(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
(0:00 - 0:16)
There's a particular kind of exhaustion that doesn't come from doing too much. It comes from being the person everyone assumes will handle it. The person who remembers, who follows through, who notices what needs to be done before anybody else does.
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You know what I mean. The person who can be counted on when something falls apart. At work, you're the one they call when the project's in trouble.
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At home, you're the one who knows where everything is, when everything's due, and what everyone needs. At church, in your community, with your friends, you're the person people trust. And that's a great thing.
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Until being reliable becomes a role you don't know how to step out of. Until everyone else's confidence in you becomes an expectation you feel obliged to fulfill. Until you realize, I'm tired of being the one who can always handle it.
(1:00 - 1:23)
Welcome to Goals in Grace. I'm Rev. Dr. Juliet Spencer, and I'm known as the Decision Architect because I believe everyone deserves to make decisions their future self will thank them for. This is Season 2, Episode 3. And throughout this opening series of our new season, we're talking about something I see over and over in high-capacity people.
(1:23 - 1:37)
The hidden cost of being the person who can handle almost anything. In Episode 1, we talked about decision fatigue. Episode 2, we talked about what happens when everything matters.
(1:38 - 1:49)
And today, we're talking about something that often sits underneath both of those struggles. The exhaustion of being the reliable one. Let's start here.
(1:50 - 1:57)
Being reliable is not a character flaw. It's a strength. It probably helped you become successful.
(1:58 - 2:12)
People trust you because you've demonstrated that you can be trusted. Because you keep your word and show up. You anticipate problems, solve things, and you don't need someone standing over you to make sure the work gets done.
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Over time, people notice. But here's what can happen to highly capable people. A strength becomes an identity.
(2:22 - 2:34)
You stop thinking, I'm someone who tries to be dependable. And somewhere along the way, it becomes, I'm the dependable one. That distinction matters.
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Once reliability becomes part of your identity, saying no to something doesn't just feel like declining a responsibility. It can feel like violating who you are. And suddenly, the question isn't, do I have the capacity to do this? It becomes, what will they think of me if I don't? That's a really different question.
(2:59 - 3:10)
I think many reliable people are living under what I would call an invisible contract. Nobody handed it to you. And certainly nobody asked you to sign it.
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You might not even remember agreeing to it. But it sounds something like this. I will be the person who keeps everything from falling apart.
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I'll remember what everyone else forgets and will fill in the gaps. I'll anticipate the problems. I will absorb the inconvenience.
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And I'll make sure as few people are disappointed as is possible. And when something goes wrong, I'll figure it out. The problem with invisible contracts is that the other people in your life may not even know the contract exists.
(3:49 - 4:04)
You might be holding yourself to expectations that nobody explicitly asked you to meet. And because you keep meeting those expectations, everyone assumes the arrangement's working. Meanwhile, you're exhausted.
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This is one of the reasons capable people can become resentful. And resentment can be confusing when you're a loving, generous, responsible person. You think, why am I irritated? Why am I frustrated with everybody? Why do I feel like nobody appreciates what I do? Well, sometimes the answer is remarkably simple.
(4:31 - 4:47)
You've been carrying responsibilities you never consciously agreed to carry. Last week, we talked about responsibility creep. The way capable people tend to accumulate responsibilities simply because they're capable of them.
(4:48 - 5:05)
And I want to come back to one sentence from that conversation. I can do this does not automatically mean I should do this. That may be one of the most important distinctions a high performer can learn.
(5:05 - 5:13)
There will always be things you can do. You can take one more client. You can lead another committee meeting.
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You can organize the family gathering or fix the presentation. But capability is not the same thing as calling. And it's not the same thing as staying in your lane.
(5:28 - 5:47)
Just because you are the person most likely to do something well does not mean you are the person who should be doing it. That applies at work and at home. Sometimes we need to give other people the dignity of carrying their own responsibilities, even if they carry them differently than we would.
(5:48 - 6:03)
And at times, that means that something might not get done as quickly or efficiently. And it might not be done to the standard that you would do it. Which, let's be honest, that can be frustrating and uncomfortable.
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But your discomfort does not necessarily mean something's wrong. Sometimes discomfort is simply what it feels like when you stop over functioning. I saw this repeatedly in church work.
(6:19 - 6:44)
Someone who would run Vacation Bible School for the last 25 years was the one everyone assumed was the only one that could run Vacation Bible School. What they didn't know is that often that one person had grown exhausted, out of ideas, and resentful. There's something I continue to go back to about Jesus when I read the Gospels.
(6:45 - 6:55)
You already know that he was surrounded by need. And it's something I reference a lot. Everywhere he went, people wanted something from him.
(6:56 - 7:09)
And yet Jesus didn't respond to every need immediately. In Mark chapter 1, Jesus has been healing people and word has spread. But early the next morning, he goes away to pray.
(7:10 - 7:26)
And Simon Peter and the others find him and say, basically, Hey, Jesus, everyone is searching for you. What's up? Well, think about the pressure contained in that sentence. Everyone is searching for you.
(7:27 - 7:41)
The pressure that everyone needs you and wants you, that everyone is waiting for you. If there were a compelling reason to rush back, then that would seem to be it. But Jesus does not.
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He tells them they're going somewhere else. There will still be needs and there will still be people waiting. But Jesus moves on.
(7:52 - 8:07)
That challenges me and frees me all at the same time. Sometimes we assume that if a need is legitimate, we are obligated to meet it. But Jesus consistently demonstrated something different.
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The existence of a need does not automatically constitute your assignment. You can care deeply without carrying everything. It's possible to love people without solving their problems.
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And you can be faithful without being endlessly available. It can be a little bit jarring to realize that you can disappoint someone without having done anything wrong. I want to say that again, because somebody listening today needs permission to hear it.
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You can disappoint someone without having done something wrong. For some of us, there's another layer underneath all of this. Being needed feels good.
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It feels safe. Being the person everyone trusts can absolutely become a source of affirmation and worth. And that's when this becomes more than a time management problem.
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It becomes an identity question. If I'm not the one who fixes it, who am I? If someone else can handle it, am I still valuable? If I say no, will people respect me? If I stop being endlessly useful, will people still want to be around me? Those are much deeper questions. And I've had this conversation with, again, people in congregations, especially those who have served in capacities for 10, 15, 20, 30 years.
(9:49 - 10:17)
Helping them to understand that while the congregation on the one hand absolutely has benefited from their generosity of time and commitment and know-how. But on the other hand, no one has been intentionally trained or given space to step in that role for themselves. And then what happens is when that one capable person in that particular department of the church passes away, everything falls apart.
(10:19 - 10:43)
But in having those conversations, it's always first about identity. If you aren't the person who always does this, who will you be? And how will you know that you're valuable? This is where faith speaks so powerfully into the conversation. Your worth was never supposed to come from how useful you are.
(10:44 - 11:12)
You are loved by God before you solve anything, before you achieve anything, before you help anybody or answer another email or fix another problem. Your usefulness may change from season to season, and your capacity certainly will, but your identity does not rise and fall with your productivity. That matters because your identity is secure.
(11:13 - 11:31)
You can make decisions based on wisdom instead of needing to prove something. You don't have to keep demonstrating that you're dependable. You can simply decide what faithfulness looks like in this season and what you're willing to be dependable about.
(11:32 - 12:05)
And that brings me to something I want to give you in every episode of this series, the architect's question, because good decisions often begin with better questions. And this week's architect's question is, is this mine to carry? And you'll notice I didn't say, can I handle this or can I carry it? But is this mine to carry? If you're the reliable one, we probably already know the answer to that question. Of course you can handle it.
(12:05 - 12:17)
You've handled many hard things before. You've figured things out and stepped into the gaps. But your ability to carry something does not mean it belongs in your hands.
(12:18 - 13:15)
So when another request comes in, or when you notice yourself automatically stepping in to fix something, pause and ask, is this mine to carry? Is this something only I can do? Is it aligned with what matters most for me in this season? Is this a responsibility I consciously choose or have been specifically assigned? Or is it one I quietly inherited? Am I doing this because it's important and because it's mine to do? Or am I doing it because I'm afraid of disappointing someone? And perhaps the hardest question, what would happen if I didn't do it? Maybe somebody else would step up. Maybe somebody would temporarily be inconvenienced just like you have many times. Or maybe it wouldn't be done exactly the way you would do it.
(13:17 - 13:31)
Perhaps someone would even be disappointed. And maybe you would discover that the world keeps turning even when you're not the one turning every wheel. So write it somewhere you'll see this week.
(13:31 - 13:45)
Is this mine to carry? That's your Architects question. Now rather than trying to answer that question in the abstract, I want you to put it to work. Choose one responsibility you routinely carry.
(13:46 - 14:02)
Maybe it's something at work that always lands on your desk. Or something at home that you always take care of because everyone assumes you will. Either because they think it's something you enjoy, or because they know if they don't do it, you'll get it done.
(14:03 - 14:44)
Whatever it is, take that responsibility and examine it through the lens of your Architects question. Is this mine to carry? Here are three additional questions to help you discern the answer. Ask yourself, did I consciously choose this responsibility? Or was it assigned to me by somebody with authority? Or am I inheriting it simply because nobody else will step up? Does it still belong to me in this season? What would happen if I stopped carrying it or carried less of it? And here's the important part.
(14:45 - 14:50)
Don't immediately change anything. Just observe. Just pay attention.
(14:51 - 15:20)
Notice what you feel when you consider putting it down. Is it relief? Guilt? Fear that somebody will be unhappy with you? Do you find immediately a need to explain or justify yourself? What's really helpful is that it's often your reaction that tells you as much as your answers do. Clarity often begins when we finally question something we've been doing automatically.
(15:21 - 15:43)
And remember, reliability is a strength, but being endlessly available is not the price you have to pay for being a good person. You simply need to become more intentional about where those gifts go. And let's face it, the people you love don't deserve the most exhausted version of you.
(15:43 - 16:02)
And work doesn't need whatever's left of you. Your purpose and passion don't need whatever energy survives everyone else's demands. God certainly did not create you simply to become extraordinarily efficient at carrying everyone else's expectations.
(16:03 - 16:30)
This is what we're talking about this season of Goals in Grace. We're looking beneath the surface of high performance. We're not simply asking how can I accomplish more? But how can I live and lead well without losing myself in the process? We've talked about decision fatigue, about the problem of everything feeling important, and today we've talked about the exhaustion of being the reliable one.
(16:31 - 16:55)
Next week we're going to keep pulling this thread because high performance isn't about being capable of carrying more and more. Sometimes the highest performance decision you can make is deciding what you're finally willing to put down. Until next time, remember my friend, you can be dependable without being endlessly available.
(16:56 - 17:07)
And you can be generous without being responsible for everyone. And you can make decisions your future self will thank you for. This is Goals in Grace.
(17:07 - 17:25)
I'm Rev. Dr. Juliet Spencer, the Decision Architect. And if I can be helpful to you in determining what you can put down, please schedule your free coaching call today. Go make one decision this week that gives your best energy to what matters most.
(17:25 - 17:28)
And may God bless you with Goals in Grace.
(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
