Wedding Business Solutions

Janice Litvin - Learn How to Banish Burnout!

• Alan Berg, CSP, Global Speaking Fellow

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Janice Litvin - Learn How to Banish Burnout!

Do you ever feel overwhelmed by the persistent demands of work, even if you love what you do? Are there moments when stress feels unmanageable, hinting that burnout might be just around the corner? In this episode, we dive into how to recognize early signs of burnout, reframe your stress reactions, and implement practical strategies to maintain your passion without the risk of burning out. Join us as Janice Litvin shares insights from her Banish Burnout Toolkit and discusses how to thrive in your wedding business.

Listen to this new episode for tips on recognizing burnout signs and mastering the art of setting healthy boundaries for a more balanced work-life harmony.

About Janice: 
Janice Litvin is an award-winning workplace wellness speaker and author. She is on a mission to help leaders and teams banish burnout in their organizations so they can retain top talent. She does this through keynotes, workshops and coaching groups. Her program, Banish Burnout: Move from Stress to Success teaches individuals how to change their reactions to stress from the inside out. Banish Organizational Burnout to Cultivate Thriving Teams helps leaders and managers prevent burnout from the top down, to boost productivity.

Giveaway for WBS listeners: to get the free Banish Burnout Toolkit here is the link: https://www.janicelitvin.com/resources


Contact Janice:
www.JaniceLitvin.com/Speaking

https://www.Linkedin.com/in/JaniceLitvin

https://www.Facebook.com/WorkplaceWellnessSpeaker

https://www.Instagram.com/JaniceLitvin

https://www.X.com/JLitvin


If you have any questions about anything in this, or any of my podcasts, or have a suggestion for a topic or guest, please reach out directly to me at Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com or visit my website Podcast.AlanBerg.com 

Please be sure to subscribe to this podcast and leave a revie

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I'm Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you'd like to suggest other topics for "The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast" please let me know. My email is Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.

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©2025 Wedding Business Solutions LLC & AlanBerg.com

Do you want to learn how to banish burnout? You want to hear this episode? Hi, it's Alan Berg. Welcome back to another episode of the Wedding Business Solutions podcast. I am so happy to have my friend Janice Litvin on, who is the founder of the Banish Burnout Academy. And we're going to talk about Burn It. Janice, thank you so much for reaching out and thank you so much for joining me.

Thank you for having me. I'm delighted to be here.

I was watching a video that you did and watching you in front of a room talking about burnout, and I'm going, oh, you have to come on and talk. Because I see so often in Facebook groups and things and people talking and even in my consulting, people just feeling that burnout, you know, and you love what you do, but loving what you do, you can still get burnt out. Is that correct?

Absolutely. And I call that. I sort of call that compassion fatigue, meaning I love what I do, but I never know how to stop. Never know how or when to stop and go to bed.

Right. And because the passion is there and you want to help people, that's why you accepted the gig in the first place. Right. But now you have to do it. Sometimes it looks better on paper. Right. Like our schedule looks better on paper than it does in real life.

Absolutely.

So what are some of the things. First of all, let's just talk about burnout. In the first place. Everybody's heard the phrase, but I think perception might be different. So how do you define burnout?

Well, the World Health Organization came up with a definition in 2019, and they declared burnout as an occupational syndrome caused by chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed. And I really like to focus on the word chronic.

Okay, so now dig deeper into that. So what do you mean by that?

Well, let me take a step back before I dig in. First of all, true burnout, the word burnout, if you take a look at the literal definition, that means somebody has absolutely mentally, physically and emotionally exhausted, can't work anymore, has have to take time off, and that could be one to six months or longer. So that's real burnout. A lot of people say, oh, I'm so burned out. I'm so burned out. What I translate that to is, I'm burning out, ing I'm in the process of burning out. I better stop and pay attention so I don't have to take six months off.

So what would be a better way to describe that then, as you say, burning out. But what. What's really happening to those people who say, I'm burnt out, but they're not burnt out yet.

They're overly stressed.

Okay.

Overwhelmed. And they're overwhelmed and overworked.

Right. And again, you can still love what you do and be overly stressed and overworked, Right? Yes. And there are little micro clues. For example, if you wake up in the morning and go, oh, I hope I don't have more than two emails today. I just don't want to look at my emails. I don't want to answer any voicemail. If you start to get those feelings of it's getting to be too much, that's a time to stop and pay attention. Number one, take that day off. And number two, start thinking about how you plan your time and what commitments you make.

And maybe you need an assistant, or maybe you need better time management planning, but it's time when you start to have those days, it's time to sit up and pay attention.

Yeah. I think for me, waiting too long to get that assistant was a mistake. But, you know, again, hindsight is always, always great. But, you know, sitting on the sofa at night with my laptop, watching tv. Well, not really watching TV because I'm working. Right, Right. And then realizing, do I really need to be doing this? I know it needs to get done, but A, do I need to be doing it at all? And B, does it need to get done now? Right. And then realizing handing that stuff off and now when those things are getting done and I'm not doing them, wow, what a difference.

You really hit the nail on the head. And I'm even experiencing some of this myself. There's so much to do to run a business, no matter what the business is. And I know in the wedding business, everything is time critical. Six months in advance, you have to do this, three months in advance, et cetera, winding down till the day of and the week before and the day of. And when you let go of every teeny, tiny little detail, your life will be so much better because there's too much to be done and you can't physically get it all done.

Yeah. And it's realizing that, yes, it needs to get done. Maybe I can do it better. I think that's a syndrome we all have as well, is I can do it better. What I've found is maybe I can't do it better, maybe somebody else can do it better. And then that's been a thing for me because I. I've been through many different assistants, and my assistant now is great. Anya, if you're listening, you should be, because you're helping with this.

Fantastic. And I've given her some assignments where instead of saying, do it this way, I said, this is what I need to be done. You want to take a stab at it. And then she'll come back with something that I never thought of. Right. Just because we all have our, you know, history and our blinders. For instance, I. I did a secret shopping.

We do a lot of secret shopping, Janice. Over 500 companies in the last couple of years. And with this one client who paid us to shop his competitors, I said, I need a report card. Right. I need to show him the results. And I said, report card. My mind goes to what probably you and I would picture as a report card going back to school. Right, Right.

But instead of saying and make it look like this, I said, I need a report card. Do you want to take a stab at that? And she did and came back with an infographic. But. And I was like, what? That's not what I think of as a report card. But oh my gosh, that's so much better. Right.

Sounds like I need to hire her.

But. But I think that that's. That's also part of the letting go is what if I can do it better? It still doesn't mean I should do it. It doesn't mean it won't be done well. It just means it won't be done the same. Right.

So that's letting go of perfection.

Yeah. Which I spoke about a lot and I've written about because I was the perfectionist. And now. Now my thing is I live by. I don't want to be the best I can ever be at anything. I just want to be better than I was the last time I did, whatever that is. So I'm incrementally improving. And the reason that perfection is a problem is because you can't be better than perfect.

So don't. If you achieve perfection, what are you going to do next? Right.

Wow, that's deep. That's very deep.

I learned that in martial arts because I had asked the master, are we trying to do a perfect punch, a perfect kick, a perfect form? And he said no, for that reason. Because if you do it perfect, how are you going to improve upon that? And that's what we're trying to do is just always be better. Right. That it'd be incrementally better. I'm listening to a book now called Bounce. Guy was a world table tennis champion and Olympic champion and stuff like that. And he said, what you want to do Is you want to set yourself a goal that's just an obtainable goal that's just past your current skill because you want to be able to reach that. But then you have to set another one that's just past your current skill and just past your current skill to be better, which could lead to burnout.

So let's come back to burnout over here. So go back to chronic. We skipped past chronic. So. Yeah, so. So talk about chronic. What. What would.

What would defi. What would make something be defined as okay, that is chronic as opposed to, I'm just feeling, you know, overwhelmed today?

Well, chronic means it never ends, okay? And every single client I talk to, whether they're an entrepreneur in the wedding business or whatever, is telling me that I feel overwhelmed and overworked. And so that. Get back. That gets back to deciding what's really important, getting it done or subcontracting it out to a vendor or a VA like you. Like you have.

Right. But so again, real first is you have to realize it. Right. You have to recognize awareness is the.

First key to everything. Right.

So. So let's talk about that. What are some of the signs that you need to be paying attention to so that you can have a better awareness?

Well, micro clues, as I said. One was waking up with these negative thoughts in your head, like, oh, no. Or you have a client or a group of clients you don't really like working with, and you start to. Anything where you start to have negative thoughts in your head about your work.

Right.

Your day. That. That's a clear sign. Other obvious signs are getting sick. Getting sick more. Wow, why do I keep getting a cold? Well, maybe you're stressed. You know, stress is the fight, flight, or freeze part of the brain activating. It's not meant to be on high 24 7.

And when it is, there are certain hormones that get flooded in your body, and those cause reduced immune system. Is one of the keys. One of the number one issues that come up from too much cortisol and too much adrenaline in your bloodstream and other things like that, other illnesses.

So the interesting thing is you hear about tgif, you know, thank goodness it's Friday.

Yeah.

If you're working on the weekend and your TGIF is, oh, great, it's Friday. I get to do what I love as opposed to, oh, it's Friday now. I have to work Friday. I have to work Saturday. Right. There's your attitude difference. Right. Just looking at that same calendar and saying, I'm looking forward to this versus I'm dreading this.

And the other thing is, if you're tired and it's 3:30 and you need a nap, take a darn nap. Take the 20 minute nap, you'll feel so much better. And then after the 20 minute nap and you can set the timer. And my husband and I experimented with this. We couldn't believe how good we felt. After a short nap then you can get back and you can work an extra 20 minutes at the end of the day if you really need to. But people, people who are that revved up forget to stop and take breaks. And by the way, speaking of breaks, this is really important.

I know it's wintertime, but if you can get out in the sun for 10 minutes a day, dopamine. As soon as the sun hits your skin, vitamin D is activated and then you feel better. Dopamine and other, if you can add a walk to that, you even get the endorphins. If you can call a friend and it could be another wedding planner and say, oh my gosh, I've got this terrible client, what should I do? And have that five or ten minute convo. You get your problem solved and you get the dopamine from having an experience, a social experience or oxytocin and all the other happiness chemicals of spending time with a friend, even if it's on the phone.

Yeah, that's great. I, you can't see it in the picture here, but there's a recliner in my office and I don't have a huge office, but there is a recliner right over here. And like you said, sometimes at 3 in the afternoon and 20 minutes is that I. A lot of the books, a lot of stuff that I've read longer is also not good. It might affect your sleep at night and things like that, but 20 minutes, you're in good company with Thomas Edison and so many people that would take these naps. And let's face it, the siesta is underrated, right? It is so underrated.

And I want to tell you this. So I was a recruiter for 20 years in high tech and talk about stress, but every single, and this is before email. So my entire life was on the phone and I had a group of recruiter friends and every single morning one of us would call each other and say, how, what do you have planned for day? How's it going? Do you have any problems? And it was kind of like an instant five minute mastermind. And just that five minutes, it warmed up my voice, got me ready for the Day made me feel better because I knew someone was rooting for me and I was rooting for them. And so just that quick little check in with a friend who might be another wedding planner that you share gigs with and you refer each other and just to touch base first thing in the morning. It really helps set your day on a positive.

Yeah.

Method.

Kind of like the hour you and I spent before we started recording.

Yes, absolutely. Having a friend that you trust and that trusts you is a really valuable part of your. Of your banishing burnout toolkit.

I think also the being on both sides of that, the person who's doing the helping. I think that that also makes you feel better because you know that you've made an impact on somebody and you see the aha moment. I mean, I saw every time you turn to write something down that we're speaking. Right. I'm feeling something now. I'm feeling your excitement. So. So you have the banish burnout toolkit.

So talk about some of the things that people can do to. Once they recognize this. Right? Once you recognize this. And besides the talking to a friend and the going for a walk, which I love doing. And not when it's 20 degrees though, but when I love doing that. Right. I did walk on the treadmill today. I didn't get the vitamin D.

So what are some of the other things that. That people can do? Because I watched your video and you get people just moving and stuff. So. So talk about moving.

Speaking of moving. So I think you know that I also am a Zumba instructor and I have been for 15 years. This past July was my 15 year anniversary. And they celebrate it by sending you a badge and all that. And I still do it twice a week. It started on Zoom during COVID I'm still doing it twice a week on Zoom. And I love it. And I don't have a lot of students, but I love it.

I feel better. They're happy. And we're having a little party with really good music. Sometimes a friend will come over and do it with me in person, which is even more fun. And so physical activity. And I know everybody's like, oh, yeah, I know I need to exercise, but that's not the point. The point is you need to feel happy. And physical activity is a definite antidote to.

To depression and anxiety for those of you who suffer from depression or anxiety. And it just makes you feel just like I said before about calling a friend and going outside. Physical activity is another way to do that. And it doesn't have to be an hour in the gym, it can be a 10 minute walk. It's better than nothing. Every time you move, whether you're gardening or going to Costco, every time you move, it's all cumulative and you're going.

To feel better, especially if you've been sitting. Right. Because they say that you can be exercising like I exercise almost every morning. But then if I go and sit all day. Right. So one of the things I did during COVID is I got a motorized base for my desk so I can stand like I'm standing right now. I'm standing on an ergonomic pad here so I can work here, I can type, I can speak, I can record, I can do all this. And if I need to sit, I can sit.

Yes, but, but it's here. So I'm just, I'm not undoing that hour and 90 minutes of exercise that I did this morning just by sitting all day.

You're not going to undo it, but sitting is the new smoking, so sitting kills.

Well, you didn't talk. You didn't hear my back after I get up out of that chair all day.

Yes. I also have a motorized desk that I got from Costco that goes up and down. Yeah, so. So that's one thing is physical activity, and that's. That was an aside. So this book, while physical activity is included in the book, the mental help. And by the way, mental health is health. I just want to make a point about that because a lot of people, when they think of health, they think of physical health.

So the first chapter is all about awareness and we talked a little bit about that already. But part of awareness, like I said before, if you catch yourself having these negative thoughts. So let's say you see a message, whether it's on a text or voicemail or whatever from a client, you're like, oh, no, what do they want? What if you convert that to. Oh, I'm so excited to hear from them. That's one of my favorite clients. So you can convert your reactions to different stressful events. Like it's the day before and you were telling me this before. It's the day before a wedding and the photographer cancels.

Yes, that's extremely stressful. But as a wedding planner, I'm sure you have a backup list of photographers and all the vendors. And so you can say, oh, that's no problem, I've got my backup list. All I have to do, I or my VA can now contact the back, go through the backup list.

Right.

So part of it is reframing your reactions to stress.

Right, because it's a choice, right? It's a choice on how to react to any situation.

Well, let me say this. Yes and yes. And so it's normal here human behavior to have a stress reaction when something happens. Someone rear ends you on the freeway, someone cuts you off on the freeway, oh my gosh. And start screaming in the car, which I'm famous for, and using bad language. But if you reframe that to think, wow, what if that's a guy who's trying to get his wife to the hospital because she's in labor? Then you can forgive the guy and you don't have to be angry. You're like, oh yeah, let me slow down. So it's all about how, yes, you're going to have a reaction.

But then the next thought should be, what can I do to reframe it? For me, it doesn't matter about the other driver. It matters about me or you, how you feel. I don't want you to feel upset and angry every time someone cuts you off a freeway. And I know in some cities, like New York and New Jersey, it's worse than others.

Well, that's just normal driving that. We just call that Tuesday. Right? That's what that is.

Well, you know what's funny about that? We were in Bogota last year, my daughter in law is from Bogota. And we, I opened my big mouth and said, why don't we all go to Bogota and visit your family? So we all went last December. And driving in Bogota is like driving in LA times 100. It's all, there's so many people and so many cars and they don't get angry and they don't honk at each other. They just know the mode of driving is cutting each other off. And it's just, it's like you say.

It'S like Tuesday in India is the same way when I went, I would never drive there. And I'm looking at this, the lines on the road mean nothing.

Nothing, right?

There was nothing. There were three lanes. It was a red light. And between the tuk tuks and the motorcycles and the mini bikes and, and, and they're just, there's eight people across in these three lanes.

Jumping in.

Yeah. Oh, and the cows, right? And, and seriously. And the cows. And I'm looking at this and these tuk tuks, they're just cutting in and out, cutting in and out. And it is the best way to get around for sure. Best way to get around there. But I would never drive there again. And like you said, they're honking is not an angry honking.

Their honking is, hey, I'm here and I'm letting you know what I'm doing. And it's like, I know you could be all day just this language going around, but. So I frame this as something I heard years ago. You can't help how things and situation make you feel, but you do control how long you feel that way.

Yes. And that is one of the keys to my banishing burnout is how high, how. How low do you go and how long do you stay there. Do you complain about situations, Your least favorite caterer that you work with or whatever? Do you complain all day for a week and complain to all your friends? Or do you say, that was annoying? Now, how long am I going to sit with this?

Yeah, right.

Do I have to complain? My family doesn't want to hear me complain for a week. My brain and my. And my mental health don't need me to complain for a week. I need to move on. Because every time you complain, you're re. Re. You're re. Energizing the negativity.

Well, again, you're feeding it. It's. I got a call the other day about a bad review. And this happens to me a few times a year. Somebody's hair is on fire. They got their first bad review. They don't know what to do, and they think of calling me because I've written about it, I speak about it, and, you know, I have to talk. Talking back off the ledge.

Come on back over here. Let me read it. Let's talk about this and go through. And, you know, sometimes it's happened recently, sometimes it's a little bit further ago. And this one was a recent one. And I said, listen, that person who wrote that review, they got it off their chest, and they're done. They're done. You're holding onto it, not them.

You're holding on to it, not them. I had one recently. I was doing this mastermind, and somebody brought up the idea of a negative review. And the group were listening to it. And I said, okay, so when was this? And it was like five years ago. And the. And everybody in the room just starts staring at him, going, wait, wait, wait. That was five years ago, and you're still complaining about that.

That person moved on four years and 11 months ago. Right. And you're still complaining about that. This is on you, buddy. This isn't them anymore. Right? And I said, how many good reviews do you have? You know, at 100 200. Whatever. I said start reading those.

Yeah, right.

Because that's, that's what you're doing now, and that's what people think about you today.

And, and there's one thing. I got a constructive critique once after a speech, and I. It was a brand new speech, and it was a situation where I did it as a favor for a client, of course. And, and, and, and I wasn't excited. Something about it was bothering me, and that guy hit the nail on the head. And it was actually the best feedback I ever got because I felt the same that he did, but I couldn't put it into words. Something was bothering me and he, from his perspective, could see it. And then I reframed it now much, much happier.

So if there's something constructive in the review, pluck the constructive thing and let go of the negativity. Because some people are just very critical.

Well, the first thing I always say is, I read the review, show me the review, and then I say how much of what they said is true.

Right, right.

Not, not how bad do you think it is versus how bad they think it is? Because that's just, that's a now perspective. You think it's this bad, they think it's that bad. Right. They paid you the money. It was their wedding, it was their event. They're going to think it's worse than you think it is because you're like, hey, it wasn't that big of a deal. Right, Right. And you also don't know who's goading them, who's poking the bear on their side.

Right. This, you should write that. Oh, you should say this. You should do all that kind of stuff. So, but that's the first thing I say, is how much of what they said is true. And sometimes it's none of it. Sometimes it isn't even the right company because companies with similar names and stuff. But when I hear.

Well, I'm like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. What do you mean? Well, I'm asking how much of that is true? Yes or no? How much of what they said is true? Okay, well, this is true. That true. But that wasn't true. Or that didn't happen that way. I said, okay, so some of it happened. Let's just start there.

Yeah, some of it happened.

Right. And, and like you said, what did we learn from that? Okay, that was a different situation. This was unusual. This is whatever I told them they shouldn't have done that it wasn't going to work. They did it anyway. It didn't work. They're blaming me. Right.

There's stuff like that. But that's what you have to start with is, you know, take responsibility. Right. Because we, we have to. Certainly, if you have a team with you. Right. You can't give people responsibility without authority. Right.

Authority to make it right. And then can we move on from this? Is. Is it catastrophic or is it. It was bad and we can move on. And yes, sometimes moving on means writing a check. Right. We understand that.

Right, right.

And. And I said, you know what? Writing the check hurts today and it'll sting for a little bit, and that's going to go away. That's just another number that's going to go away. You hanging on to the review from five years ago? Yes. I'm talking to you in Hawaii. You hanging up for five years ago. That's on you. That's.

That's not on the customer, because you could have let go of that. All right, so. So what are some of the other things? What are some exercises or some things that people can do to not get to the point where you're. You're burning out? Well, we can. We can extinguish that. That. The wick.

Yeah. So one of them is setting healthy boundaries. Now, as a business owner, we want to say yes to everything all the time. Even if it's like, oh, why did I say yes to that? So learning what your limitations are. Learning. And then set them. It's okay to say no to a client. They'll get over it.

And a lot of cli. And I. I'm sure I don't have to tell any of you that when a client asks for something that's extreme, they know they're. They know they're being extreme. They know they're being a jerk. They will respect you more for saying, I wish I could help you with that, but I can't. I'm so sorry, I can't. I can't provide South African music.

From South Africa. From Africa. You know, for your wedding on January 3rd, you know, I might be able to find someone for a different date or I might be able to find something similar, like Afro Cuban or Latin or, you know, I love all the. Those styles. But my point is, say no. Say yes and say no. And.

Right.

No, I'm sorry, I can't do that. But I can. I can do this instead.

Right? Or again, sometimes there's no. I had somebody just earlier today, we're talking, and he said, I need to ask. And he asked for a discount. And I said that don't you hate that. Actually, I don't. I'll tell you why I don't hate it. Because only buyers ask for discounts. If he, if he didn't want it, he wouldn't ask for a discount.

So it's a strong buying signal when somebody asks for a discount. Now I said to him, I appreciate, you know, budget. And he talked, you know, this is a bad time of the year for cash flow and stuff. I said, I did the yes. And I said, I don't discount the service. However, I do offer after pay. If you wanted to spread that into four payments through afterpay, yeah, you can do that. Okay.

I did have a client recently, again, somebody that I've known for a while, so I know that I'm going to get paid. Who? I said, if you need to pay me some now and pay me some later, I can do that for you. I don't offer that to everybody. I'm not going to offer that to someone I've never worked with. I will offer it to somebody. Right. So there's a yes. And I didn't lower the price.

I give them another alternative there. I've had other people ask for a discount. They didn't get it and they didn't do it. That's fine because I have integrity in my pricing. I'm going to give you full service if I don't get anything of value back. But again, the attitude wise, like, I have a lot of people that say, like you said, oh, I hate that. I don't. But there's the attitude.

Right. You hate it. I look at the exact same situation and say, I have somebody who wants my product, service, whatever. That's why they're asking for a discount, to see that they got the best possible price. And the answer is you did get the best possible price because I'm not going to discount it.

Well, and, and, and really thinking about it from my perspective as a speaker, it's an opportunity to sell something else. Well, maybe we can make it up with the books.

Exactly.

Let's make it up with the books. And I'll even customize the book with your logo like we talked about earlier. And by the way, for all your listeners, I'm offering them a free copy of my book if you'll put my email address in the notes and anybody and everybody will be happy to send them either a PDF or a hard copy.

Oh, wonderful. We'll put that into the show notes. Absolutely. Thank you. A free copy of the Banish Burnout toolkit. Love that.

And it's a workbook. It's not just a workbook. It's a workbook with beautiful visuals. But there's places for people, there's examples and places for people to write.

Oh, fantastic.

And one of the chapters I don't normally talk about is, but I think your audience could handle it, is called unpack your emotional baggage. Most people come to work with some baggage, not all. I've had one person in what audience in the year, all the years I've been speaking that told me, you know, I grew up in a very happy home. I don't, I don't need what you're doing. I said, well, I can appreciate that none of my friends did, but I can appreciate that you did. But guess what? What I teach today can help you help others.

Right?

Could be your children. Could be a niece or nephew, could be a co worker or a subordinate. Because most of us did not grow up in the perfect home. Nobody's perfect. Most parents didn't take a class on parenting. They just went for it.

And if they survived, we did our job right there. There we go. Or as I used to say before I had a grandson that I heard that becoming a grandparent was your reward for not killing your children. Because there were days. There are days. So there you go. But, but that's exactly right. I mean, I grew up in a happy household as well, but that doesn't mean I don't have baggage.

I don't have. That doesn't mean I don't have the person that cut me off that day or that, you know, that. That ran into my new car in the parking lot, which, which happened to my wife and I. The cars parked, you know, we come out and there's. It's dented like, you know, this is not recently, but again. Or talk about. My wife had a car, was about two months old, and a deer ran out of the woods and hit her. She didn't hit it.

It had her.

Wow. Right. And that's happened to her twice.

Really?

With two different cars. Well, one was in New York, one was in New York, one was in New Jersey, one was right. Right near our house. And so here she is with this brand new car, two months old, with the deer dent in the side of it. Well, she's mad, right? Of course she's mad. And she's mad at the deer, of course.

Poor dear.

But the deer bounced and went into the woods and, you know, I come home and she still got that anger. Well, where is that going to go? Right? It's going to go certain place. Now, we've been together long enough that I can usually tell if I caused whatever it is or if I'm just there at the wrong time and whatever that is. But that's also part of this, is being able to talk about it, being able to have those conversations. Because if you bottle it up, it's not going anywhere. It's just staying with you. So is that another thing? The ability to articulate.

You brought up something that I've just been thinking about recently, and that is, what do you do with the ball of anger? So I was on a flight on United who I will never fly with again unless I have to. And it's a whole long stupid story. But I had paid not to have to. You know, they have this whole thing now, this whole fighting about the carry on luggage and a lot of people have to check theirs. I had fallen for some trap of where I have to pay extra to make sure to get my carry on. And when I got to the gate, she said, sorry, we're checking your carry on. And I was like, so of course my mother in me comes out, are you kidding me? I paid extra. She goes, united doesn't do that.

I said, I, I brought my receipt if you want to see it. She goes, well, I'm so sorry. And she was being really mean. That was the other thing. She was being mean. In her defense, it was a very stressful day. It was a huge flight and all that. But I was really angry.

Number one, why was I that angry? And number two, I'm sitting on the airplane alone, no one to talk to, and I felt this heat. You know, anger has a physical feeling for me. It's knots in my stomach. For some people, it's their tightness in their body and the clenched jaws. I've heard people get rashes. So that's one. Another micro clue I didn't mention is the physical ramification. Because sometimes that's the only clue you're upset.

That's another situation I'll talk about in a minute. But in this case, I was super angry. And I'm sitting on the flight, you know, before the flight, I'm texting my son. You won't believe what happened. And you know, I didn't grow up as a text, but so I'm like with one finger texting my son. And you know, we can't like call each other and have a, have a, have a phone call at that moment. But I started to wonder, and I did blog about this recently. What do you do with that ball of anger.

Because that ball of anger hurts you. Yes, in the moment it's normal to have that reaction. But am I going to sit on a five hour flight angry? No, that's foolish for me. I'm going to calm down. I'm going to either blog about it, text about it, speak about it, speak about it, or go watch a funny video. And I chose to. And I had brought my own food, so I got out one of my snacks and I was hungry because it was breakfast time. And I chose to watch a funny video.

But I thought to myself, how do people get rid of that ball of anger? And that's something we all need to think about. It's okay to have the anger, but like we said before, how upset do you have to get? And how long do you have to stay there? And what do you do? Sometimes there's something that has a deeper trigger and that trigger can come from all kinds of things. It relates to what I said before about unpacking your emotional baggage. But ask yourself, why is this particular thing triggering me? It could be related to an extremely emotional event from the past, could be from childhood, could be from someone close to you being hurt or passing away. Could be a trigger about anything. So it's important to write about it so that you take power back over that particular trigger. And then that trigger won't bother you as much in the future.

Right. You have to let it out. With my wife, I talk about if she's angry, it's like this balloon. And I hold the pen and I know even when I didn't, even when I wasn't the one that caused the anger, I might get the brunt of it when I hit it. But when it diffuses, that's what she needs. And, and there, there have been times where it's like, pop the balloon, here you go. And then it's like, what do you feel like having for dinner? And it's done, it's done. And, and that's the way she processes.

I process differently. I become more and more Teflon as I've gotten older and, and less things bother me. That used to bother me when I was younger because I didn't realize I was allowing those things to bother me or to continue to bother me. And now it's like I'm not, it's just not going to. I'm not going to let it bother me. It's not worth it.

And sometimes your wife just needs a.

Hug, which we do a lot.

A lot of times, yes, a lot of times. We just need a hug when we're angry and just saying to yourself, I'm gonna go get a hug somewhere, hey, I've been in Macy's buying a shirt. And by the end of the experience, the person and I are hugging because something about our conversation brought something out there. Someone in their family passed away or whatever, and we're hugging and she needed the hug and I needed the hug.

Yeah. Or again, just the venting. I remember I was checking into a hotel one time and I won't go through the whole situation, but. But the man in front of me accused the person behind the counter of treating him differently than she did the person before. I didn't see it. I'm not going to get into the. I think I've spoken about this, so I know she can't talk to me about it because it's unprofessional. But I walked up, it was, it was a young lady there and she's clearly flustered.

And I walked up and I said, what was with him?

Yeah.

And she goes, oh, did I do it? And you could just feel. She's like, oh, did I do such. All that stuff there? Which then got me an upgrade, which was nice, but I didn't, But I didn't do it for that. I did it because I'm feeling like I. She really needs to talk about this and she can't, she can't just ask me. But if I bring it up right, that's, that's fair game. And that's the same thing. That's.

That popping the balloon that's unlocking that and saying, it's okay for you to talk about that now. It doesn't have to be a physical hug. That was a mental hug, right? Letting. Letting her do that. Then the joke was, it was a two story building in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, Courtyard Marriott. And I said, you know, if you have a penthouse suite with a view of the ocean and a hot tub, you know, I'll take that. And I get to my room. Of course there's no penthouse.

There's no, you know, view of the ocean. But there was a hot tub in my room. There was this big stuff.

I've had that room in that Courtyard Marriott. Not in Pennsylvania, but somewhere else.

I didn't know that. I was just joking with her saying, you know, and then she says, let me see what I can do, and gives me that. So it was pretty funny anyway. But something you.

I'm sorry for interrupting. You brought up something. Another very valuable tool, and that is empathy. So you had empathy for someone else. And you. And I bet you felt better separate from the upgrade. You felt better because you made her feel better. She so appreciated you.

So let's say you're in a long line. This is a silly example, but it brings home the point. Let's say you're in a long line at the grocery store, and it's Covid. And you remember those lines were so long because we had to be six feet apart. It's the end of the day, and you're hungry and you're tired and you got to get something for dinner. You don't have anything in the fridge, and you got to get something for dinner. And you're like, oh, God. If the other customer asks them another stupid question, I'm going to tear my hair out.

Or you can do two things. You can reframe and say, oh, that poor checker. They're on their feet eight hours a day. They barely get a break. They're exhausted. And then you're going to come up and be mad at them. No. Or you can choose like I did before, Turn on a funny video or audio or a podcast and have a laugh and let go of the BS that's running through your head all the time.

Yeah, Well, I always try to be a good customer. Right. I'm not going to be the angry whatever. So when they just reactively say, how you doing? I go back and say, I'm doing okay. How you doing? I say, well, no, nobody. Oh, see, now I even forgot the line there. I say it all the time, and.

Now I can't remember the line.

I can't complain. Nobody wants to hear it anyway.

Right?

Right. And then they smile and they laugh, and now those endorphins. Right? And now I have a better. I'm being treated better because they just smiled.

Right. And because I taught me this. Go up to them. Every time you buy something anywhere in any retail establishment, go up to them and say, how's your day going?

Right? And I. And I always use that line, and we can't complain. Nobody listens. And they always smile. And then sometimes they'll say, I have nothing to complain about. I said, that's fantastic. But we're having an interaction instead of just another anonymous checking. And there you go.

Right?

Right. And there it is. So, okay, so we are. We are about it time here. I'm going to put into the show notes how they can find out about you, how they can get a free copy of your workbook. Thank you so much for that again. Pleasure. What would be a good website or something for people to go to find out more about you.

Janice litfin.com okay.

Janice lipman.com It'll be in the show notes because more people are listening to this than watching the video. So you probably didn't see the spelling L I T V I N. So you can find that over there. Janice J I J A N I C. Janice, thank you so much for joining me and for talking to our audience about this. It's such an important topic. Remember, you're not burnt out. If you're still thinking about it, you are burning out and there's time to fix that.

Thanks for listening.

Thanks so much, Alan. This was so much fun.


I’m Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you’d like to suggest other topics for “The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast” please let me know. My email is Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com or you can  text, use the short form on this page, or call +1.732.422.6362, international 001 732 422 6362. I look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.

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Alan Berg, CSP, Global Speaking Fellow

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