable, tense existence in
(22:39):
your life every day? So that is the tip number one,
And then I would really say one be in that
is remembering that this idea that you can't live your
purpose and support your family simply isn't true. If that
were the case, we would never hear stories about people
who pivoted it in the second chapter of their life
(23:02):
and build a business or started a speaking career or
wrote their screenplayer book. Uh, they would never have done that.
And you can go on Google. You can find all
the inspiring stories and you don't need me to sit
here and tell you about you know, Colonel Sanders or
Morgan Freeman or Julia Child, you know, like we've talked
about that on this podcast before. But if it were
(23:26):
true that you couldn't reinvent and state financially afloat, then
there would be no examples of people who have done it.
The challenges is that you don't think that it's true
for you so we're gonna get into the questions that
you should ask yourself to find out why that's true.
And that just really leads me into the second tip
(23:46):
to help you overcome the breadwinner burden, which is to
uncover your burden blind spots. You know, most of us
have these beliefs that revolve around sacrificing to take care
of others. We have beliefs round NonStop hustle and climbing
the ladder or having to do everything by ourselves. And
(24:07):
as is the case with all your beliefs, they're really
not yours. None of us were born with any beliefs.
We came out of the womb as blank slates. And
most of your beliefs are things that were indoctrinated into you.
You know, nobody is born Catholic, Presbyterian, or Muslim, right
(24:27):
those the beliefs that you have when it comes to
your spirituality or religion are things that were indoctrinated into you.
What you believe to be true about your career, about
what's possible for you are things that were simply demonstrated
to you their generational patterns. You know, air quote here
gifted to you, typically by people who didn't know better.
(24:50):
So before you can move beyond the breadwinn burden, you
have to understand the subconscious prejudices that are keeping you
stuck in old patterns. Start with these question what did
you see in your father's behavior as a child and
how did it influence what you believe about men or
being a man today? Number two, what did you see
(25:12):
in your mother's behavior as a child and how did
that influence what you believe about femininity and feminism as
an adult? Another question to look at was sacrifice demonstrated
to you by your family as a show of love?
And are you engaging with your family the same way today?
And is that sacrificing yourself and your goals? Is that
(25:35):
creating some underlying resentment for you, if so, towards who?
And is there a way that you could create a
fuller demonstration of love within your family today? I told
you about that interview that we did at the end
of ten with Nick Tilia, you know, who believed at
one point he was going to sacrifice by skipping dinners
so his family could eat. And now his fullest demonstration
(25:58):
of love is, you know, to take his kids on
nice trips and spend quality time bonding with them through
activities and things that they love. Very important question here
for you Number four. Did your parents get the things
they wanted professionally and personally? If so, what did they
have to do to get it? Do you hold the
same rules as your parents or have you swung the
(26:20):
pendulum in the opposite direction and do you hold opposite rules? Now,
these are just, you know, places to get you started,
and if it's sparking some aha moments, might be a
great time for you to reach out and talk about
one on one coaching so we can work through this
and help you move beyond it. But once you understand
your subconscious model of the world that is dictating your
(26:42):
beliefs your behaviors, you can better understand why you're feeling
stuck and you can better communicate your needs at work
and at home. Tip number three to move beyond the
breadwinner burden. This one's for the men. For the masculine
energy partner will say, uh, your power is not related
(27:03):
to money and status, and that flies in the face
of everything that we see culturally. You know, think about
all the TV shows that are popular. My god, I
just finished binge watching Succession. You want to talk about
toxic masculine energy of men who think that they're worth
in the world is based on how much power that
(27:24):
they have. Go give that show a binge watch. It's
an incredible TV show, by the way, But we've also
seen this archetype and things like Breaking Bad, Right, you
have these male characters that would literally rather be sociopaths
than mediocre breadwinners. And this is demonstrated for us in politics.
We all know about some well known politicians who we
(27:46):
see in the news who value their own power over
democracy itself, who value power over basic human decency. So
we've got to move beyond these outdated stereos hypes and
for men to find lasting fulfillment, male breadwinners have got
to understand that their power is actually in their connection
(28:08):
to their purpose without a higher calling. You know, we
as men, you're living in impotent existence, and that could
be in the boardroom but also in the bedroom. Right,
You're constantly reacting to life, but you're never going to
actually feel like you're in the driver's seat and you're
never gonna feel free. So when you know your purpose,
it allows you to live in your truth. There's so
(28:31):
much energy that comes from that and it spills over
to your family, You'll show up as the most present
and version and loving version of yourself. For my female
bread winners out there, it's really about learning to thrive
at work without resentment at home. We said earlier on
the podcast. At the forty pc of households led by
(28:52):
female breadwinners. According to Harvard research, both partners in that
relationship secretly struggle with operation eating outside traditional societal norms.
This was a fascinating bit of research that I came
up with. Couples with female breadwinners are six more likely
to under report the woman's income due to underlying feelings
(29:15):
of embarrassment and shame. And what's interesting here is it
doesn't matter who's doing the reporting. Women who are finding
the taxes will over report their partners income and keep
there's the same, while men will actually under report their whites'
earnings and increase. There's so you know, there's so much
(29:36):
unspoken stuff that's coming up here. But it's also in
realizing what is the path according to the people who
have studied this, to true marital harmony in a home
where there is a female breadwinner. While Harvard says a
high earning woman has to feel supported at home. That
(29:56):
will help the marriage flourish. But it's all about the
type of support that's crucial. This isn't necessarily just about
emotional support. The data shows when men pick up their
fair share of the housework, child and elder care duties,
female breadwinners, uh, those relationships work great. It gives the
(30:18):
breadwinner more mental bandwidth to focus on her career or
perhaps a reinvention if that's what she's planning. But it
also creates a tremendous feeling of respect. So, as is
the case in any relationship, communication and teamwork matter. And
this is remembering that no matter who is making the
brunt of the income for the family, it doesn't make
(30:41):
the person who is earning less less important, you know when,
especially when we're talking about stay at home parents, and
certainly there are a lot of stay at home dads
these days, but the work of a stay at home parent,
if it was outsourced, would cost well over a hundred
thousand dollars a year and expenses. So one of the
(31:04):
things that I see a lot of times with male
breadwinners when they come to me, they're like, well, I'm
the one who works, and they dismiss the fact that
being a caretaker and being a mom at home is
a full time job in and of itself, and if
the guy was paying for all that, it's gonna cost
him six figures in the external world. So that's not
(31:24):
an excuse an excuse to put yourself above your partner. Likewise,
with the female breadwinners, right, we want to be able
to respect your partner and what they're bringing to the table.
But this really requires an open dialogue. You've got to
create a safe space to share your feelings, your needs,
and your expectations and really negotiating the win win for both.
(31:48):
How do you want to divide up those chores at home?
What do you need? What do you need from your partner?
What do you need for yourself? Uh, there's no one
size fits all for that. It's going to be unique
to the couple. But you've got to be able to
have the conversation. And tip number five when we talk
about these five steps to help you reduce the breadwinner burden,
(32:10):
ultimately it's about allowing yourself to receive support because this
breadwinner pressure is very real, and it is emotionally charged,
and when it's left unaddressed, it's a major contributing factor
and anxiety, depression, burnout, and divorce rates in this country.
So you shouldn't just try to keep pushing through, pushing
(32:32):
your feelings down, or trying to process some of the
stress by yourself. You know, breadwinner should seek professional help.
You should find a coach who can help you address
that internal pressure to perform and the tendency to put
your needs last at a root cause level, because I
guarantee you there is some childhood programming subconsciously that is
(32:55):
driving that. And additionally, you've got to be able to
ask for and support at home. You have to be
able to speak up about what you need, whether it's
dividing up the home tasks, the child care duties, whether
you're going to make a decision together to hire some
outside support. And man, this is more true than ever
for single parent bread winners, you know, who feel like
(33:19):
they got to do it all. You've got to find
that support network, whether it be from extended family or
a lot of times it's just finding other parents in
the neighborhood who understand that pressure. Somebody who can, you know,
take your kids for a few hours while you take
that time for self care to get to the gym
or to get to a yoga class, whatever that looks
(33:39):
like for you. Community support, mentorship, all of those are
so important for you moving beyond the breadwinner burden. So
quick reframe on these five tips. Number one, you cannot
use your family as an excuse to play small. And remember,
if it were impossible for you to live your purpose
(34:01):
and financially provide, then it would be true that nobody
has ever done it. That's an old story, and you're
going to uncover where that comes from when you follow
tip two, which is uncover your burden blind spots. I
gave you four powerful questions here on the episode that
will help you start to investigate. What did you learn
(34:22):
about men and women and sacrificing and relationships growing up
as a child. Number three for men in the masculine energy,
partners and relationships. I want to be very clear here
by the way, I know that this episode can sound
really head a heater normative. You know it's coming from
(34:42):
a middle aged straight guy. But when we talk about
men and women, what we're really talking about is masculine
and feminine energy. And even in lgbt lgbt Q relationships,
you know, we know that those partners occupy different energies,
so you know, if it helps you, replace men with
masculine energy, replace feminine with feminine energy. But for the
(35:05):
masculine partner, we've got to unravel this myth that your
power is about your paycheck. Your power is actually your
ability to bring your purpose to life. Number four. For
the female feminine energy breadwinners, you have to be able
to thrive at work without resentment at home, which means
(35:26):
you need to have an honest conversation with your partner
about some of those underlying feelings that come up when
one partner is financially better off or doing better than
the other. And it's about really having a win win
conversation about dividing those chores at home because for any
feminine energy partner to be taking on a second full
(35:49):
time job doing the housework on top of a full
time career, that is not going to end well. And
tip number five, it's allowing yourself to ask for and
receive support. I hope this podcast was beneficial for you.
If it is, could you please share it with a friend,
screenshot it, upload it to your Instagram stories. Be sure
to tag me at c sc Dan Mason. Uh that
(36:12):
way I can send you some love. I would love
to thank you for listening, and also if you'd like
some extra one on one support to move through some
of these themes we discussed today. You can apply for
one on one coaching on my website. Creative Soul Coaching
dot net is where you can go. I love you
for listening. Thank you so much for being here, and
(36:34):
remember it's time to turn down the volume on your
negativity turned up the volume on your purpose so you
can live life amplified. I'll talk to you next week.
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